Urban runoff samples collected from a parking lot in Blacksburg, Virginia were analyzed by several techniques for fecal coliform recovery. The samples were also analyzed for heavy metal concentrations. Statistical analyses of data by the paired-t test showed that the standard membrane filter technique (MF) yielded significantly lower recoveries (0. 05 level) than the standard MPN procedure. A modified membrane filter technique employing a two-layer agar and a two hour 35°C preincubation period (M-2hr) was found to yield recoveries consistently greater (0.01 level) than the standard MF technique. Increasing the preincubation period to five hours in this modified method (M-5hr) resulted in recoveries that were even greater (0.005 level). The recoveries of the M-5hr method were found to closely approximate the MPN recoveries in most cases. It was concluded that a substantial percentage of the fecal coliform population found in urban runoff may be injured by a host of environmental factors, though no correlations could be made with metal concentrations or elapsed time between rainfalls. The M-5hr method was concluded to be quite useful in the recovery of these stressed organisms. though growth of non-fecal-coliforms was increased and made enumeration of the fecal coliforms more difficult. / Master of Science

In 1708 Colonial poet Ebenezer Cooke published a satirical poem entitled The Sot-Weed Factor. The poem, written in the style of Samuel Butler's Hudibras, tells of a tobacco merchant's first visit to Maryland. In 1960 contemporary novelist John Barth wrote a novel, also entitled The Sot-Weed Factor and used Cooke's life and poem as sources. In order to understand why Barth chose these eighteenth-century sources for his twentieth-century novel, one must first examine his theory of "literature of exhaustion." According to Barth, this literature begins with the realization that the novel is dead or dying and uses this fact as a theme. The writers of this fiction must be aware of the history of the novel and must write technically up-to-date novels, but they must, at the same time, treat matters of the human heart. One way to accomplish these goals is to imitate earlier works, as Barth does in The Sot-Weed Factor. Because the novel imitates a two-hundred- fifty-year-old poem, it acknowledges that the history of literature does not begin with itself. Yet Barth's imitation parodies his model by embellishing and exaggerating it to a point of absurdity. The novel thereby reflects this same absurdity in the modern world and thus reaches the hearts of those who must live in it. Thus, though Barth imitates an eighteenth-century poem, he creates a thoroughly modern novel that meets his requirements for literature of exhaustion and gives new life to a moribund genre. / Master of Arts

This paper is concerned with the linear elastic static analysis of thin arbitrary shell structures by the use of the displacement approach finite element method. The various factors involved in selecting a shell finite element are discussed. A comprehensive formulation of a 27 degree of freedom, arbitrary, doubly-curved, nonconforming, triangular, shallow shell element is presented. Both the normal and tangential displacement fields are expressed by "incomplete" cubic, natural coordinate, polynomial interpolation functions. A WATFIV/FORTRAN computer code utilizing this element in a linear elastic static analysis of thin shell structures is formulated and presented. Demonstration problems are presented and comparisons are made with solutions in the literature. / Master of Science

Mass transit bus systems can be characterized by two aspects, supply and demand. As in most systems, the supplier's objective is to minimize the system's total cost yet maximize its attractiveness to the users. The present study applied this concept to a bus system in small urban area by minimizing the total operational costs and maximizing the system's attractiveness to the riders. The total operational costs are reduced by designing a route-network which will yield a minimum total bus travel distance within the physical and economic constraints. On the demand side, a measure of attractiveness is constructed based on the probability that a person will ride a bus given a certain level of service of the bus system and a cost figure for using the private automobile. The main purpose of this work is to find the equilibrium point of the demand and supply of a bus transit system so that decisions on some policy variables such as bus capacity, bus fare, determined. / Master of Science

A study was undertaken to determine the problems involved in applying wind-produced electric energy toward the needs of an apple storage facility, and to design an appropriate energy system. Fruit requirements, wind generator characteristics, and energy storage are discussed. Detail design of a cooling system was performed, including design calculations and equipment specification. The expecting cooling loads for the building were calculated and a vapor-compression refrigeration condensing unit was selected. An energy storage device utilizing the latent heat of fusion of ice was designed and calculations were performed to determine its energy capacity and heat transfer characteristics. The requirements of the air distribution system are discussed, and the pressure drop calculations are shown in connection with the circulating fan selection. The overall system operation is discussed, including control system requirements. / Master of Science

A project was undertaken to compile and evaluate a computer program to simulate a system developed by the Agricultural Engineering Department at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University to harvest, transport and express juice from sweet sorghum for syrup production. Time study and product data were taken for approximately 29 tons of sweet sorghum processed during the 1976 season. Material, consisting of standing sorghum chopped into 5" lengths, was separated by a pneumatic system and analyzed to determine effectiveness of separation. Up to 85 percent of the stalk sections were separated from the bulk material. Most of the unseparated stalks were undesirable for the production of quality syrup. The computer model simulated harvesting, transportation, stalk separation, juice expression from the stalks and syrup production. It was dynamic and deterministic in nature. Harvesting from any number of fields with known areas, yields, locations, and order of harvest could be simulated. Transportation could be simulated using any of three types of labor and equipment combinations. The program had the capability of determining required transportation equipment to keep separation and milling system operating continuously. Other principal parameters computed were labor requirements, juice expressed, and syrup yields. Simulation indicated that 40 to 45 acres of sorghum could be harvested and processed during a 30-day season. The amount of labor required using the VPI & SU system was approximately 50% of that required for conventional hand methods for harvesting and expressing juice for sorghum syrup. / Master of Science

It is now almost universally accepted that Flannery O'Connor's fiction can be interpreted only in terms of Christian orthodoxy, and that the scope of her work remains, at its broadest, narrowly theological and limited in implication. In truth, however, there remains at least one significant aspect of O'Connor's fiction that is not wholly religious, but pervasively human. In all of her works, O'Connor deals with the serious problem of human selfishness and its ugly effects: man's eventual isolation from those around him; ultimately, his insulation from meaning and life itself. Embodying her message in her characters, returning in each of her works to a similar pattern of character development and thematic representation, O'Connor exemplifies in all of her protagonists a similar emblematic experience: wrapped in their own selfish natures, her characters must either grow to an understanding that embraces others, or perish in isolation. The purpose of this thesis, is to trace the development of Flannery O'Connor's protagonists both as they embody the theme of human isolation and as they determine fictional structure, while at the same time focusing upon the specific nature of each character's selfishness in the illustration of theme. In accomplishing this objective, this work demonstrates that, far from being narrow in scope, O'Connor's fiction illustrates a shared human dilemma that possesses relevance for us all. / Master of Arts

Notched tensile tests and notched fatigue tests were performed at room temperature to study the corrosion fatigue behavior of aluminum alloy 2024-T351 in 3% salt solution. Notched characteristics of aluminum alloy 2024-T351 were found to be the same as those of other high strength aluminum alloys. Triaxiality and stress concentration were the main factors in determination of the notch characteristics. A new definition of notch ductility was developed in this study and the results compared to the use of area-contraction ductility. Air and 3% salt solution were used as the corrosive agents in the notched fatigue tests. Salt water corrosion was found to decrease the fatigue life to no more than one-fourth of the value for air fatigue. This was explained by the significant effect of salt water which sharpens the notch root rapidly at the early stage of the fatigue tests. However, this fatigue life during salt-water corrosion was decreased by a factor of more than 100 at a stress of 17.1 ksi. This enhanced effect of salt water was found to be the result of rapid propagation of small cracks which would not propagate in air fatigue. At the nominal stress of 11.4 ksi, notch ductility was found to increase with increasing salt-water corrosion fatigue. This was caused by a tendency for cracks to initiate at the notch root and move parallel to the specimen axis. This surprising result is the only known occurrence of this type of cracking. The appearance of fractographs obtained by the scanning electron microscope was correlated with the fracture characteristics in both the notched tensile tests and notched fatigue tests. / Master of Science

This research investigated current consumer attitudes about clothing and textile flammability legislation in relation to socioeconomic class and parental status. One hundred fifty women from six different regions in Virginia participated in this study. Data was collected by telephone interview. There were no statistically significant differences in the responses of women in relation to socio-economic class as determined by the McGuire-White (Short Form). However, the following findings were observed: Upper-middle class respondents were most likely to know about existing flame retardant (FR) standards and to consider FR apparel as "very important" for all ages of children, and adults, 65 years and over. They were least likely to desire FR standards on clothing for adults, ages 15 through 64. Lower-middle class women were most inclined to think there should be FR standards on all clothing, regardless of age of wearer. Women from the upper-lower class were least likely to know about existing FR standards and higher price of these protective textile items; more of these women than any other socio-economic group believed that the government and/or clothing manufacturers should assume the responsibility for protecting consumers from unsafe textile products, while women from the upper middle class were most inclined to think consumers should protect themselves. Analysis of the data was statistically significant for some of the differences in responses when the women were categorized as parents or non-parents. Parents were more likely to consider FR clothing "very important" for adults, 65 and older but less inclined to believe that clothing with FR finishes was "very important" for adults, ages 15 through 64. Parents were also more likely than non-parents to own FR clothing and have knowledge about special care and price of FR textile products. Most respondents had some knowledge of FR standards. The largest proportion of the total sample indicated that they thought there should be FR standards on clothing for all children up to age 14, adults over 65, and disabled and handicapped people. A majority of the women also believed that all consumers should have a choice available in the retail market between FR and regular clothing, especially for those people between the ages of 15 and 64. FR clothing was considered "very important" for all children up to age 14, adults over 65, and disabled and handicapped people by most of the homemakers. Approximately one-third of all respondents had some personal knowledge of fire injuries, owned FR apparel, and were aware that it costs more than regular clothing. A vast majority of the women were willing to pay more for added protection from fabrics which burn easily, and thought the government should check products on the market for safety and should educate the public about fire hazards rather than passing new laws. Government and clothing manufacturers were the two sectors of the economy that most respondents thought should assume the responsibility for protecting consumers from dangerously flammable fabrics and apparel. / Master of Science

This study is concerned with the use of "Flying squads" in municipal fire departments. Specifically, the research effort involves development of a mathematical model and solution procedure for the optimum use of flying squads as manpower transport vehicles. The exact problem considered in this thesis is that of determining (a) the number of flying squads to use, (b) the locations/allocations of each flying squad, (c) the deployment strategy of each squad, and (d) the size of each squad and the job skill levels of each member of the squads. In formulating the model, the opinions of professionals in the field, as gathered through a written survey, were utilized to develop the appropriate constraints and objective function. The objective function minimizes an estimate of the cost to society which includes the estimated fire losses and the cost of operating flying squads. The model involves constraints associated with (a) the maximum response time, (b) the potential demand for fire services, (c) the workload of a flying squad, and (d) the maximum number of squads to have. The mathematical model developed is a mixed integer programming problem having a similar structure to the Capacitated Warehouse Location Problem. A Branch and Bound type algorithm based on previous work by Akinc and Khumawala is developed to solve the problem. An example of this problem as it actually exists in the Roanoke Virginia Fire Department is modeled and solved. The results obtained from this study demonstrates that flying squads have a potential use as an alternative method of manning the companies in municipal fire departments. / Master of Science