In plasma etching process it is critical to know when the film being etched has cleared to the underlying film, i.e. to detect endpoint, in order to achieve the desired device performance in the resulting integrated circuit. The most highly…

Gene expression arrays are a technology used to measure quantities of messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA). Application of the technology involves a variety of physical processes beginning with the acquisition of mRNA samples and ending with the fluorescence imaging of a…

Sensors are increasingly being used for continuous monitoring purposes, the process of which generates huge volumes of data that need to be mined for interesting events in real-time. The purpose of this research is to develop a method to identify…

This paper demonstrates the importance of knowledge for effective
management of outsourcing. Drawing on an empirical study on automakers?
management of supplier involvement in product development in Japan, this paper shows
that the level of own knowledge is critical for…

How can we insure that knowledge embedded in a program is applied effectively? Traditionally the answer to this question has been sought in different problem solving paradigms and in different approaches to encoding and indexing knowledge. Each of these is…

Traditional scheduling algorithms (using the techniques of PERT charts, decision analysis or operations research) require well-defined quantitative, complete sets of constraints. They are insufficient for scheduling situations where the problem description is ill-defined, involving incomplete, possibly inconsistent and generally qualitative…

(cont.) which is expected, given their additional knowledge resources. The respondents' urgency in looking for the relevant knowledge is the primary explanation for this difference between the two networks. This difference in knowledge networking among the different groups did not…

his dissertation analyzes how local knowledge improves environmental decisions. The premise is that controlling pollution and addressing public health disparities are not problems that professionals alone can solve. Concerned lay publics, especially low-income populations and people of color that experience…

This thesis examines the evolution of Internet based knowledge networks (e-knowledge networks) in the domain of sustainable development. The objective of this thesis is to use an engineering systems approach to understand knowledge networks, identify the barriers to their sustainability…

In a Communication Bootstrapping system, peer components with different perceptual worlds invent symbols and syntax based on correlations between their percepts. I propose that Communication Bootstrapping can also be used to acquire functional definitions of words and causal reasoning knowledge.…