GENDER DIFFERENCE IN IMPACTS DURING RUNNING

The goal of this research was to determine whether gender differences exist in impact force and impact shock variables at stance phase during a preferred velocity running. Twelve male and ten female recreational runners were selected for this study. Comparisons of parameters relating to impact force and impact shock, which attained from time domain, and impact shock parameters, which were anal'yzed in frequency domain, were made between genders. There were no significantly differences in a magnitude of impact force and head and tibia acceleration between genders, but PSD (power spectral density) of peak impact shock at the tibia (

EMPLOYEE VOICE BEHAVIOR DURING ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE

I seek to understand the dynamic organizational change process by focusing on employees' change-related voice as the mechanism through which their dissatisfaction with change implementation processes relates to their positive behavioral outcomes during organizational change. I propose that employees who are dissatisfied with their organization's change implementation processes are more likely to engage in change-related voice behavior - defined as behavior that expresses constructive suggestions (promotive voice) and challenges (prohibitive voice) to improve change processes - and that their affective commitment to change, change efficacy, and work-unit leader's empowering leader behavior will positively moderate the relationship between dissatisfaction and change-related voice behavior. Through a survey with a sample of 192 employees and 27 work-unit leaders working for an organization undergoing a large-scale organizational change, I found that the patterns of how the hypothesized antecedents relate to change-related voice behavior vary depending on the type of voice behavior. Specifically, employees are more likely to make constructive suggestions (promotive voice) when their work-unit leader shows empowering behaviors and when they are high in change efficacy. Employees who are dissatisfied with the change implementation processes engage in promotive voice behavior only when they are strongly committed to change (affective commitment to change) and believe they are not capable of handling change demands (change efficacy). Furthermore, employees tend to point out problems in current change implementation processes (prohibitive voice) when the levels of their work-unit leader's empowering leader behavior and dissatisfaction with the current change processes are high; and the relationship between dissatisfaction and prohibitive voice was stronger when the level of their change efficacy is low rather than high. Lastly, increased levels of employee change-related voice behavior in both types are positively related with their individual performance of change tasks

Waste and wastewater clean-up using microbial fuel cells

A sustainable energy portfolio should include a range of carbon-neutral and renewable energy technologies. Amongst the renewable energy technologies, MFCs can offer a solution for both sustainable energy and clean water demands. In order to take the MFC technology to commercial level, more effort has to be spent to improve the performance and treatment efficiency. The goal for this thesis was to improve anode performance and waste utilisation. To achieve this goal, the approach taken was system scale-up through multiples of relatively small sized MFC units. Two main aspects of the MFC anode, design and biofilm affecting parameters, were investigated in order to better understand and enhance the anode performance. Through a number of experiments, better performing material for each MFC component was chosen. For example, by replacing the previous electrode material with modified anode and cathode, a 2.2 and 4.9 fold increase in power output was achieved respectively. Investigations into biofilm affecting parameters such as temperature, external load and feedstock, yielded novel findings helping to understand the dynamic characteristics of MFC anode biofilms. For the final part of this thesis, these findings were used to implement the MFC technology for practical applications such as treating wastes and resource recovery as well as producing electrical energy. Two troublesome wastes, urine and uric scale showed great potential for being power sources of MFC electricity generation. Furthermore it was demonstrated that MFCs can contribute to recovery of resources such as nitrogen and phosphorus in the form of struvite. A commercial electronic appliance was run continuously, powered by a stack of 8 MFCs fed with neat human urine, which successfully demonstrated a great potential of the MFC technology for both electricity generation and waste treatment

JMASM 32: SAS Template for Single-Subject Experimental Designs

Meta-analysis has been used to synthesize research findings and to evaluate the effectiveness of treatments or the accuracy of diagnostic tools. Although meta-analytic techniques were developed to synthesize the results of several studies, controversy exists as to how to quantify the results from singlesubject experimental designs (SSEDs). The most commonly used metrics are reviewed, including nonregression and regression based methods. The application of the SAS template is demonstrated through simulated data sets. The SAS templates can be modified to accommodate a more complex data structure

Optimal segregation of proteins: phase transitions and symmetry breaking

Asymmetric segregation of key proteins at cell division -- be it a beneficial or deleterious protein -- is ubiquitous in unicellular organisms and often considered as an evolved trait to increase fitness in a stressed environment. Here, we provide a general framework to describe the evolutionary origin of this asymmetric segregation. We compute the population fitness as a function of the protein segregation asymmetry $a$, and show that the value of $a$ which optimizes the population growth manifests a phase transition between symmetric and asymmetric partitioning phases. Surprisingly, the nature of phase transition is different for the case of beneficial proteins as opposed to proteins which decrease the single-cell growth rate. Our study elucidates the optimization problem faced by evolution in the context of protein segregation, and motivates further investigation of asymmetric protein segregation in biological systems.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures in the main tex

The Impact of Sample Size in Cross-Classified Multiple Membership Multilevel Models

A simulation study was conducted to examine parameter recovery in a cross-classified multiple membership multilevel model. No substantial relative bias was identified for the fixed effect or level-one variance component estimates. However, the level-two cross-classification multiple membership factor variance components were substantially biased with relatively fewer groups

Complete microbial fuel cell fabrication using additive layer manufacturing

Improving the efficiency of microbial fuel cell (MFC) technology by enhancing the system performance and reducing the production cost is essential for commercialisation. In this study, building an additive manufacturing (AM)-built MFC comprising all 3D printed components such as anode, cathode and chassis was attempted for the first time. 3D printed base structures were made of low-cost, biodegradable polylactic acid (PLA) filaments. For both anode and cathode, two surface modification methods using either graphite or nickel powder were tested. The best performing anode material, carbon-coated non-conductive PLA filament, was comparable to the control modified carbon veil with a peak power of 376.7 µW (7.5 W m−3) in week 3. However, PLA-based AM cathodes underperformed regardless of the coating method, which limited the overall performance. The membrane-less design produced more stable and higher power output levels (520−570 µW, 7.4−8.1 W m−3) compared to the ceramic membrane control MFCs. As the final design, four AM-made membrane-less MFCs connected in series successfully powered a digital weather station, which shows the current status of low-cost 3D printed MFC development