Defense Notices


All students and faculty are welcome to attend the final defense of EECS graduate students completing their M.S. or Ph.D. degrees. Defense notices for M.S./Ph.D. presentations for this year and several previous years are listed below in reverse chronological order.

Students who are nearing the completion of their M.S./Ph.D. research should schedule their final defenses through the EECS graduate office at least THREE WEEKS PRIOR to their presentation date so that there is time to complete the degree requirements check, and post the presentation announcement online.

Upcoming Defense Notices

Md Mashfiq Rizvee

Hierarchical Probabilistic Architectures for Scalable Biometric and Electronic Authentication in Secure Surveillance Ecosystems

When & Where:


Eaton Hall, Room 2001B

Committee Members:

Sumaiya Shomaji, Chair
Tamzidul Hoque
David Johnson
Hongyang Sun
Alexandra Kondyli

Abstract

Secure and scalable authentication has become a primary requirement in modern digital ecosystems, where both human biometrics and electronic identities must be verified under noise, large population growth and resource constraints. Existing approaches often struggle to simultaneously provide storage efficiency, dynamic updates and strong authentication reliability. The proposed work advances a unified probabilistic framework based on Hierarchical Bloom Filter (HBF) architectures to address these limitations across biometric and hardware domains. The first contribution establishes the Dynamic Hierarchical Bloom Filter (DHBF) as a noise-tolerant and dynamically updatable authentication structure for large-scale biometrics. Unlike static Bloom-based systems that require reconstruction upon updates, DHBF supports enrollment, querying, insertion and deletion without structural rebuild. Experimental evaluation on 30,000 facial biometric templates demonstrates 100% enrollment and query accuracy, including robust acceptance of noisy biometric inputs while maintaining correct rejection of non-enrolled identities. These results validate that hierarchical probabilistic encoding can preserve both scalability and authentication reliability in practical deployments. Building on this foundation, Bio-BloomChain integrates DHBF into a blockchain-based smart contract framework to provide tamper-evident, privacy-preserving biometric lifecycle management. The system stores only hashed and non-invertible commitments on-chain while maintaining probabilistic verification logic within the contract layer. Large-scale evaluation again reports 100% enrollment, insertion, query and deletion accuracy across 30,000 templates, therefore, solving the existing problem of blockchains being able to authenticate noisy data. Moreover, the deployment analysis shows that execution on Polygon zkEVM reduces operational costs by several orders of magnitude compared to Ethereum, therefore, bringing enrollment and deletion costs below $0.001 per operation which demonstrate the feasibility of scalable blockchain biometric authentication in practice. Finally, the hierarchical probabilistic paradigm is extended to electronic hardware authentication through the Persistent Hierarchical Bloom Filter (PHBF). Applied to electronic fingerprints derived from physical unclonable functions (PUFs), PHBF demonstrates robust authentication under environmental variations such as temperature-induced noise. Experimental results show zero-error operation at the selected decision threshold and substantial system-level improvements as well as over 10^5 faster query processing and significantly reduced storage requirements compared to large scale tracking.


Fatima Al-Shaikhli

Optical Measurements Leveraging Coherent Fiber Optics Transceivers

When & Where:


Nichols Hall, Room 246 (Executive Conference Room)

Committee Members:

Rongqing Hui, Chair
Shannon Blunt
Shima Fardad
Alessandro Salandrino
Judy Wu

Abstract

Recent advancements in optical technology are invaluable in a variety of fields, extending far beyond high-speed communications. These innovations enable optical sensing, which plays a critical role across diverse applications, from medical diagnostics to infrastructure monitoring and automotive systems. This research focuses on leveraging commercially available coherent optical transceivers to develop novel measurement techniques to extract detailed information about optical fiber characteristics, as well as target information. Through this approach, we aim to enable accurate and fast assessments of fiber performance and integrity, while exploring the potential for utilizing existing optical communication networks to enhance fiber characterization capabilities. This goal is investigated through three distinct projects: (1) fiber type characterization based on intensity-modulated electrostriction response, (2) coherent Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) system for target range and velocity detection through different waveform design, including experimental validation of frequency modulation continuous wave (FMCW) implementations and theoretical analysis of orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) based approaches and (3) birefringence measurements using a coherent Polarization-sensitive Optical Frequency Domain Reflectometer (P-OFDR) system.

Electrostriction in an optical fiber is introduced by interaction between the forward propagated optical signal and the acoustic standing waves in the radial direction resonating between the center of the core and the cladding circumference of the fiber. The response of electrostriction is dependent on fiber parameters, especially the mode field radius. We demonstrated a novel technique of identifying fiber types through the measurement of intensity modulation induced electrostriction response. As the spectral envelope of electrostriction induced propagation loss is anti-symmetrical, the signal to noise ratio can be significantly increased by subtracting the measured spectrum from its complex conjugate. We show that if the field distribution of the fiber propagation mode is Gaussian, the envelope of the electrostriction-induced loss spectrum closely follows a Maxwellian distribution whose shape can be specified by a single parameter determined by the mode field radius.        

We also present a self-homodyne FMCW LiDAR system based on a coherent receiver. By using the same linearly chirped waveform for both the LiDAR signal and the local oscillator, the self-homodyne coherent receiver performs frequency de-chirping directly in the photodiodes, significantly simplifying signal processing. As a result, the required receiver bandwidth is much lower than the chirping bandwidth of the signal. Simultaneous multi-target of range and velocity detection is demonstrated experimentally. Furthermore, we explore the use of commercially available coherent transceivers for joint communication and sensing using OFDM waveforms.

In addition, we demonstrate a P-OFDR system utilizing a digital coherent optical transceiver to generate a linear frequency chirp via carrier-suppressed single-sideband modulation. This method ensures linearity in chirping and phase continuity of the optical carrier. The coherent homodyne receiver, incorporating both polarization and phase diversity, recovers the state of polarization (SOP) of the backscattered optical signal along the fiber, mixing with an identically chirped local oscillator. With a spatial resolution of approximately 5 mm, a 26 GHz chirping bandwidth, and a 200 us measurement time, this system enables precise birefringence measurements. By employing three mutually orthogonal SOPs of the launched optical signal, we measure relative birefringence vectors along the fiber.


Past Defense Notices

Dates

PAVAN KUMAR MOTURU

Image Processing Techniques in Matlab GUI

When & Where:


246 Nichols Hall

Committee Members:

Carl Leuschen, Chair
Chris Allen
Fernando Rodriguez-Morales


Abstract

Identifying missing bed in radar data is very important in sea level changes. Increase in sea level is a problem of global importance because of its impact on infrastructure. Ice sheets in the Greenland and Antarctic are melting and increasing their contribution to sea level change over the last decade. Measuring ice sheets thickness is required to estimate sea level rise. We need to use several algorithms, pre-defined functions to extract the weak bed echoes, but we don’t have a tool in Matlab which contains some important algorithms like ImageJ. We can’t process all the data in ImageJ as Matlab produces better results compared to ImageJ as some of the functions like window and symmetric selection around center in FFT domain are not implemented in ImageJ. 
In this project, we will investigate the application of some image processing techniques using a GUI developed for analyzing ice sounding radargrams. One key advantage of the tool is that the image processing techniques are applied in a single GUI instead of doing separately. We apply these techniques on the data which came after applying extensive signal processing techniques. After performing these techniques, we compare the processed data with the original data. 


ASHWINI BALACHANDRA

Implementation of Truncated Lévy Walk Mobility Model in ns-3

When & Where:


246 Nichols Hall

Committee Members:

James Sterbenz, Chair
Victor Frost
Fengjun Li


Abstract

Mobility models generate the mobility patterns of the nodes in a given system. Mobility models help us to analyze and study the characteristic of new and existing systems. Various mobility models implemented in network simulation tools like ns-3 does not model the patterns of human mobility. The main idea of this project is to implement the truncated Lévy walk mobility model in ns-3. The model has two variations, in the first variation, the flight length and pause time of the nodes are determined from the truncated Pareto distribution and in the second variation, Lévy distribution models the flight length and pause time distributions and the values are obtained by Lévy α-stable random number generator. The mobility patterns of the nodes are generated and analyzed for the model by changing various model attributes. Further studies can be done to understand the behavior of these models for different ad hoc networking protocols. 

 

 


MOHSEN ALEENEJAD

New Modulation Methods and Control Strategies for Power Converters

When & Where:


1 Eaton Hall

Committee Members:

Reza Ahmadi, Chair
Glenn Prescott
Alessandro Salandrino
Jim Stiles
Huazhen Fang

Abstract

The DC to AC power Inverters (so-called Inverters) are widely used in industrial applications. The multilevel Inverters are becoming increasingly popular in industrial apparatus aimed at medium to high power conversion applications. In comparison to the conventional inverters, they feature superior characteristics such as lower total harmonic distortion (THD), higher efficiency, and lower switching voltage stress{Malinowski, 2010 #9}{Malinowski, 2010 #9}. Nevertheless, the superior characteristics come at the price of a more complex topology with an increased number of power electronic switches. As a general rule in a Inverter topology, as the number of power electronic switches increases, the chances of fault occurrence on of the switches increases, and thus the Inverter’s reliability decreases. Due to the extreme monetary ramifications of the interruption of operation in commercial and industrial applications, high reliability for power Inverters utilized in these sectors is critical. As a result, developing fault-tolerant operation schemes for multilevel Inverters has always been an interesting topic for researchers in related areas. The purpose of this proposal is to develop new control and fault-tolerant strategies for the multilevel power Inverter. In the event of a fault, the line voltages of the faulty Inverters are unbalanced and cannot be applied to the three phase loads. This fault-tolerant strategy generates balanced line voltages without bypassing any healthy and operative Inverter element, makes better use of the Inverter capacity and generates higher output voltage. This strategy exploits the advantages of the Selective Harmonic Elimination (SHE) method in conjunction with a slightly modified Fundamental Phase Shift Compensation technique to generate balanced voltages and manipulate voltage harmonics at the same time. However, due to the distinctive requirement of the strategy to manipulate both amplitude and angle of the harmonics, the conventional SHE technique is not the suitable basis for the proposed strategy. Therefore, in this project a modified Unbalanced SHE technique which can be used as the basis for the fault-tolerant strategy is developed. The proposed strategy is applicable to several classes of multilevel Inverters with three or more voltage levels. 


MOHSEN ALEENEJAD

New Modulation Methods and Control Strategies for Power Converters

When & Where:


1 Eaton Hall

Committee Members:

Reza Ahmadi, Chair
Glenn Prescott
Alessandro Salandrino
Jim Stiles
Huazhen Fang

Abstract

The DC to AC power Inverters (so-called Inverters) are widely used in industrial applications. The multilevel Inverters are becoming increasingly popular in industrial apparatus aimed at medium to high power conversion applications. In comparison to the conventional inverters, they feature superior characteristics such as lower total harmonic distortion (THD), higher efficiency, and lower switching voltage stress{Malinowski, 2010 #9}{Malinowski, 2010 #9}. Nevertheless, the superior characteristics come at the price of a more complex topology with an increased number of power electronic switches. As a general rule in a Inverter topology, as the number of power electronic switches increases, the chances of fault occurrence on of the switches increases, and thus the Inverter’s reliability decreases. Due to the extreme monetary ramifications of the interruption of operation in commercial and industrial applications, high reliability for power Inverters utilized in these sectors is critical. As a result, developing fault-tolerant operation schemes for multilevel Inverters has always been an interesting topic for researchers in related areas. The purpose of this proposal is to develop new control and fault-tolerant strategies for the multilevel power Inverter. In the event of a fault, the line voltages of the faulty Inverters are unbalanced and cannot be applied to the three phase loads. This fault-tolerant strategy generates balanced line voltages without bypassing any healthy and operative Inverter element, makes better use of the Inverter capacity and generates higher output voltage. This strategy exploits the advantages of the Selective Harmonic Elimination (SHE) method in conjunction with a slightly modified Fundamental Phase Shift Compensation technique to generate balanced voltages and manipulate voltage harmonics at the same time. However, due to the distinctive requirement of the strategy to manipulate both amplitude and angle of the harmonics, the conventional SHE technique is not the suitable basis for the proposed strategy. Therefore, in this project a modified Unbalanced SHE technique which can be used as the basis for the fault-tolerant strategy is developed. The proposed strategy is applicable to several classes of multilevel Inverters with three or more voltage levels.


SIVA RAM DATTA BOBBA

Rule Induction For Numerical Data using PRISM

When & Where:


2001B Eaton Hall

Committee Members:

Jerzy Grzymala-Busse, Chair
Bo Luo
James Miller


Abstract

Rule induction is one of the basic and important techniques of data mining. Inducing a rule set for symbolic data is simple and straightforward, but it becomes complex when the attributes are numerical. There are several algorithms available that do the task of rule induction for symbolic data. One such algorithm is PRISM which uses conditional probability for attribute-value selection to induce a rule. 
In the real world scenario, data may comprise of either symbolic or numerical attributes. It becomes difficult to induce a discriminant ruleset on the data with numerical attributes. This project provides an implementation of PRISM to handle numerical data. First, it takes as input, a dataset with numerical attributes and converts them into discrete values using the multiple scanning approach which identifies the cut-points for intervals using minimum conditional entropy. Once discretization completes, PRISM uses these discrete values to induce ruleset for each decision. Thus, this project helps to induce modular rulesets over a numerical dataset. 

 

 


NILISHA MANE

Tools to Explore Run-time Program Properties

When & Where:


246 Nichols Hall

Committee Members:

Prasad Kulkarni, Chair
Perry Alexander
Gary Minden


Abstract

The advancement in the field of embedded technology has resulted in its extensive use in almost all the modern electronic devices. Hence, unlike in the past, there is a very crucial need to develop system security tools for these devices. So far most of the research has been concentrated either on security for general computer systems or on static analysis of embedded systems. In this project, we develop tools that explore and monitor the run-time properties of programs/applications as well as the inter-process communication. We also present a case studies in which these tools are be used on a Gumstix (an embedded system) running Poky Linux system to monitor a particular program as well as print out a graph of all inter-process communication on the system.


BRIAN MACHARIA

UWB Microwave Filters on Multilayer LCP Substrates: A Feasibility Study

When & Where:


317 Nichols Hall

Committee Members:

Carl Leuschen, Chair
Fernando Rodriguez-Morales
Chris Allen


Abstract

Having stable dielectric properties extending to frequencies over 110 GHz, Liquid Crystal Polymer (LCP) materials are a new and promising substrate alternative for low-cost production of planar microwave circuits. This project focused on the design of several microwave filter structures using multiple layers for operation in the 2-18 GHz and 10-14 GHz bands. Circuits were simulated and optimized using EDA tools, obtaining good results over the bands of interest. The results show that it is feasible to fabricate these structures on dielectric substrates compatible with off-site manufacturing facilities. It is likewise shown that LCP technology can yield a 3-5x area reduction as compared to cavity-type filters, making them much easier to integrate in a planar circuit.


Md. MOSHFEQUR RAHMAN

OpenFlow based Multipath Communication for Resilience

When & Where:


246 Nichols Hall

Committee Members:

James Sterbenz, Chair
Victor Frost
Fengjun Li


Abstract

A cross-layer framework in the Software Defined Networking domain is pro- posed to study the resilience in OpenFlow-based multipath communication. A testbed has been built, using Brocade OpenFlow switches and Dell Poweredge servers. The framework is evaluated against regional challenges. By using differ- ent adjacency matrices, various topologies are built. The behavior of OpenFlow multipath-based communication is studied in case of a single path failure, splitting of traffic and also with multipath TCP enabled traffic. The behavior of different coupled congestion algorithms for MPTCP is also studied. A Web framework is presented to demonstrate the OpenFlow experiment by importing the network topologies and then executing and analyzing user defined regional attacks.


RAGAPRABHA CHINNASWAMY

A Comparison of Maximal Consistent Blocks and Characteristics Sets for Incomplete Data Sets

When & Where:


2001B Eaton Hall

Committee Members:

Jerzy Grzymala-Busse, Chair
Prasad Kulkarni
Bo Luo


Abstract

One of the main applications of rough set theory is rule induction. If the input data set contains inconsistencies, using rough set theory leads to inducing certain and possible rule sets. 
In this project, the concept of a maximal consistent block is applied to formulate a new approximation to a concept in the incomplete data set with a higher level of accuracy. This method does not require change in the size of the original incomplete data set. Two interpretations of missing attribute values are discussed: lost values and “do not care” conditions. The main objective is to compare maximal consistent blocks and characteristics sets in terms of cardinality of lower and upper approximations. Four incomplete data sets are used for experiments with varying levels of missing information. The next objective is to compare the decision rules induced and cases covered by both techniques. The experiments show that the both techniques provide the same lower approximations for all the datasets with “do not care” conditions. The best results are achieved by maximal consistent blocks for upper approximations for three datasets and there is a tie for the other data set. 


PRAVEEN YARLAGADDA

A Comparison of Rule Sets Generated by Algorithms: AQ, C4.5, and CART

When & Where:


2001B Eaton Hall

Committee Members:

Jerzy Grzymala-Busse, Chair
Bo Luo
Jim Miller


Abstract

In data mining, rules are the most popular symbolic representation of knowledge. Classification of data and extracting of classification rules from the data is a difficult process, and there are different approaches to this process. One such approach is inductive learning. Inductive learning involves the process of learning from examples - where a system tries to induce a set of rules from a set of observed examples. Inductive learning methods produce distinct concept descriptions when given identical training data and there are questions about the quality of the different rule sets produced. This project work is aimed at comparing and analyzing the rule sets induced by different inductive learning systems. In this project, three different algorithms AQ, CART and C4.5 are used to induce rule sets from different data sets. An analysis is carried out in terms of the total number of rules and the total number of conditions present in the rules. These space complexity measures such as rule count and condition count show that AQ tends to produce more complex rule sets than C4.5 and CART. AQ algorithm has been implemented as a part of project and is used to induce the rule sets.