title: Investigating the Role of BLADE-ON-PETIOLE Genes and Hydrophobic Cell-Wall Polymer Suberin in Arabidopsis thaliana Defense Against Bacterial and Fungal Pathogens

abstract: ABSTRACT In this thesis, I use the model plant species, Arabidopsis thaliana (Arabidopsis), to examine disease resistance associated with BLADE-ON-PETIOLE (BOP) 1 and 2 genes and suberin polymer. Plants are the target of a broad spectrum of pathogens, including fungi and bacteria. To detect and actively fight these pathogens, plants have innate and induced immune systems as well as pre-formed barriers. Firstly, I examined the role of the BOP1/2 genes of Arabidopsis in plant defense against bacterial and fungal pathogens. BOP1/2 genes are known to control plant development and belong to an evolutionarily conserved subclade of BTB-ankyrin transcription co-factors in plants. A paralog of BOP1/2, NPR1 is a positive regulator of the plant defense response known as systemic acquired resistance (SAR). Using a direct pathogen test approach to examine the resistance and susceptibility of BOP1/2 mutants to Pseudomonas syringae and Botrytis cinerea, I found that BOP1/2 have a role in defense against pathogens, and specifically in innate immunity. Secondly, I examined the role of the hydrophobic cell-wall polymer suberin in protecting Arabidopsis against pathogenic bacteria and fungi. Suberin forms a complex extracellular hydrophobic lipid-based barrier that is deposited in various tissues in terrestrial plants. Suberin serves as a protective barrier against abiotic and biotic environmental stresses and plays important roles in controlling water and ion movement. Mutants of Arabidopsis defective in root suberin, as well as mutants ectopically overexpressing suberin were tested in relation to resistance or susceptibility to both fungal and bacterial pathogens. Root suberin mutants differed from wild type control plants in susceptibility to the fungal pathogen Fusarium avenaceum. Strikingly, I also found that the presence of suberin in the leaves of Arabidopsis promotes Botrytis cinerea infection spread as well as water loss in the leaves of the plants.


title: A Parallel Processing Technique for Filtering and Storing User Specified Data

abstract: Users are often interested in a specific type of data (user-preferred data) from a large-volume dataset. An efficient system that only stores user-preferred data from the large dataset can reduce the search latency, which allows the users to search for relevant information in a timely manner. The motivation behind this thesis is to devise a technique that filters a large dataset and stores only the filtered data, thereby saving storage space for the user. Running the filtering operation can be CPU-intensive, which can lead to high latency in extracting preferred data from the dataset. To solve this problem, the technique employs parallel processing and machine learning. A proof-of-concept prototype for this technique has been built on Apache Spark. The performance of the prototype subjected to synthetic datasets is analyzed. The analysis of experimental results shows the viability of this technique and provides insights into the system behavior and performance.


title: Vibrant Senior Living: Rehabilitating Existing Office Towers into High-Density Senior Care Homes

abstract: This thesis investigates ways to create a more humane, safe architecture to care for seniors. Of course, higher care already exists for those who can afford it, but can such high-quality environments be brought within reach of every citizen through smarter and more efficient architecture? With increasing remote-work options for white-collar workers as well as increased availability of shared working spaces, the increase of office tower vacancy provides an opportunity to rehabilitate and to repurpose. These towers immediately provide opportunities for much higher density senior care homes than currently exist, can they achieve the same or better level of medical care and quality of life with reduced costs due to an economy of scale? A greater number of seniors obtain respectable living standards, and thus can our seniors also be brought to our society's urban centers rather than be relegated to its edges as they are routinely?


title: Singing for Our Supper: Performative Advocacy in Canadian Art Worlds

abstract: This dissertation examines aspects of artistic production and its relation to cultural policy by focusing on the dynamic performances and dispositions of artists and cultural bureaucrats as they communicate and demonstrate legitimacy through the process of advocacy. I argue for a concept of performative advocacy, a means to consider how, where, and when artists are displaying that legitimacy in relation to governmental agencies, professional and educational organizations, and the larger institution of arts funding and production in some parts of Canada. Using an institutional ethnographic approach, this study embraces the actions of individual artists and small collectives, particularly those considered in the "emerging" stage of their career, to consider how their actions are coordinated by these institutions and the texts they produce. From students in a suburban theatre training program, to a gathering of artists in Ottawa for Arts Day on the Hill, to program officers at the Canada Council itself, this research reflects on how these artists and arts bureaucrats negotiate their performances as advocates. Performative advocacy helps us to build a better art world through a more grounded understanding of what it is these individuals do as they relate to one another and the larger institution of arts funding supported by the government. By studying the presence of these actors, we can put cultural policy studies into conversation with our understanding of the work of arts practitioners while avoiding the problematic construction of the artistic identity. In this way, I offer a language of theatricality that aids in the understanding of what artists do, on a day-to-day basis, to advocate for their work, allowing policymakers, artists themselves, and the public to better listen and act in the interests of a robust art world.


title: Tales of a Coronavirus Pandemic: Topic Modelling with Short-Text Data

abstract: With more than 13 million tweets collected spanning between March 2020 to November 2020 relating to the COVID-19 global pandemic, the topics of discussion are investigated using topic models - statistical models that learn latent topics present in a collection of documents. Topic modelling is first conducted using Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA), a method that has seen great success when applied to formal texts. As LDA attempts to learn latent topics by analysing term co-occurrences within documents, it can encounter difficulties in the learning process when presented with shorter documents such as tweets. To address the inadequacies of LDA applied to short-text, a second topic modelling technique is considered, known as the Biterm Topic Model (BTM), which instead analyses term co-occurrences over the entire collection of documents. Comparing the performances of LDA and BTM, it was found that the topic quality of BTM was superior to that of LDA.


title: "It's for sure conscious that we stay central":  Barriers in Accessing Preventive Resources for Chlamydia among Youth in Southwest Calgary

abstract: Chlamydia is the most commonly reported notifiable infection among youth (15-24 years) in Alberta. However, controlling infections has been challenging for Calgary, which has the youngest population of major cities in Canada. Health reports indicate that despite the high chlamydia incidence among youth, they are not using preventive resources as expected, thus the need to examine the barriers in accessing such resources among youth in Southwest Calgary. The researcher postulated that there are spatial dimensions to the social barriers to accessing preventive resources, and that social and spatial factors work synchronously to hinder access. Opinions about the potential impact of social media dating applications on sexual activities are also examined. Data collection, which was guided by a Social Ecological Model, followed an exploratory sequential mixed-methods design. In-depth interviews were conducted with 23 youth and 4 service providers. Thereafter, a survey of the barriers was conducted with a sample of 382 youth. Thematic and descriptive statistical analytical methods were used to examine qualitative and quantitative data respectively. Geospatial analyses of the patterns of facility non-use and the spatial distribution of barriers were also conducted. Although 79.8% of youth had heard about a preventive resource, only 41.4% had used any resource before. The principal barriers reported were stigma, intimidating healthcare spaces, and uneasiness accessing resources. There was an inverse relationship between geographic distance and access for the communities on the extreme western segment of the study site. The efficacious combination of qualitative, quantitative, and geospatial analytical methods to examine the barriers to sexual health resources among youth is an indication of the practicality of merging traditional qualitative and quantitative methods with geospatial methods to community health inquiries. Lastly, most (n=170, 44.5%) survey participants agreed that social media dating applications influenced sexual activities to a very great extent, thereby providing additional evidence to inform the ongoing social media-sexual health discourse in the health geography and public health arena. Keywords: Youth, Chlamydia, Sexually Transmitted Infections, Social Media, Spatio-Social, Determinants of Health, Access, Preventive Resources, Geospatial, Social Ecological Model, Calgary, Canada


title: Paleolimnological characterization of metal(loid) sources and transport processes in Canadian subarctic lakes

abstract: Human-released metals are present to some extent in soil and sediment from even the remotest areas, including the Canadian Arctic. The cumulative impact of legacy pollution, ongoing release of contaminants and climate change could lead to important modifications to metal transport and transformation processes in the environment that can affect the exposure of biota and humans to metals. Large uncertainties remain regarding the future transport of metals on the subarctic landscape, including those that can be toxic in low dose like lead and mercury. Paleoecology is a powerful tool to evaluate changes in metal pollution and recovery in lakes by providing long-term records of environmental conditions at a relatively low cost and with rapid analysis. Paleoecological records can help fill important research gaps that current monitoring approaches can't address because of the lack of temporal perspective. In this thesis, the records of multiple environmental archives were analysed and compared to understand the changes in metal accumulation and transport that occurred over the last centuries to millennia in subarctic Canada, from the Yellowknife (Northwest Territories) and the Whitehorse Regions (Yukon). Multiple approaches to times series analysis were developed to evaluate the individual and cumulative impacts of specific sources and processes commonly affecting subarctic boreal lakes. These processes include local point-source emissions, catchment retention and transport of contaminants, and contaminants released by wildfires. This thesis provides quantification for processes that are seldom addressed in the literature so far, especially for subarctic environments. Subarctic lakes will continue receiving anthropogenic metal for years regardless of future emissions because of the impact of catchment retention. Terrestrial heavy metals retained in catchments are susceptible to remobilisation toward aquatic environments by natural processes such as land erosion permafrost thaw and wildfires; and these processes may be enhanced by climate change. Recovery of any specific site from heavy metal pollution is also dependent on local parameters, explaining the necessity to characterise ecosystem recovery from heavy metal pollution in different types of ecosystems, including subarctic environments.


title: A Target Signature Synthesis Program

abstract: This thesis presents the design of a software program and digital system to synthesize target return signals for Electronic Warfare (EW) applications. The synthesized target echo returns are used to counter high resolution radar systems. Synthesizing a realistic target echo return requires knowledge of the motion and electromagnetic properties of the simulated target. The software program implements a realistic motion algorithm for Naval targets in a variety of sea conditions. Another algorithm is designed to create the target model used in the software. Within the software application a user interface is used to define simulation scenarios for producing synthesized target return signals. The digital system design utilizes parameters from the software to synthesize the false target echo signal. Simulations performed in MATLAB verify the viability of the motion algorithm, software program and digital system design.


title: New Game +

abstract: This thesis connects architectural theories of virtual realities with the representation and experience of game space. It asks how architectural theory of the virtual can be better perceived and felt using the medium of video games, specifically representations of game space and the experience of playing within them. Game mechanics were understood along with a study of video game precedent to facilitate the creation of three game levels. During each level, and as part of the progress from one to another, the player can learn the mechanics of the game levels. Initial concepts of the levels experience are designed to change in the final level, challenging and illustrating how representation in the virtual context along with experience need not conform to notions of actual space. Even though the space is not actual, nor follows actual logic, it is still able to be perceived by the player as a reality.


title: (Re)Growing the Coast: Rehabilitation of the Land & Mind

abstract: Designing for a time beyond our own, this thesis explores a narrative-based approach in response to today's climatic issues, drawing from speculative visions and constructing fictions with surrealist sensibilities. Humanity is currently faced with a crisis of climate while relationally confronted with a crisis of the imagination. The current ontological and epistemological frameworks, along with the general priorities of today's culture, have limited the human imagination in grasping and responding to such issues. Offering alternative lifestyles through designs integrated in the world of the future and its natural elements can reveal so much more of our earth than the myopic position our current society does not provide. Positioned in Central Thailand the work of this thesis explores how architectural thinking and working can contribute to providing sustainable alternatives to the foreseeable future positioning its viewer into a productive future.


title: Theoretical Analysis of the Micro-optic Bottle Resonator and its Applications

abstract: The micro-optic resonators confines light in a small volume resonating cavity and sustains a high-quality factor. Among all micro resonator morphologies, the micro-optic bottle resonator has a 3-D mode confinement geometry. In this thesis, MBR is profiled by azimuthal sculpting of a pair of rings along the glass whisker's perimeter. The structure is examined using a numerical solver optimized for the cylindrical symmetry of such resonators. The modal space and field profiles are computed as a function of ring spacing and demonstrate that multiple glass region confined states are available and can generally be thought of as Whispering Gallery Modes. Additional computational results are presented when the structure is configured as a sensor, suitable for measuring a specific constituent such as index of refraction, temperatures, gases, and chemicals. Attempts were underway to fabricate the MBR's geometry, but the work has remained incomplete due to COVID-19.


title: The Politics of Arab Pop: Arab Pop Music, Popular Culture, and Gender Norms in Lebanon

abstract: On October 17, 2019, thousands of Lebanese flooded the streets to protest governmental corruption. Soon after, issues of gender inequality were added to the list of grievances and women began leading marches to oppose the socio-political and economic burdens faced by women. Rage quickly consumed the whole of Lebanon, including - perhaps surprisingly - many of the country's biggest pop music stars. They marched in the streets, sung nationalistic songs, and participated in the feminized re-writing of the national anthem. Using the case of pop music in Lebanon, this dissertation examines how forms of popular culture intersect with gender politics. More specifically, I argue that pop music is deeply connected to politics and that many pop music celebrities actively work to promote changes in (and awareness of) gender and sexuality norms in Lebanon. I also problematize cases where artists' actions actually reinforce and reproduce restrictive gender norms. In making these claims, however, I endeavour to remain mindful of the socio-political realities of the Lebanese context that work to impede efforts to promote and secure gender-based reforms. I am also attentive to my own heritage as a student researcher of Lebanese descent and reflect on how this 'insider' identity has come to shape my work. To guide my analysis, I rely on the insights of (feminist) intersectionality and highlight the need for nuanced understandings of power and agency. Given the seriousness of Lebanon's current political and economic crisis, I also discuss how popular music celebrities have been eager participants in the 'Lebanese Revolution' since its outset. Finally, I discuss the COVID-19 pandemic and the Beirut Port explosion, arguing that some pop stars' social media posts work to reproduce harmful gendered discourses, while others worked to give voice to the feelings of frustrated Lebanese desperately seeking accountability from their government.


title: Autonomic Performance Optimization of Big Data Workloads

abstract: The big data software stack based on Apache Spark and Hadoop has become mission critical in many enterprises. Performance of Spark and Hadoop jobs depends on a large number of configuration settings. Manual tuning is expensive and brittle. There have been prior efforts to develop on-line and off-line automatic tuning approaches to make the big data stack less dependent on manual tuning. These, however, demonstrated only modest performance improvements with very simple, single-user workloads on small data sets. In the more traditional "small data" space, research into autonomic systems development produced workload prediction and re-configuration techniques based on past workload history analysis. These have only limited applicability in the big data space, where workloads tend to be less repetitive. This thesis presents KERMIT - the autonomic architecture for big data capable of automatically tuning Apache Spark and Hadoop on-line, and achieving performance results 30% faster than rule-of-thumb tuning by a human administrator and 92% as fast as the fastest possible tuning established by performing an exhaustive search of the tuning parameter space. KERMIT can detect important workload changes with 99% accuracy, and predict future workload types with 96% accuracy. It is capable of identifying and classifying complex multi-user workloads without being explicitly trained on examples of these workloads. It does not rely on the past workload history to predict the future workload classes and their associated performance. KERMIT can identify and learn new workload classes, and adapt to workload drift, without human intervention. This thesis presents thee new machine learning algorithms - a low-overhead on-line search algorithm, a statistical ensemble algorithm for real-time change detection, and a new, advanced, zero-shot machine learning algorithm for identification of unseen hybrid classes.


title: Simple Linear Time Algorithms For Piercing Pairwise Intersecting Disks

abstract: In this thesis, we study the problem of piercing pairwise intersecting disks in the plane. A set D of disks is said to be pierced by a point set P if each disk in D contains a point of P. Any set of pairwise intersecting unit disks can be pierced by 3 points, and any set of pairwise intersecting disks of arbitrary radius can be pierced by 4 points. However, existing algorithms for computing the piercing points all use the LP-type problem as a subroutine. We present a simple linear-time algorithm for finding 3 piercing points for pairwise intersecting unit disks and a simple linear-time algorithm for finding 5 piercing points for pairwise intersecting disks of arbitrary radius. Our algorithms use simple geometric transformation and avoid LP-type machinery. In this thesis, we also present a set of 9 pairwise intersecting unit disks that cannot be pierced by 2 points.


title: Metabolism of 6:2 Fluorotelomer Alcohol by CYP 2A6

abstract: Oxidation is one of the major mechanisms leading to the bioactivation of toxicants [1]. Identification of the CYPs driving the oxidation could be used to identify the possibility of localized toxicity. This project identifies CYP 2A6 as a possible enzyme for the oxidation of 6:2 FTOH. The Michaelis Menten curve generated a KM and VMax of 4076.4 ± 581.9 ng/mL and 68.8 ± 2.8 ng/mL/min respectively. Once inhibited with tranylcypromine, HCl, the KM and VMax were determined to be 8796.2 ± 1366.1 ng/mL and 69.5 ± 4.1 ng/mL/min, representing competitive inhibition. We demonstrated that CYP 2A6 was responsible for 6:2 FTOH metabolism using human recombinant assays with purified CYP 2A6. These assays yielded a 6:2 FTOH metabolic conversion rate of 0.42 ng/mL/min. This rate significantly decreased with the addition of Tranylcypromine HCl. This confirms CYP 2A6 as an active enzyme for the metabolism of 6:2 FTOH in the human liver.


title: The Earth and Her Roots: Above + Below Place-Thought

abstract: Earth as a paradigm for architecture questions languages of design drawing/thinking. Studying Odawa pastures' potential to challenge national building codes and worldviews revealed the return of repressed design processes made of metaphysical, cosmological, and socio-political strings woven from rhythm and flows in hybrid realities. A proposal to unify agriculture/architecture policy, pedagogy, and practice through product/labour creation manifests in liminal negotiations within residential building envelopes surrounding the Tunney's Pasture post-war government campus. Speculative fabulation/feminism and radical Indigenism support intersectional justice by working with architectural methodologies founded on nondualism. Advocacy for ancestral practices, neo-materialism, Place-Thought, and care-work expands ontologies centered on unity to unsettle Archi-tecture's dualisms. Adopting a transcendent viewpoint towards polarities dissolves the boundaries of Earth/Architecture across time, scale, space, and the pluriverse. Flowing between ways of knowing/being presents growing(++), harvesting(-+), living(--), and rooting(+-) into geo-cycles through archetypal mythologies of place, culture, bodies, and folds.


title: Extrinsic Learning, Corporate Streaming, and Ungrounded Voting: The Role of STEM Schooling in the Political Socialization of Asian Canadian Youths

abstract: This ethnographic study analyzes a collection of schooling, childhood, and migration narratives from Asian Canadian youths who have entered careers related to Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM). The study centres on a group of Asian migrant engineering alumni from a major Canadian university, and unpacks the relationship between their STEM-based scholastic socialization and their political consciousness in civic life. Through the use of qualitative methods involving semi-structured interviews supplemented by neighbourhood walking tours, the data provides a humanizing portrayal of the classed and gendered dimensions of petty bourgeois migrant life. Employing a Bourdieusian framework, analysis of the data reveals that symbolic homologies related to the fundamental tension between economic and cultural capital underpin many of the mundane tensions found in the participants' life narratives. This tension between economic and cultural capital exerts effects across multiple phases of the participants' formative years, including high school as well as university and beyond. The side that one takes in this clash of capitals is homologous with their decision to enter STEM, the subjective meaning of their discipline, the learning styles they adopt within the discipline, and the political tendencies they develop upon entering the workforce. Psychosocial analysis of their homological schema suggests that conservative political tendencies amongst the voters in this demographic stem from the inaccessibility of civic engagement, especially the inaccessibility of grounded politics in which one can see oneself represented in one's cause.


title: Defining Wilderness: The Landscapes & Boundaries of Banff National Park

abstract: Wilderness is a term that holds undeniable significance within Canadian culture and has become a celebrated aspect of its' national identity. This thesis is an examination of wilderness, utilizing Banff National Park as a case study in examining how federal park boundaries act as legal and spatial tools to regulate and control territory, rather than solely preserve landscapes or ecologies. Park boundaries are investigated through their interactions with industrial interests, cultural landmarks, and historical narratives, dissecting their capacities to control intensely layered and contested areas. The thesis argues that this complex layering of histories and interests can be understood through a singular—though perhaps ambiguous—prevailing pursuit; to create, control and commercialize a spatial experience of Wilderness. Through cartography, analytical mapping and a proposed series of new design interventions for the site, the dynamics of power, exclusion, exploitation, and commercialization inherent to the defining of landscapes and boundaries are investigated.


title: Cross Case Analysis in Shipping and Logistic Industry Supply Chains: Blockchain Qualities in Stakeholder Value Proposition

abstract: Supply chain management is facing problems such as rising costs and a lack of transparency. In the recent years, firms have started adopting blockchain to help resolve these problems. However, there is a gap in the literature regarding how organizations incentivize their stakeholders to join their platforms. Hence, this study uses the stakeholder perspective to examine what blockchain qualities are used by firms in the shipping and logistic industry to create value propositions that incentivize their stakeholders to join the platform. Analyzing five companies in the industry, the study identifies various blockchain qualities and how those qualities are reflected in the companies' stakeholder value propositions. The findings reveal that firms use a variety of enabling qualities, including contract management and tokenization, enhanced data storage and movement, and enhanced tracking and tracing to create stakeholder value proposition. Further, some firms provide innovative solutions for restraining qualities such as high set-up costs.


title: ĀYAT AL-QĀHIRAH: Cairo's Cosmic Realms and Earthly Realities

abstract: Āyat al-Qāhirah is an exploration of Cairo's sacred architecture as a mediator where the human, the landscape, and the cosmos collide and coalesce. The project analyzes, interprets, and speculates how architecture and architectural representation becomes a spatio-urban bridge between the earthly and the cosmic. Framed as a travelogue that links matter and spirit, the thesis uses drawing as a catalyst to propose a series of conceptual architectural experiences that negotiate a network of thresholds between the sacred and the everyday as registers of the visible and the invisible.  The  project proposes a network of architectural tethers, that link this world and imagined corollaries. Connecting the seen and the unseen, the sensible and the unintelligible, the physical and the metaphysical, the quotidian and the divine, serving as a timeless manifestation of hidden orders imposed on the material world through the constant motions - or harakat - of the cosmos and earth.


title: Lest We Commemorate:  Assembling Canada's Great War Centenary, 2014-2018

abstract: This dissertation studies the commemorative practices of the centenary of the First World War (2014-2018). The centenary occurred within a decade-long commemorative period known as the "Road to 2017" (2010-2017) that was itself dedicated to marking the 150th anniversary of Confederation. While participating in commemorations, particularly federally sanctioned ones, is socially and culturally constructed an act of good citizenship, these elements have resulted in scholarship that focusses on nation, nationalism, and collective memory. In contrast, with its focus on practices this dissertation approaches commemoration as labour and its practitioners as history workers. To do so, the dissertation applies assemblage theory and a wide range of methodologies to an archive of Access to Information and Privacy (ATIP) records, interviews with commemoration professionals inside and outside of government, media, and autoethnographic observations. It explores how battlefields were assembled into commemorative landscapes and recognizes both the human and non-human agency involved in those processes. The dissertation then focusses acutely on the day-to-day bureaucratic work involved with designing, enacting, and managing centenary events and practices, and considers the affective nature of that labour on the people who did it. Throughout the chapters, interviews and ATIP records provide unique perspective from inside the various bureaucratic and commemorative assemblages that intersected during the First World War centenary, while autoethnographic fieldwork reveals some of the hidden and unexpected elements of commemorative experiences. This dissertation argues that more scholarly attention should be paid to the practical and logistical components of commemoration. To do so means to better understand what makes commemorations affective, including why accessible and operating toilets can be as important as navigating the political nuances of which flags to display in what order at a centenary ceremony. An attention to practice, furthermore, also makes possible a more generous, empathetic appreciation of a group of often-invisible history workers who, despite often stressful working conditions, sacrificed aspects of their personal lives and wellbeing to execute the important large-scale events that comprised the Canadian centenary experience.


title: Performing Anorexia on YouTube: The Aesthetics, Narratives, and Functions of Video Testimonials

abstract: This thesis examines anorexia video testimonials uploaded to YouTube by women. By focusing on three major sub-genres - confessionals, food videos, and life stories - this research brings new awareness to the ways women can use the platform to make themselves, and thus their anorexia, visible. The aesthetic and narrative parameters of each sub-genre create various types and levels of functionality. Confessional videos may enable YouTubers to repair their self-narratives, become active witnesses, and use their bodies to communicate their stories. Food videos, on the other hand, are uniquely suited to help those with anorexia work through the paradoxical emotions of fascination and fear around food. Finally, life story videos may increase feelings of empowerment, embodiment, and selfhood. Moreover, the comment cultures that surround these videos can generate strong affective ties and help affirm these YouTubers' decisions to share their anorexia stories and increase the visibility of the illness.


title: Barriers to Accessibility for Skiing

abstract: Across Canada, ski areas do not consistently or thoroughly recognize the experiences of persons with disabilities. Consequently, barriers to accessibility occur and impede inclusion for skiing. Five types of barriers to accessibility are experienced for skiing: architectural and physical, attitudinal, organizational and systemic, informational and communicational, and technological barriers. This thesis explores how design research can be used to identify and address barriers to accessibility for skiing. Three research phases are conducted: a preliminary field study, a questionnaire, and directed storytelling. A participatory design approach facilitates the researcher, subject matter experts, and target users of adaptive skiing to contribute to design recommendations and practical approaches that may improve the experience of skiing. Lastly, the thesis proposes further research and design of an interactive accessibility map as a novel method for information provision to reduce the impact of barriers to accessibility for skiing.


title: Investigation of Few-Shot Learning for Fall Detection

abstract: Falls affect seniors' quality of life, and therefore fall detection and prevention are paramount for the health and safety of aging seniors. Current deep learning-based fall detection methods perform well when a large amount of training data is available. As obtaining fall data from seniors is extremely difficult, training deep learning models is a challenge, and therefore, a few-shot Siamese network is considered in this thesis. A shallow 1 x 1 convolutional neural network for Siamese and Triplet networks is proposed in this work. A deeper architecture-based on the Inception and Densenet networks is also considered to improve the fall detection performance. The performances of the proposed few-shot Siamese architectures and Triplet networks are investigated using signals obtained from a wearable sensor. The proposed learning models outperform the traditional deep learning networks, while Siamese architectures also demonstrate generalizability by classifying unseen classes of falls and falls from different sensing modalities.


title: Tapping into Community: Localism, Place-Making, and Diverse Economies in Craft Brewing

abstract: This thesis examines the ways in which craft breweries in the Ottawa-Gatineau region create opportunities for community economies. Grounded in feminist economic geography and the diverse economies research paradigm, this research explores the ways in which craft brewing practices are embedded in particular understandings of place, identity and economy. By examining alternative economic practices in the context of craft beer, this research provides insights into the impacts of the concentration of power in the beer industry by large industrial brewing conglomerates on independently owned craft breweries. This concentration of power is challenged by craft breweries that generate more-than-capitalist economic possibilities, which help build towards community economies. Craft breweries model community economic practices by engaging in collaborative and non-competitive economic relationships, enhancing local economic development, and by carving out meaningful relationships with community actors with the intent of creating social good. This work contributes to a growing body of work on the geography of craft beer, and critical food studies literature on power relations in the food system. Keywords: craft brewing; diverse economies; feminist economic geography, place-making; identity; concentration of power.


title: Digitally Witnessing Police Brutality: Examining the Relationship Between Police Violence, Race, and Affect in the Age of Social Media

abstract: Police brutality has recently become a popular topic following the summer of 2020. However, long before this time, police brutality and black trauma specifically had been explored by many others. With the emergence of social media, the exhibition of black bodies in trauma has been a sight for public gathering and debates. Previous research has shown us the inconsistencies that exist between the treatment of black and white bodies who experience violence in general. With that being said, this study aims to explore the intersections of race, police violence, and affect in the digital space. By comparatively analyzing online commentary left under two racially different cases (Philando Castile and Daniel Shaver), one will begin to understand how a victim's race influences how others affectively respond to them and their deaths. In doing this, discussions around narrative reconstruction, racial stereotypes, and the power of sound and imagery will all become relevant.


title: Understanding and Predicting Software Developer Expertise in Stack Overflow and GitHub

abstract: This thesis attempts to understand and predict software developer expertise based on their activity and experience on GitHub and Stack Overflow platforms. An exploratory survey was conducted with 73 software developers and a mixed methods approach was applied to analyze the survey results. Further, using Machine Learning techniques the thesis attempts to predict software developer expertise based on their participation on social coding platforms. The thesis found that both knowledge and experience are only necessary but not sufficient conditions for a developer to become an expert, and an expert would necessarily have to possess adequate soft skills. Lastly, an expert's contribution to GitHub seems to be driven by personal factors, while contribution to Stack Overflow is motivated more by professional drivers (i.e., skills and expertise). The last section determined the best predicting classifier-algorithm for contributors, understood the distribution of expertise and their characteristics and compared prediction capability of the model.


title: Conservation behaviour in action: using fish behaviour to understand and mitigate the impacts of hydropower development

abstract: The impacts that hydropower facilities have on non-anadromous downstream migrants and other resident freshwater fish are increasingly being recognized by environmental managers. The overall goal for my thesis was to apply conservation behaviour and risk analysis approaches to inform decision making for avoiding/mitigating common hydropower-related hazards faced by freshwater fish. Specifically, the thesis considers the risks of injury and mortality from entrainment and exposure to supersaturated total dissolved gasses (TDG). Many studies have quantified entrainment-related mortality and injury, but these studies generated site-specific data. To address this knowledge gap, I conducted a systematic review to quantify the risk associated with common hydropower infrastructure. My results revealed an increased overall injury and mortality risk resulting from entrainment relative to control fish. An increased risk was also revealed for several infrastructure types and fish taxa. To examine the re-entrainment risk of a freshwater resident fish, I tracked the movements of salvaged Kokanee salmon in the forebay area of a large hydropower facility. Telemetry data revealed minimal re-entrainment risk for salvaged Kokanee at the facility. Several studies have examined spatial-temporal movements of diadromous fish relative to TDG levels, but few have examined resident fish species. To examine the TDG exposure risk of resident fish, TDG was modeled in an impounded hydro-affected river system, and I tracked Rainbow Trout and Mountain Whitefish movement and depth use. Telemetry data revealed patterns in MW reach and depth residency that corresponded to spawning, foraging, and refuge behaviour whereas RT exhibited high site fidelity in one area of the system. The risk assessment revealed that Rainbow Trout had a higher TDG risk exposure relative to Mountain Whitefish, and that risk was highest in both species at locations near one of the hydropower facilities. The results presented in this thesis are novel in that they provide some of the first empirical data to quantify the risk of common hazards associated with hydropower facilities and will, therefore, be useful from a hydropower management perspective. Moreover, this thesis provides an example of how to incorporate fundamental behavioural research into hydropower management regimes and frameworks through the use of risk analysis.


title: Ballet Pointe Shoe Discomfort: An Exploration Through the use of Real-Time Assessments while Performing en Pointe Movements

abstract: Despite the advancement in technology, the ballet pointe shoe remains unchanged and very few research and studies have investigated it. The pointe shoe is still in use today and poses many disadvantages to the ballet dancer's foot health. This research aims to uncover ballet dancers' feet discomfort while dancing en pointe, in the hopes of contributing to the improvement of the future design of pointe shoes. This research brought together a human-centred approach in order to comprehend and gain different perspectives on the topic in a real-time setting. Real-time assessments were obtained using questionnaires, a 3-D feet model apparatus and thermographic imaging in a simulated ballet laboratory. Results demonstrated the relationship of the various methods used and their contribution on examining real-time pointe shoe discomfort and pointe shoe design recommendations.


title: A Systemic Functional Linguistic Analysis of Teen Dialogue in Teen Films of Different Ratings

abstract: Language is one factor which may contribute to film rating assignments in the United States. However, linguistic concerns have been largely reduced to isolated instances of profanity. Furthermore, many US films feature characters under age 18, mirroring the audience demographic most restricted by ratings. This thesis examines peer language of teenage characters in two films, exploring the extent to which non-explicit dialogue may also contribute to a film's rating. To this end, Systemic Functional Linguistics is employed to analyse textual and interpersonal features of dialogue in How to Train Your Dragon (PG) and The Hunger Games (PG-13). Results show that Dragon illustrates a protagonist's linguistic shift in gaining acceptance among a pre-established peer group. Meanwhile, Games emphasizes its protagonist's linguistic adaptation through several idiosyncratic relationships. Findings suggest that a stronger grasp of language might be needed to follow the underlying tones in the PG-13 film.


title: Developing Indigenous Language Materials for Schools and Land-Based Documentation: Gwa'sala-'Nak'waxda'xw Nation and Kwakwala (ISO: kwk)

abstract: This study examines school-based and land-based language materials for Kwakwala (ISO, kwk) developed during a three-year investigation (2016-2019). The materials focussed on three requirements: first, supporting teachers and researchers who are learning the language, second, ensuring that documentation is accurate and conforms to curriculum and guidelines from Elders, and third, integrating Indigenous language and knowledge throughout school activities and revitalization of traditional homelands. I address the above requirements using a Transdisciplinary model to approach the complex multi-disciplinary needs of the school and land-based activities. These require Indigenous knowledge and expertise from numerous disciplines. In this study, similar to Mark and Turk (2021), various disciplines (Indigenous and Western-based) are unified through an overarching theory. Situated Learning is the unifying theory to ensure language, social, cultural, and locational contexts are authentic and situated in Indigenous settings. Evidence-based analysis is the over-arching method used to examine the materials. Together, these frame Situated Documentation, a method used in this study to situate community-based documentation in authentic locations. Participatory Action Research integrates the expertise of school staff, researchers, experts, Chiefs and Elders with the researcher. Transdisciplinary highlights include Word Paradigm corpus-based concordance analysis to compare Kwakwala inflections in materials with curriculum expectations, multimodal ethnographic coding of print and multimedia materials to examine the situational accuracy and consistency of language and social conventions, and comparative analysis to determine the communicative competence in narratives. In addition, analyses include comparison with earlier materials, attention to ethnophysiography, and examination of the study developed computer based parser to correct difficulties with written documentation. In conclusion, the materials developed during the study assist the community and the school to achieve their goals to revitalize their homelands and language. The materials meet curriculum expectations, represent language and Indigenous themes, conform to Indigenous social values and dialect variation, and demonstrate authentic and accurate land-based documentation. Results from computer-based parsing demonstrate improved documentation of written language. Recommendations indicate that non fluent teachers benefit from grammatical-functional materials and links between curriculum expectations and language structures, while both teachers and land-based researchers benefit from situating documentation activities in authentic locations.


title: A Secure and Privacy Preserving COVID-19 Notification System

abstract: The worldwide health crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic has been impacting people's life for over one year now. While waiting for an effective treatment, there have been various Contact Tracing Systems (CTS) developed and adopted across the globe to help stop the spread of the virus. While people are concerned about their exposure to the virus, they also worry about the breach of privacy inherent to using CTSs due to their collection of private information. AS of June 2020, we have designed and implemented a fully automated, secure, efficient and privacy-preserving Bluetooth-based COVID-19 Notification System (CNS) following the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada (OPC) contact tracing system development guidelines. The design addresses both security and privacy threats during the virus exposure detection and notification processes.


title: Recidivism among justice-involved women: A combined variable- and person-centered analytic approach to understanding the role of mental health

abstract: The current two-study program of research had two major aims. Study 1 – a comprehensive meta-analysis – was conduted to quantitatively summarize existing empirical knowledge of the relationships between mental health factors and recidivism among justice-involved adult women. Study 2 - a latent class analysis (LCA) – aimed to contribute to the development of mental health-focused correctional profiles that could advance our understanding of justice-involved women and support progress in correctional policy and practice. The meta-analysis included any studies of adult women that examined the association between any mental health factor and recidivism. A comprehensive literature search revealed very sparse empirical data (k = 18). The resulting significant albeit modest aggregate effect sizes revealed elevated recidivism rates among women who suffer depression and PTSD, as well as women with any psychiatric diagnosis and more extensive psychiatric histories. Conversely, anxiety, psychoses, and (unspecified) personality disorders were not significantly related to recidivism. A history of externalizing behaviours such as self-harming and suicide attemps did not predict recidivism. Study 2 - the mental health-focused LCA - involved a sample of 920 women incarcerated in Maine state prisons with complete risk/need assessments including mental health data on the SPIn-W (Orbis Partners, 2006). Three latent classes best decribed the sample in terms of nature, severity, and complexity of mental health needs; Class 1 “severe needs” (30%), Class 2 “moderate needs with severe externalizing behaviours” (20%), and Class 3 “low needs” (50%). Women in the severe and moderate needs classes had higher recidivism rates than women in the low needs class. The findings support the recommendations of contemporary women-centered correctional scholars; holistic, trauma- and mental health-informed assessment, management, and treatment approaches are required to meet the needs of justice-involved adult women.


title: Analysis of the World Design Organization 'Design Challenge' Program: Participant Insights for an Improved Process

abstract: This thesis analyses the World Design Organization (WDO) World Design Challenge program through participant insights to improve the process. The demand for well-thought-out design solutions for complex problems drives industry, governments and educational institutions to seek more efficient and effective ways to generate creative out-of-the-box results. To meet the request for unique, positive user-based approaches, the WDO expands on traditional methods and leans on online practices that produce robust options to enhance sustainability. The research analyses a series of World Design Challenge programs through observation, participation and research participant feedback. The research explored team dynamics, online obstacles, content, plus process structure and procedures. The research discovered how the WDO World Design Challenge program can be improved to increase user experience and maintain participant retention.


title: Age-Inclusive City: Reconsidering Toronto's Neighbourhoods for an Aging Population

abstract: Sites of eldercare and seniors housing can often be identified as places of age segregation and isolation for their lack of integration with their surrounding context and society. These sites take two primary forms on opposing ends of the spectrum: institutional settings and 'aging in place,' neither of which are adequate solutions for an aging population. Today, the increasingly imbalanced population of seniors to youth is making alternative living arrangements increasingly important. Seniors are valuable members of society, contributing to both their families and communities, however, their needs are under-acknowledged in urban spaces. The response to this has resulted in several population-based and place-based strategies to enrich communities at the scale of the dwelling and the neighbourhood. This thesis engages with these strategies and their role to foster age-inclusive communities - to engage the spectrum in between institutional settings and 'aging in place' in the context of Toronto's existing neighbourhoods.


title: With Drawing in Mind: Renovating an Architecture of Discovery

abstract: That brief moment when ideas become as clear as day; that is where this thesis hopes to starts. This thesis sets out to question the role of drawing in current studio education in architecture and whether new hybrid approaches can work with or unsettle the digital hegemony for the benefit of 21st century architecture. As the mind works to draw out its own creations in "real space" the brain seems to understand its capacity to create feelings, thought, movement and gesture, all poetically expanded through millions of minute details. Can drawing help us to creatively keep up with the mind and improve our architectural production, by both analogue and digital methods? With Physical tactile means of iteration can we enrich our architectural content. How can redrawing drawings help inform the new spaces around us, how can we re-think drawing to keep up with mind and society?


title: Direct and Indirect Effects of Agricultural Land Cover on Bird Species Richness

abstract: Agriculture is one of the largest threats to global biodiversity including to birds. But we know little about whether the effects of agriculture on birds are mainly direct through farming operations, or indirect through effects on natural habitats. We sampled birds at 127 sites in eastern Ontario Canada. We used structural equation modelling (SEM) to evaluate the direct and indirect effects of agriculture on species richness of three bird guilds: forest birds, shrub-edge birds, and grassland birds. We found that forest bird richness was driven by the negative indirect effect of cropland via habitat loss. Shrub-edge and grassland bird richness increased with the amount of agriculture, despite negative indirect effects. Our results suggest that management efforts for bird diversity in agricultural landscapes should focus on preserving grassland and forest habitat including forest edges, while managing agricultural land, for instance, by selecting perennial crops and low impact agricultural activities.


title: Unsupervised Machine Learning as a Tool for Exploratory Analysis of Acoustic Telemetry Data: A Case Study With Northern Pike in Toronto Harbour

abstract: Spatial ecology aims to further knowledge of an organism's relationship with its environment and guide decision-making related to conservation. The advancement of biotelemetry has facilitated this goal, however, data management, from its acquisition to its utilization, is central to its success. Standard analysis may include separating tagged individuals into predefined groups based on biometrics or capture location, and then comparing relationships among groups, environmental measures, and their seasonal habitat choices. While effective in that it informs on the relationship among variables, this approach is computationally intensive, and the insight provided is limited to behaviour among predefined groups. This study effectively and efficiently leverages machine learning methods - hierarchical clustering and principal component analysis - to explore animal behaviour, thus providing an efficient, alternative method to analyzing acoustic telemetry data. A by-product of this project is software development that can facilitate analysis of acoustic telemetry data.


title: English Vowel Duration in Textsetting

abstract: The rhythmic structure in music consists of alternating strong and weak beats and higher-level structure. Likewise, in language there is a similar structure: stress is usually an alternation of strong and weak beats. In texts that have both linguistic and musical structure, the two rhythms prefer to match but the alignment is not always perfect. This thesis investigates the effects of inherent vowel durations and voicing-induced allophonic length in two experiments using textsetting. This was done in order to explore the matching preferences between these linguistic tokens and slots in music. The results show that English speakers prefer to match shorter vowels with short notes and longer vowels with long notes in music. Both the tenseness and allophonic lengthening conditions are significant; however, the participants were more strongly guided by the tenseness of the vowel than the voicing-induced allophonic length.


title: Public Space in a Placeless Time: The Reorientation of Sparks Street

abstract: What is the future of public space? With life increasingly shifting online, what becomes of our streets, our squares, our commons? Rapid urbanization around the world has also reinvigorated debates about the right to place. While the pandemic has pushed such issues to the forefront, it is the confluence of intensifying digitalization and displacement that calls for a reconsideration of public space not only as public good, but as dynamic sites of citizenship and community. The subject of perpetual renewal, Sparks Street is a pedestrian mall in Canada's capital that serves as an ideal site to reimagine public space in these incongruous times. How is our relationship to place changing? What does that mean for our sense of place? To present an alternative to conventional placemaking, this thesis project aims to redefine public space as urban destinations that reinforce our identity of, our belonging to, and our connection through place.


title: Fish Spawning Habitat Restoration Challenges and Management Options for the Laurentian Great Lakes

abstract: Freshwater fish populations are facing numerous threats including habitat loss and degradation. As such, much effort is devoted to restoring degraded habitats and restoring access to spawning habitats. In this thesis, I conducted a narrative review on sturgeon spawning habitat characteristics and biological productivity outcomes in support of functional monitoring for mandated offsetting measures. While sturgeon life history characteristics limit the feasibility of functional monitoring, this approach can be applied to other fishes. Biotelemetry was used to guide efforts for restoration of fish populations in a river system fragmented by a dam. The dam was a barrier to migration for Lake Sturgeon (Acipenser fulvescens), but Walleye (Sander vitreus) did not fully migrate to the dam during the spawning season. These findings provide evidence for benefits of restoring river connectivity by removal of the dam but also consider impacts that dam removal would have with further invasion of non-native species.


title: Narrative Landscapes of Berlin: Conversations Between the Past and Future in Design

abstract: Across the globe, abandoned sites sit, deemed no longer advantageous. Amidst several state-led efforts to revitalize abandoned sites, this thesis explores the distinct opportunities that exist for Field Station Berlin, an abandoned US NSA surveillance zone constructed in West Berlin during the Cold War. Built atop Teufelsberg, the prominent of Berlin's Trümmerbergs, today the former field station serves as a venue for everything, from community activities to artist installations. Given this turbulent history, this thesis asks: how can design offer a unique means of site intervention capable of capturing the complexity of existing place meanings, while still supporting reactivation by contemporary society? This thesis first investigates several reclaimed sites across Berlin and creates a catalog of Counterpreservation that chronicling design approaches for re-activation. It then introduces the design potentials of Teufelsberg. Moving beyond, this thesis seeks to discover methods for reclaiming the memories of other wastelands, or Brachen of Berlin.


title: Reclaiming Memories: An Atlas of Palestinian Diaspora in Canada

abstract: Some 5 million people live in the Palestinian diaspora today, including over 50,000 individuals in Canada, as the prospects of a possible return to their ancestral homeland become ever more complicated with the realities of protracted occupation and exile. The thesis envisions a diasporic space that would illuminate the diasporic identity of Palestinians living in Canada. The process of propositional space-making is underpinned by core concepts of oral history and collective identity, reterritorialization, belonging and geography, as well as transnational and intercultural solidarity. The intent of this thesis is to utilize architecture as a form of spatial agency for Palestinians, an apparatus for engaging diaspora as an operative process of common memory production. Building on existing literature and case studies, as well as firsthand Canadian fieldwork and interviews, this thesis explores a series of interventions to interrogate the network of relations that would construct a space of diasporic connectivity.


title: Drone Characterization using Helicopter Rotation Modulation (HERM) Line Signatures

abstract: This thesis presents research on the radar micro-Doppler drone characterization using features from the long windowed short-time Fourier transform (STFT) representation referred to as HElicopter Rotation Modulation (HERM) line signatures. The long windowed STFT representation enables drone identification at longer ranges using a low pulse repetition frequency (PRF) radars. A simple mathematical model is proposed to describe the HERM line signature using three parameters or features, namely the number of HERM lines, the fundamental frequencies and the number of fundamental frequencies. This model motivates research into parametric spectral estimation techniques for micro-Doppler feature extraction which is lacking in the current state of the art. Subspace-based spectral estimation techniques are applied to real and simulated data and compared with the Fourier-based techniques from the literature. These proposed techniques are shown to perform better for smaller windows of data. An application of these features for drone detection/classification is demonstrated.


title: Secure Routing and Forwarding in RPL-based Internet of Things: Challenges and Solutions

abstract: As the Internet of Things (IoT) becomes an integral part of our everyday life, securing the IoT devices against malicious activities became critical for their deployment, especially with such devices entering homes and controlling essential services. Most IoT devices still have limited resources (i.e., energy, processing power, and memory), complicating the use of traditional security measures. A modified version of the traditional TPC/IP protocol stack was developed for IoT devices, commonly known as the uIP protocol stack. This protocol stack includes either lightweight versions of the traditional protocols, operating at each layer or IoT-suitable replacement protocols. Among these protocols, the Routing Protocol for Low Power and Lossy Networks (RPL) was designed to perform network-layer routing in IoT, while the IPv6 over Low-powered Wireless Personal Area Network (6LoWPAN) protocol was introduced to a new network-sub-layer called the 6LoWPAN adaptation layer. While exploring the challenges that face the routing and forwarding processes at the Network layer in RPL-based networks (or 6LoWPAN networks), from the work in this dissertation, it was found that both processes suffer from a significant vulnerability: the inability to authenticate the message's immediate sender. This problem is explored in detail, and its effects on the performance and security of IoT devices are thoroughly investigated. A solution is proposed to the authentication problem, in the form of a framework based on Network Coding (NC), which is introduced as a third security mode for RPL: the Chained Secure mode (CSM). A prototype for the proposed solution is evaluated, through simulations, for the RPL against several replay attacks, which proved to be effective against the investigated attacks. An integration of the 6LoWPAN protocol and the CSM framework is proposed to reduce the effect of buffer-reservation attacks. The preliminary evaluation results show that this integration between RPL and 6LoWPAN has the potential to mitigate and minimize the effect of the external adversaries of the buffer-reservation attack with minimal resource consumption.


title: From Worship to Wellness: A Study of the Adaptive Reuse of Historical Churches in Urban and Rural Ontario

abstract: Historical churches in Canada are in a time of crisis. The National Trust for Canada estimates that 1/3 of faith buildings will be forced to close before 2030, which translates to the loss of over 9,000 buildings. The heritage values of these unique spaces are well established in Ontario, and churches have come to represent not only a subset of religious ideologies but also the collective memories of rural and urban communities across the province. The rise of the COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted pre-existing inequalities and resource gaps in Ontario's healthcare system. As many churches are faced with imminent closure, this thesis questions how these underutilized spaces can reconnect with the church's original values of health and wellness, while also generating a collection of new public health uses and continuing their architectural legacy in Ontario.


title: Filling the Gaps: Reimagining Public Space as a Continuum

abstract: There is a special joy found in the gaps of time and space along the street. Yet, these moments are rapidly disappearing from the urban fabric. Who owns public space? To address this question, Filling the Gaps reflects on the agency of the street and the different actors that come into play. How can the notion of public and private be reconceptualized? This thesis discovers the missed opportunities for interactions with and within the city by observing Ottawa's street life. How can the street be transformed from a space of passage alone to a space for connection and human interaction? Four dismissed and unseen urban gaps are chosen to explore the possibilities of publicness along the street. How can a continuum streetscape for public life emerge within the city? Through tactical interventions and urban storytelling, the project reimagines a process where urban dwellers renegotiate and extend the public realm's boundaries.


title: Testing Potential Mitigation Strategies for Injuries in Angled Fish

abstract: Recreational angling is a common and enjoyable activity that many people consider a hobby, lifestyle and/or passion however it can have negative effects on fish. The goal of my thesis was to identify strategies to mitigate injuries that arise during recreational fishing events. Chapter 2 investigated if replacing treble hooks on hard plastic lures with single hooks would reduce injuries and fish handling time in three common targeted gamefish species. My data suggested that making these alterations reduced unhooking time for Northern Pike, Smallmouth and Largemouth Bass. Chapter 3 explored the viral tactic of pouring carbonated beverages on bleeding fish injuries. I did not find any benefits of using various carbonated beverages on bleeding injuries in Northern Pike. Together, these studies recommend that anglers switch the treble hooks on their hard plastic lures to single hooks and return the fish to the water as soon as possible.


title: Glitch-Visible Cities - Fictional Essays

abstract: What if architecture became street art? This thesis explores alternate ways to see the city — and the invisible terrains that are hidden within cities — through the lens of "glitch" territories and fiction. These invisible cities are born from intuition and draw sustenance from theory — including the work of Roland Barthes and Italo Calvino. It follows photogrammetry protocols used in heritage documentation — gathering, processing, consolidation of data, underlined with manipulation of techniques on photography, photogrammetry, and writing, respectively. Consequently, this thesis argues on the role of authorial agency and subjectiveness of the reader, as it is inferred in Calvino`s literary production, by revisiting it with digital imagery. The fiction essays are figuratively told by Invisible Cities`s protagonist, Marco Polo, where he depicts Glitch-Visible Cities. There, he departs into a universe of sprayed canvas and pixels to unnest the hidden pluriverse virtues of Ottawa and its murals.


title: Preserving the Heartbeat of Trench Town: A Vision for Urban Renewal

abstract: Urbanization has increased the demand for housing in major cities across the Caribbean. Jamaica is one of several islands dealing with the overwhelming difficulty of providing and improving the living conditions of individuals living in informal settlements. In the heart of Jamaica's capital, Kingston, the inner-city Trench Town neighbourhood is plagued with crime, historic political corruption and urban decay -- posing challenges for sustainable urban development. Through an in-depth analysis of the historical, political, Culture and architectural context of Trench Town, this thesis proposes a series of interventions to promote a higher standard of living. Increasing the supply and quality of housing, as well as accommodating informal economic activity can be a catalyst for community change. This redevelopment proposal for Trench Town will provide residents with the advantages of homeownership, reduce levels of crime, and stimulate employment opportunities and expand tourism.


title: The Institutional Remains: Transinstitutionalization of Disability & Sexuality

abstract: This research investigates access to sexuality for disabled people in Ontario. To understand sexual access, this research uses frameworks of disability justice and critical carceral studies to make explicit the pervasive and ongoing institutionalization of disabled people. Critically analyzing transinstitutionalization policy reveals surveillance, spatial regulation, and the criminalization of sex work as prohibitive barriers in disabled people's realization of their sexual desires. The City of Ottawa serves as a case study to interrogate the municipal regulation of sexuality through Minimum Separation Distance bylaws. The findings of this study illustrate the shared use of policy tools to invisibilize disabled people and sex workers through spatial regulation and segregation. These shared policy tools demonstrate the need for coalitional politics between sex workers and disabled people. The harms associated with transinstitutionalization and criminalization demand urgent action. Abolition responds to this urgency, demanding decriminalization, deinstitutionalization and decarceration.


title: Littoral Tales: Lagos

abstract: This thesis explores speculative interventions along Lagos' Littoral zones woven within complex layers of land, water, and waste. Subverting colonial extractive operations of dredging, drilling and draining, it imagines the social construction of space through interventions that aggregate, accumulate and promote adaptation, to changing environmental conditions such as rising water. Drawings, maps, sections and collages at the urban scale are used as tools to explore the geo-historical development of Lagos, beginning with the colonial period. Narrowing into a locality with an industrial and military history, this thesis presents some interesting challenges: How do we re-interpret and subvert colonial ways of understanding land and sea? How might viewing non-human entities as co-creators of architectural space affect the way we design? How can an architectural understanding of the networks of land, water, and waste at the urban scale support speculation around sustainable and community-driven interventions at the human scale of a neighbourhood?


title: On Intimacies and Infrastructures: Sex Work and Spatial Politics

creator: Pereira-Edwards, Alexandra Evelyn Olivia

abstract: The city is constituted by overlapping networks of infrastructures and intimacies. These networks form the often-overlooked space of the everyday for many, yet for sex workers these networks have the capacity to reproduce patterns of violence and marginalization. A deep reading of Canadian sex work legislation exposes an interconnected web of power, policing, and exclusionary tactics with harmful repercussions—essentially making it illegal for sex workers to exist in either "public" or "private" spaces as defined by Western logic. Situated within sex-positive feminist discourse and an ongoing infrastructural turn across disciplines, this thesis utilizes writing and drawing methods to engages sex work as a lens through which to assess acceptable forms of intimacy within the space of the city, and to recognize numerous affective infrastructural networks that subvert dominant stigmas associated with the profession.


title: Several Reinforcement Learning Methods in Mean-Field Games with Binary Action Spaces

abstract: Recent years have witnessed significant progress in the sub-field of machine learning known as reinforcement learning, in which interactions between intelligent agents and the environment enable agents to learn and solve sequential decision-making problems through accumulating rewards with delays. Despite much success in single-player settings, reinforcement learning in multi-agent domains remains a challenging task in many aspects. In this thesis, the mean-field approach will be used to study binary action space stochastic games with a sufficiently large number of players that can be generalized to the multi-population case. Based on the mean-field approximation, several algorithms will be implemented and compared in numerical experiments to visualize their convergence to the equilibrium policy.


title: Characterization and Application of a Histamine Aptamer-Based Biosensor

abstract: Histamine is a biogenic amine, identified as a natural contaminant in food and alcoholic beverages, with high levels eliciting allergy-related conditions. Exposure to allergens can lead to abnormal high levels of histamine in the body that is detectable in blood and urine. A rapid histamine biosensor that can detect histamine levels in food, beverages and also be used as a diagnostic tool for allergy-related conditions will be an ideal point of care testing tool. In addition, histamine has been identified as a close-range aggregation pheromone component in bed bug feces. A portable biosensor that detects bed bugs in these settings is in demand. Nano-aptamer based biosensors have previously been used to detect wide range of targets. In this study, histamine-binding aptamers were characterized. A head-to-head comparison of binding affinity and specificity for these group of aptamers were conducted, and the aptamer candidates best suited for biosensor application was selected.


title: The Subjunctive Pause The Nature of Architecture and Its Representation in the Works of Indian Architect Balkrishna Doshi

abstract: This dissertation takes a critical look at architectural storytelling that imparted a polysemic and contronymic nature to architecture and its representation in the works of Indian architect, Balkrishna Doshi (b.1927). It studied three modes of architectural storytelling that Doshi adopted, namely, tectonic (through his buildings), visual (through his miniature painting style illustrations), and literary (through his written stories). His non-conventional ways of storytelling disregarded the notion of architectural creation and representation as a formulaic and precise visual image and explored the possibility of converting them into instruments of imaginative dreaming for making, inhabiting, and conversing in architecture. Doshi's built work and its representation, created a 'pause'—bringing in a reorientation to present the invisible by offering a poetic and syncretic virtual world. This 'pause' solicited engagement. It was a clever contraption to engage in an imaginative understanding, conceptualization, inhabitation, making, and reading of built work and its representation, inculcating novel points of view to engage in a broad and deep architectural discourse. This dissertation argues that the 'pause' was a quality of architectural conceptualization, experience, and representation that imparted to his architecture a subjunctive character that opened a space of translation between the author (architect) and the reader (users and others who are involved in the architectural creation) to foster an imaginative assimilation of architectural activities, in which they viewed architectural creation not only through a positivistic lens, but allowed the imaginative, oneiric, and fantastical to contribute. For Doshi, architectural creation assumed the form of a verb—the act of dreaming collectively a numinous architecture, rather than a substantive—the architecture of production that celebrated the singularity of the architect or the building as a seductive and commercialized image ignoring what he considered the basic tenet of architecture, which is its ability to promote a joyful and virtuous human life. The subjunctive act of dreaming that Doshi demonstrated and induced for others to practice created a contronymic condition through storytelling, by evoking the latent presence of a virtuality, the particularity of which was its ability to make architecture and its representation become analogous, vying for each other's status and qualities.


title: Can Decision-Making be Improved by Allowing Eyewitnesses to Opt-Out?: Examining the Utility of a ‘Not Sure’ Option With Showups

abstract: I examined the impact of an explicit opt-out option on eyewitness identification performance. I predicted that an opt-out option would decrease innocent-suspect identifications more than culprit identifications, and that this effect would be more pronounced when viewing conditions were worse. I randomly assigned participants (N = 2003) to watch either a clear or degraded simulated-crime video. After a brief filler task, participants viewed either a culprit-present or culprit-absent showup and responded either "Yes" or "No". Half of the participants were randomly assigned to have an additional option to respond, "Not Sure". Contrary to my prediction, the not-sure option decreased both culprit (44% to 36%) and innocent-suspect (19% to 14%) identifications; this effect was unaffected by viewing condition quality. Despite empirical evidence and theoretical rationale indicating an opt-out option would improve the culprit and innocent-suspect identification tradeoff, the present results suggest otherwise.


title: A role for LRRK2 and Neuroinflammatory Processes in Multi-Hit Toxicant Models of Parkinson’s Disease

abstract: Parkinson's disease (PD) is characterized by the loss of dopaminergic neurons in the substantia nigra (SNc) leading to a range of motor behavioral deficits. In addition to motor features, non-motor behaviors are also evident in many cases. Although it has been suggested that genetic mutations represent a cause or risk factor for the disease, there is evidence to suggest that PD arises as a result of the interaction between multiple factors. In the current dissertation, one overarching theme we were interested in was how the behavioral and neurochemical effects of the PD relevant herbicide paraquat might be impacted when combined with different stressors including psychological stress, immune stress, or age induced alterations. We were also highly interested in providing further understanding regarding the role of neuroinflammatory processes (as occurs in PD) in the paraquat induced death of SNc dopamine neurons. In these instances, we focused on the inflammatory regulatory gene (and number one gene implicated in PD), leucine rich repeat kinase 2 (LRRK2). Accordingly, in our study combining paraquat exposure with a chronic unpredictable stress regimen, we found that psychological stressor exposure did not influence the degeneration of midbrain dopamine neurons or accompanying microglia activation induced by the toxin; however, it did influence motor coordination. Conversely, exposure of the pesticide in combination with the inflammatory agent lipopolysaccharide (LPS) augmented SNc cell loss. In these studies using LPS, we found that knocking out LRRK2 protected against the loss of midbrain dopamine neurons and behavioral deficits, induced by LPS priming followed by paraquat exposure. In fact, knocking out LRRK2 altered the pro-inflammatory microglia phenotype that is typically induced by LPS exposure. Likewise, LRRK2 deficiency protected against the paraquat induced peripheral and central toxic effects in mice older than what we typically use. Taken together, our results support the hypothesis that the interaction between different stressors can impact behavioral and biological outcomes relevant for PD, and LRRK2 is important for the toxic effects of paraquat, and LPS priming with later paraquat exposure. The data presented herein may also provide important implications for the development of treatment strategies that target inflammatory processes in PD.


title: Investigating the Multiple Roles of Boundary Genes in Abscission in Arabidopsis thaliana

abstract: Plants shed organs through abscission. This process scatters seeds and removes foliage but can reduce crop yield if unmanaged. In the model plant species, Arabidopsis thaliana, the outer parts of the flower are shed after pollination. BLADE-ON-PETIOLE boundary genes initiate abscission zones (AZ) where separation occurs. This work focused the abscission role of boundary TALE homeodomain transcription factor genes KNOTTED1-LIKE FROM ARABIDOPSIS THALIANA2 (KNAT2), KNOTTED1-LIKE FROM ARABIDOPSIS THALIANA6 (KNAT6), and functional partner ARABIDOPSIS THALIANA HOMEOBOX GENE1 (ATH1). I show that TALE boundary genes are required for the correct formation of two distinct layers that develop after specification of the AZ. Collective loss of TALE activity disrupts the proper formation of both layers. I also show that TALE boundary genes are active in the signalling pathway that activates abscission, and promote the production of hydrolytic enzymes. I propose that TALE boundary genes contribute to multiple steps of the abscission process.


title: mGluR5 Modulation as a Treatment for Parkinson’s Disease

abstract: Parkinson's disease is an age related neurodegenerative disease. Current treatments do not reverse the degenerative course; rather they merely manage symptom severity. As such there is an urgent need to develop novel neuroprotective therapeutics. There is an additional need to stimulate and promote inherent neuro-recovery processes. Such processes could maximize the utilization of the existing dopamine neurons, and/or recruit alternate neuronal pathways to promote recovery. This thesis investigates the therapeutic potential of the mGluR5 negative allosteric modulator CTEP in a 6-hydroxydopamine mouse model of Parkinson's disease. We found that CTEP caused a modest reduction in the parkinsonian phenotype after only 1 week of treatment. When administered for 12 weeks, CTEP was able to completely reverse any parkinsonian behaviours and resulted in full dopaminergic striatal terminal re-innervation. Furthermore, restoration of the striatal terminals resulted in normalization of hyperactive neurons in both the striatum and the motor cortex. The beneficial effects within the striatum were associated with an increase activation of mTOR and p70s6K activity. Accordingly, the beneficial effects of CTEP can be blocked if co-administered with the mTOR complex 1 inhibitor, rapamycin. In contrast, CTEP had differential effect in the motor cortex, promoting ERK1/2 and CaMKIIα instead of mTOR. Together these data suggest that modulating mGluR5 with CTEP may have clinical significance in treating Parkinson's disease. In addition to the CTEP work, extensive appendices are included in this thesis outlining the optimization of animal models and tools used in the present thesis, as well as other potential therapeutic avenues.


title: Quality Control of Asphalt Pavement Field Compaction Using Field-Measured Pavement Permeability

abstract: For decades, the use of rotary steel drum compaction train to compact asphalt concrete and the use of density as a quality control criterion for job acceptance have been the mainstream practices. These have remained essentially unchanged since their respective adoptions by the industry. Hence, asphalt material properties have been overemphasized with no consideration of the impact of construction processes. Limiting the intrusion of water into the body of asphalt concrete pavement has been an age-long recommendation. This was found to reduce the potential of asphalt concrete moisture damage susceptibilities. However, attempts to reliably measure asphalt pavement permeability in the field or correlate it to other surrogates have not been successful or at least reliable, thus, frustrating the applicability of permeability measurements. This thesis seeks to solve the aforementioned problems by measuring asphalt pavement permeability in the field and relating the measured permeability coefficients to different construction factors. The study also compares the rotary steel drum compaction technologies and the AMIR to highlight the effects of different compaction methods on the properties of asphalt pavements with a focus on permeability as an alternative quality control property. Ten sites were selected for the field compaction used in this thesis to study the effects of different field compactors on asphalt pavement compaction and permeability. Case one of the field compaction studies involved the use of vibratory train and AMIR in nine projects. Case two involved the use of the vibratory and oscillatory trains and AMIR compactors in one project. The results of field compaction and permeability using the rollers indicate that AMIR compactor yields asphalt pavement with less permeable surfaces at a comparable level of compaction with the vibratory and oscillatory trains compaction methods. AMIR compactor was also found to reduce the mean permeability of the surfaces compacted on concrete base compared to the conventional rotary steel drum compactors and was also more efficient. Also, this thesis further presents new developments in field measurements of permeability. Based on laboratory trials and calibrations that employ the electronic water level sensor system, a new device termed "Carleton Permeability Device" is developed and proposed.


title: Characterization of Receptor Kinases and Downstream Signalling Components Involved in Fusarium Head Blight Resistance

abstract: Fusarium Head Blight (FHB) is a devastating disease that affects wheat, barley and other small grain crops. Despite huge economic losses, current measures have not yielded desirable resistance to FHB. Resistance to F. graminearum is quantitative and thus identification of putative transmembrane receptors and signalling components involved in plant immunity will help combat this disease. A reverse genetic screen using 249 T-DNA Arabidopsis mutant plants identified two putative leucine-rich transmembrane localized receptors, RLK7 and APEX and a downstream signalling component RbohF as contributors to FHB resistance. The expression analysis suggested that RLK7 and APEX activated distinct hormone signalling pathways, ethylene and salicylic acid, to mediate the resistance. Our analyses indicated that as an intracellular signalling component, RbohF integrates signals from these hormone signalling pathways to regulate stomatal pore closures, a potential entry point for the pathogen. Overall, our findings identified key genes involved in mediating quantitative resistance to F. graminearum.


title: Biomimetic Approaches to Synthesis of Cannabidiol

abstract: Found in cannabis, cannabidiol (CBD) holds promise as a nonpsychoactive cannabinoid in treating a number of conditions, including anxiety, schizophrenia, and some forms of epilepsy. However, large scale studies on the therapeutic use of CBD are lacking, and more research is needed to precisely establish its safety and efficacy. Extraction of CBD from cannabis is challenging, and past methods of synthesizing CBD have suffered from at least one of the following: poor selectivity, low yields, complex and laborious reaction sequences, or unavailable starting materials. We report here a concise approach to CBD synthesis from readily available nerol. This route uses directed orthometallation to regioselectively allylate olivetol dimethyl ether, followed by a biomimetic oxidative cyclization with Mn(III) to cleanly generate dimethyl CBD in low yield. We also demonstrate that using cationic polyene cyclization as the key ring-forming step produces a similar yield of dimethyl CBD in a complex mixture of isomers.


title: Error Floor Analysis of Quasi-Cyclic LDPC and Spatially Coupled-LDPC Codes and Construction of Codes with Low Error Floor

abstract:
Forward error-correcting (FEC) codes play an important role in transmitting data with extremely high reliability through modern communication systems. In this thesis, we study the design and analysis of low-density parity-check (LDPC) codes in general and spatially coupled (SC) LDPC codes, in particular. At first, we analyze the error floor performance of finite-length protograph-based spatially coupled LDPC codes in terms of their design parameters. We conduct a comprehensive analysis to show that the parameter syndrome former memory plays the main role in the average number of cycles and trapping sets in the Tanner graph of finite-length SC-LDPC codes. This, in fact, gives an insight into the error floor performance of protograph-based SC-LDPC codes, and demonstrates the superiority of these codes in the error floor region, compared to their block code counterparts.
To complement the theoretical analysis conducted in the first stage of this research, we develop corresponding design techniques to construct high-performance quasi-cyclic (QC)-LDPC and SC-LDPC codes. Our design approach is aimed at improving the performance of finite-length (SC) LDPC codes while maintaining the decoder complexity and latency small. The improvement in error floor is achieved by minimizing (elimination of) the most harmful trapping set (TS)s. We present two design approaches: 1) imposing simple conditions on the small cycles to eliminate specific classes of trapping sets, 2) developing a search-based design technique such that specific trapping sets are targeted for minimization/elimination. Our constructed QC-LDPC and time-invariant SC-LDPC codes are superior to the state-of-the-art both in terms of their error floor performance and their low decoding latency and complexity.
Finally, we look into the design of finite-length time-invariant QC SC-LDPC codes with a small constraint length and a specific girth. In this respect, different scenarios for the construction process are proposed such that the final QC SC-LDPC code has a specific girth of 6 or 8 with a small constraint length. Bounds on memory and lifting degree are derived accordingly to fulfill the girth constraint associated with the specific scenario. Numerical results are provided to compare with the proposed theoretical bounds.


title: Engaged histories : Wendat women's souvenir arts of cultural preservation and entrepreneurial invention

abstract:
The nineteenth century souvenir arts of the Wendat (Huron) women of Wendake, Quebec, works of virtuosity in technique and design, were sought after as collectibles by European visitors and Euro-Canadians, and today appear in substantial numbers in European, Canadian, and American museum collections. Although souvenir wares have been the object of study in the fields of anthropology and art history, an in-depth systematic analysis of the tradition, situated within a history of Wendat visual arts, had yet to be written. This study addresses two problems: First, the lack of a corpus of material to place nineteenth-century souvenir arts in the context of art from earlier periods created for ceremonial and community use and drawn both from archaeological and ethnological collections. Second, it addresses the need to explore the relationship among modes of production and to carry out a close reading of the imagery and women’s egalitarian status in Wendat society from pre- and early-contact periods through the nineteenth century. 1 argue that souvenir arts, produced during a period of intense change and challenges to Wendat identity and economic self-sufficiency caused by increasing settler populations and colonial pressures of assimilation, offer a site for the exploration of Wendat women’s economic and social roles in their community. I base these arguments in archival and historical research and in consultation with Wendat community members, who have provided important insight into symbolic content of the souvenir works and their significance for the Wendat as well as for European buyers. The development of souvenir arts was intertwined with the diplomatic and political agenda of Wendat community leaders, reflecting Wendat women’s agency in creating commercial works that inspired the admiration of European collectors, and could serve as ceremonial gifts that contributed to harmonious relations with settler communities.
The research database of over 220 examples of Wendat and Eastern Great Lakes objects, on which my arguments are based, is the foundation for Appendix B and the illustrations referred to in the text. In keeping with the collaborative research methods of the thesis, I will present a copy of the thesis to Wendat Grand Chief Conrad Sioui, together with a DVD of the database.


title: Scientific Research and Experimental Development (SR&ED) Engagement and Management by Small Canadian-Controlled Private Corporations (CCPCs)

abstract: Innovation plays a vital role in the growth of an economy. Spending on research and development (R&D) is an important determinant of the innovation process. Engaging in R&D can be considered risky for firms as there is no guarantee that there will be a positive return and concerns of competitors imitating a successful innovation. As a result, firms may be reluctant to engage in R&D. These challenges may be especially acute for small Canadian-controlled private corporations (CCPCs), who may not have the same access to resources and expertise as larger firms. Given the importance of innovation for growth, governments seek to intervene to fix the R&D under-investment issue through grants, loans, or tax incentives. Since 1944, the Canadian government has used the Income Tax Act and R&D tax incentives to stimulate scientific research activity. The incentives have evolved, and since 1985, the primary mechanism used in Canada to encourage R&D is the Scientific Research and Experimental Development (SR&ED) program. The SR&ED program comprises tax deductions and an investment tax credit and with differing rates for smaller CCPCs, individuals, and larger corporations. Traditional research in R&D and tax incentives has evaluated whether the incentives displace private R&D activities (crowding-out) or induce increased R&D expenditures and projects (additionality). There was little understanding of why CCPCs engage in R&D and how they manage their R&D practices. In order to better understand the motivation to engage in R&D and how small CCPCs manage their R&D practices in the context of the SR&ED program, the research design includes semi-structured interviews with 18 small CCPCs. This study finds that firms that engage in R&D are more likely to have an internal context that has values and a strategic orientation to develop innovation. The decision to engage in R&D is also influenced by the product lifecycle and resource, systems, and processes constraints. In contrast, the R&D management practices are influenced by the external environment. The findings of this study provide insight into the motivation to apply for the SR&ED program and the influence the program has on R&D behaviour within a small CCPC.


title: Mass-Spectrometry based Metabolomics to Decipher Strain Specific Microcystis Cyanopeptide Profiles

abstract: Cyanobacterial harmful algal blooms (cHABs) are increasing in frequency and magnitude. cHABs release mixtures of bioactive compounds into freshwater that negatively impact human and ecosystem health. Factors that influence cyanobacterial growth and toxin production are broadly understood. However, cHABs are a prolific source of structurally diverse and strain-specific mixtures of toxins. Currently, the chemistry, environmental concentrations, and risks associated with most cyanobacterial metabolites are unknown. We utilize untargeted and semi-targeted mass-spectrometry based metabolomics to decipher the strain-specific profiles of non-ribosomal peptide metabolites (cyanopeptides) from five Microcystis strains. The established semi-targeted approach enables detection of all variants of a cyanopeptide group within environmental samples. Finally, growth medium composition effects on Microcystis metabolomes are assessed with the metabolomic techniques. Optimal growth conditions for cyanopeptide production are elucidated and provide means for large-scale cultivation of target strains for isolation and characterization of novel and common environmental contaminants for structural and toxicological assessment.


title: Techno-Economic Analysis of a Solar Adsorption Cooling System for Residential Applications in Canada

abstract: As the population increases so does the demand for space cooling which causes higher peak loads on the electrical grid. Areas without a renewable dominant energy grid produce more carbon dioxide during peak periods due to the fossil fuel plants ramping up to match demand. Solar adsorption cooling reduces and shifts the electrical loads required for cooling. Various residential applications of an adsorption system were studied within this project for different cities across Canada. Regions in Ontario would benefit the most due to higher solar potential for water heating and the reduction of fossil fuel plants. Areas where natural gas is available for a low cost, like Alberta, were found to have a much lower economic benefit for this type of system but would receive a massive reduction in carbon dioxide emissions. This study produced promising results depending on the GHG composition of the electrical grid, utility rates, and weather.


title: Aging and Large-Scale Consolidation in Centrifuge Cake Oil Sands Tailings

abstract: Consolidation in centrifuge cake tailings generated from bitumen extraction was studied in experiments conducted in two phases. In phase I, 10 cm thick layers of centrifuged tailings were deposited in polypropylene columns and processed at different time steps for oedometer testing, water content profiles, and fall cone measurement. In phase II, a large-scale consolidation apparatus consisting of a 0.49m by 0.35m steel box was used with tailings deposited to a height of 0.62m. Volume change, pore-water pressure, and water contents behaviour were monitored over time. The cakes was allowed to self weight consolidate and loaded incrementally up to an effective stress of 16 kPa. Finally, the large-strain consolidation model UNSATCON was used to analyze consolidation in the large cell.


title: Hybrid Localization for UAV-based Charging of Wireless Sensor Networks

abstract: Localization - assigning sufficiently accurate positions to nodes - in Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) has attracted research among various strategies, some using Received Signal Strength Indication (RSSI) at nodes. Nodes with known position, called anchors, may be fixed or mobile. Position may be computed by global optimization, or locally between anchors and nodes. For Wireless Rechargeable Sensor Networks (WRSNs), a charger may act as a mobile anchor enabling high-resolution localization for efficient RF charging. This study describes a hybrid scheme for localization and charging of WRSNs using an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) carrying a node and an RF charger. It works reliably under log-normal fading of RSSI due to shadowing. RSSI localization brings the UAV close enough to the node to elicit a response from the RF charger. Time of Charge is then used to position the UAV accurately above the node, to allow for charging with maximum efficiency.