Cakes were prepared with high fructose corn syrup as the total sweetening agent in a moisture adjusted formulation which allowed for the moisture content of the syrup. Three treatments were produced by adding glucose-delta-lactone and cream of tartar (high acid), cream of tartar (medium acid), or no addition (low acid). Cakes were baked and.immediately tested under controlled conditions. The pH and specific gravity were determined for cake batters. Baked cakes were evaluated for pH, standing height as an index to volume, moisture, deformation, crust color, and crust and crumb browning. Volume, color and browning were all significantly affected by pH adjustment. As acidity increased, cakes had less volume and a gummy, pudding-like texture. Color decreased and browning decreased at higher levels of acidity. Thus, it was concluded that increasing acidity decreased the over-development of color and browning, but altered the texture. The high fructose corn syrup sweetened cakes that were moderately acidified by the addition of cream of tartar alone were less brown but lighter in texture than the other treatments. / Master of Science

A test fixture for combined tension-compression cyclic testing of unidirectional composites was designed and characterized using 606l-O aluminum specimens. The elastoplastic response of graphite/aluminum l5° off-axis and 90° specimens under tension-compression cyclic loading was subsequently investigated at three temperatures, -l50°F, room temperature and 250°F. The test results showed that the tensile response was predominantly elastoplastic, whereas the compressive response could not be characterized exclusively on the basis of the classical plasticity theory. Secondary dissipative mechanisms caused by inherent voids in the material's microstmcture had an apparent influence on the elastoplastic behavior in compression. At different test temperatures, the initial yield stress in tension and compression were translated in the tension direction with increasing temperature. This is believed to be caused by residual stresses induced in each phase of the composite. The micromechanics model proposed by Aboudi was subsequently employed to correlate the experimental and analytical results at room temperature. A semi-inverse methodology was incorporated to determine the in-situ properties of the constituents. Comparison between the analytical and experimental results showed good agreement for monotonic tensile response. For tension-compression cyclic loading, fairly good correlation was obtained for l5° specimens, but poor for 90° specimens. The major cause of the discrepancy is suggested to be caused by the secondary dissipative mechanisms. / Master of Science

Star-like macromers were prepared from hydroxypropyl lignin by reaction with propylene oxide. The average number of arms per macromer was controlled by partial capping with diethylsulfate, and the average arm length by the degree of chain extension with propylene oxide. Six methods of analysis were applied for characterizing of the star-like macromers: total hydroxyl (by titration), vapor pressure osmometry, hydriotic acid/gas chromatography, ultraviolet spectroscopy, proton-nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy and thermal analysis. Number average molecular weights were measured by vapor pressure osmometry. Total hydroxyl content was determined after acetylation by potentiometric titration. Based on HPL molecular weight and hydroxyl content it was estimated that the average HPL molecule generates a star-like structure ("macromer”) with an average of 6 arms. Hydriodic acid/gas chromatography proved to be the most appropriate method for the quantitative determination of the degree of capping. Based on this technique it was possible to classify star-like macromers with between two and six radiating arms per average molecule. The same method could also be applied for the determination of arm length. Two different propoxylation reaction conditions produced macromers with an average of 2.5 and 3.5 propylene oxide units per arm. Ultraviolet spectroscopy was the simplest and most rapid method of analysis investigated. The decrease in copolymer absorptivity coefficient was found to be related to an increase in non-UV absorbing mass after capping and/or chain extension. Results indicated that H-NMR spectroscopy is an adequate method of analysis for star-like macromers. Macromer arm length was calculated from the ratio of signals representing the methyl group of acetyl (i.e. hydroxyl) and propoxyl functionality. Two levels of propoxylation produced star-like macromers with 2.2 - 2.5 and 3.9 - 4.0 propylene oxide units per arm. Thermal analysis by DMTA of lignin derivative-containing blends with ethylene-vinyl acetate copolymer indicated that the glass transition behavior of the star-like macromers follows the Gordon-Taylor relationship for copolymers. Although variable, the results revealed a consistent decrease in T_g as a consequence of an increase of propylene oxide chain length. / Master of Science

The objective of this thesis is to determine the average probability of bit error of an asynchronous, noncoherent, direct-sequence, code-division multiple-access (CDMA) system using wideband M-ary FSK as bandpass modulation. The immediate analysis and determination of the average probability of bit error is made inherently more difficult because of two random effects. The first disturbance encountered in the analysis is the existence of additive, white, Gaussian noise and multi-user noise. The second disturbance, which is more difficult to analyze, is the effect of multipath fading, which is caused by reflections of the transmitted signal through the propagating medium to the receiver. / Master of Science

Twenty-five gay men, 20 with Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) and 5 with either AIDS Related Complex (ARC) or who tested positive for the AIDS virus, were asked in semi-structured interviews whether they felt supported or isolated. Areas covered included society in general, employment, housing, health care, insurance, religion, families of origin, ex-wives, children, friends and lovers. Subjects indicated that fear of AIDS, homophobia, and death anxiety were all present in certain circumstances, but there was no attempt to differentiate between these three possible causes of social isolation in this exploratory study. / Master of Science

Software development cost estimating models were analyzed using an application of the hedonic pricing approach. Several recently proposed software cost estimating tools were surveyed for the purpose of revealing their roots in the hedonic pricing approach. The analysis includes discussion of the hedonic pricing approach, the logic of several software cost models, and analysis of the models' hedonic pricing traits. Hedonic prices are the implicit prices of attributes of I differentiated products as revealed in the market through attribute levels associated with market-clearing prices. Several aspects of the software costing models fit within the hedonic pricing approach. Many of the models base cost estimates on the varying quantities of software product attributes (e.g., complexity of program, schedule requirements, etc.). Similarities and differences of traits among cost models were noted. / Master of Arts

A survey of research in nonlinear optical fibers is given. Important background concepts are introduced and explained. Present and future applications of nonlinear optical fibers arc reviewed. A mathematical model of a nonlinear optical fiber is developed using a coupled-mode theory approach, and methods of solving nonlinear partial differential equations arc discussed. A detailed history of research in the field is given, and recommendations for future research are made. / Master of Science

Scholars in many fields have long studied the patterns of employment and promotions in industries and occupations. However, the area of sport has been largely omitted from studies of this type. This study explored the possibility of an internal labor market for head coaches of the National Football League (NFL). Subjects were those people who were the head coaches of NFL teams for the years 1970 to 1975 and 1980 to 1985. Following theoretical guidelines, the subjects were tested for evidence of industrial, occupational, and/or pure internal labor markets. Statistical treatment of the data utilized chi square tests. The results of this study provided evidence of industrial and occupational internal labor markets, but there was no support for a pure internal labor market. The tests showed an intertwining of the industrial and occupational internal labor markets over the course of the subjects' careers. There also were significant findings in the areas of mentor and position played by the subjects. This study can serve as a foundation for further studies. / Master of Science

Music composed by computers has always been lacking in "musical" qualities: mood, emotional expression and a sense of purposefulness or goal. A musical expert system, called EMOTER, is the first attempt to address these important musical aspects. EMOTER receives as input a list of moods (e.g., happy, lively) and generates melodic passages intended to evoke those moods in an organized, coherent fashion. EMOTER composes the basic units of music called phrases. The program uses the mood-specification from a theory due to Deryck Cooke to derive a few motifs (very primitive melodic material) exemplifying the moods and computes a number of musical attributes to guide its compositional choices. A theory of emotion due to Leonard Meyer further helps plan the phrase. The theory states that an emotional response is stimulated in a listener when expectations about the progression of the music are first established and then inhibited (with the understanding that the expectations will eventually be fulfilled). A melodic passage is composed using the selected motifs, attributes and emotional theory to create a "skeletal" phrase. This is embellished and developed (also using the attributes and theory) to flesh-out the bare melodic material into a passage that embodies the musical characteristics of the mood-specification. Results with EMOTER are excellent. Many musical phrases comparable to music of normal composers are generated from a single mood-specification. More theory is needed, however, before the full complexities of human-composed music are sufficiently captured in code for EMOTER to pass a Turing test in music composition. / Master of Science

Collision-detection is a critical task for off-line robot path planning. A general robot path verification simulation system, GRPVSS, applicable for all industrial robots with open-looped links, is created to verify the intended robot path. The manipulator and obstacles are modeled by convex polyhedra to reduce the computation burden required by the collision detection algorithm. As a kinematic simulator, GRPVSS employs motion-time profiles or ideal trapezoid profiles which describe the position-vs-time relation of an individual joint, to generate the robot working trajectory. This approach makes the to-be-verified working path closer to the real one. Both point-to-point(PTP) and continuous path(CP) operations can be simulated by GRPVSS. Collision detection is conducted by performing geometric interference detection between the static configurations of the expanded moving robot and the static obstacles at each simulation step. Inn this case, the resolution of a simulation is critical to path verification. Simulations with low resolution take the risk of undetected collisions, while simulations with high resolution consume too much computing time. GRPVSS computes and employs the lowest resolution level that yields 100% path verification for the specified tolerances of manipulator dimensions. The tolerance value is specified by the user but should not be specified smaller than the positioning accuracy of the simulated industrial robot. The links of the manipulator are expanded by the amount of tolerance. GRPVSS is a graphic simulator. A systematic control supervisor is constructed for the simulator to request input and to proceed all functions interactively with users. The robot motion of a simulated path is animated on a 3-D graphical screen. A11 collision configurations and related information of the simulated path are stored in a file and shown on the screen. The graphical display works on graPHIGS, one of the 3-D graphical software packages published by IBM. / Master of Science