VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
Negotiating Citizenship: Mediatized Migration and the Canadian Data Border

This thesis reflects upon the anomalous rise of irregular migration into Canada near the town of Lacolle, Quebec and the response of the Canadian government in the context of prevalent networked communications. Conceiving of politics as performance, the research engages in a systematic content analysis of Canadian Press and Agence France Press coverage of arrivals through Lacolle to identify an official ‘institutional narrative’. Subsequently, I test this institutional narrative, which privileges the voices of Canadian political elites, establishing my own ‘narrative of encounter’ through analysis of a variety of legislation, policy, and internal documents obtained both publicly and through Canada’s Access to Information System. This produced novel insights regarding how the massive proliferation of networked communication has shaped possibilities for citizenship and authority at the Canadian border in many paradoxical and ironic ways.

Keywords: anticipatory governace
citizenship
humanitarian securitization
irregular migration
media institutions
Advisor: Caidi, Nadia
Revisiting the Interaction Between Memory and Perception in Emotionally Enhanced Vividness

Emotionally salient visual stimuli are perceived with more clarity than neutral ones (Markovic et al. 2014). It has been hypothesized that the advantage of enhancement at perception is passed on to memory (Markovic et al., 2014, Todd et al. 2012). This study investigates the influence of memory and perception on emotionally enhanced vividness through the employment of the El Greco strategy. The first experiment revealed the opposite effect to the previous literature, suggesting emotional images are either remembered worse, or perceived more clearly at response than they are remembered. To elucidate which of these two hypotheses better explains these results, a second experiment was conducted. As expected from the latter hypothesis, and consistent with the previous literature, significantly reduced vividness reporting occurred for neutral images when reported on emotional response images. These findings suggest that emotional enhancements of vividness occur at perception are not fully passed to short-term memory.

Keywords: Memory
Perception
Vividness
Advisor: Ferber, Susanne
A Representative Experience Sampling Study of Everyday Empathy

Empathy — the ability to understand, share, and care about the emotions of others — has received considerable attention. However, important questions about empathy remain unsettled; including its frequency, whether it’s a choice, and its impacts on prosociality and well-being. The current study advances understanding by investigating empathy outside the lab. Participants were recruited with quota sampling for age, education, income, region, gender, and ethnicity. They completed a baseline survey, then a week of experience sampling where they were prompted 7 times daily and asked whether they experienced or received empathy in the last 15 minutes. This research tests links between trait and state empathy, and clarifies the relationships between empathy and prosocial behavior, and empathy and well-being. One emerging theme was the importance of positive empathy. This study provides a novel description of empathy in everyday life, and an indication of the utility of experience sampling for understanding empathy in context.

Keywords: Compassion
Empathy
Experience Sampling
Perspective Taking
Prosocial
Subjective Well-being
Advisor: Inzlicht, Michael
Interpersonal Problems and the Social Reality of Psychological Need Fulfillment

People with interpersonal problems have difficulty adapting to situational demands and navigating social hierarchies, which has important implications for the satisfaction of their basic psychological needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness. Though people with interpersonal problems are likely to experience frustrated need fulfillment, the mechanisms explaining this relationship are not well understood. One such mechanism is interpersonal perception specifically the way a person is perceived by their peers (target effects) and the way they perceive others (perceiver effects). This study investigated whether target and/or perceiver effects mediated the relationship between interpersonal problems and psychological need fulfillment. Undergraduate students participated in a group interaction task. Measures of personality, interpersonal problems, and psychological need fulfillment were completed pre-task and need fulfillment was measured again post-task. Results demonstrated that people with dominance-related problems reported lower autonomy and relatedness need satisfaction post-task in part because they tended to perceive their peers as competitive.

Keywords: hierarchy
interpersonal perception
interpersonal problems
need fulfillment
Advisor: Uliaszek, Amanda A.
Fournier, Marc A.
Chronic Stress Induces Specific Cellular and Morphological Astroglial Changes Associated with Depressive-like Phenotypes

In major depressive disorder (MDD), one of the most consistent findings from post-mortem studies is decreased astroglia number and function in limbic brain regions including the prefrontal cortex (PFC). However, the contribution of astroglial pathology in synaptic dysfunction and depressive symptoms associated with MDD remains unclear. Here, using chronic restraint stress (CRS) in mice to model MDD, we demonstrate that CRS induced time-dependant decreases in astrocytic and synaptic protein expression in the PFC, which correlated with both anxiety- and anhedonia-like deficits. We also investigated CRS effects on astroglial cell morphology using Sholl analysis and found CRS decreased distal processes while increasing proximal processes. This structural rearrangement may parallel functional astrocytic and synaptic changes. Furthermore, we validated a custom-designed plasmid, allowing astroglial activity enhancement in vitro. This novel tool will allow us to test if PFC astroglial activation prevents CRS effects. This work substantiates astroglia as targets for antidepressant development.

Keywords: Astrocytes
Chronic Stress
Major Depression
Rodent Models
Tripartite Synapse
Advisor: Sibille, Etienne L
Banasr, Mounira
Effects of Forest Management and Experimental Dead Wood Removal on Macrofungal Communities in Boreal, Mixedwood Forests of Ontario

Boreal macrofungi are an ecologically diverse group of organisms that are threatened by forest management, including harvest-associated reductions in coarse woody debris (CWD) supplies. In this thesis, I compared richness and composition of macrofungal communities in old-growth and post-logged mixedwood stands in boreal northeastern Ontario, including post-logged stands in which downed CWD availability had been experimentally manipulated. Canonical Correspondence Analysis showed a strong distinction between macrofungal communities of unlogged and logged plots, correlated with harvest-related reductions in large-diameter CWD supplies. Rarefaction revealed that macrofungal richness, particularly of saprotrophs, was higher in unlogged compared to logged plots, especially those with experimentally-reduced CWD supplies. These results demonstrate the negative effects of post-harvest decreases in CWD on macrofungal richness and suggest that forest management in Canada may, over time, lead to the harvest-related biodiversity losses of boreal Europe. Management practices that better emulate habitat conditions in old-growth stands, including availability of large-diameter CWD, are discussed.

Keywords: boreal forest
coarse woody debris
forest management
macrofungi
old-growth forest
Advisor: Malcolm, Jay R.
Moncalvo, Jean-Marc
Surface Patterning of Polymer-functionalized Gold Nanoparticles

Polymer patterning on nanoparticles has been recently achieved on polymer-grafted nanoparticles, opening doors to more advanced nanofabrication and self-assembly. However, patchy nanoparticles are mostly prepared using homopolymers under unfavorable solvent. Fabrication conditions and tendency to aggregate at high concentrations limit their throughput and potential utilization. This thesis aims to improve the long-term stability of patchy nanoparticles by using block copolymers as well as mixed polymer brushes. A block copolymer, polystyrene-b- poly(4-vinylbenzoic acid) (PS-b-P4VBA), was used to produce patchy nanocubes. It was that found not only could patchy nanocubes be obtained using PS-b-P4VBA, but also the aggregation of patchy nanoparticles was largely prevented by the P4VBA outer block. Alternatively, mixed polymer brushes of polystyrene and polyethylene glycol were employed to produce patchy nanorods. Due to their microphase separation, gold nanorods carrying helical patches were successfully obtained at certain grafting ratios between the two polymers, even in a good solvent environment.

Advisor: Kumacheva, Eugenia
Walker, Gilbert
Towards the Implementation of an Activity-based Travel Demand Model for Emerging Cities: Integrating TASHA and MATSim

In many emerging cities, there are various proposals for transit-oriented infrastructural investments and transport policies. However, the effort to understand possible current and future effects of alternative investment strategies, socio-economic trends, and travel behaviour patterns before deciding on pressing projects is lacking. Finding a solution to this problem would enable rapid identification and representation of local transport need with all possible policy effects of public transport strategy evaluation. By identifying modelling challenges in an application context on data and modelling framework to use, and demonstrating methods taken to overcome these challenges, this study proposes practical steps decision-makers can apply to better forecast future travel patterns, by exploring an “integrate-refine-and-transfer” strategy of the operational Greater Toronto Area travel demand model (GTAModel) implementation to an emerging city. The modelling approach used involves the integration of the household-based activity scheduling model travel activity scheduler for household agents (TASHA) with Multi-Agent Transport Simulation (MATSim).

Keywords: activity-based
Africa
decision making
developing countries
emerging cities
travel behaviour
Advisor: Miller, Eric J
Depression, Anxiety, and Quality of Life in Postconcussion Syndrome

Postconcussion syndrome (PCS) affects a considerable percentage of concussion patients. A follow-up analysis was conducted to evaluate the occurrence of anxiety and depression in patients with PCS and measure their quality of life. A questionnaire package consisting of the Depression and Anxiety Stress Scale (DASS), the WHO Quality of Life Assessment (WHOQOL-Bref), and a general follow-up questionnaire was sent to 526 PCS patients. A total of 37 (35.2%) patients had symptoms of anxiety, depression, or both. 8 (7.6%) patients had symptoms of depression alone, 8 (7.6%) patients had symptoms of anxiety alone, and 21 patient (20%) had symptoms of both. The number of previous concussions was significantly correlated with increased DASS anxiety (r=0.207, p=0.0034) and depression (r=0.264, p=0.006) scores. Increased DASS scores were significantly correlated with a poorer quality of life in all four domains of the WHOQOL-Bref. Thus, concussion-related symptoms of depression and anxiety are important public health concerns.

Keywords: Anxiety
Concussion
Depression
Postconcussion Syndrome
Quality of Life
Advisor: Tator, Charles H
Women Ice Hockey Officials and Gender Relations in Officiating

This study explores the current experiences of women ice hockey officials in Canada. To guide my research, I applied a Critical Feminist Theory framework to data from document analyses, observations of hockey games and semi-structured interviews with women ice hockey officials from across Canada. The results show that women ice hockey officials face numerous challenges in obtaining higher certification levels and having opportunities to officiate higher level hockey games. The career paths and career contingencies for women ice hockey officials differ from their men colleagues due to the hegemonic structures that construct hockey as a masculine space, and as a result, these structures directly influenced the participating women’s ability to advance in officiating in Canada. The participants shared experiences of exclusion at sites of training and education, limitations to advancing, and disinvolvement such as quitting/dropping-out, and retirement. This study unpacks the complex tensions between the ‘love of the game’ and systemic hegemonic exclusion institutionally, and calls for policy and procedures to better support women ice hockey officials.

Keywords: Equality
Gender
Hockey
Officials
Women
Advisor: Donnelly, Peter
Motif Elucidation in ChIP-seq Datasets with a Knockout Control

Chromatin immunoprecipitation-sequencing (ChIP-seq) is widely used to find transcription factor binding sites, but suffers from various sources of noise. Knocking out the target factor mitigates noise by acting as a negative control. Paired wild-type and knockout experiments can generate improved motifs but require optimal differential analysis. We introduce peaKO—a method to automatically optimize motif analyses with knockout controls, which we compare to two other methods. PeaKO often improves elucidation of the target factor and highlights the benefits of knockout controls. It is freely available at https://peako.hoffmanlab.org.

Keywords: ChIP-seq
DNA motif
knockout control
transcription factor
Advisor: Hoffman, Michael M
Identifying the Rhodoquinone (RQ) Biosynthetic Pathway in Search of Novel Antihelminthic Targets

Helminths infect a quarter of the world’s population. Infections caused by these parasitic nematodes, cestodes and trematodes can lead to complications such as severe malnutrition, pneumonia and liver failure. Following the ingestion of the helminth the parasites are exposed to a hypoxic environment inside the host’s digestive tract. To survive, helminths rely on an anaerobic metabolism called fumarate respiration. Fumarate respiration requires a molecule called rhodoquinone (RQ). Although RQ was discovered over 50 years ago its biosynthetic pathway is unknown. Discovering how RQ is synthesized could lead to potential targets for new antihelminthic treatments. Resistance to all classes of antihelminthic drugs has been reported and it is critical that new treatments are found. By analyzing quinone extracts from the non-parasitic nematode C. elegans using LC-MS, I have discovered the biosynthetic precursor, potential intermediates and enzymes required for RQ synthesis and its regulation.

Keywords: anaerobic
caenohabditis elegans
C. elegans
helminth
metabolism
rhodoquinone
Advisor: Caudy, Amy
An Experimental Study of the Nose Landing Gear Noise with Emphasis on the Steering Actuators, Torque Link and Tow Hook

Aeroacoustic and Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) tests were conducted on the simplified model of a nose landing gear that permitted independent additions of the tow hook, torque link and steering systems. Tow hook was found to suppress low-frequency overhead noise originating from the axle-strut region. Tests involving torque links mounted upstream and downstream of the strut with varying arm separation distances showed that upstream mounting induces: i) prominent low-frequency noise in the sideline direction, and ii) higher broadband noise in the overhead and sideline directions when the torque link arms are close. Increasing the separation between the torque link arms decreased the broadband noise contribution of the upstream mounted torque links to levels of those mounted downstream. The steering actuator orientation is shown to be crucial for the acoustic response of the gear. Steering actuators placed nearly perpendicular to the freestream flow were found to generate the quietest responses.

Keywords: aeroacoustics
beamforming
landing gear
noise
steering
torque link
Advisor: Ekmekci, Alis
3-year Outcomes of Cannabis use Patterns: Evidence from a Longitudinal Survey

Objectives: We investigated the 3-year follow up on cannabis use disorder (CUD) of cannabis users with different use patterns, as defined by Lower Risk Cannabis Use Guidelines. Methods: Data was obtained from the US surveys NESARC wave 1 (2001-2002) and wave 2 (2004-2005), which included 31,464 respondents with no history of CUD at wave 1. We applied multiple logistic regression and propensity score method to examine the 3-year risk of DSM-IV CUD among different use patterns. The risk of transitioning to higher use frequency was also accessed. Results: Propensity score method showed significant association between lower risk cannabis use and CUD, but not increased use frequency. A significant increase in the risk of CUD was also observed among higher risk cannabis users. Logistic regression showed similar results. Conclusions: The findings suggest that guideline recommended lower risk use pattern may not completely protect an individual from developing CUD.

Advisor: Le Foll, Bernard
Measuring Foot Clearance on Outdoor Walkways

Over half of older adult falls are caused by tripping. Many of these trips are likely due to obstacles present on walkways that put older adults at risk because of their low foot clearances during gait. The Parallel Laser Array Recording (PLAR) system was developed for measuring foot clearance values. The PLAR system was designed to be positioned at ground level next to outdoor walkways to efficiently collect sagittal plane videos of many pedestrians’ feet. The objective of this project was to develop a computer vision algorithm for analyzing PLAR video to estimate foot clearance values and evaluate the accuracy of the algorithm by comparing to the current time-consuming manual analysis process. The developed algorithm was found to have good accuracy with an RMS error of 3.70 mm when compared to a manual PLAR video analysis with RMS error of 2.32 mm.

Keywords: computer vision
falls
gait
Minimum foot clearance
outdoor
tripping
Advisor: Dutta, Tilak
A Novel Combination of Natural Language Processing and Brain Computer Interface in a Communication System

A brain-computer interface (BCI) is a communication system that enables individuals with severe physical disabilities to communicate or control external devices through their brain activities. In this study, we proposed a communication system combining natural language processing (NLP) and BCI in a question and answer paradigm. Specifically, we combined a context-aware predictive speller and an answer generation engine that comprehends the question being asked of the user, to efficiently present potential conversational responses. The user could either type a response or select from suggested answers. If the user started typing, the cells containing suggestions were repopulated with context-relevant words matching the user’s typed characters, thereby reducing typing time. We have evaluated our proposed system through 4 sessions per subject in terms of accuracy, bit rate, timing, and user satisfaction. Our data analysis has validated that the proposed paradigm doubles the typing speed, increases accuracy and reduces mental demand of message composition.

Advisor: Chau, Tom
Water Removal Process in Electrochemical Valorization of Glycerol

Glycerol, as a by-product of biodiesel industries, can be converted to a broad range of high value-added products chemically in the presence of hetero/homogeneous catalysts and also electrochemically in electrolyzers. Using an alkaline medium for glycerol conversion increases the yield of the reaction. In several glycerol valorization reactions, water is used as a solvent or is produced as a by-product. Excess water reduces the reaction conversion and hinders the efficiency by decomposition of final products such as glycerol carbonate in the alkaline solution, and hence must be maintained in a low concentration. The removal of water from aqueous salt solutions containing soluble organic species is a very challenging extraction. This research seeks to design a simple and energy-efficient water removal process by focusing on two organic solvent dehydration methods, desiccants and membrane pervaporation to increase the efficiency as well as purifying the produced glycerol derivatives as commercial products.

Keywords: Electrosynthesis
Glycerol Conversion
Membrane
Pervaporation
Stability
Water Separation
Advisor: Kirk, Donald W
Subgroups of Youth within the Attitudes/Orientation Domain of the YLS/CMI: A Latent Class Approach

Antisocial attitudes are a “Big Four” risk factor for recidivism. Within the Attitudes/Orientation domain of the Youth Level of Service/Case Management Inventory (YLS/CMI), items appear to assess two different factors – antisocial attitudes and treatment readiness.  Research has demonstrated the importance of both in predicting offender outcomes and guiding treatment. To determine whether different classes of youth exist based on identified YLS/CMI Attitudes/Orientation domain items, a Latent Class Analysis was conducted using a sample of justice-involved youth referred to a mental health agency in Toronto, Canada (n=824) for forensic assessment. Four classes were identified: High Overall Attitude Needs (19%), Antisocial-Predominant (20%), Treatment-Resistant (9%), and Low Overall Attitude Needs (52%).  Significant class differences were found in terms of total risk, index offense, criminogenic needs identified for intervention, and recidivism. Results suggest that class information may assist in targeting interventions.

Keywords: Antisocial attitudes
Rehabilitation
Risk-Need-Responsivity
YLS/CMI
Young offenders
Youth criminal justice
Advisor: Peterson-Badali, Michele
An Evaluation of Alternative Fuels and Powertrain Technologies for Canada’s Long Haul Heavy-duty Vehicle Sector

Heavy-duty vehicles (HDVs) are responsible for a growing share of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in Canada. Despite the near-term availability of several low GHG alternatives to diesel, the most viable alternatives have yet to be identified. The first portion of this thesis reports insights gathered through expert interviews in relation to the perceived barriers and opportunities to the adoption of promising alternative technologies for long haul HDVs. Expert insights are incorporated into frameworks for the evaluation of current or near-term alternative technologies. The second portion of the thesis evaluates an emerging fuel, dimethyl ether (DME), on the basis of its well-to-wheel GHG emissions when produced in Canada. It is found that DME produced from renewable feedstocks can reduce GHG emissions by up to 60%, while natural gas-based DME may increase GHG emissions by 20%. Insights from this thesis can inform policies to support uptake of low GHG alternatives for HDVs.

Keywords: Alternative fuels
Dimethyl ether
Greenhouse gas emissions
Heavy-duty vehicles
Life cycle assessment
Multi-criteria decision making
Advisor: Posen, I. Daniel
MacLean, Heather L.
Design and Evaluation of an Interactive Tactile Aid to support Older Adults’ Adoption of Technology

Older adults are often considered to be less frequent adopters of new technologies, in part due to increased efforts required to learn new interaction paradigms, especially if these need to overcome long-established mental metaphors of technology use. Many current interfaces such as mobile devices often do not incorporate elements that align with older adults’ models of use: explicit help menus, user manuals, navigation affordances. The lack of such reassuring elements may cause anxiety to those trying to learn interaction paradigms that are new to them. This thesis details the help and support paradigms behind the design of a contextual support interface for tablet devices and describes the results of a usability evaluation with older adult participants.

Keywords: gerontechnology
hci
mobile devices
Older adults
Tactile interface
Technology adoption
Advisor: Munteanu, Cosmin