McGill University Theses and dissertations by author name (F)

On December 15, 1999, the people of Venezuela approved a new Constitution, which is the first Venezuelan constitution to entrench the rights of indigenous peoples. The purpose of this thesis is to analyze the different theoretical issues raised by the problem of rights for indigenous peoples. It is argued that indigenous rights are collective rights based on the value of cultural membership. This implies both an investigation of the value of cultural membership and of the criticisms that the multicultural perspective has offered against that point of view. Indigenous peoples have the moral right to preserve their cultures and traditions. …  Read more

This thesis will develop a number of improvements to the thermodynamic and kinetic consistency of the Phase Field Crystal (PFC) model. First a reformulation of the binary alloy model concentration field to ensure thermodynamic consistency as well as consistency with the motivating assumptions of the model will be introduced. The kinetics of the PFC alloy model are additionally reformulated to allow a consistent description of two-species dynamics. Exploration of the reformulated PFC alloy model reveals certain kinetic anomalies that arise as a result of attempts to harshly separate the long and short wavelength behaviour of fields. These anomalies are explored, …  Read more

Biochar has been suggested for use in many applications such as soil amendment, long-term carbon storage and use in batteries as an electrode. Certain applications require a particular set of traits thereby necessitating the careful selection of production parameters to meet the end user’s needs. This research aimed to produce biochar using a Micro Auto Gasification Systems (MAGS) provided by Terragon Environmental Technologies (Montreal, Canada) then conduct physical, chemical and biological characterization. The MAGS’ operating procedure was adapted to increase the carbon content of the charred product and qualify it as biochar, as per the International Biochar Initiative (IBI) and …  Read more

In proposing to devote this thesis to a study of the leading women characters in George Eliot's novels, I am confronted with the necessity of choosing from each novel the woman or women to be discussed. In The Mill On The Floss, Silas Marner, and in the stories from Scenes of Clerical Life (The Sad Fortunes Of The Reverend Amos Barton, Janet's Repentance, and Mr. Gilfil's Love Story) the choice is obvious.  Read more

Metrakos, Peter (Supervisor)  Read more

This study investigated friendship formations of two girls with Down Syndrome who were integrated into a unit of 34 ten and eleven-year-old girls at a residential summer camp. While acting as participant observer, in the role of co-counsellor, I recorded behavioural observations and informal interviews in a journal, friendship log and personal log. A quantitative data analysis investigated the frequency with which campers elected to be with these two girls, as well as the number of campers who chose them as their best friends, as preferred bunkmates for next year and as those with whom they would want to keep …  Read more

The term intestinal absorption implies passage of a substance into the blood stream through the intestinal wall. This term has often been held to be synonymous with the removal of substances from the lumen. Measurement of the disappearance of a substance from the intestinal lumen, may however include more than absorption.  Read more

Before proceeding with the historical survey a brief review of the structure of the liver is presented below. The logical unit of liver anatomy is the liver lobule. Many lobules are contained in a lobe and two or more lobes (depending on the species) form the whole organ. [...]  Read more

Studies have shown that about 95 per cent of the radioactivity incorporated from glucose-U-14C into RNA nucleotides is found in the ribose moiety of each nucleotide. The radiospecific activity of the ribose moieties of guanine and uracil were the highest; that of adenine was somewhat lower, while the specific activity of the ribose of cytosine was about ten times lower than the above three. It has been shown that the specific activities of the various nucleotides of RNA are a reflection of the labelling of the corresponding nucleotides in the acid-soluble fraction. These results are discussed in relation to the …  Read more

This thesis seeks to address corporate governance from both a practical as well as an academic perspective. It searches for solutions to self-interest and agency costs, problems that it is posited are innate to the anthropomorphism of the corporation and to the separation of management and ownership of widely held, publicly traded, corporations. Practically, this dissertation is anchored in experience, garnered from empirical research, based on in depth and general surveys, as well as detailed interviews. It examines the workings of corporations, including their boards of directors, of gatekeepers, of checks and balances and of shareholders and the relative importance …  Read more

Pick-and-place robots play an important role in industry, performing packaging and assembly tasks. To meet the demand for increasingly fast manipulators, new designs of parallel robots are being developed, as they have distinct speed advantages over their serial counterparts. Recently, a two-limbed, four-degree-of-freedom manipulator with high rotatability of its gripper and an isostatic (fully constrained) structure, the latter improving its assemblability, was introduced. The robot produces Schönflies motion, that is, three independent translations and one rotation about an axis of fixed direction; it is therefore classed as a Schönflies motion generator (SMG). The premiere prototype of this design, termed the …  Read more

Cette thèse examine Les Lois de Platon, offrant une nouvelle perspective sur l'importance des différences entre les trois personnages. Ces différences pointent à une tension clé entre la voix singulière de la loi à proprement parler, et les voix multiples du projet philosophique de Platon à l'intérieur de la loi. À son tour, cette tension fournit non seulement l'opportunité mais aussi les dilemmes pour ce projet, qui a pour but principal le développement de la responsabilité humaine authentique. Ceci se dégage particulièrement dans le droit pénal délinéé au Livre 9, qui doit prévoir la punition des criminels malgré le fait …  Read more

Malgré le fait que la baryogénèse électrofaible explique de façon prometteuse et testable l’asymétrie matière-antimatière, elle se fie à des calculs difficiles de vélocité de mur de bulle pendant la transition de phase électrofaible. Dans cette thèse, je détermine la vélocité des murs pendant une phase de transition électrofaible à deux étapes qui est de premier ordre dû à un champ singulet scalaire avec masse. Dans un premier temps, je passe en revue la théorie de baryogénèse électrofaible et des conditions qui doivent être remplies pour faire du modèle une explication viable. Ensuite, je présente le modèle scalaire singulet et …  Read more

A general route to optically active organosulfur and phosphorus compounds was investigated. Sulfinimides incorporating camphorimide were synthesized directly from a sulfinyl chloride and N-(trimethylsilyl)camphorimide. The diastereomers were found to be inseparable by crystallization or chromatography, although in one case an optically active sulfinamide was prepared by an asymmetric synthesis. The phosphorus-imide bond was formed by coupling of an asymmetric phosphinous chloride and N-(trimethylsilyl)camphorimide. Addition of sulfur gave N-(phosphinothioyl)camphorimides as separable diastereomers. These were converted into optically active thiophosphoryl compounds which were chiral only at phosphorus. The absolute configurations of the diastereomers were obtained by single-crystal X-ray analysis, through NMR techniques …  Read more

Canadian history from the beginning can almost be written in terms of her foreign trade. It was not only the inquisitive interest in discovery, the lust for adventure, and the sudden patriotic fervour that sent the little wooden ships across the Atlantic to Canada, from France and later from England, to poke tentatively around the Maritime coast and sail up the St. Lawrence; it was trade. In the same way that the famous East India and French East India Companies with their strong mercantile backing opened India and the treasures of the East to Europe, so French businessmen (such as …  Read more

[...] The work to be reported here was stimulated by the desire to study kidney function in the rat, particularly under the influence of various endocrine steroids. The experimental hypertension was thus produced, not by mechanical injury to the kidney, but hormonally. Most of the work has been performed in the last eighteen months, although its beginnings were in 1941.[...]  Read more

Afin d'élucider le rôle du tronc cérébral clans le contrôle des états de veille-sommeil, du sommeil paradoxal en particulier, une nouvelle méthode informatisée de quantification, représentation graphique et classification automatique des données électrographiques a été developpée. La concordance entre les classifications automatique et traditionelle s'est prouvée satisfaisante. L'application de cette méthode a permis une analyse quantitative et objective des effets de diverses lésions sur les états de veille-sommeil. Une comparaison entre les effets de lésions à l'intérieur du tegmentum pontique a demontré que les structures du tegmentum latéral sont essentielles à la génération de l'état de sommeil paradoxal, tandis que …  Read more

This paper investigates whether or not the experience of survivors of the Holocaust through the dying process follow the stages and tasks of dying as defined in the theoretical literature and the ramifications this has for the social worker serving these individuals and their families. The methodology employed was a library search to overlay the literature on death and dying upon the literature concerning Holocaust survivors. The study concludes that, for the most part, there is little congruence between the theories of dying and the coping mechanisms of the Holocaust survivor and that a different model of death and dying …  Read more

[...]I thought it possible that a study of the secretory and motor functions of the stomach of the lower vertebrates might reveal importantinformation about the phylogenetic history of the mammalian stomach. I undertook this investigation of gastric secretion and motility in the lessorganized vertebrates in the belief that it would lead to an approach of a better understanding of the complicated secretory and motor processesof the stomach of the more highly organized mammals.The following vertebrate animals were employed: Elasmobranch fishes (skate), Amphibia (Necturus or mud-puppy, andfrog), and birds (pigeon and chicken). Early in the research many differences in gastric physiology …  Read more

Current brain machine interface (BMI) systems are limited in their ability to extract information from physiological signals. To this end, the primary goal of this project is to investigate decoding multiple variables from neural activity in the medial intraparietal sulcus (MIP) and dorsal premotor cortex (PMd). Decoding multiple variables potentially increases useful extracted information for a BMI system. Neurons in these premotor areas are thought to compute the planning of arm movements, and previous studies have successfully inferred ongoing reach plans from their activity. Because the same brain areas are also sensitive to eye position, we investigated the possibility of …  Read more

Investigati ons "Were carried ou t in the field of polymethylene nitramine ohemistry. Fifteen new polymethylene nitramine compounds were prepared. their struotures, along with that of BSI, eluaidated, and their reaotions studied. RDX was degra.ded for the first time into an ieolableaoyalia polymethylene nitramine.From the study of the ohemistry of polymethylene nitramines. a new fundamental conoept in the eleotronio interpretation of organic chemistry is presented. The concept is applied to a study of thepolymethylene amine, and the polymethylene nitrarnine amine systems. the reactions of hexamine being thus explained.A new mechanism for the formation of RDX in the Baahmann reaction is …  Read more

The present study was undertaken for the purpose of ultimately systematically investigating the possible relationships between hormones, the kidney and hypertension and thus as the basis for later more complete work. This study deals entirely with all the evidence gathered to date which would make the kidney a target organ for hormonal effects, and essentially seeks to review the literature and to give a brief outline of original investigations thus far carried out. [...] Unfortunately accurate quantitative work has not yet been applied to any extent to the study of the effects of hormones on the kidney. We have thus …  Read more

Despite rapid advances in medical knowledge, the alimentary tract still presents a clinical problem. Complaints referable to this system are, it is recognized, among the most common of clinical symptoms, and frequently the most baffling. Thus, while the pathologist recognizes a variety of intestinal lesions, cases which reach autopsy represent only a fraction of patients with digestive complaints. Similarly, the Roentgenologist and the surgeon often cannot demonstrate a cause for digestive symptoms. To the internist falls the unhappy task of treating that large number of patients with gastro-intestinal disorders lacking any apparent organic basis.[...]  Read more

This work looks at the role of street dance in forming student understandings of hip-hop cultureand identity in an Urban Arts high-school. In particular, this thesis asks how the incorporation of street dance and hip-hop culture by community artists into the school affect the gendered and racialized dynamics of the school culture. These questions are addressed through a focus on bodily practice and how that practice affects students’ sense of belonging within hip-hop based education. Drawing from ethnographic data collected over two years of involvement in the school, the thesis focuses on student and artist perspectives on two hip-hop dance …  Read more

A student of the history of Islam in India is soon confronted with the name of Shaykh Ahmad Sirhindi (1563/4-1624). He was a contemporary of the emperors Akbar and Jahangir, was given by his disciples the honorific title of the Renewer of the Second Millennium (mujaddid-i alf-i thani) and is the author of a celebrated collection of letters that came to be known as Maktubat-i Imam-i Rabbani. [...]  Read more

This thesis presents an assessment of the effectiveness of the compliance mechanisms of the Kyoto Protocol in promoting compliance with the obligations under the Protocol. First, theoretical approaches to compliance are explored in order to understand the reasons for which states comply, using both international legal and international relations theory. This not only contributes to a greater understanding of compliance, but also helps to establish a framework of criteria for the assessment. Second, practical experience with the compliance mechanisms of the Montreal Protocol is used to develop further assessment criteria. Following a detailed description and analysis of the compliance mechanisms, …  Read more

The purpose of the work reported was to investigate the suitability of whale meat, whale liver, cod-fish products and of a dry meal mixture for the formulation of a mink ration. Until required for feeding, all the marine products were stored frozen. Chemical examinations of the frozen feeds for keeping quality over a prolonged period of time, demonstrated that storage conditions were adequate and that the levels of vitamin E remained remarkably constant.  Read more

It is one of the paradoxes of the history of the modern drama that the works of a playwright who was awarded the Nobel prize for literature, and who came to be regarded a classic writer during his own lifelime, were once considered "undramatic." It is the paradox of the literary achievement of George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950), and it may be described as follows:- During his most productive years as a playwright, from 1892 until the period immediately following World War l, Shaw was not considered a "dramatist" by a number of the influential critics of the London theatre (although …  Read more

In order to understand the implications of Frege's Grundlagen der Arithmetik, we must bear in mind that Frege saw logic as an overarching discipline, necessary for all scientific enquiry. This consideration allows us to make sense of his logicism, the idea that arithmetic is embedded in logic, and his platonism, the commitment to the mind-independent nature of arithmetic objects, such as numbers. In 1902, Russell generated a paradox from Basic Law (V), found in the first volume of Grundgesetze, which suggested that Frege's entire logical system was inconsistent. Recent work by Boolos and Wright, have fenced off the damage and …  Read more

It is axiomatic that taken together the works of Geoffrey Chaucer (1343? -- 1400) constitute the first sustained effort toward realism in fictional characterization found in English literature. This thesis examines the process whereby realism evolved in Chaucer's work and particularly the stylistic devices by which it was secured. In order better to understand Chaucer's contribution, we may briefly outline the obvious standards by which realm in characterization has come to be judged since his time.  Read more

Aubin-Horth, Nadia (Supervisor2)  Read more

A revolt against Colonel Muammar Gadhafi's Libyan government began in February of 2011. The conflict lasted for eight months and affected the entire country. Two distinct sides fought for control during those eight months making the conflict a civil war. This master's thesis uses a series of interviews as well as the academic and journalistic literature produced about the Libyan conflict to argue that the war should also be understood as a revolution. Considering the war a revolution introduces a number of puzzles. Firstly, Colonel Gadhafi's position within Libya was officially symbolic in much the same way Great Britain's royalty …  Read more

In this dissertation I present the results of comparative ethnographic and spatial research carried out in Alma and Saint-Georges, Québec between August 2015 and July 2016. I chose these cities as field sites in order to study why two populations of nearly equal size (roughly thirty thousand) and extremely similar demographic, economic and social characteristics voted differently since 1976 on the two most salient political cleavages in Québec – the left-right spectrum on economic issues and the question of provincial sovereignty. In the dissertation, I argue three main points. First, the political differences expressed in the voting histories of Alma …  Read more

Ce mémoire est une enquête sur les interactions entre les composantes acoustiques etélectroniques dans les pièces de la musique mixte, et comment ces interactions peuvent être à l’origine des nouveaux effets de perception ainsi que des dialectiques sémantiquement riches. Dans ces cas, la technologie n’est pas utilisée seulement pour produire les sons, néanmoins son incorporation est intégrale à la formation du sens musical. Les pièces mixtes qui font partie de la tradition spectrale (crée par Gérard Grisey et Tristan Murail dans les années 1970) sont particulièrement aptes pour ces enquêtes grâce à une préoccupation esthétique, élaborant ainsi les sons musicaux …  Read more

The goal of this study is to develop a general theoretical perspective for the archaeological study of intersocietal interaction among hunter-gatherers. Several theoretical frameworks have been offered for the study of interaction, including acculturation, ecological interdependency, peer polity interaction, world-system theory, and a number of more particularist approaches. Although all offer valuable insights, only world-system theory has the potential for application to all types and scales of intersocietal interaction, past and present. The perspective developed here represents an experimental modification of the world-system perspective, with the addition of aspects of previous hunter-gatherer studies, most of which are strongly influenced by …  Read more

Low income is a barrier to optimal feeding practices of infants and young children (IYC). Microcredit programs for rural Ghanaian women aim to increase incomes, which may improve the quantity and quality of foods given to IYC. This study examined (1) the association between a mother's participation in a microcredit-only program and IYC dietary quality and nutritional status, (2) factors influencing IYC feeding among mothers, and (3) factors influencing the incorporation of nutrition education within a microcredit program. Participants included 102 active microcredit (MC) member mothers and 102 non-microcredit (NMC) member mothers and their youngest child (6-23 mo). Information was …  Read more

This thesis argues that economic development, in both theory and practice, is inevitably based on moral questions. These questions have been explored in recent years by "development ethicists," a multidisciplinary group of scholars and practitioners committed to evaluating the policy implications of economic development. Chapter 1 engages this body of literature, arguing that the capability ethic articulated by Amartya Sen and Martha Nussbaum can provide a valuable ethical framework for evaluating economic development in the Canadian north. Their approach is considered in conjunction with other ethical proposals, and, in particular, how theological insights provide an additional dimension for a more …  Read more

In response to extra-cellular cues, cells activate signal transduction pathways to elicit a biological response. Cell surface growth factor receptors such as the Met receptor tyrosine kinase (RTK) activate signals that result in cellular proliferation, survival, migration, as well as epithelial morphogenesis. In order for signal transduction to occur, docking proteins are recruited to the activated RTK, become phosphorylated on tyrosine residues, which then serve as docking sites for the recruitment of other signaling proteins. Docking proteins function to diversify the signal by assembling multi-protein complexes. The Gab1 docking protein is the most tyrosine phosphorylated protein upon Met receptor activation …  Read more

Charles, Trevor C. (Supervisor)  Read more

Contexte: La douleur chronique est un problème de santé majeur qui affecte environ 20% de la population adulte. Il y a eu une forte augmentation dans l’utilisation d’opioïdes afin de pallier la douleur chronique ces 20 dernières années en Amérique du Nord. La thérapie par opioïdes a montré qu’elle pouvait être efficace pour soulager les patients atteints de douleur chronique, cependant l’utilisation d’opioïdes peut être accompagnée de problèmes liés aux opioïdes, incluant le mésusage d'opioïdes et l'addiction aux opioïdes. Le mésusage d'opioïdes (i.e., l’usage d’opioïdes de façon différente que prescrite) peut mener à des problèmes sévères et peut ultimement mener …  Read more

This thesis investigated the nature of the deficit in story recall associated with temporal-lobe damage in the left hemisphere dominant for speech. The first three experiments examined whether excision of this region (1) slows the rate at which verbal material is processed, (2) reduces working-memory capacity, or (3) interferes with the integration of information across sentences. Left temporal lobectomy does not impair these aspects of the initial processing of stories, since on none of the above variables was the performance of left temporal-lobe groups deficient relative to that of normal control subjects, or patients with unilateral frontal- or right temporal-lobe …  Read more

Tm3+ ions provide amplification in a wide variety of wavelength bands,including 480 nm, 810 nm, 1480 nm, 1900 nm, and 2300 nm. This thesis presentsthe characteristics of lasers fabricated with Tm:ZBLAN fibre as the gain medium.First, a single-wavelength linear cavity fibre laser at 810 nm is presented. Dual-wavelength lasing and bistable behaviour are demonstrated in single cavity lasers,while dual-wavelength lasing, bistable behaviour and wavelength switching are demonstrated in cascaded cavity lasers. Second, single wavelengths fibre lasers at 1480 nm in linear and ring cavities are presented. A maximum power of 340 mW at 1476 nm was obtained. Dual-wavelength lasing at …  Read more