title: Genetic Interactions and Biochemical Pathway Involved in Escape from het-6 Incompatibility in Neurospora crassa

abstract: Non-self recognition during asexual growth in filamentous fungi is mediated by interactions between proteins encoded by heterokaryon incompatibility (het) genes. For example, N. crassa strains that carry the incompatible factors un-24PA and het-6OR exhibit a slow and aberrant growth phenotype. Remarkably, after about 4.5 days of growth, wild-type-like sectors emerge from these self-incompatible un-24PA het-6OR colonies through a process called ‘escape’. Escape is due to point mutations that arise in het-6 gene (94%), vib-1 (3%), a transcription factor of het-6, or other factor(s) (3%) that have only been characterized by a unique feathery morphology. Results show that deletions of the DNA damage checkpoint factors, mus-9, uvs-3, mus-23, vib-1 and rtt109 either suppress or delay escape from incompatibility. We proposed that het-6 and vib-1 are DNA damage checkpoint effectors.


title: North as Nature: An Ecocritacal Analysis of Royal Canadian Air Force Photography and Leslie Reid's Mapping Time

abstract: A semiotic analysis of visual narratives, this thesis explores representations of Arctic landscape to uncover discourses of North and Nature. In the mid-twentieth century, the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) was tasked with photographing the Canadian Arctic to construct accurate maps of the region. And, following a residency with the Canadian Forces Artists Program in 2013, contemporary artist Leslie Reid began an ongoing series of paintings and photo-mosaics: Mapping Time. This trans historical thesis is dedicated to an ecologically sensitive approach and considers how aerial photographs of the RCAF not only represent space, but also construct narratives of Canadian sovereignty and contribute to an idea of North as Nature. Integrating examples of RCAF photographs into her photomontages, Reid asks viewers to contemplate the history of Arctic mapping and her paintings welcome a critical approach to representations of place, space, and landscape.


title: Yuxweluptun, Nicolson and Assu: Land, Environment and Activist Art in British Columbia

abstract: Land rights and environmental issues have long been the cause of fiercely intense and heated disputes between the Canadian government and Aboriginal communities in British Columbia. This thesis focuses on the representation of land loss and environmental issues in British Columbia through the work of contemporary Cowichan Coast Salish and Okanagan artist Lawrence Paul Yuxweluptun and Kwakwaka’wakw artists Marianne Nicolson and Sonny Assu. The objective is to bring a fresh perspective to understanding the politicized artistic practice of these three artists by considering their work as a form of environmental activism. I examine the relationships between the three artists while contextualizing their work within twentieth-century developments in Northwest Coast art. This research is informed by first hand interviews with the artists themselves conducted in January 2016, as well as the work of scholars Gerald Vizenor, Philip J. Deloria and James Clifford among others.


title: Improvisation Pedagogies Via Improvised Dialogues: Lessons From a Week-Long Course on Musical Improvisation for Youth

abstract: Musical improvisation is the negotiation of musical ideas and differences in the moment. Despite its considerable contributions to the development of music history, improvisation remains conspicuously absent from mainstream Western schooling. Its omission from the classroom is due in part to the scarcity of information on the topic of facilitating improvised music. My research explores the pedagogical applications of musical improvisation and the opportunities it presents for fostering creativity and cultivating critical reflection. In this thesis, I discuss my experiences teaching a week-long course on the topic of musical improvisation to nineteen students as a part of the Enrichment Mini-Courses Program. Together through co-investigation, the class and I unpacked issues and concepts concerning improvisation in theory and practice. Exploring frameworks for improvised music making, my findings are the product of verbal, written, and musical dialogues with the students, formulating pedagogies of improvisation that are themselves improvised.


title: Protocols for Evaluation of an Interactive Video Tracking System Utilizing Face Recognition

abstract: The Search and Retrieve prototype was developed as an interactive video tracking prototype to find and follow targets in a multi-camera surveillance system using face recognition. The overall potential benefits of using interactive face recognition for video tracking are unknown. We developed an evaluation protocol for the Search and Retrieve program using human-computer interaction and video tracking metrics. The protocol included three tracking cases: manual tracking, automated tracking using face recognition, and interactive tracking using both. We demonstrate that adding the operator's skill through interaction to the face recognition tracking present in the Search and Retrieve program can measurably increase recall by an average of 8 times for automated tracking and 39% over manual tracking in a limited time span of 20 minutes and without any prior training of the system for the user. The system's precision remains constant over the three cases.


title: Multi-Scale Failure Analysis of Laminated Composites Using the Boundary Element Method

abstract: This project has as its main objective the development of the computational tools capable of facilitating multi-scale failure analysis in laminated composites. First, for the continuum meso-scale, the boundary element method (BEM) is used, in which the anisotropic 3D fundamental solutions based on double Fourier series were employed. The most significant advantage of using this Fourier series representation and its derivatives is that Fourier coefficients need to be evaluated just one time independent of the number of field points. This fact reduced the computational efforts, besides facilitating the ease of implementation into a BEM code. The dynamic effects in the continuum media were included in the equilibrium equation. These effects induced domain integrals in the boundary integral equation (BIE). The Dual Reciprocity Method (DRM) and the Radial Integration Method (RIM) were implemented for the transformation of the domain integrals into boundary integrals. Additionally, an acceleration technique namely the Adaptive Cross Approximation (ACA) was used with the BEM. The combination of the 3D anisotropic fundamental solutions with ACA resulted in a substantial memory and processing speed gain, that is of main importance when huge numerical problems, such as multi-scale problems, are being analized. Next, the failure multi-scale criterion was implemented and applied to laminated composites. For the micro-scale analysis, a specific potential for epoxy materials was used. Then, the Cauchy-Born rule was used to couple the scales on the 3D multi-scale model. Some numerical examples were presented in order to show the validity of the failure criterion. The project involved a one-year period at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada, under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Choon-Lai Tan, specialist in fracture mechanics, anisotropic material formulation and boundary elements. This period in Canada provided the student with a strong academic formation, besides, providing the possibility of obtaining a double diploma. Through a cotutelle agreement, the student will receive a Ph.D. degree from Carleton University as well as from UNICAMP.


title: The Status of Women News Journalists in Lebanese Television: A Field-Gender Approach

abstract: This dissertation examines the status of women in the Lebanese television newsroom using the field theory proposed by Bourdieu, gender theory in relation to journalism studies and the concept of the glass ceiling. Women’s newsroom positions, field accomplishments, social and educational capitals, as well as the obstacles they face, are studied alongside the effect of their religious and political affiliation and their strategies of struggle. Utilizing a qualitative research design, individual in-depth interviews were conducted in the fall of 2014. Respondents included 27 newsroom workers, 18 of whom were females and 9 of whom were males chosen from Lebanon’s nine official television stations. The respondents’ gendered distribution ensures the inclusion of both the male and female perspectives of the newsroom environment. The findings are thematically divided under cultural and social capitals, gendered news division, age and appearance, the glass ceiling, obstacles and advancement strategies. The findings revealed how the Lebanese television newsroom juggles inter-state and intra-state rivalries which are part of the television’s politico-sectarian identity. This study showed that respondents’ career paths are affected in fluid ways by a number of characteristics that intersect with the politico-sectarian nature of the Lebanese television and gender. These characteristics, which include age, appearance, parenthood, political and religious affiliations, shape the respondents’ experiences and offer them ways to comply with or resist the dominant newsroom culture. Women, who seem to bear the weight of these characteristics more than men, have managed to prove themselves in the Lebanese television newsroom. They occupy senior management positions and have established parity in pay and in news coverage. Though they are still a minority in top management positions and in governance, women have re-shaped the newsroom environment inviting us to re-conceptualize established gendered news divisions and forms of gendered interaction and struggle. Yet women in the Lebanese television newsroom have a long way to go- their reach into the upper echelons of media management is conditioned by their political participation in a country where the media are an extension of the politico-sectarian governing body, in which women are still a minority.


title: Consumer, Producer and State Relations within the Multiple Scales of the Eastern Ontario Egg Industry:  Exposing Scalar Relations and Neoliberal Tensions

abstract: This research evaluates relationships between consumers, producers and the state within eastern Ontario’s multi-scalar egg industry. Comparative case studies of three producers, Burnbrae Farms, Reinink Family Farm and Covenant Farm, reveal distinctly scalar production, marketing, and communication practices within the industry. The findings challenge the dichotomy of large versus small scales, revealing mutually beneficial multi-scalar partnerships. The research also evaluates the power of consumers and the state in shaping the industry. Surveys of egg consumers reveal demand for alternative production. However, consumers face barriers to agency, including lack of knowledge and a tendency to outsource their ethics. Policy analysis reveals supply management, Canada’s alternative regulatory system, protects many consumer and producer interests by challenging conventional globalized agri-food production and protecting (to an extent) small-scale, alternative producers. However, international neoliberalization processes threaten Canada’s supply management systems. Therefore, the industry must evolve to enhance consumer and producer support for the system.


title: Mining NHL Draft Data and A New Value Pick Chart

abstract: For every hockey player, getting drafted to the NHL is a dream come true, but the real goal is to reach 160 games played (GP). A simple model is fit to NHL draft years 1998 to 2009 with an aim at predicting the proportion of players who will play 1 or 160 games. For individual players drafted between 1998 and 2011, predictive models (GLM, Neural Network, SVM and LOESS) are created to predict a player's career GP, then combined to create a voting model to decide whether or not a player will reach 160 GP. Players drafted from 1998 to 2008 were analysed using non-linear multi-variate model, with a modified weighted least squares, to predict a player's Time-On-Ice (TOI) for their first seven seasons. The results were analysed for positional advantage, then converted to value pick charts (used by teams when choosing a draft pick or considering a trade).


title: Cyclic Behaviour and Dynamic Properties of Soils Under Simple Shear Loading

abstract:
An experimental study was carried out on sensitive clays obtained from Eastern Canada and sand obtained from the Fraser Delta. Large strain tests were conducted to investigate the monotonic and cyclic behaviour of clays. Small strain tests were carried out at different consolidation stress levels to investigate the dynamic properties of soils. Tests were performed using the Carleton University simple shear device, which was modified to enable confident measurements at small strains.
Results show that shear strength of clays is influenced by consolidation stress, OCR and clay content. Tested clays have relatively strong cyclic resistance at in-situ stress, but resistance decreased significantly if clays are normally consolidated.
Site-specific modulus reduction and damping curves are proposed for Ottawa-Quebec area clays and sand. These site-specific curves are unique for sensitive clays and curves generated for sand are close to the average and lower bound curves reported in the literature.


title: Effective Expressions of Agency in a Broad Network of Relationships

abstract: I argue that while Amartya Sen provides good reasons for focusing on the agency aspect of individuals, his account is too constrained. Sen describes agency in terms of individuals and their capacity for rationality and fails to account for the effect of a broad network of relationships. I turn to Sarah Clark Miller’s expanded account of agency to argue that the abilities of relationality and emotionality are also relevant for effective agency. I then argue that Miller’s focus on the moral duty to care means that her account is also too individualistic. I ground her account instead in the thoroughly relational nature of agents to show that her account must be coupled with a relational account of autonomy to be adequately sensitive to the effects of oppression on agents. I end by suggesting that oppressed agents can challenge social conditions that are not completely conducive to full autonomy through solidarity.


title: Test Generation from an Extended Finite State Machine as a Multiobjective Optimization Problem

abstract: Extended Finite State Machines are widely used in different phases of software development including software testing. In this Ph.D. dissertation, we argue that test generation from an Extended Finite State Machine (EFSM) can be considered as a multiobjective optimization problem. When a test engineer generates tests from an EFSM he/she typically considers several objectives. We propose a search-based approach to generate test suites from an EFSM, accounting for multiple (potentially conflicting) such objectives. We aim at maximizing coverage of the EFSM test model and maximizing feasibility of the generated test suite so that its test cases can actually execute, while minimizing similarity between these test cases since this has been shown to increase fault detection, as well as minimizing overall cost. Therefore, we have defined a multiobjective genetic algorithm that searches for optimal test suites based on four fitness functions. In doing so, we create an entire test suite at once as opposed to creating a test suite one test case one at a time, which we argue is a suboptimal test suite generation procedure. Our approach is evaluated on different case studies, showing interesting results. We also investigate different ways of improving our solution and analyze impact of those improvements.


title: On the Use of Frequency Response Functions in the Finite Element Model Updating

abstract: Finite element model updating methodologies allow the identification of structures by improving the accuracy of an initial finite element model considering data acquired from a vibration test. Usually, numerical predictions and experimental results disagree thus requiring an updated model that best reproduces the dynamic behavior of the actual structure. Several updating methodologies have been developed in the last years such as the modal-based and response-based ones, which minimize the difference between the measured and predicted modal parameters and Frequency Response Functions, respectively. This thesis investigates a response-based method which iteratively minimizes a residual vector defined on the correlation functions between the Frequency Response Functions, which are directly available from experimental tests, to identify the mismodeled regions of a numerical model and improve the correlation with its experimental counterpart. The minimization problem is generally solved by means of the weighted least-squares approach and starting from a reference formulation available in literature, some enhancements are proposed, validated numerically, and extended to real experimental data using simple structures such as beams and plates. Finally, the proposed methodology is applied to identify the physical properties of a reduced-scale helicopter blade model that incorporates a semi-active device for vibration control, named Smart Spring. As a further study, the effectiveness of this device to reduce vibration is analytically verified through the development of its mathematical model in the frequency domain that makes use of an open-loop control law. Moreover, the capability of the Smart Spring to modulate the structural properties of a system and alter its dynamic behavior, thus acting as a semi-active device, is experimentally assessed through vibration tests performed at different operative working conditions of the device.


title: Associations Between Long Term Exposure to Air Pollution and the Incidence of Dementia and Cognitive Impairment in a Canadian Prospective Cohort Study

abstract: The analyses revealed that PM2.5 was somewhat positively associated with the development of dementia, Alzheimer’s, and CIND. Specifically, the adjusted hazard ratios (HR) in relation to a 10 μg/m3 increase in PM2.5 for these three conditions were: 1.15 (95% CI=0.93-1.40), 1.32(95% CI=0.95-1.83) and 1.52 (95% CI=1.20-1.95), respectively. In contrast, NO2 concentrations were not associated with any of these three outcomes. The corresponding hazards ratios for a 5 ppb increase in NO2 for dementia, AD, and CIND were 0.98 (95% CI=0.93-1.03), 1.00(95% CI=0.91-1.09) and 0.99 (95% CI=0.83-1.06), respectively. Our findings also suggest that the association between PM2.5 and our measures of dementia are stronger among those who are obese when compared to those who are not.


title: Neural & Predictive Effects of Verb Argument Structure

abstract: This project seeks to consider new ways in which neuroscience and language can inform each other. This project uses language as a recognized high-order cognitive function that can be manipulated to test neuronal mechanisms. The hypothesis here is that the predictive ability of online language processing is sensitive to the syntactic requirements of verbs. For example, things that modify the meaning of a verb phrase but are not a required a syntactic component required by the verb, such as adverbs, are impossible to predict by listeners, since there are no linguistic ques that necessitate their appearance. The idea then is that they must rely on more self-driven processing because of this lack of external ques that can strictly dictate their purpose. If they are more internally driven in processing then they should also be more susceptible to the effects the spontaneous brain activity.


title: Digital Wood:  Computational Grain Realignment

abstract: Digital Wood seeks to develop lighter, more delicate, and more efficient structural framing members by computationally realigning wood grain to the corresponding principle stress lines acting within the member while it’s under load. This will be achieved by utilizing computational analysis and design software in conjunction with digital milling tools to produce molds, jigs and formwork required for fabrication. Once fabricated, the resulting framing member will retain the performance properties of the original, but in a fraction of the material and thus a fraction of the weight. This materials research thesis will utilize the intrinsic mechanical properties of wood fibre to produce a superior structural framing system.


title: Developing the Slum Main Street:  An Urban Intervention in Kisenyi, Kampala

abstract:
Slums are widely perceived as hubs of hopelessness and societal decay that require removal. As architects we can affirm the place of these settlements in the urban milieu. A solution to the disrepair of the city’s slums lies in a model that provides a more qualitative, habitable living and working place that can act as a framework to stimulate the existing economic activity.
Kisenyi II is one such site, bustling with economic activity and potential. It is also one of Uganda’s largest informal settlements, and home to the country’s largest open-air market. Its inhabitants however live in constant fear as they have been repeatedly threatened with eviction. This thesis and design proposal will be focused on designing a framework upon which quality living and ordered economic activity can thrive and in so doing reclaim the informal dwellers’ right to the urban realm.


title: The Influence of Exogenous Cortisol Manipulation on Parental Investment and Reproductive Success in Nest Guarding Male Smallmouth Bass

abstract: Parental care, providing post-fertilization care to a developing brood, is beneficial for teleost fishes. Parental care is a challenging period for fish. Stress resulting from anthropogenic influences may make this already challenging period even more difficult, with the potential for negative fitness consequences. Experimentally elevating cortisol using intraperitoneal injections is effective in exploring the potential effects of the stress hormone cortisol on parental care. In Chapter 2, using a gradient of body sizes, I explore the interactive influence that elevated cortisol, body size, and brood size have on parental care behaviours and reproductive success in nesting smallmouth bass. In Chapter 3, using accelerometers attached to nesting smallmouth bass, I examine the influence of elevated cortisol on swimming behaviours and locomotor activity level, at a fine scale and over a longer time period. These results contribute to the growing body of literature illustrating the effects of elevated cortisol on teleost reproduction.


title: Material Memory

abstract:
Through the depression, the Second World War, and the postwar decades of expanding scientific research and economic growth, the Energy Mines and Resources Complex in Ottawa stood at the forefront of Canadian technological research and innovation. Shuttered since 2001 , the complex—a collection of remarkable historic buildings made for research and development—now stands empty.
Material Memory explores narratives of Canada’s modern industrial history. The project investigates the potential of rerepresentation, through the creation of a physical archive of the complex and the artefacts located therein, to deepen our understanding of place. Purposeful appropriation of, and additions to the historical EMRC buildings provide means for reimagining the futures of urban industrial complexes and governmental sites.


title: Photographic Encounters in the North: Rosemary Gilliat Eaton's 1960 Trip to the Eastern Canadian Arctic

abstract: This thesis interrogates historic representations of gender, race, and landscape in the North through a case study of Canadian photojournalist Rosemary Gilliat’s 1960 trip to the eastern Arctic. Considering photography as a social practice and material object, I investigate Gilliat’s personal ritual of image-making, the encounter between photographer and Inuit subject, and the constitutive power of the resulting images. As a woman facing numerous gender biases, Gilliat empathized with her Indigenous subjects and created photographs that often reflect a collaborative space of interaction. Yet, she did not exist outside of colonialism’s oppressive structures; thus her published images simultaneously supplement and support primitivizing views of the North and Inuit. Gilliat’s photographs, therefore, are not unequivocal documents of history but performative objects with complex and multivalent meaning. Consequently, I argue for the archive as a productive site for the recuperation of women’s professional histories and the excavation of narratives of intercultural encounter.


title: Smooth Signed Distance Field Textures

abstract: We present a procedural method to produce continuous texture that can contain both smooth and irregular organic shapes. Our method is suitable for modeling many patterns found in the natural world, including certain types of amphibian skin and animal coat markings.


title: Development of Low Bandgap Donor-Acceptor Polymers for Use in Optoelectronics

abstract: Development of organic optoelectronic devices have gained great deal of attention in recent years due to unique advantages over their inorganic counterpart such as easy processability and flexibility. The demand for clean and renewable energy have amplified development of organic polymer for commercialization. The focus of development has gone into conjugated organic polymers and turning band gap. Donoracceptor (D-A) methodology have been the most effective strategy in conceptualizing these developments. This thesis consists of four parts: 1) design, syntheses and characterization of diketopyrrolopyrrole (DPP)- based polymers bearing thermal cleavable moiety used for multilayer device structure; 2) introduction of a stronger acceptor, diazapentalene (DAP), in polymer to achieve coverage of longer wavelength and study of multilayer device for photodetection; 3) development of cross-linkable polymer for use as p-type interface layer; 4) modification of benzothiadiazole (BT) acceptor to study electrochromic activity in the near-infrared region.


title: Motion Detection in Dynamic Cardiac Positron Emission Tomography Images

abstract:
Dynamic PET is being increasingly utilized to quantify myocardial blood flow, leading to improved diagnostic and prognostic value for the management of coronary artery disease. MBF quantification assumes constant positioning of anatomical structures throughout image acquisition. This assumption is violated in the presence of patient motion and heart motion. This thesis discusses methods for motion detection in dynamic cardiac 82Rb PET images.
First, we determined if positron-emitting fiducial markers can be used as surrogate markers for heart motion in dynamic PET images. Second, algorithms were developed to track fiducial marker motion. Lastly, we tested the idea that principle component analysis may be able to detect heart motion in dynamic 82Rb PET based on patterns in the residue image.
Overall, this thesis proposes low-cost, fast, and vendor independent post-reconstruction dynamic 82Rb PET motion detection methods which can be used to detect motion in a clinical environment as a quality assurance tool.


title: Behavioural and physiological ecology of coastal marine fish: basic and applied perspectives

abstract: Energy is the currency of life, by which we can measure how ecological and anthropogenic factors influence individual fitness, scaling up to population and ecosystem dynamics. Energy is expended and gained by organisms through diverse behavioural tactics aimed at maximizing fitness. My overarching hypothesis for this dissertation is that ecological and anthropogenic factors influence animal behaviour and energetics. I tested this hypothesis in two coastal marine fish species, bonefish (Albula vulpes) and great barracuda (Sphyraena barracuda) using a combination of field studies and controlled experiments. In the wild, landscape features had the greatest impact on bonefish activity and energy expenditure at both fine (i.e., between habitats on a single coral reef crest) and broad (i.e., between coastal habitats and regions) spatial scales. Diel period, water temperature, and tide state also influenced bonefish behaviour and energetics, with some consistent patterns across environments, including greater activity and energy expenditure during the day, as well as ebbing and low tides. Bonefish activity levels and habitat selection also corresponded with temperature-related physiological performance. Comparing two disparate coastal ecogeographic regions, activity- and temperature-based estimates of bonefish energy expenditure were higher in the fringing coral reefs of tropical Culebra, Puerto Rico than the expansive sand flats of sub-tropical Eleuthera, The Bahamas; however, home ranges were significantly larger in Eleuthera than Culebra, which likely has significant energetic costs that may contribute to differences in growth rates between the regions. From a more applied perspective, a common anthropogenic stressor, recreational angling, caused significant locomotory (i.e., swimming capabilities) and behavioural (i.e., refuge use) impairment in bonefish and great barracuda, which resulted in increased post-release predation risk. Retaining bonefish for a short period prior to release reduced this impairment and may be a useful strategy for improving post-release survival in environments with high predator burden. Collectively, by examining how ecological and anthropogenic factors influence fish behaviour and energetics, my dissertation has advanced our understanding of fundamental ecology and management of coastal marine fish and their ecosystems.


title: Three Essays on Private Labels, Product Quality and The Retailer's Bargaining Power

abstract:
The first chapter of this thesis studies the motivations of a retailer to launch a private label product in an environment where consumers do not know the quality of the product before consumption. I show that the launch of the private label product can be a form of brand stretching, with the sales of a national brand acting as a bond to ensure that the retailer sells a private label product of high quality. Consequently, the retailer would carry and sell the national brand product even in situations where it would not have done so under perfect information. In addition, I also demonstrate that other motivations for launching a private label product, namely to strengthen the retailer's bargaining position and to engage in market segmentation, are not fundamentally affected by the presence of asymmetric information.
In the second chapter, an overlapping-generation model is constructed to investigate the motivations of a retailer to launch a private label product in an environment of asymmetric information about its quality. I focus on the case where the national brand product is too costly to be offered by the retailer under perfect information. I show that, under imperfect information, the national brand product can be used as a signal for the quality of the private label product in a long term even though its cost is very high relative to that of the private label product.
In the final chapter, I use data on a large super-market chain to test two hypotheses regarding the use of private labels by a retailer that also offers national brands. The first hypothesis is whether private labels enhance the retailer's bargaining power vis-a-vis its manufacturers. The second hypothesis is whether the retailer strategically sets its prices to favor its private labels. I find that private labels indeed enable the retailer to receive lower wholesale prices with its national brand manufacturers. Moreover, private labels lead to an increase in retail prices for the national brands in support of the strategic retail pricing hypothesis. I also use a simulation exercise to evaluate the benefit of private labels to the consumers.


title: Creating 3D Human Character Mesh Prototypes from a Single Front-View Sketch

abstract:
3D character modeling, a vital part in film and video game production, is a process that starts by blocking out the basic geometry of a character, which is then transformed into a detailed and enhanced mesh. This process can be a long and daunting task to novice modelers. As a result, extensive research in the area of sketch-based modeling has focused on finding solutions that facilitate this process.
We developed a sketch-based modeling system that constructs the basic 3D geometry of a human character mesh based on a single front-view sketch and minimal user interaction through a simple interface. The main objective of this system is to help novice modelers by automating the initial phase of the modeling process with the aid of an intuitive user interface, and to construct a basic mesh with suitable structure that conforms to common modeling techniques.


title: Your Friendly Neighbourhood Zombie: Normalizing Monstrous Bodies Through Zombie Media

abstract: Our deepest social fears and anxieties are often communicated through the zombie, but these readings aren’t reflected in contemporary zombie media. Increasingly, we are producing a less scary, less threatening zombie — one that is simply struggling to navigate a society in which it doesn’t fit. I begin to rectify the gap between zombie scholarship and contemporary zombie media by mapping the zombie’s shift from “outbreak narratives” to normalized monsters. If the zombie no longer articulates social fears and anxieties, what purpose does it serve? Through the close examination of these “normalized” zombie media, I read the zombie as possessing a non-normative body whose lived experiences reveal and reflect tensions of identity construction — a process that is muddy, in motion, and never easy. We may be done with the uncontrollable horde, but we’re far from done with the zombie and its connection to us and society.


title: A Difficult Conversation: The News Media and the Story of the First Peoples of Canada

abstract:
The news media have long contributed to the oppression of indigenous peoples in Canada; when journalists did report on indigenous peoples, they were stereotyped as helpless victims and threats to national identity. The result has been a distorted version of history championing settlers’ pioneering legacy. In 2007-2008, the federal government introduced reconciliation policies. After conducting case studies of the Globe and Mail, Maclean’s, and CBC, this thesis finds that the watershed moment when coverage began reflecting the nuances of the indigenous story came in 2014-2015.
Analyzing the case studies through a theoretical framework that considers the principles that guide journalists, the culture of the news media, and agenda-setting offers insight into what changed. This thesis concludes more information, institutional legitimacy, indigenous activism, indigenous journalists, and a digital vista have all influenced the continuity and the evolution in the way the indigenous story is told by the news media in Canada.


title: Digesting Data: The Social and Ideological Actions of Eating Well with Canada's Food Guide

abstract: "Eating Well with Canada’s Food Guide" (CFG), Canada’s official dietary guidelines, is designed to address high rates of obesity and diet-related chronic diseases in Canada. This dissertation reports on a qualitative study of the social and ideological actions that the CFG performs. The study draws on concepts from Rhetorical Genre Studies, Science and Technology Studies, and Multimodal Interactional Analysis, and applies them in the analysis of interviews with key informants involved with the latest revision of the CFG and registered dietitians (RDs) working with vulnerable populations, as well as in a rhetorical and multimodal analysis of the guidelines. The findings of the analyses suggest that the CFG relies heavily on the representations typically reserved for scientific evidence from nutrition science, which focus on nutrients rather than on food. In the context of the CFG, these typical scientific representations are used for non-scientific audiences or in non-scientific situations, that is, cease to be scientific and become scientistic. The scientistic representations create rhetorical complexities, such as layers of rhetorical action (rhetorical laminations), and contribute to multiple rhetorical failures of the CFG. The scientistic representations in the CFG and the rhetorical failures they produce influence how RDs conceptualize nutrition, and dominate, rather than facilitate, discussions about healthy eating. As a result, RDs develop new discursive activities whereby they have to rely on additional resources to translate the scientistic representations for people and apply the CFG to their lives. Overall, the study suggests that the CFG, instead of an enabling resource, serves as a limiting document: it limits who can make healthier food choices and how such choices can be made. The study indicates that the CFG, as a rhetorical failure, has not achieved its intended social and ideological goals, or, in other words, has written itself out of usefulness.


title: Investigation into the Mode of Antifungal Action of Berberine

abstract: The motivation in this research is that Berberine’s antifungal mode of action is not known yet. The focus of this study is to identify the biochemical basis of yeast sensitivity to berberine (i.e. "mode of action"). The MIC of berberine with yeast was determined to be in the range of 0.156 to 0.078 mg/ml. To infer berberine mode of antifungal activity, GDA analysis was performed using a library of 4700 yeast strains, each with a different gene deletion, using a berberine concentration of 0.13 mg/ml. Out of the library, the 71 most sensitive yeast deletion mutant strains and 22 resistant strains were identified and analyzed with GO terms. Finally, using berberine’s natural florescence characteristic together with other histochemical stains, confocal fluorescence microscopy revealed that berberine was dynamically localized first to mitochondria and then to oil droplets within the yeast cell.


title: Deleuze and Big Data: How Facebook's Use of Big Data Analytics Shifts Legal Personhood, Privacy and Commercial Expression

abstract: This thesis explores the application of Deleuze to the use of big data analytics by Facebook to conceptualize the fusion between the physical and digital world. The fusion of technology and everyday life revolves around a debate between technological determinism and instrumentalism. This thesis begins by examining the operation of Facebook as a web 2.0 service and applies a Deleuzian discourse to explore Facebook as an assemblage of control. This assemblage is framed as a soft form of technological determinism in the control of a mass aggregated population of profiles. Facebook’s profiles are representative of Deleuze’s dividual, a replicated image of the self held in data. The combination of the use of data based surveillance and the data feedback loop in retrieving, analyzing and manipulating these profiles leads to a series of legal challenges. This thesis seeks to provide a framework for understanding these challenges in law.


title: Design, Analysis and Modeling of the Effect of the Phase Detector in Digital Phase-Locked Loops

abstract:
The limitations and the effect of the performance of the binary phase detector on the overall performance of the digital phase-locked loop is the main focus of the research presented in this proposal. In the first part of the research, the gain limitation of the binary phase detector on the performance of the digital Bang-Bang PLLs (BBPLL) is investigated. Then to validate the concept that is explained and to improve the performance of the digital loop under the gain limitation, two schemes are explored and explained. In one scheme a random bit-stream which is noise-shaped using a software defined ΣΔ modulator is used to dither the reference and improve the performance and in the second scheme a Time-Amplifier (TA) is used to improve the digital loop performance by preventing the phase detector from operating in metastable region.
The second part of the research focuses on a novel multi-bit phase detector for high-speed applications where high-resolution performance is needed and the jitter budget is stringent. In this design a Transmission Delay Line (TDL) is used to generate the delayed versions of the input clock. The performance of this phase detector is analyzed in detail using stochastic analysis.
In the second multi-bit, TDL based phase detector a search algorithm is used to find the closest delayed reference to the feedback clock. This scheme provides superior performance compared to the first scheme as its performance is not affected by the mismatch of the binary phase detectors used in the first scheme. The performance of the two design are compared and example of the performance in the loop is provided.


title: Numerical Building Blocks: Exploring Domain-Specific Cognitive Predictors of Mathematics

abstract: This dissertation includes three studies examining individual differences in domain-specific quantitative skills as predictors of adults’ mathematical performance. Quantitative skills included subitizing, counting, approximate number system (ANS), and symbolic skills. Subitizing is the ability to quickly and exactly enumerate small sets without counting (1 to 3 or 4), whereas the ANS facilitates discrimination between large quantities. Given the evidence for their presence among human infants and other animals, the subitizing and approximate number systems are considered core quantitative systems—leading to theories that one or both systems scaffold the acquisition of symbolic quantity representations. Counting is the process of enumerating sets beyond the subitizable range to determine exact quantity; learning to count is the first step in acquiring the symbolic system. The present research was framed by three theoretical accounts, each of which emphasize the subitizing, counting, or approximate number system as the key contributor to mathematical success. Compared to the ANS literature, very little research has examined subitizing and counting skills in relation to mathematics performance with adult samples. To address this issue, the current research included subitizing, counting, and ANS—as well as symbolic skills. These domain-specific quantitative skills were examined in relation to each other and as relative contributors to mathematics outcomes via path analyses (Studies 1 and 2) and structural equation modeling (Study 3). ANS skill did not uniquely predict mathematical outcomes requiring exact calculation, but did predict symbolic and nonsymbolic number line performance. Counting predicted symbolic quantitative skills, but not mathematical outcomes. Subitizing emerged as a predictor of arithmetic fluency across all three studies, but did not predict other mathematical outcomes. As hypothesized, symbolic quantitative skill tended to be the strongest predictor of all mathematical outcomes, except for nonsymbolic number line. Experiential factors also predicted mathematical outcomes across all three studies. These findings suggest that the subitizing system scaffolds the development of counting and symbolic quantitative skills, and continues to predict arithmetic fluency in adulthood. It is recommended that future research explore the role of subitizing in the development of symbolic quantitative skills, to gain understanding of this developmental trajectory.


title: Big City, Tiny House

abstract:
This thesis will pursue the urban interpretation of the modern day minimal existence derived from the Tiny House Movement. Baltimore is chosen for this proposal for its predominant housing type: row houses. Minimal dwellings built to house harbor workers cheaply, the row houses have become derelict in large numbers. Renovation and rethinking of this typology can preserve Baltimore’s identity and reinvigorate the fading city.
The Tiny House is not a universal dwelling. Entirely evident with the people who do inhabit these structures, there are particular groups who are more wooed by the idea than others. Each social group has their own program, and therefore their own interpretation of the Tiny Home; however, they also have their own angle of community influence. A view of Baltimore will be made possible through the lens of the Tiny House, defining the current quandaries and potential directions for the city.


title: Innovation Management in Canadian Newspaper Newsrooms:  Identifying Blocks and Enablers to Facilitate Digital Change

abstract: Local newspapers have become fixtures in communities as archivists, watchdogs over people with power, and as trusted sources for information and analysis. This thesis examines the challenges newspapers face as they reinvent themselves as digital media companies. When a legacy company attempts to innovate, it will encounter a number of predictable forces that will stand between it and change. Innovation blocks are associated with newsroom culture, processes, and physical assets that have become so embedded over time that they inhibit new ways of doing things. By identifying what blocks exist, specific strategies can be developed to overcome them. This theory was applied to three Canadian newspapers that had just gone through significant innovation projects. The research provides insight into what factors blocked each of these projects along specific strategies that were used to enable change.


title: Urban Systems:  How Can a Parametric Building Information Model Serve to Democratize, Optimize and Challenge the Master Planning Process at Carleton University?

abstract:
Building Information Model (BIM) of the Carleton University campus embedded with information on infrastructure, people and energy consumption. A parametric BIM of Carleton University campus can exist as a detailed resource of information and statistics that parallel the operation and development of its physical counterpart.
The project explores the potential for parametric virtual representations of datasets to narrow the distance between the digital and the material world. It questions the implications of built assets on campus, results of which can be used as input parameters to create a feedback loop that further improves the datasets. Furthermore, the parametric masterplan can be used to compare simulated results with proposed real-world scenarios to help predict positive or negative impacts on Carleton campus. The goal of this parametric visualization is to democratize a variety of real-time datasets to the community at large so that they may establish quality proposals for the campus.


title: Self-Sorting Sergeant-Soldier, and Majority Rules Phenomena in Crystals and Gels of Polyurethane Model Compounds

abstract: Hydrogen bond-mediated self-assembling biscarbamates have been studied by our group as model compounds of polyurethanes with respect to the crystallization and gelation behaviour in both solid state and solution phase respectively. The aim of my thesis is to investigate the effects on the blending and the gelation of biscarbamates with different alkyl side chain lengths. Melt blending of these molecules shows molecular selectivity and self-sorting behaviour leading to immiscibility. We revealed that the difference in the growth rates of the individual species is responsible for the self-sorting behaviour in these non-chiral synthetic compounds. We discussed methods to bridge the self and non-self that would lead to a more homogeneous system. The gelation properties of biscarbamates with an odd number of carbon atoms in the alkyl side chains, such as the critical gelation concentration, gelation time, gelation temperature, and morphology of the gel fibres were examined. Biscarbamates show odd-even effects in their thermal and gelation behaviours as a function of carbon atom parity in the alkyl side chains in a similar manner to their crystallization behaviours. The blending of the biscarbamate gels shows three different types of blending behaviours. The C8/C9 blend and any gel blends composed of a biscarbamate smaller than C6 display the sergeant-soldier behaviour. The majority rules principle was observed for odd-odd gels blends with an intermediate difference in side chain length. The odd-odd gels blends with a small difference in side chain length self-sort. Organogels with a series of biscarbamates as gelators were prepared using microwave (MW) heating source as well as conventional heating. Biscarbamates with alkyl side chain lengths varying from C5 to C18 were used, with six solvents having dipole moments ranging from 0.07 to 4.3D. The minimum gelation concentration and the amount of heating for dissolution were significantly reduced with MW heating with benzonitrile, compared to the conventional heating for all the side chain lengths of the biscarbamates. MW is found to be effective with solvents possessing large dipole moments. Although the gels consist of fibers using both methods, an inherent orientation of these fibers was seen with MW heating.


title: Irish Catholic Voluntary Associations in the Canadian Liberal Order, 1840-1882

abstract:
This study will explore the ways in which Irish Catholic voluntary associations engaged with the Canadian liberal order in the nineteenth century by focusing especially on three specific associations that were formed at particular times to confront particular social problems: temperance societies, the Catholic League, and Home Rule branches. Some of these organizations opposed liberalism and the liberal state, while others disseminated liberal values. Some, like temperance societies, did both. Informed by Ian McKay's Liberal Order Framework, I have framed the Canadian context within which Irish Catholic voluntary associations functioned as a liberalizing society with a strong attachment to Protestant British identity. In studies focusing on state formation, democracy, and liberalism, scholars such as Alan Greer and Ian Radforth, Jeffrey McNairn, and Darren Ferry have positioned mainstream voluntary associations as having had a central role in the development of liberalism and the formation of the Canadian state. This study sets out to examine the extent to which Irish Catholic voluntary associations had a similar function.
Research suggests that in some cases Irish voluntary associations resisted the liberal Canadian state through their advancement of Catholic values that challenged state encroachment into the lives of parishioners, demonstrations of a robust collective identity that, though couched in liberal terms, emphasized ethno-religious difference, and objections to illiberal techniques of governing by British authorities such as the land tenure system in Ireland and the suspension of legal due process both there and in Canada. Yet in other significant ways the organizations under review in this study contributed to the development of liberal British Canada by promoting principles of self-government, participating in the solidification of the liberal Canadian state, and casting their own Irish nationalism in liberal terms. By the time the Canadian Parliament passed resolutions in support of Irish Home Rule in 1882, a liberal consensus was emerging between Canadian Irish Catholics and the Canadian liberal order on the issue of Irish self-government, thus forcing promoters of liberalism in Canada to allow a greater level of pluralism than they wanted, albeit on thoroughly liberal terms.


title: The Insider Perspective: Three Emic Studies About Sensemaking and Organizational Change Over Time

abstract:
Scholars contend that our understanding of organizational change would benefit from research that more closely represents the lived reality of organizational change. Research on sensemaking is particularly valuable in this vein because of its focus on the individual’s experience and understanding. Existing empirical work on sensemaking about organizational change, however, is largely based on retrospective interview data and/or focuses on a narrow window of time during change implementation and thus does not thoroughly consider how individuals’ make sense of change over time. This thesis seeks to address this limitation through three complementary studies aimed at understanding how individuals make sense of organizational change over time from an emic (or insider) perspective.
All three papers are interpretive process-oriented case studies, which use grounded theory data analysis techniques to analyze interview data for the same 26 hospital employees collected at three points in time over a five year period of organizational change. Paper one is about the interpretation stage of sensemaking. This paper identifies four stable sensemaking lenses and develops two new concepts related to how individuals make sense of organizational change over time: (1) sensemaking constancy and (2) sensemaking scope. Paper two considers sensemaking triggers and explores how individuals’ retrospective sensemaking compares to their real-time assessments during change. Findings indicated that in “real-time” the experience of change varied in somewhat stable way between groups but that when “looking back” over the change, change agents tended to view the changes more positively than change recipients. Finally, paper three looks at the enactment stage of the sensemaking process and examines individuals’ strategies for coping with excessive change. Coping (from cognitive appraisal theory) and sensemaking are positioned as overlapping processes that individuals use to make sense of and respond to excessive organizational change. Five patterns, or stories about how individuals cope with and make sense of excessive change over time, emerged. Taken as a group, the three papers contribute to the research and practice of organizational change by offering novel insights and theoretical contributions related to how individuals experience and make sense of change over time.


title: La représentation du français parlé dans quatre pièces de théâtre québécoises.

abstract: La présente étude examine la représentation du français parlé dans quatre pièces de théâtre québécoises. L’étude permet de mettre en évidence la représentation à l’écrit, des quatre variables linguistiques étudiées par des sociolinguistes portant sur des corpus oraux. Il y a également la mise en exergue de l’influence que le changement du statut du français au Québec apporte sur la représentation de ces variables dans les pièces. Cette étude s’articule autour de six moments forts. Le premier chapitre décrit la variété du français considérée. Le deuxième chapitre présente la dramaturgie québécoise, le concept de la représentation, et les pièces de théâtre. Le chapitre trois traite des variables et de la méthodologie de la recherche. Les chapitres quatre et cinq présentent l’analyse des résultats et le chapitre six compare les résultats aux études empiriques. L’étude se termine par une conclusion résumant le travail et mettant en relief quelques contributions de l’étude.


title: MAMSaaS: Mashup Architecture with Modeling and Simulation as a Service

abstract: In recent years, developing Modeling and Simulation (M&S) applications has become more and more complex. New technologies, like Web Services (WS) and Cloud computing, have been recently used in Modeling and Simulation (M&S). However, developing M&S applications using these technologies is still a complicated process. The reasons for this include: 1) it is hard to develop web services for varied M&S resources; 2) it is complicated to deploy M&S resources in the Cloud; 3) it is hard to integrate with varied M&S services; 4) it is complex to identify and select resources and services based on their meaning. In this research, we aim to simplify the development and integration of M&S applications using web technologies by solving the issues mentioned above. To do so, we propose the Mashup Architecture with Modeling and Simulation as a Service (termed MAMSaaS). MAMSaaS is a layered and lightweight M&S application development approach. It has five layers, which are Cloud, Box, Wiring, Mashup, and Tag Ontology Layers. It has a simplified life cycle to develop, deploy, identify, select, integrate and execute varied M&S resources as services in the Cloud. In the Cloud Layer, we developed CloudRISE middleware to expose RESTful Modeling and Simulation as a Service (MSaaS) for varied M&S resources; in addition, we propose new methods using Cloud computing and Experimental Framework concept to simplify the deployment of experiment environment. In the Box, Wiring and Mashup Layers, we present a new method based on mashup technologies to simplify the integration, execution and visualization of M&S applications. In the Tag Ontology Layer, we propose a new semantic selection approach using tag-mining and ontology-learning technologies, to identify and select M&S resources based on their meanings.


title: The Water-Use Efficiency of Dairy Farming in Eastern Ontario:  A Case Study

abstract: An excel-based calculator (WatBal-Dairy) was created as a framework for water use accounting of dairy farm operations. The water use of alfalfa was measured in situ and compared to Denitrification and Decomposition (DNDC) model results in anticipation of using DNDC outputs in WatBal-Dairy. Results highlighted the need to calibrate DNDC to Canadian growing conditions with the model over-estimating measured evapotranspiration (ET) (34.1%), net ecosystem exchange of carbon dioxide (11.8%) and biomass (9.7%), while under-estimating soil moisture (-12%). The WatBal-Dairy prototype was created using validated empirical models for cattle and barn water use and tested using operational data including measured cattle intake and washwater from a working dairy farm near Ottawa. The study farm water footprint was 1025.7 kg H2O L-1 FPCM; precipitation (green water) accounted for 99.35% and pumped (blue) water 0.45% of inputs. Consumption was dominated (99.6%) by the field environment (crops and pasture).


title: Development of Multifarious Cueing Systems for Cost-Effective Flight Simulation Training Devices

abstract: This project was an investigation for the development of a high-quality cost-eﬀective Cessna 172 type-speciﬁc FSTD. The CURVS research program consisted of multiple micro-projects that were distributed to a team of researchers in the ADL at Carleton University. The main objective of the project was to develop technologies by assembling COTS components to build a FSTD that is relatively inexpensive and therefore accessible to smaller ﬂight schools. Visual cueing, vibratory cueing, and sound cueing systems that were developed for the CURVS are discussed in this thesis. A visual system, sound system, and a standalone vibratory cue that shakes the pilot seat were implemented and analyzed. Finally, ﬂight tests were performed to obtain simulator tuning data. A quantitative comparison between the aircraft and the simulator, and as well as a qualitative evaluation of the simulator is also presented. Results conﬁrm that the cueing system satisfy their design requirements.


title: Recovering Subjects: Investment in an Era of Reconciliation

abstract: This doctoral project examines reconciliation and how Canada’s Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement (2005) was designed to provide reparations to former students who were harmed in residential schools. In the past three decades, many Indigenous leaders and organizations identified a need for public investment to address historical injustice. In response, settler governments reframe these demands as opportunities for economic investment that is guaranteed to produce self-esteem and social inclusion for Indigenous peoples. This dissertation documents and problematizes an ideological shift whereby demand for redress and restitution give way to an investment rationale that is used to bypass demands for self-determination (Green 2015). Therefore, in this study I ask: how do investment discourses structure Indigenous-settler relationships? What is specific about the application of investment rationale when deployed during redress and reconciliation processes? In order to answer these questions I use a multi-site methodology to examine material and symbolic reparations, such as the Independent Assessment Process, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, and therapeutic health supports. I draw on governmentality literatures to argue that an investment rationale disciplines individual compensation claimants through categories of harm and legal accounting processes to construct Indigenous subjects as dysfunctional and wage employment as emancipatory. I then examine how Indigenous health supports are subject to disinvestment, which effectively marginalizes Indigenous conceptualizations of health that privilege self-determination. Finally, I explore how the Truth and Reconciliation Commission routinely valorizes “mutually beneficial partnerships” as a template for contemporary Indigenous-settler relationships. My analysis thus contributes to the field of settler colonial studies and reveals how investment rationale is deployed to contain the cost of reparations and to create a politics of exchange where a return can be recovered from monies allotted to reparative strategies. The expected return that is desired by the settler state is, ultimately, the assimilation of Indigenous peoples’ into neoliberal citizenship.


title: A Dual-Process Account of Moral Judgment:  What Psychopaths Can Teach Us About Morality

abstract:
Researchers who argue that moral judgment is based on emotions (`emotion-backers') and those who believe that it is based on reasoning and deliberation (`reasoning-backers') have both struggled to account for the moral deviance of psychopaths.
Emotion-backers, such as Jonathan Haidt, focus on psychopaths' lack of affect, or deficiencies in particular emotions, such as sympathy. Reasoning-backers, such as Lawrence Kohlberg, focus instead on psychopaths' deficient reasoning. Both accounts offer separate descriptions of what goes wrong in the disorder, but neither can fully explain psychopathic moral deviance.
The moral account that I built, bridges these accounts in an attempt to better and more fully describe the empirical data available on psychopathic moral judgment. Further, by considering the cognitive deficits affecting morality in psychopaths, I was able to develop an account of moral judgment which explains moral decision-making in the general population. I argue that moral judgment is best explained with a dual-process account that incorporates a large system of moral emotions as well as integrates multiple bases of morality, such as concerns of fairness, harm, and purity.
It is only by focusing on both the reasoning and emotional deficits in psychopaths that we can begin to understand psychopaths' use of utilitarian reasoning, criminal and non-criminal psychopaths. All of these issues are best described by the dual-process approach that I have developed.
My account of moral judgment has both theoretical and practical applications. Theoretically, it offers a new dual-process paradigm for describing moral judgment in people by bridging reasoning-based and emotion-based accounts. Additionally, my theory challenges accounts of moral emotion that narrowly focus on specific emotions, such as guilt or empathy. It instead integrates all emotions, including disgust, fear, and sympathy, and links specific emotions to moral judgments. Practically, my approach challenges the ways in which we have traditionally studied and applied ethics. It opens the doors for the development of new tools and training programs which better take into consideration the dual-process nature of moral decision-making.


title: Development of an Innovative Method for the Adaptation of Advanced Structural Bracing Systems into Heavy Timber Structures for Seismic Applications

abstract: This study investigates the adaptation of lateral load resisting systems that are typical of modern steel buildings for application to improve seismic performance and design of timber structures. Emphasis was placed on the adaptation of buckling restrained braces and friction damping devices through the development and application hybrid timber-steel design procedures. A hybrid braced heavy timber frame was designed, using capacity design principles to avoid damage in the primary timber structural components and connections. Overall, the findings suggest that hybrid timber-steel buildings provide a viable seismic design alternative to steel-only structures.


title: Obverse Ecologies:  Coexisting with Nature in the Anthropocene

abstract: Architecture and nature cannot exist as two of the same. While architecture is the product of our need to create or to control space for our own benefit, nature simply ‘is’ for its own benefit. The title Obverse Ecologies is a direct reaction of the separation between the constructed environment and nature: obverse - corresponding to something else as its opposite or counterpart; ecologies - connections and interactions between organisms and their environment. This thesis is an exploration of architecture and nature as opposite counterparts in a mutually beneficial relationship. It attempts to rectify a possible future where nature exists within the constructed environment of the Toronto port lands. This project explores architecture as an ecotone. It attempts to reintroduce a gradient boundary where the constructed environment and Nature can exist at the same time and rectify the connections and interactions between these obverse ecologies.


title: A Phased-Scaled Vernier Time-to-Digital Converter Architecture with Switchable Coarse/Fine Resolutions, Wide Range and Ultra Low Power Consumption

abstract: A novel phase-scaled Vernier time-to-digital converter (TDC) architecture with a switchable coarse/fine (16ps/2ps) time resolution function is presented to achieve large phase (time) detection range (32.7ns in 14 bits), fine time resolution (2ps), compact size and super low power consumption simultaneously. The phase noise (caused by the TDC) can also be improved due to it allowing a higher reference frequency compared to other types of TDC architectures.


title: The Size Effect and Strain Effect in Reinforced Masonry

abstract:
The research described in this thesis focuses on improving our understanding of the behaviour of reinforced concrete masonry subjected to shear. All shear design methods in current masonry building codes are empirically based, and have been shown to produce widely varying predictions of shear strengths of masonry walls, beams and columns. Furthermore, the research community acknowledges that there is little to no consensus on the exact mechanisms of shear transfer in masonry elements, thereby slowing the replacement of empirical design expressions with more rational approaches. Given that shear failures can be brittle and sudden, with little to no warning of impending failure; experimental research focusing on these two issues is of primary importance.
An extensive experimental program consisting load-testing fifteen large-scale reinforced masonry beams is presented in this thesis. The results definitively show that principles that govern the shear design of reinforced concrete beams in Canada can be applied to reinforced masonry beams. Various phenomena that have been observed in reinforced concrete subjected to shear were also observed in these tests, includes “the size effect” and “the strain effect”. It is shown that design codes that do not account for these effects exhibit higher variability and in the case of size effect, may produce unsafe designs.
Detailed instrumentation of the test specimens showed that aggregate interlock is the major mechanism of shear transfer in masonry beams, and as such this mechanism can explain much of the observed experimental behaviour. The size effect, wherein the failure shear stress decreases as the effective depth increases, can be explained by the reduced aggregate interlock capacity. Likewise, the strain effect, wherein the failure shear stress decrease as longitudinal strains increase, can be explained based on reduced aggregate interlock. It is also found that stirrups and longitudinal reinforcement distributed over the height of the beam have highly beneficial effects on shear behaviour of reinforced masonry. The test results of this research were used to justify the use of the CSA A23.3 as a base to revise the shear provisions in of CSA S304-2014 masonry code.


title: Exploring the Competing Risk Rationalities Surrounding Surgical Birthing Interventions: The Risk Positions of Expectant Mothers and Issues Surrounding Informed Choice

abstract: Contrary to the World Health Organization’s (WHO) recommendation of 10-15%, Canada’s caesarean section (C-section) rate is presently greater than 27%, making it the most common surgical procedure performed each year (CIHI 2015b). This thesis seeks to establish a link between the risk discourses present in popular sources of pregnancy-related information and the alarming national C-section rate. This is achieved using a mixed methods approach. Data from the Maternity Experiences Survey (MES) is used to assess the sociodemographic context of C-section in Canada. This is followed by a qualitative description analysis of the risk discourses present in several popular sources of pregnancy-related information. Notably, findings suggest that the type of care provider and the type of birth have an impact of women’s satisfaction with the information they received leading up to labour and delivery. The implications of these findings within the broader context of the Canadian maternity care culture are explored.


title: Architecture & National Identity: The Judicial Precinct a Century in the Making

abstract: Architecture & National Identity | The Judicial Precinct a Century in the Making examines the relationship between Canadian national identity and its association to architecture and place. Focusing on the architecture of the Capital Plateau, this thesis aims to understand Canadian identity in its ‘elusiveness’ and the significant role that architecture and its particular location play in establishing and evoking a sense of identity. By understanding architecture’s ability to become a symbol of identity, this research becomes the foundation for the design of the future Federal Courts of Canada. Currently missing an association to place, the courts and judicial system play a strong role in Canadian democratic identity. It is an idealistic, almost utopian, proposal which aims to manifest our national values regarding how our judicial system should function (transparency, security, justice) as architecture.


title: Electrorock

abstract:
This thesis will explore the potential of a new biologically engineered system and its implementation to benefit our society and bionetworks. The technology is referred to as electrodeposition of minerals, which is a chemical reaction that mimics the shell formation process of marine organism. The strength and porosity of the precipitate, calcium carbonate, can be determined by the electrical parameters set forth during the growth procedure.
The objective is to produce reinforced architectural panels that are grown from natural minerals on an industrial scale. Through quantitative research, experiments, and interviews; this study will investigate how to maximize the growth process and how to design a closed loop production facility in Saint John. This new biological frontier will open up endless possibilities for future building materials and will encourage cross-disciplinary collaboration.


title: Automatic Derivation of Dependability and Fault Tolerance Analysis Models from Software Architecture

abstract:
The goal of this thesis is to develop a framework for integrating model-based dependability assessment techniques in the early stages of the software development process. This will support designers in taking the right design decisions and avoiding costly corrective actions later on, after the implementation and deployment have been completed.
The first objective of the thesis is to introduce an aspect-based modeling approach for representing the erroneous behavior of UML components and for capturing failure propagation between connected components. This approach, called Component Erroneous Behavior Aspect Modeling approach (CeBAM), supports the definition of aspects representing component erroneous behavior and composes the aspects automatically with the normal component behavior represented as a state-machine. It also enables the compatibility verification between interacting components and conformance verification of their internal behavior with the corresponding ports protocol behavior.
The next objective is to provide an automated transformation chain for deriving a Stochastic Reward Net (SRN) reliability analysis model from the software model in four phases: a) In-Place transformation to automate CeBAM approach, b) model-to-model transformation from UML software model extended with dependability annotations to SRN model, c) intermediate model-to-model transformation to build a CSPL model, and d) model-to-text transformation from the generated CSPL model to a C-based SRN Programming Language (CSPL) specification. The derived SRN model is used first to verify the conformance and compatibility of the involved components in the selected scenario. Once it passes the verification, the CSPL code is generated and used to obtain the required reliability analysis results. These results are fed back to the designer, to support the selection of proper software fault tolerance mechanisms for the software. Moreover, we developed the Single Version Fault Tolerance Aspect Modeling approach (SvFTAM), which captures architectural and behavioral models of single version fault tolerance tactics into a generic reusable aspect model.
The state space explosion is a well-known problem of state-based analysis models such as SRN. To address this problem, we use decomposition and reduction techniques of the derived SRN model to compute approximate system reliability measures.


title: Architecture at the Outfalls: Sixteen Constructions for the Ottawa River

abstract: This thesis considers the architectural potential of hidden hydraulic systems and the cycle of water within cities with a view to acknowledging water’s invisible, yet essential movements through an urban area. A combined sewage system dating from the late 19th century in older parts of Ottawa causes untreated wastewater to be discharged directly into the river at sixteen locations. Architecture at the Outfalls proposes the design of sixteen habitable spaces at these locations to materialize the collision of hidden hydraulic infrastructures and everyday paths, and engineering systems and the public realm. The architectural interventions also reveal water as an essential resource for living, and the Ottawa River as a visible, topographical, and spatial element in urban life.


title: Five Watermarks:  Five Design Interventions on the Ottawa Civic Hospital that Explore the Potential for Water and Architecture to Assist in Inhabitant Well-Being

abstract: Five Watermarks explores the question of ‘healing’ in the built healthcare environment, and in particular asks what role the incorporation of water can play in increasing inhabitant well-being. The primary role of healthcare architecture is to house technological tools and medical professionals. This project searches for ways in which architecture can be further integrated into the healing process. Through the design of five “Watermarks” (water-centralized design interventions) on the Ottawa Civic Hospital, the influence of water on atmosphere and environment is explored. The interventions incorporate water as either a natural building material or a filtered substance for cleanliness, while investigating concepts of dream, wayfinding, hygiene, tranquility and contemplation, through space and matter. Five Watermarks studies water’s capacity to deconstruct the boundaries between the self and the environment and to unify the conditions of space, life and well-being.


title: Are Gender Roles Related to Purpose in Life and Well-Being in Younger and Older Females?

abstract: Previous research has found that holding an egalitarian attitude towards gender roles has been associated with increased well-being, but being unable to engage in life goals that reflect these attitudes may lead to feelings of restriction. The current paper looks at how gender roles are associated with purpose in life and well-being by first assessing female university students through quantitative measures, then by in depth interviews with older women. Study 1 showed no relationship between gender role attitudes and purpose in life, but a significant connection between traditional attitudes and greater depressive symptoms. Study 2 found that older women did mention gender roles when discussing their purpose, and a greater proportion of egalitarian gender roles was associated with higher levels of purpose in life. These results indicate a greater need for understanding the complex relationship between gender roles, goal pursuit, and well-being across women of all ages.


title: Towards the Skyscraper of the Future

abstract: The skyscraper has become a staple of development in the modern day cityscape by which to address the concerns of our growing population and density. The urban landscape of cities has thus been radically transformed, enabling staggering density within small land ratios. Although the repetition of generic floors can maximize a sites profitability and density, there is a condition of repetitiveness which emerges, promoting banality, lacking connectivity, and ultimately resulting in a fragmentation of the urban realm. This proposal for a skyscraper in New York City addresses these concerns, offering a new genre of skyscraper in which connectivity and social identity is of utmost importance. In blending the line between public versus private space with the strategic and deliberate superimposition of mixed program, Battery Park Tower can lay the ground work for a future of high-density living which successfully brings with it a sense of neighborhood, connectivity and vitality.


title: Leveling the Field:  Talking Levels in Cognitive Science

abstract: This thesis aims to advance the study of cognitive science by examining the “levels metaphor.” The levels metaphor is defined as the application of levels talk to various aspects of scientific investigation. The thesis examines several applications of the levels metaphor within cognitive science and provides a conceptual framework for analyzing discussion. The thesis argues for a pluralistic approach to levels. The main claim is that different applications of the levels metaphor are justified insofar as attention is paid to how and why the metaphor is deployed. To show that my approach has practical applications, I discuss the role of levels within computational cognitive modeling.


title: Slow Architecture: An Environmental Design Approach to Community Health

abstract: Individuals spend excessively in an attempt to make themselves healthier, only for the purpose of extending their lives in the detrimental environments they have created. To ensure the future health of our society, changes must be made on an individual and collective scale which serve to contribute to the amelioration of environmental and communal health. Through design which incorporates ecologically mindful remediation processes and sustainable urban redevelopment in our existing environments, we can begin to make the changes necessary for health on an individual, community, and environmental scale. To achieve health along these three scales of impact we must first concern ourselves with the state of our environment; healthier environments lead to healthier and happier individuals. Providing community focused spaces that educate the public on the incorporation of sustainable technologies into our existing industries will enable a future which will be marked by positive environmental change, stronger communities, and a healthier population.


title: Programming Architecture for Elevated Cognitive Functionality

abstract: This thesis seeks to explore novel forms and spatial configurations in architecture that are rationalized through the logic of elevated cognitive functionality. The initial assertions, references, hunches and assumptions for this discourse are set out and analyzed as described in the introduction. This dialectic eventually reaches a stage where we can address computation and algorithms in architecture from the naive and structural points of view. The thesis develops an emerging set of exercises to show how computation can be used to leverage complex sets of data that emerge from the human mind and their relations to emerging architectural transfer into form and spatial configurations. To introduce this enquiry an invented and proposed syllabus at 4th year level works as both a structural narrative and framework for the questions posed on computing data for architecture and the design thinking and strategies that emerge from this thesis.


title: Using Discrete EVent System Specification in Real-Time (DEVSRT) in Order to Model and Simulate Artificial Pancreas.

abstract:
The artificial pancreas is composed of a continuous glucose sensor that senses the user's sugar level, an insulin infusion pump that secretes insulin into the user's body when required; and an algorithm that regulates the insulin based on the glucose levels obtained from the sensor. In order to minimize cost and time to build and verify such a complex system, one must first model and simulate the system. This methodology in turn provides risk-free testing environments and can also be tested with different scenarios.
This thesis will focus on modelling and simulating the artificial pancreas using Discrete EVent System Specification in Real-Time (DEVSRT).This is accomplished by simulating both a meal model and a control algorithm to control the insulin pump based of the data provided by the continuous glucose monitor. The meal model simulation will validate the control algorithm model.


title: Siblings of Those With and Without Mental Illness: Differences in Life Decisions and Depressive Symptoms

abstract: Young adulthood is a difficult period - individuals begin to separate from their families and transition into adulthood, focusing more on themselves and the future. This study aimed to better understand psychosocial and individual differences that contribute to different well-beings for young adults that have siblings without (n=156) and with (target sibling) (n=121) mental illness. Target siblings reported more depressive symptoms and less positive influence of siblings on life decisions. Closeness was related to well-being, but did not interact with sibling type to influence well-being. Both sibling types reported little support and unsupport, and did not differ in coping. Target siblings reported little sibling influence on life decisions at lower levels of perfectionism, but a strong impact at higher levels. This study: confirmed previous findings that sibling types differ in depression; extended findings to include differences in life decisions; and identified factors that did and did not influence well-being.


title: Errors of Commission: EU Accession and the struggle against corruption in Romania

abstract:
The dissertation explores corruption in Romania during its transition from communism to democracy as well as the EU's efforts to curtail it and their consequences. It applies a theoretical framework that draws insight from three literatures: those relating to rent-seeking and corruption, the EU accession process and path-dependence. The dissertation demonstrates that corrupt practices in post-communist Romania are embedded in clientelistic structures originating in communist-era patron-client relations.
The dissertation examines the incentives and opportunities that underpin corruption and the mechanisms for curbing it in three distinct periods: post-transition, pre-EU and post- EU accession. In that process, the author identifies and analyzes the range of endogenous and exogenous factors that gave an impetus to anticorruption reforms.
The findings reveal that neither democratization nor marketization was able to undermine the persistent treatment of the state as the propertied possession of the political elite. The EU largely misunderstood corruption in Romania and underestimated the resourcefulness of a domestic elite determined to defend its privileges even after EU accession, while misconstruing the nature of the transition in Romania.
The dissertation highlights the importance of a better understanding of corruption in post-communist countries, and demonstrates the constraints and impact of EU Commission policies on the evolving Romanian polity. Parsimonious assumptions fail to encompass a path –dependent understanding of corruptive patterns. At the same time the dissertation brings to light the impact of multilevel governance on deep-seated patterns of political behavior. Without the efforts of the EU, corruption would reign unchecked, yet even with the powerful incentives and sanctions wielded by the EU Commission, corrupt practices remain embedded in Romania.


title: Radon Detection Using CMOS Alpha Sensor

abstract: A radon monitor based on a 3 mm × 3 mm alpha particle-detecting IC fabricated in a foundry CMOS process is reported. The alpha-detecting IC consists of a 16×16 array of pn junction diodes (sense diodes) that are precharged in reverse bias and then allowed to electrically float. Radon progeny are collected on the IC using an electrostatic concentrator. On-chip comparators detect the voltage change induced in a sense diode by an alpha particle emission from radon progeny passing though a sense diode. The comparator outputs are monitored by a microcontroller which processes the data and transmits it to a microcomputer using Bluetooth. The monitor has a sensitivity of 1.12 counts per hour per 100 Bq/m^3 of radon activity. The monitor appears suitable for mass production at very low cost.


title: Becoming the Camera: Body Worn Video and Shifting Expectations of Police Work

abstract:
Traditionally positioned at the top of the hierarchy of visibility, police are being incorporated into the surveillant assemblage as a result of the proliferation of citizen cameras and viral footage of misconduct. As they struggle with their new visibility, many departments have turned to body worn video (BWV) as a solution. These devices record from a first-person perspective, giving police the opportunity to present their point-of-view.
By discrediting external footage and positioning their own as ‘official’ police are able to manage their visibility strategically, establishing a privileged position within the assemblage. The creation of technologically extended officers with superior claims to truth gives police the opportunity to shape narratives.
A consequence of these embodied devices is that officers are turned into collectors of visual evidence, tasked with ensuring the camera is interpreting the situation appropriately in the moment. This new responsibility forces officers to adopt the logic of their cameras.


title: Hong Kong High DensCity: Merging Urban Scale with Human Scale

abstract: Human beings have largely transitioned from a nomadic to more sedentary, urban way of life. Cities however tend to generate their own forms of movement, both horizontal and vertical. In order to function cities require air, light, water: they must breathe, accommodate continuous flow, sustain renewal. While cities throughout time have struggled with high densities, these challenges are proof of their attractiveness. The combination of high densities and robust topography is what produced the network of elevated walkways in the central business district of Hong Kong Island. This thesis researches an as-yet-unrealized but inevitable fourth generation (4G) circulation system for Hong Kong’s downtown core. While primarily for pedestrians, this new circulation layer will be physically and functionally distinguishable from the city’s current network of elevated walkways. While the latter only brushes past towers’ façades, this proposal has the audacity of merging with the architecture, refurbishing in consequence its interior layout.


title: Convolutive Blind Sparse Source Separation with Application to EMG Decomposition

abstract: Electromyogram (EMG) signal decomposition is a special case of convolutive blind source separation (CBSS) problem. Specific characteristics of EMG signals and their corresponding channel matrix leads us to proposing family of algorithms using multi-domain sparsity of EMG signals and low rank structure of channel matrix. In this thesis we propose family of algorithms for CBSS that exploits sparse source signals in multiple domains. Our approach is to jointly estimate the sparse vector of concatenated sources and mixing matrix. We propose CBSS algorithms which are composed of two steps for multi domain sparse vector recovery and mixing matrix estimation. In particular, we propose two efficient algorithms coined multi domain adaptive thresholding (MDAT) for both under-determined and over-determined cases and multi domain blind approximate message passing (MDBAMP) for multi-channel convolutive blind sparse source separation for under-determined cases, when the source signals are sparse in multiple domains. In multichannel source separation, channels are usually correlated. Therefore, in this thesis, we propose a CBSS algorithm that exploits both low rank channel matrix and sparse source signals in the time domain. In sparse vector recovery and low rank matrix estimation algorithms, the mixing matrix and the linear operator of low rank matrix are known. Here, we propose a CBSS algorithm which is composed of two steps for sparse vector recovery and low rank matrix estimation when the mixing matrix and the corresponding operator of low rank channel matrix are unknown. In particular, we propose an efficient and guaranteed algorithm coined SMiRE for multi-channel convolutive blind sparse source separation, where the channel matrix is low rank. All three proposed algorithms are based on the sparsity of source signals and they are solved using compressed sensing (CS) methods. Checking the restricted isometry property (RIP) of measurement or mixing matrices is a promising approach to guarantee the unique solution in compressed sensing methods. In convolutive source separation, mixing matrices have banded block Toeplitz structure. Therefore, the analytical RIP bound for banded block Toeplitz matrices is calculated in this thesis as an initial step prior to proposing sparsity based algorithms.


title: (Un)settling Mary Weekes: Collecting Indigenous Beadwork and Confronting Settler Identity in Twentieth-Century Saskatchewan

abstract: This thesis examines the acquisition and exhibition history of a collection of Plains Indigenous beadwork donated to the Royal Saskatchewan Museum by the Regina-based author and collector Mary Weekes (1884-1980). Taking the rural cottage where she acquired her collection as a contact zone, this thesis considers how Weekes developed unusually intimate settler-Indigenous friendships that forced her to confront her complicity in colonial practices of dispossession and assimilation. It also interrogates how her dedication to Saskatchewan’s marginalized Indigenous peoples at times irreconcilably conflicted with her own marginalized status as a woman with unusual professional ambitions—the pursuit of which was aided by participation in the same colonial systems she critiqued. Consequentially, while collecting is typically understood as a settler’s attempt to invent a sense of belonging, I argue that the social circumstances of her collecting activities alternatively (un)settled Mary Weekes, as she both resisted and confirmed colonial hierarchies.


title: Creating Holistic Architecture:  Unifying Natural Ecology with Technology Through Design

abstract: This Master’s Thesis seeks to determine which aspect of an ecological setting will promote occupant health, productivity and ecological awareness through a detailed study. In conjunction with this familiarity study, research will be conducted into emerging technologies which can remedy the effects of urban air pollution. The most promising system will be selected, and will be redesigned to be incorporated into an architectural composition. The final project for this thesis will involve combining the data accumulated from the survey along with the remediation technology into an architectural design. This project will actively reduce surrounding pollution while fostering a greater relationship between local ecology and the building's occupants, creating the first truly holistic architectural design.


title: Deconstructing the Fourth Wall: Directions for an Urban Mise-en-Scène

abstract:
In the ever-expanding context of the digital age, theatre is the one remaining art form incapable of reproduction or possession. The survival of performance can be attributed to its ability to create spaces and conditions that contain the illusion and magic of spectacle. However, by deconstructing the fourth wall, this space can be viewed as an extension of, rather than a container for performance.
This thesis will analyze the theatrical potential of public spaces within an urban context, informed and enhanced by the notion of performance in architecture as an autonomous event. These moments of civic theatricality are derived from the reciprocal relationship of theory and theatre as historical precedents. They are facilitated by the implementation of architectural conditions and intervention, following a framework that traces a narrative thread throughout the city.


title: Efficient Travel for the Flâneur: Intermodal Station and Central Library for Ottawa

abstract: The proposed expansion and long-awaited light rail connection to the Ottawa Airport offers the opportunity to create a practical and symbolic transportation node within Canada’s capital city. Overlooking the Ottawa River, Bayview Station occupies an almost barren site, detached from its context offering subpar connection between the east-west bus and north-south O-Train routes. A proposed Intermodal Station at Bayview will not only unify these lines, but promises to organize a multifaceted social and cultural landscape for persons arriving to the City and for commuting residents. At the shoreline of the Ottawa River, immediately flanking the Central Business District, the axial termination of the Prince of Wales Bridge -- Bayview Station -- becomes a fundamental mediator between Ottawa and Gatineau. The programmatic pairing of Intermodal Station and Central Ottawa Library intertwines the paths associated with efficient travel and wandering, opening a space to reflect on the dual nature of urban movement.


title: Deathscape: The Silent City

abstract:
A cemetery, as the physical location of the dead, can be considered a distinctive landscape unlike any other. While visitors, if related to the buried, may have an inherent relationship to the monument representing their loved one, their interaction with the whole site is often limited solely to the location of their relatives.
With consideration of the disconnection that occurs between the visitor and the landscape, this thesis explores and suggests ways to re-establish this connection through architecture. Can the cemetery, for example, be considered a city for the dead, with a specific role within the relationship between the living and the deceased? Research will demonstrate how an architectural intervention within an existing cemetery might work towards expressing the history of the dead while providing an enriched and possibly rewarding experience for the living. How can architecture act as a medium between the living and the dead?


title: Three Essays on the Study of Persistence via Impulse-Response Confidence Bands with Application to Autoregressive Moving Average (ARMA) Processes

abstract:
The two-step simulation-based method introduced in this thesis combines Indirect Inference jointly with Monte Carlo (MC) test methods to deliver identification robust confidence sets for finite samples. In the first chapter, a general framework is introduced, which considers three auxiliary estimating functions: two-sided forward and backward looking regressions with leads and lags, long- autoregressions and empirical autocorrelations. The first simulation stage is incorporated to calibrate parameter estimates. In the second simulation stage, the resulting objective functions are inverted applying the MC test to obtain joint confidence sets. The empirical focus is on Autoregressive Moving Average (ARMA) processes, since identification and boundary issues raise enduring complications for estimation and inference. In particular, simultaneous impulse-responses confidence bands are derived for ARMA processes via confidence set projections. Supporting simulation studies illustrate the accurate size and good power of our method.
The following chapters introduce further refinements to our framework with empirical applications. The second chapter investigates the persistence of oil shocks via impulse-response confidence bands. For the particular case of non-Gaussian Stable distribution, the “Local” Monte Carlo (LMC) test method is applied in the second stage, which is based on calibrations of the nuisance parameters of skewness and kurtosis. By studying long and short weekly samples as well as monthly samples, we find that shocks to oil returns are not permanent, since they are able to dissipate in short to middle time frames of approximately twenty periods. Our findings support the usefulness of impulse-responses obtained from asymmetric and heavy tailed distributions as a tool to understand the uncertainty surrounding commonly applied forecasting techniques.
Lastly, the third chapter assesses the persistence of shocks on a measure of idiosyncratic risk (MIR) computed for a non-diversifiable portfolio of Telecom stocks. The two-stage simulation based method is applied with a particular refinement; the average of the statistics of the three estimating functions is computed as a forth resulting test statistic to harvest information from the other three. We conclude that a shock to the MIR can be described as having a short-lived large impact and relatively small oscillatory effects, which remain close to zero approximately after eight months.