VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
The American ideology [electronic resource] : plot and culture since 1945

The American Ideology: Plot and Culture Since 1945 uncovers the emergence of an intellectual formation that had a profound effect on post-1945 US literature and politics: the practice of cultural poetics, an interpretive project that approaches culture as the 'deep structure' of meaning that animates society and politics. Scholars have offered many explanations of the development of post-1945 literature—e.g., as the rejection of American Marxism and rise of Liberalism (Michael Denning); as the politicized reengagement with 'sublime' history through increasingly fantastic narrative (Amy Elias); or as a paradoxical turn to the spiritual and supernatural in the absence of religious belief (Amy Hungerford). These interpretations, I argue, point to a more fundamental change in humanistic thought: a reification of culture as the causal epicenter of conflicts social, personal, and political. This cultural poetics developed at the intersection of New Criticism with the Cold War interest in cultural analysis, and subsequently catalyzed the most important literary innovation of the postwar era: the tactical refashioning of narrative by multicultural writers in order to speculate about the causal relationship between history, politics, and identity. The literature of the era could thus be read as a response to Lionel Trilling's assertion that "it is clearly no longer possible to think of politics except as the politics of culture." As a corrective to poetic theories of the novel, I offer a theory of narrative that focuses on its inherently causal nature and the myriad ways in which it can abstract, explain and speculate about how and why events occur—a theory that also illuminates narrative's potential as a tool for progressive politics. Contemporary literary interpretations are predominantly allegorical and synchronic in nature, treating narratives as symbolic encodings of reality. I argue, however, that narrative is more correctly understood as a diachronic process whose primary power is the ability to evaluate and project paths of action. By emphasizing the intimate link between causality and narrative form, I undertake a new historical study of post-1945 literary production, revealing that the experimental narratives of this period—traditionally classified as 'Postmodern'—are in fact formal responses to a new theory of causality grounded in the reification of culture as a material agent.

Advisor: Heise Ursula K. primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Woloch Alex
Saldívar Ramón
An Analysis of a Chinese Renminbi Appreciation Through the Lens of the Plaza Accord and the Japanese Yen

China’s currency policy has been one of the most hotly debated subjects in the United
States (U.S.) over the past decade. U.S. citizens commonly believe that the peg of the renminbi (RMB) to the U.S. dollar (USD) causes Chinese employment and exports to boom at the expense of the U.S. export industry and its workers. China today faces criticisms similar to those faced by Japan thirty years ago, when the yen (JPY) widely was considered undervalued against the USD. Our analysis will use a handful of models and empirical evidence from the Japanese experience with the Plaza Accord to discuss the dangers posed by the appreciation of a creditor country’s currency. We will examine key ways in which the past Japanese economy was similar and dissimilar to the more recent Chinese economy to determine which of our findings related to the Plaza Accord are applicable to China’s case. We will end with a study of the international USD standard, and will propose policy solutions to the global imbalances discussed in earlier sections.

Keywords:  Department of Economics
Stanford Department of Economics
Thesis
Advisor: McKinnon Ronald
An assessment of late Pleistocene to middle Holocene lake level fluctuations in Surprise Valley, California

Knowledge of Earth’s climate history and sensitivity, combined with modeling past and future climate, are central to informing policy decisions regarding future climate change. The hydrologic response to future warming scenarios due to increased anthropogenic CO2 emissions remains uncertain. Freshwater availability in the arid western United States is projected to decrease in availability as increased agricultural, urban and industrial uses continue to stress supplies. Motivated by the potential for dramatic future hydrologic changes, studies recording the abrupt transitions between different equilibrium states of natural past climate variability shed light on our understanding of the modern climate system.
The presence of pluvial lakes in the Basin and Range Province, in the western United States, during the late Pleistocene (40 to 10 ka) indicates far greater moisture availability during the Pleistocene glacials. This study investigates the timing and magnitude of the most recent pluvial lake cycle that filled Surprise Valley, California using geophysical, geochemical and geochronologic tools. Spanning 31.2 to 4.6 ka, this new lake level record places the highest lake level, at 180 meters above present day playa, at 13.9 ± 1.2 ka. This age appears to be nearly synchronous with highstands of Lake Lahontan to the south and the Chewaucan Basin to the north. Additionally, most of the Basin and Range lake highstands, including Lake Surprise, follow peaks in precipitation minus evapotranspiration (P-ET) by 8-10 kyr. By compiling a diverse set of paleoclimate data available for western North America, I found that the timing and geographic distribution of lake highstands is inconsistent with increased precipitation in response to shifting westerly winds, the current model for the genesis of large lakes in western North America. Rather, lakes levels are more strongly correlated with changes in summer insolation, suggesting that lake highstands were likely facilitated by colder temperatures and increased humidity due to the presence of continental ice sheets and increased atmospheric convergence. I compared the constraints from lake and soil-based records to Atmosphere-Ocean General Circulation Model simulations from the Paleoclimate Model Intercomparison Project 2. Based on model-proxy intercomparison, the Atmosphere-Ocean General Circulation Models, the same models used to also assess future climatic changes, poorly predict hydrologic quantities for the Last Glacial Maximum.

Keywords: Pluvial Lakes
Geochronology
Isotopes
Uranium
Geological and Environmental Sciences
Thesis
Advisor: Maher Kate
Egger Anne E.
An Assessment of Late Pleistocene to Middle Holocene Lake Leven Fluctuations in Surprise Valley, California

The presence of pluvial lakes in the Basin and Range Province, in the western United States, during the late Pleistocene (40 to 10 ka) indicates far greater moisture availability during the Pleistocene glacials. This study investigates the timing and magnitude of the most recent pluvial lake cycle that filled Surprise Valley, California using geophysical, geochemical and geochronological tools.

Keywords:  Department of Geological and Environmental Sciences
School of Earth Energy &amp; Environmental Sciences
Pleistocene
California
Thesis
Advisor: Maher Kate
Egger Anne E.
Analysis of the BOLD characteristics in pass-band balanced steady state free precession functional magnetic resonance imaging [electronic resource]

Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is a powerful medical imaging modality that provides unique and flexible tissue contrast. MRI provides anatomical images, and also provides other capabilities such as measuring physiological changes such as neuronal activation. Since Ogawa et al. suggested oxygenation level as a contrast mechanism underlying the correlation between brain activation and image intensity of gray matter in MRI, various methods have been proposed to improve the contrast. Currently, Gradient Echo (GRE) Echo Planar Imaging (EPI) is most widely-used for the purpose. Balanced Steady-State Free Precession (bSSFP) has recently been proposed as an alternative method to acquire BOLD contrast. Pass-band bSSFP fMRI utilizes the T2 sensitivity of bSSFP in a relatively wide and flat off-resonance frequency band of the bSSFP profile. The method has a potential to provide higher SNR efficiency with reduced imaging artifacts compared to conventional approaches. Previous experimental results suggested that the level of the functional contrast and its characteristics are significantly influenced by the sequence parameters. However, few of these contrast characteristics have been investigated systematically. In this study, a computer simulation was performed to investigate the sources of functional contrast and the influence of scan parameters on the functional contrast to elucidate the contrast characteristics of pass-band bSSFP fMRI. The results suggest that both intravascular T2 change and extravascular spin diffusion are contrast sources with the intravascular contribution covering more than 60% of the total signal change. The extravascular contrast is the main source of small vessel specificity in the pass-band bSSFP fMRI. The pass-band bSSFP fMRI with short TR is most sensitive to vessels with 2 to 5 [mu]m radius, equivalent to human brain capillary size. The extravascular contrast of the pass-band bSSFP fMRI also depends on flip angle, B0 field, and TE. Experiments were performed to validate the simulation results.

Keywords: Electrical Engineering
Advisor: Nishimura Dwight George primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Pauly John (John M.) primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Gold Garry E.
Analysis of zero emission power generation from SCWO of coal and development of an experimental facility for its investigation [electronic resource]

Decarbonization of electricity production is vital for curbing the effects of emissions on global climate change. Most projected pathways toward meeting emissions targets include a large contribution from carbon capture and storage. Many capture technologies impose a large energy penalty to separate and compress carbon dioxide (CO2). Deep saline aquifers are the largest and most distributed reservoirs for CO2 sequestration. However, neat CO2 injected in an aquifer is buoyant compared to the aquifer brine and requires an impermeable seal to prevent it from escaping the aquifer. An alternative technology, recently proposed by Heberle and Edwards, burns coal in supercritical water pumped from a saline aquifer. The entire effluent stream is sequestered, capturing all carbon and non-mineral coal combustion products in the process. This stream is denser than the aquifer brine and therefore offers a higher level of storage security. Aquifers without suitable structural trapping could be opened up for storage as a result. This technology also increases energy security in the U.S., allowing for the use of its coal resources while avoiding atmospheric pollution. In this work, a complete architecture employing supercritical water combustion (SCWC) is proposed, including a liquid oxygen-pumped air separation unit and regenerator system that heats and desalinates the incoming brine. A thermodynamic model is used to calculate the overall thermal efficiency of the plant, including all separation and storage energy penalties. In addition, an exergy analysis determines the least efficient parts of the proposed system. The details and assumptions of the model are discussed. Insights from the model and these analyses elucidate how the proposed system may be operated as a zero-emission electricity source, and the technical challenges that must be addressed for deployment. In order to determine the operating characteristics of the supercritical water combustor, an experimental facility was developed. A test apparatus was designed to study turbulent, hydrothermal diffusion flames for use in a SCWC power plant. The lab-scale combustor operates at 250 bar, with up to a 50 kW fi ring rate and 1600 K burner outlet temperature. Initial combustion studies have provided autoignition temperature data of methanol in supercritical water.

Keywords: Mechanical Engineering
Advisor: Edwards Christopher
Cappelli Mark A. (Mark Antony) advisor. Thesis advisor
Mitchell Reginald advisor. Thesis advisor
Antibody adsorption at the silicone oil-water interface [electronic resource] : exploring the strengths and limitations of the quartz crystal microbalance technique

High-concentration antibody formulations for parenteral delivery are increasingly packaged and stored in pre-filled glass syringes due to the ease of dosage control and administration. A thin film of silicone oil provides a lubricious layer to prevent freezing of the syringe plunger. This layer is thought to cause several complications when in contact with the antibody solution, namely surface-induced aggregation of the antibody and silicone oil droplet formation, leading to visible particle formation, increased viscosity of the solution, and possible unintended immunogenic reactions once injected into the patient. In this work, we describe an experimental platform to study the fate of antibodies on a model hydrophobic surface. By combining acoustic (quartz crystal microbalance with dissipation) and optical (ellipsometry) surface-sensitive techniques, we can monitor not only the amount of protein adsorbing onto a surface, but also its state of solvation and mechanical coupling to the surface. By this approach, we can examine the orientation of adsorbed proteins and detect aggregation on the surface. This platform allows us to study the effects of formulation conditions and excipients on antibody-surface interactions, with the ultimate goal of minimizing aggregate formation.

Keywords: Chemical Engineering
Advisor: Frank C. W. primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Dunn Alexander Robert advisor. Thesis advisor
Swartz James
Approximate equilibria in large games [electronic resource]

The complexity of studying Nash equilibrium in large games often scales with the size of the system: as it increases, computing the exact Nash equilibrium can soon become intractable. However, when the number of players in the system approaches infinity and no individual player has a significant impact on the system, we can approximate the system by considering each single player no longer playing against other individual players but a single aggregation of all other players. In this paper, we apply this idea to study and approximate Nash equilibria in two large scale games. In part I, we consider a model of priced resource sharing that combines both queueing behavior and strategic behavior. We study a priority service model where a single server allocates its capacity to agents in proportion to their payment to the system, and users from different classes act to minimize the sum of their cost for processing delay and payment. As the exact processing time of this system is hard to compute and cannot be characterized in closed form, we introduce the concept of aggregate equilibrium to approximate the exact Nash equilibrium, by assuming each individual player plays against a common aggregate priority that characterizes the large system. We then introduce the notion of heavy traffic equilibrium as an alternative approximation of the Nash equilibrium, derived by considering the asymptotic regime where the system load approaches capacity. We show that both aggregate equilibrium and heavy traffic equilibrium are asymptotically exact in heavy traffic. We present some numerical results for both approximate equilibria, and discuss efficiency and revenue, and in particular provide a bound for the price of anarchy of the heavy traffic equilibrium. In part II, we study the reputation system of large scale online marketplace. We develop a large market model to study reputation mechanisms in online marketplaces. We consider two types of sellers: commitment sellers, who are intrinsically honest but may be unable to accurately describe items because of limited expertise; and strategic sellers, who are driven by a profit maximization motive. We focus on stationary equilibria for this dynamic market, in particular, on separating equilibria where strategic sellers are incentivized to describe the items they have for sale truthfully, and characterize the conditions under which such equilibria exist. We then complement our theoretical results with computational analysis and provide insights on the features of markets that may incentivize truthfulness in equilibrium.

Keywords: Management Science and Engineering
Advisor: Johari Ramesh
Aperjis Christina advisor. Thesis advisor
Bambos Nicholas advisor. Thesis advisor
Arc search methods for linearly constrained optimization [electronic resource]

We present a general arc search algorithm for linearly constrained optimization. The method constructs and searches along smooth arcs that satisfy a small and practical set of properties. An active-set strategy is used to manage linear inequality constraints. When second derivatives are used, the method is shown to converge to a second-order critical point and have a quadratic rate of convergence under standard conditions. The theory is applied to the methods of line search, curvilinear search, and modified gradient flow that have previously been proposed for unconstrained problems. A key issue when generalizing unconstrained methods to linearly constrained problems using an active-set strategy is the complexity of how the arc intersects hyperplanes. We introduce a new arc that is derived from the regularized Newton equation. Computing the intersection between this arc and a linear constraint reduces to finding the roots of a quadratic polynomial. The new arc scales to large problems, does not require modification to the Hessian, and is rarely dependent on the scaling of directions of negative curvature. Numerical experiments show the effectiveness of this arc search method on problems from the CUTEr test set and on a specific class of problems for which identifying negative curvature is critical. A second set of experiments demonstrates that when using SR1 quasi-Newton updates, this arc search method is competitive with a line search method using BFGS updates.

Advisor: Murray Walter primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Saunders Michael
Ye Yinyu advisor. Thesis advisor
Architectures and mechanisms for wireless coexistence [electronic resource]

Wireless has quickly become an irreplaceable medium for communication, but by their very nature, wireless transmissions are vulnerable to RF interference from various sources. This weakness is a growing problem for technologies that operate in unlicensed frequency bands, as these bands are becoming more crowded over time. The increasing density of radios, coupled with the growing number of different protocols, dictates that future wireless devices will require the ability to coexist and operate in a crowded and often unregulated electromagnetic environment. This dissertation presents a set of architectures and mechanisms for wireless coexistence. These mechanisms are intended as general primitives, enabling future wireless networks to be architected such that they are aware of who their RF neighbors are, what they are doing, and how to respond to them. We design and develop two systems, each demonstrating how changes at different levels across the network stack can provide significant gains. Degrees Of Freedom (DOF) is a robust and accurate technique to detect activity in any band of the relevant spectrum, while Picasso is an extensible radio design which allows the device to more easily exploit the fragmented bands which are available. This dissertation contributes to advancing the state of the art in wireless network design in multiple ways. First, the systems in this dissertation present novel algorithms that span signal processing, circuit design, and software systems. Not only do these algorithms enrich existing theory, they are designed with practical implementations in mind - helping to bridge the gap between theory and practice. Second, we present prototype implementations and testbed evaluations of our systems. Our results demonstrate that our systems deliver significantly improved performance in crowded interferencecentric environments, compared to the state-of-the-art. Finally, the work in this dissertation demonstrates that by having layers work cooperatively, rather than in isolation, common goals of high throughput and reliability in dense interference scenarios are much more practical to achieve. In particular, DOF demonstrates that more fine-grained information passed between the PHY and the MAC enables the MAC to make more informed and intelligent decisions regarding how to respond to the varying sources of interference. In the same vain, Picasso demonstrates that increased RF isolation can significantly lessen the burden on PHY filtering and MAC coordination - similarly allowing the three to share in the task of exploiting fragmented spectrum. We believe that the systems in this dissertation make a compelling and strong argument for cross-layer interdisciplinary wireless network design in order to solve the problems of wireless coexistence.

Keywords: Electrical Engineering
Advisor: Katti Sachin primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Levis Philip advisor. Thesis advisor
McKeown Nick advisor. Thesis advisor
Are we there yet? Exploring English learners' journey to reclassification and beyond [electronic resource]

Limited research exists about the time that English learners (ELs) take to acquire English proficiency, the factors that are related to students' English acquisition trajectories, and the relationship between reclassification as proficient in English and later academic outcomes. I use nine years of longitudinal, student-level data from the Los Angeles Unified School District, combined with interviews and observations from a cohort of San Francisco Bay Area students initially classified as English learners, to explore students' journey to reclassification. The data show that likelihood of reclassification is powerfully related to students' initial proficiency in English and in their primary language. For example, students who enter kindergarten with beginning levels of English proficiency have a 50% probability of reclassification after nine years in the district, compared to an 80% probability of reclassification for students who enter with intermediate levels of English proficiency. Meanwhile, although conventional methods suggest the reclassification is associated with higher academic achievement, I show that when regression discontinuity is used to remove bias from these estimates, there is no significant effect of reclassification on later academic achievement for my analytic sample. Finally, students reclassified at later grades describe the strong stigma they felt when placed in English Language Development classes at the secondary level, highlighting the need to scaffold instruction for ELs in ways that students do not experience as remedial.

Keywords: Education.
Advisor: Hakuta Kenji primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Haertel Edward advisor. Thesis advisor
Reardon Sean F. advisor. Thesis advisor
Valdés Guadalupe advisor. Thesis advisor