VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
Infrapolitics [electronic resource] : the social life of water in Mumbai

Framed by popular and scholarly anxieties about burgeoning cities on one hand, and disappearing water resources on the other, this dissertation is an account of how urban water is made, moved, and subsequently delivered to settlers and other marginalized residents in one of the world's largest cities- Mumbai, India. Based on twenty-two months of ethnographic fieldwork among settlers, engineers of the city's water department, and various other urban experts (plumbers, city planners, social workers), it explores how cities, citizens and their states are made and differentiated through the incremental and continuous extension of the city's hydraulic infrastructure. In theorizing how cities are claimed, inhabited and made livable, particularly for (and by) politically marginalized groups, this research seeks to make a contribution to the literature in political ecology, state formation and citizenship. Where many settlers are formally and substantively denied access to water from the city's public system, I show how they access water through infrapolitics, by drawing on relations with social workers, laws, politicians, pipes, plumbers and policies. By focusing on these everyday practices of making connections, this dissertation shows why we need to reconsider normative distinctions between rights and commodities, persistent in international debates about urban water supply. The everyday practices of settlers in making water connections effect what I suggest are forms of hydraulic citizenship; forms of belonging to the city that are enabled by effective political and material claims to the city's public water system. I show how settlers mobilize hydraulic citizenship through a diverse articulation of political, social and material relations with the city's water pipes and their various authorities. In showing how Mumbai's hydraulic infrastructure constantly and consistently escapes political control, this research also seeks to make a contribution to the scholarship in Science Studies and Political Ecology. I suggest that the materiality of the city's public water system- made through thousands of miles of pipes and employees- makes it especially conducive to the claims of marginalized groups. As settlers and other residents constantly mobilize their votes, favors and money to evaluate and respond to the dynamic flow of water in the city, their connections both elucidate and differentiate the ways in which they are able to make reliable homes in the city despite the predations of states and markets.

Keywords: Anthropology
Advisor: Ferguson James
Gupta Akhil
Yanagisako Sylvia Junko
Innovation in modular industries [electronic resource] : implementing energy-efficient innovations in US buildings

Product architectures are becoming increasingly modular, along with the industries that produce them. Instead of a single integrated firm designing and producing an entire product, clusters of firms design and produce individual components that are later integrated. While modularity has often been hailed as a catalyst for innovation, I show that modularity can hinder some kinds of innovation. Within a modular system, innovations that are limited to individual modules without altering interfaces and processes (modular innovations) thrive, while innovations that cross module boundaries and alter interfaces and processes (integral innovations) are stifled. In a study of implementations of twenty three different technologies in one hundred and twelve US buildings, I demonstrate that the odds for integral innovations to be implemented are 84% lower than for modular innovations, even after accounting for technology costs and other factors. The primary underlying mechanism is that integral innovations involve a loss of the embedded coordination that standardization provides. Thus, I investigate supply chain integration as a moderator and a substitute for the lost coordination. I compare high integration (both vertical and horizontal), medium integration (either vertical or horizontal), and low integration (neither vertical nor horizontal). I demonstrate that as integration increases, so does the likelihood of implementing integral innovations. In fact, the odds of implementation of integral innovations increase by 542% in supply chains characterized by high levels of integration. Thus, I shed light on the relationship between an innovation's alignment with existing industry structure and standards and the complex moderating effect of supply chain integration in modular industries. In addition, I develop a comprehensive analytical framework to explain innovation diffusion in the construction industry -- integrating the supply chain learning and coordination issues discussed above with high levels of demand fluctuation, competitive bidding by trade, and broken agency.

Advisor: Levitt Raymond E. primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Katila Riitta advisor. Thesis advisor
Taylor John E.
Insights into structural details and energy usage of the group II chaperonin TRiC [electronic resource]

Chaperonins are a subset of molecular chaperones which assist in the protein folding process. These oligomeric chaperone complexes can be classified into two structurally distinct classes: group I, which are found in prokaryotes and endosymbiotic organelles, or group II, which are present in archaea and eukaryotes. The TCP-1 ring complex (TRiC) or CCT, is an essential, barrel-shaped group II chaperonin complex involved in folding approximately 10% of all proteins within the eukaryotic cytosol. While the general architecture of TRiC is understood, the exact arrangement of the 8 unique TRiC subunits (CCT1-8) within each ring, as well as the stacking between the two rings, has been debated for over a decade. This thesis includes data to support a specific arrangement for the TRiC complex based on results from mass spectrometry from crosslinked yeast and bovine TRiC, yeast ex vivo crosslinking, and probabilistic models. In addition, this work also characterizes the different affinities for ATP among CCT1-8 as well as their functional relevance in vivo. These developments contribute to the understanding of fundamental mechanisms regarding how TRiC mediates the folding of different protein substrates in the chaperonin-assisted folding process.

Keywords: Biology.
Advisor: Frydman Judith primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Gozani Or Pinchas advisor. Thesis advisor
Nelson W. J. (W. James) advisor. Thesis advisor
Yang Yanmin
An integrated approach to robotic navigation under uncertainty [electronic resource]

Autonomous robot navigation has been gaining popularity in the field of robotics research due to its important and broad applications. Sequential Monte Carlo methods, also known as particle filters, are a class of sophisticated Bayesian filters for nonlinear/non-Gaussian model estimation, and have been used for the simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) problem in robot navigation in lieu of extended Kalman filters. However, the current particle filters, and their derivatives such as the particle-based SLAM filters for robotic navigation, still need further improvement to have better trade-off between performance and complexity in order to be used for online applications. Also, the current robot navigation approaches often focus on one aspect of the problem, lacking an integrated structure. In this work, we designed better sampling proposal distributions for particle filters, and demonstrated their superiority in simulation. Then, we applied our new particle filters to design and implement improved particle-based SLAM filters for the application of the SLAM problem in robot navigation, and tested using both simulation and outdoor experimental datasets. Finally, we incorporated the new particle-based SLAM filters in the design of a new framework for solving robotic navigation problems under uncertainty in a continuous environment. The framework balances between exploration and exploitation, and integrates global planning algorithms, local navigation routines, and exploration procedures in order to achieve the global goal, overcoming many common drawbacks of current approaches.

Keywords: Electrical Engineering
Advisor: Cover T. M.
Lai T. L. primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Glynn Peter W. advisor. Thesis advisor
Integrated plasmonic waveguide photodetectors for optical interconnection of silicon chips [electronic resource]

To keep pace with the scaling of semiconductor technology, the amount of energy required to transmit one bit of information needs to be drastically reduced. Optical interconnects may become a key technology in enabling high bandwidth interconnections, provided that its components operate at sufficiently low energies per bit. At the receiver, the capacitance of the photodetector limits the speed and power consumption that can be achieved. Lower capacitance can be achieved by reducing the physical size of the photodetector to nanoscale volumes, an order of magnitude smaller than the optical wavelength. This dissertation focuses on metallic nanostructures that can be used to bridge this size mismatch between the optical mode and the optoelectronic device. They can be used to enhance the interaction between the optical signal and the photodetector, and if designed as a waveguiding structure, they can provide an efficient way of routing optical signals with deep subwavelength mode dimensions and can integrate well with nanoscale photodetectors, providing a route towards highly integrated low capacitance detectors for optical interconnects.

Keywords: Electrical Engineering
Advisor: Miller D. A. B. primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Brongersma Mark L. advisor. Thesis advisor
Fan Shanhui
Integration of electronic health records and public biological repositories illuminates human pathophysiology and underlying molecular relationships [electronic resource]

Secondary use of electronic health record (EHR) data has the potential to unlock novel insight into human pathophysiology. While EHR data has often been used in retrospective studies, management of public health, and to improve patient safety, its use in discovering underlying molecular mechanisms of human disease and pathophysiology has been limited. Much of this can be attributed to the differing priorities between healthcare providers and basic biological researchers. The advent of biobanks that collect physiological measurements as well as tissue samples and molecular measurements promises to address this issue. However, the sheer number of different biological and clinical measurement modalities hinders the generation of a truly complete view of the human organism. The increased adoption of EHRs as well as growing biological data repositories enables researchers to answer biological questions applicable to the human population. The goal is not to treat humans as experimental organisms, but rather to gain as much knowledge as possible from every patient seen. By viewing EHRs as a repository of perturbations and their associated physiological consequences we can begin to design experiments that leverage EHR data to generate hypotheses that can be further evaluated. This thesis aims to describe methods to summarize EHR biomarker data in a systematic way to enable downstream analysis as well as methods for integrating EHR data and disparate biological data. I will describe the creation of the "clinarray" and its application to specific disease populations to differentiate patients by severity and to discover latent physiological factors associated with disease. I will also describe how to aggregate and analyze clinarrays from across the EHR to build models of aging. Finally I will discuss the use of diseases to integrate EHR data with gene expression data from a disparate biological data source to discover genes related to aging and to generate hypotheses for relationships between biomarkers and genes. The integration of readily available clinical and biological data promises to improve our understanding of phenomics without impacting patient care and adding an unnecessary burden to the healthcare system. It is important for biological research to leverage the increased amount of molecular and environmental data stored in EHRs to build a more complete view of the human organism.

Keywords: Biomedical Informatics.
Advisor: Butte Atul J. primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Altman Russ advisor. Thesis advisor
Walker Michael advisor. Thesis advisor
Integration of sensory and reward information during perceptual decision-making in lateral intraparietal cortex (LIP) [electronic resource]

The work presented in this dissertation primarily focuses on decision-related activity in the lateral intraparietal area (LIP) and, secondarily, the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC). In Chapter 1 we review the previous independent investigations indicating that these areas are separately modulated by sensory information, value information and choice appropriate to represent decisions. We argue that when both sensory and value information must be simultaneously integrated to make choices, it is unknown, if, how and when these areas integrate these factors. We present a behavioral paradigm in which animal subjects must combine sensory and value information, on a trial-to-trial basis, to make optimal choices. This paradigm is based on a well-known motion discrimination task; however, in our task the magnitude of the reward associated with each option varies from trial to trial. On some trials both options are worth equally large or small rewards. On other trials one option's reward is greater than that of the other. In Chapter 2, we demonstrate that in the unequal reward conditions subjects' choices are consistently biased towards the greater magnitude option. Additionally, we will show that this bias is independent of the motion stimulus strength and its magnitude is nearly optimal. In Chapter 3, we observe that single neurons in cortical area LIP consistently, simultaneously and dynamically represent both sensory and value information. We will argue that this representation supports an integrator model of decision making, in which sensory information is accumulated until the decision is resolved by a threshold crossing. Our results support an interpretation of this model in which value information adjusts the likelihood of a threshold crossing by iv raising or lowering the accumulator's initial state. In Chapter 4, we present a preliminary comparison between LIP and DLPFC activity, under identical conditions, suggesting they play fundamentally different roles in decision making. In Chapter 5, we discuss future lines of research.

Keywords: Neurobiology.
Advisor: Newsome William T. primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Knutson Brian advisor. Thesis advisor
Moore Tirin
Shenoy Krishna V. (Krishna Vaughn) advisor. Thesis advisor
Intermediated blind portfolio auctions [electronic resource]

As much as 12% of the daily volume on the New York Stock Exchange, and similar volumes on other major world exchanges, involves the sale of portfolios by institutional investors to brokers through blind portfolio auctions. Such transactions typically take the form of a first-price sealed-bid auction in which the seller engages a few potential brokers and provides limited information about the portfolio being sold. Uncertainty about the portfolio contents reduces bids, effectively increasing the transaction cost paid by the seller. We consider the use of a trusted intermediary or equivalent cryptographic protocol to reduce transaction costs. In particular, we propose a mechanism through which each party provides relevant private information to an intermediary who ultimately reveals only the portfolio contents and price paid, and only to the seller and winning broker. Through analysis of a game-theoretic model, we demonstrate substantial potential benefits to sellers. For example, under reasonable assumptions a seller can reduce expected transaction costs by as much as 10% under a broker valuation model that induces efficient allocations at equilibrium, and as much as 33% under one that does not. We also consider the effects of intermediation on broker payoffs and social welfare as well as its performance in the context of the second-price auction. In addition, we consider the two-stage game in which sellers have the choice of selecting intermediation or not and show that under certain reasonable modeling assumptions that all sellers will select intermediation at equilibrium.

Keywords: Electrical Engineering
Advisor: Van Roy Benjamin primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Goel Ashish advisor. Thesis advisor
Johari Ramesh
Intermittent and transient behavior in Cygnus X-1 and GRS 1915+105 X-ray emission [electronic resource]

Much work has been done on trying to gain insight into the dynamics of accreting systems, such as black hole and neutron star binaries, by analyzing timing measurements from X-ray telescopes. In this thesis we present a novel approach to this problem using a kurtosis measure of the wavelet distribution obtained from the light curve to quantify the presence of intermittent activity. This method is applied to large RXTE data sets for GRS 1915+105, and Cygnus X-1. We demonstrate a new approach to reveal bursting modes. Negative correlation between the presence of a low frequency QPO in the Cygnus X-1 Fourier power spectrum and a wavelet kurtosis indicator of temporal intermittency is observed. A possible interpretation of this anti-correlation is developed using a "dripping handrail" transient chaos model.

Keywords: Physics
Advisor: Bloom E. (Elliott)
Blandford Roger D. advisor. Thesis advisor
Wagoner Bob
Internal Beam Annihilation Therapy: A Novel Approach to Radiation Therapy

Photon external beam therapy is currently the most widely used modality of radiotherapy in the treatment of cancer. However, due to the exponential characteristics of photon attenuation in matter, most of the energy is deposited before the beam even reaches the tumor inside the body. This results in poor dose conformity and large entrance doses, causing undesired irradiation of healthy tissue which can ultimately lead to toxicity and secondary cancers. In this study we describe a new theoretical modality of radiotherapy termed Internal Beam Annihilation Therapy (IBAT) which in an ideal model case can exhibit far superior dose contrast and conformity by using muon anti-muon annihilation at the tumor site. Using Monte Carlo simulation in conjunction with FLUKA, a particle transport code, we evaluate the energy deposition distribution of such a modality and compare its unique characteristics with those of existing modalities.

Keywords: Physics
Burchat, Patricia
cancer treatment
radiotherapy
Internal Beam Annihilation Therapy
IBAT
Thesis
Interorganizational ties and organizational outcomes [electronic resource] : essays on the role of network ties and ecological factors in the U.S. venture capital industry, 1961-2002

This dissertation integrates relational (network) factors emphasized by the social exchange perspective and ecological factors emphasized by population ecology and demography to account for organizational outcomes. It includes three essays that analyze the ways in which interorganizational ties and ecological factors interact to affect organizational outcomes. The first essay shows that firms with wide market niches depend on alliances with other organizations for survival more than do organizations with narrower niches. It also demonstrates that generalist and specialist organizations increase their survival chances by exploiting resources complementary through interorganizational ties with each other. The second essay distinguishes between two types of centrality in a network: status centrality and hub centrality and analyzes their effects on organizational outcomes and mutual dynamics. Results indicates that status centrality positively affects access to and quality of market resources available to organizations as well as their survival and that hub centrality has no effect on these outcomes. Finally, the third essay finds that status increases an organization's chances of survival the most in periods where survival chances are lowest due to environmental (ecological) factors. Status thus plays the role of a "safety net", allowing high status organizations to survive in periods where lower status organizations fail.

Keywords: Sociology
Advisor: Granovetter Mark S. primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Grusky David B. advisor. Thesis advisor
Zhou Xueguang
Interrogating, manipulating, and controlling nano-bio interfaces [electronic resource]

Cells communicate through direct contact and soluble chemical signals. Mimicking an extracellular environment requires controlling these signals at micron length scales. Integrated circuits make electronic control at these scales trivial, but fluidic control at these length scales requires very different principles. Standard microfluidic devices can finely control flowing fluids, but fluid flow affects cells in a myriad of ways. Alternatively, diffusion based chemical delivery methods tend to be crude, ill defined systems that offer very limited control. This thesis describes three distinctive platforms that combine the active spatial and temporal control of microfluidic systems with a delivery system that relies purely on diffusion. First, we detail a silicon based array of nanoreservoirs underneath the cell culture surface which are used to store and release bioactive molecules. These reservoirs are opened and closed with electrochemical dissolution and deposition at a narrow reservoir opening. Next, we describe an adaptation of traditional, elastomer based microfluidics. In these devices the cell culture area is separated from a microfluidic channel located directly underneath the chamber by a nanoporous membrane. The desirable microfluidic properties, including temporal and spatial control, are preserved, while fluidic flow over the cells is eliminated. Finally, we demonstrate a novel "nanostraw" culture surface, which is combined with the previous device to offer fluidic access directly to the cell cytosol, creating a powerful tool with implications for cell delivery and sampling. Additional work on probing the assembly of protein structures is also detailed. Clathrin 2-dimensional lattice assembly on lipid monolayers, serving as cell membrane mimics, was monitored and studied through surface rheological techniques. Rheological measurements elucidated important network properties, and the formation process was compared to various models for clathrin network assembly.

Keywords: Materials Science and Engineering
Advisor: Melosh Nicholas A. primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Heilshorn Sarah advisor. Thesis advisor
Longaker Michael T.