MASTER OF SCIENCE THESIS DEFENSE BY: Brandon David Malaguti
When: Tuesday,
May 19, 2015
1:00 PM
-
3:00 PM
Where: > See description for location
Cost: free
Description: TOPIC: MONITORING REAL TIME PAVEMENT CONDITIONS USING AN RFID WIRELESS SENSING NETWORK
LOCATION: Lester W. Cory Conference Room
Science & Engineering Building (Group II), Room 213A
ABSTRACT:
States deal with below freezing weather causing roads and the ground below to freeze. When the ground begins to thaw, ice melts, leaving the ground under the roads softer. Large trucks carrying heavy loads can cause permanent damage to roads when the roads are in a soft state. For this reason, a seasonal load restriction (SLR) policy is implemented to restrict truck loads during the road thaw period. Consequently, SLR imposition results in a lack of profit from trucking and related industry. During the SLR period there are times when the roads could be safe for larger loads. Currently, no cheap real-time method exists for roads to be monitored to allow trucks to change loads based on real-time circumstances.
The proposed solution to this problem is to implement an affordable system for monitoring road temperatures and moisture using radio frequency identification (RFID) sensors. To successfully place and remove SLRs, the RFID sensors need to detect the current condition of the pavement and relay the condition to a collector, or RFID reader. The current condition of the pavement is measured through the use of external temperature and moisture sensors. An onboard microcontroller unit (MCU) gathers the measured readings and store them into memory with a corresponding time. The MCU connects to an RF transceiver allowing for the data in memory to be wirelessly transmitted to an RFID reader. Collected data is used by the State Department of Transportation (DOT) to properly decide the real-time road conditions on a daily or hourly basis, effectively allowing the DOT to place or remove restrictions as necessary.
NOTE: All ECE Graduate Students are ENCOURAGED to attend.
All interested parties are invited to attend.
Open to the public.
Advisor: Dr. Paul J. Fortier
Committee Members: Dr. David Rancour and Dr. Honggang Wang, Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering and Dr. Heather Miller, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
LOCATION: Lester W. Cory Conference Room
Science & Engineering Building (Group II), Room 213A
ABSTRACT:
States deal with below freezing weather causing roads and the ground below to freeze. When the ground begins to thaw, ice melts, leaving the ground under the roads softer. Large trucks carrying heavy loads can cause permanent damage to roads when the roads are in a soft state. For this reason, a seasonal load restriction (SLR) policy is implemented to restrict truck loads during the road thaw period. Consequently, SLR imposition results in a lack of profit from trucking and related industry. During the SLR period there are times when the roads could be safe for larger loads. Currently, no cheap real-time method exists for roads to be monitored to allow trucks to change loads based on real-time circumstances.
The proposed solution to this problem is to implement an affordable system for monitoring road temperatures and moisture using radio frequency identification (RFID) sensors. To successfully place and remove SLRs, the RFID sensors need to detect the current condition of the pavement and relay the condition to a collector, or RFID reader. The current condition of the pavement is measured through the use of external temperature and moisture sensors. An onboard microcontroller unit (MCU) gathers the measured readings and store them into memory with a corresponding time. The MCU connects to an RF transceiver allowing for the data in memory to be wirelessly transmitted to an RFID reader. Collected data is used by the State Department of Transportation (DOT) to properly decide the real-time road conditions on a daily or hourly basis, effectively allowing the DOT to place or remove restrictions as necessary.
NOTE: All ECE Graduate Students are ENCOURAGED to attend.
All interested parties are invited to attend.
Open to the public.
Advisor: Dr. Paul J. Fortier
Committee Members: Dr. David Rancour and Dr. Honggang Wang, Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering and Dr. Heather Miller, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Contact:
ECE: Electrical & Computer Engineering Department 508.999.9164 http://www.umassd.edu/engineering/ece/
Topical Areas: General Public, University Community, Electrical and Computer Engineering