This research study examined the potential application of a color-based machine vision system under development at Virginia Tech for lumber processing in the furniture rough mill. The evaluation was done by conducting a yield study using 134 red oak boards. ROMI-RIP, a rip-first simulation program by Thomas (1995), was used to simulate yields for both the manually digitized lumber data and the machine vision scanned lumber data. The color-based machine vision system was evaluated by comparing the optimum yield obtainable when using lumber data derived from the automatic scanning system to: (1) observed yield from an existing state-of-the-art rip-first rough mill and (2) the optimum yield from manually digitized lumber data. Overall, the color-based machine vision system resulted in about 17 percent lower yield than was measured in the rough mill and 20 percent lower than the optimum, based on manually digitized lumber data. An analysis of the yield percentage point difference between the machine vision-based yields and optimal yields indicates: (1) approximately 11.5 yield points were lost due to errors in defect detection accuracy, (2) 7.3 yield points were lost due to errors in the machine vision material handling system, and (3) 1.3 yield points were lost due to data digitization and truncation errors. Since material handling, data digitization, and truncation problems are solvable with current technologies, future research should focus on developing systems that can improve the accuracy of feature recognition in lumber. / Master of Science

Software size measurement provides a basis for software project management and plays an important role for its activities such as project management estimations, process benchmarking, and quality control. As size can be measured with functional size measurement (FSM) methods in the early phases of the software projects, functionality is one of the most frequently used metric. On the other hand, FSMs are being criticized by being subjective. The main aim of this thesis is increasing the accuracy of the measurements, by decreasing the number of defects concerning FSMs that are measured by COSMIC FSM method. For this purpose, an approach that allows detecting defects of FSMs automatically is developed. During the development of the approach, first of all error classifications are established. To detect defects of COSMIC FSMs automatically, COSMIC FSM Defect Detection Approach (DDA) is proposed. Later, based on the proposed approach, COSMIC FSM DDT (DDT) is developed.

Anlass der vorliegenden Arbeit war die Suche nach einem geeigneten Sehnendefekt-Modell, das die Untersuchung der Wirkung moderner Therapieansätze unter Standardbedingungen ermöglicht. Die Auswertung der Literatur zeigte, dass eine große Anzahl an Sehnendefekt-Modellen mit sehr unterschiedlichen Fragestellungen sowohl an Großtieren, Kleintieren als auch Labortieren eingesetzt wurde. In der vorliegenden Arbeit wurden bekannte Sehnendefekt-Modelle mit besonderem Augenmerk auf die verwendete Methodik und das damit induzierte Schadmuster untersucht. Die umfassende Literaturauswertung mit präziser pathomorphologischer Charakterisierung der Defekte diente als entscheidende Grundlage für die Entwicklung des eigenen Tiermodells. Beim hier vorgestellten Schafmodell handelt es sich um ein Core Lesion- Modell. Es simuliert die am häufigsten beim Pferd auftretende Sehnenerkrankung und bietet die Möglichkeit der direkten intraläsionalen Injektion eines Therapeutikums. Die Core Lesion stellt ein abgeschlossenes Kompartiment dar, so dass keine Trägermaterialien nötig sind, um ein appliziertes Therapeutikum am Wirkort zu binden. Verschiedene chirurgische Zugänge und Zielsehnen wurden beim Schafmodell untersucht. Als geeignet für ein Core Lesion- Modell erwiesen sich beim Schaf die tiefe Beugesehne distal des Karpalgelenks sowie die oberflächliche Beugesehne im Bereich des Tendo calcaneus communis. Für die Induktion der Läsion wurden in Anlehnung an die von LITTLE und SCHRAMME (2006) bzw. SCHRAMME et al. (2010a) beim Pferd gezeigte Methodik unterschiedliche chirurgische Instrumente verwendet. Dabei wurden der Einsatz einer Knochenmark-Extraktionsnadel sowie verschiedene manuell oder elektrisch betriebene arthroskopische Klingen und Fräsköpfe hinsichtlich ihrer Verwendbarkeit sowie des durch sie verursachten Schadmusters miteinander verglichen. Ein manueller Instrumenteneinsatz führte zu deutlich milderen Schadmustern. Dabei kam es durch die Verwendung des Stiletts einer Knochenmark-Extraktionsnadel in einigen Bereichen zu scharfen Faserdurchtrennungen, in anderen Bereichen wurden die Kollagenfasern nur stumpf auseinander gedehnt. Der Einsatz arthroskopischer Klingen und Fräsköpfe beim Schafmodell ist nur eingeschränkt möglich. Durch die geringe Sehnengröße stehen nur sehr wenige Instrumente mit einem entsprechend kleinen Durchmesser zur Verfügung. Ein Round Burr konnte unter experimentellen Bedingungen eingesetzt werden und führte zu einer hochgradigen Schädigung des kompletten Sehnenquerschnitts. Dabei wurden die Fasern aus ihrer ursprünglichen Orientierung heraus gerissen, zumeist aber nicht vom umgebenden Gewebe abgetrennt. Ein Synovial Resector führte hingegen zu einer scharfen Faserdurchtrennung und dadurch zu einem deutlich abgegrenzten Defektbereich. Weitere Einzelheiten wie die resultierende Einblutung und das Einwandern verschiedener Entzündungszell-Spezies müssen in-vivo untersucht werden, um eine klare Empfehlung für den Einsatz der verschiedenen Instrumente formulieren zu können. Die Auswertung der vorhandenen Sehnendefekt-Modelle sowie die eigenen Ergebnisse führten zu dem Schluss, dass eine Kombination verschiedener Methoden sinnvoll sein könnte. Die Arbeit beschreibt ein sicheres, praktikables Großtiermodell für die Simulation von Core Lesions. Das Modell kann zunächst im Tierversuch eingesetzt werden, um die nach Defektinduktion ablaufenden pathophysiologischen Prozesse zu charakterisieren. Dann steht mit dem Schafmodell ein zeitgemäßes Modell für die Untersuchung verschiedener Therapiekonzepte zur Verfügung, das für die Pferdemedizin eingesetzt werden kann, sich aber auch für Untersuchungen mit humanmedizinischem Hintergrund vielversprechend zeigt. Das Modell stellt damit ein wichtiges Bindeglied zwischen Grundlagenforschung und dem klinischen Einsatz moderner Therapiekonzepte dar.

Darbe išnagrinėti mažiau invazinės įgimtų prieširdžių pertvaros defektų (PPD) ir skilvelių pertvaros defektų (SPD) ydų chirurgijos galimybės ir ypatumai. Standartinį šių ydų operavimo būdą per išilginę vidurinę sternotomiją galima pakeisti mažiau invaziniu su geresniu kosmetiniu rezultatu. Darbe parodoma, kad mažiau invazinių PPD ir SPD korekcijų rizika iš esmės nesiskiria nuo standartinės metodikos per vidurinę išilginę sternotomiją. Mažiau invazinių širdies pertvarų defektų uždarymo operacijų metodika įgalina jas saugiai atlikti su įprastiniais širdies chirurgijos instrumentais be papildomų išlaidų. Mažiau invazinių įgimtų širdies ydų operacijų indikacijos yra siauresnės. / The study defines the possibilities and peculiarities of the less invasive congenital atrial septal defect (ASD) and ventricular septal defect (VSD) surgery. A standard median sternotomy approach in some cases is possible to replace with more cosmetic friendly and less invasive access. The study demonstrates that the risk of less invasive ASD and VSD closure doesn’t differ from the standard median sternotomy surgery risk. Less invasive operations methodic used in our centre enables it with conventional instrumentary set. Indications for less invasive congenital heart defects surgery are narrower.

In einer klinisch-prospektiven Feldstudie wurden Legehennenherden untersucht, in denen poldefekte Eier auftraten. Aus 3 betroffenen Herden wurden hierzu gezielt 86 Hühner, die poldefekte Eier legten, sowie willkürlich 72 Hühner, die normale Eier legten, untersucht. Alle Herden zeigten eine gute Legeleistung und eine hohen Sekundaanteil von über 5% an der Legeleistung, wobei die verschmutzten Eier die größte Fraktion ausmachten. Je mehr poldefekte Eier auftraten, umso höher waren der Schmutzeianteil sowie der Anteil an Bruch- und Fließeiern. Dieses Phänomen lässt sich durch die verringerte Schalenstabilität der poldefekten Eier erklären. Bei den auf poldefekte Eier selektierten Hühnern machten die poldefekten Eier den Hauptanteil der absoluten Legeleistung mit 46 bis 64% aus, sie hatten zudem einen Bruch- und Fließeianteil zwischen 27 und 38%. Der Bruch –und Fließeianteil hat die absolute Legeleistung gesenkt, aufgrund ihrer Instabilität gingen viele dieser Eier auf dem Weg vom Huhn zur Packstelle verloren. Hatte ein Huhn einmal begonnen poldefekte Eier zu legen, legte es fast keine normalen Eier mehr. In der serologischen Untersuchung mittels ELISA hatten die Hühner aller drei Herden, welche poldefekte Eier legten, einen signifikant höheren Antikörpertiter (p<0,05) gegen Mycoplasma synoviae (MS) im Vergleich zu der Kontrollgruppe. Bei allen Hühnern konnte MS-spezifische DNA in Trachealabstrichen mittels PCR amplifiziert werden. Kloakenabstriche erwiesen sich mittels MS-PCR bei den Hühnern mit poldefekten Eiern zu 87% (n=72), bei den Kontrollhühner dagegen nur zu 18% (n=13) als MS positiv. MS war darüber hinaus aus Legedarmabstrichen von fünf Hühnern, welche poldefekte Eier legten, kultivierbar. Darüber hinaus wurden 49 poldefekte Eier und 43 Eier ohne Poldefekte im Eiklar auf MS untersucht. Bei fast allen poldefekten Eiern konnte im Eiklar MS-spezifische DNA nachgewiesen werden (n=48; 98%), im Unterschied zu den Kontrolleiern (n=11; 26%). Ein kausal-pathogenetischer Zusammenhang zwischen einer Infektion des Legedarms mit MS und dem Legen von Eiern mit Poldefekten ist den Ergebnissen folgend wahrscheinlich, wobei verschiedene Faktoren für die Infektion des Legedarms verantwortlich zu sein scheinen. Bei der qualitativen Untersuchung hatten die poldefekten Eier eine signifikant (p<0.05) geringere Schalenstabilität im Vergleich zu den Kontrolleiern. Die Eischalenspitzen der Gruppe „Pol A“ hielten mit 11,4N fast nur ein Viertel der Belastung der Referenzherde aus. Die hohe Schalenstabilität der Kontrolleier von über 40N zeigte, dass die Legehennen, die keine poldefekten Eier legten, keine Schalenstabilitätsprobleme hatten. Die Farbe der braunen poldefekten Eier war oft signifikant heller als die der Kontrolleier, auch waren die Farbpigmente (a- und b-Wert) signifikant (p<0,05) verändert. Das trockene Schalengewicht war bei den poldefekten Eiern mit bis zu einem Gramm Unterschied pro Ei signifikant (p<0,05) niedriger als bei den Kontrolleiern. Elektronenmikroskopische Untersuchungen der Eischale wurden an 2 poldefekten Eiern und 2 Eiern ohne Poldefekte durchgeführt. Es konnte gezeigt werden, dass sich die poldefekten Eier sowohl in Struktur als auch im Durchmesser der Eischale erheblich von den Kontrolleiern unterschieden. Es ist fraglich, ob die veränderte Schale der poldefekten Eier in ihrer mikrobiologischen Barrierefunktion beeinträchtigt ist. Die für die Eifrische relevanten Größen wichen bei den poldefekten Eiern teilweise signifikant von den Kontrolleiern ab. In den braunen poldefekten Eiern traten vermehrt Fleischflecken auf. Aus den poldefekten Eiern ließ sich der Erreger MS jedoch nicht isolieren und anzüchten. Die untersuchten poldefekten Eier erfüllten damit - soweit ihre Schale intakt war - die formalen Anforderungen an frische Eier der Güteklasse A nach VO (EG) Nr. 1234/2007 und 598/2008. In der gelelektrophoretischen Analyse der organischen Matrix der Eischalen war in den poldefekten Eiern die Intensität der Lysozym zugeordneten Bande jeweils höher als in den Kontrolleiern, dies ließ sich jedoch statistisch nicht untermauern. Ätiologisch ist denkbar, dass eine subklinische bakterielle Besiedlung des Legedarms mit MS und die daraus resultierende Immunantwort den Lysozymspiegel des Uterussekrets erhöht. Die Verschiebung des Lysozymspiegels wirkt sich sowohl qualitativ als auch quantitativ negativ auf die Eischalenbildung aus. Das Resultat ist eine verringerte Schalenstabilität, das morphologische Korrelat der im Eischalenspitzenbereich sichtbare Defekt. / Hens laying eggs with egg-pole shell defects (EPS) were examined in a clinical prospective study. 86 hens with EPS and 72 hens without EPS from 3 flocks were selected for this study. All examined flocks showed a good laying performance, although laying many eggs off quality class B. The rate was over 5 percent of all laid eggs, most of them were dirty eggs. There was a significant correlation between EPS-eggs and dirty eggs, although between EPS-eggs and broken- and thin shelled eggs. This phenomenon could be explained by the decreased eggshell strength of the EPS-eggs. The selected hens with EPS showed a rate between 46 and 64 percent EPS-eggs of all laid eggs, the rate of broken- and thin shelled eggs was between 27 and 38 percent. Those broken- and thin shelled eggs increased absolute laying performance, because of their instability many of them were lost on the way from the cage to the packing station. The selected hens with EPS produced almost no normal eggs. It could be shown that if a hen starts laying EPS-eggs, she is almost unable to lay normal eggs any more. It could be proven serologically that hens with EPS had significant (p<0.05) higher titers against Mycoplasma synoviae (MS) then hens without EPS. MS-DNA was detectable from the tracheal swab in all tested hens. PCR tested cloacal swabs for MS were more frequently positive from hens with EPS (n=72; 87%) then from hens without EPS (n=13; 18%). Furthermore MS could be cultivated from the oviduct of 5 hens with EPS. Additionally 49 Eggs with EPS and 43 Eggs without EPS were examined microbiologically. MS-DNA was detectable in the albumen of nearly all eggs with EPS (n = 48; 98 %), contrary to the eggs without EPS (n = 11; 26%). Due to the findings it is very likely that an infection of the oviduct with MS results in eggs with EPS, whereas different factors may play an important role for the infection of the oviduct. In the qualitative investigation EPS-eggs had a significant (p<0.05) decreased pole eggshell strength than the eggs without EPS. The pole eggshell strength of the EPS-eggs of flock A (group “Pol A”) was with 11,4N just about a quarter of the pole eggshell strength of the reference flock. Nearly all eggs without EPS had a pole eggshell strength over 40N. It could be shown that hens without EPS had no decreased eggshell strength. The color of the brown EPS-eggs was often significant brighter than color of brown eggs without EPS. Furthermore the color pigments of the EPS-eggs were significant (p<0.05) changed. Dry eggshell weight was in EPS-eggs up until 1 gram difference significant (p<0.05) lower compared to eggs without EPS. Scanning electron microscopy was performed in 2 eggs with EPS and 2 eggs without EPS. This investigation revealed that eggs with EPS showed considerable differences of the eggshell structure as well as the cross section dimension according to eggs without EPS. It is doubtful whether the changed eggshell of EPS-eggs is impaired in its microbiological barrier function. The relevant variables for the freshness of the egg varied in the EPS-eggs in some cases significantly (p<0.05) compared to the control eggs. In Brown EPS-eggs increased Meat-spots occurred. However, MS could not be cultivated from EPS-eggs. Therewith fulfilled the investigated EPS-eggs - if their shell was intact - the formal requirements for fresh eggs of grade A eggs under regulation VO (EG) No. 1234/2007 and 598/2008. A gel electrophoretic analysis of the organic matrix of the eggshells of EPS-eggs and normal eggs was made. Intensity of the lysozyme-associated band was in the EPS eggs respectively higher than in the control eggs. However, this could not be proven statistically. Etiologically is conceivable that subclinical bacterial colonization of the hens oviduct with MS and the resulting immune response increases the lysozyme level in the uterine secretions. The shift of the lysozyme level affects both quantitatively and qualitatively negative on the eggshell formation. The result is a decrease in shell strength. The morphological correlate is the visible eggshell pole defect.

No description available.

abstract: One of the most common errors developers make is to provide incorrect string identifiers across the HTML5-JavaScript-CSS3 stack. The existing literature shows that a significant percentage of defects observed in real-world codebases belong to this category. Existing work focuses on semantic static analysis, while this thesis attempts to tackle the challenges that can be solved using syntactic static analysis. This thesis proposes a tool for quickly identifying defects at the time of injection due to dependencies between HTML5, JavaScript, and CSS3, specifically in syntactic errors in string identifiers. The proposed solution reduces the delta (time) between defect injection and defect discovery with the use of a dedicated just-in-time syntactic string identifier resolution tool. The solution focuses on modeling the nature of syntactic dependencies across the stack, and providing a tool that helps developers discover such dependencies. This thesis reports on an empirical study of the tool usage by developers in a realistic scenario, with the focus on defect injection and defect discovery times of defects of this nature (syntactic errors in string identifiers) with and without the use of the proposed tool. Further, the tool was validated against a set of real-world codebases to analyze the significance of these defects. / Dissertation/Thesis / Masters Thesis Computer Science 2016

Additive Manufacturing (AM) is a fast-growing technology in manufacturing industries. Applications of AM are spread across a wide range of fields. The aerospace industry is one of the industries that use AM because of its ability to produce light-weighted components and design freedom. Since the aerospace industry is conservative, quality control and quality assurance are essential. The quality of the welding is one of the factors that determine the quality of the AM components, hence, detecting faults in the welding is crucial. In this thesis, an automated system for detecting the faults in the welding process is presented. For this, three methods are proposed to find the anomalies in the process. The process videos that contain weld melt-pool behaviour are used in the methods. The three methods are 1) Autoencoder method, 2) Variational Autoencoder method, and 3) Image Classification method. Methods 1 and 2 are implemented using Convolutional-Long Short Term Memory (LSTM) networks to capture anomalies that occur over a span of time. For this, instead of a single image, a sequence of images is used as input to track abnormal behaviour by identifying the dependencies among the images. The method training to detect anomalies is unsupervised. Method 3 is implemented using Convolutional Neural Networks, and it takes a single image as input and predicts the process image as stable or unstable. The method learning is supervised. The results show that among the three models, the Variational Autoencoder model performed best in our case for detecting the anomalies. In addition, it is observed that in methods 1 and 2, the sequence length and frames retrieved per second from process videos has effect on model performance. Furthermore, it is observed that considering the time dependencies in our case is very beneficial as the difference between the anomalous and the non anomalous process is very small

Imaging techniques have been developed for decades for the detection of biomolecules in biomedicine cells, in vitro or in living cells and organisms. The application however, often constrained by the available probes, whose optical properties may limit the imaging possibilities. It is very essential to improve the sensitivity of these devices by enhancing efficiency to detection. Recently, Fe3O4 has been used primarily in cancer theranostic application such as magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). However, its toxicity towards normal cells has been pointed out by scientific communities, when they are involved in in vitro (helics) cancer treatment. In this work, we have chosen to use α-Fe2O3, because it has proven to be less toxic than Fe3O4. Hematite is antiferromagnetic (AFM) at room temperature with a small canted moment lying within the crystal symmetry plane. At low temperature, hematite undergoes a magnetic phase transition from weak ferromagnetic (WFM) to a pure antiferromagnetic configuration (AF), which is known as the Morin transition. This magnetic property makes it possible for hematite to be applied in imaging technique. To enhance the optical properties, the α-Fe2O3 is doped with lanthanide ions due to their unique optical properties. Incorporation of these rare earth ions, enable the α-Fe2O3 to have enhance luminescence properties. Imaging techniques have been developed for decades for the detection of biomolecules in biomedicine cells, in vitro or in living cells and organisms. The application however, often constrained by the available probes, whose optical properties may limit the imaging possibilities. It is very essential to improve the sensitivity of these devices by enhancing efficiency to detection. Recently, Fe3O4 has been used primarily in cancer theranostic application such as magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). However, its toxicity towards normal cells has been pointed out by scientific communities, when they are involved in in vitro (helics) cancer treatment. In this work, we have chosen to use α-Fe2O3, because it has proven to be less toxic than Fe3O4. Hematite is antiferromagnetic (AFM) at room temperature with a small canted moment lying within the crystal symmetry plane. At low temperature, hematite undergoes a magnetic phase transition from weak ferromagnetic (WFM) to a pure antiferromagnetic configuration (AF), which is known as the Morin transition. This magnetic property makes it possible for hematite to be applied in imaging technique. To enhance the optical properties, the α-Fe2O3 is doped with lanthanide ions due to their unique optical properties. Incorporation of these rare earth ions, enable the α-Fe2O3 to have enhance luminescence properties. These lanthanide-doped nanoparticles (UCNPs) undergoes up-conversion process which have remarkable ability to combine two or more low energy photons to generate a singly high energy photon by an anti-stokes process and hold great promise for bio-imaging. These nanoparticles exhibit excellent photostability, continuous emission capability and sharp multi-peak line emission. With near infrared excitation, light scattering by biological tissues is substantially reduced. α-Fe2O3 have been singly and co-doped with Holmium, Thulium, and Ytterbium by both sol-gel and microwave methods. The doping of these lanthanides have shown improved luminescent properties of α-Fe2O3. The up-conversion has been observed from co-doping Thulium and Ytterbium. This work is a proof of concept to show the up-conversion in α-Fe2O3. However, the up-conversion intensity is low about 200000 CPS maximum observed, this could be due to the nature of the host structure quenching the luminescence. There is rather, a need to increase the intensity for the maximum application to be achieved. / Physics

The evolution of electrical resistance as function of defect concentration is examined for the unipolar n-conducting oxides CdO, β-Ga 2 O 3 , In 2 O 3 , SnO 2 and ZnO in order to explore the predictions of the amphoteric defect model. Intrinsic defects are introduced by ion irradiation at cryogenic temperatures, and the resistance is measured in-situ by current–voltage sweeps as a function of irradiation dose. Temperature dependent Hall effect measurements are performed to determine the carrier concentration and mobility of the samples before and after irradiation. After the ultimate irradiation step, the Ga 2 O 3 and SnO2 samples have both turned highly resistive. In contrast, the In 2 O 3 and ZnO samples are ultimately found to be less resistive than prior to irradiation, however, they both show an increased resistance at intermediate doses. Based on thermodynamic defect charge state transitions computed by hybrid density functional theory, a model expanding on the current amphoteric defect model is proposed.