In fishes, elopomorphs have a leptocephalous stage in the life cycle. Elopomorpha includes tenpounders (Elops), tarpons (Megalops), bonefishes (Albula), spine eels (Notacanthus), apodes and gulper eels. They are highly diversified in morphology and habitat utilization, Their monophyly is based on sharing of this larval stage. However, not all researches on these group accept the idea that this stage is of relationship. If this is true, the concept of elopomorpha must be re-evaluated. In attempt to elucidate their phylogenetic relationships, mtDNA 12S rRNA sequences were analyzed and data suggest that: (1)Elopomorpha is a monophyletic group. In other word, leptochphalous stage is a valid phylogenetic indictor, and it is not the result of convergency to environment; (2)Elops and Megalops share a common ancestor, and is a primitive group for Elopomorpha; (3)Megalops is the primitive lineage of Elopomorpha; (4)Albula and Notacanthus share a common ancestor, and they are the sister group of Anguilliformes; (5)Anguilliformes is a monophyletic group; (6)Muraenidae is a primitive group of Anguilliformes; (7)A high speciation rate might have taken place in Apodes within a short period of time; (8)Synaphobranchidae is a monophyletic group and it is the primitive group of Congroidei. (10) Synaphobranchid species have short interspecific genetic distance among species.

ABSTRACT Field observation and of sound recording of Formosan macaques (Macaca cyclopis) at Mt. Longevity were conducted from Oct. 1999 to Oct. 2000. Spectrographic analyses revealed at least 25 basic patterns with 32 different vocal types from a total of 375 hrs recordings (55 hrs for scan sampling and 320 hrs for focal animal sampling). The three most frequent calls in overall vocal repertoire were coo calls (18.59%), hack (17.78%) and contact rattle (11.85%). The other calls included squeak (11.34%), noise and undulated scream (6.61%), sneeze (4.54%), greeting (3.77%), squeal (3.41%), vibrato growl (3.02%), growl (2.86%), cluck (2.54%), female copulation call (2.45%), squawk (2.14%), tonal scream (2.03%), alarm call (1.74%), threat rattle (1.66%), chuckle (0.92%), rise (0.61%), weeping (0.56%), male copulation call (0.32%), babble (0.30%), whine (0.29%), roar (0.27%), bark (0.24%) and mounting grunt (0.15%). Formosan macaques employ a complex vocal system composed of discrete signals as well as graded signals which vocal patterns connected by intermediate gradations. Discrete signal included coo call, greeting, contact rattle, mounting grunt, two copulation calls, babble, whine, weeping. Whereas the graded signals included the aggressive signals (threat rattle, growl, bark, roar, vibrato growl and alarm call), chuckle, the submissive signals (noise and undulated scream, squeal, tonal scream and squeak) and the distress signals (squawk, hack, cluck and sneeze). According to the context of emission, some of vocalizations could be divided into: (1) Affiliative contact calls: The calls, as the coo calls, greeting and contact rattles, may be summarized as affinitive contact calls for reduction and/or maintenance of close proximity between group members. (2) Aggressive calls: The growls, threat rattles and vibrato growls were uttered by dominant animals menacing sub-dominate group mates, members of other groups or other species. (3) Submissive calls: these submissive calls (including the various form of scream, squeal and squeak) with obviously structure differences. Male and female copulation calls and alarm call of M. cyclopis were clearly related to particular interactions or specific external stimulus. The acoustic structures might be influenced by specific social factors, motivation or the arousal state of the callers. The acoustic structure of submissive calls was associated with the aggression with or without physical contact. Noise and undulated scream were usually used in aggressive interactions with physical contact (68%), whereas squeal, tonal scream and two types of squeak were used without physical contact (75%). Age specific difference of vocal behavior seemed to more pronounced than asymmetries between the sexes. Infants have the highest vocal rate (1142.2 vocalizations/10 h) and relative frequency of vocalization (44.58 %) than other age/sex classes and they decreased from infants to adults. With increasing age, visual signals could not only complement vocal signals but also replace the vocal cues. The relative frequency of four vocal patterns (coo call, greeting, squeak and hack) decreased from infants to adults, whereas that of threat rattle and growl increased from infant to adults. On the other hand, there were five vocal patterns (including cluck, sneeze, whine, weeping and babble) only used by juveniles and infants. In addition, seven vocal patterns included squeak (64 %), hack (63.6 %), squawk (76%), cluck (85.7 %), sneeze (90 %), weeping (88 %) and babble (100%) mainly were used by infants. Among them, three vocal patterns (squeak, hack and squawk) were produced mostly by infant II. Only infants used babble. Roar and bark were only present in adults and sub-adults. Obvious sex differences of relative frequencies of vocal patterns occurred in adults, the vocal activity of females consistently higher compared to that of males. In six patterns (vibrato growl, chuckle contact rattle, squeal, squeak and hack), females uttered more often than male peers. Mounting grunts and male copulation calls were exclusively used by adult males whereas female copulation calls were only produced by adult/sub-adult females. Vocalizations were produced/ceased by certain sex/age class that might associate with social organization, morphological feature and circumstances experience. The vocal repertoires of Formosan macaques revealed the high similarities in the species within genus Macaca, especially to M. fuscata, M. mulatta and M. radiata. It may be due to phylogeny, habitats and social organizations.

Spectral analysis of heart rate variability (HRV) has been applied in many medical research to study autonomic nervous system activity. In these studies, the researchers found that (i) ratio of low frequency (LF) to high frequency (HF) spectrum power is a useful measure of sympathetic/parasympathetic balance, and (ii) low heart rate variability is an important risk factors for patients. Therefore, continuous monitoring of the ratio and heart rate variability have the potential to early detect physiological deterioration of patients. This thesis consists of the following two parts. In the first part, we establish control charts monitoring heart rates and low HRV. Numerical method is applied to compute exact control limits of the EWRMS and EWMV charts. The distribution of the conventional LF/HF ratio statistic is difficult to derive, significant of alterations in HRV parameters can not be assessed efficiently. We resolve this problem in the second part, a new equivalently useful ratio statistic is proposed whose distribution can be derived more easily. Based on the derived distribution, the probability control limits of the proposed statistic are calculated. In application, we construct Shewhart charts of the newly proposed ratio statistic and EWRMS, EWMV charts of the heart rate variability to monitor the risk factors of patients in vascular intensive care unit. Furthermore, we define a risk score which combining the two risk factors together, heart rate variability and LF/HF spectrum power ratio. The results show that the higher risk scores corresponding to patients after operation in severer condition.

Cracked beam problem is an elliptic boundary value problem with singularity. It is often used as a testing model for numerical methods. We use numerical and symbolic boundary approximation methods and boundary collocation method to compute its extremely high accurate solution with global error $O(10^{-100})$. This solution then can be regarded as the exact solution. On the other hand, we vary the boundary conditions of this problem to obtain several related models. Their numerical solutions are compared to those of cracked beam and Motz problems, the prototypes of singularity problems. From the comparison we can conclude the advantage of each model and decide the best testing model for numerical methods.

Recently, the formation of charge density wave in 3D structure, Lu5Ir4Si10, had been observed in the X-ray diffraction experiment. At the same time, the transition in Lu5Ir4Si10 was thought to be first-order due to the spike-shaped anomaly in specific heat. The first-order transition usually accompanies with thermal hysteresis. In order to clarify this problem, we measure and analyze the specific heat result of Lu5Ir4Si10. As a matter of fact, we don¡¦t observe the thermal hysteresis behavior within the resolution of our apparatus, and we think the formation of CDW in Lu5Ir4Si10 is strong interchain coupling. In addition, we also perform the resistivity, magnetic susceptibility and specific heat measurements under zero and external field on the isostructure component Lu5Rh4Si10 for comparison, which has also been thought to undergo a CDW transition. We indeed observe the thermal hysteresis behavior no matter on resistivity, susceptibility or on specific heat results, and this phenomenon doesn¡¦t have magnetic effects. The thermal hysteresis features in Lu5Rh4Si10 are attributed to the presence of metastable states due to the pinning of the CDW phase to impurities, and we also discuss some possibilities about it. The specific heat measurement in our research is performed with an ac calorimetry, using chopped light as a heat source. The details of this technique are also discussed.

The performance and speed of the interframe motion estimation method for sequencial frame sequence compression are the important issues especially in networking application such as video conference and video on demand. In this paper, we proposed a new fast search algorithm for motion estimation on block matching technique called the cocktail search algorithm (CTS). This new algorithm takes advantages of prior search algorithms proposed in the literature and improves at our observations. The experiment results show that the proposed CTS algorithm can provide the better performance and require less computational costs than others. In other words, the CTS can obtain the accurate motion vector efficiently and fast. The fruitful results is achieved by not only holding the original benefit but also constructively improving the existing drawbacks.

Draper and Guttman (1997) show that for basic 2^{k-p}designs, p >= 0, k-p replicates of blocks designs of size two are needed to estimate all the usual (estimable) effects. In Chapter 1, we provide an algebraic formal proof for the two-level blocks designs results and present results applicable to the general case; that is, for the case of s^{k} factorial (p=0) or s^{k-p}ractional factorial (p>0) designs in s^{b} blocks, where 0<b<k-p, at least (k-p)/(k-p-b) replicates are needed to clear up all possible effects. Through the theoretical development presented in this work, it can provide a clearer view on why those results would hold. We will also discuss the estimation equations given in Draper and Guttman (1997). In Chapter 2, we present a methodology for analyzing the variability of the radiated emission testings of electronic, elecommunication and information technology equipment based on a modified analysis of variance (ANOVA), with polynomial regression analysis. In our study, three electronic products; modem, monitor and notebook bought from the market are tested. Through the experiment, we show that the international standard fails to provide a methodology which gives control limits for EMC when the electronic products in question are produced. We feel that an improved EMC control procedure presented here can better meet the needs of radiated emission control.

In this study, metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS) capacitances were prepared with rf magnetron sputtering of Ta2O5 on both n-type GaN and p-type GaN. And metal-insulator-semiconductor (MIS) capacitances were prepared with conjugated rigid-rod polymers PBT on n-type GaN. The processes of fabrication the diodes were shown, and the structures of MOS/MIS diodes were represented. Hysteresis was observed in high-frequency capacitance-voltage (C-V) measurements. And the hysteresis was changed with different scanning delay time on scanning step. They were ascribed to mobile charges and interface charges. The carrier concentration were calculated and compared with the Hall results. The flatband voltage and threshold voltage were calculated and compared with C-V curves which were measured.

Roller Gear Cam mechanism¡]RGC¡^has been used widely in different automation mechanisms and all kinds of orientation mechanism. High speed and high accuracy of the RGC system is a tendency in high production automation. The interaction between the driving speed and torque of a high speed RGC system is investigated in this work. The effect of adding a torque compensation cam¡]TCC¡^on the improving of indexing precision of a RGC system is investigated in this thesis. The dynamic responses of a RGC system driven by a DC motor are conducted. Dynamic equations of the intermittent- motion of a RGC driven system are derived by using the Lagrange¡¦s equation with the assumption of dual-stiffness. Furthermore, the effect of adding a torque compensation mechanism¡]TCM¡^ such as torque compensation cam¡]TCC¡^ or idle wheel on the improving of indexing precision of a RGC system is investigated in this work. The sixth order Runge-Kutta iteration method is employed in the system¡¦s responses simulation. Variations of the driving torque, driving speed and residual vibration of a RGC system with different torque compensation devices are analyzed in this research. The simulated and measured results indicate that a RGC system attached with a TCC can improve its speed and torque fluctuation at the designed speed significantly. However, this compensation effect is quite sensitive to the driving speed. On the contrary, the compensation effect introduced by using an idle wheel is not so sensitive to the speed as the TCC does. The low cost and easy design are also the favorable factors for using an idle wheel to instead of an expensive TCC device.

As the continuous waves of new technology, there has been an explosion of electronic access to government information. It has undeniably not only led to a dramatic change in the way people communicate, but also increased the ability of institutions, businesses and individuals to channel information. Among various formats of electronic access, the World Wide Web (WWW) is the most powerful way to disseminate information. Governments are well placed to take advantage of the Internet's ability to disseminate electronic documents quickly, cheaply and efficiently. Moreover, as new communication technologies make it possible to establish a closer relationship between citizens and their governments, it is increasingly likely that the Internet's role in the political process will evolve beyond the mere dissemination of information. The intention of this study is to compare the Technology Acceptance Model to a traditional version and a decomposed version of the Theory of Planned Behavior in terms of their contribution to the understanding of the government web sites usage. Data from a field study of 207 students are used to test these models using structural equation modeling. The results are concluded as follows: The coefficient of determination R2BI of the Decomposed Theory of Planned Behavior is about 0.4, in other words, approximately 40% of the variation in behavioral intention is explained by linear regression of behavioral intention on attitude, subjective norm, and perceived behavioral control. In the view of behavioral intention, the explanatory power of the Decomposed Theory of Planned Behavior is equivalent to the Technology Acceptance Model, and is moderately better than the Theory of Planned Behavior. There are several managerial implication. First, the designers of the government web sites should pay more attention to understand the information need of users, not just put effort on technical level. Second, Ease of use with readable format is the best discipline of the government web sites design. Third,. The designers may have to enrich the content of the government web sites so as to enhance intention of users.