Engineering, Mechanical

Experimental and theoretical results are presented forthe rotordynamic coefficients of a four-pocket oil-fedorifice-compensated hydrostatic journal bearing, including thehybrid effects of journal rotation. The test aparatusincorporates a double-spool-shaft spindle which permitsindependent control over the journal spin speed and the frequencyof an adjustable-magnitude circular orbit, for both forward andbackward whirl. This configuration yields data that enablesdetermination of the full linear an...

Alzheimer s disease (AD) is a degenerative disorder ofthe central nervous system that results in a progressive loss ofmemory and higher cognitive function. In AD there are largenumbers of senile plaques throughout the cerebral neocortex andhippocampus. Senile plaques consist of a spherical cluster ofabnormal neurites surrounding an amyloid core. The major proteinin the plaque core amyloid is a 39-42 amino acid polypeptidereferred to as the {dollar}{bsol}beta{dollar} amyloid protein({dollar}{bsol...

ATP receptors are present on several cell typesincluding cardiac myocytes. Recent studies from our laboratoryhave shown that extracellular ATP transiently increases theintracellular Ca{dollar}{bsol}sp{lcub}2+{rcub}{dollar}concentration in cardiac myocyte suspensions. Pretreatment withnorepinephrine (NE) greatly potentiates the ATP-inducedCa{dollar}{bsol}sp{lcub}2+{rcub}{dollar} response. In the presentstudy, we investigated the underlying mechanism of thepotentiation. We used adult rat ventricul...

Psychology, Clinical

The purpose of the present study was to describe therelationship among creativity, dream recall frequency andrelaxation ability as it was affected by allocentricity andanxiety in a group of undergraduate students. An allocentricattitude involves an objective (as opposed to a subjective) viewof objects; receptivity to ideas and people; a non-judgmentalattitude; and an ability to focus attention completely on thesubject at hand. Anxiety was measured by performance on thestate-trait anxiety invento...

Public Health

Many young expectant mothers do not have theopportunity, for a variety of reasons, to attend prenatal classesin preparation for the labor and delivery process. For laboringpatients, especially primiparas, who receive no prenatalchildbirth classes, providing support becomes more of a challengefor nurses. Literature regarding techniques of providinginformation to unprepared primiparas in labor is nonexistent.Early Intrapartal Childbirth Preparation is a concept by whichlabor sensate information an...

Magnetism

The minority carrier diffusion length (L) is animportant parameter in modeling the expected performance of asolar cell. Therefore, an accurate means for its measurement isessential. This work suggests that presently used values of L maybe in error by as much as a factor of 3 because of the customaryassumption that the edge surface-recombination velocity isinfinite. To demonstrate this point, a novel electron-beaminduced current (EBIC) technique for determining L was used: ascanning electron micr...

Science; Physics, Condensed Matter

Considerable interest has developed in organicmolecular materials since the discovery of a wide range ofproperties previously thought to be the exclusive domain ofinorganic materials and metals. Many of these properties oforganic materials, such as conductivity, nonlinear opticalsusceptibility, and ferromagnetism, are dependent upon therelative orientation of the constituent molecules within thematerial. Hence, to be able to predict crystal packing has longbeen recognized as being of great impor...

Pure conductive films were prepared by the anodicpolymerization of pyrrole in aqueous solutions by applying apotential in the range of 0.6 to 2.0 V. Conductive compositeswere prepared using a two step process: microemulsionpolymerization to form a porous (nonconductive) coating followedby electropolymerization of pyrrole. The porous nonconductivecoating was prepared by polymerizing a microemulsion containingacrylamide and styrene as monomers and a surfactant: anionic,sodium dodecylsulfate; catio...

Convex quadratic programming is a very important topicin mathematical programming because of its numerous applicationsin such diverse fields as economics, statistics and engineering.This thesis presents a finite improvement algorithm that solvesthe Linear Complementarity Problem (LCP) obtained from theKuhn-Tucker conditions of the quadratic programming problem. Themajor advantage of the proposed algorithm is that any existinglinear programming package may be used without modification tosolve a c...

Science

Changes in mechanical properties during isothermalphysical aging were investigated for three miscible blends:polystyrene(PS)/poly(2,4-dimethyl 1,6-phenylene oxide)(PPO),PS/poly(vinyl methyl ether)(PVME), and poly(methylmethacrylate)(PMMA)/poly(ethylene oxide)(PEO). The aim was tocompare the kinetics of the physical aging process between blendsand pure components, using tensile stress relaxation and dynamicmechanical measurements. Positron annihilation lifetime (PAL)spectroscopy was used as a pro...

Infrared radiative cooling of vibrationally excitedn-butylbenzene ions was studied in chapter III. This was done bya technique called ion thermometry, where the internal energy ofthe ions could be probed by the branching ratio of twocompetitive photoproducts. The infrared radiative cooling rateconstant was observed to be 0.8s{dollar}{bsol}sp{lcub}-1{rcub}{dollar} for ions with energies ofonly 0.3 eV above room temperature. =520 \\$aConfidence in thethermometric data depended on the reliability o...

Part I. Studies on the total synthesis of halichondrinB. Halichondrin B is a remarkably effective antitumor agent invivo. A practical synthesis of an F-ring intermediate 91 forhalichondrin B was accomplished starting from D-glucose. In thepresence of HCl and methanol, glucose-derived 33 was rearrangedto furan 32. Activation of alcohol 32 to phenylthiocarbonatederivative 40 followed by deoxygenation provided 39. Thestereocenter at C17 (halichondrin numbering) of 32 was providedby C5 of D-glucose ...

; Engineering, Biomedical

Compartmental distribution of protons and associatedregulation mechanisms are important aspects of brain functions.The dynamic regulation of proton concentration in brain tissue isessential for maintaining normal metabolic andelectrophysiological activities. Two optical methods are usedbecause of their superior spatial and temporal resolution and thepotential capability for measurement of multiple ionic species.Neutral red (NR) and carboxy-seminaphthorhodaflur-1 (SNARF-1) areused to measure intr...

Physics, Electricity and Magnetism

The eddy current problem associated with magnetic fieldgradients in superconductive magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) andspectroscopy (MRS) applications is well-known throughout thenuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) scientific and engineeringcommunity. The electromagnetic interaction of gradient fieldcoils with surrounding cold (4.2 K to 80 K) and warm (300 K)metal structures from which the superconducting magnet systemsare fabricated, nonetheless, has largely remained unstudied froma theoretical s...

Two homologous series of potentially mesomorphicmonomers,4,4{dollar}{bsol}sp{bsol}prime{dollar}-bis(n-(acryloyloxy)alkyloxy)biphenyl (BnA) and 2,6-bis(n-(acryloyloxy)alkyloxy) naphthyl(NnA) were synthesized. Researches in three different areas wereconducted based on above monomers: i. The first three chaptersconcern about topochemically controlled polymerization of BnA inmesophases. Generally two liquid crystalline phases were observedfor BnA homologues, S{dollar}{bsol}sb{lcub}{bsol}rmB{rcub}{do...

Public Administration

The 1928 founding of the Maternal Health Association(MHA) of Cleveland, Ohio, demonstrates the power of women svoluntarism to modify public policy and elucidates the role ofgender within a social movement. Prominent white women acrossNorth America created birth control clinics like the MHA in the1930s as independent voluntary associations. The clinics offeredan innovative--and somewhat illicit--service to less-privilegedwhite and black women. On the edge of respectability and at theboundary of t...

Studies

The purpose of this study is to explore and identifypatterns of engagement in value struggles leading to Jewishidentity development in adolescents. Jewish identity has beendefined as engagement in a set of value struggles betweentraditional and modern value, within a framework of Jewish WorldView, Concretization of World View and Jewish Peoplehood.Twenty-five North American, adolescent participants in the Nesiyaprogram, a six week, arts oriented trip to Israel, were studied.The Nesiya program ad...

This dissertation classifies five of Poe s tales into agroup that I call "murder narratives"--that is, those talesnarrated from the perspective of a criminal who "fancies" himselfmorally superior not only because he has "power" to take a lifewithout concrete motive but also because he has power to createthrough tale-telling: "William Wilson," "The Tell-Tale Heart,""The Black Cat," "The Imp of the Perverse," and "The Cask ...

Engineering, Aerospace

The present work is an experimental study ofoscillatory flow and heat transfer in a simulated Stirling engineregenerator. In particular the effect of high pressure and highfrequency zero-mean velocity oscillating flow on the internalheat transfer coefficient between working fluid and solid matrixin the regenerator was studied. Using the same configuration asin the regenerator of NASA s Stirling Space Power DemonstrationEngine (SPDE), an experimental apparatus was designed. Theworking conditions ...

Condensed Matter

Diamondlike carbon and nitrogen containing diamondlikecarbon films were made from a dual ion beam system and an RFplasma discharge deposition system. Non-hydrogenated carbon films(a-C and a-C:N) were made using nitrogen and argon ion beamsputtering of a graphite target in an ion beam system.Hydrogenated diamondlike carbon (a-C:H) and nitrogen containingdiamondlike films were made from methane with and without theaddition of Ar and nitrogen at various ion energies. As-depositedfilms were characte...

Engineering, Materials Science

A number of analytical techniques have been employed tostudy the mechanical properties of amorphous hydrogenated carbonfilms deposited by rf self bias plasma enhanced chemical vapordeposition. The internal stress was determined by the substratedeflection technique. The elastic and plastic behavior of a-C:Hwas investigated by measurement of internal stress during thermalcycling, by temperature-relaxation experiments and by nanotensiletesting. In addition, hardness was determined by plasticindenta...

Radiation

In an attempt to better understand the superiorradiation resistance of InP solar cells, 2 MeV proton irradiationdamage was studied in Zn and Cd doped InP Schottky diodes. Thedamage was analyzed using the capacitance/voltage technique tostudy carrier loss, and using DLTS to study the irradiationinduced deep levels. The carrier removal rate was found to beidentical in both Zn and Cd doped InP. The DLTS spectrum of Cddoped InP was studied in detail for the first time: it wasidentical to the spectru...

A biosensor chip aimed for the evaluation of theelectrochemical effects of immobilization of enzymes wasdesigned, fabricated and tested. The chip includes sensorstructures for the potentiometric, amperometric and impedometricdetection of biological reactions catalyzed by enzymesimmobilized in the same manner, on the same substrate. The chipand its packaging were designed to allow different immobilizationschemes to be used without chip design modification. A platinummicro-electrochemical electrod...

Physics, General

A monolayer of uniform, micron-sized, polystyrenecolloids dispersed in water are used as a physical simulation ofinteracting point particles in two dimensions. The application ofan electric field normal to this monolayer polarizes theparticles, inducing a repulsive dipole interparticle potential.The electric field is applied at a relatively high frequency,3.75 MHz, to reduce screening from ions in the water. Atsufficiently high fields ({dollar}{bsol}sim{dollar}2000 V/cm for2 {dollar}{bsol}mu{dol...

The present work has made gains in relating thekinetics of fatigue testing to that of creep failure. It has beenfound that fatigue loading produces brittle crack growth similarto that observed in long term field failures. Furthermore, thefatigue testing is able to rank different polyethylene copolymersin the same order as does creep. This is very promising in lightof the fact that fatigue can accelerate slow crack growth toorders of magnitude faster than creep. In support of this,international r...

Chemistry, Polymer

The objective of this work was to develop anunderstanding of the processes which limit the molecular weightobtainable in the polyetherifications of sulfones and ketonesinvolving bis(aryl chloride)s that are activated by the carbonylgroup, and then to develop strategies to obtain high molecularweight polymers. This work demonstrates that reductivedehalogenation of the bis(aryl halide) or aryl halide chain endof the polymer can compete with aromatic nucleophilicsubstitution of the halide by the ph...

Psychology, Clinical

The purpose of the present study was to examine therelationships between early experiences of loss and abuse andlater functioning in 106 severely emotionally disturbed (SED)children (ages 6-14) in residential and day treatment. It washypothesized that early loss under traumatic circumstances (i.e.,removal for the child s safety, abandonment) would predict arange of later outcomes. More specifically, it was expected thatchildren who experienced earlier losses and/or more severe abusewould differ ...

Biology, Cell

The role of sphingolipids in mediating the action ofplatelet-derived growth factor (PDGF) has been investigated inthe vascular smooth muscle-derived A7r5 cell line. L-cycloserine(2 mM), an inhibitor of sphingolipid synthesis, causedtime-dependent inhibition of ({dollar}{bsol}sp3{dollar}H) serineincorporation into ({dollar}{bsol}sp3{dollar}H) sphingomyelin inA7r5 cells. PDGF-AB (10 ng/ml), PDGF-BB (10 ng/ml) or sphingosine(10 uM) independently stimulated ({dollar}{bsol}sp3{dollar}H)thymidine inco...

Protein kinase C(PKC) has been implicated theregulation of a variety of cellular functions, including hormonesecretion. There is accumulating evidence that aCa{dollar}{bsol}sp{lcub}2+{rcub}{dollar}-mobilizingCa{dollar}{bsol}sp{lcub}2+{rcub}{dollar} receptor exists on theparathyroid cell membrane whose activation is linked to thegeneration of inositol briphosphate(InsP{dollar}{bsol}sb3{dollar}) and diacylglycerol (DG),increases in (Ca{dollar}{bsol}sp{lcub}2+{rcub}{dollar}){dollar}{bsol}sb{lcub}{b...

Psychology, Behavioral

The purpose of this investigation was three-fold: (a)to explore the perceptions of women in abusive relationships whenhealth care services are used, (b) to identify factors thatinfluence women s disclosure or concealment of abuse in a healthcare encounter, and (c) to develop a conceptual understanding ofthe basic process and overall goal of women s behaviors andinteractions as they live in an abusive relationship and interactin health care encounters, grounded in the women s perspective.Semistru...

; Chemistry, Biochemistry

The surface of the Escherichia coli L-arabinose-bindingprotein, ABP, that interacts with the AraG:AraH complex, thecytoplasmic membrane component of the L-arabinose periplasmictransport system, has been defined by saturation andsite-specific mutagenesis. A set of ABP mutants with single ormultiple amino acid substitutions has been generated. Thetransport phenotypes of these mutants, when expressed withwild-type AraG and AraH in whole cells, suggest that the surfacecontaining the mouth of the ara...

Cultural

The study of advanced chiefdoms in theCarpatho-Danubian region reflects the emergence of asocio-political-economical organization focused on large scaleiron production. The Carpatho-Danubian data indicate a precociousdevelopment in which craft production included a highly organizedmetallurgical industry. After the 5{dollar}{bsol}sp{lcub}{bsol}rmth{rcub}{dollar} century BC iron was introduced into almost alleconomic activities, becoming a common commodity produced in massquantities. Unlike other ...

Operations Research

Most replacement models assume that whenever areplacement is needed a spare is immediately available. Thisassumption implies that lead times are zero or that an inventoryis maintained. Typically, the associated costs of managinginventory are ignored. This dissertation explores joint inventoryreplacement policies for a single unit and for multiple unitsoperating in parallel. Such policies are particularly importantwhen reorder lead times are significant and downtime costs large.Models within this...

Chemistry, Physical

The major objectives of this thesis research are twofold: (1) to study the mechanisms of the electrocatalyticoxidation of methane, ethane and ethylene and (2) to understandthe factors controlling the kinetics of these processes. Anunderstanding of the mechanisms of the electrocatalytic oxidationof these hydrocarbon molecules has been reached by identifyingthe adsorbed species, intermediates as well as products which areeither adsorbed on the electrode surface or dissolved in theelectrolyte. Two ...

A novel method for estimating the susceptibility of anobject using the MRI field distortions in an external referencewater bath next to the object is described. The field measurementis obtained using a MRI phase reconstruction from a Gradient Echoscan. A field model of an arbitrary object in a static magneticfield is discretely calculated using a Fourier convolution methodfrom geometry determined from the magnitude reconstruction. Leastsquares estimation then yields the susceptibility of the obj...

Engineering, Materials Science

The metastable t-ZrO{dollar}{bsol}sb2{dollar} particlesin both Y-TZP and Mg-PSZ can transform tom-ZrO{dollar}{bsol}sb2{dollar}, and in the PSZ also too-ZrO{dollar}{bsol}sb2{dollar}, via a martensitic transformation.This research has demonstrated that the transformation iscontrolled by the thermally activated, stress-assisted nucleationof the martensite phase. The thermally activated character of thephase change was manifested as isothermal transformation kineticsin both materials: Residually str...

Condensed Matter

Based on Pirouz s twinning model in {dollar}Si{bsol}{bsol}lbrack 46{bsol}rbrack{dollar} which has been successfullyapplied to other materials (35,24) as well, polytypictransformations in SiC can be explained (47, 51, 50). In order toget evidence for this model a study of dislocation corestructures using HRTEM is performed. As a preliminary study, theglide and shuffle question in Ge is investigated. Fromexperimental HRTEM, and image simulations including imageprocessing, it is shown that perfect6...

Computer Science

The recent progress in local area networks and indistributed systems has also made inroads in the area ofreal-time control systems. To keep pace with the hardware andsystem development, designers need suitable software tools to aidin the creation and optimization of distributed programs. Whencontrol system designers want to automate a machine or process,they describe its proper operation in the form of a programcontaining many interrelated modules and decide how they willallocate these modules t...

Cotransfection of neo with various oncogenes resultedin CEF transformation in vitro and, in several instances, sarcomaformation in vivo. Transfection of a family of v-src, c-src andv/c-src chimeric constructs demonstrated the ability of the assayto discriminate between transforming and nontransforming genes.Transfection of a number of erbB variants showed that internalmutations, primarily in the kinase domain, contributesignificantly to this oncogene s fibroblast transformingabilities. The tumor...

Biology, Molecular

In addition to the conserved AAUAAA hexanucleotide, GUand U-rich sequences in the 3{dollar}{bsol}sp{bsol}prime{dollar}flanking region are thought to be critical for the efficientpolyadenylation of vertebrate pre-mRNAs. The3{dollar}{bsol}sp{bsol}prime{dollar} flanking sequencerequirements for efficient and accurate polyadenylation of thebovine growth hormone (bGH) gene were determined by quantitativeS1 nuclease analysis of transcripts derived from various bGH3{dollar}{bsol}sp{bsol}prime{dollar} d...

Pharmacology

Thioltransferase, also known as glutaredoxin, is asmall (11.7 kDa) cytosolic protein that has been classified as aglutathione dependent thiol:disulfide oxidoreductase (EC1.8.4.1). Thioltransferase (TTase)-mediated catalysis ofreduction of disulfide bonds has been thought to be essential forthe maintenance and proper function of many intracellularproteins. In order to study the role of thiol:disulfide exchangereactions in the red blood cell, our laboratory purified andcharacterized a thioltransfe...

Biology, Cell

The calcium- and phospholipid-dependent protein kinase,protein kinase C (PKC), is a family of isozymes which function incell surface transduction for a variety of external stimuli. Inthe present study, the role of nuclear PKC in HL60 promyelocyticand K562 erythroleukemia cell line proliferation anddifferentiation is investigated. In addition, the phosphorylationsites mediated by nuclear PKC on the previously identifiednuclear envelope substrate lamin B are identified and a role forPKC in the mod...

Chemistry, Biochemistry

The neurotrophins are a family of small dimericproteins involved in the development and survival of neurons invertebrate nervous systems. At the time this project began,information pertaining to the structure of the neurotrophins andtheir receptor was limited to the primary structure andassociation of NGF as a noncovalent homodimer and the receptorsequence. With the availability recombinant expression systemsfor NGF and the extracellular domain of its low affinity receptor(RED), additional infor...

Chemistry, Physical

A method is herein described for determining in situthe atomic magnetic susceptibility of a metal ion in anelectrogenerated complex (corrected by the diamagneticsusceptibility associated with the ligands) in aqueous solutionsby monitoring the shift in the (water) proton resonance presentas an adventitious impurity in the2O-based electrolyte. As predicted by Evans formalism, the totalshift for mixtures of the diamagnetic [Fe(CN)6]4-and Paramagnetic [Fe(CN)6]3-prepared electrochemically in situ wa...

General; Economics, Theory

This dissertation describes the structural andoperating characteristics of foreign-owned companies that wereactive in Ohio during the second half of 1991, and reaches sometentative conclusions about the possible regional impacts ofIDFI. It uses primary and disaggregated, i.e., firm-specific datathat were obtained via a mail questionnaire from 180foreign-owned companies operating in Ohio. The design of thequestionnaire reflected the issues that had arisen in theacademic and public policy debates ...

Nutrition

Most fast growing tumors utilize glucose as theirprimary fuel. In contrast they do not have enzymes that wouldallow them to utilize ketone bodies. One could therefore devise astrategy for controlling the growth of fast growing metastatictumors that would involve controlled hypoglycemia and inducedketosis. It is hypothesized that periodic sessions ofhypoglycemic ketosis might control the growth of some tumors. Thepresent work represents the first phase of investigation ofcontrolled starvation of ...

Biology, Molecular

Nucleocytoplasmic transport of macromolecules acrossnuclear membrane was the essential invention during evolution ofeukaryotes. This bidirectional transport is carried out by amachine, the nuclear pore complex, that is anchored in bothlayers of the nuclear envelope. Although significant progress hasbeen made in understanding of the mechanisms of nuclear proteinimport, very little is known about the mechanisms of RNA exportfrom nucleus to cytoplasm. To learn molecular and cellularmechanisms of mR...

DNA polymerase III, the primary replicative polymeraseof E. coli and S. typhimurium, is a large enzyme with multiplesubunits. Its complexity reflects the complexity of its task: toaccurately and rapidly replicate the approximately 4,700 Kb ofDNA comprising the bacterial chromosome. Pol III interacts withnumerous auxiliary proteins during initiation, elongation andtermination, and with various SOS-induced proteins duringerror-prone repair. In none of these cases is the role of pol IIIcompletely d...

Sciences, Public Health

Three studies that are related to the choice oftreatment have been done. =520 \\$aIn Chapter I, the treatment ofhyperthyroidism has been analyzed. There are three differenttreatments for hyperthyroidism: medical, surgical, and radiationtherapy. It is rather difficult to choose the best treatment forevery given patient with the disease. Trade-offs among thesevarious treatment modalities foster disagreement over thepatient s indication for choice of one of the various therapeuticmodalities over th...

Chemistry, Polymer

The research presented in this thesis investigates theeffect of structural variants on the phase transitions of sidechain liquid crystalline polymers based on oligooxyethylenic andsemifluorinated flexible spacers. In addition, the effect ofalkali metal salt complexation by the oligooxyethylenic spacerson the phase behavior of these polymers is also investigated.Side chain liquid crystalline polysiloxanes based onoligooxyethylenic spacers and end-on fixed mesogens displaysmectic or nematic mesoph...