Investigation of Pulsed Laser Deposition Growth Parameters and their influence on the Sheet Resistance of a Complex Oxide Heterointerface

In this project, the growth parameters of Pulsed Laser Deposition are optimized in order to obtain a high quality interface between two complex oxides, LaAlO3 and SrTiO3. The prepared samples are compared by their sheet resistance, and the influence by the various growth parameters are investigated.The main finding is that reducing the laser fluence significantly lowers the sheetresistance. The lowest obtained sheet resistance was 81.2kohm. This value wasobtained with a laser fluence of 0.7 J/cm^2 and the results indicate that morecan be gained by going even lower. In previous work, a strong anisotropy of the sheet resistance has been observed. The anisotropy is further studied in this project and compared with the step-and-terrace topography at the interface. Atomic Force Microscopy is used to obtain the step directions and terrace widths, and these values are compared with resistance measurements. No correlation is found between these data. The results suggests that the anisotropy is due to other factors than the steps-and-terraces

Isometric factorization of vector measures and applications to spaces of integrable functions

Let X be a Banach space, Σ be a σ-algebra, and be a (countably additive) vector measure. It is a well known consequence of the Davis-Figiel-Johnson-Pełczyński factorization procedure that there exist a reflexive Banach space Y, a vector measure and an injective operator such that m factors as . We elaborate some theory of factoring vector measures and their integration operators with the help of the isometric version of the Davis-Figiel-Johnson-Pełczyński factorization procedure. Along this way, we sharpen a result of Okada and Ricker that if the integration operator on is weakly compact, then is equal, up to equivalence of norms, to some where Y is reflexive; here we prove that the above equality can be taken to be isometric.publishedVersionPaid open acces

An approach to compositional reasoning about concurrent objects and futures

Distributed and concurrent object-oriented systems are difficult to analyze due to the complexity of their concurrency, communication, and synchronization mechanisms. Rather than performing analysis at the code level of mainstream objectoriented languages such as Java and C++, we consider an imperative, objectoriented language with a simpler concurrency model. This language, based on concurrent objects communicating by asynchronous method calls and futures, avoids some difficulties of mainstream object-oriented programming languages related to compositionality and aliasing. In particular, reasoning about futures is handled by means of histories. Compositional verification systems facilitate system analysis, allowing components to be analyzed independently of their environment. In this paper, a compositional proof system in dynamic logic for partial correctness is established based on communication histories and class invariants. The soundness and relative completeness of this proof system follow by construction using a transformational approach from a sequential language with a non-deterministic assignment operator

Enforcing Behavioral Constraints in Evolving Aspect-Oriented Programs

Reasoning, specification, and verification of Aspect-Oriented (AO) programs presents unique challenges especially as such programs evolve over time. Components, base-code and aspects alike, may be easily added, removed, interchanged, or presently unavailable at unpredictable frequencies. Consequently, modular reasoning of such programs is highly attractive as it enables tractable evolution, otherwise necessitating that the entire program be reexamined each time a component is changed. It is well known, however, that modular reasoning about AO programs is difficult. In this paper, we present our ongoing work in constructing a rely-guarantee style reasoning system for the Aspect-Oriented Programming (AOP) paradigm, adopting a trace-based approach to deal with the plug-n-play nature inherent to these programs, thus easing AOP evolution

Den ulovfestede adgangen til å fremme direktekrav i entrepriseretten. En analyse av HR-2018-2256-A.

Avhandlingen gjelder den ulovfestede adgangen til å fremme direktekrav i entrepriseretten. Hovedproblemstillingen er hvilken adgang et tidligere ledd i kontraktskjeden har til å fremme et mangelskrav direkte mot et senere ledd i kontraktskjeden. Utgangspunktet for avhandlingen er en deskriptiv og en normativ analyse av HR-2018-2256-A, med det formål å vurdere Høyesteretts tilnærming til problemstillingen. I tillegg fremheves flere av de mest fremtredende reelle hensyn som begrunner den ulovfestede regelen. Formålet er å si noe om innholdet i den ulovfestede regelen, samt å vurdere om Høyesterett fulgte det samme argumentasjonsmønsteret som tidligere dommer har lagt til grunn

35: Justice of the Peace appointment, 1792: Manuel Gayoso do Lemos to William Dunbar

Justice of the Peace appointment, 1792: Manuel Gayoso do Lemos to William Dunbarhttps://scholarlycommons.obu.edu/dunbar/1037/thumbnail.jp

Liberating Coroutines: Combining Sequential and Parallel Execution

Concurrent programming using threads is considered a hard and error-prone task. Coroutines are conceptually simpler, they are easier to program with due to their sequential nature. Flexible coroutines as presented by Belsnes and Østvold liberate classical coroutines from their quasi-parallel world and combine them with threads. This allows the programmer to factor programs into sequential and parallel tasks, leading to simpler programs. This thesis presents an extension to the formal semantics for flexible coroutines. A detailed breakdown of the scheduling strategies and parameter passing is presented in the same formal framework. Some words are given on patterns that emerge when programming with flexible coroutines and these patterns are defined in the formal framework. We present a clean implementation of flexible coroutines in Java, based on standard threads and semaphores. Challenges encountered, such as representing coroutines in Java and invoking methods across threads are discussed. This framework is used in examples that employ flexible coroutines in different ways; the classical synchronization problem of readers and writers, the Santa Claus problem and binary and general semaphores

Do you see my pain? Aspects of pain assessment in hospitalized preverbal children

Background and aim: Pain in hospitalized preverbal children is underassessed and undermanaged. According to the Social Communication Model of Pain, pain is both a personal experience and a social construction, influenced not only by the child in pain, but by the observer and the context. Nurses’ pain assessment is biased towards underestimation. The use of structured pain scales is strongly advocated, but pain scales have been difficult to implement into clinical practice. To improve clinical pain assessment and reduce unnecessary pain for hospitalized preverbal children, a better understanding of aspects concerning these scales is needed, and nurses’ views regarding clinical pain assessment and their understanding and practical use of structured pain scales need to be further explored. The overall aim of this thesis was to contribute to knowledge regarding how to reduce unnecessary pain and suffering in hospitalized preverbal children by exploring aspects that influence nurses’ assessment of pain in the clinical setting. Material and Methods: This PhD thesis consists of four different studies using both qualitative and quantitative methods. In study I the COMFORT behavioral scale was translated into Norwegian using the forward-back-translation method and culturally adapted in 12 cognitive interviews with clinicians who would later be using the scale in clinical practice. The translated scale’s responsiveness to change and inter-rater reliability were tested in study II, based on repeated measurements from 45 preverbal children before and after minor outpatient surgery. Study III was a systematic review appraising the evidence underlying the recommendations presented in 14 systematic reviews on the measurement properties of observational pain scales. Study IV was a semi-structured interview study with 22 nurses in Norway and Canada and examined their pain assessment practices based on selfselected clinical examples. Results: Cognitive interviews identified several problems with the content validity of the Norwegian and original versions of the COMFORT behavioral scale. The responsiveness of the translated version was supported for assessment of sedation, but not for assessment of pain/distress. Scale recommendations given in systematic reviews addressing the measurement properties of observational pain scales had low evidence value and should be interpreted with caution. Observational pain scales were infrequently used in clinical practice and pain scores were not considered pain –specific. Instead; nurses expressed strong preferences for pain assessment based on clinical judgment and individually tailored to the child and the situation. When assessing pain, nurses combined experience-based and childspecific knowledge with one or more specific strategies to interpret observations of and information from the child. Described strategies included identifying a probable cause for pain, eliminating other sources of distress, evaluating behavioral change and/or effect of interventions on behavior, using a personal and contextual approach, and using behavioral pain scores. Conclusions: A preverbal child’s pain will probably be better seen, evaluated and managed if nurses apply a systematic and comprehensive assessment approach that integrates clinical judgement and structured pain scales

A History of BlockingQueues

This paper describes a way to formally specify the behaviour of concurrent data structures. When specifying concurrent data structures, the main challenge is to make specifications stable, i.e., to ensure that they cannot be invalidated by other threads. To this end, we propose to use history-based specifications: instead of describing method behaviour in terms of the object's state, we specify it in terms of the object's state history. A history is defined as a list of state updates, which at all points can be related to the actual object's state. We illustrate the approach on the BlockingQueue hierarchy from the java.util.concurrent library. We show how the behaviour of the interface BlockingQueue is specified, leaving a few decisions open to descendant classes. The classes implementing the interface correctly inherit the specifications. As a specification language, we use a combination of JML and permission-based separation logic, including abstract predicates. This results in an abstract, modular and natural way to specify the behaviour of concurrent queues. The specifications can be used to derive high-level properties about queues, for example to show that the order of elements is preserved. Moreover, the approach can be easily adapted to other concurrent data structures.Comment: In Proceedings FLACOS 2012, arXiv:1209.169