University of Pennsylvania
Department of Electrical
Engineering
Senior Design Project Abstracts
1996- 1997
Authors : Juan M. Roman Lourdes C. Moreno
Advisor: Dr. Van der Spiegel
Human beings depend on their eyes for 99% of the information they receive from their surroundings. The use of imaging devices with computers is essential in research to better understand how the eye sees. For this purpose, the display, and processing of acquired images with the aid of a PC has become increasingly important in this field. The goal of this project was to design, fabricate and test an interface between an image sensor and a PC monitor. The sensor reads a static image in black and white and routes it to the interface as an 8 bit per pixel digital stream. How this image is displayed on the PC was also examined.
The project can be divided in the following three stages: * Frame acquisition * Driver interface to PC * Image display An ITC-232A board was used as a frame acquisition device to receive the parallel digital readout coming from the image sensor. The board converts the 8 bit data into an ASCII representation of the pixel, and serially forwards the data bits to the PC when indicated. Timing synchronization is achieved by reading the pixel and frame pulses into a driver interface, which forwards the signals to the computer according to the RS-232 protocol.
Once the image is received by the PC through the serial port, the data is mapped into the Windows environment and correctly displayed. An image display code was developed in Visual Basic for this purpose. It provides a user-interface that permits the manipulation of the displayed frame, including save and print options.
Authors : Rishi K. Patel Tim Weingarten
Advisor: Professor Nelson Dorny
Digital Subscriber Line (DSL) technologies allow transmission of digital data at speeds of 1 to 5 Mbps over normal, unconditioned copper phone lines. This technology will be used in the near future for a host of broadband communications applications. One of the more mature DSL technologies is High-bit-rate Digital Subscriber Line (HDSL). HDSL allows transmission of data at 1.544 Mbps up to a distance of 3 km over copper phone lines. The goal of this project is to use HDSL transmission technology to construct a modem to transmit T1 data without the need for T1 lines. The modem is transparent to the T1 system. The design consists of T1 framers and transceivers along with HDSL modules provided by PairGain Technologies. This system provides a cheap substitute to installing and servicing T1 lines to connect two sites.
Authors : Lin Ping Ang Raymond Tong Dong Joon Yoon
Advisor: Professor Jan Van der Spiegel
The recent development in the image sensor technology, particularly the Active Pixel Sensor (APS) concept, has opened up tremendous opportunities for applications in various fields. State-of-the-art high end image sensors use what is called Charge-Coupled Devices (CCDs), which have a major drawback of requiring near-perfect charge transfer efficiency (CTE). And the APS concept addresses this problem of CCD by using active transistors in each pixel to transfer the signals and drive the readout lines.
The APS chip consists of an array of 42 x 60 image sensors, for a total of 2520 pixels, using the photogate configuration. The goal of this project was to develop a low cost, high performance digital Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor (CMOS) camera incorporating the APS concept. A 2 mm x 2 mm tiny chip, consisting of 14,500 transistors, has been successfully designed, fabricated and tested. Also, a test bench was designed and built to interface the image sensor to a PC.
Authors :
Authors : Michael Feng and Chun Chan
Advisor: Phil Farnum
A 50 MHz wireless surveillance system was successfully designed, constructed and implemented. It consisted of a transmitter that when activated, broadcast an encoded binary message. A receiver successfully decoded the transmitted message and informed the user via an LED. In the wireless surveillance system, the transmitter acted as a sensor alarm circuit that activated when any door/window opened within a household or business environment. In addition, each transmitter possessed a personalized code. This code represented a specific location such as a door or window.
Since typical surveillance systems require a third party to install and to monitor, the wireless surveillance system emphasized a cost effective and simple system that could be easily implemented without any technical expertise. Areas of concern included frequency range, power link budget, security encryption and component (e.g. receiver, transmitter, antenna) research.
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Authors :
Author : Ana G. Lacaze
Advisor: Dr Badler
Simulations of human figures have become part of our everyday visual culture through advertisement, movies and entertainment. However, there are very few human simulations that have hair. Most cyber-humans have a rigid skullcap or helmet-like hair. In this project a simple hair model that can yield realistic looking images is proposed. The model calculates the position of each strand under environmental stresses by using a finite element analysis. Animation of a head of hair was implemented under gravity and wind.
Author : Ryan Crowell
Advisors: Santosh Venkatesh and Gui Karyo
Processing algorithms for the extraction of the musical content from a human singing voice have been designed. The algorithms were worked out completely independently from any particular hardware implementation, allowing an application engineer considerable flexibility in designing a product around this system. The Voice to Pitch system can extract the pitch, amplitude, and timing information from an incoming note.
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Authors :
Author : Darian Wong
Advisor : Dr. Dillon
The goal of this project was to develop a method that will acquire three-dimensional data from an existing setup that is limited to two-dimensional information. A laser scanning system is being used to optically map patterns of electrical activation on the epicardium of Langendorf perfused hearts of New Zealand White rabbits. The research is being conducted in conjunction with Dr. Stephen Dillon's Lab at the Allegheny University Hospital. Dr. Dillon's lab has devised a scheme to observe the propagation patterns and the action potentials of cardiac impulses across the epicardium of a Langendorf perfused rabbit's heart. A CCD (charged coupled device) camera was added to the setup to acquire three-dimensional information. This camera was placed at a known, precise angle with respect to the plane of the laser beam. In this way the camera, together with a laser scanned grid upon the surface of the heart, was able to record images that yielded information about the curvature of the heart. Together with the data taken from the optical mapping system, geometric distortions have been corrected in the conduction maps. All processing was performed through a program written in Matlab. Bitmap images taken from the "Snappy" frame grabber, which digitizes images from the CCD camera, were read into the program. Intersection points of the laser scanned grid were chosen from the images and together with input parameters such as camera angle and grid pattern distances, a three-dimensional map was constructed representing the surface of the heart. Using the technique of projection mapping, x and y displacement values were calculated and deflection matrices were constructed. These deflection matrices, for both the x and y direction displacements were then used to warp the laser scanned image of the heart to account for the curvature of the surface.
Student: Darian Wong
Author : Mei Yee Lui
Advisor : Dr. Kassam
Noise weakens and corrupts an original signal. Since noise is difficult to avoid, filtering becomes necessary. An adaptive noise canceller was successfully designed, built and tested for the project using digital signal processing (DSP). This noise canceller optimally filters a reference noise from a noisy signal containing both signal and interference.
Adaptive noise cancellation is employed in the project as opposed to direct filtering, because the former allows the processing of inputs whose properties are unknown or non-stationary. This adaptive capability leads to a stable system that turns itself off automatically when no improvement in the output signal-to-noise ratio can be achieved.
This project was divided into two major tasks:
-Hardware design of adder and multiplexer
-Software implementation of adaptive noise cancellation using DSP TMS320C30 Evaluation Module (EVM) board
Although there are many applications for the adaptive noise canceller, this project focused on its audio applications..
Author : Jonah Parinsky
Advisor : Dr. Johnson
Two- and three- dimensional periodic dielectric structures ("photonic crystals") have optical band structures analogous to the electronic band structures of atomic crystals. They should allow direct control of atomic light emission, leading to a new generation of high-efficiency laser diodes and lightguides. I have combined electron beam lithography and surface modification to fabricate two-dimensional photonic crystals of 474nm polystyrene spheres arranged in various geometries. In the future we plan to extend the structures into the third dimension using "convective assembly" techniques being explored by others in our lab.
Authors : Maria Valdes, Raul Planas
Advisor : Dr. Ketterer
The purpose of the Electronic Nurse is to substitute in-home care for certain individuals for whom the cost of a live-in nurse would be excessive. The Nurse will receive periodic data calls from the doctor's office to download data containing the doctor's requests (e.g. medication needs). Data is protected from power outages through a battery backup. The Nurse will voice synthesize these requests and require that the patient push an acknowledgment button. If acknowledgment is not received, the Nurse will notify the doctor's office about the incident. The doctor can then decide if this is an emergency . The Nurse will also include a "panic" button that can be activated by the patient to notify the doctor's office of a possible emergency. The device will be about the size and cost of a smart answering machine and will be transparent to normal telephone operation.
Author : Radoslav K Koitchev
Advisors: Dr. Van Berg, Dr. van der Spiegel
The objective of this Senior Design Project is to design and fabricate the memory and logic circuitry of the Memory Read Out Chip (MROC), while meeting both size and performance specifications. The MROC is to be deployed in the ATLAS detector section of the Hadron Collider at CERN when the accelerator becomes operational shortly after the year 2000. Design efforts have been focused on the synthesis of both static and dynamic unit memory cells with minimum transistor count. Another major accomplishment has been the minimization of the unit cell layout area. The assembled chip was sent out for fabrication on March 21, 1997. Investigation into memory testing strategies has also been carried out. >From these, the relevant test vectors are created and converted into binary form that can be used as input stimulus for the HP82000 test hardware.
Author : Tyler Arnold
Advisor : Dr. Smith
As computer networks go to higher speeds and levels of complexity, the need for highly efficient methods of maintaining throughput grows. Protocol boosters are a method of altering network processing in such a way as to increase efficiency. The purpose of the project will be to design a unique platform for testing protocol booster algorithms in hardware. This board will be able to dynamically reconfigure itself through the use of Altera field-programmable-gate-arrays to implement protocol functions . It will serve as a primary test-bed for further research into dynamic protocol processing in conjunction with the Distributed Systems Lab (DSL).
A library of selected compiled hardware programs for the FPGAâs are stored in memory. The selected library components will be downloaded into the FPGAâs and set their function. The two protocol boosters implemented for this project are a parallel convolutional encoder and Viterbi decoder used for forward error control.
Authors : Chris Hong, Yang Chung
Advisor : Dr. Farber
This project involves designing an intermediate protocol driver which serves to manage network resources such that communications over multiple network devices is transparent to the end user. The motivation of such functionality arises from the applicability to many systems such as cable networks and satellite transmission, taking advantage of the highly asymmetrical nature of a typical end users traffic flow characteristics. A lack of standards in the industry is a major barrier to widespread acceptance of realistic solutions to growing demands for high speed networking to the home. We present a means to simplify data traffic coordination for the Microsoft Windows NT operating system, allowing for scalability and efficient operation.
Authors : Thomas Warner Peter Wisniewski Simon Barere (CSE)
Advisor : Dr. Vijay Gehlot
The main objective of the project is to provide for Lockheed Martin business managers a Web-based forum for the reviewing of financial data and for the sharing of ideas and information in an efficient and orderly manner. Because Lockheed Martin EIS Business Operations is an umbrella organization for a wide variety of smaller technology firms scattered throughout the country, this kind of information sharing is essential to the productivity of each individual firm and for Lockheed Martin as a whole. Only continuous communication between all the business managers will result in a unified company which seeks the most productive and efficient answers to the many questions implicit in a large organization.
The proposal is to use the current Internet Web technology as a platform for the communications system. The system would use The Corporate Intranet of Lockheed Martin as the network backbone, a Netscape Enterprise Server v2.0 as the system software server, and Web browsers (namely Netscape Navigator) as the client software interface. The software will consist primarily of HTML applications, but also commercial discussion group software, Javascript programming, and Perl programming. The applications developed included an Interactive Organizational Chart Page, a Help Desk Form, Capital Expenditure Request Form, a Financial Calendar, and a Database Administration Application.
For information, contact Prof. F. Ketterer (ketterer@ee.upenn.edu)
Updated May 12, 1996
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