VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
Mechanical Measurement and Stimulation of Human Pluripotent Stem Cell-Derived Cardiomyocytes
Keywords: Biosensing platform
Conduction velocity
Contractile stress
Heart-on-a-chip
In vitro cardiac models
iPSC-cardiomyocytes

The emerging heart-on-a-chip platforms are promising approaches to establish cardiac cell/tissue models in vitro for studying cardiac physiologies, disease modeling, cardiotoxicity testing, and therapeutic discoveries. Challenges still exist in realizing the capability of sensing and evaluating the functional properties of cardiac cell/tissue models in situ (i.e., on the platforms). In particular, generating sufficient forces of contraction during the rhythmic beating of cardiomyocytes plays a central role in pumping oxygen-rich blood through the circulatory system. Developing new platforms and technologies to assess the beating behaviors and contractile functions of in vitro cardiac models is essential to provide information on cell/tissue physiologies, drug-induced inotropic responses, and mechanisms of cardiac diseases. This thesis focuses on developing biosensing technologies/platforms for the measurement of contractile functions of in vitro cardiac models. In vitro cardiac cell/tissue models were established by using Human Induced Pluripotent Stem Cell-Derived Cardiomyocytes (iPSC-CMs) generated with the human proteome to avoid the potential species-dependent differences. Firstly, a label-free imaging technique was developed to offer a cytotoxic-free method for long-term measurement of dynamic beating trajectories, beating amplitude, beating propagation, and conduction velocities of cardiomyocyte monolayers, avoiding the perturbation and cytotoxicity induced by fluorescent dyes. Next, a carbon-based biosensing platform integrated with flexible biosensing components was developed for continuous measurement of multiple parameters of cardiac functional properties in vitro, including contractility, beating rate, beating rhythm, and field potential. In addition, a microdevice array integrated both contraction sensing and mechanical stimulation functions was also developed to recapitulate the mechanical microenvironment of myocardium in vitro and characterize the effect of mechanical strain magnitude on the maturation of iPSC-CMs. Highlighted applications and discoveries enabled by these developed platforms were summarized and discussed in aspects of investigating fundamental cardiac physiologies (e.g., iPSC-CM maturation under mechanical stimulation), drug testing (e.g., isoproterenol, verapamil, blebbistatin, and E-4031), and disease modeling (e.g., drug-induced cardiac arrhythmia and arrhythmogenic right ventricular cardiomyopathy (ARVC)).
Deep Structured Models for Spatial Intelligence
Keywords: Deep Learning
Localization
Mapping
Perception
Spatial lntelligence
Structured Models

The future robots and embodied devices will seamlessly interact with the physical world, help us in our everyday lives and become an integral part of society. To make this dream come true, we need to bring spatial intelligence to our embodied devices: the ability to understand, reason, and create rich knowledge about the spatial relations among objects and space. While computer vision has significantly enhanced capabilities in 2D perception, we are still missing key ingredients to achieve the desired goal — holistic spatial modeling of our 3D world. In this thesis, we present a collection of work towards this goal. The core idea is to build expressive representations of the world and exploit rich structure in the problems. Our research efforts span both creating new structured models as well as developing novel solutions to various applications. The effectiveness of our integrated approach has been demonstrated at the full spectrum of spatial intelligence tasks, including localization, perception, and mapping. Finally, I will give a brief personal outlook on open research topics towards achieving spatial intelligence.
Canadian Post-secondary Institutional Response to Students’ Off-campus Behaviour
Keywords: educational administration
higher education
institutional response
off-campus behaviour
perceived fairness
student discipline

This study sought to explore how Canadian post-secondary institutions [CPIs] address students’ off-campus behaviours [OCBs]. Findings were generated through document analysis of 41 Student Codes of Conduct [SCCs], an examination of four relevant illustrative cases, and semi-structured interviews with five CPI administrators responsible for student discipline. These three sources were then triangulated for further analysis and consideration of key research questions. My original contribution to the research phenomenon is to present an informed understanding of how SCCs are used at CPIs in the context of five participating institutional key informants’ responses to incidents of student OCBs. This research also examined the legitimacy and authority of CPIs institutional responses to alleged instances of student misbehaviour which occur off-campus in four illustrative case studies.Key findings revealed that SCCs varied widely in terms of their scope and authority. While some do acknowledge OCBs as meriting administrative response, a clear connection to the CPI is needed to enact such a response. In the illustrative case studies this was also seen in how the CPI administrators determined how and when to respond to students’ OCBs. Interviews with key informants echoed this need to determine each act of misconduct as a standalone case and to determine best outcomes with taking what external parties may view as extreme measures. In all three data sets, specific processes of progressive discipline were taken to enforce ‘perceived’ fairness for all parties involved. The four illustrative cases also highlighted both the use of SCCs and the administrative response to students’ OCBs in that procedural fairness is not always framed in the same manner nor are policies implemented with universal use in that policy revision and reimplementation is often incited by significant occurrences of student misconduct. As such, consideration was given to the cyclical nature of policy design and implementation in addressing the research phenomenon. Implications of the findings include a consideration of additional areas of research study such as meta-analysis of SCCs, intersectionality of CPI administrators and potential expansion of scope and authority of CPIs as online and remote learning expands.
Modelling the impact of changes in education requirements on nurses’ labour market outcomes
Keywords: Entry-to-practice Requirement
Labour Supply
Nurse
Participation
Sector of Employment
Wage

Provinces across Canada, with the exception of Québec, have changed their Entry-to-Practice (ETP) requirements for Registered Nurses (RNs) from a diploma to a baccalaureate degree in nursing. The variation in introduction of the RN ETP requirement across Canada was used to investigate its impact on RNs’ probability of participation in the nursing labour force (relative to non-nursing employment and being ‘unemployed/out of the labour force/retired’), wages, and choice of care sector of employment. Licensed Practical Nurses (LPNs) simultaneously experienced a change in ETP requirement. LPNs’ labour market outcomes were also examined because LPNs are thought to offset changes in RNs’ labour force participation. Nurses’ outcomes were modelled using a nationally representative longitudinal dataset that captures nurses between 1996 and 2010, allowing for unobserved heterogeneity to correlate with the covariates. I found that the change in RN ETP requirement did not impact RNs’ or LPNs’ participation in the nursing labour force; however, RNs’ and LPNs’ probabilities of non-nursing employment and being ‘unemployed/out of the labour force/retired’ were impacted. The change in the RN ETP requirement did not impact RNs’ average wage and had no differential effect between diploma and baccalaureate RNs and between newly trained and experienced nurses. LPNs’ average wage across the country decreased post-changes in the RN ETP requirement. On the other hand, the change in the LPN ETP requirement did not impact RNs’ and LPNs’ average wage; however, newly trained baccalaureate RNs faced a wage decrease after changes in the LPN policy. The change in the RN ETP requirement had no effect on RNs’ and LPNs’ choice of care sector of employment. Relative to diploma RNs, baccalaureate RNs’ probability of working in the community sector increased after changes in the LPN ETP requirement. The likelihood of LPNs working in hospitals increased as their probability of working in the community decreased after the change in their ETP requirement. Jurisdictions should consider the labour market impact of changes in ETP requirement on targeted as well as non-targeted nursing categories, and the potential impact on a range of nurses’ labour market outcomes.
On Surgeon Stress: An Exploration of Distress and Eustress
Keywords: Distress
Eustress
Flow
Medical Education
Surgeon Stress
Surgical Education

Rationale: High rates of distress among surgeons, and physicians more broadly, are alarming and negatively impacting provider wellness, performance, and healthcare system functioning. Yet despite increased attention, we continue to struggle in addressing stress in practice. One challenge is the lack of a shared vocabulary for understanding stress, which is a complex and idiosyncratic phenomenon that can be experienced both positively (as eustress) and negatively (as distress). While traditional reductionist approaches focusing on individual facets –such as physiology or cognition– have greatly advanced scientific knowledge, stepping back to examine the composite, subjective experience of stress may provide new, complementary insights for mitigating distress and supporting more favorable states in practice. Objectives: This research program explored the multidimensional, integrated experience of stress among academic surgeons in order to establish conceptual frameworks for understanding surgeon distress and eustress in practice. Design: Qualitative data were collected over three phases, guided by a constructivist grounded theory methodology. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with staff surgeons affiliated with the University of Toronto, purposively sampled to capture a broad range of perspectives including specialty and experience level. Results: Eustress and distress were reconceptualized as multidimensional experiences, comprising physiologic, physical, cognitive, affective, social, cultural, and environmental facets. Subjective control was identified as central to the stress experience. In contrast to traditional dichotomous views placing eustress and distress on two polar ends of a spectrum, findings illustrated how experiences of distress and eustress could overlap and coexist. Conceptual frameworks were established for understanding eustress and distress, and how physicians might reflect on their own experiences in practice. Conclusions: Stress is not simply positive or negative, cognitive or physiologic, or individual- versus system-based; understanding the points of intersection and seeking to embrace inherent complexities in the subjective human experience may provide deeper understandings and allow us to approach stress in a more authentic way.
Optimal Attention
Keywords: Costly Learning
Inattention
Posterior Separable
Shannon Entropy

In many environments it is costly for decision makers to determine which option is best for them because learning about different options takes time, and time is valuable to decision makers. To accurately predict changes in behavior and estimate preferences in such settings it is crucial to understand what information agents choose to acquire. In the following three chapters I study costly information acquisition both theoretically and experimentally. In the first chapter I characterize the choice patterns that are consistent with two major models of costly learning when price changes and then test these theoretical results in a lab setting. The experiment shows that the heterogeneity of subjects is key for understanding aggregate behavior and that subjects are sophisticated when choosing both if and what to learn. In the second chapter I use an axiomatic foundation to create a new measure for the cost of information that allows for multiple perceptual distances in a single choice environment so that some events can be harder to differentiate between than others. In the third chapter I show that the new measure of uncertainty produced in the second chapter maintains the tractability of Shannon's classic measure but produces richer choice predictions, identifying a new form of informational bias significant for both welfare and counterfactual analysis. The third chapter also establishes a new foundation for `non-compensatory' behavior anddemonstrates novel predictions for the formation of consideration sets.
My Heart is in Sepharad: Writing Medieval Spain in the Modern Sephardic Diaspora
Keywords: al-Andalus
Diaspora
Inquisition
Jewish
Sephardi
Spain

This dissertation investigates the cultural construction of a modern global diaspora by foregrounding the historical, linguistic and nationalist contexts embedded in literary works produced over the last two centuries, written by a diverse collection of writers who imagine a preserved ethnoreligious community. Sephardim—descendants of medieval Jews expelled from Spain in the fifteenth century—have sustained an ethnic heritage by drawing on the figures, texts, and experiences of medieval Iberia, specifically the Golden Age of al-Andalus (ca. 950- 1140) and the anti-Jewish measures in Christian Spain that led to the Inquisition and expulsion (ca. 1391-1492). I argue that by reading, translating, and rewriting the rich literature of medieval Iberian Jews, from Andalusian liturgical poetry to Kabbalistic commentaries to converso epistles, modern Sephardim creatively interpret the historical and political significance of their ancestral homeland. To conceptualize such diasporic identities, I compare temporalities, regions, and genres, consistently juxtaposing major forms of literature written by Iberian Jews throughout the Middle Ages with those written by their descendants.This study of a modern diaspora also compares the role of contemporaneous historiography, from Romantic historicism to the Wissenschaft des Judenthums to archival research of the Cairo Geniza, in accessing the history and texts of a former homeland. I furtherexplore the intertextual strategies through which modern Sephardim imagine the medieval Jewish experience, constructing palimpsests that bring influential texts into relief by writing around and about them in order to situate artistic expressions, such as those in homoerotic or Romantic poetry, as a medieval inheritance. By adopting genres from al-Andalus, where quantified meters of poetry and conventions of form reflected Jewish acculturation in a predominantly Arab society, Sephardim writing in Hebrew, in particular, produce experimental, actively archaic forms of poetry and narrative. Finally, this study addresses how Sephardim deploy medieval tropes, such as the intolerance of the Inquisition or the heroic pilgrimage of an Andalusi poet, to project an ethnicity onto modern nationalist identities.
New Elemental Mass Tags for Mass Cytometry Applications
Keywords: Elemental mass tags
Mass cytometry

This thesis describes the synthesis, characterization, and application of four new elemental mass tags for mass cytometry immunoassays. Mass cytometry is an emerging bioanalytical technique that uses metal-tagged antibodies (Abs) for high-dimensional single-cell analysis. Currently, this technique can measure ~ 50 parameters per cell with metal-chelating polymer (MCP)-based reagents. My research focused on developing new elemental mass tags with the goal to further expand the multiplexity of current immunoassays. The first mass tag (Chapter 3) was based on the azide-functionalized tantalum oxide nanoparticles (NPs). These NPs could react with DBCO-functionalized Abs to generate the metal-tagged Abs for detection of both high-abundance and low-abundance cellular biomarkers. This tantalum oxide NP-based mass tag opened the 181Ta mass channel for mass cytometry immunoassays. The second mass tag (Chapter 4) was a rhenium-containing polymer. The polymer had ca. 20 pendant dipicolylamine (DPA)-containing chelators for complexing with the rhenium tricarbonyl core ([Re(CO)3]+) and a maleimide end group for Ab attachment. Ab-polymer conjugates prepared by thiol-maleimide reaction were employed in multiplexing immunoassays to identify cell subsets within PBMCs. This rhenium-containing polymer allowed the 185Re and 187Re mass channels to be used in mass cytometry immunoassays. The third mass tag (Chapter 5) was a clickable platinum-chelating polymer. This polymer shared a similar chemical structure to that of the rhenium-containing polymer but with some side chains of the polymer being modified with azide functional groups. Platinum (II) was loaded to the polymer by treating the polymer with platinum salt (K2PtCl4) in methanol. The Ab-polymer conjugate prepared by a DBCO-azide click reaction gave promising results in mass cytometry immunoassays. The development of this platinum-chelating polymer added the six Pt isotopes (m/z, 190, 192, 194, 195, 196, 198) to the repertoire of MCPs for biomarker detection. The last mass tag (Chapter 6) was a tellurium-containing polymer with a poly-l-lysine backbone. This polymer carried ca. 48 tellurophene units per chain and had a terminal azide group for antibody conjugation. Antibody-polymer conjugates prepared via the DBCO-azide click reaction were tested in mass cytometry immunoassays and gave curious results.
Language-based Lifting of Analyses to Software Product Lines
Keywords: Datalog
Functional Programming
Lifting
Software Analysis
Software Product Lines

Software Product Lines (SPLs) allow software engineering teams to develop families of products together using a common set of artifacts. The goal is to maximize reuse of artifacts (requirements, design models, source code, test cases, etc...) across related products. Many of the analysis tools (e.g., static analysis, model checking, test-case generation) used throughout the engineering process are designed to analyze one product at a time. Several attempts have been made to \emph{lift} some of those analysis tools to analyze the whole product line at once, leveraging the amount of commonality between individual products to avoid the intractability of analyzing each product instance by itself in a brute-force fashion. In this thesis, we address the problem from a different angle. Instead of lifting an analysis, we lift languages used to implement analyses. Since a given analysis is a program written in some programming language, extending that language with variability-aware constructs would allow for reinterpreting the original analysis program to process a product line instead of a single product. We presented the lifting of two languages: Datalog, and an extended version of Programming Computable Functions (PCF). Datalog combines relational data definition and manipulation, together with logical inference. It has been used to implement different categories of declarative, succinct, and easy to understand software analyses. We present syntactic extensions to Datalog to allow variability annotations of facts, and a variability-aware inference algorithm. In addition, we present two approaches to automatic variability-aware lifting of software analyses written in a functional language (PCF+). A light-weight, black-box approach (shallow lifting) wraps an analysis in its variability-aware version. The second approach (deep lifting) is an automatic program-rewriting mechanism that translates an analysis program into a semantically equivalent variability-aware analysis. We evaluated the lifted versions of Datalog and PCF+ on a set of Java and C-language benchmarks, comparing their performance against brute-force analysis. Our evaluation results validate our assumption that variability-aware analysis is in general orders of magnitude faster than brute-force analysis. Also in the case of Datalog analyses, variability-aware analysis resulted in similar savings in fact database size.
Air Quality and Energy Implications of Filtration System and Operation Strategies in Residential Buildings
Keywords: Exposure reduction
Filter efficiency
Filtration effectiveness
HVAC system
Indoor air
System runtime

Central forced-air HVAC systems with filters are commonly used in North American homes to reduce particle concentrations and occupant exposure. The filtration performance of these systems is strongly influenced by many system-, filter-, and building-specific parameters including system runtime, cycle on-time, recirculation rate, in-situ filter efficiency, and building air change rate. These parameters vary considerably across homes, and in the same home over time. Thus, characterization of these parameters is essential for filtration system performance evaluation. The goal of this dissertation is to improve the performance of residential filtration systems by advancing the understanding of their influencing parameters. This work first assesses the runtimes in both heating- and cooling-dominated climates. The results show that there were large variations in runtimes and the mean daily runtime was less than 20% in the studied homes. Secondly, this work evaluates the in-situ efficiency of four types of filters in 21 residences in Toronto, Ontario. The results show that the variations for the same type of filters across homes were greater than the differences between filter types. Comparisons between in-situ and lab-tested filter performance further confirm that the lab-tested results of a filter may not well represent its in-situ performance – they generally overestimate the efficiency and underestimate the pressure drops. Lastly, this work examines the range of effectiveness of the HVAC filtration systems with varying influencing parameters through a time-varying mass balance model. The results show that in addition to runtimes, when and how long (i.e., cycle on-time) the system operates also influences its performance. Based on this finding, four filtration operation strategies (concentration, source, pulsed, and concentration pulsed) are evaluated, and the results show that operating the system during periods with high indoor concentrations could achieve a comparable level of effectiveness as continuous operation but at runtimes as low as 80%. This strategy provides opportunities to reduce indoor particle concentration while conserving fan energy use. Overall, this dissertation provides a framework with tools and models to characterize the influencing parameters of residential filtration, evaluate filtration performance, and provide guidance on operation strategies for performance improvement.