McGill University Thèses et mémoires publiés en 2004

Galaxy shell, a sub component of Galaxy project, is designed and implemented. Galaxy shell is a core component of the Galaxy services, which provides an interface for Galaxy developers or other modules to access certain functions supported by Galaxy system. Through Galaxy shell, developers can search, query, and bind resources according to static or dynamic constraints, launch commands either locally or remotely. Galaxy shell also supports some special functions, such as remote pipeline and multicast remote execution. Galaxy shell not only provides a valuable tool for the research and development of Galaxy project, but also can be integrated into the …  Read more

This thesis considers simplified decoding for a type of full-rate non-orthogonal complex space-time block codes (STBCs) over Rayleigh fading channels. More precisely, we propose a decision feedback symbol-by-symbol decoding algorithm for the Quasi-Orthogonal code family, that comprises the Quasi-Orthogonal code and the Improved Quasi-Orthogonal code, by using the QR decomposition. Compared to optimal joint decoding, this algorithm significantly reduces complexity. For performance evaluations of the simplified decoding algorithm for the Quasi-Orthogonal code family over Rayleigh fading channels, we derive upper and lower bounds for symbol error rate. Furthermore, by using high SNR asymptotics we investigate the diversity orders provided by …  Read more

Often in neurosurgical planning a dual echo acquisition is performed that yields proton density (PD) and T2-weighted images to evaluate edema near a tumor or lesion. The development of vessel segmentation algorithms for PD images is of general interest since this type of acquisition is widespread and is entirely non-invasive. Whereas vessels are signaled by black blood contrast in such images, extracting them is a challenge because other anatomical structures also yield similar contrasts at their boundaries. In this thesis we present a novel multi-scale geometric flow for segmenting vasculature from PD images which can also be applied to the …  Read more

The major group of HIV-1 viruses that comprises the current global pandemic evolved, during their worldwide spread, into at least 10 distinct subtypes or clades. Subtype C predominates in sub-Saharan Africa and is responsible for the majority of the worldwide HIV-1 infections, while subtype B predominates in North America and Europe and subtype A/E is prevalent in Southeast Asia. Functional distinctions in the arrangement of NF-kappaB elements within the long terminal repeat (LTR) among HIV-1 subtypes have been identified, thus raising the possibility that transcriptional divergence amongst the subtypes of HIV-1 has occurred. In addition, significant amino acid variations have …  Read more

The 'Arco Seco' or 'Dry Arc' region of the Republic of Panama is considered to be the driest in the country, where many areas of this region experience severe water stress during the months of January through May. This study was conducted to develop a tool for the assessment of sustainable implementation of water harvesting through ponds for agricultural purposes in the region. A computer based Decision Support System (DSS) has been developed specifically for the Arco Seco region in order to facilitate pond storage capacity estimation. As part of the DSS, four computer programs have been designed for four …  Read more

Subclinical infections with the nematode Heligmosomoides polygyrus affect the behaviour and spatial learning of CD-1 mice in a Morris water maze. In early trials testing their ability to find and land on a hidden, submerged platform, uninfected mice displayed normal stress-related behaviours, such as avoiding the central areas of the circular maze and overswimming the platform. Infected mice manifested few such behaviours. Although both acquired the task, there were substantial differences between infected and uninfected mice in their patterns of task acquisition and execution. Although infected mice eventually reached comparable levels of competency, higher cognitive behaviours which suggest familiarity with …  Read more

Sampalis, John S. (Supervisor)  Read more

This study describes the biomechanics of the foot and ankle during the transitional and steady state skating strides using kinematic, kinetic, and myoelectric measures. A data set for five collegiate hockey players was completed (mean +/- SD: age = 21.8 +/- 1.9 years, height = 1.81 +/- 0.05 m, mass = 83.3 +/- 8.0 kg). Three acceleration strides and a constant velocity stride were examined on ice. An electrogoniometer at the ankle was used to measure angular displacement and velocity values. Myoelectric activation patterns were measured at the vastus medialis, tibialis anterior, peroneus longus, and medial gastrocnemius of the right …  Read more

This thesis will examine how the Islamic concept of tawḥid ("monotheism") was understood, and perhaps more importantly, experienced by the 12th/13th Sufi, Ibn 'Arabi (1165-1240), also known as al-Shaykh al-Akbar ("The Greatest Master"). It has been argued that tawḥid is not simply a belief but also an operation, that is to say, a continual process whereby the literal meaning of tawḥid ("asserting oneness") is upheld. This understanding of tawḥid implies a certain dualism which for Ibn 'Arabi is a reflection of the two perspectives which express God's oneness, namely, tanzih ("transcendence"), which literally means "declaring something to be pure and …  Read more

The purpose of this study was to develop new routes to couple commercially and/or readily available starting materials into biologically relevant structures via one-pot transition metal catalyzed multicomponent coupling reactions. More specifically, we showed that a palladium catalyst could couple imines, acid chlorides and carbon monoxide to directly generate 1,3-oxazolium-5-oxides (Munchnones). Chapter 2 of this thesis describes a new palladium catalyzed multicomponent synthesis of beta-lactams. This reaction was developed based upon previous work in this laboratory, which showed that imidazoline-carboxylates could be generated from coupling two imines, an acid chloride and CO. Mechanistic studies suggested that this product arose from …  Read more

Le syndrome Gilles de la Tourette (SGT) est une affection neuropsychiatrique caractérisée par de multiples tics moteurs ainsi qu’un ou plusieurs tics vocaux. Chez les écoliers de 6 à 17 ans, la fréquence de la maladie est estimée à environ 1%. Elle touche tous les groupes ethniques. La cause du syndrome n’est pas connue, mais des facteurs génétiques jouent très probablement un rôle important, même si aucun gène augmentant les risques d’exprimer le SGT n’a encore été identifié formellement. Seules des études de linkage positives ainsi que des anomalies chromosomiques ont pour l’instant été rapportées. La recherche de variants génétiques …  Read more

Legionella pneumophila is an intracellular bacterium that causes an acute form of pneumonia called Legionnaires' disease. Segregation analyses using macrophages from susceptible and resistant inbred mice previously indicated that a single genetic locus, named Lgn1 , could determine permissiveness to intracellular replication of L. pneumophila. A positional cloning strategy was undertaken, which makes use of genetic and molecular biology techniques to identify the gene responsible for a particular phenotype, based mostly on its location within a chromosome. The work described in this thesis covers three aspects of Lgn1: (1) Building upon the work of others, the Lgn1 genetic interval was …  Read more

The aim of this doctoral dissertation was to examine effects of olfactory imagery on other sensory and perceptual processes, and to explore brain areas involved in generation of olfactory mental images. Four studies, three behavioral and one functional neuroimaging (Positron Emission Tomography, or PET), were conducted, and healthy volunteers participated in all four studies. In Study 1, participants were better at detecting weak odors when they simultaneously imagined the same compared with a different odor as the one being detected. This effect of olfactory imagery was specific, as the request to imagine objects visually did not have any effect on …  Read more

Since their discovery, transposable elements (TEs) have been regarded either as useful building blocks of genomes, or as "selfish DNA": genetic parasites that exploit the sexual cycle to spread in copy number within populations to the detriment of their hosts. If the "selfish DNA" hypothesis is correct, TEs are expected to deteriorate and be lost from asexual populations. This thesis tests the predictions of the "selfish DNA" hypothesis in four asexual plant species, focusing on patterns of nucleotide diversity and nucleotide substitution. Sequences bearing strong resemblance to known TE families including Ty1/copia, Ty3/gypsy, and LINE-like elements were successfully isolated from …  Read more

The progressive enrichment in volatiles and light incompatible elements observed during upper-crustal differentiation of granitic and rhyolitic magmas leads to significant changes in melt physical-chemical properties and has important implications for ore deposition and volcanic devolatization. Thermodynamic calculations and experimental studies of melting equilibria in the Na 2O-K2O-Al2O3-SiO2-F 2O-1-H2O system are used to evaluate mineral stabilities, fluid compositions, the extent of fluoride-silicate liquid-liquid immiscibility, fluorine and water solubility limits and differentiation paths of natural fluorine-bearing silicic magmas. The interaction of fluorine with rock-forming aluminosilicates corresponds to progressive fluorination by the thermodynamic component F2O-1. Formation of fluorine-bearing minerals first occurs in …  Read more

Finite element accuracy and efficiency can be directly affected by mesh quality. When employing h-adaptive solution strategies, a mesh improvement stage is required in order to ensure high quality tetrahedra. However, mesh improvement techniques and quality indicators are often based on purely geometrical considerations. Recent work has focused on theoretically linking mesh quality criteria to interpolation and discretization errors. The potential benefits and related costs of a family of new mesh quality improvement systems are investigated using a set of electromagnetic benchmarks and mesh quality measures directly associated with finite element accuracy and efficiency. The new techniques are shown to …  Read more

This qualitative study explores which cognitive characteristics and strategies are common to both adult experts and adolescents when placed in the role of an expert. The basis for comparison are the nine characteristics and five strategies identified as common to all adult experts by Shanteau, 1992. Data were collected from interviews held with eight adolescents upon completion of an "Expert Project" in their Secondary II Physical Science course. Certain shared characteristics and strategies emerged during data collection and analysis, such as acts responsibly and uses help from others. Implications for future research are presented.  Read more

Ce travail est une analyse historique de l'experience migratoire feminine, examinee par le coin de femmes emigrants grecques. Le zenith de l'emigration grecque au Canada se date aux premieres annees apres la Deuxieme Guerre Mondiale, quand la situation politique, economique et sociale en Grece combinee avec les regulations etabli par le Canada sur l'emigration ont contribue au mouvement des plusieurs femmes grecques vers ce qui semblait comme un 'meilleur future'. Cette these qui tient comme base les temoignages oraux, examine les fonds des femmes grecques, leurs experiences au Canada, leurs activites et leurs identites transnationales. Bien que plusieurs travaux d'academiciens …  Read more

Kraft recovery boiler capacity limitations can be alleviated by using wet air oxidation (WAO) to treat excess kraft black liquor. The WAO process can be described as the liquid phase oxidation of organic and oxidizable inorganic components at elevated temperatures (125ºC to 320ºC) and pressures (0.5 MPa to 20.0 MPa) using a gaseous source of oxygen. In an attempt to improve the degree of oxidation of kraft black liquor, the use of different heterogeneous metal oxide catalysts was investigated. Experiments were carried out in a stainless steel batch reactor using pure oxygen. Screening experiments showed that cupric oxide (CuO) considerably …  Read more

This Master thesis examines the main characteristics of the 'New Objectivity' (Neue Sachlichkeit) appearing in Irmgard Keun's first novel, Gilgi---eine von uns (1931). The author uses in fact some stylistic elements of this movement to trace a portrait of her time, especially of trends emerging in the large city Cologne. The Weimar model of the emancipated woman, the so-called 'New Woman', serves as basis for Keun's depiction of her protagonist. Her representation was influenced by the image of the white-collar worker and of the Flaneuse (in the figure of her best friend). The comparison with other women figures emphazises Gilgi's …  Read more

Protein tyrosine phosphatase 1B (PTP1B) is a ubiquitously expressed enzyme that is involved in multiple signaling pathways. Biochemical and substrate trapping studies have implicated PTP1B in the dephosphorylation of various tyrosine kinases, including the EGFR, PDGFR, IR, IGF-IR, JAK2, p210Bcr-Abl, and Src. Of particular interest, gene-targeting studies in mice have established PTP1B as a critical physiological regulator of metabolism by attenuating insulin and leptin signaling. Indeed, PTP1B null mice exhibit resistance to diet-induced diabetes and obesity. Although PTP1B is involved in signaling pathways that contribute to oncogenesis, PTP1B null mice do not develop spontaneous tumors. Therefore, my doctoral research focuses …  Read more

The somatotopic organization of the motor fibers within the posterior limb of the internal capsule (IC) in humans remains unclear. Several electrophysiological (EP) atlases created from stimulation during stereotactic neurosurgery have suggested that there is considerable overlap between representations of body parts. Overlap reported in these studies may have been due to the linear scaling methods applied to the data. In the current work, a three-dimensional EP database that accounts for inter-subject anatomical variability through the use of a nonlinear registration technique was developed. The somatotopic organization was explored at two levels of the IC using EP data acquired during …  Read more

With this paper, I aim to demonstrate that, in Late Antiquity, the definition of magic was inherent to the definition of its opposite, religion. Assuming that the separation of magic and religion is the symptom of cultural clashes. I argue that Iamblichus' (240-325 AD) De Mysteriis was participating in a politico-religious reorganization of the Roman Empire. The first part of the study analyses the religions beliefs of Porphyry (232--305 AD). With this analysis, I demonstrate that Iamblichus rectified Porphyry's philosophical approach to religion, which minimizied the distinctions between magic and religion. In the second part of the study, I demonstrate …  Read more

In order to perform meaningful experiments in optimizing compilation and runtime system design, researchers usually rely on a suite of benchmark programs of interest to the optimization technique under consideration. Programs are described as numeric, memory-intensive, concurrent, or object-oriented, based on a qualitative appraisal, in some cases with little justification. In order to make these intuitive notions of program behaviour more concrete and subject to experimental validation, this thesis introduces a methodology to objectively quantify key aspects of program behaviour using dynamic metrics. A set of unambiguous, dynamic, robust and architecture-independent dynamic metrics is defined, and can be used to …  Read more

Ensemble of seasonal forecasts done with four atmospheric models over 26 winters and springs (1969-1994) are used to investigate the Northern Hemispheric model responses to SST anomalies and to compare them with observations. The response, for winter (DJF) and spring (MAM), is obtained as the regression of the 500hPa geopotential heights against the main modes of sea surface temperature (SST) variability over two different regions of the world oceans. The regression against the main mode of the equatorial Pacific Ocean SST, takes the expected form of the Pacific-North-America (PNA) pattern both in models and observations. The response to the North …  Read more

Superantigens trigger the polyclonal activation of human T cells. We exploited this property to gain insight into the mechanisms governing CD4 T cell expansion and to study the functional heterogeneity of naive and memory CD4 T cell subsets. We show that the amount of TCR ligand affects the evolution of a T cell response in two ways: by shaping the diversity of the T cell population recruited in the proliferative pool and by affecting the progression of these precursors into cell cycle. These two processes characterize a hierarchy of recruitment of cells that strongly correlates with the efficiency of TCR …  Read more

Research on leadership in sport has primarily focused on the behaviors of coaches despite the claim that leadership behaviors of athletes are considered by many to be an important component of success. More precisely, ice hockey team captains are recognized as having a significant leadership role. The purpose of this study was to identify and examine the key leadership behaviors exhibited by athletes, specifically ice hockey team captains. Semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted with six former university male ice hockey team captains. Data were analysed inductively, following the guidelines of Cote, Salmela, and Russell (1995). Three main areas emerged from …  Read more

Corporations appear to be mesmerized by the revenue value of intellectual assets to the exclusion of other attributes thereof. Moreover, empirical evidence suggests that corporate lawyers share this perception, primarily conceptualizing of intellectual assets as a means of generating corporate wealth. This over-promotion of revenue value has wide ranging effects. Specifically, this example of willful blindness on the part of corporations and corporate lawyers is a potential stumbling block for the appropriate utilization of corporate intellectual assets as well as the development of intellectual property regimes and academic discourse. These negative effects stem directly from the misguided corporate perception of …  Read more

The pathogenesis of Multiple Sclerosis (MS), a demyelinating disease of the central nervous system (CNS) with associated early axonal damage, is poorly understood. Considerable data indicate that MS is an inflammatory-mediated autoimmune disease. Normally, the naive T-cell niche is maintained by homeostatic mechanisms and in MS, naive T-cells play a central role in the autoimmune response against CNS antigens. Naive T-cells are produced by the thymus and naive T-cell production by the thymus can be ascertained by quantifying signal joint T-cell receptor excision circles (sjTRECs); episomal products formed during V(D)J T-cell receptor rearrangement. Naive T-cells expressing CD31, a cell surface …  Read more

Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is a debilitating autoimmune disease affecting 1/1000 Canadians, primarily women of childbearing age. Mycobacterium bovis-BCG, the tuberculosis vaccine, is a potent immunomodulator and has been used to treat other autoimmune diseases. To study the impact of M. bovis-BCG on disease progression in the MRL/ lpr mouse model of lupus, groups of MRL/lpr and background control MRL/+ mice were infected with BCG at 16-18 weeks of age, and their longevity, kidney function and serologic characteristics examined. MRL/lpr mice infected with BCG showed a slight improvement in longevity, and were protected from kidney failure. This was accompanied by …  Read more

The use of medical devices and drugs is constantly increasing in the United States. New techniques are developed, pharmaceutical companies manufactured thousands drugs and medical devices each year, these products are put on the market immediately; therefore, the consequences can be terrible. In the US, thousands even millions of people suffer from personal injuries because they use a defective medical product; this is referred as a mass tort. The class action procedure is often used in order to repair these personal injuries. Plaintiffs always ask for the use of this procedure, but the federal American courts always refuse the certification …  Read more

Background. Tuberculin skin testing is an important tool for diagnosis and control of tuberculosis. The role of host genetics in responsiveness of pediatric tuberculosis patients to purified protein derivatives (PPD) has rarely been investigated. Objective. To determine the impact of the candidate genes - Natural Resistance Associated Macrophage Protein 1 (NRAMP1), Vitamin D Receptor (VDR) and Interleukin 4 Receptor (IL4R) with other covariates on PPD reaction size in pediatric tuberculosis patients. Methods. A family-based association study was conducted using eighty-three parent-child trios from a database of tuberculosis patients and their families from Texas, USA. Results. Marker IL4Rrs1805010_GA was in linkage …  Read more

This thesis introduces a new approach to the protection of power transmission systems wherein all the component activities associated with system protection design are gathered together in one integrated environment referred to as the Unified Approach to transmission system protection. These activities consist of automatically generating the most probable abnormal events in the network and analyzing the resulting consequences that arise from these abnormalities. From this analysis, the appropriate characteristics are determined for the relay under study as part of the performance specification of that relay. The proposed Unified approach overcomes the disadvantages that are associated with the current approaches …  Read more

The concept of chastity has not figured prominently in the discourse on sex education or philosophy in general. If and when it does arise, it is treated cursorily at best and is almost always misrepresented. This thesis undertakes to re-present the concept of chastity by situating it against the context of four contemporary philosophical concerns: the problem of technology; the search for authenticity; the experience of beauty; and the anthropology of violence. Within this context chastity emerges as the anthropological hermeneutic which reveals human sexuality and identity in a manner consistent with the ideal of authenticity and the horizon of …  Read more

With the increasing demand for wireless voice services and limited bandwidth resources, it is critical to develop and implement coding techniques which use spectrum efficiently. One approach to increasing system capacity is to lower the bit rate of telephone speech. A typical telephone conversation contains approximately 40% speech and 60% silence or background acoustic noise. A reduction of the average coding rate can be achieved by using a Voice Activity Detection (VAD) unit to distinguish speech from silence or background noise. The VAD decision can be used to select different coding modes for speech and noise or to discontinue transmission …  Read more

"Cette dissertation est centrée autour du mot masca, qui désigne un personnage populaire et très ancien de genre féminin, qu'on retrouve exclusivement dans le folklore et la littérature de la région italienne du Piémont. On attribue à ce personnage la capacité fort rare d'exercer autant le bien que le mal, selon les circonstances. Cette dissertation fait preuve d'une recherche historique et linguistique qui puise ses données des coins les plus reculés de la civilisation celtique, au sein du territoire piémontais où elle triompha depuis le début du 4e siècle avant J.C. jusqu'au 1 er siècle de notre ère, époque à …  Read more

The purpose of the present work was to examine the effects of asphaltenes, amphiphilic molecules found in crude oils, on subsurface contamination by petroleum liquids. Initial experiments were conducted, using naphthalene as a representative target contaminant, to determine the contaminant equilibrium partitioning relationships in an asphaltene-oil-water system. Further experiments were conducted to determine if the presence of asphaltenes in petroleum liquids affected resistance to interphase mass transfer of naphthalene in situ with aging. Results were analyzed using a lumped mass transfer coefficient calculated after various aging periods. Experimental data suggested that adding increasing amounts of asphaltenes to gasoline resulted in …  Read more

Five steels were used in the present work to investigate the dynamic, static and metadynamic recrystallization behavior of hypereutectoid steels of 1% carbon, alloyed with high silicon and microalloying levels of vanadium. Compression tests were performed using single and double hit schedules at temperatures between 875--1100ºC, strain rates of 0.01s-1 -1s-1, and inter-pass times of 0.1--500 seconds and 0.1--30 seconds for static recrystallization and metadynamic recrystallization, respectively. For dynamic recrystallization, it was found that an increase in carbon and vanadium content led to smaller grain sizes. Equations were generated that can be used to predict the critical strain for dynamic …  Read more

The issue of mold cooling is one, which presents a foundry with a dilemma. On the one hand; the use of air for cooling is safe and practical, however, it is not very effective and high cost. On the other hand, water-cooling can be very effective but it raises serious concerns about safety, especially with a metal such as magnesium. An alternative option that is being developed at McGill University uses heat pipe technology to carry out the cooling. The experimental program consisted of designing a permanent mold to produce AZ91E magnesium alloy and A356 aluminum alloy castings with shrinkage …  Read more

Potentially large network delay variability experienced by voice packets when travelling over IP networks complicates the design of a robust voice conference bridge. Intrastream synchronization is required at the conference bridge to smooth out network delay jitter on a given stream and provide a continuous stream of voice packets to the conference bridge core. Interstream synchronization is needed to provide time synchronization between packets in different streams, allowing for a mapping of selected voice streams to the conference bridge output and the creation of a periodic and synchronized output from the conference bridge. This work presents a design and evaluation …  Read more

The discussion over whether arts education has an impact on social responsibility has been an interesting field of investigation in the educational realm. Although there still remains a dearth of information surrounding this issue, past research in the field has shed light on the importance of art and aesthetic education. Building upon prior research, this study offers a critical investigation into issues linking social responsibility and arts and aesthetic education. At the core of this study, through the use of a phenomenological framework, insight was offered into whether students' perceptions of a dance program in one British Columbia school assisted …  Read more

This study is an attempt to gain a better understanding of Ibn Khaldun's political theory contained in The Muqaddimah from the stance that religion and his faith in Islam are at the core of his political theory. Though there is a great deal of scholarship that has been dedicated to the interpretation of Ibn Khaldun's political theory contained in The Muqaddimah, there are a limited number of works that deal exclusively with the role of religion in his conception of the State. Those that do tend to either exaggerate Ibn Khaldun's secular thought in the realm of politics or understate …  Read more

This Master's Thesis offers a study of the works of Swiss travel narratives' writer Nicolas Bouvier (1929-1998). Bouvier develops a poetics that defines the practical rules of his travels as well as the aesthetic rules of his writing. These rules form a whole that can be named poetics of transparency and divided into two complementary poles, each linked to themes and images of disappearance or apparition. Both are oriented towards one single goal: to make the world visible for the reader. Seemingly contradictory, the two movements of Bouvier's project are connected by a polyphonic worldview, mirrored in narratives by the …  Read more

Racine, Guylaine (Supervisor)  Read more

The serotonin transporter has long been implicated as a key modulator of mood, with deficits of central nervous system serotonin implicated in many psychiatric disorders (anxiety, depression, alcoholism, etc.). The serotonin transporter is responsible for the high-affinity reuptake of serotonin from the synapse, effectively terminating the potentiation of the serotonergic signal. The objectives of this work were to sequence the serotonin transporter promoter region in the vervet monkey (C. aethiops), identify polymorphisms and determine whether they were associated with any of the previously characterized behavioural dimensions of the vervet. 2.8kB of previously unknown sequence was obtained and one novel polymorphism …  Read more

The ability to pinch an object precisely is an essential function of the hand. The primary objective of this experiment was to examine the effect of aging on the perception of a pinch-grip force exerted by the thumb and index finger. Twelve young (25.3 +/- 2.4 yr.) and twelve older (71.4 +/- 3.3 yr.) healthy adults executed unilateral and bilateral pinch-grip tasks with and without visual feedback. The performance of the older group was worse than that of the younger individuals when asked to reproduce a pinch force. Specifically, the older adults tended to produce an initial overshoot in force …  Read more

This study examined diagnostic problem solving and post-problem reflection in medical students, residents, and experts. Participants worked on three internal medicine cases from the computer-based learning environment, BioWorld. The analyses focused on general performance measures, problem solving operators and knowledge states, and post-problem reflection activities. Verbal protocol data was collected and examined using a coding scheme developed and implemented with the N-Vivo software. Students and residents differed in overall diagnostic accuracy, and significant differences were found in solution time and the number of utterances made for cases of varying difficulty. Differences in the use of operators and knowledge states are …  Read more

Approximately 10,000 tones of Hg are deposited annually as a result of anthropogenic activities. This increased Hg burden is known to have adverse neurological and reproductive effects on Common loons. A positive correlation between mercury (Hg) and selenium (Se) has been reported to exist in marine mammals and various species of marine and aquatic piscivorous birds. It has been hypothesized that the Hg/Se interactions may involve in the multiple mechanisms of Hg detoxification. This study focused on the suggested Hg/Se complex that forms in association with specific proteins. Specifically, this project focuses on the nature of these interactions in different …  Read more

There are increasing numbers of preterm children of very low and extremely low birth weights surviving due to advances in neonatal care. The majority of these children attend mainstream classrooms and perform in the low average range on cognitive measures compared to peers. However, outcome studies document a range of subtle, clinically important impairments in their motor, visual-motor and visual perceptual performance compared to peers. The impact of these impairments on a complex, occupational task such as handwriting performance has never been investigated in the preterm population using an objective measure, except through parent or teacher questionnaires. The primary objective …  Read more

DCharts, a formalism for modeling and simulation of complex reactive software systems, is proposed and studied. The DCharts formalism is based on UML statecharts and DEVS, but provides better modularity and expressiveness. DCharts semantics is rigorously defined in both an operational way and in a denotational way. Abstract, textual, and visual syntax for DCharts are presented. SVM, a DCharts simulator implemented in Python, is presented. It accepts textual model descriptions and simulates them. Multiple types of simulations, as well as real-time execution, are discussed in detail with examples. Model verification is supported by means of repeated simulations in SVM and …  Read more