VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
Detection of eyelid position in eye-tracking systems

The estimation of eyelid position relative to the pupil is important for improving the accuracy of eye tracking systems and estimating subject fatigue level. Novel algorithms were developed for the detection of eyelid relative to the pupil by a band of local minima appearing at the boundary of the eyelid and the iris, and by the change in tangential angle of the pupil boundary. The algorithms were optimized to recognize all images with partial pupil coverage, resulting in a false negative rate of 9.5%. Another algorithm was developed to measure the percentage of pupil coverage, which was shown to have a RMS error of 4.2%. The algorithms were used successfully to reduce the bias in pupil centre estimates due to eyelid interference to within 1° of visual angle of the expected pupil centre position when the pupil was covered by less than 30%.
On modeling surface tension-dominant, large density ratio, two-phase flows

For many interfacial flows, especially at small scales, surface tension is a dominant force. Since the surface tension force is proportional to the interface curvature, precise calculation of the curvature is crucial for accurately modeling the surface tension effects. Errors in computed curvatures can generate spurious currents in flows, which can dominate important physical effects such as buoyancy. The other key issue in modeling interfacial flows is that the timestep restriction associated with common surface tension models is very stringent, especially when surface tension is a dominant force. A semi-implicit algorithm for implementing surface tension in finite volume models is presented, by which the surface tension timestep restriction can be exceeded by at least a factor of five without destabilizing the solution. This significantly reduces simulation run times, by allowing larger timesteps. The results of the implicit model at large timesteps are very similar to those of the explicit models. The surface tension force is applied to the velocity field by solving a system of equations iteratively. Since the equations are solved only near interfaces, the computational time spent on the iterative procedure is insignificant. Note that the two new methods developed here were not implemented together. A new methodology is presented for accurately calculating normals and curvature of an interface, in which the interface unit normals are advected along with whatever function represents the interface, and curvatures are calculated directly from these advected normals. The new method has been implemented in a flow solver that is capable of simulating interfacial flows of any density ratio, via a consistent mass and momentum advection scheme. Test results show that the new method is second-order accurate in space when calculating normals, and that it yields curvatures that converge with a good order of accuracy, unlike traditional approaches that calculate gradients of the volume-of-fluid (VOF) or level set (LS) function, in a coupled LS and VOF context. Furthermore, the new method yields interface geometry more accurately. Results show that the new methodology generates smaller spurious currents, compared to using the VOF or LS functions, and that it is capable of modeling interfacial flows that involves interface breakup.
The role of Caspase-3 in c-Myc-induced beta-cell apoptosis

C-Myc is a powerful trigger of beta-cell apoptosis and proliferation in rodent islets in vivo. In a transgenic tamoxifen-inducible model of c-Myc activation, c-Myc induction causes rapid beta-cell apoptosis and acute hyperglycemia. In this model, suppression of apoptosis by overexpression of the anti-apoptotic Bcl-xL gene leads to a full spectrum of tumor development upon c-Myc induction. Caspase-3 is a key effector molecule in the apoptotic process. To test the hypothesis that elimination of Caspase-3 will confer protection of beta-cells from c-Myc-induced apoptosis without the tumour formation seen in Bcl-xL overexpressing mice, we generated Caspase-3 knockout mice containing the c-Myc-inducible transgene. Indeed, in contrast to Bcl-xL overexpression, we have found that Caspase-3 deletion confers protection from c-Myc-induced apoptosis and diabetes development without unwanted tumourigenic effects. Results from these experiments may lead to further elucidation of mechanisms of c-Myc biology relevant to beta-cells which may result in novel therapeutic strategies for diabetes.
Is the Canadian extradition scheme consistent with Canada's national and international obligations?

The essay explores the conformity of the extradition scheme with Canadian Constitutional Law and International Law, and determines whether the scheme is consistent with s. 7 of the Canadian Charter and Canada's obligation under the Convention Against Torture and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. It focuses on the standard of review applicable to administrative surrender decisions under the Extradition Act. The author proposes improvements to the extradition scheme to ensure its conformity with the Canadian Charter and international law. The paper examines various sources of international law and their normative impact on domestic law. It also explores the problems raised by the fact that non-independent decision-makers take surrender decisions that are not effectively judicially reviewed by superior courts.
"Nomadic" modernisms, modernist "nomadisms": (Dis)figuring exile in selected works of Djuna Barnes, Jean Rhys, Jane Bowles, and Eva Hoffman

Most recent revisionist studies of modernist and contemporary women's writing about exile deploy nomadism, migrancy, and travel as important vehicles for achieving a cross-culturally negotiated, feminist identity. Their contention is that the potential dangers inherent in nomadism and exilic displacement as well as the resulting in-betweenness are, nonetheless, important, if not crucial and justifiable means towards intellectual, spiritual, and artistic development. Viewed in this light, women writers' figurations of home and exile are interpreted as complementary or surrogate locations where fixed national and cultural identities are rendered fluid or completely eradicated. This thesis argues that modernist and contemporary women's narratives about exilic displacement hesitate to erase the line between exile and home just as they do not always justify the consequences of radical dislocation as constructive. Through a close reading of narratives by modernist women writers, Djuna Barnes, Jean Rhys, and Jane Bowles, and a contemporary writer, the essayist, and critic, Eva Hoffman, this thesis traces the ways in which these women writers (dis)figure various exilic and nomadic visions. It argues that the refrains of exile inscribed in their narratives problematize the tempting alternative of seeking a sense of self-locatedness in and through multiple re- and dis-locations, physical or figurative. In their work, their characters' exilic displacement is mostly aligned with drastic socio-cultural paradigm shifts that not only impact their sense of self and body, but also contribute to their psychological, cultural, or linguistic nomadisms that are not always productive. Viewing specific historical and socio-cultural events (for example, literary expatriate movements, WWI, WWII, and migration waves) as necessary yet displaced faces/phases of their characters' psychological and bodily topographies, these women writers' narratives consequently question the potential of the autobiographical genre to function as a textual home in which the exile's cultural, psychological, and bodily ruins may be housed.
Investigation of formation and stability of fixation products of inorganic wood preservatives based on their differential solubilities in aqueous solutions

The information on availability and stability of preservative components from treated wood is essential for the assessment of preservative performance, environmental losses, and development of remedial extraction treatments of preservative treated wood. The chemical nature of fixation products and their availability was investigated on the basis of their differential solubilities in aqueous solutions during and after the preservative treatment of wood sawdust. Water solubility of CCA components was determined by the extent of fixation and preservative retention. Availability of preservative components was profoundly affected by pH and ionic composition of the solution. Availability of chromium and arsenic from CCA was governed by anionic composition of the solution, increased toward extreme pH values, and was consistent with dissolution of nonstoichiometric Cr-As fixation products of variable composition. Alkaline conditions favour oxidation of insoluble and nontoxic Cr(III) to soluble and toxic Cr(VI) forms. Similar copper availability consistent with acid elution and cation displacement of Cu bound to wood by cation exchange mechanism was observed from CCA and ACQ treated wood. Fixation of Chromated Copper Arsenate type C (CCA-C), conducted at 30°C was investigated in trembling aspen, red pine and red maple at four different treatment retentions. Kinetic parameters of Cr, Cu and As fixation reactions were calculated by Essen's kinetic approach. Reaction rates and the extent of fixation of CCA components were affected by chemical composition of wood and strength of the treating solution. Species with normal fixation characteristics, red pine and aspen, had similar fixation patterns governed predominantly by reactions on structural wood components, while red maple had abnormal fixation, controlled largely by reactions with extraneous wood components. The relationship between treatment retention and reaction rate constants was observed for all CCA components. The effect of retention on CCA fixation reactions was consistent and similar between red pine and aspen. The fixation anomalies in red maple were more pronounced at low retentions than at high retentions.
Innate regulation of adaptive immunity: natural killer cell recognition of stressed and activated T cells

The activation and expansion of T cells in response to host invasion by pathogens is paramount to the generation of an immune response that results in pathogen elimination. The immune system, however, must impose a complex system of checks and balances to ensure that T cell responses to pathogens are controlled lest they result in autoimmunity and cancer. Activated T cells encounter hostile pro-inflammatory environments where tissue expression of death receptor ligands and stress can lead to programmed cell death and effective regulation of immunity. Like many other physiological systems, the immune system is designed with redundancy and we now demonstrate that Natural Killer (NK) cells also regulate T cell homeostasis by recognizing activated and stressed T cells and influencing thymocyte selection. Activated NK cells lyse stressed, activated T cells and DP thymocytes in a perforin dependent manner. In all cases, soluble ULBP2, a ligand for the NK activation receptor NKG2D, and anti-NKG2D mAb inhibits lysis in BALB/c. In B6, T cell homeostasis is regulated by NK in a similar manner but independent of NKG2D.
Methylation pathway perturbations with folate deficiency: a role for epigenetics in endothelial gene expression

Folate deficiency is an independent risk factor for atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease. To better understand how folate deficiency elicits changes in vascular wall homeostasis, we established an endothelial cell model of folate deficiency. Increases in steady-state mRNA levels of the folate receptor-α and γ-glutamyl hydrolase and an accumulation of cell-associated homocysteine and SAE were found. Because SAH can inhibit many SAM-mediated methylation reactions, we assessed DNA and histone methylation pathways. Genomic cytosine methylation levels indicated global DNA hypomethylation. In agreement with recent evidence indicating that folate bioavailability affects a key endothelial phenotype, namely the production of NO, we found a concentration-dependent decrease in eNOS steady-state mRNA levels. Decreased eNOS promoter RNA polymerase II loading and dimethylated H3-K4 suggested the folate deficiency can alter gene expression by inhibiting methyltransferase pathways. This work describes, for the first time, a novel mechanism by which folate deficiency can confer a predisposition to cardiovascular pathology.
The voice of women for animal rights and welfare

An interview study was conducted with women who are active in the animal rights and welfare movements. The purpose of conducting the research is to contribute to the existing literature on women who rescue, save, and/or protect animals and who also act as teachers and possibly role models for those people with whom they come in contact through their rescue work. Another purpose of the research is to determine whether the thoughts, values, and practices of the participants correspond with ecofeminist theory. The researcher interviewed, in one-on-one sessions, six women who share philosophies and beliefs with regard to animals and their need to be rescued. In addition, two women were interviewed (in a similar manner to the first group of women) but who act and work within an alternative framework with regard to their attitudes, philosophies, and beliefs toward animals. The research method used in this study is snowball sampling. By conducting interviews and giving the women the opportunities to express their voices, the researcher explored the significant and influential experiences and motivations in the lives of women who sincerely care and worry about animals, and who, through their actions and initiatives, demonstrate their care through rescuing, saving, and/or protecting animals from dangerous and life threatening situations. The researcher has attempted to determine what these women try to accomplish in their rescue work, whether and how they act as teachers and role models, why they work toward rescuing, saving, and/or protecting animals, and the extent to which their voices have been heard.

Keywords: Animal rights
Animal welfare
Animal rights activists
Women political activists
Animal rescue
Viability kernals for nonlinear systems

The task of restricting the evolution of a system to a safe set of states is a practical engineering problem with applications in ecology, biology, economics and robotics. In control theory, the problem corresponds to the existence of a control input for which (controlled) system trajectories remain inside the safe set. When no control exists to satisfy this requirement, then the problem is to find the largest subset of the safe set, called the viability kernel, and an associated controller, called a viability controller, so that the system remains inside the safe set, starting from any initial condition in the viability kernel, using a viability controller. This thesis develops a constructive theory of viability kernels for single output nonlinear control systems affine in the control. The safe set is a manifold with boundary and the control space is a compact polyhedron.
Motivation and readiness to change in anorexia nervosa and premature discharge from inpatient treatment

This study examines the relationship between motivation to recover from anorexia nervosa (AN) and premature discharge from treatment in patients undergoing a voluntary specialized inpatient program for AN. The trans-theoretical model assessed patients' stage of change and processes of change at week one and week four of intensive treatment, in addition to various other psychometric variables. Results from a survival analysis suggest that, at admission, patients rating themselves in the Contemplation (63%) or Preparation (69%) stage are much more likely to complete treatment than those in Action (38%) (p
Municipal planning, land development and environmental intervention: an institutional ethnography

Municipal planning and land development politics are increasingly central to public and scholarly debates on the governing and restructuring of public institutions and their effects on people's quality of life and environment. This thesis begins in the author's experience as a resident being drawn into a planning process and public decision making regarding a developer's proposal to build a housing development in a small ravine. It explores land use planning as a complex of work processes that actively puts together and mediates relations of land use, governing, and city politics. From a location inside planning relations, accounts of planning and urban politics are found to presuppose the routine textual and communicative practices that one encounters as a participant. This inquiry makes the extended work processes and their routine textual practices that put together institutional action the object of study in order to explicate them. The study uses Institutional Ethnography (IE) as its method of inquiry. It develops IE's focus on textual practices and work processes that connect people's diverse activities in multiple settings and examines how these routine practices coordinate those activities into the ‘macro’ institution of land development and produce its power and agency. The study explores how standardized texts, in the form of reports, letters and site plans, operate in complex exchanges where people do their work in the temporal process of planning and approving development in the ravine. Texts shape essential aspects of institutional action: ‘the public’ is notified, informed and participates; the public decision making by elected officials comprising a local government ‘council’ is carried out; and ‘commenting agencies’ with protective jurisdiction over physical features of the land are consulted and produce legal ‘conditions’ of development approval. The close examination and analytic descriptions and diagrams of text based processes make visible how environmental interventions are incorporated into the complex interchanges that produce the main business of land development routinely so that the ‘neutral’ public institution is produced, interventions and concerns are given ‘fair hearing’ and ‘resolved’ and the production of land development for profit and ‘systematic’ destruction of the physical environment goes on.

Keywords: Community development
Sociology, Urban
Urbanization
Oral communication
Ethnology, Methodology
Land use
Septin GTPases in the central nervous system: An investigation into axon specification, formation and function

Septins are filament-forming GTPases that are conserved in many species. In mitotic cells, septins are important for cytokinesis. Interestingly, at the outset of this study, one septin was found in postmitotic brain tissue suggesting that septins could have roles that extend beyond cell division. I decided to test this possibility by characterizing the protein products of the septin gene family (SEPT1-11) in brain by generating polyclonal alpha-septin antibodies. I discovered that individual septins diverge with respect to their tissue distribution, but are all expressed in the brain. Specific septins were found in different regions of the brain suggesting that septin filaments are heterogeneous. My data suggest that five septins (SEPT3, SEPT5, SEPT6, SEPT7 and SEPT11) may be functioning as a basic unit for septin filament assembly in some neurons because unlike other septins they: (1) co-immunoprecipitated from neurons, (2) shared the same developmental expression profile, (3) were enriched in nascent axons and a preparation of synaptic vesicles and (4) were observed in presynaptic terminals. I tested the importance of septins in axon development by reducing the levels of SEPT5 by RNA interference. I discovered that knockdown of SEPT5 produced defects in neuronal polarization by interfering with axon development. I tested the importance of septins in synaptic transmission by generating a Sept3-/- mouse. I discovered that Sept3-/- mice were similar to wildtype mice in many ways because: (1) the mice were viable and fertile, (2) septin expression levels in the brain did not change, (3) hippocampal and cerebellar architecture were unaffected, (4) cultured neurons formed normal axons and synapses and (5) the size of the recycling pool of synaptic vesicles was normal. Although SEPT3 was not essential for synaptic vesicle recycling, its absence affected the efficiency of endocytosis. Taken together, the data suggests that septins participate in axon development and synaptic transmission by regulating vesicle traffic. Since vesicle traffic is also important for cell division, the insights from this study help to reconcile the expression of septins in both mitotic and non-mitotic cells.
The route to chaos and turbulence in annular electroconvection

Convection is essential and ubiquitous in Nature. For a century, classical thermal convection, or Rayleigh-Bénard convection, has been a central paradigm for laboratory studies. This thesis concerns an electrical analogue of Rayleigh-Bénard convection—electroconvection in a thin fluid film. This complementary system was studied with a combination of experiment, theory, and numerical simulation. The fluid film is driven to convect by a critical applied electric potential interacting with a charge inversion, in direct analogy with the buoyancy inversion that drives thermal convection. As the imposed voltage is increased, electroconvection proceeds from steady, laminar patterns through time-dependent flows and eventually into chaotic and turbulent regimes. The experimental procedure consisted of precise measurements of current-voltage (IV) characteristics when a DC voltage was applied to an annular film between two concentric electrodes. The onset of convection was found by a change in the slope of the IV curve; unsteady flow was indicated by a large increase in current fluctuations. From the IV measurements, the corresponding dimensionless charge transport, or Nusselt number Nu, was determined as a function of the electric forcing, characterized by the dimensionless Rayleigh number [special characters omitted]. A power-law relationship Nu ∼ [special characters omitted] was observed in the turbulent convection regime when [special characters omitted] 104. The influence of the annular geometry, characterized by aspect ratio Γ, on this scaling was investigated. A scaling theory was developed which explains the power law and its dependence on Γ. The corresponding theory for thermal convection does not account for this Γ dependence. In addition, a direct numerical simulation was constructed using a pseudo-spectral method, based on realistic governing equations. The simulation affords deep insights into the flow dynamics, charge distribution and electric potential of the electroconvection instability and its route to turbulence, including for the case of an externally applied shear.