identifier: Ruschiensky, Carmen  (2015) Competence and Creativity in Translation: Multilingual Perspectives.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: This thesis addresses competence and creativity in translation by focusing on the translator as a multilingual, historically grounded subject. Drawing on recent multilingualism research and integrating insights from translation studies, hermeneutics, sociolinguistics, and second-generation cognitive science, it is argued that translators do not simply transfer meaning between words, texts or cultures; they embody a relation to the languages and cultures they are translating, just as multilinguals do in code-switching, performing identities, and symbolically identifying with different linguistic and cultural meanings. To explore these ideas, I conducted a qualitative study on multilingual translation students in Montreal to learn more about their diverse backgrounds. Research results—covering a broad range of languages, age groups, life experience, education, and employment histories—suggest that the translation process cannot be defined without considering the sociocognitive complexity of translation and that translators, at every stage of their development, actively draw on their unique linguistic and sociocultural repertoires. A working definition of translators’ symbolic competence is proposed as a framework for analysing students’ interests in, attitudes about, and approaches to translating and for considering how translators, especially translation students, can potentially develop their competence and creatively in translation by exploring this nuanced terrain.


identifier: Sidhu, Ramneet  (2015) Investigating ISO 14001 for developing green supply chain performance.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

type: Thesis NonPeerReviewed

abstract:
Delivering superior performance than competitors has always been the significant force for any company’s success and companies are constantly endeavoring for different initiatives to gain advantage over their competitors. Recently, green supply chain management has been receiving great interest from researchers and practitioners. Consideration has been given to consider environmental factors in entire supply chain starting from the procurement, production, transportation, consumption, and post disposal of products for making the whole product life cycle green. The main objective of the study is to identify the relationship between ISO 14001 and green supply chain management and how it can be used for green supply chain planning. The thesis is divided into two parts. In the first part, we decide whether ISO 14001 practice is beneficial to make supply chain green and in the second part we identify the customer and the technical requirements for green supply chain planning on the basis of ISO 14001, investigate their relationships, and propose a QFD based approach for selecting best green supply chain initiative(s) for organizations.
The data for the study is collected from published reports of 20 different companies belonging to three sectors namely food and beverage, transportation, and retail that are implementing green practices in their supply chain. The proposed approach has strong practical applicability for organizations considering investing in ISO 14001 for improving green supply chain performance.


identifier: Zuyderhoff, Sandrine  (2015) Concepts de pédiatrie sociale en communauté et musicothérapie : Une perspective herméneutique.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: Cette étude vise à approfondir la compréhension des concepts de pédiatrie sociale appliqués à la musicothérapie grâce à une recherche herméneutique. La musicothérapie est intégrée à l’approche de pédiatrie sociale au Québec depuis 2011, mais aucune recherche reliant ces deux approches n’a été écrite. L’intention est  de développer un premier cadre théorique documentant et alimentant la pratique de la musicothérapie en pédiatrie sociale en communauté.  Les concepts clés en pédiatrie sociale, une approche dérivée de la médecine sociale et implantée au Québec par le Dr Gilles Julien, ont été explorés par le biais d’entrevues avec des musicothérapeutes pratiquant en pédiatrie sociale. Cette recherche a permis de dégager les thèmes principaux de leur pratique qui s’inscrivent dans un continuum d’interventions en musicothérapie. Les résultats décrivent l’interprétation, la compréhension et l’application des concepts de pédiatrie sociale par les musicothérapeutes pratiquant au sein de cette approche. Neuf thèmes sont présentés: une approche fondée sur les besoins de l’enfant, qui vise des objectifs variés et qui tient compte du contexte bio-psycho-social, la dimension sociale du travail des musicothérapeutes en pédiatrie sociale et les avantages perçus de la musique en tant qu’outil d’intervention,  un refuge contre le stress, la présence des parents, le savoir-être nécessaire pour pratiquer en cohérence avec les concepts de pédiatrie sociale. La réflexion de l’auteure est présentée sous forme d’auto-herméneutique en vue d’approfondir la compréhension de chacun des thèmes présentés. La recherche est limitée au contexte actuel de la musicothérapie pratiquée au sein du Mouvement de pédiatrie sociale en communauté et aux exigences du programme de maîtrise de l’Université Concordia.


identifier: Xu, Sizhe  (2015) The relationship between financial performance and safety in the aviation industry: A worldwide perspective.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: The year 2014 turned out to be a significant one for the global airline industry. The missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, the shooting down of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17, the disappearance of Air Algérie flight AH5017 and most recently the crash of Air Asia flight QZ8501 have raised great concerns about airline safety. In this paper, we investigate whether financial factors influence an airline's maintenance, purchasing, and training policies, and ultimately its safety performance. Using global data from 110 airlines in 26 countries over the period 1990 to 2009, we find an inverse relationship between profitability of air carriers and their accident propensity. Other financial variables such as liquidity, asset utilization, and financial leverage do not appear to affect an airline’s safety record. Moreover, we find that the legal and economic environment of a given country has a significant effect on airline safety. Specifically, airlines in countries with strong law enforcement, more stringent legal regulations, and better economic performance have better safety performance.


identifier: Leons, Paul  (2015) A Proximity Measurement System on FPGA for Avionic Applications.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract:
Proximity sensors are widely used in aerospace applications for controlling and monitoring the movement of mechanical systems. This thesis describes the design of a highly accurate proximity sensing system that is capable of operating in a wide distance range. The system is based on passive inductive proximity sensors that can withstand harsh environments, and, therefore, are widely used in avionic applications.

Our design methodology consists of determining the best excitation method with careful considerations of computational complexity. Once the method is chosen, we create a FPGA design for sensor characterization. Finally, we create the deployment design that uses the
characterization data to determine the distance between the passive sensor and the metallic target. Our experimental results show that we are able to measure distances in the range of 0–5 mm at 0.1 mm resolution with high accuracy using off-the-shelf passive sensors and FPGA. This is a major improvement over comparable proximity sensing technologies currently available for avionic applications.


identifier: García Fuentes, César Augusto  (2015) Agreeing to disagree: The effect of task repetition on Colombian EFL students’ pragmatic competence.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: Research has confirmed the benefits of pragmatics instruction for a variety of speech acts such as suggestions and requests (Gu, 2011; Halenko & Jones, 2011; Martinez-Flor & Alcón-Soler, 2007; Takimoto, 2012); however, less is known about instruction of proper disagreements, which are face threatening acts as they intentionally establish a point of view that runs against the other speaker’s opinion. Additionally, little is known about the effects of instructional tasks used as part of pragmatics instruction. The current study explored the effect of explicit instruction with task repetition on Colombian EFL learners’ (N = 40) use of politeness strategies when disagreeing. Over a two-week period, the control class (n = 11) received explicit instruction only, while the task repetition classes received both instruction and practice tasks. Whereas the procedural repetition class (n = 15), repeated the same task procedure four times with new content, the content repetition group (n = 14) repeated the same content with different task procedures (Patanasorn, 2010). The participants carried out a pretest, immediate and delayed posttests which consisted of discourse completion tasks (DCT) and role-playing. Results from Friedman tests, non-parametric repeated-measure ANOVAs, indicated that the procedural repetition group significantly performed better in the posttests in both DCTs and role-playing. Meanwhile, the content group and the control group did not show significant differences. Results are discussed in terms of implications for pragmatics research and pedagogical implications in EFL settings.


identifier: Tirdad, Parisa  (2015) Variational Learning for Finite Inverted Dirichlet Mixture Models and Its Applications.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: Clustering is an important step in data mining, machine learning, computer vision and image processing. It is the process of assigning similar objects to the same subset. Among available clustering techniques, finite mixture models have been remarkably used, since they have the ability to consider prior knowledge about the data. Employing mixture models requires, choosing a standard distribution, determining the number of mixture components and estimating the model parameters. Currently, the combination of Gaussian distribution, as the standard distribution, and Expectation Maximization (EM), as the parameter estimator, has been widely used with mixture models. However, each of these choices has its own limitations. In this thesis, these limitations are discussed and addressed via defining a variational inference framework for finite inverted Dirichlet mixture model, which is able to provide a better capability in modeling multivariate positive data, that appear frequently in many real world applications. Finite inverted Dirichlet mixtures enable us to model high-dimensional, both symmetric and asymmetric data. Compared to the conventional expectation maximization (EM) algorithm, the  variational approach has the following advantages: it is computationally more efficient, it converges fast, and is able to estimate the parameters and the number of the mixture model components, automatically and simultaneously. The experimental results validate the presented approach on different synthetic datasets and shows its performance for two interesting and challenging real world applications, namely natural scene categorization and human activity classification.


identifier: Zhukovskaya, Nadezda  (2015) Enhanced electrokinetic process for industrial wastewater treatment containing a high concentration of Total Kjeldahl Nitrogen (TKN).  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: The primary objective of this research was to search for an effective method of industrial wastewater treatment containing a high amount of Total Kjeldahl Nitrogen (TKN).  Photographic process wastewater is one of them. Traditional approaches, e.g. biological, filtration, carbon absorption are often ineffective in the degradation of persistent organic nitrogen. Thus, this study included four phases of investigation for an effective simultaneous removal of organic nitrogen and ammonia. In Phase I the electrochemical oxidation was performed under different operating conditions to determine the ability of this process to mineralize organic nitrogen and to determine operating ranges for the further investigation. In Phase II conventional electro-Fenton oxidation was implemented. The most successful results were obtained in Phase III, when enhanced electro-Fenton oxidation (EEFO) by additional of an oxidation agent was applied.  The best removal efficiency of TKN, ammonia and organic nitrogen reached 92.4 %, 95.2 % and 81.4 % respectively. Also, it was demonstrated that enhanced electro-Fenton process with pretreatment from the ammonia can remove TKN and organic nitrogen by 95.8% and 97.2% respectively in a shorter residence time of 24 hours. In Phase IV the system was tested with a series of electrodes implemented in parallel. The results showed that the removal of organic nitrogen in a single cell and in series was similar. The developed process demonstrated an acceptable level of TKN removal while an insignificantly low amount of chemicals was added. The developed enhanced electro-Fenton oxidation method can be applied to other industrial wastewaters with a similar composition of pollutants.


identifier: Chang, Qi  (2015) The Impact of Mergers and Acquisitions on Corporate Bond Ratings.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: We examine the impact of mergers and acquisitions on a firm's bond ratings using a large sample of U.S. firms between 1990 and 2012 that experienced a rating change.  For both the upgrade and downgrade samples, we investigate the acquisitions undertaken by these firms within three years and five years before the rating change. We find that firms with positive announcement period abnormal returns around the acquisition preceding the rating change are more likely to experience a rating upgrade, whereas firms with a rating downgrade had abnormal returns around acquisitions that were more negative. Before the bond rating change, the upgraded firms make better acquisitions compared to downgraded firms; however downgraded firms make fewer but higher quality acquisitions in the post rating change period.  We further employ the Berkovitch and Narayanan (1993) methodology to distinguish between the synergy, agency and hubris motives for acquisitions. We determine that for rating upgrades, the acquisitions are mostly motivated by synergy in the years prior to the upgrade announcement.  For rating downgrades, there is some evidence to suggest that the acquisition motive is either agency or hubris prior to the downgrade announcement.  However, in the post rating period, our evidence suggests that value creation through synergy is an important motive for acquisitions in subsequent years for both, upgraded and downgraded firms.


identifier: Joyce, Kylie  (2015) Bridging the Gap: Sex Education in Quebec’s English Secondary Schools.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: The purpose of this study was to describe and evaluate Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport (MELS) sex education program from the perspective of teachers in Quebec’s English language high schools. Six teachers from four different schools and three different school boards were interviewed. The teachers spoke about incidents that involved sex education, teenage sexual activity and sexuality related matters that have taken place throughout their careers.  The results suggest that there is a definite gap between what MELS expects with regards to sex education and classroom actualities.  In particular, the teachers who participated felt that they were ill prepared to teach sex education as they had received little to no training. Furthermore, some were unaware of MELS’ expectations.


identifier: qiu, ming  (2015) Dual Class Firms and Debt Issuance.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

title: Dual Class Firms and Debt Issuance

abstract: We examine the impact of dual class share structures on the parameters of debt issuance. We find that, as compared to single class firms, the debt in dual class firms is associated more use of covenants especially performance based covenants, and is more likely to be secured. In addition, the impact of dual class share structure differs based on the severity of the agency costs of debt. We find that many of these issuance parameters are differently affected for large, profitable and low leverage firms (which face lower agency costs of debt) as opposed to small, less profitable and highly levered firms. These results are robust when we control the endogeneity of ownership structure and simultaneous changes in these issuance parameters. These results suggest that dual class share structures exacerbate the conflicts between controlling shareholders and lenders. However, the link between dual class share structures and debt issuance is not as clear for other issuance parameters such as the maturity and interest cost of debt.


identifier: Penzendorfer, Leif  (2015) Massaging Ourselves to Sleep: McLuhan and the Difficulties of Praxis.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract:
The purpose of this thesis is to determine the extent to which Marshall McLuhan’s performance of his media texts influenced their form and the ways in which he disseminated his message. From The Gutenberg Galaxy to Understanding Media to the medium is the MASSAGE his style changed significantly. Throughout much of his career he was driven both by his foundational aphorism that the medium is the message, and also by his desire to create a discipline, that of communication/media studies, from the tools he had crafted in order to probe his ideas. By looking at the ways in which his ideas came together, through agency and praxis, and how he put
them into play by crafting his texts to resemble his theories, I aim to both understand his concepts better and also show how he became a performer targeted at the media that were presenting his ideas, from print to radio to television. A driving question of this thesis is why were McLuhan, and this theories, dismissed for so long?


identifier: Kazerooni, Helia  (2015) Mixed-Integer Programming Solution to Zone-Based Air Traffic Management Problem.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract:
The study presented in this research discusses the Air Traffic Flow Management Problem by introducing alternative routing options for aircrafts in a constrained 3-dimensional capacitated airspace. The airspace is divided into a set of capacitated 3-dimensional sectors in order to depict the concept of a free flight situation in which the pilots have more autonomy. This study aims to minimize the total arrival time of all aircrafts to their final destinations while upholding timing and routing constraints and most importantly regarding the capacity constraints through which mid-air collision is avoided and safety is ensured. In order to achieve such a goal, a non-time indexed mixed integer programming model has been developed. Solving the model provides us with a comprehensive flight schedule consisting of the sequence of sectors each flight has to take and the exact departure and arrival times from/to each sector while the capacity constraints defined for all sectors ensure flight safety and collision avoidance at all times.
This model takes multiple airports into consideration and despite the complexity of the problem and its NP-hard nature, is able to be solved for a number of flights on a personal computer using CPLEX. Furthermore, three different solution strategies are introduced in this research in order to tackle real-life size instances. First, we investigated the computational complexity of the problem by considering all flights in the system. Next, a sequential solution methodology is proposed. In the sequential solution method, first the problem is solved for a subset of flights. Next, new set of flights from remaining flight list according to their departure time are added to the airspace by considering the en-route flight plans of previously solved flight sets. The addition of new flights continued until an en-route flight plan for all flights is determined. Obviously the sequential solution method cannot guarantee optimality, yet the problem for large instance can be solved. Finally, an iterative conflict resolution methodology is proposed. In this method, first we relax some of the constraints so large instances can be solved. Next, flights that conflict with the actual constraint are identified and problem is solved to satisfy only these flights. The iteration is continued until no unresolved conflict is left. Performance of each solution methodology is demonstrated through various case studies.


identifier: Beach, Adam  (2015) Mechanisms Underlying the Essential Role of Mitochondria in Chronological Aging of the Yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae.  PhD thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: This thesis describes studies that have resulted in uncovering molecular and cellular mechanisms underlying the essential role of mitochondria in chronological aging of the baker’s yeast, Saccharomyces cerevisiae. The Titorenko laboratory has recently identified lithocholic acid (LCA), a bile acid and a natural compound that operates synergistically with caloric restriction (CR) to cause a substantial increase in yeast chronological lifespan under longevity-extending CR conditions. As a first step towards establishing a mechanism by which LCA extends longevity of chronologically aging yeast limited in calorie supply, I investigated the distribution of LCA within yeast cells. I found that exogenously added LCA enters yeast cells, is sorted only to mitochondria, resides mainly in the inner mitochondrial membrane and also associates with the outer membrane of mitochondria. I demonstrated that LCA-elicited changes in the membrane lipidome of mitochondria trigger age-related alterations in mitochondrial respiration, membrane potential, reactive oxygen species (ROS) quantity, oxidative macromolecular damage, respiratory complexes composition and ATP concentration. My findings provided evidence that the longevity-extending potential of LCA is due in part to its ability to alter the age-related dynamics of mitochondrially produced ROS in both chronologically ʺyoungʺ and ʺoldʺ cells, thus reducing the damaging effect of these ROS in ʺyoungʺ cells and amplifying their ʺhormeticʺ effect in ʺoldʺ cells. I demonstrated that LCA alters the age-related dynamics of changes in the levels of many mitochondrial proteins, as well as numerous proteins in cellular locations outside of mitochondria. My findings imply that LCA-driven changes in the mitochondrial lipidome alter the mitochondrial proteome and functionality, thereby enabling mitochondria to operate as signaling organelles that orchestrate the establishment of an anti-aging transcriptional program for many longevity-defining nuclear genes. Based on these findings, I proposed a model for how such LCA-driven changes early and late in the life of chronologically aging yeast cause a stepwise development of an anti-aging cellular pattern and its maintenance throughout lifespan. Moreover, I provided evidence that mitophagy, a selective autophagic degradation of aged and dysfunctional mitochondria, is a longevity assurance process that in chronologically aging yeast underlies the synergistic beneficial effects of CR and LCA on lifespan.


identifier: Taghipour Hajiabadi, Behzad  (2015) Information asymmetries and insider trading in firms subject to securities class action litigation: A look at managing vs. non-managing insiders.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: In this study, we investigate the trading patterns of corporate insiders around the announcement dates of shareholder class action lawsuits and related settlements. In particular, we explore whether these trading patterns are indicative of information asymmetries between managing and non-managing insiders. We provide evidence that litigation and settlement announcements have a significant impact on the stock prices of sued firms, and that foreknowledge of these events may be used by insiders to earn abnormal profits. We assess both actual and proposed trades by insiders in sued firms to detect abnormal trading activity prior to these events. Our results provide strong evidence of abnormal trading activity by insiders of sued firms prior to these announcements. The direction of their trades suggests the presence of informed trading prior to both litigation and settlement announcements. Moreover, we observe that managers exhibit higher abnormal trading activity than non-managing insiders prior to litigation and settlement announcements.


identifier: Hashemi, Vesra  (2015) Aerospace Manufacturing-Remanufacturing System Modeling and Optimization.  PhD thesis, Concordia University.

abstract:
In recent years, increasing environmental concerns, costs of raw materials, and stricter government regulations have resulted in companies striving to reduce their waste materials. An earlier approach adopted was the recycling of materials such as waste paper, glass and metals. However, recycled products typically lose a portion of their added values. Different waste reduction options such as direct reuse, repair, refurbishing, cannibalization, and remanufacturing were studied to overcome this drawback. Remanufacture recaptures the value added to materials when a product was first manufactured.
In the aerospace industry, where safety and performance are the overriding concerns and repairs are highly regulated, it could be perceived that remanufacturing has minimal appeal. However, the very low design tolerance of manufactured components results in a high percentage of defects. Due to the high price of raw materials, remanufacturing and components saving through “transforming” could be applied in imperfect production systems to reduce the amount of scrap materials. In this thesis, a general model is first proposed for a closed-loop supply chain network which includes the following processes: repairs, remanufacturing and transforming of selected defective components and end-of-life products, and cannibalization. A mixed integer linear programming formulation is developed to investigate the effect of various factors on profit, inventory carrying cost, and number of scrap components.
Uncertainty in demand and lead-time is one of the major issues in any manufacturing supply chain. Uncertainty is incorporated into an extended model through the scenario-analysis approach and outsourcing is considered as an option for remanufacturing of the customer owned components. Demand of final products is assumed to be deterministic. The defect rate of disassembled components, however, is considered to be variable which makes the demand for spares to be variable. The lead-time of in-house remanufacturing of the customer owned components is also considered to be variable. Sensitivity analysis is performed to investigate the effect of capacity, inventory carrying cost, outsourcing cost, lead-time, and defect rate variation on profit and amount of scraps. The inventory carrying cost variations have direct effect on the inventory turnover ratio. The maximum capacity of the outsourced company and process costs per unit have significant effect on the profitability. Maintaining a long-term relationship with third-party service providers, designing the components with a longer life cycle, and transforming and remanufacturing of defective components directly impact the profitability over the life cycle of a product.


identifier: Adam, Gabrielle  (2015) The influence of pain and pain-related fear on muscle activation in the neck/shoulder of female office workers with pain during computer work.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: Neck/shoulder musculoskeletal disorders in computer workers are a significant problem.  Fear-avoidance has been correlated to work-related injuries. No study to date has measured the relationship between pain-related fear and muscle activity in the painful neck/shoulder during a computer task.  Our research clarifies the relationship between pain-related fear, pain and muscle activity of the neck/shoulder in female office workers with pain and disability during a computer task.  Twenty-six subjects volunteered for the study.  Muscle activity was measured at the trapezius muscle during three computer tasks: typing, mousing and typing-and-mousing.  All participants filled out pain-related fear questionnaires.   Initial pain was measured before testing using a visual analog scale and evoked tenderness was measured after the computer tasks at the muscle recording locations. There was higher muscle amplitude and lower muscle rest in tasks involving typing (RMS: F(2,40)=34.99 p<.001; RRT F(2,42)=43.05 p<.001).  There was a correlation between disability and muscle amplitude for the left trapezius during typing (rs =.495, p=.019). There was a relationship between fear-avoidance beliefs and evoked tenderness at the trapezius (right: rs=.442, p=.039; left: rs=.471, p=.027) and a significant relationship between catastrophizing and evoked tenderness at the left UT (rs=.568, p=.006).  However, there was no relationship between pain and muscle activity.  The relationship between fear-avoidance and evoked tenderness suggests that pain-related fear may be a factor in a painful muscle.  Office workers with neck/shoulder pain should attempt more mousing activities compared to typing to reduce muscle activity.  As well, addressing pain-related fear in treatments may be beneficial to patient outcome.


identifier: Panagiotopoulos, Alexandra  (2015) An investigation of tense, aspect and other verb group features for English proficiency assessment on different Asian learner corpora.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract:
Recent interest in second language acquisition has resulted in studying the relationship between
linguistic indices and writing proficiency in English. This thesis investigates the influence of basic
linguistic notions, introduced early in English grammar, on automatic proficiency evaluation tasks.
We discuss the predictive potential of verb features (tense, aspect, voice, type and degree of em-
bedding) and compare them to word level n-grams (unigrams, bigrams, trigrams) for proficiency
assessment. We conducted four experiments using standard language corpora that differ in authors’
cultural backgrounds and essay topic variety. Tense showed little variation across proficiency lev-
els or language of origin making it a bad predictor for our corpora, but tense and aspect showed
promise, especially for more natural and varied datasets. Overall, our experiments illustrated that
verb features, when examined individually, form a baseline for writing proficiency prediction. Feature combinations, however, perform better for these verb features, which are grammatically not
independent. Finally, we investigate how language homogeneity due to corpus design influences the
performance of our features. We find that the majority of the essays we examined use present tense,
indefinite aspect and passive voice, thus greatly limiting the discriminative power of tense, aspect,
and voice features. Thus linguistic features have to be tested for their interoperability together with
their effectiveness on the corpora used. We conclude that all corpus-based research should include
an early validation step that investigates feature independence, feature interoperability, and feature
value distribution in a reference corpus to anticipate potentially spurious data sparsity effects.


identifier: glassman, dominique  (2015) paris, 'en carton'.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

title: paris, 'en carton'

abstract: The colonization of parts of Africa and the Caribbean has continued to greatly impact both France and these formerly colonized countries. In 1830, the French monarchy invaded Algeria. During the colonization of Algeria, France imposed its own culture and civil code, giving Algerians French citizenship in an attempt to force them to denounce Islam (543 Balch). 1954 saw the Algerian War of Independence, which ended in 1962. During the 1630’s, French religious orders began to develop colonies in the Caribbean or French Antilles (Peabody 114). Due to the propagation of the French language in these colonies, as well as the deplorable living conditions resulting from problematic governance in the wake of independence from France, large portions of formerly colonized populations immigrated to France. Unprepared for this influx of different cultures, immigrants were relegated to factory jobs and undesirable neighborhoods both in Paris itself as well as the surrounding suburbs. In this study, I will examine the difficulties facing these immigrants from lack of integration into French society; and how France’s relationship with immigrants is manifest in the ways certain films polarize diegetic spaces as either French or Other. This analysis argues that the spatial limitations facing the racial Other are not exclusive to the Parisian banlieue, or its subsequently named cinema genre. Different films from a variety of genres will demonstrate that limitations are set on immigrants in the city of Paris just as much as the urban/suburban divide that generalizes popular conceptions of postcolonial filmic representation.


identifier: Koury, Olivia Hanna  (2015) Diet-Induced Effects and the Potential for Cardiovascular Risk.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract:
Cardiovascular disease remains the leading cause of death in America impacting the lives of millions.  There are many modifiable risk factors that may help in the prevention and treatment of cardiovascular disease such as coronary artery disease or congestive heart failure. Proper diet and healthy weight management is a crucial factor in preventing disease. Dieting is a large component of American living, and the low-carbohydrate high-protein diet remains the most common form of weight loss. This thesis will investigate different types of diets and eating habits that can affect risk of developing cardiovascular disease.
	An apolipoprotein E-deficient mouse model was used to investigate different diets and how they may develop cardiovascular disease, more specifically, atherosclerosis in the aorta and altered mitochondrial functioning in the heart. The diet of interest for this project, was a low-carbohydrate high-protein diet. This diet promotes an environment that causes a shift in cellular metabolism due to macronutrient imbalances. Past research has yet to address a possible link between low-carbohydrate high-protein diets and atherosclerosis and vascular smooth muscle cells, and mitochondrial functioning. This thesis contains data that will be of interest to both clinicians and patients, in terms of safe dieting and the potential for cardiovascular risk.


identifier: Rocha, Cynthia  (2015) Cardiac Mitochondrial Adaptations Induced by Elevated Lipid Exposure.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: Apolipoprotein E (ApoE) is necessary for normal lipid metabolism. A deficiency of this protein impedes plasma clearance of both triglycerides and cholesterol. These lipids are consequently broken down through alternate pathways, thus resulting in atypical cellular function. Cardiac mitochondria play a significant role in cellular respiration specifically, considering the extent of oxygen consumption that is required by the heart muscle. Their capacity to utilize oxygen and produce energy may be affected by the buildup of cholesterol and triglycerides, due to a deficiency in ApoE. This study will investigate the influence of ApoE deficiency on energy metabolism in young and older female mice. Whether or not any of these effects are exacerbated by further supplementation of lipids through diet will also be evaluated in male mice. Cardiac mitochondrial oxygen consumption, mitochondrial oxidative phosphorylation (OXPHOS) capacity and protein expression in cardiomyocytes will help in examining these influences. Our findings have the potential to provide important information regarding lipid shunting into non-oxidative pathways, which can ultimately disrupt normal cellular function leading to damaging effects of the heart.


identifier: Farley, Marilyn  (2015) Réconcilier l’irréconciliable : l’expérience de terrain des médiatrices et médiateurs de l’art contemporain.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract:
Cette thèse aborde l’expérience de terrain des médiatrices et médiateurs de l’art contemporain évoluant actuellement dans le milieu institutionnel québécois ; six participant(e)s issu(e)s d’institutions culturelles différentes se sont rencontré(e)s lors de groupes de discussion, afin d’examiner collectivement les réalités de leur profession et les possibilités / limitations
propres à celle-ci. Ces rencontres – et les analyses qui en découlent – permettent un regard critique et direct sur ce qui caractérise la médiation artistique, ce qui définit ses rôles et ses actions, et ce qui peut être appris à partir de l’expérience des médiateurs(trices). Leur profession étant encore peu (re)connue, cette recherche et sa diffusion subséquente visent à
offrir aux participant(e)s une plateforme propice à l’échange, permettant ainsi de faire connaître certains aspects méconnus des réalités de la médiation en milieu institutionnel et de suggérer plusieurs éléments de (re)définition.

En suivant la méthode de la théorie ancrée, les propos des participant(e)s furent comparés– d’abord entre eux et ensuite avec la revue de la littérature – afin d’en souligner les convergences et dissemblances. De ces mises en relation émergent quatre grands thèmes, soit 1) la problématique de la définition ; 2) le lieu ; 3) la dimension interpersonnelle ; et 4) le rapport à l’institution. L’analyse de ces thèmes et de leurs enchâssements permet de mettre en lumière certains rouages et « non-dits » de la médiation artistique en milieu institutionnel. En plus de jeter un regard lucide sur leur pratique, ces participant(e)s illustrent par leurs propos l’importance cruciale d’une prise en considération des contextes réels qui donnent lieu à la médiation artistique telle que pratiquée aujourd’hui, contextualisation essentielle à sa
compréhension.
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identifier: Koranteng, Antoinette  (2015) A Studio-based Self-study of my Perceptions about my Mixed (black and white) Identity.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: My studio-based inquiry critically examines my perceptions regarding aspects of my mixed black and white identity. My artwork was informed by a systematic practice of journaling, sketching, photo-documentation, and reflection. I examined the racialized categories that I identify with and that others use to identify me. I made links with critical reflection on concepts related to race related literature, and looked at the work of other artists dealing with similar themes and materials to mine. In the process of using different materials to make the artwork, I gained insight regarding how racialized categories – “black,” “white,” “bi-racial,” “multiracial” – may function to perpetuate negative stereotyping, mainly through fixed conceptions of identity and misconceptions about scientific notions of race. The purpose of my thesis is to maintain dialogue on race-related issues, especially at a time in our society when people sometimes believe that such things are a thing of the past and that one’s skin colour no longer matters like it used to. My reflections about my mixed identity, as detailed through my art-making, show that problems concerning race and the concepts associated with them still need to be critically examined. Applied in a multicultural art education context, a critical approach in teaching and learning should involve, or continue to involve students’ reflections on their own experiences in their work, as well as others, through inclusion of a diverse range of artists that reflect the contributions of many, rather than a select few, in the fine arts.


identifier: Wu, Xing  (2015) Dynamic Load Balancing and Autoscaling in Distributed Stream Processing Systems.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: In big data world, Hadoop and other batch-processing tools are widely used to analyze data and get results in minutes. However, minutes of latency still cannot satisfy the proliferated needs for real-time decision in many fields such as live stock and trading feeds in financial services, telecommunications, sensor networks, online advertisement, etc. Distributed stream processing (DSP) systems aim to process, analyze and make decisions on-the-fly based on immense quantities of data streams being dynamically generated at high rates. As the rates of data streams may vary over time, DSP systems require an architecture that is elastic to handle dynamic load. Although many dynamic load balancing and autoscaling techniques for general pull-based distributed systems have been well studied, these solutions cannot be directly applied to DSP systems because DSP systems are push-based, they process data streams with different types of operators, each running on a cluster node. One research problem is to allocate data processing operators on nodes of clusters and balance the workload dynamically. Since the data volume and rate can be unpredictable, static mapping between operators and cluster resources often results in unbalanced operator load distribution. Furthermore, the problem of making DSP system scalable requires autoscaling at runtime. In this context, the operators need to be relocated among newly provisioned nodes. The contribution of this thesis is three folds. First, we proposes a software layer that is load-adaptive between a DSP engine and clusters. The architecture allows dynamic transferring of an operator to different cluster nodes at runtime and keeps the process transparent to developers. Second, an optimization method that combines correlation of resource utilization of nodes and capacity of clusters is proposed to balance load dynamically. Lastly, we design the autoscaling mechanism and algorithm to detect overload and provision nodes at runtime. We implement our design on S4, an open-source DSP engine first developed by Yahoo!. The implementation is evaluated by a top-N topic list application on Twitter streams using clusters on Amazon Web Services. The results demonstrate a 75.79% improvement on stream processing throughputs, and a 294.47% improvement on cluster resource utilization.


identifier: Barbieri, Jan Marie  (2015) Addressing Perceived Pain in Childbirth: A Music Therapy Voicework Intervention Design.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: This study presents a six session music therapy intervention design for the use of vocalization during labor to reduce the perceived pain of un-medicated vaginal childbirth. Currently, only one childbirth education study is available on the use of vocalizing during childbirth, and with positive outcomes. While music therapy offers an established recorded music intervention for childbirth (music therapy-assisted childbirth), there is currently no evidence of a comparable vocal intervention in the music therapy literature, despite a growing body of evidence-based vocal interventions being used with other populations. In this study, a directed content analysis of 13 music therapy-assisted childbirth texts revealed that the main “problem” of childbirth is the pain associated with labor. Further analysis of these texts as well as 11 obstetrics texts identified numerous risk and protective factors and malleable mediators that may influence the perceived pain of the laboring woman in childbirth. Music therapy, sound healing, and voicework literature were reviewed to target vocal strategies which may positively influence the identified malleable mediators, thus potentially reducing a woman’s perceived pain during childbirth. These findings were combined with the researcher’s professional knowledge and personal experience to generate the first draft of an intervention program design for women and their birth partners where they would learn how to use vocalization during labor to reduce perceived pain. The proposed intervention design will need to be piloted and adapted based on participant feedback, and then clinically tested in order to verify its effectiveness.


identifier: Borgal, Samantha M.  (2015) A Music Therapist’s Use of Her Voice in End-of-Life Care: A Heuristic Self-Inquiry.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

format: text audio

abstract: The purpose of this research was to examine the author’s beliefs, attitudes, and emotions related to her voice and to gain insight and self-awareness about how this might affect her work as a music therapist in end-of-life care. The data collection and analysis procedures were conceptualized within Moustakas’ six stages of heuristic inquiry and were delimited to include only self-reflection components.  Sources of data included a self-reflexive journal and audio recordings of the researcher’s voice. Open coding was used to identify themes related to the research question. These themes were organized using axial coding and layers of meaning were examined and clarified. The research process culminated with a creative synthesis in the form of an original song that was composed, sung, and recorded by the researcher. Personal implications as well as implications for clinical, educational, and research activities are presented.


identifier: Ungerman-Sears, Jeremy  (2015) Corporate Sponsorship vs. Traditional Advertising in Sports: An Empirical Comparison.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract:
With the growth of corporate sport sponsorship as a widely-used marketing tool allowing brands to reach vast audiences, it has become a threat to traditional advertising practices like television advertising. Sponsorship’s perceived benefits over advertising operate via a transfer of “goodwill” from the favored sports property (e.g., an iconic hockey franchise like the Toronto Maple Leafs) to the sponsoring brand. Numerous streams of sponsorship research have emerged over the years, yet none have directly compared the performance of corporate sponsorship in professional sport with any type of traditional advertising, on the same set of consumer outcomes. Here, we address this gap by manipulating television (TV) and event sponsorship activations across five conditions, in order to explore significant differences in consumer attitudes and purchase intentions arising from exposure to varying degrees of sponsorship. Our ultimate goal was to conclusively identify whether or not sponsorship is superior to traditional TV advertising for brands.

While our results were not enough to definitively address this question, we did find numerous benefits of TV and event sponsorship over traditional TV advertising that offer promising prospects for future research; namely we saw marked improvements in attitude towards the target brand, aided recall of the sponsoring brand, and sponsor recognition of consumers exposed to TV sponsorship. Further, we found additional benefits of integrating event sponsorship with both types of TV communications, suggesting a synergy effect between the two methods. Individuals’ sport involvement and team loyalty were found to partially moderate consumer responses to TV and event sponsorship, while self-construal was not.


identifier: Purscell, Karli  (2015) Potential for Music Therapy Intervention with Family Caregivers of Adults with an Intellectual Disability: A Survey Study.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: The purpose of this survey was to investigate the extent to which professional music therapists in North America are working with family caregivers of adults with an intellectual disability (ID), the nature of the work they are doing, and their perspectives on the types of music therapy services that would best serve this population. The survey was sent to 6083 Canadian and American music therapists. A total of 309 music therapists who fit the criteria for inclusion responded. Eighty-three percent of respondents had some kind of contact with family caregivers. More specifically, 190 respondents reported family caregivers were present during sessions but not as clients, 40 indicated that they provided services where family members and adults with an ID were in sessions together as clients, and 19 indicated that they provided services that focused solely on the needs of these family caregivers. Behavioral music therapy was the approach being used most often in most contexts. However, when providing direct services for family caregivers, the music therapy approaches being used and recommended music experiences often fell outside of a behavioral model. Participants’ written comments and quantitative responses indicate that there is potential and desire to provide more formalized music therapy services and supports to family caregivers. Limitations of the study as well as implications for music therapy research and practice are presented.


identifier: Chandolias, Nikolaos  (2015) Responsive Environments for Performance, Including Voice, Speech and Whole Body Interaction Techniques.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract:
For my Master of Arts in the Individualised Program, my practice-based research investigates a design and development framework within an artistic context of responsive environments for performance, including voice, speech and movement interaction techniques. To poetically address issues regarding the way people perform and experience a space, responsive environments, as ambient intelligence systems, should be able to coevolve and auto-adapt to its inhabitants and to the environment.

Although relevant work and research has taken place in the fields of interactive art and installations, they primarily concern body tracking, while the potential for voice, spoken or written language, and sound has been left floundering. Positioned at the intersection of design, computation arts, performance and physical spaces, I introduce the role of natural language processing as a tool that aims to non-hierarchically co-construct, augment and mediate human experience, interaction and perception in live events.

Furthermore, by adopting different interaction design paradigms and collaborating with artists and performers, I am afforded the opportunity to reproducibly and rigorously investigate the potentialities of such systems under the demands of live improvised situations. In addition, these collaborations with non-digital artists and practitioners allowed me to better reflect on the effectiveness of such systems and re-evaluate the way I am developing them.

The understanding of interactivity as a quality that exists between different systems and their ability to converse with and respond to any sensorial input correspondingly impacts the aesthetic and affective experience of the participants (performers and spectators). This allows for redefining the role of the participant from a spectator to a co-creator, as well as the role of the space itself.

My practical explorations emerged as two complementary trajectories: the development of a responsive audio-visual Storytelling Space, and a technologically augmented - sound and movement improvisation - performance, Orbital Resonance.


identifier: Limoges, Alexandre  (2015) A fairer House than Prose - Retraduire Emily Dickinson.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract:
Preeminent amongst the images used by Emily Dickinson’s works are the room and the house, which are sometimes the starting point of a mystic endeavor in which poetry becomes the medium of a divine union. Often, though, the same images lead to the anguished confinement of entombment. This imagery, capital in her personal quest for meaning, is key to understanding some of the creative choices made by the Poet, such as the use of the hymn (her preferred poetic form), the omnipresence of the em dash or the high frequency of monosyllabic words. For this thesis, we have chosen twelve poems in which the images of the room and the house are explicitly mentioned. These poems have then been translated in French with the goal of retaining the formal aspects most often disregarded in translation, since most other renderings of the poet’s work have eschewed these as either secondary or unessential. However, they are critical to understanding the meaning that Emily Dickinson attempted to put forth in her work.

Le thème de la demeure et de la chambre, qui parfois se prête, chez Emily Dickinson, à un rêve mystique où la poésie devient le médium d’une union avec la divinité, prend souvent la forme d’une angoissante claustration dans la tombe. Cruciale dans l’œuvre de la poétesse américaine parce qu’elle se situe au cœur de ses préoccupations existentielles, cette thématique permet également de saisir l’importance de certains choix formels, tel que celui de l’hymne, sa forme de prédilection, l’emploi du tiret cadratin ou la prépondérance des monosyllabes. Nous avons choisi, pour ce mémoire, de regrouper douze poèmes traitant explicitement de la chambre et de la demeure, puis de les traduire en français, en insistant notamment sur des aspects formels souvent jugés secondaires par les traducteurs.


identifier: McGarvey-Lechable, Kathleen  (2015) Design of slow light modes in photonic crystal ring resonators.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: This work explores the optical properties of a photonic crystal ring resonator (PhCRR), a device consisting of a microring resonator upon which a photonic crystal structure is superimposed.  Due to the periodic dielectric structure of the PhCRR, the gradient of the device's dispersion curve approaches zero near the photonic band edge, resulting in enhanced light-matter coupling and quality factors due to the low group velocity of the resonant modes. In order to fully exploit the ``slow light" characteristics of the PhCRR, a design approach is used which allows for the selection of band edge resonant modes. A frequency domain computational approach models the dispersion of a periodic silicon photonic crystal waveguide. Boundary conditions are then imposed on the waveguide, ensuring the phase matching of propagating electromagnetic waves and the discreteness of the number of lattice cells in the ring. Through proper selection of design parameters, these geometric constraints return a set of resonant modes which fall precisely at the photonic band edge. Finite-difference time-domain simulations yield the field energy densities of the individual resonant modes of the PhCRR, with calculated quality factors greater than 10^7.  The spectral features of the PhCRR and the effect of geometric disorder are explored.  Finally, a design proposal for the silicon-on-insulator fabrication of on-chip photonic crystal ring resonators is discussed.


identifier: Goldsmith, Mark  (2015) Neural Networks as Pseudorandom Number Generators.  PhD thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: This thesis brings two disparate fields of research together; the fields of artificial neural networks and pseudorandom number generation. In it, we answer variations on the following question: can recurrent neural networks generate pseudorandom numbers? In doing so, we provide a new construction of an $n$-dimensional neural network that has period $2^n$, for all $n$. We also provide a technique for constructing neural networks based on the theory of shift register sequences. The randomness capabilities of these networks is then measured via the theoretical notion of computational indistinguishability and a battery of statistical tests. In particular, we show that neural networks cannot be pseudorandom number generators according to the theoretical definition of computational indistinguishability. We contrast this result by providing some neural networks that pass all of the tests in the SmallCrush battery of tests in the TestU01 testing suite.


identifier: Bouzouf, Boutaina  (2015) Numerical Simulation of Saltwater Intrusion in Coastal Aquifers.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: The modeling of groundwater in costal aquifers is an important and difficult issue in water resources. The primary difficulty resides in efficient and accurate simulation of the movement of the saltwater front. This thesis is devoted to the sharp interface numerical study of one and two dimensional of seawater intrusion into coastal aquifers. The Finite Volume method is adopted here to solve the set of simultaneous diffusion differential equations describing the motion of saltwater and freshwater separated by a sharp interface. These diffusion equations are based on the Dupuit approximation and are obtained from integration over the vertical dimension. The one dimensional Finite Volume model is first being validated using academic test case studies with known close from solutions. The second purpose of this study is to compare two dimensional numerical methods, Finite Volume method and Sharp model based on Finite Difference method when applied to a Llobregat aquifer, in Barcelona, Spain. Both methods are using the same mathematical formulation for the sharp interface. The comparison between both methods indicates that Finite Volume method provides predictions closer to the observed results.


identifier: Donald, Kristina  (2015) Understanding Parent Perceptions of Autism Spectrum Disorder Diagnosis and Intervention Services Through A Culturally Responsive Framework.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: While the process of obtaining an Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) diagnosis for a child can involve several challenges for parents (Keenan, Dillenburger, Doherty, Byrne, & Gallagher, 2010), this process may be even more complex for immigrant parents (Begeer, El Bouk, Boussaid, Terwogt, & Koot, 2009; Jegatheesan, Fowler, & Miller, 2010). This qualitative study utilized an eco-cultural framework (Super & Harkness, 1986) to explore the experiences of eight immigrant families during their process of obtaining a diagnosis and services for their children with ASD. Each family participated in two in-depth, semi-structured interviews (45-90 minutes) with many open-ended questions to permit parents to recount their story of obtaining the ASD diagnosis and services for their children. Using open and axial coding, the data were analyzed inductively and deductively to reveal various themes related to the diagnosis, treatment services, relationships with professionals, and future expectations for their children. Given that Montreal is such a highly multicultural metropolis (Statistics Canada, 2007), it is important that professionals recognize how parental beliefs about the ASD diagnosis could shape their treatment decisions and adherence (Dale, Jahoda, & Knott, 2006). Data from this qualitative study support the importance of adopting a culturally responsive practice when working with families by considering families’ perceptions and the core meaning of their experiences (Harry, 2002). That is, a culturally responsive practice helps to ensure that parents are given a voice, permits professionals to understand how parent perceptions may be formed, and allows for professionals to revisit any relevant problems that may interfere with parents’ negotiation of services.


identifier: Hamidfar, Tabassom  (2015) Fabrication and characterization of surface nanoscale axial photonics microresonators.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract:
Micro-scale, whispering gallery mode (WGM) resonators are important devices for trapping, slowing down, and intensifying light in opto-electronic applications. Of the many available silica-based devices, surface nanoscale axial photonics (SNAP) resonators are a new generation of WGM microresonators, consisting of an optical fiber with nanoscale variations of its effective radius. They have received great attention owing to their advantages over conventional silica-based devices, such as flexibility and ultra-low losses, which lead to ultra-high quality factors. They have demonstrated great potential as photonic micro-devices in switching, slowing light, filtering, lasing, and sensing with high precision, as well as for research on Anderson localization and tunnelling.

In this thesis, we present a new fabrication method for SNAP devices using a regular hydrogen-oxygen torch, requiring less equipment than current techniques. We have characterized our SNAP devices with evanescent spectroscopy, utilizing a tapered optical fiber as an excitation source. The transmission spectroscopy results show that our  flame fabricated SNAP devices have modes with very high quality factors (~10^7) which can show significant thermal non-linear effects.


identifier: Hunte, Grace-Ann  (2015) A Music Therapy drumming Intervention in Support of Children with Developmental Dyslexia.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract:
This study sought to create a 16-week music therapy program using drumming to address the psychosocial needs of high-functioning school aged children between the ages of 10-12 associated with developmental dyslexia. These needs included self-esteem, anxiety, and reading deficits. The program formulated through this research study encompasses a variety of rhythm-based interventions originating from West African musical practices and emphasizes a group-oriented model of participation. It also draws from the principles and approaches developed from music therapy practices for children with dyslexia, which emerged from the literature and interview data.
Results of this study suggest that drumming potentially addresses the learning needs of children with dyslexia because aspects such as rhythm, structure and sequencing are common components between drumming, music perception, and language (Lamb & Gregory, 1993). Results of this study also showed that drumming can potentially address the psychosocial needs of children with dyslexia as it promotes expression, as well as physical and emotional releases (Amir, 1999). Drumming in music therapy encourages social interaction, while also offering opportunities for children to establish and connect with themselves, gain internal awareness of self through organization, and build skills in hopes that these will transfer into their daily lives.
The results of this design serve the purpose of answering the established research question: “What is the structure of a music therapy program that uses drumming for children between the ages of 10-12 who have been diagnosed with dyslexia?”  A functional music therapy program was created, providing concrete examples of techniques for music therapists to develop further knowledge of how music therapy can address the needs of children with developmental dyslexia. Once tested and refined, this program can be used in music therapy clinical practice and can be the basis for further research.

Concordia University, 2015


identifier: Balkanova, Olga  (2015) The fourth moment of automorphic L-functions of prime power level.  PhD thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: The main result of this dissertation is an asymptotic formula for the fourth moment of automorphic $L$-functions of prime power level [rho vu], [vu] --> [infinity]..  This is a continuation of the work of Rouymi, who computed the first three moments at prime power level, and a generalisation of results obtained for prime level by Duke, Friedlander & Iwaniec and Kowalski, Michel & Vanderkam.


identifier: Salah, Mohammadhadi  (2015) Investigating the Pattern of Coordination between the Sarcoplasmic Reticulum Ca2+ Handling Channels and Calcineurin/NFAT Signalling Pathway in Distinct Mouse Models and Approaches of Muscular Dystrophy Studies.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: Duchenne muscular dystrophy is a progressive neurodegenerative muscle disease that makes the patients wheelchair-dependent around the age of 12 and eventually causes death in the late twenties due to lung and/or heart failure. A functional dystrophin is absent in DMD patients which makes their muscle cells prone to physical damage by every single movement. A homolog of this fundamental protein is utrophin which is known to be able to partially compensate for the lack of dystrophin. Hence, up-regulation of this protein has been promising for years as a strategy to improve this disorder. It has been repetitively proved that this approach could be achievable via stimulation of calcineurin/NFAT signalling pathway which in turn promotes the oxidative capacity of the muscle. Also, pharmacological induction of the Adenosine monophosphate - activated protein kinase pathway can provoke the slow oxidative myogenic program. Nevertheless, recent evidence shows the capability of the Heat Shock Protein 70 to ameliorate the dystrophic phenotype by preserving the function of sarco/endoplasmic reticulum Ca2+ ATPase channels independent of utrophin. Thus in this study, we sought to shed light on the underlying mechanisms by which intracellular Ca2+ oscillations coordinate with calcineurin/NFAT signalling in these adaptive responses. Our data suggest an inhibitory effect of AMPK activators on calcineurin activity and further prove the independence of HSP70 regulation from the calcineurin /NFAT pathway. Moreover, we were able to represent a more detailed understanding of the way Ca2+ handling proteins determine the activity rate of calcineurin in response to altered cytosolic Ca2+ oscillations. Collectively, our results may bring the scientific community one step closer to finding a comprehensive approach to cure or improve the dystophic disorders in general and duchenne muscular dystrophy in particular.


identifier: Sokolovskaya, Anna  (2015) Connectivist Knowledge Building, Collaborative Learning, and Social Presence in a Connectivist Massive Open Online Course: A Study of PLENK2010.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: The pedagogy of connectivist massive open online courses (cMOOCs) is based on the new learning theory proposed by G. Siemens in 2004.  This theory, called connectivism, takes to consideration the changes in learning process as a result of advancements in technology.  The first cMOOCs, completely open and online courses, attracted thousands of participants from all over the world. The popularity of cMOOCs later gave rise to xMOOCs – massive online courses based on more traditional behaviourist theory.  This study examines student interactions in weekly discussion forums of PLENK2010 - a cMOOC that ran for ten weeks in Fall 2010.  The goal of this research is to investigate whether the student interaction in the context of weekly forums supports the ideas of connectivist knowledge building, allows for collaborative work to happen, and increases the sense of social presence.  Using qualitative content analysis to analyse over 2000 forum posts, it was found that PLENK2010 was successful in fostering collaboration between students.  The levels of social presence in the course were high and connectivist learning processes were shown to be successfully fulfilled.  Results from this study can help to better explain ways of increasing the sense of presence in xMOOCs and promoting teamwork and collaboration through discussion forums in online course environments.


identifier: Zhang, Shuzhe  (2015) Color associations with masculine and feminine brand personality among Chinese consumers.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: This research examines the association between color hue and brightness and consumers’ perceptions of masculine and feminine brand personality traits. As most research on color-brand personality associations has focused on the North American context, the current research extends this investigation to Chinese consumers. Building on the literature on color meaning and the gender dimensions of brand personality (i.e., brand masculinity and brand femininity), this research reports results from three empirical studies. Study 1 consisted of interviews exploring the classification of color hues in terms of masculine and feminine brand personality. Studies 2 and 3 examined the relation between color hue (Study 2) and color hue and brightness (Study 3) on consumers’ perceptions of masculine and feminine brand personality. Study 2 involved eleven color hues (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, pink, white, black, brown, and gray) that were applied to fictitious brand logos adapted from prior research. Study 3 involved three color hues (red, green, purple) and three brightness levels. Participants rated each colored logo in terms of brand masculinity and brand femininity. Results suggest that red, orange, blue, black, and white are perceived as more masculine (than feminine), and that high levels of brightness tend to increase femininity—a result that was significant for the hue purple. This research concludes with a discussion of the theoretical contributions, limitations, managerial implications and future research.


identifier: Krastel, Zachary  (2015) Investigating the Influence of the Herding Effect on Consumption Experience: The Case of Online Music.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: Social influence has shown to be incredibly powerful in shaping a consumer’s behaviour. An example of this occurs with the “herding effect”, in which consumers ignore any of their own signals in favour of copying the actions or preferences of the majority. Social influence has been shown to be especially strong in online music consumption, due to the fact that music is highly subjective and can only be ascribed value after it has been experienced; therefore, it is not surprising that strong relationships have been found in research looking at herding effects in music consumption. However, past studies have limited their scope to analyzing the effect across situations, and have so far assumed that the herding effect holds for all consumers, and for all types of music. Therefore, this study looks determine whether there are any potential moderators to the herding effect, such as an individual’s personality or the type of music being consumed. Furthermore, while past studies have looked only at product choice as an outcome variable, this study aims to extend our understanding of the strength of the effect to see if it also impacts consumers’ subsequent evaluations of the consumption experience. Results suggest this effect on the consumption experience does exist, and significant effects are found that suggest online social connectedness and self-construal moderate the impact of the herding effect. These results have implications for marketers in the music industry, and also more generally for anyone looking to understand how personality may moderate social influence effects.


identifier: Calvo, Carousel  (2015) To Come Back Again.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

title: To Come Back Again

abstract: To Come Back Again is a bildungsroman of two characters – Luis and Rowena. The concept of leaving and returning (balikbayan in Filipino) is a major theme in the story. The novel details both characters’ perspectives: Luis’ reluctant departure from the Philippines juxtaposed with Rowena’s desperation to enact her own departure. Luis’ story starts when he is sent off to live with his aunt in Vancouver. He leaves behind a developing relationship with Rowena, which becomes the impetus for his longing to return to his former home. In Vancouver, he starts to question why he had to leave Cebu and to ascertain his purpose in staying in Vancouver. This anxiety manifests itself in a recurring nightmare. The pull of not only Rowena, but also his barangay (village), stifles any new relationships he forms. Despite his reluctance to entrench himself in Vancouver’s cultural milieu, and despite the fact that the city itself has begun to influence his way of thinking and speaking, Luis begins to question his identity, which then casts doubt on his goal of going back to Cebu. Rowena’s story begins a week after Luis’ departure. As Luis was her only ally and the one person she thought would change her life, his leaving forces Rowena to come to terms with her own situation. She comes to question the idea of permanence. Upon meeting Mr. Park (an older South Korean man vacationing in Cebu), Rowena sees a relationship with him as a way out of her poverty. Both stories explore the ideas of migration, poverty, class hierarchy – Filipinos vs. Chinese- Filipinos – and family responsibility.


identifier: Gholizadeh Touchaei, Ali  (2015) Characterizing the Effect of Increasing Albedo on Urban Meteorology and Air Quality in Cold Climates, a case study for Montreal.  PhD thesis, Concordia University.

abstract:
The higher temperature of urban areas compared to their surrounding rural areas is called urban heat island (UHI). UHI during summer may harm inhabitants and aggravate cooling energy demand. Increasing urban albedo is proposed to counter the undesirable impacts of UHI. To analyze the effect of albedo enhancement on urban climate, land-atmosphere interactions and various physical processes in the atmosphere and on the land should be modeled. Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model, urban canopy model (UCM), building energy model (BEM), and chemical transport model (CHEM) are coupled, to accurately investigate the effect of an increase in the urban albedo. To select appropriate models sensitivity of near surface air temperature and near surface wind velocity to the choice of parameterization is evaluated. Montreal and Toronto, as the two most populated Canadian cities, are selected for evaluation of UCMs and an increase in the urban albedo.
Seasonal performance of the increase in albedo of roofs, walls, and road by 0.45, 0.4, and 0.25, respectively, results in an average decrease of 0.25 °C during summer and a negligible effect during winter (<0.1 °C). The daily building energy savings of HVAC systems in summertime is about 18 Wh/100m2, while, the winter heating penalty is about 2 Wh/100m2. Considering the effect of aerosols and other pollutants, in summertime, the simulated maximum air temperature decreased by about 1 °C, near surface 8-hour average ozone concentration decreased by 0.1 ppbv, and 24-hour average PM2.5 concentration  decreased by 2 μg/m3. Simulations show that increasing the urban albedo results in a reduction in summertime air temperature, leading to a lower cooling energy use and an improved outdoor air quality.


identifier: Nolte, Victoria  (2015) Crawling Across Borders: Transnational Nationalisms and the Asian Canadian Body in the Video Works of Jin-me Yoon.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: This thesis is a critical analysis of two multi-site video performances: The dreaming collective knows no history (2008) and As it Is Becoming (2008) by Vancouver-based artist Jin-me Yoon. In both works the artist crawls through or between politically-charged sites in Seoul, South Korea and Beppu, Japan, referencing histories of colonization, civil war, and Cold War politics. Analyzing Yoon’s video performances in conversation with the works of other Korean and Asian North American artists who also centralize the Asian body in their varied practices, my research aims to fill a gap in scholarship on Asian Canadian performance art from a diasporic and critical race lens. This thesis begins by situating these works within interrelated concepts of border crossings and the “diasporic turn” to argue that Yoon’s performing of Korean Canadian is an instance of “debordered” citizenship, a concept that looks to feelings of cultural belonging (within multiple cultural contexts) rather than fixed territorial borders, to form a transnational national identity. From there, I analyze the space of the video screen and present a framework through which to understand how Yoon relates the histories of the Japanese colonial occupation of Korea (1910-45), the Korean War (1950-53), and the traumatic history of the comfort women to a multi-layered narrative of embodiment. The final section brings these arguments together to discuss how negotiations of the cultural, racial, and civil histories of Korean Canadian contribute to struggles for social justice and equal citizenship. By regarding these narratives of history, embodiment, and border crossings through the body, this thesis ultimately concludes that the artist’s act of crawling is an embodied performance of “debordered” citizenship, one that resists racist and essentialist conceptions of the artist’s Korean Canadian identity.


identifier: Goettlich, Walter  (2015) Interstate Interstitials: Bumper Stickers, Driver-Cars and the Spaces of Social Encounter on Contemporary American Superhighways.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract:
Since the turn of the 21st century, it has been the established aim of mobilities scholars to investigate the ways in which contemporary life is conditioned and carried out through the movements of people, things and ideas. Despite concerns over global climate change on the one hand, and the heyday of peak-oil receding quickly into the rear view mirror on the other, the primary vehicle of mobility in the United States remains the personal automobile. Contemporary American notions of self and identity are frequently interpreted through the individual’s relationship(s) to cars and driving, and while cars themselves are mass-manufactured items, they afford a number of many non-technical practices of customization as modes of individuation. Perhaps most commonplace of these practices is the use of bumper stickers.

This thesis is a critical examination of the type of everyday cultural construction and social encounter that may emerge from reading bumper stickers in motion. Such a practice is informed by both the structural and systemic conditions of American superhighway automobility, as well as by the phenomenological effects of isolation and speed on the road these conditions produce. An embodied subject, emerges through participation in the regime of automobility, but the body I have in mind is not, strictly speaking, the unitary, human body. It is, rather, a performed, materially-heterogeneous assemblage: a reader-car, through which unexpected—often asymmetrical and asynchronous, but nonetheless social— spaces of interaction coalesce and extend.


identifier: Arnold, Andre Gilham  (2015) WEHST: Wearable Engine for Human-Mediated Telepresence.  PhD thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: This dissertation reports on the industrial design of a wearable computational device created to enable better emergency medical intervention for situations where electronic remote assistance is necessary. The design created for this doctoral project, which assists practices by paramedics with mandates for search-and-rescue (SAR) in hazardous environments, contributes to the field of human-mediated teleparamedicine (HMTPM). Ethnographic and industrial design aspects of this research considered the intricate relationships at play in search-and-rescue operations, which lead to the design of the system created for this project known as WEHST:  Wearable Engine for Human-Mediated Telepresence.  Three case studies of different teams were carried out, each focusing on making  improvements to the practices of teams of paramedics and search-and-rescue technicians who use combinations of ambulance, airplane, and helicopter transport in specific chemical, biological, radioactive, nuclear and explosive (CBRNE) scenarios. The three paramedicine groups included are the Canadian Air Force 442 Rescue Squadron, Nelson Search and Rescue, and the British Columbia Ambulance Service Infant Transport Team. Data was gathered over a seven-year period through a variety of methods including observation, interviews, examination of documents, and industrial design. The data collected included physiological, social, technical, and ecological information about the rescuers. Actor-network theory guided the research design, data analysis, and design synthesis. All of this leads to the creation of the WEHST system. As identified, the WEHST design created in this dissertation project addresses the difficulty case-study participants found in using their radios in hazardous settings.  As the research identified, a means of controlling these radios without depending on hands, voice, or speech would greatly improve communication, as would wearing sensors and other computing resources better linking operators, radios, and environments. WEHST responds to this need. WEHST is an instance of industrial design for a wearable “engine” for human-situated telepresence that includes eight interoperable families of wearable electronic modules and accompanying textiles. These make up a platform technology for modular, scalable and adaptable toolsets for field practice, pedagogy, or research. This document details the considerations that went into the creation of the WEHST design.


identifier: Peloso, Jérémie  (2015) Cross-Listed Stocks: Conduit for Contagion across Borders.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: In this paper, I examine the effects of the arrival of phony public information originating from the United-States on a sample of Canadian stocks listed both on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSE) and on the major U.S. exchanges. I find that following the news announcement the stocks on both markets instantaneously experience a similar, highly correlated and significant log return surge along with a disruption in liquidity and a widening of the spread. Using control stocks for the sample of firms, my results suggest that the transmission mechanism is exacerbated by the presence of cross-listed stocks on the U.S. exchanges. Overall, this empirical work shows that cross-listed stocks can act as vectors for shocks, or at least strengthen the transmission mechanism of a shock from the home (foreign) market to the foreign (home) market. It also suggests that firms may have to take this potential pitfall into consideration when deciding to cross-list on a foreign exchange.


identifier: Asadi, Mohammad Mehdi  (2014) Cooperative Control and Connectivity Assessment of Multi-Agent Systems subject to Disturbance and Constrained Measurements.  PhD thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: The problem of designing distributed control strategies and developing connectivity metrics for multi-agent systems subject to constrained measurements and external disturbances is studied in this work. The constraint on the field of view (FOV) of the sensing devices used in multi-agent networks is ubiquitous in a wide range of applications. Such constraints have a fundamental impact on the overall performance of the network. The consensus and containment problems for a network of single-integrator agents are investigated, where each agent is assumed to have a sensor with a constrained angular FOV. The flocking problem for a network of double integrators with constrained FOVs is then investigated, where each agent is assumed to be equipped with relative distance and bearing angle sensors, with conic-shaped sensing areas of limited visibility. The angular velocity of the FOV of each agent along with the corresponding control inputs are designed such that the flocking objectives are achieved in a certain neighborhood of the desired configuration. A distributed consensus controller for a network of unicycle agents subject to external disturbances in input channels is also developed for two different cases of disturbances with known linear dynamics and unknown disturbances with known upper bounds. Then, a multi-agent system composed of underwater acoustic sensors is considered, where the network is modeled by a random graph. Different notions for the connectivity assessment of the expected graph of a random network are introduced, and efficient algorithms are developed to evaluate them. Simulations are provided throughout the work to support the theoretical findings.


identifier: Serban, Ovidiu Mircea  (2015) Improving the Earthquake Resilience of Existing Multi-Storey Concentrically Braced Frames Office Buildings in Moderate to High Seismic Zones.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract:
In the past decades, concentrically braced frames (CBF) have been frequently employed as earthquake resistant systems for low- and middle-rise buildings. Their configuration and straightforward design made them appealing for engineers. It is noted that building structures designed and built in Canada prior to 1970 were not proportioned to carry seismic loads, while those constructed between 1970 and 1985 were designed to withstand lower seismic forces than those required by the current code. As a consequence, these buildings are characterized by lack of seismic resilience and therefore are vulnerable to earthquakes. Herein, the building’s resilience is defined as the capability of a system to maintain a level of functionality in the aftermath of an earthquake event and is characterized by the performance metrics such as fragility, loss, and recovery functions.

To quantify the seismic resilience of existing office buildings, a methodology was proposed and exemplified in a case study comprising of 3- and 6-storey fictitious CBF office buildings located in Quebec City and Vancouver. These buildings were designed in accordance with the requirements of the 1980 edition of the National Building Code and CSA/S16.1-M78 standard. It is noted that before 1985, Quebec City and Vancouver were located in the same seismic zone (the seismic demand was identical) and the Vancouver buildings were selected for comparison purpose.

The proposed seismic resilience methodology consists in selecting the Rehabilitation Objective Class and the associated performance levels corresponding to earthquake hazard levels (e.g. 2%/50 yrs., 10%/50 yrs. and 50%/50 yrs.). To achieve this step, nonlinear dynamic time-history analyses are required and fragility curves computed for different hazard levels for both existing and retrofitted 3- and 6-storey fictitious buildings were generated from the Incremental Dynamic Analysis curves (IDA). Both aleatoric and epistemic uncertainties were considered. The loss estimation model is a function of system’s components deficiency determined by the use of performance limit thresholds for different damage states. In addition, functionality curves computed for different hazard levels using an exponential recovery model are also shown.

The seismic assessment process was done according to performance based design principles and nonlinear time-history analysis by means of IDA using the OpenSees framework (Open System for Earthquake Engineering Simulation). Herein, all studied buildings were assessed against the current code demand. Based on the results, the buildings located in Quebec City and Vancouver show deficiencies at the level of structural members, especially the buildings located in Vancouver. Moreover, all brace-to-frame connections had insufficient strength and showed failure due to shearing of the welds. As reported from IDA curves, all existing buildings experienced collapse when subjected to ground motion intensities in agreement with the current code demand and a retrofit action was required.

To respond to the Rehabilitation Objective Class defined as Basic Safety by the ASCE/SEI 41-13 provisions, the selected rehabilitation strategy consisted in local strengthening of system’s components (e.g. cover plating steel columns or beams and gusset plate replacement). According to the results, when the 3- and 6-storey retrofitted buildings located in Quebec City were subjected to ground motions scaled to the current code demand, their functionality was higher than 86.67% and 75.7%, respectively. Conversely, for the Vancouver buildings, besides the retrofit action, it is suggested to double the number of CBFs in order to pass the current code requirements. In conclusion, the proposed retrofit scheme for Quebec City buildings was able to improve the building performance and implicitly its earthquake resilience.


identifier: ZAFAR ASOODEH, AMIR  (2015) FACE AND FRAME CLASSIFICATION USING GEOMETRIC FEATURES FOR A DATA-DRIVEN EYEGLASS RECOMMENDATION SYSTEM.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract: Recommending glasses based on face and frame features is the main issue of this thesis. In this work we present an automatic shape extraction and classification method for face and eyeglass frame shapes. Our novel frame shape extraction algorithm can extract the polygonal shape of the frame accurately and reliably even for reflective sunglasses and thin metal frames. Additionally, we identify the key geometric features that can di↵erentiate reliably the shape classes and we integrate them into a supervised learning technique for face and frame shape classification. Finally, we incorporate the shape extraction and classification algorithms into a practical data-driven frame recommendation system that we validate empirically with a user study. Using a supervised learning technique, we identified the geometric discriminatory features that can be used to classify both the face type and the eyeglass type form a single photograph. Our classification method reaches near 90% accuracy. We ran this classification on over 200 photographs and we surveyed 100 people on the compatibility between face and eyeglasses. Using this data we created an eyeglass recommendation system that we have validated experimentally.


identifier: Masisi, Lesedi M  (2015) Design and Development of Novel Electric Drives for Synchronous Reluctance and PM Synchronous Machines.  PhD thesis, Concordia University.

abstract:
Permanent magnet synchronous machines (PMSMs) with rare-earth magnets are widely used by the hybrid electric and electric vehicle industry due to their high torque density and efficiency. However the increasing fluctuating prices of the rare earth magnets have triggered the search for other alternative electrical machines such as the induction machine (IM), synchronous reluctance machine (SynRM) and a variable flux machine (VFM). The SynRM and the variable flux machine have been identified as potential PMSMs replacement. This is because the control strategy for the SynRM is closer to the PMSM and that the VFM is a PMSM. Therefore the same hardware used for the PMSM drive can be used for the SynRM and the VFM.

There has also been an increasing demand for higher dc bus voltage on the electric drive train for better performance. A three level inverter has been identified as the best candidate to meet this demand. Hence the thesis presents a three level inverter neutral point clamped SynRM drive for traction applications. A new space vector modulation scheme is also proposed for the three level inverter SynRM drive. A comparison between a three and two level inverter SynRM drives was also conducted.

Due to high cost associated with EV/HEVs, a low cost high resolution position sensor is proposed for the SynRM and the variable flux machine drives. The low cost position sensor is also compared to the position sensor used in electric power steering (EPS) machine. The EPS machines are predominantly used in vehicles and the low cost position sensor is proposed as a best alternative for the position sensor used in the EPS machine due to their simpler algorithm for position information, higher resolution and cost reduction benefits.

The effect of the three level inverter supply on the core losses of the SynRM was also conducted. The SynRM experienced lower core losses when supplied from a three level inverter. The reduction in the core losses is more significant in the stator tooth which is harder to cool as compared to the stator yoke. Hence the additional benefit of a three level inverter SynRM drive is that the burden of the cooling system will be reduced and hence a reduction in the cost associated with machine cooling.

The thesis also presents a novel control strategy for a variable flux machine (VFM) which uses low cost aluminum-nickel-cobalt (AlNiCo) permanent magnets (PMs). The strategy implements field weakening for speed extension and takes into account the demagnetization characteristics of the AlNiCo magnets. The magnet flux is reduced from the armature current pulses thus eliminating the additional copper losses associated with the flux weakening current in conventional rare earth PMSMs. The performance of the core losses on the VFM are also evaluated and quantified.


identifier: Mahvash-Mohammadi, Batoul  (2014) Three-Dimensional Capacitated Vehicle Routing Problems with Loading Constraints.  PhD thesis, Concordia University.

abstract:
City logistics planning involves organizing the movement of goods in urban areas carried out by logistics operators. The loading and routing of goods are critical components of these operations. Efficient utilization of vehicle space and limiting number of empty vehicle movements can strongly impact the nuisances created by goods delivery vehicles in urban areas. We consider an integrated problem of routing and loading known as the three-dimensional loading capacitated vehicle routing problem (3L-CVRP). 3L-CVRP consists of finding feasible routes with the minimum total travel cost while satisfying customers’ demands expressed in terms of cuboid and weighted items. Practical constraints related to connectivity, stability, fragility, and LIFO are considered as parts of the problem. We address the problem in two stages. Firstly, we address the three-dimensional (3D) loading problem followed by 3L-CVRP.
The main objective of a 3D loading problem without routing aspect is finding the best way of packing 3D items into vehicles or containers to increase the loading factor with the purpose of minimizing empty vehicle movements. We present the general linear programming model to the pure three-dimensional vehicle loading problem and solve it by CPLEX. To deal with large-sized instances, Column Generation (CG) technique is applied. The designed method in this work outperforms the best existing techniques in the literature.

The 3DVLP with allocation and capacity constraints, called 3DVLP-AC, is also considered. For the 3DVLP-AC, CPLEX could handle moderate-sized instances with up to 40 customers. To deal with large-sized instances, a Tabu Search (TS) heuristic algorithm is developed. There are no solution methods or lower bounds (LBs) for the 3DVLP-AC existent in the literature by which to evaluate the TS results. Therefore, we evaluate our TS with the CPLEX results for small instances.
3L-CVRP is addressed by using CG technique. To generate new columns, the pricing problem that is part of CG is solved by using two approaches: 1-by means of shortest path problem with resource constraints (ESPPRC) and loading problem, and 2-a heuristic pricing method (HP). CG using HP with a simple scheme can attain solutions competitive with the efficient TS algorithms described in the literature.


identifier: Ghassemi, Azadeh  (2015) Effects of moderate exercise and dissonant music on salivary cortisol fluctuations.  Masters thesis, Concordia University.

abstract:
Thesis Abstract

The influences of moderate exercise and dissonant music on Hypothalamus-Pituitary-Adrenal (HPA) axis activity was studied in 14 healthy individuals. Both moderate exercise and music are potent stimuli that influence HPA axis activity. Exercise and music have been used in clinical settings to help alleviate pain and improve quality of life among patients. The effects of music on hormonal release and cortisol levels depend on the type of music being used. The aim of this study was to better understand how cortisol levels were affected by dissonant music, which had not been studied as extensively as consonant music. To reduce the subjectivity aspect of music, a dissonant piece of music that was unfamiliar to participants was selected.
To gain a better understanding of the effects of moderate exercise and dissonant music on HPA axis activity, cortisol (an end product of the HPA axis) from the saliva samples of 14 participants was measured after random exposure to the following activities:
1.	Moderate exercise (stationary cycling at 60% of VO2 max)
2.	Listening to dissonant music
3.	Listening to dissonant music during moderate exercise (stationary cycling at 60% of VO2 max)
4.	Resting on stationary bike without pedaling and without listening to music
Saliva samples were collected prior to and at specific time intervals after the intervention. Salivary cortisol was measured using enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). A two-way repeated measures ANOVA was used to investigate the effects of the four variable activities and variable time. Both variables, activity and time, were within-subject factors. The potential significance of the interaction of the two variables, activity and time was also studied. The effect of variable activity was not statistically significant, as repeated F-tests uniformly displayed p-values well above the significance level of 0.05. However, a significant main effect of time was observed. Salivary cortisol levels changed across time points. Salivary cortisol levels decreased over time in each group. Time had a significant effect on the salivary cortisol level, with F (2, 26) = 9.216 and p-value=.001, according to the F-test assuming sphericity. Music was not statistically significant, with F (1,12) = 0.162 and p-value = 0.695.These findings suggest that moderate exercise and pre-selected musical stimuli had no effect on HPA axis activity as indicated by cortisol levels in young, healthy adults.

Keywords: music, dissonant, moderate exercise, HPA axis, salivary cortisol