McGill University Thèses et mémoires par auteur commençant par Ó

This is a study of public-owned and privately-owned telephone systems. It compares four aspects of their operations: rates, operating costs, efficiency, and quality of service. Data covers the period from July 1957 to June 1959, or the financial years 1957 and 1958. The study is based on material obtained from four companies. Three of them are publicly owned: Manitoba Telephone System, Saskatchewan Government Telephones, and Alberta Government Telephones. All three are located in Western Canada.  Read more

The fur trade was for generations the chief industry of this continent. Tile struggles of France and Britain were not for possession of anapparently barren country. They were motivated by the desire to control the great wealth of the fur trade.UncLer the French regime the traffic was monopolistic in character. Colonizing companies possessing exclusive privileges forbade free trading,only to have their decrees flouted by Pierre Esprit Radisson and other members of that enterprising class known as coureurs des bois. [...]  Read more

More than two centuries have elapsed since the first isolation of cholesterol, yet its structure was elucidated only twenty-two years ago and its total synthesis was achieved in 1951. The first steroid hormone to be isolated in pure state was estrone in 1929. Within a short period of time the various sex hormones, estrogens, androgens and progestins were isolated, characterized and synthesized. The compounds elaborated by the adrenal cortex were the last type of steroid hormones to be investigated. Experiments initiated in 1935 led to the isolation and characterization of twenty-eight crystalline steroids, six of which exhibit activity in prolonging …  Read more

Since 1946 the development of the electronic computer has simplified and speeded up the processing of data of all types. Consequently, many scientific problems have either become tractable for the first time or can now be approached in a more rigorous and less subjective manner. Specifically, the study of meteorology, in all its aspects, has gained new impetus from the introduction of machine methods. [...]  Read more

In September, 1911, Italy declared war on Turkey and proceeded to the conquest of the vilayet of Tripoli, a North African province of the Ottoman Empire. This thesis will attempt to determine the effect of this war upon British policy during the critical period just prior to the First Great War.  Read more

[...] The Italo-Turklsh War was singular in many respects. Although most of the fighting took place in Africa the real importance of the war lay in its effect upon European politics. Because of Italy's naval superiority the Turkish forces in Africa could not be reinforced, with the result that the two opponents could not actually come to grips with one another. It became a war which was at once half European and half colonial, and one in which no decisive battle could be fought between the belligerents. The question posed by this war was not who would possess Tripoli, but …  Read more

De tous les personnages saisissants dont est remplie la “Comédie Humaine” de Balzac, celui de Jacques Collin, dit Trompe-la-Mort, dit Vautrin, dit l’abbé Carlos-Herrera, est un des plus intéressants et des plus remarquables. Vautrin est en même temps un individu, un type et un symbole. L’oeuvre de Balzac aurait été manquée s’il avait omis de son tableau cette société en dehors et au-dessous de la société, le monde criminel. Ce monde est dépeint dans plusieurs des romans dans lesquels Vautrin joue un rôle; et Vautrin en est le type. Il est aussi le symbole du crime, de la révolte, de …  Read more

Basic assumptions throughout the linear baroclinic model proposed by Fleagle (1957) for atmospheric motions are re-evaluated to assess applicability of the model for vertical motion computations in connection with potential-kinetic energy conversions in the stratosphere. It is found that some revisions are necessary to adequately describe very long wave activity, dominant at these levels, under the high stability conditions present. The source of the difficulties is found in the scaling of parameters of the zonal flow. Simple, but computationally awkward, corrections are suggested, and their affect partially traced through the model.  Read more

Findings are presented indicating the effects of nutrient solutions containing combinations of nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium at different levels, on the tissues causing stringiness in celery petioles. These tissues are the collenchyma strands and the vascular bundles. High applications of nitrogen stimulated succulent growth and hence retarded maturity and development of stringiness in the collenchyma, and to a lesser extent in the vascular bundles. Phosphorus had no direct effect on stringiness. Potassium had a marked effect in increasing stringiness when applied in large amounts. The cell walls of the collenchyma strands became thicker as maturity progressed. This thickening of the …  Read more

Bennett, Dr. Gary  Read more

In this investigation an attempt was made to discover the effect on grinding efficiency of increasing circulating loads. The experiments werecarried out in a 3 ft. Marcy ball mill employing an Open end for pulp discharge.Test results showed an overloadling of the classifier in all experiments. The resulting inefficiency of classification prevented reliable conclusions as tothe effects of circulating loads on the grinding efficiency of the mill.Results, however, seem to indicate ore efficient grinding takes place in making a coarser finished product. A comparison between laboratory andcommercial mills shows the latter to be more efficient. This is open to criticism, …  Read more

An examination of the literature concerning general crushing practice and ball mill grinding in particular clearly indicates the need for a thorough investigation into all thephases affecting the efficiency of this type of grinding machine. Today ball mills are used extensively wherever grinding is an adjunct of a mechanical process but it is in themining and metallurgical industry - in the reduction of ores and minerals-that ball mill grinding has its widest application. [...]  Read more

Thirty-two teachers from grades 2,5,8 and 11 responded to interviews and questionnaires concerning the individualization of programs for their students. Questions to teachers concerned specific students in their classes,not hypothetical situations or their classes in general. Interviews took place during the teacher's non-teaching time. These are the circumstances under which a teacher would make decisions concerning the learning activities of a particular student. In addition teachers filled out a checklist of labels for each student, and students responded to a written questionnaire. This study was based upon the data from the high school sample. [...]  Read more

Bernard Shaw discovered early in his life that a private prophet from the other side of the Irish Sea had little chance of winning the public ear in the Capital of Victoria's Empire until he took his trumpet and blew hard and long. The Victorians at this time had had their share of prophets, and one cannot blame them if they were unimpressed when this redbearded messenger mounted his cart and announced again: Lo I am he. G»B«S. the journalist set himself to invent a reputation for Bernard Shaw. He advertised himself so sedulously that, on his own confession, he …  Read more

This exploratory study examined the relationship between selected epidemiological characteristics, experiences and attitudes towards treatment of a randomly selected sample of 17 patients treated at the Psychiatric Emergency Service of the Emergency Department and their failure to return for referral appointment to the Emergency Follow-Up Clinic, Out-Patient Department, Allan Memorial Institute of the Royal Victoria Hospital in 1973.  Read more

Daniel, Sam Joseph (Supervisor1)  Read more

As the complexity of software systems increases, the engineering effort for developing those systems must deal with that complexity. One paradigm for software development is model-driven engineering, where the models of the system become the first-order artefacts. These models may be used for simulation or analysis of the system, or be transformed into executable code or documentation. The intention is to represent each facet in the system in the most appropriate formalism at the most appropriate level of abstraction.Model transformations provide a structured and understandable way of manipulating these models, and are often rooted in a mathematical approach which enables …  Read more

L'application de l'informatique évolutive au domaine de l'Intelligence Artificielle (IA) émerge naturellement. Pour l'industrie du divertissement (jeux ludiques), IA fait référence aux différents éléments visuels ou non qui déterminent une partie importante de l'expérience du joueur. Cette responsabilité fait en sorte que développer des système d'IA n'est pas une tâche simple, ce qui en fait un domaine de recherche intéressant. Ce travail applique les concepts d'informatique évolutive a un jeu par tour en lassant évoluer des stratégies d'IA. Les stratégies sont représentées par des arbres de comportement. Nous retrouvons cet automate dans l'industrie des jeux digitales, en général il est …  Read more

The development of healthy gametes is paramount to the health of progeny and to the survival of a species. Epigenetic information contained within gametic DNA in the form of DNA methylation is essential for germ cell and embryo development. DNA methylation is a genome-wide phenomenon involved in the control of gene expression and chromosome structure and stability. During germ line development, patterns of DNA methylation are established in a sex- and sequence-specific manner. The primary goal of the work presented in this thesis is to gain an understanding of the nature of the genome-wide pattern of DNA methylation in germ …  Read more

Extramarital relationships and women's sexuality are by far some of the most controversial and elusive subjects in our society, and most of the empirical literature and popular opinion about the connection between women and infidelity perceive it as unequivocally taboo. Following the work of feminist researchers who valorize the potential for women's sexual experiences and view heterosexual relationships as a form of oppression, I explore the extramarital relationships between single women and married men. To perform this exploration, I completed two-part, in-depth interviews with eleven single women who had an intimate relationship with a married man. Once the interviews were …  Read more

An integrated process for education and sustainable community development has not been incorporated in countries of the North or the South. Although environmental education has been introduced into many curricula, this is only a beginning step compared to what is required to rebuild our understanding of development and set ourselves on more sustainable paths. The Barefoot College, in India has developed an education process for sustainable community development and has experience with reinventing the concepts of education and development. Their process has broad implications for educators, policy makers, academics and the general public in the South and North. The main …  Read more

The relationship between soils, soil water and stream chemistry was investigated for a first order stream in a small forested watershed in the southern Laurentians, Quebec. The study was restricted to near-stream processes, particularly how the chemistry of water leaving a hillslope influenced stream chemistry. For snowmelt, 1986, a number of naturally occurring chemical elements were used to separate stream flow into three subsurface flowpaths: groundwater, solum and upwelling flow. By quantifying upwelling flow, we introduced a new approach to identify solutions forced from the groundwater up through the solum before entering the channel. In upwelling flow, we found that …  Read more

Walters, Carl (Supervisor2)  Read more

This thesis is a case study in inflation, showing the interaction between government policy and the development of the inflationary spiral in France from 1944 to 1952. The wartime destructions and attendant shortages laid the groundwork for inflation, but the manner in which it developed was largely influenced by political factors. The first government attempts at stabilization were insufficient, and allowed a wage-price spiral to get under way. [...]  Read more

Cette thèse explore un seul artefact pour contribuer à l'histoire architecturale des institutions d’aide aux femmes pauvres à Montréal: le registre des maisons d'hébergement de Montréal. Que révèle l'étude ciblée d'un registre sur les femmes et l'architecture à Montréal au 19e siècle ? Que suggère le registre sur la façon dont les différentes classes sociales percevaient l’architecture, la côtoyer dans la vie de tous les jours ? Contrairement aux histoires traditionnelles de l'architecture qui focalise sur les projets d'architectes éminents ou sur les typologies, cette étude soutient que la narration, fondée sur les données du registre et animée par des …  Read more

Sullivan, C. (Supervisors)  Read more

Clients involved with child protection systems due to issues of neglect are known to have multiple needs. The issues that they confront are personal, situational, and social in nature. The emphasis on risk reduction in many jurisdictions within North America has meant that needs have been given less priority. The aim of the exploratory study was to gain a better understanding of both the nature of needs and risks in cases of child neglect in Ontario, as well as the similarities and differences in the views of clients and child protection workers. It is posited that through the acquisition of …  Read more

De Pokomandy, Alexandra (Supervisor1)  Read more

Corinne Hoesli (Supervisor1)  Read more

Seventy-five years ago the provincial governments of Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta signed a series of Natural Resources Transfer Agreements (NRTAs) with the federal government. These agreements provided the answer to a contentious debate known as the 'Natural Resources Question'. Before the NRTAs, the three prairie provinces did not have control over their public domain lands and did not share equal constitutional status with the other Canadian provinces. In the early 1920s, Prime Minister King recognized the validity of the provincial arguments for constitutional equality and no longer wanted the federal government to be responsible for the administration of provincial natural …  Read more

Isomorphia is a composition written for orchestra and electronics whose principal artistic impetus concerns the transcription of field recordings to material reproducible by acoustic instruments. The work attempts to imagine the orchestra as an ecosystem, employing environmental sound sources and ecological models for their organisation. A main feature of the work is the idea of transformation, both between different recorded sound sources and also between these recordings and their instrumental transcriptions.  Read more

Endothelial cells are key regulators of physiological functions as well as important determinants of atherosclerosis. Many endothelial cell activities are influenced by the reverse cholesterol transport lipoprotein HDL, and histologically, endothelial cells are resistant to cholesterol accumulation. In this thesis, we explore the endothelial response to cholesterol treatment and examine the role of three cholesterol efflux proteins, ABCA1, ABCG1, and SR-BI, in endothelial cholesterol efflux to HDL. Using DNA microarrays, we found cholesterol treatment of endothelial cells results in coordinated downregulation of cholesterol biosynthesis genes and upregulation of the putative cholesterol efflux protein ABCG1. ABCA1 was not highly expressed in …  Read more

[...] Slime settling is a process of dewatering in which flnely divided rock or ore material, with more or less colloidal matter, is separated in part from the solution in which it is suspended. The process is carried out in tanks or trays of various types and designs, but the apparatus preeminently in use for this purpose is the Dorr thickener. Slime settling fulfills a very important function in the mining industry. In the cyanide process for the recovery of gold and silver, most of the valuable solution is recovered by settling the leached ore and rock material in thickeners. …  Read more

The objective of this thesis is to complement the wealth of scholarly works which examine the "transitions from authoritarian rule" that occured in Spain and Brazil. This thesis distinguishes itself from these earlier works by bracketing discussion concerning the elite-level political transitions that occured in order to concentrate on the democratization and socialization of the Spanish and Brazilian societies. The work focuses on a number of collective organizations that emerge during these transitions, and will postulate an argument as to why they should be referred to as "transformation movements". Two important questions that the thesis addresses while examining these cases …  Read more

Contexte et hypothèse: D-mannose, un C-2 épimère du glucose, est un monosaccharide importantpour la glycosylation des protéines et qui est très présent dans les fluides corporels et les tissus. Ila été démontré que D-mannose prévient l'obésité chez les jeunes souris C57BL/6 nourries avec unrégime riche en gras par la régulation du microbiote intestinal. De plus, plusieurs études ont montréque le mannose a de puissantes propriétés anti-inflammatoires. Ce qui reste inconnu est si le Dmannoserégule l'athérosclérose, une maladie inflammatoire chronique des artères initiée etentraînée par l'accumulation de lipides oxydés sous la couche des cellules endothéliales. Nousémettons l'hypothèse que la supplémentation en …  Read more

Leveille, Richard (Supervisor2)  Read more

A new method for the preparation of 1,5-disubstituted-1Z,4Z-pentadienes by the addition of alkenyl cuprates to vinyltriphenylphosphonium bromide followed by an aldehyde is described. This method is used for the syntheses of 6Z,9Z-heneicosadiene and 15,15-(diethyldithio)-13S-t-butyldiphenylsilyloxy-6Z,9Z,11E-pentadecatriene. Syntheses of $(-)$-(5R)-argentilactone and (+)-(5R)-goniothalamin are described. Model studies towards the synthesis of the novel antileukemic agent CI-920 were carried out.  Read more

Nichols, Naomi (Supervisor1)  Read more

One of the fundamental goals in ecology is to explain the variation in species richness and distribution across the planet, and in the geographic range size of individual species. Within the context of species’ geographic ranges, there are two principle aspects: the potential and realized range, which can be affected by such abiotic and biotic limitations to expansion as geophysical barriers, environmental limitations and competitive exclusion. Herein, I performed a review and analysis of post-glacial range expansions of herpetofaunal species across Canada to ascertain general patterns in the geophysical barriers that these species encountered that may be directing their range …  Read more

Cette étude explore l'évolution de l'action réelle en amirauté au cours des dix-huitième et dix-neuvième siècles. Elle s'appuie sur l'analyse des archives des cours d'amirauté de Québec et de Londres, dont la plupart n'ont jamais été étudiées auparavant. Les cours maritimes de Québec incluent celle constituée par les Français comme première cour permanente d'amirauté du Canada, puis ensuite celle constituée comme cour de vice-amirauté par les Anglais. Parmi tous les tribunaux maritimes des colonies des deux empires, ce sont ces cours qui ont connu l'achalandage le plus élevé. L'action réelle en amirauté est indéniablement d'origine civiliste. Cette étude retrace toutefois …  Read more

This research examines the current educational challenges facing First Nation students of northern Canada, through the exploration of two experiential and place-based educational programs. These programs of study are presently being applied in the public school system (primary and secondary) of the Yukon Territory and in two Cree and Dene Nation reserve schools in northern Alberta. The collaborative research draws on observations and participants’ descriptions and insights to address three principal questions: How do students, educators and community members interpret the field of experiential and place-based education? In what ways can educators and community members share values and practices to …  Read more

The lack of Indigenous cultural knowledge and perspectives in the school curriculum has been identified as a significant factor in school failure amongst Indigenous students. This thesis includes a literature review of Indigenous education, as articulated by Indigenous scholars. Issues of identity, self-determination, local control, community, culture and a return to a traditional-holistic model of education are investigated. An analysis of experiential and place-based educational models is taken as these alternative practices have shown success in addressing Indigenous students needs. The fundamental significance story, narrative and the concept of place has in Indigenous culture and knowledge development is explored, as …  Read more

The behaviour of Surf Scoters (Melanitta perspicillata ) was studied on staging grounds in spring of 2006 and compared to behaviour on moulting grounds later that summer. Moulting Surf Scoters have a distinct activity pattern in comparison to those on spring staging grounds. During moult, foraging occurs mainly in the morning and evening, whereas during the spring a similar proportion of birds foraged at all periods of the day. Birds having recently initiated moult foraged significantly less that on staging grounds. However, as moult progressed, this discrepancy disappeared. In addition, we tracked the movements of flightless Surf Scoters using satellite …  Read more

This qualitative interpretive inquiry investigates how mathematical meaning is constructed in a sixth grade classroom during one academic year in an English medium suburban school. Mathematical meaning is situated within Piaget's constructivist theory and Vygotsky's socio-cultural theory of the development of higher mental functions. Halliday's social theory of language use provides another theoretical framework for interpreting the daily interactions between the teacher and learners and among learners. Particular focus is on modality and the use of modal auxiliaries in teacher interrogative modals across the teaching of two strands, fractions and geometry. Data collected and analyzed includes 107 audio taped mathematics …  Read more

We present the observations, reduction and preliminary analysis of a sample of 45 mid-to-high redshift galaxy clusters imaged with the Spitzer Space Telescope's MIPS camera at 24 ~m and selected from the Red Sequence Cluster Survey. The purpose of the data set is motivated by a broad review of studies into the evolutionary trends of galaxy clusters and their constituent galaxy populations, focusing specifically on recent results that indicate clusters are environmental drivers of dusty starburst and active galactic nuclei activity. To accommodate the large amount of data in hand, we have constructed an extensive data reduction pipeline for the …  Read more