VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
A safe haven?: the ongoing debate on the policy required to most appropriately and effectively deal with war criminals in Canada

This Thesis considers and assesses the adequacy and effectiveness of Canadian historical and current policy dealing with war criminals. Excluding the four decades subsequent to WWII, Canada's decision makers have followed an adequate policy on preventing war criminals from entering and residing within the country. Prior to the middle of the 1980's the issue of war criminals was wholly ignored in the nation but since that time more effective policies have been implemented, tested, and progressively improved. The country's current policy and legislative scheme allow for effective dealing with war criminals. Some necessary remedies have yet to be used and need to be pursued in order to make the policy completely successful. However, the policy on this matter has suffered from the serious flaw that not all available remedies against war criminals have been utilized. Domestic prosecution of war criminals found in Canada has simply not been a viable option.

Keywords: War criminals, Canada
Crimes against humanity
World War, 1939-1945, Canada
The diagnosis, prognosis and treatment of the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS): A retrospective cohort study of the Toronto SARS outbreak

Background. During the global severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) outbreak, patients were treated with high dose ribavirin although its safety and efficacy were unknown. We conducted a retrospective cohort study of the completed Toronto SARS outbreak to evaluate the efficacy and safety of ribavirin in the treatment of SARS. Methods. The study population included all adult patients hospitalized with suspected SARS. Cases were classified as confirmed, excluded or indeterminate using microbiological methods. The presentation of confirmed and excluded SARS patients were compared to identify diagnostically useful findings. A prognostic rule predictive of mechanical ventilation and/or death was derived using multivariable regression and externally validated. A logistic model predictive of treatment status was used to assign a propensity score to each patient. Patients were stratified into five groups based on their propensity score. Post-stratification covariate balance was assessed using standardized differences. The treatment effect was estimated within quintiles and then averaged across quintiles. The incidence of adverse events were compared in treated and untreated patients. Results. Direct contact with a SARS case, fever, lymphopenia or thrombocytopenia were more common in confirmed cases, while rhinorrhea, sore throat, productive cough and an elevated absolute neutrophil count were more common in excluded cases. Age, pulmonary infiltrates and hypoxemia were independent predictors of mechanical ventilation and/or death. Our prognostic rule had an area under the receiver operating characteristic curve of 0.88, which fell to 0.77 on external validation. We were unable to obtain covariate balance using propensity score stratification, suggesting that residual confounding was present in our estimates of treatment effect. Progressive anemia, bradycardia, hypomagnesemia and hypocalcemia were associated with the use of ribavirin. Conclusions. Clinical and epidemiological findings may be useful in the diagnosis of SARS. Our prognostic rule identifies patients at risk of respiratory failure due to SARS and could be used to assist in making triage and treatment decisions. Ribavirin efficacy could not be established and ribavirin use was associated with frequent adverse events. Our results suggest that ribavirin should not be used in the treatment of future SARS cases except in the context of a randomized controlled trial.
The effect of sugar and fat on glycemic response in type 1 diabetes

This thesis examines the role of sugars and fats on glycemic responses. We hypothesized that, in the context of normal mixed-meals, blood glucose concentrations would rise and fall more quickly after meals with a higher sugar content in both healthy control and type 1 diabetes (T1DM) subjects, and that adding fat would flatten glycemic responses in control subjects but not those with T1DM. In both Control and T1DM subjects, high sugar meals elicited quicker rises and falls in blood glucose than the starch meals (p
Re-visioning staff development for K--6 French immersion teachers: a case study of a professional learning community

The present case study examines the inception, development and achievements of a professional learning community (PLC) comprised of French immersion teachers working in three schools, located in a large urban school board in Ontario. Professional learning communities represent a new wave of staff development, founded upon the principle that professional development is most effective when it is school-based, sustained and collaborative rather that centralized, ad hoc and didactic. The PLC presented in this study, was established in 2000, and is among the first of its kind within the school district. The fact that the school board has pioneered this staff development model with French immersion teachers is of particular interest, given the well-documented history of inadequacy of pre-service and in-service preparation opportunities for immersion teachers. In the final chapter, the information acquired through this investigation has been applied to present a plan for future creation of similar learning communities.

Keywords: French language, Study and teaching
French language, Ontario
French teachers, In-service training
French teachers, Ontario
Elementary school teachers, In-service training
Elementary school teachers, Ontario
Planetary system evolution: Planet-disk interactions and planet ejection from binary systems

Throughout the evolution of a planetary system, planets, especially those newly formed, interact by several means with a variety of the system's constituents. In particular, the influence of the most massive planets is expected to govern much of the long-term evolution of the system. In early stages of this evolution, the gas disk that provided the material from which the planets formed also acts to couple the planets to its own dynamics. In part I of this thesis, I describe a new hydrodynamic code that I have developed, tuned to study these interactions. Using this code, I explore the formation of hydrodynamic structures within the disk, such as jets and eddies, that arise from the influence of the planets on the overall flow. I show that while the formation of vortices is damped in disks with a large enough viscosity, jet formation is more robust in this sense and jet structures form even in viscous flows. I further propose that these jets may affect the amount of material transport that occurs in the flow in a manner similar to that found in the Earth's atmosphere and in the weather layers of the Jovian planets. In order to qualify this claim, I perform preliminary numerical experiments that aim to establish this relationship. Even after the removal of the gas disk, the gravitational influence of massive planets---or stellar companions in the case of multiple systems---severely limits the range of stable orbits of the system's lesser planets. In part II of this thesis, I examine the physical mechanisms responsible for planet ejection from unstable orbits previously observed in numerical experiments. I determine the instability is due to overlap of subresonances lying within mean-motion resonances.
Texture synthesis using convolution and nonlinear mapping

A great deal of attention has been paid to the problem of texture synthesis. Procedural techniques have become commonplace. Yet while a proliferation of models, and the success of nonparametric synthesis-from-example methods, has made an extraordinary variety of textures realizable, still the creation of novel textures is a challenge. We present a model where iteration of nonlinear functions and convolution is combined with multiscale cascade and summation. The textures resulting from this model share characteristics with textures we deem “natural”: they exhibit a tension between structure, or smoothness, and randomness, or roughness. Many texture synthesis methods generate only statistically stationary textures. Even when nonstationary texture can be generated, the changes in structure can seem arbitrary. We present a method for adjusting our model's parameters according to higher-level transforms in order to achieve controllable changes in structure. This method is sufficiently straightforward that it can be used to blend between two dissimilar textures, automatically generating a plausible continuum of intermediate texture types. Textures from iterating the basic synthesis operator have frequency content on approximately the scale of the operator's kernel. We enhance the expressiveness of our method by specifically allowing multiple levels of detail: we perform a cascade of operations by applying a single operator, upsampling the lattice and adding a small amount of noise, then applying a new operator to the new lattice, and repeating the process. We can use the final lattice as a texture itself, or each lattice in the cascade can be an octave in a summed texture. We extend our method's ability to generate greyscale texture to permit coloured texture. Though good spatial coherence and continuity of colour is observed, control over the specific colours expressing texture features is difficult to accomplish within our original framework; to address this, we present a simple method for recolouring images, based on radial basis functions.
Cell and molecular biological studies of the hypersensitive response induced in cowpea by the cowpea rust fungus

A cytological and molecular biological approach was undertaken to examine the events that occur during the very early stages of the hypersensitive response (HR) in cowpea midvein epidermal cells that are being infected by the cowpea rust fungus. The HR is one of the most-ubiquitous defense responses that plants exhibit in response to pathogen infection and has been defined as the rapid, localized cell death in association with disease resistance. For the cytological portion of the study, stereological ultrastructural analyses of rust fungus infected and uninfected midvein epidermal cells from resistant and susceptible plants indicated that transcription and translation were up-regulated in the cells of the resistant plant while the fungus was penetrating through the plant cell wall, and prior to fungal contact with the plant plasma membrane. Conversely, in the rust-susceptible cells, there was evidence that decreases in transcription and translation occurred in the rust fungus-infected cells at this same stage of infection. To identify genes that were up-regulated in the rust resistant cowpea cells during this very early stage of the penetration process, cytoplasm was extracted from individual epidermal cells of rust fungus-inoculated and uninoculated plants that were either resistant or susceptible to the fungus. RNA was isolated from each of the extracted cell types and amplified in a non-gene-specific manner in order to generate a 3′ EST library for each of the four cell types. Differential screening of the library generated from the infected-resistant cells resulted in the identification of three overall groups of genes. These were genes that were up-regulated in both the infected-resistant and -susceptible cells, those that appeared to be suppressed in the infected-susceptible plants and those that were up-regulated only in the infected-resistant cells. Genes in the latter situation differed from those reported previously for studies of the HR that involved sample tissue including both living cells and those advanced in the death process.
The "passing on" argument in the context of private enforcement of competition law rules

Several decades ago, the U.S. Supreme Court rendered two landmark decisions in the field of antitrust damage law---"Illinois Brick" and "Hanover Shoe"---that both dealt with the problem of "passing on" supra-competitive overcharges. Neither in Canada non in Europe, "passing on" has been an issue but until recently, since a trend has developed in both legal orders to shift the enforcement of competition laws from public to private agents. The aim of the thesis is to evaluate different policy options for the "passing on" problem. The analysis is based on a general reflection on the rationales of private enforcement and examines the economics of "passing on". It is argued that since compensation is hard to achieve, it is dubious whether private enforcement can be defended on the grounds that private litigants are more efficient enforcers than public agents.
Properties and application of thermo- and pH-responsive polymers for drug and gene delivery

Thermoresponsive polymers based on poly[N-isopropylacrylamide] were prepared as linear chains and crosslinked polymer nanogels. pH-responsiveness was introduced by the incorporation of acidic and basic comonomers, methacrylic acid and 2-(dimethylamino)ethyl methacrylate, respectively. The responsive properties of nanogels were characterized in terms of the effects of chemical composition, temperature, pH and ionic strength on the volume phase transition. The drug loading and release properties of anionic nanogels were evaluated using model drug compounds. Release of small cationic molecules by ion-exchange mechanism and macromolecules by diffusion mechanism from the gels was demonstrated. The rate of diffusion was dependent on the swelling state of the gel phase and decreased dramatically upon gel collapse at low pH and above the phase transition temperature of the gels. Convection driven release of macromolecular drug in response to temperature was demonstrated. Responsive anionic nanogels have potential utility in drug delivery applications where protection and rapid release of drug is required. Responsive cationic nanogels based on N-isopropylacrylamide and 2-(dimethylamino)ethyl methacrylate or its quaternary alkyl ammonium halide salts were investigated as DNA carriers. Differences in the pH- and ionic strength-dependence of phase transition properties of cationic nanogels were attributed to the nature and to the distribution of structural charge in the gels. The results showed that stable cationic nanogels with tunable responsiveness could be prepared with potential for nucleic acid delivery. Responsive cationic copolymers were tested as components of non-viral transfectants and as modifiers of adenoviral vectors for gene delivery. The copolymers were shown to effectively modulate gene expression of plasmid DNA and adenovirus vectors when coupled by electrostatic interaction. The coupling of copolymer and plasmid DNA complexes with adenovirus resulted in transgene expression even in the absence of a functional viral genome suggesting that aggregate systems incorporating responsive copolymers with non-viral and viral components may lead to improved vector performance.

Keywords: Pharmacy
Medicine
The development of the health biotechnology sector in South Africa

This is a qualitative study of the South African health biotechnology sector. This study uses the National System of Innovation (NSI) framework as a conceptual tool to identify and analyze the factors that encourage and/or hinder the development of the health biotechnology in South Africa. This study aims at gaining an insight of how the sector has developed within the NSI framework and provide lessons for other developing countries on how to develop a local capacity and effectively harness health biotechnology innovations to improve health. This study identifies the main themes that have arguably influenced the development of the health biotechnology in the country. These themes include, the exploitation of indigenous knowledge together with science based innovations, the importance of adopting a biotechnology strategy that identifies new opportunities and a competitive edge, the importance of knowledge networks and mission oriented strategies that target local health needs.
Feminist explorations in selfhood, identity and autonomy from a relational perspective

0The purpose of this thesis is to advance a relational model of selfhood and autonomy that makes multiple and intersecting differences amongst women theoretically central. This is important, I argue, because much of the relational literature in feminist theory is perceived as upholding a dualistic and essentialist conception of gender. While the earlier literature (Dinnerstein, Chodorow, Gilligan) is more vulnerable to this charge than more recent articulations (Minow, Ruddick, Hoagland), I suggest that there is still much work to be done towards incorporating the concept of multiplicity into a relational model. Towards this end, I put forward what I term a multi-relational approach, which demands that the self be understood not only in relation to (1) interpersonal relationships, but also in relation to (2) material structures and institutions, (3) discourses—interpretative frameworks and narratives that produce social meanings, and (4) the dynamic and fluid ways in which all of these relations intersect. By encouraging us to examine social relations from the vantage point of these many sides, I suggest that my approach helps to unlayer the social relations that lay behind and construct differences in the first place, and in turn prompts a critical posture regarding what kinds of relations might promote flourishing and what kinds might undermine it. In chapters one and two I lay the ground work for my multi-relational approach. In chapter three, I use this approach to advance a relational conception of autonomy. Drawing on the work of Cornelius Castoriadis and Hannah Arendt, I suggest a way for thinking about the relational nature of autonomy as the creative ways an agent negotiates and navigates the relational world that it inhabits. In chapter four, I explore the dynamics of this process through the medium of personal narrative using the childhood memoir of bell hooks. And in chapter five, I explore how selfhood and autonomy are understood within a completely different world view, that of Orthodox Judaism. I explore this example to see what we can learn when autonomy is exercised within deep structures of interpersonal and communal relationships.
An investigation of an augmented reality display of predictive and historical trajectory information for manual control under misaligned visual-motor mappings

Under conditions of misaligned, or non-natural, visual-motor mappings, accurate spatial control of human movement is difficult. Historically operators have learned to compensate for these misalignments through extensive practice. A display concept is proposed to facilitate adaptation to this control difficulty by providing historical and predictive trajectory information using an augmented reality technique. An experimental platform to test the display concept is developed. The rapid adaptation to several rotationally misaligned visual-motor mappings conditions is tested with three modes of the proposed display (historical information, predictive information, and both) and a control using a sequential aiming task. Global performance measures, analysis of trajectory characteristics, and correlations with spatial abilities are reported. The performance detriment of the rotational misalignments follows the typical pattern of results seen in the literature. Predictive information appears to assist adaptation to some conditions of misaligned visual-motor mappings; however this finding is highly constrained.
Readers' perceptions of lexical cohesion and lexical semantic relations in text

The potential subjectivity of human interpretation is largely ignored in current research on automatic text understanding. Current computational systems are largely based on statistical analysis of text corpora and focus on meaning presumed to exist "in the text", whereas text meaning in computational linguistics in the past and in other disciplines (English, education, and philosophy) is considered to exist "in the text", "in the reader", and "in the writer". This study is an empirical investigation of the subjectivity of readers' perceptions of two related aspects of meaning in text: lexical cohesion and the lexical semantic relations that are its building blocks. Also, the types of lexical semantic relations given by the readers are analyzed. In library and information science, linguistics, computational linguistics, and psychology, lexical semantic relations have largely been studied outside the context of text, and readers' views have not been studied. In this study, participants were given extracts from general-interest articles. They marked groups of words they perceived as related while reading the text, identified related pairs of words within these groups, and stated what the relations were. First, average pair-wise agreement statistics indicate 60% agreement on lexical cohesion as represented by word groups marked by at least 4 readers. For relations between word pairs marked by more than one reader, 70% were similarly described. These results indicate that applications using lexical cohesion and lexical semantic relations for text understanding should consider reader subjectivity and that similar research on the subjectivity of other aspects of text meaning should be conducted. Reader models are suggested to computationally account for interpretations of text meaning that are "in the reader". Thus, a return to considering all three views of text meaning is suggested as computers provide increasingly complex interpretations of text. Second, 62% of the readers' relations were non-classical (not hyponymy, meronymy, synonymy or antonymy). A group of 20 types was found to cover the readers' relation descriptions. These types have potential use in applications that rely on identifying lexical cohesion and/or lexical semantic relations in text. The readers' focus on non-classical relations indicates a need for a similar focus in research and applications.