Maternal Love as Narcissistic Deprivation: On the Mother-Daughter Relationship in Everything I Never Told You

In Celeste Ng’s debut novel Everything I Never Told You, both the two generations’ mother-daughter relationships witness the maternal use of the daughter as “obscure maternal double”, as the daughter unwittingly suffers from the mother’s narcissistic deprivation in the name of maternal love. This thesis attempts to illustrate that the profound shaping motivation of the daughter’s tragedy lies in the mother’s desire and practice of power-participation in a patriarchal society. Under the phallocentric culture that strangles female voice, the mother-figure establishes identity and gains authority by materializing her daughter as a receptive vase, strangling her development of an autonomous sense of self through the operation of doll complex and symbiotic illusion. This traps her into a dualistic power paradigm, which makes her voluntarily or subconsciously play the role of a maintainer and a conspirator to patriarchy, and this power-operation mode bears great generational continuity from mothers to daughters

Sensing Noise as an Information Object in Socio-Technical Environmental Monitoring

A noise phenomenology is proposed that considers noise as an information object that only has meaning when experienced by an actor. Environmental noise has a major impact on the health and well-being of citizens, particularly when the noise occurs at night. Noise level monitoring can fail to take into account the impact of noise on the lived experienced of citizens. A socio-technical multi-sensor architecture is used to record night time noise in a domestic urban environment in a longitudinal study in the UK. Results are triangulated with contemporaneous logs of occupants to isolate noise patterns that cause the most disturbance to sleep behaviour. The phenomenology identifies the need for a multidimensional interdisciplinary approach to developing sensor networks to acquire noise information for environmental monitoring

IoT technology for smart Water system

A serious drop in ensuring the water quality in the distribution system is a factor that affects public health. This could lead to increase in biological and non-biological contents, change in colour and odour of the water. These contaminants cause a serious threat to the whole water ecosystem. The conventional methods of analyzing the water quality require much time and labour. So there is a need to monitor and protect the water with a real time water quality monitoring system in order to make active measurements to reduce contamination. The growth of the technology had helped in developing efficient methods to solve many serious issues in real-time. Internet of things (IoT) has achieved a great focus due to its faster processing and intelligence. This paper focuses on discussing the architecture, applications and need of IoT in water management syste

Leakage discharge separation in multi-leaks pipe networks based on improved Independent Component Analysis with Reference (ICA-R) algorithm

The existing leakage assessment methods are not accurate and timely, making it difficult to meet the needs of water companies. In this paper, a methodology based on Independent Component Analysis with Reference (ICA-R) algorithm was proposed to give an more accurate estimation of leakage discharge in multi-leaks water distribution network without considering the specific individuality of one single leak. The proposed algorithm has been improved is improved to prevent error convergence in multi-leak pipe networks. Then an example EPANET model and a physical experimental platform were built to simulate and evaluate the flow in multi-leak WDNs, and the leakage flow rate is calculated by improved ICA-R algorithm and FastICA algorithm. The simulation results are shown the improved ICA-R algorithm has better performanc

Numerical Modelling and Simulation of Two-Phase Flow Flushing Method for Pipeline Cleaning in Water Distribution Systems

Secondary pollution by microorganisms and substances peeling of from the “growth ring” causes clean water deterioration during the water distribution process. In order to reduce the secondary pollution, our previous research investigated the best settings of a two-phase flow flushing method for pipeline cleaning in water distribution systems experimentally, and a case study was carried out for comparison of the efficiencies between two-phase and single-phase flow methods. In this paper, based on the results of the experimental study, numerical modelling and a simulation study are carried out by FLUENT to evaluate the performance of the two-phase flow flushing method for removal of the “growth ring”. Results: the simulation results match the experimental results; pressure, water-phase flow velocity and water-phase volume ratio distributions in a section of pipe are simulated and analysed; the shear force against time in a period is obtained; elbow pipes cause flushing energy loss, and therefore, at most one section of elbow pipe is flushed in one flushing perio

A case report on ATP6V0A4 gene mutation: Forecast of familial deafness by genetic investigation in a patient with autosomal recessive distal renal tubular acidosis

The autosomal recessive form of distal renal tubular acidosis (dRTA), a condition associated with the systemic accumulation of acid owing to its reduced elimination through kidneys, is caused by ATP6V0A4 mutation, which is typically related to either late-onset sensorineural hearing loss (SNHL) or normal hearing. This article reports dRTA in seven year old boy, born to a Chinese couple who have family history of deafness. The patient does not have hearing impairment. ATP6V0A4 gene sequencing demonstrated that there were 2 heterozygous mutations, c.1376C>T and c.1029+5G>A, in gene ATP6V0A4. c.1376C > T (p.Ser459Phe) is a kind of missense mutation in gene ATP6V0A4. c.1029+5G>A is a kind of intragenic mutation near the cutting area of gene ATP6V0A4. ATP6V0A4 gene mutation study substantiated the autosomal recessive dRTA without hearing impairment in the patient. This case report emphasizes the significance of early diagnosis and genetic screening of recessive forms of dRTA independent of hearing status and offer suitable intervention to treat dRTA as well as diminish the influence of SNHL on the child’s learning and communication in daily life.Keywords: Renal tubular acidosis, Homeostasis, Electrolytes, Hearing impairment, ATP6V0A4 gene, Mutatio

A Wireless Passive SAW Delay Line Temperature and Pressure Sensor for Monitoring Water Distribution System

Wireless passive surface acoustic wave (SAW) sensor has been widely used in many applications. This paper presents a feasibility study on a designed wireless passive SAW delay line temperature and pressure sensor for monitoring water distribution systems. The substrate of the sensor node is a Y-Z orientation cut LiNbO3 crystalline with 0.5 mm thickness. The Interdigital transducer (IDT) was fabricated centrally on the surface of the substrate with an antenna connected. There are three reflectors fabricated on the same surface of the IDT. One reflector is on one side and the other two are on the other side of the IDT. A simulated water pipe platform with testing devices was assembled to test the feasibility of the sensor node working in water pipe environment. The experimental result showed that the designed sensor worked properly but 4/5 amplitude of signals is lost compared to the experimental results in the open-air environment

Human Health Impact Analysis of Contamination in Water Distributed Networks

This paper aims to assess and analyze the health impact of consuming contaminated drinking water in a water distributed system (WDS). The analysis was based on qualitative simulation performed in two different models named hydraulic and water quality in a WDS. The computation focuses on quantitative analysis for chemically contaminated water impacts by analyzing the dose level in various locations in the water network and the mass of the substance that entered the human body. Several numerical experiments have been applied to evaluate the impact of water pollution on human life. They analyzed the impact on human life according to various factors, including the location of the injected node (pollution occurrence) and the ingested dose level. The results show a significant impact of water contaminant on human life in multiple areas in the water network, and the level of this impact changed from one location to another in WDSs based on several factors such as the location of the pollution occurrence, the contaminant concentration, and the dose level. In order to reduce the impact of this contaminant, water quality sensors have been used and deployed on the water network to help detect this contaminant. The sensors were optimally deployed based on the time-detection of water contamination and the volume of polluted water consumed. Numerical experiments were carried out to compare water pollution’s impact with and without using water quality sensors. The results show that the health impact was reduced by up to 98.37% by using water quality sensors

Modulators of Toll-like Receptors-4 and -2

The toxicity of Gram-negative bacterial endotoxin (lipopolysaccharide, LPS) resides in its structurally highly conserved glycolipid component called lipid A. The major goal of the first project was to further explore structure-activity relationships in small-molecules that would sequester LPS by binding to the lipid A moiety, so that it may find application in the prophylaxis or adjunctive therapy of Gram-negative sepsis. Several guanylhydrazones had earlier been identified in rapid-throughput screens as potent LPS binders. It was desirous to examine if grafting the guanylhydrazone functionality on the scaffold of a lead N-alkyl polyamine compound would afford greater LPS sequestration potency. In the first project, a congeneric set of guanylhydrazone analogues were synthesized and evaluated for LPS-sequestering potency. It was found that a C16 alkyl substitution was optimal in the N-alkylguanylhydrazone series; a homospermine analogue with the terminal amine N-alkylated with a C16 chain with the other terminus of the molecule bearing an unsubstituted guanylhydrazone moiety was marginally more active suggesting very slight, if any, steric effects. Neither C16 analogue was significantly more active than the N-C16-alkyl or N-C16-acyl compounds that we had characterized earlier, indicating that basicity of the phosphate-recognizing cationic group is not a determinant of LPS sequestration activity. The N-terminus of bacterial lipoproteins are acylated with a (S)-(2,3-bisacyloxypropyl)cysteinyl residue. Lipopeptides derived from lipoproteins activate innate immune responses by engaging Toll-like receptor 2 (TLR2), and are highly immunostimulatory and yet without apparent toxicity in animal models. The lipopeptides may therefore be useful as potential immunotherapeutic agents. Previous structure-activity relationships in such lipopeptides have largely been obtained using murine cells and it is now clear that significant species-specific differences exist between human and murine TLR responses. In the second project, I have examined in detail the role of the highly conserved Cys residue as well as the geometry and stereochemistry of the Cys-Ser dipeptide unit. (R)-diacylthioglycerol analogues were maximally active in reporter gene assays using human TLR2. The Cys-Ser dipeptide unit represents the minimal part-structure, but the stereochemistry of neither amino residues of the dipeptide was found to be a critical determinant of activity. The thioether bridge between the diacyl and dipeptide units was determined to be crucial, and replacement by an ether bridge resulted in a dramatic decrease in activity. Moreover, the replacement of the two ester-liked C16 hydrocarbons by ether or amide linkages led to a dramatic loss in activity, while the replacement of one of the ester-linked fatty acyl moiety (internal) with an amide linkage remained partially active

Improved Basin Analog System to Characterize Unconventional Gas Resource

Unconventional resources will play an important role in filling the gap between supply and demand for future world energy. In North America, the impact of unconventional resources on energy supplies is growing continuously. However, around the world they have yet to serve as a major contributor to the energy supply, partly due to the scarcity of information about the exploration and development technologies required to produce them. Basin analogy can be used to estimate the undiscovered petroleum potential in a target basin by finding a geological analog that has been explored enough that its resource potential is fully understood. In 2006, Singh developed a basin analog system BASIN (Basin Analog Systems INvestigation) in detail that could rapidly and consistently identify analogous reference basins for a target basin. My research focused on continuing that work, comprehensively improving the basin analog system in four areas: the basin analog method; the database; the software functionality; and the validation methods. The updated system compares basins in terms of probability distributions of geological parameters. It compensates for data that are sparse or that do not represent basin-level geological parameters, and it expands the system's ability to compare widely varying quantitative parameters. Because the updated BASIN database contains more geologic and petroleum systems information on reference (existing) basins, it identifies analog basins more accurately and efficiently. The updated BASIN software was developed by using component-based design and data visualization techniques that help users better manage large volumes of information to understand various data objects and their complicated relationships among various data objects. Validation of the improved BASIN software confirms its accuracy: if a basin selected as the target basin appears in the reference basin list with other basins, the target basin is 100% analogous only to itself. Furthermore, when a target basin is analyzed by both BASIN and PRISE (Petroleum Resources Investigation and Summary Evaluation) software, results of the improved BASIN closely matched the PRISE results, which provides important support for using BASIN and PRISE together to quantitatively estimate the resource potential in frontier basins