Postural instability is one of the hallmarks of Parkinson's disease (PD), currently evaluated using several subjective tools. However, the nature and degree of the resulting balance deficit is not well specified by these tools. Computerized dynamic posturography (CDP) provides an objective assessment by isolating and quantifying sensory and motor contributions to balance control. The purpose of this study was to compare balance in individuals with PD to a control group using CDP (NeuroCom Smart Balance Master® system). Testing took place at the Southeast Parkinson's disease Research Education and Clinical Center (PADRECC), an interdisciplinary center of excellence for people with PD within a Veterans Affairs Medical Center. The 51 PD patients (mean age = 72.18 ± 6.98 years;) were compared to 55 age-matched controls supplied by the CDP manufacturer. Subjects were assessed with three test scales defined by the Smart Balance Master® system: Sensory Organization Test (SOT), Adaptation Test (ADT), and Limits of Stability Test (LOS). All PD population CDP scores were significantly different (a=0.05) than those of a healthy population, except for the SOT Somatosensory subscale (p=0.28), LOS Directional Control subscale (p=0.08), ADT Toes Up subscale (p=0.16) and ADT Toes Down subscale (p=0.23). The Smart Balance Master® system's LOS Movement Velocity, Endpoint Excursion, Maximum Excursion, and Reaction Time subscores and the SOT Composite, Visual, and Vestibular subscores uniquely describe the varying symptoms of the disease. These disease specific abnormalities may provide insight into focused treatment intervention strategies.

This thesis presents algorithms to utilize the wireless bandwidth efficiently and at the same time meet the quality of service (QoS) requirements of the users. In the proposed algorithms we present an adaptive frame structure based upon the airlink frame loss probability and control the admission of call requests into the system based upon the load on the system and the QoS requirements of the incoming call requests. The performance of the proposed algorithms is studied by developing analytical formulations and simulation experiments. Finally we present an admission control algorithm which uses an adaptive delay computation algorithm to compute the queuing delay for each class of traffic and adapts the service rate and the reliability in the estimates based upon the deviation in the expected and obtained performance. We study the performance of the call admission control algorithm by simulation experiments. Simulation results for the adaptive frame structure algorithm show an improvement in the number of users in the system but there is a drop in the system throughput. In spite of the lower throughput the adaptive frame structure algorithm has fewer QoS delay violations. The adaptive call admission control algorithm adapts the call dropping probability of different classes of traffic and optimizes the system performance w.r.t the number of calls dropped and the reliability in meeting the QoS promised when the call is admitted into the system.

Master of Science / Department of Architectural Engineering and Construction Science / Fred L. Hasler / The Internet of Things (IoT) is rapidly growing and is starting to be incorporated into commercial buildings. One of the ways that the IoT is being used in buildings is connected lighting, also referred to as smart lighting. Connected lighting allows for communication between the lighting system, people, the environment, and other devices. This paper will focus on connected lighting and its effect on lighting controls and design. The IoT is expected to see substantial growth in the next few years and the growth of connected devices will have a huge impact on the lighting industry as connected lighting systems will be installed in more commercial buildings. The shift to solid state lighting (SSL) in recent years has brought the transition from conventional lighting controls to connected lighting controls. For this shift to be successful, issues with interoperability, security and reliability will need to be overcome. Connected lighting systems on the market are using both wired and wireless technologies. Power over Ethernet (PoE) and wireless technologies such as ZigBee and Bluetooth Smart are currently being incorporated into connected lighting systems. The introduction of these technologies is changing the way that lighting control systems are designed and installed. Products such as fixture-integrated sensors and wireless devices are also being used in connected lighting systems. These products, along with the wired and wireless technologies, are changing lighting control system configurations. Lighting design will also be affected by connected lighting systems. New features including color-tunability and indoor positioning will be used to enhance the lighting system and improve occupant health. Also, energy code compliance will be easier since connected lighting controls will be mostly software-based and can be reprogrammed. Connected lighting systems will be integrated into other building systems such as heating, ventilating, and air conditioning systems or security systems and will also be used in a variety of applications. Connected lighting systems will greatly affect both lighting controls and design of lighting control systems. This paper introduces connected lighting and is intended for those who are not familiar with its design, applications, and implementation.

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering / Balasubramaniam Natarajan / Caterina Scoglio / Many physical and engineered systems (e.g., smart grid, transportation and biomedical systems) are increasingly being monitored and controlled over a communication network. These systems where sensing, communication, computation and real time control are closely integrated are referred to as cyber physical systems (CPS). Cyber physical systems present a plethora of challenges related to their design, analysis, optimization and control. In this dissertation, we present some fundamental methodologies to analyze the optimization of physical systems over a communication network. Specifically, we consider a medium voltage DC shipboard smart grid (SSG) reconfiguration problem as a test case to demonstrate our approach. The main goal of SSG reconfiguration is to change the topology of the physical power system by switching circuit breakers, switches, and other devices in the system in order to route power effectively to loads especially in the event of faults/failures. A majority of the prior work has focused on centralized approaches to optimize the switch configuration to maximize specific objectives. These methods are prohibitively complex and not suited for agile reconfiguration in mission critical situations. Decentralized solutions proposed do reduce complexity and implementation time at the cost of optimality. Unfortunately, none of the prior efforts in this arena address the cyber physical aspects of an SSG. This dissertation aims to bridge this gap by proposing a suite of methods to analyze both centralized and decentralized SSG reconfigurations that incorporate the effect of the underlying cyber infrastructure. The SSG reconfiguration problem is a mixed integer non convex optimization problem for which branch and bound based solutions have been proposed earlier. Here, optimal reconfiguration strategies prioritize the power delivered to vital loads over semi-vital and non vital loads. In this work, we propose a convex approximation to the original non convex problem that significantly reduces complexity of the SSG reconfiguration. Tradeoff between power delivered and number of switching operations after reconfiguration is discussed at steady state. Second, the distribution of end-to-end delay associated with fault diagnosis and reconfiguration in SSG is investigated from a cyber-physical system perspective. Specifically, a cross-layer total (end-to-end) delay analysis framework is introduced for SSG reconfiguration. The proposed framework stochastically models the heterogeneity of actions of various sub-systems viz., the reconfiguration of power systems, generation of fault information by sensor nodes associated to the power system, processing actions at control center to resolve fault locations and reconfiguration, and information flow through communication network to:(1) analyze the distribution of total delay in SSG reconfiguration after the occurrence of faults; and (2) propose design options for real-time reconfiguration solutions for shipboard CPS, that meet total delay requirements. Finally, the dissertation focuses on the quality of SSG reconfiguration solution with incomplete knowledge of the overall system state, and communication costs that may affect the quality (optimality) of the resulting reconfiguration. A dual decomposition based decentralized optimization in which the shipboard system is decomposed into multiple separable subsystems with agents is proposed. Specifically, agents monitoring each subsystem solve a local concave dual function of the original objective while neighboring agents share information over a communication network to obtain a global solution. The convergence of the proposed approach under varying network delays and quantization noise is analyzed and comparisons with centralized approaches are presented. Results demonstrate the effectiveness as well as tradeoffs involved in centralized and decentralized SSG reconfiguration approaches.

Master of Science / Department of Computing and Information Sciences / Daniel Andresen / The world is becoming smarter with an increase in efficiency of wireless communication resulting in an accelerated use of smart phones. Open source of Android market gave a chance to individuals to freely develop their own applications which could be run easily on Android smart phones. The purpose of this project is to develop an Android application for managing and tracking a user’s shopping information. The Smart tracker is about tracking the user's purchase of clothes and accessories. The main advantage of this Android app is that it helps to remember the size of clothing purchased. When a user shops at a retail store, he feeds the information pertaining to the fitting of the clothes purchased brand wise, whether it is a correct fit or a bit loose/tight. The data thus entered can be retrieved when he decides to make a purchase in the same store in future. This tremendously decreases the user’s shopping time and makes the experience easier as the right size is already known and hence there is no hassle of using trial rooms to see if the clothes fit. In addition to size, Smart tracker also stores the price at which the item was bought and any additional user comments along with the store location. When data pertaining to a purchased clothing item is entered, the app provides the option to append an image of the item either by capturing a picture through the smart phone’s camera or by uploading an image from the gallery. This helps the user recount the item to which the information corresponds. Another important feature is that tracking of purchases for a family can be personalized, i.e., the shopping information of each family member can be stored separately (especially for kids who can't track their own expense). Additionally, the user can also keep track of money spent on each item/brand/family member. Smart tracker also enables user to create a wish list to remember what they (or a friend) liked but didn't buy in a particular store.

From fall 2003 to spring 2004 I served as an intern producing ART JAM, a free, interactive children's arts festival for KID smART. KID smART is a nonprofit 501 c.3. organization created to teach positive life skills to underserved children through hands-on arts activities in New Orleans, LA. ART JAM is an interactive children's arts festival presented by KID smART. The festival serves as a major public relations campaign and serves to advocate that the arts are important in the lives of all children. This report is broken into 5 chapters and details the activity of producing ART JAM 2004. Chapter 1 is an introduction KID smART and ART JAM including its mission, history, organizational structure, funding, and programs. Chapter 2 is a description of my internship including tasks and responsibilities. Chapter 3 is an exploration of organizational issues including strengths, weaknesses, threats and opportunities. Research and explanation of "Best Practices" along with recommendations will be discussed in Chapter 4. Chapter 5 analyzes the short and long term effects of the internship on KID smART and ART JAM.

The aim of the diploma thesis is to analyse marketing strategy of Listerine Smart Rinse and recommend possible improvements into the future. Theoretical part is divided into three chapters. The first chapter deals with the essence of marketing and definition of marketing process. The second chapter covers brand policy and the importance of brand in marketing. The third chapter offers basic theoretical approaches for the formulation of product, pricing, promotional and distribution strategy which are applied in the practical part. The theoretical part is followed by analysis of Listerine Smart Rinse strategy in terms of 4Ps -- product, price, promotional and distribution policy. Based on the findings there are recommendations offered in the last chapter to improve marketing strategy for the future.

Cidades ao redor do mundo enfrentam diversos desafios para proporcionar uma boa qualidade de vida aos seus cidadãos. Sistemas de software vêm sendo desenvolvidos com objetivo de melhorar os serviços e otimizar o uso da infraestrutura da cidade. Desenvolver ambientes de experimentação para esses sistemas na escala de grandes cidades ainda é um desafio, devido ao alto custo e problemas de infraestrutura. Por sua vez, a simulação é um mecanismo que vem sendo utilizado na realização de experimentos em diversas áreas do conhecimento. O objetivo deste trabalho é auxiliar na construção de um ambiente de experimentação de larga escala e interativo para plataformas de Cidades Inteligentes através de simulação. Para tanto, desenvolvemos uma arquitetura de software visando permitir a integração de plataformas e simuladores de Cidades Inteligentes. Dois estudos de caso demostraram a viabilidade da solução, integrando o simulador InterSCSimulator e a plataforma InterSCity, envolvendo uma série de melhorias em ambas as ferramentas. Apresentamos detalhes de como implementar a arquitetura proposta, além da execução de experimentos na escala da cidade de São Paulo. Acreditamos que a solução nos levou a resultados satisfatórios, tendo em vista que, foi possível realizar experimentos de larga escala através de simulação por meio da implementação da arquitetura apresentada. Portanto, projetamos uma arquitetura de software que poderá servir de base para integração de plataformas e simuladores de Cidades Inteligentes com o intuito de realizar experimentos de larga escala e interativo, visando principalmente questões de desempenho e escalabilidade. / Cities around the world face a number of challenges to provide a good quality of life for their citizens. Software systems have been developed with the aim of improving services and optimizing the use of the citys infrastructure. Developing experimentation environments for these systems in the large cities scale is still a challenge due to the high cost and infrastructure problems. In turn, the simulation is a mechanism that has been used to enable experiments in several areas of knowledge. The goal of this work is to assist in the development of a large scale and interactive experimentation environment for Smart Cities platforms through simulation. For this, we developed a software architecture to allow the integration of platforms and simulators of Smart Cities. Two case studies demonstrated the feasibility of the solution, integrating the InterSCSimulator simulator and the InterSCity platform, involving a series of improvements in both tools. We present details of how to implement the proposed architecture, as well as the execution of experiments on the scale of the city of São Paulo. We believe that the solution led us to satisfactory results, considering that it was possible to perform large- scale experiments through simulation using the implementation of the presented architecture. Therefore, we have designed a software architecture that can be used as a basis for the integration of Smart Cities platforms and simulators in order to perform large-scale and interactive experiments, primarily focusing on performance and scalability issues.

The urban population is predicted to increase to 66% by 2050. The rapid growth of urbanization and increasing congestion are significant challenges faced by the world today. Innovative solutions in urban mobility are key for a successful development and a sustainable future. The new paradigm, Internet of Things (IoT), facilitates the need for new approaches in urban transportation, leading to a modern concept: Smart Mobility. The boom of technology and innovation from recent years allowed a great expansion of IoT. Furthermore, the number of smart devices that communicate, cooperate and complement each other, grows rapidly in every domain broadening the scope of IoT applications. This paper sets to discuss the impact that IoT might have on urban mobility, mentioning its implications, challenges and technical solutions. It further reviews the advancements made in the transport infrastructure along the years that support the emergence of Smart Mobility. Three main research questions stay at the forefront of this paper which are drafted in pursuit of the solutions for the problems and challenges currently faced by urban transportation. Which leads to a sustainable future with efficient and effective urban transportation system. The paper uses a mix-method approach, using on one hand qualitative research for literature review (State of the field) and on the other hand quantitative research to assess public opinion on the research topic, through an online questionnaire. To answer the research questions with proper arguments, both research methods were necessary, which lead to optimal results. The results of the questionnaire were interpreted based on Spearman's correlation and descriptive statistical analysis. They brought an in-depth view on the public opinion regarding IoT and the developments enabled by this paradigm within the urban mobility sphere. The output of the questionnaire highlights the eagerness of participants usually stuck in traffic to see innovation within urban mobility. Over all the results based on the opinions suggest that the public strongly believes in the Internet of Thing's applications and its adaptation will benefit the urban transportation system. Furthermore, new developments in the urban mobility sphere will be largely embraced.

Student Number : 9501020M - M Sc dissertation - School of Clinical Medicine - Faculty of Health Sciences / An exciting and novel concept of tissue engineering and morphogenesis is the generation of bone by the implantation of smart biomaterials that in their own right can induce a desired and specific morphogenetic response from the host tissues without the addition of exogenously applied bone morphogenetic and osteogenic proteins.