VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
Bedside nurses and the restructuring of healthcare, identity, power and resistance

This thesis examines the views and experiences of bedside nurses in the restructured Ontario healthcare system of the late 1990s. Amidst increasing routinization and deskilling many nurses were laid off and a nursing shortage was beginning to emerge. The twenty participants worked in a variety of hospital settings in a large Ontario city. During semi-structured interviews they shared their thoughts on the changes in work organization, staffing patterns, their own quality of work lives and patient care. The theoretical framework for the design and analysis of the study is based on Michel Foucault's ideas of power and subjectivity. Power is seen as a productive force working through relationships between people which are inegalitarian and unstable by nature. Subjectivity is about how individualities are perceived and formed within competing discourses, past and present, including conscious self formation and 'self styling'. Recognition of how the dominant discourses interfere with practices considered ethical, such as caring, and devalue them, may become 'points of resistance'. The findings were organized into three layers, each representing a chapter. In the first layer the work and staffing patterns of the restructured system are discussed. The second layer shows the nurses' relationships amongst themselves and with other groups in the workplace, including the 'games of power' in which nurses participate. The third layer deals with the participants' ideals of nursing, their disappointments, philosophies and collective strategies of proletarianization and professionalism. While uncomfortable and competitive processes are revealed, many traceable to historical roots and gendered expectations for medicine and nursing, there are also signs of increasing mutual support and assertiveness. Major themes that emerge are that nurses 'sit on the sidelines' and have no 'voice', while decisions are 'imposed from above'. Yet as active participants they also co-create their submissive positions. Recommendations for nursing's future, professionalism, recruitment and retention, education and further research are proposed. They include increasing the 'field of possibilities' through analysis of existing dominant discourses. More aware of their active participation in the ongoing relations of power, nurses may 'squeeze into spaces of freedom' that open up within the current crisis and thereby revalue nursing.
Treponema Denticola outer membrane extract enhances the phagocytosis of collagen coated-beads by human gingival fibroblasts

Human gingival fibroblasts (HGFs) degrade collagen by actin-dependent phagocytosis. Since Treponema denticola outer membrane extract (OM) perturbs actin, my aim was to determine whether the OM affects collagen phagocytosis by HGFs. Phagocytosis was measured by flow cytometric assessment of internalized collagen-coated fluorescent latex beads. Confluent HGFs pretreated with T. denticola ATCC 35405 OM exhibited a significant, saturable, dose-dependent increase in collagen phagocytosis index (PI; % cells with beads), and phagocytic capacity (PC; beads per phagocytosing cell) compared with untreated controls. The enhancement was swift, and exhibited a significant, linear, time-dependent increase. PI and PC of HGFs for BSA-coated beads were also stimulated following OM pretreatment in a dose- and time-dependent manner. These results were in contrast to the control OM from Veillonella atypica ATCC 17744. The T. denticola OM-induced bead uptake increase was irreversible and was eliminated by heating the OM for 30 min at 60$\sp\circ$C, and 10 min at 100$\sp\circ$C, and by cytochalasin D treatment of HGFs. Fluid phase accumulation of Lucifer yellow-CH (LY) was enhanced in a saturable, dose-dependent, transient manner. The findings were not due to HGF detachment or cytotoxicity in response to the T. denticola and V. atypica OM treatment as: (1) electronic particle counts indicated minimal HGF detachment; (2) propidium iodide staining revealed that the attached HGFs remained viable; and (3) flow cytometry analysis of T. denticola OM-treated cells showed that there was no significant change in their size and granularity, and that there was no development of populations containing sub-G$\sb1$ DNA. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)
The ghost of the EDC, the United States and European integration, 1955-1960

This dissertation examines the American role in and perceptions of the development and implementation of the European Communities between 1955-1960, particularly the European Economic Community and the European Atomic Energy Commission. The political and economic unification of Europe was a major foreign policy goal of the Eisenhower Administration, as a Europe infused with supranational institutions, many in Washington believed, promised the solutions to two long-term foreign policy headaches--a means to reconcile prance and Germany once and for all, and an instrument to cement West Germany's ties to the West. At its core, this thesis is a study of American foreign policy focusing on a major issue over a relatively brief period of time. It looks at the events taking place in Europe from an American perspective--what American policy makers were seeing, the American frame of reference, and the primary issues of concern and debate in Washington and the American embassies overseas. The integration process in Europe provides the focal point for American policy makers and adds to the story its own colorful personalities of the day who in turn frustrated, complicated and advanced American objectives. Following the defeat of the European Defense Community in August 1954, the Eisenhower Administration altered their diplomatic approach toward European integration. While the United States never strayed from a public policy of sympathy and support for the unity movement, there was, in April 1955, an unwavering commitment adopted by American policy makers to staking out a backseat, hands-off role in the negotiation process. Stemming from an ever-changing mix of being able to, to being asked to, to simply wanting to, the choice by the Eisenhower Administration of a non-interventionist diplomacy meant that European integration was to be made in Europe, not America. This behind-the-scenes diplomacy continued from the initial integration meetings in June 1955 through to the signing and ratification of the Treaties of Rome in March 1957 which established the European Economic Community and EURATOM. Following this, a subtle change in American diplomacy is evident--while always keeping one eye firmly on the look-out for potential problems, the United States began to take tentative steps towards a more familiar interventionist role as the actual implementation of the Common Market and EURATOM treaties began to affect, positively and negatively, specific American economic, political and strategic considerations. Using material from the Eisenhower Library in Abilene, Kansas, as well as the National Archives in College Park, Maryland, this study traces a changing American policy from its hands-off approach to European integration to a more interventionist activism. Cold War alliance politics, domestic supports and constraints on foreign policy, the technical, economic and political implications of atomic diplomacy, and intra-governmental personality conflicts all appear as major themes in this thesis.
BAD as a prototype for a novel therapeutic agent for the treatment of acute leukemia

Inhibitors of Bcl-2 may be useful therapeutic agents for the treatment of a wide variety of malignancies including leukemia. A potential prototype of such a compound is the endogenous Bcl-2 and Bcl-xL binding protein BAD. Previous reports indicate that BAD can overcome the anti-apoptotic effect of Bcl-xL but not Bcl-2. If BAD cannot induce apoptosis in cells over-expressing Bcl-2, it would limit the application of molecules like BAD as novel anti-tumor agents. We reported that transient transfection of BAD induced cell death in cells with and without over-expression of Bcl-2 or Bcl-xL and thereby validated the pursuit of molecules like BAD as novel therapeutic agents. Small cytotoxic peptides that mimic BAD and overcome Bcl-2 mediated drug resistance may be useful in the treatment of malignant disease. One example is the BH3 domain of BAD that binds and inhibits Bcl-2 and Bcl-xL. A cell permeable version of the peptide was created by fusing it to cpm, a decanoic fatty acid internalization sequence. This fusion peptide induced rapid cell death and apoptosis. However, its cytotoxicity was significantly impaired by the over expression of Bcl-xL, which could limit the usefulness of this compound in treating malignancies with increased levels of Bcl-2 and Bcl-xL. Therefore, enhancing the ability of the BH3 domain of BAD to kill cells over-expressing these survival factors might be therapeutically useful. One strategy to enhance its toxicity is to capitalize on the inherent alpha helical shape of the peptide, since some amphipathic alpha helices are potent naturally occurring antibiotics capable disrupting negatively charged membranes. We harnessed the alpha helical properties of the BH3 domain of BAD by fusing it to the Antennapedia internalization sequence. We created a 37 amino acid fusion peptide corresponding to the 21 amino acids of the human BH3 domain of BAD fused to the C-terminus of the 16 amino acids of the ANT peptide (ANTBH3BAD). The ANTBH3BAD fusion peptide induced rapid cell death and apoptosis. Its alpha helical secondary structure disrupted mitochondrial function and allowed the peptide to overcome Bcl-2 over-expression and caspase inhibitors.
Dentin bonding factors involved in resin luting

'Objectives'. (1) To determine if the mode of polymerization of the bonding agent can influence the strength of the attachment of auto-cure resin luting cements to dentin. (2) To establish a standard method for a microtensile bond strength test at the Faculty of Dentistry. 'Methods'. Bovine dentin shear bond strengths were determined for two auto-cure resin cements using bonding agents with multiple modes of polymerization. Microtensile bond strength test apparatus was set-up and utilized with two groups from Part I of this study. 'Results'. Shear bond strength tests of 16 bonding agent/resin cement groups revealed significant differences between the groups (p < 0.05). There were significant interactions between mode of polymerization, cement brand, and adhesive brand (p < 0.001). The microtensile bond strength test was successfully established and provided initial results consistent with expected values and modes of failure. 'Conclusions'. In vitro bond strength test results predict low bond strengths with some bonding agent/resin cement combinations that are potentially clinically significant.
Critical, literacy : whose way of thinking is it?

Is bias detection an effective way to improve the critical thinking skills of students "at-risk?" The research involved nine Grade Five students "at-risk" from a school in Ontario. These students were selected in order to provide the opportunity for them to participate in advanced skills instruction, rather than the more common basic skills practice. The students looked for bias in the pictures of three picture books, during twelve 40-minute sessions, over six weeks. Beyond the description of my work as a teacher-researcher, the students' oral participation was the only data gathered. In conclusion, bias detection provided the context for critical thinking (observation and questioning) however, the improvement of these skills was attributed more so to their practice over time, as well as to the teaching approach. Determining a direct connection between teaching bias detection and the improvement of critical thinking skills would require more research.
A study of advancing & receding contact angles and contact angle hysteresis

Three types of experiments were used to study advancing and receding contact angles (and contact angle hysteresis), namely the dynamic one-cycle contact angle (DOCA), the dynamic cycling contact angle (DCCA) and the dynamic one cycle-soaking contact angle (DOSCA) experiments. These experiments were performed using an automated Axisymmetric Drop Shape Analysis-Profile (ADSA-P). DOCA measurements of 21 liquids from two homologous series (i.e., ' n'-alkanes and 1-alcohols) and octamethylcyclotetrasiloxane (OMCTS) were performed on FC-732-coated surfaces. It is apparent that the contact angle hysteresis decreases with the chain length of the liquid. It was found that the receding contact angle would equal the advancing angle when the alkane molecules would become infinitely long. Furthermore, from the results obtained from DCCA, one can infer that the time dependence of contact angle hysteresis on relatively smooth and homogeneous surfaces is mainly caused by liquid retention/sorption. The results also suggested that the hysteresis will eventually approach a steady state, presumably because liquid retention will be balanced by evaporation from the solid surface. The results from the DOSCA experiments support the supposition that liquid sorption is a key contributor to contact angle hysteresis.
Mathematical problems in the theory of incomplete markets

We study some mathematical problems that arise in studying the financial mathematics of incomplete markets. In the first chapter, we consider the pricing of derivative securities when markets are incomplete. In this case, the prices of all derivatives cannot be uniquely determined based on only the absence of arbitrage. We propose a method for determining the value of a derivative to a given investor based on the dual variables of the investor's utility maximization problem. We also derive results on the stability of these prices with respect to changes in the model inputs. In the second chapter, we study some properties of the mean-reverting Ornstein-Uhlenbeck process that appears in many places in applied mathematics, and in particular in financial modelling. We study the estimation of the parameters of the model based on a constrained maximum likelihood problem (a hybrid of method of moments estimation and the method of maximum likelihood). We also derive the distribution of the range of the process over an interval. The third and fourth chapters study the application of hidden Markov models to financial modelling. In particular, we study two dimensional stochastic differential equations driven by Brownian motion with one hidden variable. In the third chapter, we study the case where only the drift coefficient of the observed variable depends on the hidden variable, while in the fourth chapter we allow the diffusion coefficient of the observed variable to depend on the hidden variable. In each chapter, we study the problem under the following headings: marginal distributions of the observed process, estimation of the path of the hidden process based on observations, and estimation of the parameters of the hidden process.
The influence of age, parental education level, and parenting style on children's understanding of their nurturance and self-determination rights

This study examined the influence of age, maternal education, and maternal demandingness and responsiveness on children's understanding of rights. The sample consisted of 134 children in grades six, eight, and ten. Participants were presented with eight hypothetical 'rights' vignettes and were asked whether the protagonist should assert the right in question and to provide reasons for their responses. Children of all ages supported nurturance rights and home-based self-determination situations. However, there was less support for school-based self-determination rights. Grade level had some influence on the reasoning about nurturance and self-determination vignettes. Maternal education had only a sporadic effect on support for assertion and reasoning. Maternal responsiveness influenced self-determination situations, while maternal demandingness influenced reasoning about nurturance scenarios to a much lesser extent. The specific content of each vignette was the greatest influence on children's responses. Findings are discussed in terms of the importance of the content and context of rights scenarios on children's understanding of rights.
Modulation of the metabolism and cytotoxicity of formaldehyde in isolated rat hepatocytes

HCHO was toxic to isolated rat hepatocytes in a dose- and time-dependent manner by targeting mitochondria and causing oxidative stress (GSH depletion, ROS formation, lipid peroxidation). A decrease in HCHO metabolism caused by inhibiting the metabolising enzymes alcohol dehydrogenase, aldehyde dehydrogenase or formaldehyde dehydrogenase correlated with increased cytotoxicity. CYP 2E1-catalysed HCHO metabolism was greater in CYP 2E1-induced rat liver microsomes versus non-induced or CYP 2E1 inhibited microsomes. Inhibition of CYP 2E1 prevented HCHO metabolism and formate production by hepatocytes and increased cytotoxicity. Removal of HCHO by increasing enzymatic metabolism with NADH generators or oxidisers or by trapping with amines or thiols decreased cytotoxicity. However trapping HCHO with catecholamines resulted in increased cytotoxicity. This study suggests that persons who are deficient in HCHO-metabolising enzymes may be more susceptible to HCHO toxicity. Amines/thiols may be used as antidotes for HCHO poisoning, however the mechanism of toxicity of the reaction with catecholamines needs to be further examined.
An experimental investigation of free-surface structures in turbulent channel flow at low Reynolds numbers

Flow visualization using photochromic dye activation (PDA) and image processing was performed in a smooth, open channel to study the turbulence beneath the shearfree and waveless, gas-liquid interface. Experiments were done over a low-Reynolds number range of 800 to 2,400 based on liquid depth and a Froude number range of 0.25 to 0.32. Turbulence quantities obtained from statistical analysis of the instantaneous streamwise velocity profiles include the mean velocity distribution, probability density function, turbulence intensity, skewness and flatness factors and Reynolds stress. On the video recordings, coherent motions of large-scale free-surface structures were qualitatively observed, namely upwellings, downdrafts, spiral eddies and streamwise vortices. Visual counting of wall events showed that the scaling of their temporal frequency with the inner variables of viscous shear stress and viscosity improved with increasing Reynolds number, yielding average ejection and bursting periods of 39 and 119 for the highest Reynolds number, respectively.
A numerical investigation of turbulent interchange mixing of axial coolant flow in rod bundle geometries

Turbulent coolant flow mixing within an array of nuclear fuel rods is an essential mechanism for maintaining a uniform distribution of heat throughout the array. Of the various coolant mixing mechanisms, turbulent interchange mixing is one of the more important. Using a three dimensional numerical solution, the characteristics and appropriateness of an isotropic $k-\varepsilon$ turbulence model for use in modeling turbulent interchange mixing within rod arrays was investigated. The isotropic model accurately predicted the radial component of turbulent eddy viscosity, but underpredicted the azimuthal component. As a result, radial diffusion processes (such as pressure drop) were predicted accurately, but azimuthal diffusion processes (such as turbulent interchange mixing) were underpredicted. An isotropic eddy viscosity turbulence model, therefore, is not recommended for analysis of turbulent interchange mixing.
Design of a photoactivated electron gun for the ultrafast study of chemical reaction dynamics by electron diffraction

The design of an electron gun which operates on ultrafast timescales is presented. The discussion begins with the consideration of several fundamental issues in reflection high energy electron diffraction theory. In addition, a number of concepts from the free-electron theory of metals are developed in order to construct a model for electron emission from metal surfaces. Having established a theoretical framework and experimental apparatus requirements, a design for a photoactivated electron gun which attempts to satisfy these conditions is presented. The development process is outlined in detail, and the calculations which establish the gun's physical parameters are presented. Several electron optical parameters of the system are computed in order to evaluate its performance. The appendix contains the complete code for all numerical work.
Identification and characterization of a novel kallikrein gene, KLK-L4/KLK13

Kallikreins are a subgroup of serine proteases and these proteolytic enzymes have diverse physiological functions in many tissues. Growing evidence suggests that many kallikreins are implicated in carcinogenesis. In rodents, kallikreins constitute a large multigene family, but in humans, only three genes were identified. By using the positional candidate gene approach, we were able to identify a new kallikrein-like gene, tentatively named KLK-L4 [for kallikrein-like gene 4]. This new gene maps to chromosome 19q13.3-q13.4, is formed of five coding exons and four introns, and shows structural similarity to other kallikreins and kallikrein-like genes. KLK-L4 is expressed in a variety of tissues including prostate, salivary gland, breast and testis. Our preliminary results show that KLK-L4 is down-regulated, at the mRNA level, in breast cancer tissues and breast cancer cell lines. Its expression is regulated by steroid hormones in the breast cancer cell line BT-474. In addition, testis-specific mRNA splice variants have been found. Their expression has been found in certain normal testicular tissues but not in their cancerous adjacent counterparts. This gene and its splice variants may be involved in the pathogenesis and/or progression of various reproductive-organ cancers and may find applicability as novel cancer biomarkers.
A Learning College for health care, the applicability of learning-centred education to The Michener Institute for Applied Health Sciences (Ontario)

This thesis explores how learning-centred education can enhance the effectiveness of The Michener Institute for Applied Health Sciences (TMI) as a post-secondary institution offering health sciences education. The concept of the "Learning College", which exemplifies learning-centred education at the post-secondary level, is examined as a vehicle for engaging students in their own learning, improving learning outcomes, and providing a workable model for educational reform. The first part of the thesis is composed of a literature review, which presents the main themes in learning-centred education; the pressures and trends that are driving colleges and universities in this direction; and the educational theories and models of learning that support it. This is followed by a review of the current conditions, both external and internal, which exert an impact on colleges, influencing the degree of difficulty they may have in becoming Learning Colleges. A set of characteristics, in the form of criteria, has been developed, to describe the ideal Learning College. In the second part of the thesis, The Michener Institute is subjected to an assessment of its current status and future potential toward becoming a Learning College by reference to the external and internal conditions, which it is currently facing, and then comparing it to the criteria developed for an ideal Learning College. This assessment provides the basis for detailed recommendations for action that TMI can undertake if it wishes to proceed toward implementation of learning-centred education. The thesis concludes with a discussion of the implications of learning-centred education for higher education, for continuing professional education, for further study in this area, as well as the possible future uses of the instrument developed in this thesis for assessing the level of learning-centred education achieved in colleges.