McGill University Thèses et mémoires publiés en 2005

In this thesis, we present two new methods to overcome the effects of both camera calibration errors and partial emptiness of surface voxels in voxel-coloring. Voxel-coloring is a relatively new volumetric method for 3D scene reconstruction from multiple calibrated views. The quality of reconstruction is affected by the presence of errors in the estimated calibration parameters. Furthermore, a voxel forming a scene surface may be partially empty as there is no prior knowledge about the scene surface. Both of these sources of error result in outlier pixels in voxel projections in the input images. These outlier pixels affect the photo-consistency …  Read more

Data matching is the automated process permitting the comparison of significant amounts of personal data from two or more different databanks in order to produce new information. Its use by governments implicates many rights and freedoms, including the protection against unreasonable search and seizure under section 8 of the Canadian Charter. In the author's opinion, a governmental data matching program will probably constitute a search or seizure under section 8 when a positive answer is given to two questions. First, is there a use or transfer of information which implicates constitutionally protected information? Generally, section 8 will only protect biographical …  Read more

This study explores the role of exercise and nutrition in burnout rates of social workers. Through convenience and snowball sampling 100 workers were asked to complete a questionnaire, with 82 returned. Burnout was assessed on three subscales, Emotional Exhaustion (EE), Depersonalization (DP) and Personal Accomplishment (PA), using the Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI). The exercise questions were adapted from Canada's Physical Activity Guide of Healthy Living. The nutrition questions were adapted from Healthy Eating Worksheet from the Canadian Cancer Society. Those employed in child welfare had significantly higher levels of EE and DP and significantly lower levels of PA. Results of …  Read more

Car dependency has resulted in traffic congestion in the Champlain Bridge corridor between the South Shore and Montreal CBD. This thesis addresses the ongoing debate of whether an inflexible rail or more flexible express bus system is better suited for travel in the corridor. An exploratory analysis of commuters revealed dispersed work destinations, suburb-to-suburb commuting, and public transit constraints for car users, providing evidence that rail would not be an effective solution. Factors known to affect mode choice such as access walking time, cost, and number of transfers were quantified in a discrete choice model of mode choice by commuters …  Read more

Despite significant progress in the field of organic chemistry, the asymmetric formation of all-carbon quaternary centers still represents a considerable challenge. Our group previously reported the stereocontrolled generation and alkylation of alpha,alpha-disubstituted amide enolates to form quaternary centers. This reaction takes place via the reduction of bicyclic alpha,alpha-dialkylated alpha-thioglycolate lactams using one-electron transfer reagents. This method suffered from several limitations to practicality, thus this research project has focused on the development of a second-generation chiral auxiliary system which would overcome the first generation auxiliary shortcomings. The design and synthesis of a new chiral auxiliary system is described. The design is …  Read more

The subject of this thesis is an American Zen monastery in New York, Zen Mountain Monastery (ZMM). The study is approached through a survey of methodologies: (1) through the scholarship on American culture and religion, (2) through the sociology of the study of religious institutions and communities and (3) through a comparison with East Asian Zen monasticism. The study reveals that ZMM's monasticism: (1) is part of a systematization of Zen in America that has made Zen into a mainstream option in American society, (2) has created group practices and commitment mechanisms that put ZMM in a better position than …  Read more

Lipase was partially purified from the viscera of grey mullet ( Mugil cephalus) by ammonium sulfate fractionation, simultaneous desalting, and concentration via ultrafiltration and then affinity chromatography on EAH-Sepharose 4B. The partially purified extract was characterized using p-nitrophenyl palmitate (rho-NPP) as substrate. Grey mullet lipase was active within the pH range of 7-10, with an optimum pH of 8.0, and was stable from pH 4-10. The enzyme was active within the temperature range of 20°C and 60°C, and exhibited an optimum for the hydrolysis of rho-NPP at 50°C. The enzyme was stable between 10-50°C, beyond which it lost activity progressively. …  Read more

Background. Alzheimer Disease (AD) is a common progressive neurodegenerative disorder that results in impairment of memory, thinking and behavior (dementia). Objective. To delineate the patterns and extent of EpoR expression in the brains of patients with sporadic AD, Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI; a frequent harbinger of AD) and normal elderly controls (NEC). Results. (A) Temporal cortex: Percentages of GFAP-positive astrocytes co-expressing EpoR were (i) significantly increased in AD and MCI vs. NEC (p<0.05) in layers II and III, (ii) increased in MCI, but not in AD, vs. NEC in layer I, and (iii) unrelated to diagnosis (p>0.05) in layers IV, …  Read more

Background. The Response Evaluation Criteria in Solid Tumours (RECIST) assess the efficacy of new therapies in clinical trials of solid tumours but not of lymphoma. These criteria, with some modifications, could replace the International Workshop Classification (IWC) for assessing efficacy in lymphoma. A lymphoma-adapted version of RECIST (LAR) would be simpler to apply than the IWC criteria and allow efficacy assessment to be standardized across clinical trials. Methods. RECIST was modified to apply to the unique features of lymphoma. Using data from three phase II lymphoma trials (n=115), the clinical qualities of this modified scale were studied. Face, content and …  Read more

Increasingly, knowledge-based tasks such as new product development and market research are being conducted by geographically dispersed teams. Early evidence from knowledge-based view of the firm and geographically dispersed work literatures suggests that at least four kinds of knowledge gaps---transactive memory system, mutual knowledge, categorization and situated knowledge---exist because of the (dispersed) structure of the knowledge management context . Dispersed members therefore cannot take for granted that they have a common context, making dispersed collaboration problematic. The dissertation - a qualitative, theory-generating exercise - seeks to address the question, 'how do dispersed teams collaborate to create useful knowledge?' Specifically, the …  Read more

The polyglutamine diseases are caused by an expansion of a CAG repeat sequence. This group of late-onset neurodegenerative disorders is characterised by neuronal cell death and the accumulation of polyglutamine-containing proteins. Several molecular mechanisms have been proposed that may explain disease pathogenesis. In this study, we propose a new pathogenic mechanism for these neurodegenerative diseases. We have demonstrated that expanded CAG stretches are prone to frameshifting to the -1 alanine-encoding GCA frame, and we propose that this phenomenon is due to ribosomal slippage during translation. This slippage depends on the presence of long CAG tracts, and generates polyalanine-containing proteins. We …  Read more

Recent brain imaging studies have shed light on the effects of nicotine on human cognition. However, few efforts have investigated how changes in brain connectivity may engender nicotine-induced cognitive modulation. Recent studies have also examined the effects of drug cues in addicts; however, little has been established about the influence of perceived drug availability on these responses and the resulting changes in brain connectivity. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), we investigated the effects of nicotine on brain connectivity during a verbal and visual working memory (WM) task. We have shown that nicotine modulates connectivity in a cortico-striatal-thalamic loop during …  Read more

Al-Jazeera asserted itself in the global media scene shortly after the attacks of September 11th, 2001 in the United States. The station's regional prominence had already been entrenched in the new Arab media environment before it was overshadowed by the station's newfound global fame. Subsequently, al-Jazeera was considered an Arab media ambassador and the "voice of the Arab world." This dissertation provides an analysis of al-Jazeera's programming in Arabic that is lacking in the burgeoning English language academic literature. The dissertation furthermore highlights the way treatment of global current affairs informs a sense of Arab identification on a regional level. …  Read more

Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children and Ahdaf Soueif s The Map of Love both construct cosmopolitan figures, who through their narratives, attempt to reformulate nationalist constructions of nation. This study compares Rushdie and Soueif's configuration of the cosmopolitan global consciousness and its rootedness in the postcolonial local centers of Bombay and Cairo respectively. The comparison shows that the multiply determined identity of cosmopolitans can both impede, as well as allow for, the active participation in the social and political life of the country in which they inhabit and aim to represent. This thesis considers Rushdie and Soueif's journey back into postcolonial …  Read more

Human standing posture depends on sensory inputs from vision, from touch and from the vestibular system. Humans use these inputs to determine position in the environment and to compensate for external forces resulting in constant swaying. This thesis investigated the creation of a four-degree-of-freedom robotic model of human upright stance using only hip actuation. In this model, the ankles are free so that there is no reaction torque from the ground and balance is provided by torques at the hip joint, resulting in an underactuated system. The mathematical model of the system was first derived using the Euler-Lagrange formulation. Using …  Read more

The purpose of this project is to study the role of human color vision in shape processing. We examine the extent to which color vision can contribute to complex shape processing tasks or whether they are accomplished mainly by the achromatic pathways of the brain. We tested normal human visual performance using psychophysical experiments. The stimuli were presented on a monitor and the task of the subject is to indicate whether shape differences in the stimuli have been seen. Each psychophysical trial was run four-to-five times using a two-interval forced choice paradigm. Stimuli were calibrated so that they selectively activate …  Read more

Problem. Oppressive cultural and social representations are inscribed on the body and intersect with women's subjective identity. Objective. The present study explores the use of the body as a vehicle for resistance against such inscriptions. Method. The practice of martial arts is investigated as one of the means of empowerment for women. Quantitative methods were used to compare the levels of empowerment in a group of women who practice martial arts versus a comparison group of women who do not practice martial arts. Results. Quantitative analysis revealed that while no differences were found in overall empowerment scores between the two …  Read more

Innate responses in the central nervous system (CNS) provide first-line defense against infection and injury. Microglia and astrocytes may direct leukocyte infiltration to the injured CNS. The signaling mechanisms that orchestrate this response are ill-defined. Innate roles for microglia and astrocytes are supported by reports demonstrating glial expression of Toll-like receptors (TLRs). TLRs recognize conserved pathogen-associated motifs and generate innate immune responses, usually by signaling through the adaptor protein, MyD88. TLRs may also generate innate responses to tissue damage. The data in this thesis implicate TLR2/MyD88 as key mediators of innate response to brain injury in mice. Transection of axons …  Read more

Implicit self-esteem is the automatic and unconscious component of self-esteem, which is generally not correlated with more traditional measures of explicit self-esteem. The goal of the research presented in this dissertation was to test a cognitive model of implicit self-esteem. Drawing from interpersonal theories of self-esteem and from theories of evaluative learning, I hypothesized that implicit self-esteem is developed through repeated exposure to pairings of the self with interpersonal rejection or acceptance, leading to unconscious and automatic self--rejected or self--accepted cognitive associations. I tested this theory using a computer-based conditioning task designed to enhance implicit self-esteem through the repeated pairing …  Read more

We review basic results in the field of finding extremal metrics for spectral invariants of the Laplacian on both graphs and manifolds. Special attention is given to the special case of the Klein bottle. The nececery theory is developed to produce the result of Jakobson et all [J-N-P] regarding lambda 1 on the Klein bottle. Using similar techniques, a new result is established in proving that there is only one extremal metric of a certain kind for lambda 2 on the Klein bottle.  Read more

In 1992, Algeria's government held its first ever democratic elections. With the Front Islamique du Salut poised to win the elections overwhelmingly, the Algerian military cancelled the democratic process and imposed military rule. Soon afterward, Algeria plunged into a civil war that claimed upward of 100,000 lives. Despite very significant popular support for the Islamist insurgency aiming to violently overthrow the Algerian government, the insurgency ultimately failed. Why? This paper will argue that while structural and actor-oriented approaches to understanding revolution are certainly important, they focus inadequate attention on contingencies that arise during a conflict, which in turn, affect structural …  Read more

This document presents the design, fabrication, characterization and packaging of a stand-alone all-photonic 1X4 switch. All of the designs pertaining to the implementation of the device including those of required custom components are given. The core of the switch is comprised of a "2-bit" electro-optic deflector capable of sub-microsecond deflection times. The packaged switch operates at 1100V and boasts a worst-case fiber-to-fiber insertion loss and crosstalk reading of 5.3dB and -23dB, respectively. Furthermore, a worst-case deflection time of 86ns has been achieved.  Read more

Seven strains of Actinobacillus suis (ATCC 15557, B49, C84, H89-1173, H91-0380, SO4 and VSB 3714) were investigated with respect to iron acquisition from animal transferrins (Tfs) and haemoglobins (Hbs). Growth assays with porcine, bovine and human Tfs and Hbs revealed that all seven strains could use porcine (but not human or bovine) Tf and all three Hbs as iron sources. In solid phase binding assays, membranes derived from all strains exhibited strong binding of porcine Tf and each of the Hbs. Competition binding assays indicated that all three Hbs were bound by the same receptor(s). Affinity procedures allowed the isolation …  Read more

The joint stiffness plays a significant role during movement; however its function is not fully understood, particularly in terms of reflex contributions. Studies examining the mechanical consequences of reflex activity during movement are few. The long term objective of this thesis was to develop and validate a method for identifying joint mechanics during movement. Previously developed ensemble, time-varying algorithms were used to extend the parallel-cascade model to non-stationary conditions. This algorithm was tested using simulated data. We obtained parameter estimates of ankle stiffness from experiments under stationary conditions and used them to create a simulated system undergoing a ramp displacement. …  Read more

Many bacteria have the ability to degrade cyclohexanol through a five-step biochemical pathway that leads to the production of adipic acid. Adipic acid is then processed by beta-oxidation to succinyl-CoA and acetyl-CoA. The original goal of this study was to locate and characterize the gene that is responsible for the first dehydrogenation step of the cyclohexanol ( chn) degradation pathway in the Grampositive bacterium Rhodococcus maris strain HI-31 in order to obtain the full gene complement for cyclohexanol degradation. Instead, three new open reading frames (ORFs) or genes were obtained as the result of cloning and sequencing of a 5-kb …  Read more

This thesis consists of four essays. The first essay looks at pollution taxation under capital mobility, and analyzes the role of pre-commitment by countries to their pollution tax rate. A polluting firm sells its product in two countries, and can locate and produce in a single country or in both countries. Due to the discrete-choice nature of the firm's location problem, the countries' welfare functions are discontinuous in their pollution tax rate. We show that when the countries cannot pre-commit to their pollution tax, the firm can still engender tax competition between them by strategically locating in both the countries. …  Read more

Efforts to resolve environmental planning and decision-making conflicts usually focus on participant involvement, mutual understanding of the problem situation, evaluation criteria identification, data availability, and potential alternative solutions. However, as the alternatives become less distinct and participant values more diverse, intensified negotiations and more data are usually required for meaningful planning and decision-making. Consequently, questions such as "What collaborative spatial decision making design is best for a given context?" "How can the values and needs of stakeholders be integrated into the planning process?" and "How can we learn from decision making experiences and understanding of the past?" are crucial considerations. …  Read more

The main objective of this research program is to formulate a framework for durability design of concrete elements against deterioration of bond at the steel rebar-concrete interface due to corrosion of reinforcing bars. Mass loss of the reinforcement is an important parameter in defining the corrosion level. Therefore, it can be used to develop a correlation between corrosion, cracking and bond strength at the steel rebar-concrete interface. A preliminary design equation for prediction of bond strength at different corrosion levels is presented. Secondly, the existing state of the art of design of concrete elements for durability against deterioration of bond …  Read more

The objective of this study was to examine the effects of plant sterols and/or glucomannan on lipid profiles and cholesterol kinetics in hyperlipidemic individuals with or without type 2 diabetes. It was hypothesized that plant sterols and glucomannan reduce circulating cholesterol levels and may have an additive or synergistic effect when combined by reducing cholesterol absorption. Thirteen type 2 diabetics and sixteen non-diabetics all mildly hypercholesterolemic free living subjects participated in a randomized crossover trial consisting of 4 phases, 21 days each. Subjects consumed plant sterols and glucomannan during the trial. Overall reductions in total and LDL-cholesterol levels were greater …  Read more

Field evidence suggests that the fate of sedimentary dissolved organic carbon (DOC) is linked to the diagenetic cycles of iron and manganese in marine sediments. Co-variations of their concentrations in sediment porewater, as well as the release of DOC upon the reductive dissolution of authigenic iron and manganese oxides lead us to believe that sorption (i.e., co-precipitation and/or adsorption) onto these oxides may play an important role on the diagenetic behavior of DOC. This DOC sink, if it exists, would considerably alter our views of the mechanisms that regulate DOC fluxes across the sediment-water interface as well as their quantification. …  Read more

During development of the mammalian cerebral cortex, precursor cells in the ventricular zone sequentially produce neurons and glial cells. This process clearly involves a complex interplay between intrinsic cellular machinery and extrinsic cues. Remarkably, embryonic cortical precursor cells isolated at the onset of neurogenesis, and cultured under serum-free conditions, will mimic the temporal differentiation pattern observed in vivo, producing neurons first, and then glia. In the studies presented here, I have used this system to identify critical components of the intracellular machinery that co-ordinately control two essential steps in neuronal differentiation, exit from the cell cycle (via the retinoblastoma family) …  Read more

Despite being dismissed as low brow, nonsensical and a cheap form of entertainment, the present cultural phenomenon of reality television reveals a shared space where people are exposing more personalized, emotional aspects of themselves than typically seen in other genres of television programming or areas of contemporary public life. This recent trend of reality TV is both heightening and challenging many of the long-standing ethical debates over the boundaries between public and private, individual and collective as well as rational and emotional experience and needs to be considered within a pedagogical context. This study will explore reality television's position as …  Read more

Determining the factors responsible for the origin and maintenance of diversity remains a difficult problem in evolutionary biology. There is extensive theoretical work which suggests that environmental heterogeneity plays a major role. This theory argues that diversification is ultimately due to divergent natural selection for alternative resources. In this thesis I investigate adaptation and the evolution of diversity in experimental populations of the asexual bacterium Pseudomonas fluorescens. In all experiments I introduce clonal isolates of Pseudomonas to a novel environment and allow evolution to occur through the substitution of random mutations. Adaptation can then be quantified by comparing evolved genotypes …  Read more

Alcohol is frequently co-administered with other psychotropic substances, yet little is known about patterns of alcohol use in a simultaneous polysubstance context. In the present dissertation concomitant alcohol-drug administration is examined with an emphasis on delineating patterns of alcohol use when it is co-administered with psychostimulant drugs known to interact with neural mechanisms believed to be involved in mediating alcohol's ascending limb reinforcing effects: midbrain dopamine transmission. In two retrospective self-report studies polysubstance users reported on their simultaneous use of drugs and alcohol. Results revealed that alcohol was commonly co-administered with various abused substances, particularly with psychostimulant drugs that are …  Read more

Recent revisions to Articles 9 and 1 of the Uniform Commercial Code (the "UCC") have proposed new intangible secured financing choice of law rules. These choices of law rules contain rules that represent all three major schools of thought in the field of conflicts of laws: multilateralism, substantivism and unilateralism. This thesis examines the new rules by analysing them in the context of the strengths and weakness of these schools of thought and in light of the requirements of a secured financing system. On the whole the strong mulitlateralist focus of the majority of the rules provides a solid basis …  Read more

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) has become a worldwide problem. Roughly 3% of world population are estimated to be infected with the virus, producing high rates of progressive liver disease, leading to cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma. The present therapy, a combined administration of pegylated interferon-alpha (IFN) and ribavirin is costly and only successful in 50% of patients infected with HCV. It is also associated with serious side effects. Thus, there is an urgent need for better tolerated and more effective treatment modalities. A therapeutic vaccine may be the solution. Recent efforts to produce efficient vaccines require not only the identification of …  Read more

Mercury (Hg) is a toxicant of global concern, but few strategies exist to evaluate its biological effects on the ecosystem. Piscivorous wildlife, such as mink (Mustela vison), are particularly at risk because they can bioaccumulate Hg to concentrations known to impair neurological systems. Given that biochemical changes in the brain precede functional and structural impairments, I evaluated the use of neurochemicals as early-warning biomarkers of Hg toxicity in mink. Initial studies demonstrated that neurochemical biomarkers could be measured from mink carcasses collected from the field, as long as factors such as storage temperature and freeze thaw cycles were accounted for. …  Read more

In India, the Hindu Succession Rights Act of 1956 allows the widow, the daughters, alongside the sons of the deceased senior male, to claim an equal share in familial property. By giving inheritance rights to daughters and widows, and not exclusively to sons, this Act proposes a radically different organization of the ideal patrilineal household, commonly referred to as "the Hindu joint family". The Act initiates a transformation of Hindu women's status through their rights to property, which implies the transformation of women's rights and duties in India. Drawing on the analysis made during an extensive fieldwork period in a …  Read more

We examine the sensitivity of the ATLAS detector to extra-dimensional scalars in scenarios having the extra-dimensional Planck scale in the TeV range and n = 2 large extra dimensions. Such scalars appear as partners of the graviton in higher-dimensional supersymmetric theories. Using first the scalar's lowest-dimensional effective couplings to quarks and gluons, we compute the rate of production of a hard jet together with missing energy. We find a nontrivial range of bulk scalar couplings for which ATLAS could observe a signal, and in particular, higher sensitivity to couplings to gluons than to quarks. Bulk scalar emission increases the missing-energy …  Read more

Since the early 1990s, the concept of substantial equivalence has been a guiding principle of the Canadian Food Inspection Agency and Health Canada's regulatory approach toward products of plant biotechnology destined for the food and livestock feed markets. To assess substantial equivalence in terms of chemical composition, genetically modified (GM) plants are compared to conventional counterparts at the level of macro- and micro-nutrients, allergens and toxicants. Such targeted comparative analyses are limited in their scope and their capacity to detect unintended changes in chemical composition. There is a need to develop more effective testing protocols to improve the substantial equivalence …  Read more

The official reaction of the Russian Federation and of the People's Republic of China to the announcement made by the United States in December 2001 to abrogate the almost thirty years old Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty has been remarkably weak, given their sustained and coordinated opposition to the deployment of strategic defences against ballistic missiles (BMD). Because the existing literature, particularly balance of power theory, under-explored this puzzle and fails to provide a satisfactory explanation to it, a neoclassical realist model building on structural and unit-level variables is proposed to supplement this caveat. It is argued that Russia, as a …  Read more

This thesis examines the role of photography in making the Canadian Pacific Railway company (CPR) an integral part of Canadian mythology. It focuses on the company's photographic advertising in the 1920s, and the ways in which its increasingly nationalistic transcontinental brochures framed the country, and equated the act of travelling with nation-building and national identity. The CPR's tourist brochures established a visual vocabulary of the travelling experience, which was readily employed by individuals such as Montreal journalist Frank Randall Clarke. Clarke was sponsored by the CPR to travel across the country in the summer of 1929. His journalistic writing and …  Read more

This study compares how English and French Canadian intellectuals viewed American society from 1891 to 1945. During the period under study, the Dominion experienced accelerated industrialization and urbanization, massive immigration, technological change, and the rise of mass culture. To the nation's intellectuals, many of these changes found their source and their very embodiment in the United States. America, it was argued, was the quintessence of modernity, having embraced, among other things, secularism, democracy, mass culture, and industrial capitalism. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Canadian hostility to the United States and continental integration was expressed in two conservative …  Read more

In spite of the crucial importance of the Russian front in the outcome of the Second World War, this aspect of the conflict has been studied relatively little in the West since 1945. This omission can be attributed to several factors including linguistic complexity, the difficulty of access to Soviet archives, and the political constraints caused by the ideological climate of the Cold War. Since the time of glasnost' and the collapse of the Soviet block, however, a new era has begun for historians thanks to the release of many documents which had been secret and to the improved ideological …  Read more

Several evidence indicate that presenilin-2 gene is rhythmically regulated in the mouse suprachiasmatic nuclei (SCN), which is the master circadian clock in mammals, as well as in the liver. We investigated the mechanism of circadian modulation behind presenilin-2 oscillation. CLOCK and BMAL1 are the two major transcription factors for circadian gene expression. We demonstrated that CLOCK and BMAL1 partially modulate presenilin-2 gene expression in vitro. In vivo, we showed that the gene does not oscillate in the muscle, spleen, thymus, heart and kidney. On the other hand, we demonstrated a circadian oscillation of presenilin-2 in the liver. We suspect another …  Read more

Attempts by the international community to establish a comprehensive global framework for protection of foreign investment have not yet succeeded. The Russian Federation has remained aloof from these efforts. Its attention instead has been focused on the need to redesign its internal legal framework to accommodate the transition to a market economy. The first aim of this thesis is to identify the major policy issues that inform the multilateral investment protection debate and to identify the motives that have influenced Russia not to participate. The second aim is to provide an analysis of the progress that the Russian Federation has …  Read more

Prostate-specific antigens (PSA) help monitor the post-therapy course of prostate cancer. If radiotherapy is successful, levels reach a nadir, and remain low or possibly rise very slowly. A sustained steep increase indicates biochemical failure. Serial PSA measurements are rarely perfectly monotonic. The American Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology (ASTRO) consensus panel defines biochemical failure as three consecutive PSA increases. I examined the sensitivity and specificity of the ASTRO criterion using simulations of realistic, sophisticated data sets, that accurately reflect the systematic and random variations observed in PSA series. In a preliminary analysis, I estimated the underlying PSA trajectories in …  Read more

In order to establish the viability of using a biological system to decaffeinate coffee, a bacterium (Pseudomonas putida IF-3) capable of living on caffeine as its only source of carbon and nitrogen was studied. Resting cell suspensions and cell-free extracts of P. putida IF-3 were tested to assess their ability to degrade caffeine, and to determine their capacity to retain activity at different temperatures. A method to quantify cell lysis was developed; this method allowed comparison of cell free extract and resting cell caffeine degradation rates. Caffeine degradation rates for cell free extracts were found to be 55 times faster …  Read more

This thesis is an evaluation of the extent to which theories of focalization are useful for the analysis of point of view in film. In it, I apply the small number of focalization models advanced within film studies to an analysis of the works of an internationally acclaimed Taiwanese director, Edward Yang. I reveal that Yang's films serve well to demonstrate how the conventional typologies of external and internal focalization are convenient labels that mask the considerable degree of ambiguity that is reflected by processes of focalization and narration in many films. Furthermore, I illustrate how an application of the …  Read more

One way to achieve high data rate and bandwidth efficient wireless communications is to employ multiple transmit and receive antennas creating a Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) system, combined with Linear Dispersion (LD) codes. Sphere Decoder (SD) is a low complexity Maximum Likelihood (ML) method of decoding LD codes. Using Subspace Matched Filtering principles, two complexity reducing front-ends to any variant of the SD, are developed. These two-stage decoders are designed to only have marginally worse performance than SD. Computer simulations confirm the lower complexity and close to ML performance of the two-stage decoders. For a two transmit and two receive antenna …  Read more