Developing an Active Contours Model for Layer Detection from Polar Radar Imagery
Summer 2015
Indiana University Bloomington

Mentor:Mr. Jerome Mitchell
Poster (ppt)(pdf)

Abstract:
The focus of this project is to explore learning algorithms for automatically detecting layer boundaries from images collected from the Polar Regions, specifically Antarctica images. . Layer boundaries are incorporated into climate models for forecasting a rise in sea level but are difficult to extract from noisy images. Currently, glaciologists manually identify layer boundaries, which is time-consuming and requires sparse hand selection.

An active contours model will be explored for detecting layer boundaries. An active contours model (snake) is used in computer vision for object tracking, shape recognition, segmentation, and edge detection. The snake algorithm is an energy optimization spline guided by an outside constraint force and influenced by image forces, which would pull it toward layer boundaries.

Documentation of Site Preparation for Installation of SeaSpace Ground Stations at ECSU
Spring Semester 2015
Elizabeth City State University

Keywords:
SeaSpace, TREX, TeraScan, CentOS, Visualization Stations, TeraVault, Monitoring Systems, GOES

Mentor: Mr. Michael Osterhouse & Mr. Andrew Brumfield
http://nia.ecsu.edu/ur/1415/teams/terascan/Homepage.html

Abstract:
In September 2014, a transition was made to a direct purchase and installation of Seaspace hardware and software. The installation of the Seaspace hardware included: 15 Visualization stations, 2 monitoring systems, a Teravault raw storage device, and a TeraScan Rapid Environmental X-treme (TREX) high-powered processor. The installation of the Seaspace software on the 15 Visualization stations included: an updated version of TeraScan, which includes the Graphical User Interfaces TeraVision and TeraMaster, and CentOs, which is a Linux-based Operating System. Also two 5.0m L band systems were installed on Dixon-Patterson hall in the summer of 2012. The purpose of this project was to document the installation requirements and internal processes at ECSU for Seaspace Hardware and Software Equipment, with also addressing; the location of engineering findings, location of installation requirements, repositioning and securing current ground stations, and proper training center needs.

Evaluating the Performance of MPI Java in FutureGRID
Summer 2014
Indiana University Bloomington

Keywords:
MPI, HPC, OpenMPI, FastMPJ, Benchmark

Mentor:Dr. Geoffrey Fox & Mr. Saliya Enkayanke
https://github.com/cloudmesh/reu/blob/master/doc/source/projects/mpi-java-test.rst
Poster(ppt)

Abstract:
Message Passage Interface (MPI) has been popular in developing tightly coupled parallel applications in the high performance computing (HPC) domain. The majority of such applications are based on either C, C++ or Fortran. The recent advancement in big data, however, has brought attention towards Java. Effort has also been put on Java's support for HPC with flavors of MPI such as OpenMPI Java and FastMPJ. We evaluate these against native C based MPI on a set of standard micro-benchmarks from Ohio State University. The results show a promising future with Java and MPI for HPC applications.

Multimedia Team
Spring Semester 2014
Elizabeth City State University

Keywords:
GOES, PHP, TeraScan, ImageMagick, Macintosh OSX, MySQL, Remore Sensing

Mentor:Mr. Jeff Wood
http://nia.ecsu.edu/ur/1314/teams/mmt/

Abstract:
The Center of Excellence in Remote Sensing Education and Research (CERSER) on the campus of Elizabeth City State University is currently tasked with the responsibility of receiving remotely sensed data from National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Polar Operational Environmental Satellites (POES) and Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites (GOES). This data is collected by SeaSpace TeraScan systems installed in the CERSER labs in Dixon-Patterson Hall.

In 2005, the processing system underwent a major update due to a migration to a new operating system. A minor update was needed at this time to deal with a second operating system migration and display of the processed images on the CERSER web site. Since then, a second transfer to a new server was made in 2013. The cataloguing system went down at this time and was not repaired due to technical issues with the TeraScan system. The 2014 team corrected issues within the current server directory system and updated the data script to process images from the GOES-13 satellite received by the TeraScan system. Software and languages utilized for this task included ImageMagick, PHP, HTML, Dreamweaver, phpMyAdmin, and MySQL.

Along with this operating system update, a major script development was needed on the TeraScan processing equipment due to an upgrade in hardware. The ground station upgrades included a 3.7m X/L band, a 3.6m C band, and a 5.0m L band dishes, along with accompanying computing hardware.

This project implemented new script on the TeraScan and CERSER servers. This new script processes both infrared and visible light images received from the GOES-13 satellite into the Tagged Image File (TIFF) Format.

Analysis of Traditional Herb on Brine Shrimp
Viking Enhancing Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (VESTEM)
Summer 2013
Elizabeth City State University

Keywords:
Brine Shrimp, Refluxation, Dilution

Mentor:Mrs. Shante Armwood Outlaw
Presentation(ppt)

Abstract:
The purpose of this study was to test the behavior patterns of Brine Shrimp based on the extracts of Thyme and Rosemary mixed in their water. The hypothesis was Rosemary would affect the brine shrimp’s behavior, specifically movement more than thyme; however, based on this study the hypothesis was incorrect. The processes used in this experiment were Refluxation and Dilution.