Ahmed Qureshi - Academia.edu (original) (raw)
Papers by Ahmed Qureshi
Computing in Cardiology Conference (CinC)
2021 Computing in Cardiology (CinC), 2021
Abstract- This study is focused on exploring the causes of making China one of the biggest market... more Abstract- This study is focused on exploring the causes of making China one of the biggest markets of cosmetic surgery. There are some solid reasons dug out for this immense interest, one is the natural features of the Chinese, with eyes especially, which seem not to be fully opened, need surgery for making their appearance look larger. Benefiting exclusionary social, cosmetic, and company systems from the West (and those who run them), and thereby preventing genuine prospect for individual licensee via medical procedures on a worldwide stage. Suggestions for upcoming study in this area consists of the sectors of healthcare, travel and vacation, epidermis whitening items, and tissue collection as well as an ever growing industry of medical procedures for teens and kids. Although modifications of epidermis shade, diet, dress, and individual body accessories have always persevered to be able to reach the sophistication values made popular by prominent groups, the improved correctness,...
Biopolymers and their Industrial Applications, 2021
Abstract The chapter overviews additive manufacturing/3D printing techniques used for the process... more Abstract The chapter overviews additive manufacturing/3D printing techniques used for the processing of biopolymers. Various biopolymers such as alginate, starch, cellulose, chitosan lignin, polylactic acid, and polycaprolactone are elaborately discussed to illustrate the formulation challenges, along with a comprehensive study of their intrinsic properties, processing parameters, and product specifications. It also highlights the formation of tailor-made structures for targeted application in the food industry, consumer products, biomedical field, and aerospace applications. Finally, the chapter presents future perspectives and provides a way to overcome the challenges associated with the 3D printing of biopolymers.
Frontiers in Physiology, 2021
Atrial fibrillation (AF) is the most common cardiac arrhythmia and currently affects more than 65... more Atrial fibrillation (AF) is the most common cardiac arrhythmia and currently affects more than 650,000 people in the United Kingdom alone. Catheter ablation (CA) is the only AF treatment with a long-term curative effect as it involves destroying arrhythmogenic tissue in the atria. However, its success rate is suboptimal, approximately 50% after a 2-year follow-up, and this high AF recurrence rate warrants significant improvements. Image-guidance of CA procedures have shown clinical promise, enabling the identification of key patient anatomical and pathological (such as fibrosis) features of atrial tissue, which require ablation. However, the latter approach still suffers from a lack of functional information and the need to interpret structures in the images by a clinician. Deep learning plays an increasingly important role in biomedicine, facilitating efficient diagnosis and treatment of clinical problems. This study applies deep reinforcement learning in combination with patient i...
The Astrophysical Journal, 2018
One of the predictions of high eccentricity planetary migration is that many planets will end up ... more One of the predictions of high eccentricity planetary migration is that many planets will end up plunging into their host stars. We investigate the consequence of planetary mergers on their stellar hosts' spin-period. Energy and angular momentum conservation yield that a planet consumption by a star will spin-up the star. We find that our proof-of-concept calculations align with the observed bifurcation in the stellar spin-period in young clusters. For example, after a Sun-like star has eaten a Jupiter-mass planet it will spin up by ∼ 60% (i.e., spin-period is reduced by ∼ 60%), causing an apparent gap in the stellar spin period, between stars that consumed a planet and those that did not. The spun-up star will later spin down due to magnetic braking, consistent with the disappearance of this bifurcation in clusters (∼ > 300Myr). The agreement between the calculations presented here and the observed spin-period color diagram of stars in young clusters, provides circumstantial evidence that planetary accretion onto their host stars is a generic feature of planetary-system evolution.
Materials Today Communications, 2020
Graphene and related nanomaterial-based polymer composites have shown the potential to resolve th... more Graphene and related nanomaterial-based polymer composites have shown the potential to resolve the longstanding conflict between strength and toughness, the two vital mutually exclusive mechanical properties. The uniform dispersion of the nanofillers in polymer matrices to attain strong matrix-filler interfacial bonding, which is essential for effective load transfer between the polymer matrix and fillers, is the least investigated aspect and a major challenge in composite engineering. Copolymeric materials can be exploited to enhance the distribution of nanofillers. Herein the optimization of monomer ratios of the poly (styrene-co-methyl methacrylate) copolymer and a facile method to fabricate graphene oxide (GO) reinforced nanocomposites using in situ bulk copolymerization are reported. The ultimate tensile strength, failure strain, and storage modulus of the injection molded copolymer were increased by 14.6, 15, and 43%, respectively, by adding only 0.1 wt.% GO. Also, the thermogravimetric analysis revealed that the thermal stability of the nanocomposite is much better than the neat copolymer. Crack arresting mechanism and dispersion state of GO sheets in the copolymer matrix were also investigated using scanning and transmission electron microscopes. Thus, this paper provides a methodology for uniform dispersion of GO in copolymeric materials to attain high toughness and thermal stability.
Frontiers in Physiology, 2018
Introduction: Atrial fibrillation (AF) is a widespread cardiac arrhythmia that commonly affects t... more Introduction: Atrial fibrillation (AF) is a widespread cardiac arrhythmia that commonly affects the left atrium (LA), causing it to quiver instead of contracting effectively. This behavior is triggered by abnormal electrical impulses at a specific site in the atrial wall. Catheter ablation (CA) treatment consists of isolating this driver site by burning the surrounding tissue to restore sinus rhythm (SR). However, evidence suggests that CA can concur to the formation of blood clots by promoting coagulation near the heat source and in regions with low flow velocity and blood stagnation. Methods: A patient-specific modeling workflow was created and applied to simulate thermal-fluid dynamics in two patients pre-and post-CA. Each model was personalized based on pre-and post-CA imaging datasets. The wall motion and anatomy were derived from SSFP Cine MRI data, while the trans-valvular flow was based on Doppler ultrasound data. The temperature distribution in the blood was modeled using a modified Pennes bioheat equation implemented in a finite-element based Navier-Stokes solver. Blood particles were also classified based on their residence time in the LA using a particle-tracking algorithm. Results: SR simulations showed multiple short-lived vortices with an average blood velocity of 0.2-0.22 m/s. In contrast, AF patients presented a slower vortex and stagnant flow in the LA appendage, with the average blood velocity reduced to 0.08-0.14 m/s. Restoration of SR also increased the blood kinetic energy and the viscous dissipation due to the presence of multiple vortices. Particle tracking showed a dramatic decrease in the percentage of blood remaining in the LA for longer than one cycle after CA (65.9 vs. 43.3% in patient A and 62.2 vs. 54.8% in patient B). Maximum temperatures of 76 • and 58 • C were observed when CA was performed near the appendage and in a pulmonary vein, respectively. Dillon-Murphy et al. Modeling Left Atrial Catheter Ablation Conclusion: This computational study presents novel models to elucidate relations between catheter temperature, patient-specific atrial anatomy and blood velocity, and predict how they change from SR to AF. The models can quantify blood flow in critical regions, including residence times and temperature distribution for different catheter positions, providing a basis for quantifying stroke risks.
ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces, 2020
A novel self-healable, fully reprocessable, and inkjet three-dimensional (3D) printable partially... more A novel self-healable, fully reprocessable, and inkjet three-dimensional (3D) printable partially biobased elastomer is reported in this work. A long-chain unsaturated diacrylate monomer was first synthesized from canola oil and then crosslinked with a partially oxidized silicon-based copolymer containing free thiol groups and disulfide bonds. The elastomer is fabricated through inkjet 3D printing utilizing the photoinitiated thiol-ene click chemistry and reprocessed by compression molding exploiting the dynamic nature of disulfide bond. Self-healing is enabled by phosphinecatalyzed disulfide metathesis. The elastomer displayed a tensile strength of ∼52 kPa, a breaking strain of ∼24, and ∼86% healing efficiency at 80°C temperature after 8 h. Moreover, the elastomer showed excellent thermal stability, and the highest thermal degradation temperature was recorded to be ∼524°C. After reprocessing through compression molding, the elastomer fully recovered its mechanical and thermal properties. These properties of the elastomer yield an ecofriendly alternative of fossil fuel-based elastomers that can find broad applications in soft robotics, flexible wearable devices, strain sensors, health care, and next-generation energy-harvesting and-storage devices.
2019 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition Proceedings
2019 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition Proceedings
This research paper is dedicated to questions related to transdisciplinary engineering design edu... more This research paper is dedicated to questions related to transdisciplinary engineering design education. Contemporary product design has become highly transdisciplinary, as a collaboration of engineering specialists and designers from multiple disciplines is required for the development of integrated products such as automobiles. The new transdisciplinary nature of industrial design practice inevitably affects recent engineering graduates. Today, employers seek well-rounded engineering graduates with well-developed technical and professional skills. This new reality as well as industrial demands and employers' expectations should be properly reflected and accounted for in engineering design education system, which still often remains strongly monodisciplinary. To enhance engineering design curriculum and account for industrial demands, one first needs to understand how it affects recent graduates when they enter the workplace and what difficulties they may encounter during the first few years of industrial practice. This paper presents the results of the two focus group interviews with engineering alumni of the Faculty of Engineering from the University of Alberta who graduated in the last 8 years and are currently employed in various engineering companies. The focus group interviews are a part of the empirical research project entitled Transdisciplinary Design Education for Engineering Undergraduates, which goals are to establish a common understanding of the design processes across multiple engineering disciplines and develop a first-year transdisciplinary engineering design course to facilitate overall design curriculum enhancement. This paper presents and discusses alumni feedback and reflections regarding their early experiences in the workplace when they just entered the industry, the transdisciplinarity in the workplace and in design practice, their employers' expectations regarding the qualifications of the new graduates, and alumni suggestions for the curriculum enhancement. The results support the findings of other studies regarding graduates' knowledge base and qualifications that industrial employers look for today as well as what is missed in graduates' knowledge base, which points out to the gaps in the Faculty curriculum. In addition, alumni provided a fresh perspective on how to approach engineering curriculum enhancement in light of expectations of contemporary employers. These findings are important to consider when developing and/or redesigning engineering design curriculum to account for industrial demands as of today.
Procedia CIRP, 2018
In today's business environment, the trend towards more product variety and customization is unbr... more In today's business environment, the trend towards more product variety and customization is unbroken. Due to this development, the need of agile and reconfigurable production systems emerged to cope with various products and product families. To design and optimize production systems as well as to choose the optimal product matches, product analysis methods are needed. Indeed, most of the known methods aim to analyze a product or one product family on the physical level. Different product families, however, may differ largely in terms of the number and nature of components. This fact impedes an efficient comparison and choice of appropriate product family combinations for the production system. A new methodology is proposed to analyze existing products in view of their functional and physical architecture. The aim is to cluster these products in new assembly oriented product families for the optimization of existing assembly lines and the creation of future reconfigurable assembly systems. Based on Datum Flow Chain, the physical structure of the products is analyzed. Functional subassemblies are identified, and a functional analysis is performed. Moreover, a hybrid functional and physical architecture graph (HyFPAG) is the output which depicts the similarity between product families by providing design support to both, production system planners and product designers. An illustrative example of a nail-clipper is used to explain the proposed methodology. An industrial case study on two product families of steering columns of thyssenkrupp Presta France is then carried out to give a first industrial evaluation of the proposed approach.
All Days, 2015
A case history is presented for a horizontal injector drilled at the base of a moveable oil colum... more A case history is presented for a horizontal injector drilled at the base of a moveable oil column on top of a tar mat in a carbonate oil reservoir in the Middle East. The well was placed utilizing real-time Logging-While-Drilling (LWD) Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) oil viscosity correlations and formation tester mobility data. As a pilot water injector, placed at an oil/tar interface with restricted historic oil viscosity versus depth data, obtaining calibration oil samples was considered critical. Both LWD and pipe-conveyed (TLC) formation tester data sets were acquired, which made direct comparisons of LWD and TLC acquired formation pressures and formation mobilities possible. The comparison proves the reliability of the LWD formation mobilities. The LWD measured formation pressures were supercharged while the TLC formation tester formation pressures were largely in line with expected formation pressures. The oil viscosity results from the TLC formation tester in-situ viscosit...
For a natural social human-robot interaction, it is essential for a robot to learn the human-like... more For a natural social human-robot interaction, it is essential for a robot to learn the human-like social skills. However, learning such skills is notoriously hard due to the limited availability of direct instructions from people to teach a robot. In this paper, we propose an intrinsically motivated reinforcement learning framework in which an agent gets the intrinsic motivation-based rewards through the action-conditional predictive model. By using the proposed method, the robot learned the social skills from the human-robot interaction experiences gathered in the real uncontrolled environments. The results indicate that the robot not only acquired human-like social skills but also took more human-like decisions, on a test dataset, than a robot which received direct rewards for the task achievement.
All Days, 2012
ABSTRACTA Jurassic oil field in Saudi Arabia is characterized by black oil in the crest, with hea... more ABSTRACTA Jurassic oil field in Saudi Arabia is characterized by black oil in the crest, with heavy oil underneath and all underlain by a tar mat at the oil-water contact (OWC). The viscosities in the black oil section of the column are similar throughout the field and are quite manageable from a production standpoint. In contrast, the mobile heavy oil section of the column contains a large, continuous increase in asphaltene content with increasing depth extending to the tar mat. Both the excessive viscosity of the heavy oil and the existence of the tar mat represent major, distinct challenges in oil production. A simple new formalism, the Flory-Huggins-Zuo (FHZ) Equation of State (EoS) incorporating the Yen-Mullins model of asphaltene nanoscience, is shown to account for the asphaltene content variation in the mobile heavy oil section. Detailed analysis of the tar mat shows significant nonmonotonic content of asphaltenes with depth, differing from that of the heavy oil. While the g...
Offshore Technology Conference-Asia, 2014
The elemental sulfur deposition is a potential risk in gas field production especially during off... more The elemental sulfur deposition is a potential risk in gas field production especially during offshore gas early development stage since it is related to economical issues. Later on, when elemental sulphur finally deposited, it is a serious concern during production as it can result in various significant flow assurance, safety, operational, corrosion and integrity problems. Sulphur solubility in gas wells can be affected by a number of conditions including, but not necessary limited to their origins, gas composition, pressure, temperature and the amount of condensate present. These include elemental mercury, ammonia, carbon sulphides and mercaptans. It is noticed that sulphur is not only physically soluble in gas or condensate but also can be chemically bonded to H2S. The paper objective is to explain a novel work flow of elemental sulphur, mercury and condensate identification, bottom hole sampling process, solubility curves prediction and treatment mitigation during initial gas field development project as a case study especially during facilities concept development. The sets of correlation process are applied as screening to predict elemental sulfur deposition risk. The physical solubility of sulphur in a natural gas increases with the pressure and the density of the gas phase but is limited by spatial interactions between molecules. However, it decreases with the temperature because low energy interactions are broken by thermal agitation. In offshore environment particularly, the physically dissolved sulphur in a natural gas is sensitive in responds to changes in pressure and temperature; its precipitation will occur as soon as saturation conditions are reached along the production pathway from wells to onshore receiving facilities. As summary, the elemental sulphur deposition for lean (< 1% C2+), sour gas containing H2S is viable and has higher risks compared to similar sour gas with condensate field, while the elemental sulphur and mercury cannot co-exist in the reservoir and in the same time, anhydrites must be present in the formation for elemental sulphur to be present.
lib.utexas.edu
This thesis is dedicated to my loving parents, Khalil Ahmed Qureshi and Hasina Qureshi, both of w... more This thesis is dedicated to my loving parents, Khalil Ahmed Qureshi and Hasina Qureshi, both of whom passed away during the course of my studies. Words are incapable of describing my feeling of gratitude for them. The value my father placed on education, even though he had limited access to it, is the single biggest reason in my completing this PhD. My mother was a constant source of love and encouragement. The strength and courage I derive from their memories has kept me going forward. I am grateful for the patience, love, and unconditional support of my siblings: Shaheen, Mona, Amina, and Alauddin. I am especially grateful to my sister Mona for always being there for me when I needed support. Her unwavering faith in me and her taking care of things at home at the most delicate times allowed me to do my studies in the US. I am indebted to my adviser, Yale Patt, for his influence on my life with both his teaching and guidance. His EE360N is responsible for much of what I know in computer architecture. His EE382N motivated me to pursue a PhD. Yale provided the right balance of freedom and guidance needed for my development as a researcher and as an individual. His teachings and principles will continue to influence my life for a long time. My life in graduate school would have been barren had it not been for two members of Monga family: Vishal Monga and Archna Monga. More than friends they became my family away from home. Vishal was my roommate for the first four years. He helped me focus during the most difficult times and made my dark days seem brighter. I was deeply touched by his friendship, patience, and maturity. During the last year, I had the good fortune of knowing Archna. Archna taught me that it is possible to balance work and life. I am grateful for her friendship, understanding, discussions, and yummy parathas. I also thank other elderly members of the Monga family for their affection and blessing. v Members of the HPS research group provided a creative and helpful environment for my studies. I thank them all. Dave Thompson for helping me with writing and presentation during the initial years. Francis for his helpfulness, sense of humor, and letting me steal his pens. Onur for his friendship and feedback on research. Hyesoon Kim for her comradeship and accompanying me for coffee even though she just had one. Aater Suleman for "extreme writing", critiquing my slides, and joining me for Friday prayers. Danny Lynch and Santosh Srinath for providing mental breaks. Paul Racunas, Robert Chappell, and Mary Brown for their mentorship. Veynu Narasiman, Jose Joao, Chang Joo Lee, Rustam Miftakhutdinov and Linda Hastings for their friendship and proof reading my papers.
Computing in Cardiology Conference (CinC)
2021 Computing in Cardiology (CinC), 2021
Abstract- This study is focused on exploring the causes of making China one of the biggest market... more Abstract- This study is focused on exploring the causes of making China one of the biggest markets of cosmetic surgery. There are some solid reasons dug out for this immense interest, one is the natural features of the Chinese, with eyes especially, which seem not to be fully opened, need surgery for making their appearance look larger. Benefiting exclusionary social, cosmetic, and company systems from the West (and those who run them), and thereby preventing genuine prospect for individual licensee via medical procedures on a worldwide stage. Suggestions for upcoming study in this area consists of the sectors of healthcare, travel and vacation, epidermis whitening items, and tissue collection as well as an ever growing industry of medical procedures for teens and kids. Although modifications of epidermis shade, diet, dress, and individual body accessories have always persevered to be able to reach the sophistication values made popular by prominent groups, the improved correctness,...
Biopolymers and their Industrial Applications, 2021
Abstract The chapter overviews additive manufacturing/3D printing techniques used for the process... more Abstract The chapter overviews additive manufacturing/3D printing techniques used for the processing of biopolymers. Various biopolymers such as alginate, starch, cellulose, chitosan lignin, polylactic acid, and polycaprolactone are elaborately discussed to illustrate the formulation challenges, along with a comprehensive study of their intrinsic properties, processing parameters, and product specifications. It also highlights the formation of tailor-made structures for targeted application in the food industry, consumer products, biomedical field, and aerospace applications. Finally, the chapter presents future perspectives and provides a way to overcome the challenges associated with the 3D printing of biopolymers.
Frontiers in Physiology, 2021
Atrial fibrillation (AF) is the most common cardiac arrhythmia and currently affects more than 65... more Atrial fibrillation (AF) is the most common cardiac arrhythmia and currently affects more than 650,000 people in the United Kingdom alone. Catheter ablation (CA) is the only AF treatment with a long-term curative effect as it involves destroying arrhythmogenic tissue in the atria. However, its success rate is suboptimal, approximately 50% after a 2-year follow-up, and this high AF recurrence rate warrants significant improvements. Image-guidance of CA procedures have shown clinical promise, enabling the identification of key patient anatomical and pathological (such as fibrosis) features of atrial tissue, which require ablation. However, the latter approach still suffers from a lack of functional information and the need to interpret structures in the images by a clinician. Deep learning plays an increasingly important role in biomedicine, facilitating efficient diagnosis and treatment of clinical problems. This study applies deep reinforcement learning in combination with patient i...
The Astrophysical Journal, 2018
One of the predictions of high eccentricity planetary migration is that many planets will end up ... more One of the predictions of high eccentricity planetary migration is that many planets will end up plunging into their host stars. We investigate the consequence of planetary mergers on their stellar hosts' spin-period. Energy and angular momentum conservation yield that a planet consumption by a star will spin-up the star. We find that our proof-of-concept calculations align with the observed bifurcation in the stellar spin-period in young clusters. For example, after a Sun-like star has eaten a Jupiter-mass planet it will spin up by ∼ 60% (i.e., spin-period is reduced by ∼ 60%), causing an apparent gap in the stellar spin period, between stars that consumed a planet and those that did not. The spun-up star will later spin down due to magnetic braking, consistent with the disappearance of this bifurcation in clusters (∼ > 300Myr). The agreement between the calculations presented here and the observed spin-period color diagram of stars in young clusters, provides circumstantial evidence that planetary accretion onto their host stars is a generic feature of planetary-system evolution.
Materials Today Communications, 2020
Graphene and related nanomaterial-based polymer composites have shown the potential to resolve th... more Graphene and related nanomaterial-based polymer composites have shown the potential to resolve the longstanding conflict between strength and toughness, the two vital mutually exclusive mechanical properties. The uniform dispersion of the nanofillers in polymer matrices to attain strong matrix-filler interfacial bonding, which is essential for effective load transfer between the polymer matrix and fillers, is the least investigated aspect and a major challenge in composite engineering. Copolymeric materials can be exploited to enhance the distribution of nanofillers. Herein the optimization of monomer ratios of the poly (styrene-co-methyl methacrylate) copolymer and a facile method to fabricate graphene oxide (GO) reinforced nanocomposites using in situ bulk copolymerization are reported. The ultimate tensile strength, failure strain, and storage modulus of the injection molded copolymer were increased by 14.6, 15, and 43%, respectively, by adding only 0.1 wt.% GO. Also, the thermogravimetric analysis revealed that the thermal stability of the nanocomposite is much better than the neat copolymer. Crack arresting mechanism and dispersion state of GO sheets in the copolymer matrix were also investigated using scanning and transmission electron microscopes. Thus, this paper provides a methodology for uniform dispersion of GO in copolymeric materials to attain high toughness and thermal stability.
Frontiers in Physiology, 2018
Introduction: Atrial fibrillation (AF) is a widespread cardiac arrhythmia that commonly affects t... more Introduction: Atrial fibrillation (AF) is a widespread cardiac arrhythmia that commonly affects the left atrium (LA), causing it to quiver instead of contracting effectively. This behavior is triggered by abnormal electrical impulses at a specific site in the atrial wall. Catheter ablation (CA) treatment consists of isolating this driver site by burning the surrounding tissue to restore sinus rhythm (SR). However, evidence suggests that CA can concur to the formation of blood clots by promoting coagulation near the heat source and in regions with low flow velocity and blood stagnation. Methods: A patient-specific modeling workflow was created and applied to simulate thermal-fluid dynamics in two patients pre-and post-CA. Each model was personalized based on pre-and post-CA imaging datasets. The wall motion and anatomy were derived from SSFP Cine MRI data, while the trans-valvular flow was based on Doppler ultrasound data. The temperature distribution in the blood was modeled using a modified Pennes bioheat equation implemented in a finite-element based Navier-Stokes solver. Blood particles were also classified based on their residence time in the LA using a particle-tracking algorithm. Results: SR simulations showed multiple short-lived vortices with an average blood velocity of 0.2-0.22 m/s. In contrast, AF patients presented a slower vortex and stagnant flow in the LA appendage, with the average blood velocity reduced to 0.08-0.14 m/s. Restoration of SR also increased the blood kinetic energy and the viscous dissipation due to the presence of multiple vortices. Particle tracking showed a dramatic decrease in the percentage of blood remaining in the LA for longer than one cycle after CA (65.9 vs. 43.3% in patient A and 62.2 vs. 54.8% in patient B). Maximum temperatures of 76 • and 58 • C were observed when CA was performed near the appendage and in a pulmonary vein, respectively. Dillon-Murphy et al. Modeling Left Atrial Catheter Ablation Conclusion: This computational study presents novel models to elucidate relations between catheter temperature, patient-specific atrial anatomy and blood velocity, and predict how they change from SR to AF. The models can quantify blood flow in critical regions, including residence times and temperature distribution for different catheter positions, providing a basis for quantifying stroke risks.
ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces, 2020
A novel self-healable, fully reprocessable, and inkjet three-dimensional (3D) printable partially... more A novel self-healable, fully reprocessable, and inkjet three-dimensional (3D) printable partially biobased elastomer is reported in this work. A long-chain unsaturated diacrylate monomer was first synthesized from canola oil and then crosslinked with a partially oxidized silicon-based copolymer containing free thiol groups and disulfide bonds. The elastomer is fabricated through inkjet 3D printing utilizing the photoinitiated thiol-ene click chemistry and reprocessed by compression molding exploiting the dynamic nature of disulfide bond. Self-healing is enabled by phosphinecatalyzed disulfide metathesis. The elastomer displayed a tensile strength of ∼52 kPa, a breaking strain of ∼24, and ∼86% healing efficiency at 80°C temperature after 8 h. Moreover, the elastomer showed excellent thermal stability, and the highest thermal degradation temperature was recorded to be ∼524°C. After reprocessing through compression molding, the elastomer fully recovered its mechanical and thermal properties. These properties of the elastomer yield an ecofriendly alternative of fossil fuel-based elastomers that can find broad applications in soft robotics, flexible wearable devices, strain sensors, health care, and next-generation energy-harvesting and-storage devices.
2019 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition Proceedings
2019 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition Proceedings
This research paper is dedicated to questions related to transdisciplinary engineering design edu... more This research paper is dedicated to questions related to transdisciplinary engineering design education. Contemporary product design has become highly transdisciplinary, as a collaboration of engineering specialists and designers from multiple disciplines is required for the development of integrated products such as automobiles. The new transdisciplinary nature of industrial design practice inevitably affects recent engineering graduates. Today, employers seek well-rounded engineering graduates with well-developed technical and professional skills. This new reality as well as industrial demands and employers' expectations should be properly reflected and accounted for in engineering design education system, which still often remains strongly monodisciplinary. To enhance engineering design curriculum and account for industrial demands, one first needs to understand how it affects recent graduates when they enter the workplace and what difficulties they may encounter during the first few years of industrial practice. This paper presents the results of the two focus group interviews with engineering alumni of the Faculty of Engineering from the University of Alberta who graduated in the last 8 years and are currently employed in various engineering companies. The focus group interviews are a part of the empirical research project entitled Transdisciplinary Design Education for Engineering Undergraduates, which goals are to establish a common understanding of the design processes across multiple engineering disciplines and develop a first-year transdisciplinary engineering design course to facilitate overall design curriculum enhancement. This paper presents and discusses alumni feedback and reflections regarding their early experiences in the workplace when they just entered the industry, the transdisciplinarity in the workplace and in design practice, their employers' expectations regarding the qualifications of the new graduates, and alumni suggestions for the curriculum enhancement. The results support the findings of other studies regarding graduates' knowledge base and qualifications that industrial employers look for today as well as what is missed in graduates' knowledge base, which points out to the gaps in the Faculty curriculum. In addition, alumni provided a fresh perspective on how to approach engineering curriculum enhancement in light of expectations of contemporary employers. These findings are important to consider when developing and/or redesigning engineering design curriculum to account for industrial demands as of today.
Procedia CIRP, 2018
In today's business environment, the trend towards more product variety and customization is unbr... more In today's business environment, the trend towards more product variety and customization is unbroken. Due to this development, the need of agile and reconfigurable production systems emerged to cope with various products and product families. To design and optimize production systems as well as to choose the optimal product matches, product analysis methods are needed. Indeed, most of the known methods aim to analyze a product or one product family on the physical level. Different product families, however, may differ largely in terms of the number and nature of components. This fact impedes an efficient comparison and choice of appropriate product family combinations for the production system. A new methodology is proposed to analyze existing products in view of their functional and physical architecture. The aim is to cluster these products in new assembly oriented product families for the optimization of existing assembly lines and the creation of future reconfigurable assembly systems. Based on Datum Flow Chain, the physical structure of the products is analyzed. Functional subassemblies are identified, and a functional analysis is performed. Moreover, a hybrid functional and physical architecture graph (HyFPAG) is the output which depicts the similarity between product families by providing design support to both, production system planners and product designers. An illustrative example of a nail-clipper is used to explain the proposed methodology. An industrial case study on two product families of steering columns of thyssenkrupp Presta France is then carried out to give a first industrial evaluation of the proposed approach.
All Days, 2015
A case history is presented for a horizontal injector drilled at the base of a moveable oil colum... more A case history is presented for a horizontal injector drilled at the base of a moveable oil column on top of a tar mat in a carbonate oil reservoir in the Middle East. The well was placed utilizing real-time Logging-While-Drilling (LWD) Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) oil viscosity correlations and formation tester mobility data. As a pilot water injector, placed at an oil/tar interface with restricted historic oil viscosity versus depth data, obtaining calibration oil samples was considered critical. Both LWD and pipe-conveyed (TLC) formation tester data sets were acquired, which made direct comparisons of LWD and TLC acquired formation pressures and formation mobilities possible. The comparison proves the reliability of the LWD formation mobilities. The LWD measured formation pressures were supercharged while the TLC formation tester formation pressures were largely in line with expected formation pressures. The oil viscosity results from the TLC formation tester in-situ viscosit...
For a natural social human-robot interaction, it is essential for a robot to learn the human-like... more For a natural social human-robot interaction, it is essential for a robot to learn the human-like social skills. However, learning such skills is notoriously hard due to the limited availability of direct instructions from people to teach a robot. In this paper, we propose an intrinsically motivated reinforcement learning framework in which an agent gets the intrinsic motivation-based rewards through the action-conditional predictive model. By using the proposed method, the robot learned the social skills from the human-robot interaction experiences gathered in the real uncontrolled environments. The results indicate that the robot not only acquired human-like social skills but also took more human-like decisions, on a test dataset, than a robot which received direct rewards for the task achievement.
All Days, 2012
ABSTRACTA Jurassic oil field in Saudi Arabia is characterized by black oil in the crest, with hea... more ABSTRACTA Jurassic oil field in Saudi Arabia is characterized by black oil in the crest, with heavy oil underneath and all underlain by a tar mat at the oil-water contact (OWC). The viscosities in the black oil section of the column are similar throughout the field and are quite manageable from a production standpoint. In contrast, the mobile heavy oil section of the column contains a large, continuous increase in asphaltene content with increasing depth extending to the tar mat. Both the excessive viscosity of the heavy oil and the existence of the tar mat represent major, distinct challenges in oil production. A simple new formalism, the Flory-Huggins-Zuo (FHZ) Equation of State (EoS) incorporating the Yen-Mullins model of asphaltene nanoscience, is shown to account for the asphaltene content variation in the mobile heavy oil section. Detailed analysis of the tar mat shows significant nonmonotonic content of asphaltenes with depth, differing from that of the heavy oil. While the g...
Offshore Technology Conference-Asia, 2014
The elemental sulfur deposition is a potential risk in gas field production especially during off... more The elemental sulfur deposition is a potential risk in gas field production especially during offshore gas early development stage since it is related to economical issues. Later on, when elemental sulphur finally deposited, it is a serious concern during production as it can result in various significant flow assurance, safety, operational, corrosion and integrity problems. Sulphur solubility in gas wells can be affected by a number of conditions including, but not necessary limited to their origins, gas composition, pressure, temperature and the amount of condensate present. These include elemental mercury, ammonia, carbon sulphides and mercaptans. It is noticed that sulphur is not only physically soluble in gas or condensate but also can be chemically bonded to H2S. The paper objective is to explain a novel work flow of elemental sulphur, mercury and condensate identification, bottom hole sampling process, solubility curves prediction and treatment mitigation during initial gas field development project as a case study especially during facilities concept development. The sets of correlation process are applied as screening to predict elemental sulfur deposition risk. The physical solubility of sulphur in a natural gas increases with the pressure and the density of the gas phase but is limited by spatial interactions between molecules. However, it decreases with the temperature because low energy interactions are broken by thermal agitation. In offshore environment particularly, the physically dissolved sulphur in a natural gas is sensitive in responds to changes in pressure and temperature; its precipitation will occur as soon as saturation conditions are reached along the production pathway from wells to onshore receiving facilities. As summary, the elemental sulphur deposition for lean (< 1% C2+), sour gas containing H2S is viable and has higher risks compared to similar sour gas with condensate field, while the elemental sulphur and mercury cannot co-exist in the reservoir and in the same time, anhydrites must be present in the formation for elemental sulphur to be present.
lib.utexas.edu
This thesis is dedicated to my loving parents, Khalil Ahmed Qureshi and Hasina Qureshi, both of w... more This thesis is dedicated to my loving parents, Khalil Ahmed Qureshi and Hasina Qureshi, both of whom passed away during the course of my studies. Words are incapable of describing my feeling of gratitude for them. The value my father placed on education, even though he had limited access to it, is the single biggest reason in my completing this PhD. My mother was a constant source of love and encouragement. The strength and courage I derive from their memories has kept me going forward. I am grateful for the patience, love, and unconditional support of my siblings: Shaheen, Mona, Amina, and Alauddin. I am especially grateful to my sister Mona for always being there for me when I needed support. Her unwavering faith in me and her taking care of things at home at the most delicate times allowed me to do my studies in the US. I am indebted to my adviser, Yale Patt, for his influence on my life with both his teaching and guidance. His EE360N is responsible for much of what I know in computer architecture. His EE382N motivated me to pursue a PhD. Yale provided the right balance of freedom and guidance needed for my development as a researcher and as an individual. His teachings and principles will continue to influence my life for a long time. My life in graduate school would have been barren had it not been for two members of Monga family: Vishal Monga and Archna Monga. More than friends they became my family away from home. Vishal was my roommate for the first four years. He helped me focus during the most difficult times and made my dark days seem brighter. I was deeply touched by his friendship, patience, and maturity. During the last year, I had the good fortune of knowing Archna. Archna taught me that it is possible to balance work and life. I am grateful for her friendship, understanding, discussions, and yummy parathas. I also thank other elderly members of the Monga family for their affection and blessing. v Members of the HPS research group provided a creative and helpful environment for my studies. I thank them all. Dave Thompson for helping me with writing and presentation during the initial years. Francis for his helpfulness, sense of humor, and letting me steal his pens. Onur for his friendship and feedback on research. Hyesoon Kim for her comradeship and accompanying me for coffee even though she just had one. Aater Suleman for "extreme writing", critiquing my slides, and joining me for Friday prayers. Danny Lynch and Santosh Srinath for providing mental breaks. Paul Racunas, Robert Chappell, and Mary Brown for their mentorship. Veynu Narasiman, Jose Joao, Chang Joo Lee, Rustam Miftakhutdinov and Linda Hastings for their friendship and proof reading my papers.