First order conservation law framework for large strain explicit contact dynamics

This thesis presents a novel vertex-centred finite volume algorithm for explicit large strain solid contact dynamic problems where potential contact loci are known a priori. This methodology exploits the use of a system of first order conservation equations written in terms of the linear momentum and a triplet of geometric deformation measures, consisting of the deformation gradient tensor, its co-factor and its determinant, in combination with their associated Rankine-Hugoniot jump conditions. These jump conditions are used to derive several dynamic contact models ensuring the preservation of hyperbolic characteristic structure across solution discontinuities at the contact interface, which is a significant advantage over standard quasi-static contact models where the influence of inertial effects at the contact interface is completely neglected. By taking advantage of this conservative formalism, both kinematic (velocity) and kinetic (traction) contact-impact conditions are explicitly enforced at the fluxes through the use of the appropriate jump conditions. Specifically, the kinetic contact condition was enforced, in the traditional manner, through the linear momentum equation, while the kinematic contact condition was easily enforced through the geometric conservation equations without requiring a computationally demanding iterative scheme. Additionally, a Total Variation Diminishing shock capturing technique can be suitably incorporated in order to improve dramatically the performance of the algorithm at the vicinity of shocks, importantly no ad-hoc regularisation procedure is required to accurately capture shock phenomena. Moreover, to guarantee stability from the spatial discretisation standpoint, global entropy production is demonstrated through the satisfaction of semi-discrete version of the classical Coleman-Noll procedure expressed in terms of the time rate of the Hamiltonian energy of the system. Finally, a series of numerical examples is presented in order to assess the performance and applicability of the proposed algorithm suitably implemented across MATLAB and a purpose built OpenFOAM solver

Extension for Community Healthcare Outcomes-Palliative Care in Africa Program: Improving Access to Quality Palliative Care

Purpose: There is limited access to quality palliative care (PC) for patients with advanced cancer in sub-Saharan Africa. Our aim was to describe the development of the Project Extension for Community Healthcare Outcomes- Palliative Care in Africa (ECHO-PACA) program and describe a preliminary evaluation of attitudes and knowledge of participants regarding the ability of the program to deliver quality PC. Methods: An interdisciplinary team at the MD Anderson Cancer Center, guided by experts in PC in sub-Saharan Africa, adapted a standardized curriculum based on PC needs in the region. Participants were then recruited, and monthly telementoring sessions were held for 16 months. The monthly telementoring sessions consisted of case presentations, discussions, and didactic lectures. Program participants came from 14 clinics and teaching hospitals in Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, and Zambia. Participants were surveyed at the beginning, midpoint, and end of the 16-month program to evaluate changes in attitudes and knowledge of PC. Results: The median number of participants per session was 30. Thirty-three (83%) of 40 initial participants completed the feedback survey. Health care providers’ self-reported confidence in providing PC increased with participation in the Project ECHO-PACA clinic. There was significant improvement in the participants’ attitudes and knowledge, especially in titrating opioids for pain control (P = .042), appropriate use of non-opioid analgesics (P = .012), and identifying and addressing communication issues related to end-of-life care (P = .014). Conclusion: Project ECHO-PACA was a successful approach for disseminating knowledge about PC. The participants were adherent to ECHO PACA clinics and the completion of feedback surveys. Future studies should evaluate the impact of Project ECHO-PACA on changes in provider practice as well as patient outcomes

Synthesis and biological investigation of (+)-JD1, an organometallic BET bromodomain inhibitor

(+)-JD1, a rationally designed ferrocene analogue of the BET bromodomain (BRD) probe molecule (+)-JQ1, has been synthesized and evaluated in biophysical, cell-based assays as well as in pharmacokinetic studies. It displays nanomolar activity against BRD isoforms, and its cocrystal structure was determined in complex with the first bromodomain of BRD4 and compared with that of (+)-JQ1, a known BRD4 small-molecule probe. At 1 μM concentration, (+)-JD1 was able to inhibit c-Myc, a key driver in cancer and an indirect target of BRD4

A Evaluative study to assess the Effectiveness of Structured Teaching Programme on Knowledge regarding Antiretroviral Therapy among HIV patients in selected community care centres, in Kanyakumari District

The study was undertaken to assess the effectiveness of structured teaching programme on knowledge of antiretroviral therapy among HIV patients in selected community care centres, in Kanyakumari District. OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY: 1. To assess the level of knowledge regarding antiretroviral therapy before and after structured teaching programme among HIV patients. 2. To evaluate the effectiveness of structured teaching programme on antiretroviral therapy among HIV patients. 3. To associate the post test knowledge score among HIV patients regarding antiretro viral therapy with selected demographic variables such as age, sex, type of family, marital status, education, occupation, and income. ASSUMPTIONS: The knowledge of antiretroviral therapy varies from one another. The level of knowledge of antiretroviral therapy is influenced by selected demographic variables like age, sex, type of family, marital status, education, occupation and income In this study J.W. Kenny’s open system model (2002) was used to assess the effectiveness of structured teaching programme and also for associating the selected demographic variables with knowledge of antiretroviral therapy. This study adopts a quantitative approach and design was quasi experimental one group pre test post test design. Data were colleted from 50 samples by convenience sampling technique. The tools used for data collection include- 1. Selected demographic variables. 2. Structured questionnaire regarding knowledge on HIV and antiretroviral therapy with a score of 24. All tools were validated and subjected to reliability testing. On pilot study the tools were found to be appropriate and relevant for the study. The procedure of data collection was done from subjects on convenience sampling technique and data analysis was done by using descriptive and inferential statistics. MAJOR FINDINGS OF THE STUDY: 1. Among 50 samples none of them had high knowledge during pretest. After structured teaching programme, in post test 30% of them had high knowledge. 2. Association between level of knowledge and selected demographic variables such as sex, type of family, marital status, education, occupation, and income have no significant association.(P>0.050). 3. The mean score for knowledge during pretest was 6.56 and has changed to 13.6 in post test, P<0.050. After imparting the structured teaching programme there is a significant improvement in knowledge on antiretroviral therapy. CONCLUSION: This evaluative study reveals that among the 50 participants of the study 74% of them had high knowledge after post test. There is no statistically significant association between demographic variables such as sex, education, marital status, occupation, and income. The structured teaching programme was also found effective in improving the knowledge of antiretroviral therapy thereby adherence to this therapy can be improved

Reuse of knowledge bases & problem solvers explored in the VT domain

This thesis explores the reuse of knowledge bases through semi-automated code generation of new KBs and explores the issues surrounding the use of constraint satisfaction techniques to solve the Sisyphus II VT challenge and the related class of problems.  For my primary analysis I chose a knowledge base system written in CLIPS which was based on the propose-and-revise (PnR) problem solver, and which had a lift/elevator knowledge base (KB).  Components were initially extracted manually, and then semi-automatically, and were used with both an Excel spreadsheet and a constraint problem solver (ECLiPSe) to solve a range of tasks.  I have produced a reuse system which is useable by domain experts. The next phase was to implement ExtrAKTor which extracts the same 4 knowledge sources virtually automatically from the CLIPS knowledge base (held by Protégé), and to transform these so that they are compatible with additional problem solvers.  To date Excel & ECLiPSe have been used, and again it has been demonstrated that the resulting systems are able to solve lift configuration tasks.  This work has produced a reuse system which is useable by domain experts.  The ExtrAKTor system has been independently tested using an enhanced version of the U-HAUL KB; a KB in the removal truck rental domain. Fixes are an essential part of P&P.  Using the tightly constrained VT KB generated by ExtrAKTor from the original Protégé KB, ECLiPSe did not require fix information to find a solution.  The decision was made to create a less tightly constrained version of the KB to more fully investigate the solution space and determine if fix information could be encoded and used effectively in a CSP environment.  It became apparent that performance was significantly affected by ordering of clauses due to Prolog’s backtracking during component selection; this had not been an issue with the more tightly constrained KB.  The ExtrAKTor code was then further refined adding the “domain” and “infers most” construct which led to a substantial performance improvement largely independent of clause ordering.  The conclusion of the experimentation is that ECLiPSe does not require expert provided fix information to efficiently solve the VT class of parametric design problems.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo

Experiencing social research

xviii, 204 p.; 22 cm

Sydney Harbour pH data 2016

Electrical conductivity (salinity), temperature and fluorescence-based measurements of pH were employed to examine diel fluctuations in seawater carbonate chemistry of surface waters in Sydney Harbour over two 5 multiple-day periods. A proof-of-concept device employing the fluorescence-based technique provided a useful time series for pH. Alkalinity with pH and temperature were used to calculate the degree of calcite and aragonite saturation (ΩCa and ΩAr, respectively). Alkalinity was determined from a published alkalinity-salinity relationship. The fluctuations observed in pH over intervals of minutes to hours could be distinguished from background noise. While the stated phase angle resolution of the lifetime fluorometer translated into pH units was 0.0028 pH units, the repeatability standard deviation of calculated pH was 0.007 to 0.009. Diel variability in pH, ΩAr and ΩCa showed a clear pattern that appeared to correlate with both salinity and temperature. Drift due to photodegradation of the fluorophore was minimized by reducing exposure to ambient light. The ΩCa and ΩAr fluctuated on a daily cycle. The net result of changes in pH, salinity and temperature combined to influence seawater carbonate chemistry. The fluorescence-based pH monitoring technique is simple, provides good resolution and is unaffected by moving parts or leaching of solutions over time. The use of optics is pressure insensitive, making this approach to ocean acidification monitoring well suited to deepwater applications

Photosynthetic responses of Halophila stipulacea to a light gradient. II. Acclimations following transplantation

Halophila stipulacea is the dominant seagrass in the Gulf of Aqaba (northern Red Sea), where it grows from the intertidal to depths exceeding 50 m. Its successful growth under such a broad irradiance gradient shows either a high plasticity or is caused by longer-term adaptations to the various depths, possibly resulting in the formation of ecotypes. In April 2008 we transplanted shoots of this seagrass between the extreme depths of its distribution at the study site (8 and 33 m) in order to evaluate its acclimation potential to various irradiances. We compared photosynthetic parameters derived from light response curves generated by PAM fluorometry (so-called rapid light curves, RLC) and measured chlorophyll a and b concentrations. RLCs from the shallow (similar to 400 pmol photons m(-2) s(-1) at midday) and deep (similar to 35 pmol photons m(-2) s(-1) at midday) sites were characteristic for high- and low-light growing plants, respectively, and the transplanted seagrasses acclimated to their new environments within 6 d, at which time their RLCs resembled those of the original plants growing at the depths to which they had been transplanted, Concentrations of both chlorophyll a and b decreased or increased when the plants were transferred to high- vs. low-light environments, respectively, but the chlorophyll a:b ratios remained constant. These fast changes in photosynthetic responses and light absorption characteristics in response to changing light environments points to Halophila stipulacea as being a highly plastic seagrass with regard to irradiance, which may partly explain its abundance across a wide range of irradiances along the depth gradient that it occupies