Theses and Dissertations from UMD
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New submissions to the thesis/dissertation collections are added automatically as they are received from the Graduate School. Currently, the Graduate School deposits all theses and dissertations from a given semester after the official graduation date. This means that there may be up to a 4 month delay in the appearance of a give thesis/dissertation in DRUM
More information is available at Theses and Dissertations at University of Maryland Libraries.
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Item SHORT TERM TRAVEL BEHAVIOR PREDICTION THROUGH GPS AND LAND USE DATA(2015) Krause, Cory; Zhang, Lei; Civil Engineering; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The short-term destination prediction problem consists of capturing vehicle Global Positioning System (GPS) traces and learning from historic locations and trajectories to predict a vehicle’s destination. Drivers have predictable trip destinations that can be estimated through probabilistic modeling of past trips. This dissertation has three main hypotheses; 1) Employing a tiered Markov model structure will permit a shorter learning period while achieving similar accuracy results, 2) The addition of derived trip purpose information will increase accuracy of the start of trip and in-route models as a whole, and 3) Similar methodologies of travel pattern inference can be used to accurately predict trip purpose and socio-economic factors. To study these concepts, a database of GPS driving traces (120 participants for 70 days) is collected. To model the user’s trip purpose, a new data source was explored: Point of Interest (POI)/land use data. An open source land use/POI dataset is merged with the GPS dataset. The resulting database includes over 20,000 trips with travel characteristics and land use/POI data. From land use/POI data, and travel patterns, trip purpose is calculated with machine learning methods. A new model structure is developed that uses trip purpose when it is available, yet falls back on traditional spatial temporal Markov models when it is not. The start of trip model has an overall increase of accuracy over other start of trip models of 2%. This comes quickly, needing only 30 days to reach this level of accuracy compared to nearly a year in many other models. When adding trip purpose and the start of trip model to in-route prediction methods, the accuracy of the destination prediction increases significantly: 15-30% improvement of accuracy over similar models between 0-50% of trip progression. Certain trips are predicted more accurately than others: work and home based trips average of 90% correct prediction, whereas shopping and social based trips hover around the 50% mark. In all, the greatest contribution of this dissertation is the trip purpose methodology addition and the tiered Markov model structure in gaining fast results in both the start of trip and in-route models.Item A POSITIVE MODEL OF ROUTE CHOICE BEHAVIOR AND VALUE OF TIME CALCULATION USING LONGITUDINAL GPS SURVEY DATA(2012) Krause, Cory; Zhang, Lei; Civil Engineering; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This thesis approaches the topic of value of time calculation and route choice behavior with a new and innovative methodology using a survey dataset that was uniquely designed and implemented for this purpose. The survey is a 70 day, 218 participant GPS travel survey used to track individual location constantly at one minute intervals. Using a positive behavior theory framework, an in depth knowledge database for each user is created that iteratively updates the learned behavior and experienced travel conditions for each trip the user takes. A new approach for calculating value of time is presented; using the cost and trip duration of previous trips. The bounds (or caps and floors) are averaged to achieve the individual's value of time based upon their route (and therefore cost) decisions. Also using this updating knowledge base, route decision rules are derived using machine learning algorithms to tell why a user has decided to take the toll road option for certain days, and under what conditions the user will not take the toll road option. The final contribution is a model that fully takes advantage of longitudinal GPS data to create an adaptive system for value of time calculation and positive route decision making.Item Debating Space Security: Capabilities and Vulnerabilities(2012) Sankaran, Jaganath; Steinbruner, John D; Public Policy; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The U.S. position in the debate on space security has been that (1) space-based systems could be developed and used to obtain decisive warghting superiority over an adversary, and (2) these space-based systems, because they might give such an inordinate advantage over any adversary, will be attacked. The Russians and Chinese, in contrast, claim to be threatened by U.S. aspirations in space but deny that they pose a serious threat to U.S. space-based systems. They view the development of advanced military space systems by the United States as evidence of a growing gap of military capabilities limited only by technological--not political--constraints. They argue that U.S. missile defense systems operating in coordination with advanced satellite sensors would weaken their nuclear retaliatory potential. This dissertation argues that the positions held by both of these parties are more extreme than warranted. An analytical evaluation quickly narrows the touted capabilities and assumed vulnerabilities of space systems to a much smaller set of concerns that can be addressed by collaboration. Chapter 2: Operationally Responsive Space (ORS): Is 24/7 Warghter Support Feasible? demonstrates the infeasibility of dramatically increasing U.S. warfighting superiority by using satellites. Chapter 3: What Can be Achieved by Attacking Satellites? makes the case that although U.S. armed forces rely extensively on its satellite infrastructure, that does not immediately make them desirable targets. The functions performed by military satellites are diffused among large constellations with redundancies. Also, some of the functions performed by these satellites can be substituted for by other terrestrial and aerial systems. Chapter 4: The Limits of Chinese Anti-Satellite Missiles demonstrates that anti-satellite (ASAT) intercepts are very complex under realistic conditions and that a potential adversary with space capabilities comparable to China's has very limited capability to use ASATs in a real-world battle scenario. Finally, in order to evaluate the chief concern raised by the Russians and Chinese, chapter 5: Satellites, Missile Defense and Space Security simulates a boost-phase missile defense system cued by the advanced Space Tracking and Surveillance (STSS) sensors. It demonstrates that even under best case assumptions, the STSS sensors are not good enough for the boost-phase missile defense system to successfully intercept and destroy an ICBM. Together, these chapters aim to narrow the contentions in the debate on space security thereby fostering the international colloboration and data sharing needed to ensure safe operations in space.Item Gravity Gradiometer Aided Inertial Navigation Within Non-GNSS Environments(2008-01-25) Richeson, Justin Arthur; Pines, Darryll J; Aerospace Engineering; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Gravity gradiometer aiding of a strapdown inertial navigation system (INS) in the event of Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) signal loss, or as a complement to an INS/GNSS system, is proposed. Gravity gradiometry is ideal for covert military applications where a self contained, passive, spoof-free aid is desirable, and for space navigation near planetary bodies and moons where GNSS is unavailable. This dissertation provides the first comprehensive discussion on gravity gradiometry fundamentals, map modeling, and regional and altitude effects on the gravitational gradient signal for use as a navigation aid. A thorough methodology to implement strapdown and stabilized gravity gradiometer instruments (GGIs) into an autonomous extended Kalman filter is also presented in the open literature for the first time. Lastly, a brief discussion on extraterrestrial navigation using gravity gradiometry is given. To quantify the potential performance for future gravity gradiometer instruments as an INS aid, extensive Monte Carlo simulations of a hypersonic scramjet cruise missile were performed. The results for the 1000 km range mission indicate that GGI updates significantly improve the navigation accuracy of the autonomous INS. The sensitivities of the system to variations in inertial measurement unit (IMU) quality, gravity field variation, GGI noise, update rate, and type are also investigated along with a baseline INS/Global Positioning System (GPS). Given emerging technologies that have the potential to drastically decrease gradiometer noise levels, a hypothetical future grade gravity gradiometer aided INS is shown to bound root-mean-square (RMS) position errors at 0.336 m, velocity errors at 0.0069 m/s, and attitude errors at 0.00977 degrees, which is comparable to the nominal INS/GPS system with 10 sec updates. The performance of two subsonic cases is also investigated and produced impressive passive navigation accuracy. A commercial aircraft simulation using a future grade GGI provided RMS errors of 0.288 m in position, 0.0050 m/s in velocity, and 0.0135 degrees in attitude. A low altitude and velocity gravity gradiometer based survey simulation similarly showed sub-meter RMS position errors of 0.539 m, velocity errors of 0.0094 m/s, and attitude errors of 0.0198 degrees.Item Topology Control and Pointing in Free Space Optical Networks(2007-12-05) Shim, Yohan; Gabriel, Steven A; Civil Engineering; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Free space optical (FSO) communication provides functionalities that are different from fiber optic networks and omnidirectional RF wireless communications in that FSO is optical wireless (no infrastructure installation cost involving fibers) and is highly directional (no frequency interference). Moreover, its high-speed data transmission capability is an attractive solution to the first or last mile problem to bridge to current fiber optic network and is a preferable alternative to the low data rate directional point-to-point RF communications for inter-building wireless local area networks. FSO networking depends critically on pointing, acquisition and tracking techniques for rapidly and precisely establishing and maintaining optical wireless links between network nodes (physical reconfiguration), and uses topology reconfiguration algorithms for optimizing network performance in terms of network cost and congestion (logical reconfiguration). The physical and logical reconfiguration process is called Topology Control and can allow FSO networks to offer quality of service by quickly responding to various traffic demands of network users and by efficiently managing network connectivity. The overall objective of this thesis research is to develop a methodology for self-organized pointing along with the associated autonomous and precise pointing technique as well as heuristic optimization methods for Topology Control in bi-connected FSO ring networks, in which each network node has two FSO transceivers. This research provides a unique, autonomous, and precise pointing method using GPS and local angular sensors, which is applicable to both mobile and static nodes in FSO networking and directional point-to-point RF communications with precise tracking. Through medium (264 meter) and short (40 meter) range pointing experiments using an outdoor testbed on the University of Maryland campus in College Park, sub-milliradian pointing accuracy is presented. In addition, this research develops fast and accurate heuristic methods for autonomous logical reconfiguration of bi-connected ring network topologies as well as a formal optimality gap measure tested on an extensive set of problems. The heuristics are polynomial time algorithms for a congestion minimization problem at the network layer and for a multiobjective stochastic optimization of network cost and congestion at both the physical and network layers.