Recent Submissions

  • Understanding and utilization of thermal gradients in spark plasma sintering for graded microstructure and mechanical properties 

    Author(s):Preston, Alexander David, author; Ma, Kaka, advisor; Weinberger, Chris, committee member; Neilson, Jamie, committee member; Heyliger, Paul, committee member
    Date Issued:2022
    Format:born digital; doctoral dissertations
    Spark plasma sintering (SPS), also commonly known as electric field assisted sintering, utilizes high density electric currents and pressure to achieve rapid heating and significantly shorter sintering times for consolidating ...
  • Stable and unstable tiling patterns of ABC miktoarm triblock terpolymers studied via GPU-accelerated self-consistent field calculations 

    Author(s):Hawthorne, Cody, author; Wang, David, advisor; Bailey, Travis, committee member; Miyake, Garrett M., committee member; Szamel, Grzegorz, committee member
    Date Issued:2022
    Format:born digital; masters theses
    Block copolymers are macromolecules formed from linking together two or more chemically distinct types of polymers. Provided the different monomers that make up each polymer are immiscible enough, melts of these molecules ...
  • Tuning interfacial biomolecule interactions with massively parallel nanopore arrays 

    Author(s):Wang, Dafu, author; Kipper, Matt J., advisor; Snow, Chris D., advisor; Bailey, Travis S., committee member; Stasevich, Tim J., committee member
    Date Issued:2021
    Format:born digital; doctoral dissertations
    This project studied interfacial interactions of macromolecules with nanoporous materials, with an ultimate goal of exploiting these interactions in functional biomaterials. We quantified interaction forces and energies ...
  • Development of surface modifications on titanium for biomedical applications 

    Author(s):Maia Sabino, Roberta, author; Popat, Ketul C., advisor; Martins, Alessandro F, advisor; Herrera-Alonso, Margarita, committee member; Li, Yan Vivian, committee member; Wang, Zhijie, committee member
    Date Issued:2021
    Format:born digital; doctoral dissertations
    For decades, titanium-based implants have been largely employed for different medical applications due to their excellent mechanical properties, corrosion resistance, and remarkable biocompatibility with many body tissues. ...
  • Sustainable recycling of metal machining swarf via spark plasma sintering 

    Author(s):Sutherland, Alexandra E., author; Ma, Kaka, advisor; Sambur, Justin, committee member; Simske, Steve, committee member
    Date Issued:2021
    Format:born digital; masters theses
    In general, extracting virgin metals from natural resources exerts a significant environmental and economic impact on our earth and society. Production of virgin stainless steels and titanium (Ti) alloys have particularly ...
  • Stability of thin-film CdTe solar cells with various back contacts 

    Author(s):Hill, Taylor D., author; Sites, James, advisor; Sampath, Walajabad, advisor; Bradley, Mark, committee member
    Date Issued:2021
    Format:born digital; masters theses
    With an increasing reliance on photovoltaic energy comes an ever-increasing demand to understand the mechanisms of failure which lead one to having an under-performing solar module. Recent technological advances have proven ...
  • Structural optimization of 3D printed hdyroxyapatite scaffolds 

    Author(s):Isaacson, Nelson D., author; Prawel, David, advisor; James, Susan, committee member; Séguin, Bernard, committee member
    Date Issued:2021
    Format:born digital; masters theses
    Poor healing of critically sized bone defects affects 1.5 million Americans per year and results in more than $1 billion in treatment and therapy cost. Treatment options remain limited and often lead to reoperations, ...
  • Cationic-doping of mayenite electride: synthesis, processing, and effect on thermal stability 

    Author(s):DeBoer, Brodderic, author; Ma, Kaka, advisor; Weinberger, Chris, committee member; Bailey, Travis, committee member; Bandhauer, Todd, committee member
    Date Issued:2021
    Format:born digital; masters theses
    Mayenite electride is an electrically conductive ceramic developed from its parent phase, oxy-mayenite (12CaO•7Al2O3, commonly referred to as C12A7). C12A7 has a unique unit cell that consists of a positively charged ...
  • Preparation and characterization of poly lactic-co-glycolic nanoparticles encapsulated with gentamicin for drug delivery applications 

    Author(s):Sun, Yu, author; Li, Yan Vivian, advisor; Bailey, Travis, committee member; Wang, Zhijie, committee member
    Date Issued:2019
    Format:born digital; masters theses
    Wound treatment has always been a popular topic around the world. Since the emergence of nanotechnology, the development and design of novel wound dressing materials have been dramatically improved. The ues of nanoparticles ...
  • Processing of mayenite electride and its composites in spark plasma sintering 

    Author(s):Kuehster, Adam Edward, author; Ma, Kaka, advisor; Weinberger, Chris, committee member; Williams, John, committee member
    Date Issued:2019
    Format:born digital; masters theses
    Mayenite electride, as the first inorganic room temperature stable electride, has attracted intensive research interests since the early 2000s due to its great potential in various applications such as catalysts, conductive ...
  • Hydroxyapatite structures created by additive manufacturing with extruded photopolymer 

    Author(s):López Ambrosio, Katherine Vanesa, author; James, Susan P., advisor; Ma, Kaka, committee member; Prawel, David A., committee member
    Date Issued:2019
    Format:born digital; masters theses
    Bone tissue has the ability to regenerate and heal itself after fracture trauma. However, this ability can be affected by different risk factors that are related to the patient and the nature of the fracture. Some of the ...