VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
Dynamic control and power management of converter fed microgrids

The subject of this thesis is modeling and control of voltage source converter (VSC) fed microgrids. These microgrids are powered by modern distributed generators that require VSCs as part of their grid interface circuitry. This thesis develops two supervisory control schemes that allow VSCs with standard inductor interface and the ubiquitous dq-frame current control to operate in both grid connected and islanded modes. Both of these supervisory control schemes are based on a dynamic model of a VSC fed islanded microgrid, which reveals that the microgrid voltage depends on the real power balance between the VSCs and the load while reactive power balance determines the frequency. Thus, both control schemes set the real and reactive power references of the VSCs to regulate the microgrid voltage and frequency respectively. The Voltage-Power Droop/Frequency-Reactive Power Boost (VPD/FQB) control scheme acts as a supervisory control over the dq-frame current control of a VSC. It allows parallel operating VSCs to jointly regulate a common microgrid voltage and frequency. A VPD/FQB controller droops its voltage reference against the VSC real power output for joint regulation of the microgrid voltage and autonomous real power sharing among the VSCs. Similarly, a frequency-reactive power boost characteristic is employed to achieve joint frequency regulation and autonomous reactive power sharing. A systematic method of coordinating the parameters of parallel operating VPD/FQB controllers is also presented to guarantee damping of inter-controller modes and provide instantaneous load sharing. The second supervisory control scheme, called the Voltage-Power/Frequency-Reactive Power Cross Droop (VP/FQ Cross Droop) control scheme, allows a current controlled VSC to share a common load with synchronous generators as well as other VSCs. A VP/FQ Cross Droop controller droops its frequency reference against the VSC real power output and voltage reference against the reactive power output to share a common real and reactive load respectively. Despite its versatility, the VP/FQ Cross Droop control scheme does not replace the VPD/FQB control scheme in purely VSC fed microgrids due to the former's comparatively poorer inter-controller dynamics.
The effectiveness of asynchronous tele-endoscopy

This work sought to investigate whether store-and-forward tele-endoscopy using asynchronous MPEG-1 video was an effective means of documenting and diagnosing lesions in the upper gastrointestinal (Gl) tract. A statistically significant difference in diagnostic performance between the Local and Asynchronous Endoscopists could not be detected but the small sample size was a major limitation. Still, the Panel review indicated that most disagreements in findings were attributable to inter-observer variability and that in general, the Asynchronous Endoscopists felt that the image quality of the asynchronous video was sufficient for diagnosis. Asynchronous Endoscopists reviewed MPEG-1 endoscopic videos; their findings were compared with those of the Local Endoscopists who performed the procedure for diagnostic accuracy and concordance. The Asynchronous Endoscopists also evaluated on a Likert scale the adequacy of the image quality and demonstration technique of the GI tract for diagnosis. An expert Panel reviewed disagreements in findings between the Local and Asynchronous Endoscopists.
Feminist perspectives of individual psychotherapy as an agent of social change

The goal of the research was to explore whether individual psychotherapy could be seen as an agent of social change by therapists who hold feminist perspectives. Utilizing a life history approach, three to six dialogic interviews were conducted with six female psychotherapists in which the personal and practice experiences and theory regarding their understanding of the contribution of psychotherapy to social change was explored. Participants were experienced, middle-class psychotherapists between the ages of 39 and 67 years of whom four participants were psychologists, one was a psychologist/psychiatrist and one a Master's level social worker; five of the participants were non-Hispanic Caucasians, and one participant was African American/Native American; and five participants were heterosexual, one was lesbian. All six participants identified themselves as supportive of the goals of the feminist movement. Transcripts of interviews were audio taped and transcribed and participants had access to them for further clarification and correction. A qualitative analysis revealed three major approaches utilized by participants in their work to foster social change: individual empowerment, situating the work within the social context, and the integration of social action as a component into the therapeutic process. Approaches were found to parallel major theoretical traditions within feminist theory, primarily, the liberal and socialist/radical traditions. Several therapeutic issues arose from participants' contributions regarding the integration of a social element into their work: the manner in which personal history and personality influenced the integration of social change into their work; the compatibility of the work of social change with the goals of therapy; and the impact of therapist values on the psychotherapeutic work for social change. The results suggest that practitioners could benefit from exploratory dialogue, explicit information, training and further research on ways to integrate the feminist therapy goal of social transformation into psychotherapy.

Keywords: Psychotherapy, Social aspects
Women psychiatrists
Feminist therapy
Social change, Psychological aspects
The contribution of Doreen Hall to the development of Orff-Schulwerk in Canada, 1954--1986

This study will be of interest to historians of music education as well as those who are interested in the development of Orff---Schulwerk in North America from 1955 to 1986. Historical data from primary sources and published books and articles serve as the basis for this study of Doreen Hall's remarkable career in music education. During the period of 1954 to 1986 Hall worked tirelessly in order to introduce the ideas of Carl Orff into music education in Canada and the United States. This study attempts to provide an overview of the main events and initiatives Hall was involved in that led to the acceptance of Orff---Schulwerk (the name given to Orff's philosophy of music education and those techniques that defined it) in North America. This study also attempts to understand the meaning of Hall's work for music education in the public schools of Canada. Even though the focus is on the significance of her work for music education in Canada, key events that she was involved in that influenced the acceptance of Orff---Schulwerk in the United States will also be touched upon. Chapters One and Two establish the context for this study by providing an overview of Orff's work in Munich at the Guntherschule as well as the nature of music education in Canada when Doreen Hall began her work. Chapters 2--5 review and analyze the significance of the many events and initiatives Doreen Hall was involved with in order to establish Orff---Schulwerk in Canada.

Keywords: School music, Instruction and study
School music, Canada
Assessing the role of mast cells in cardiac contractile dysfunction following hemorrhagic shock and resuscitation

Hemorrhagic shock (HS) is associated with significant myocardial contractile dysfunction. We investigated the role of cardiac mast cell degranulation in contractile dysfunction following HS using a rat model of HS. HS was induced by the removal of blood from the carotid artery until a MAP of 40mmHg was established and maintained for 60 minutes. Animals were resuscitated with their shed blood. 15 minutes prior to HS, animals received either saline, or mast cell stabilizing agents, ketotifen or cromolyn. HS resulted in an increased mast cell density in the heart and the induction of cardiac IL-1beta and IL-6 mRNA. Mast cell stabilization significantly improved cardiac function and attenuated the HS-induced rise in cardiac IL-1beta and IL-6 mRNA. Elevated serum beta-hexosaminidase during HS provided a marker of degranulation. These results suggest that mast cells and their granule mediators may contribute to the cardiac contractile dysfunction that occurs following HS/R.
The construction and interpretation of gender and race in initial teacher education

My study's data describes three impediments to the inclusion of equity issues in initial teacher education: the ideological debate between theory and practice in teacher training; the concentration of equity issues in the area of social foundations and the small amount of time allocated to these topics; and the problematic reactions of student teachers to the inclusion of equity issues. Specifically, I examine student teachers' overt resistance to and denial of equity issues, and their tendency to individualize the occurrence of gender and race inequity to singular isolated events. The overall findings of the study demonstrate that social justice issues continue to exist in educational institutions, and that there are some dedicated teacher educators who address social justice concerns in their education courses, despite the personal and professional obstacles that have arisen during this journey. These teacher educators have hope for a better future. They see themselves as agents for change. To better understand the experiences of teacher educators who raise issues of gender and race in their preservice education courses and their students' reactions to the inclusions of such issues, I have conducted a study that examines how gender and race are included in a faculty of education. The major research questions are: How do teacher educators and their students construct and interpret the place of race and gender in initial teacher education? What are the impediments to the inclusion of gender and race issues in initial teacher education? How are issues of gender and race included in preservice education courses? What are the theoretical frameworks utilized by teacher educators to conceptualize gender and race in their education courses?This study draws on in-depth interviews and non-participant observations of 11 teacher educators (8 women and 3 men), 5 student teacher focus group interviews, and student teacher written in-class reflective tasks in one Canadian faculty of education. I utilize feminist poststructural theory, feminist pedagogical theory and resistance theory to describe how the concepts of difference, discourse, power and subjectivity have influenced feminist scholarship and my understanding of how race and gender are taken up by teacher educators and their students.

Keywords: Teachers, Training of
Teachers, Canada
Sexism in higher education, Canada
Sexism, Study and teaching (Higher)
Sexism, Canada
Racism in education, Canada
Racism, Study and teaching (Higher)
Racism, Canada
Teacher educators, Attitudes
Teacher educators, Canada
Student teachers, Attitudes
Student teachers, Canada
Black voices, black souls: black music as a means of voice, resistance, and social transformation in education

There have been moments in our history when certain groups of people have unjustly been deprived of their freedom. This especially rings true for Black people who have endured over 100 years of slavery and still continue to experience institutionalized racism. This thesis addresses how the musical styles of the Spirituals, Gospel, the Blues, Reggae, Rap and Hip Hop have created a powerful venue for Black people of African descent to express their feelings regarding racial discrimination and society at large. It includes analysis of the origins of the these genres of music and examines the various ways that they have served as a means of resistance, voice and social transformation. In order to deal with the horrors of slavery, this disenfranchised group of people resorted to other outlets that served as a means of survival; their music. Thus, music came to represent not only a form of entertainment, but a mode of communication, resistance, voice and essentially survival. It is about the spirit of enslaved people and their ability to overcome.

Keywords: Blacks, Cultural assimilation
Blacks, Songs and music
Hip-hop
Blacks, Study and teaching
Design and analysis of high voltage drive electronics for inchworm positioners

Inchworm positioners are positioning systems that offer nanometer accuracy and are often based on piezoelectric actuators. Piezoelectric actuators typically behave as capacitances of the order of several hundred nanofarads to few microfarads. Hence high voltage drive electronics are required in order to drive these positioning systems. This work outlines the systematic procedure for the design of high voltage drive electronics with optimal parts counts tailored to perform efficiently to a defined set of specifications: provide an output voltage of 200 volts, frequency bandwidth of 800 Hz while driving a load of 1 muF capacitance. Each of the modules---high voltage amplifier, low voltage and high voltage power supply---were designed, simulated and evaluated for performance as individual units and then integrated. The overall performance of the integrated system is evaluated in terms of frequency and transient responses and harmonic distortion. The whole system provides a voltage gain of 26.01 dB and a closed loop bandwidth of 715 Hz into an output capacitive load of 1 muF.
Three-pulse photon echo studies of colloidal semiconductor quantum dots

This dissertation presents ultrafast spectroscopic studies and theoretical modelling of the origins of the lineshape and linewidth in colloidal semiconductor quantum dots. Three-pulse photon echo peak shift experiments were employed to separate the inhomogeneous line broadening from the homogeneous line broadening. We first verified that this technique is capable of separating the two broadening mechanisms by investigating two samples with different static inhomogeneity associated with the size-distribution of the sample. The homogeneous linewidth was then investigated by doing 3PEPS and steady-state measurements at various temperatures. Results showed an anomalous temperature dependence of the optical gap and Stokes shift. The measurements were also performed on various nanocrystal size, crystal structure, capping group, embedding polymer matrix, and shape to better understand the role of exciton-phonon coupling, spectral diffusion within the fine structure, and disorder on the lineshape of the nanocrystals. To interpret our 3PEPS signals, non-linear response functions using a two-level model were formulated and numerically evaluated. The effect of excited state absorption in our peak shift measurement, was investigated by formulating the three-level response functions, including biexciton contributions as the third level. Numerical calculations revealed that the excited state absorption can give an initial fast decay on the peak shift. Finally, we show that exciton-exciton scattering contribution can also significantly decay the peak shift and including it in our numerical simulation allows us to fit our REPS data even with weak exciton-phonon coupling.
The Glass Bead Game: From post-tonal to post-modern

By drawing on the writings of Northrop Frye, Arnold Schoenberg, Michel Tournier, and Thomas Mann, this thesis explores the implications of using Hermann Hesse's fictional Glass Bead Game to model the role of recursion in literary criticism and, by extension, in the creative process itself. While Hesse associates the quintessential modernism of his Game with the fugue of the High Baroque, his 1943 novel Das Glasperlenspiel ironically gestures toward post-tonal music, just as it anticipates the development of what has come to be known as post-modernism. Tournier's 1970 novel Le Roi des aulnes, when read as a Glass Bead Game, exemplifies the modal counterpoint that Frye associates with the Ironic Mode of twentieth-century literature, thus completing Hesse's journey from Romantic assonance to ironic dissonance. However, Hesse and Tournier's novels also illustrate that Frye's conception of centripetal counterpoint, like the Glass Bead Game itself, is closer to Schoenberg's music than it is to Bach's, as is his conception of twentieth-century literature and criticism.

Keywords: Comparative literature
Literature, Modern
Components of flaxseed responsible for its effectiveness in reducing breast tumour growth and mechanism of action

Flaxseed (FS), rich in lignan (secoisolariciresinol diglucoside, SDG) and omega-3 fatty acid-rich oil (FO), inhibits breast cancer growth and increases effectiveness of the breast cancer drug tamoxifen (TAM). This study determined which FS component (SDG, FO or combination), alone or with TAM, is more effective in reducing human estrogen receptor (ER) positive breast tumour growth in ovariectomized athymic mice, and the mechanism of action. SDG, FO or their combination regressed tumours faster and reduced tumour cell proliferation greater compared with untreated control. Only SDG significantly decreased PS2, IGF-1R and BCL2 mRNA expressions. TAM-treated tumours had large size and high cell proliferation, HER2 and IGF-IR mRNA expressions and low apoptosis which were reversed by SDG, FO and their combination, with FO producing greatest effect. In conclusion, SDG is more effective without TAM while FO is more effective with TAM. The mechanism involves modulation of both ER and growth factor-mediated pathways.
Online (real-time) locating of a switched shunt capacitor in a power system

This thesis introduces a real-time method for locating a switched, shunt capacitor bank with reference to the monitoring points of a power system. The proposed method locates the switched capacitor based on the slopes of voltage and current space vector magnitudes at the capacitor switching instant. The salient features of the proposed method are (i) robustness since the proposed space vector method uses an algebraic calculator block; (ii) reliability since the space vector method uses the information of all the three phases; and (iii) simplicity as the proposed method is independent of power system frequency and dynamics so that its calculator block can be readily embedded within a monitoring point's processing software. The Thevenin equivalent circuit of a balanced power system is used for analytical evaluation of the space vector method. The method is also verified based on time-domain simulation results of three study systems.
Is regulation of the Canadian broadcasting system preordained to failure?

Radio was first developed in Canada in 1919. Television came on the scene in 1952. They were followed by new technologies: cable television, video cassette recorders, pay-TV and, most recently, direct-to-home satellites. Throughout most of that time, successive Canadian governments have sought to capture these technologies to create a strong domestic broadcasting system. They conducted numerous inquiries, passed five different Broadcasting Acts, created four separate regulatory bodies, enacted various legislative initiatives and experimented with various regulatory instruments to bring about their goal. Despite their efforts, regulation has not succeeded. Canadians have always preferred American programming. Why? This thesis critically examines the various regulatory methods that have been deployed and analyzes why they have failed. It concludes that regulation of the Canadian broadcasting system is preordained to failure in a globalized world and needs to be replaced by a free market approach while strengthening the CBC as the distinctive voice of Canadian culture.

Keywords: Broadcasting, Law and legislation
Broadcasting, Canada
The calreticulin saga: Focal adhesion to adipogenesis

Calreticulin is a multifunctional ER resident protein that participates in calcium homeostasis and modulation of gene expression, most notably those of genes involved in cell adhesion. Calreticulin has three domains: the N, P and the C domain. The N and P domains are responsible for the chaperoning function, while the C domain is responsible for the calcium storage function of calreticulin. In fact, calreticulin is the main calcium buffer of the ER. Using calreticulin-null, under- and overexpressing fibroblasts I showed that calmodulin/CaMKII-dependent signaling pathways are indeed modulated by calreticulin and affect cell adhesiveness. Calreticulin-null cells had elevated expression of calmodulin, activated CaMKII, activated ERK and activated c-src. Inhibition of calmodulin/CaMKII caused the weakly adhesive calreticulin-null or underexpressing cells to behave like the overexpressing cells, via induction of cell spreading and increased vinculin, activated-paxillin and activated-focal adhesion kinase levels and fibronectin deposition. Moreover, I demonstrated that adipogenesis is not only calcium-dependent, but it is also adhesion-dependent. The highly adipogenic calreticulin-null ES cells showed, similarly to fibroblasts, poor focal adhesion formation. Furthermore, reduction of adhesion induced adipogenesis in the calreticulin-containing ES cells. Conversely, inhibition of the calmodulin/CaMKII pathways increased focal adhesion protein expression and decreased adipogenesis in the calreticulin-null ES cells. Hence, the presence of calreticulin reduces adipogenesis by promoting cell adhesion and by downregulating the calmodulin/CaMKII pathways, both critical components of adipogenesis. In this present work, I show a novel role for calreticulin as an inhibitor of adipogenesis via its calcium homeostasis function. This function can impinge on the calmodulin/CaMKII pathway and can regulate focal adhesion formation. Calreticulin-null embryonic stem (ES) cells exhibited a dramatic increase in adipocyte differentiation compared to calreticulin-expressing ES cells. Lowering intracellular calcium concentration increased adipogenesis in the calreticulin-containing ES cells, while increasing intracellular calcium concentration decreased adipogenesis in calreticulin-null ES cells. Expression of the [P+C] domain of calreticulin into calreticulin-null ES cells inhibited their adipogenesis, while insertion of the [N+P] domain into calreticulin-null ES cells remained without effect. The calmodulin/CaMKII pathways were upregulated in calreticulin-null ES cells, compared with the calreticulin-containing ES cells and inhibition of CaMKII halted adipogenesis.