Type III secretion systems (T3SS) are a common feature of Gram-negative bacteria, allowing them to inject anti-host effectors into the interior of infected eukaryotic cells. By this mechanism, these virulence factors help the bacteria to modulate eukaryotic cell function in its favor and subvert host innate immunity. This promotes a less hostile environment in which infecting bacteria can colonize and cause disease. In pathogenic Yersinia, a crucial protein in this process is YopD. YopD is a T3S substrate that, together with YopB, forms a translocon pore in the host cell membrane through which the Yop effectors may gain access to the target-cell cytosol. The assembly of the translocator pore in plasma membranes is considered a fundamental feature of all T3SSs. How the pore is formed, what determines the correct size and ultimately the stoichiometry between YopD YopB, is still unknown. Portions of YopD are also observed inside HeLa cells. Moreover, YopD functions together with its T3S chaperone, LcrH, to control Yops synthesis in the bacterial cytoplasm. The multifunctional YopD may influence all these processes by compartmentalizing activities into discrete modular domains along the protein length. Therefore, understanding how particular domains and/or residues within these regions coordinate multiple functions of the protein will provide a platform to improve our knowledge of the molecular mechanisms behind translocation through T3SSs. Comprehensive site-directed mutagenesis of the YopD C-terminal amphipathic α-helix domain, pinpointed hydrophobic residues as important for YopD function. Some YopD variants were defective in self-assembly and in the ability to interact with the needle tip protein, LcrV, which were required to facilitate bacterial T3S activity. A similar mutagenesis approach was used to understand the role of the two predicted coiled-coils located at the N-terminal and C-terminal region of YopD. The predicted N-terminal element that occurs solely in the Yersinia YopD translocator family is essential for optimal T3SS and full disease progression. The predicted YopD C-terminal coiled-coil shapes a functional translocon inserted into host cell membranes. This translocon was seen to be a dynamic structure facilitating at least two roles during effectors delivery into cells; one to guarantee translocon pore insertion into target cell membranes and the other to promote targeted activity of internalized effector toxins. In Yersinia expression of yop genes and secretion of the corresponding polypeptides is tightly regulated at a transcriptional and post-transcriptional level. If T3S chaperones of the translocator class are known to influence transcriptional output of T3SS genes in other bacteria, we show that in Yersinia the class II T3S chaperone LcrH has no such effect on the LcrF transcriptional activator activity. We also demonstrate that there are possibly additional yop-regulatory roles for the LcrH chaperone besides forming a stable complex with YopD to impose post-transcriptional silencing on Yops synthesis. This mechanism that relies upon an active T3SS, might act independently of both YopD and the regulatory element LcrQ. In conclusion, this work has sought to delineate the encrypted functions of the YopD translocator that contribute to Yersinia T3SS-dependent pathogenesis. Contributions of the YopD cognate chaperone LcrH in yop regulatory control are also presented.

The Generic Nanosatellite Bus (GNB) is a spacecraft platform designed to accommodate the integration of diverse payloads in a common housing of supporting components. The development of the GNB at the Space Flight Laboratory (SFL) under the Canadian Advanced Nanospace eXperiment (CanX) program provides accelerated access to space while reducing non-recurring engineering (NRE) costs. The work presented herein details the development of the attitude determination and control subsystem (ADCS) of the GNB. Specific work on magnetorquer coil assembly, integration, and testing (AIT) and reaction wheel testing is included. The embedded software development and unit-level testing of the GNB sun sensors are discussed. The characterization of the AeroAstro star tracker is also a major focus, with procedures and results presented here. Hardware models were developed and incorporated into SFL's in-house high-fidelity attitude dynamics and control simulation environment. This work focuses on specific contributions to the CanX-3, CanX-4&5, and AISSat-1 nanosatellite missions.

The Generic Nanosatellite Bus (GNB) is a spacecraft platform designed to accommodate the integration of diverse payloads in a common housing of supporting components. The development of the GNB at the Space Flight Laboratory (SFL) under the Canadian Advanced Nanospace eXperiment (CanX) program provides accelerated access to space while reducing non-recurring engineering (NRE) costs. The work presented herein details the development of the attitude determination and control subsystem (ADCS) of the GNB. Specific work on magnetorquer coil assembly, integration, and testing (AIT) and reaction wheel testing is included. The embedded software development and unit-level testing of the GNB sun sensors are discussed. The characterization of the AeroAstro star tracker is also a major focus, with procedures and results presented here. Hardware models were developed and incorporated into SFL's in-house high-fidelity attitude dynamics and control simulation environment. This work focuses on specific contributions to the CanX-3, CanX-4&5, and AISSat-1 nanosatellite missions.

In this master thesis, a new method for estimating the position of the moving parts of avoice coil is presented. Instead of using a position sensor the method exploits the connectionbetween the position and the inductance of the voice coil. This is done by superpositioning a small sine voltage signal and the voice coil voltage control signal. By measuring thevoltage and current and using the fourier transform, the impedance and phase difference iscalculated which are used to compute the inductance. A medical ventilator (also known as a respirator) concept is developed with a control systemwhich takes the expiratory pressure from a higher to a lower level. The position estimationalgorithm is then used in an attempt to improve the pressure control. The result is a slightlymore stable control system. The master thesis is conducted at Maquet Critical Care (MCC) in Solna, Sweden. MCC is amedical technology company working with high performance medical ventilators. The longterm goal of this work is to develop a ventilator which is more comfortable for the patient.

<p>In magnetic resonance microscopy, insufficient signal-to-noise ratio currently limits imaging performance. Superconducting probes can potentially increase the sensitivity of the magnetic resonance experiment. However, many superconducting probes failed to entirely deliver the expected increase in signal-to-noise ratio. </p><p>We present a method based on finite-element radiofrequency simulations. The radiofrequency model computes several figures of merit of a probe, namely: i) the resonant frequency, ii) the impedance, iii) the magnetic field homogeneity, iv) the filling factor, and v) the sensitivity. The probe is constituted by several components. The method calculates the electromagnetic losses induced by every component within the probe, and identifies the component limiting the sensitivity of the probe. Subsequently, the probe design can be improved iteratively.</p><p>We show that the sensitivity of an existing superconducting Helmholtz pair can be improved by increasing the filling factor of the probe and cooling the radiofrequency shield, which was implemented in the design of a new superconducting probe. The second probe exhibits a sensitivity three times as high, leading to improved imaging performance.</p> / Dissertation

In industrial drives market, speed and position estimation are one of the most important subjects for accurate motor drives. Vector controlled drives has the best dynamic performance among AC motor drives. Sensorless vector control is one of the most studied one. However, sensorless drive systems fail at low or zero speeds and may not have enough accuracy. For better accuracy and speed range speed sensors or position encoders are usually essential. However, coupling of sensor and sensor prices introduces extra cost on the drive. Thus in order to reduce the cost of the drive a cheap and easy to mount speed sensor is essential. Throughout this study, a speed and position sensor using an external search coil placed between cooling fins on the frame of an induction machine is proposed. The search coil utilizes the fringing flux outside the frame of induction motor. Using the induced voltage on the external search coil, a new method that estimates the flux and rotor position is proposed. In this study, the induced voltage on the search coils are investigated with different types of search coils placed on various positions. The frequency domain and time domain analysis are performed in order to build a model that can estimate machine flux, rotor speed and rotor position. As a result of this study, a low cost, easy to mount speed and position sensor is designed and implemented. Experiment results are presented.

Solid-state complexes between diblock copolymer and amphiphilic surfactant (surf) results in polymers characterized by two length scales with one macroscopic ¡§block copolymer length¡¨ and one mesomorphic ordered ¡§nanoscale¡¨. In this study, the desired polymer was prepared by complexing the surf molecules, i.e., 4-dodecylbenzenesulfonic acid (DBSA), with polystyrene-block-poly(4-vinyl pyridine) (PS-b-P4VP) and a comb-coil A-block-(B-graft-C) type copolymer can be generated through a supramolecular assembly route. On the block copolymer scale, the PS blocks are phase-separation from the P4VP(DBSA)x block, which x denotes the molar ratio between DBSA and pyridine groups. Bonding interaction between PS-b-P4VP and DBSA was conformed by FTIR. PLM was used to detect the mesomorphic structure within P4VP(DBSA)x block. In all cases, we found that birefringent can be only found in copolymer with their comb content exceeding 63 wt%. In the thermal analysis, shows us that the glasses transition temperature(Tgs) of the P4VP(DBSA)x block increases with the increasing DBSA content, a result related to the stiffening of the P4VP main chain due to dense packing. On the mesomorphic nanoscale, wide-angle X-ray diffraction study suggests an ordered supramolecular layer structure was formed in most of the complexation cases, in which the thicknesses of the polymer and surf layers were determined from the one-dimensional correlation function. The result indicates that both layers thickness increase with increasing DBSA amounts due to the stretching of the long alkyl tail in DBSA. Finally, macroscopic morphology varied with the DBSA content according to TEM results.

Three experimental studies were conducted to quantify the effects of system cycling, evaporator airflow, and condenser coil fouling on the performance of residential air conditioners. For all studies, the indoor dry-bulb (db) temperature was 80°F (26.7°C) db. The cycling study consisted of twelve transient tests conducted with an outdoor temperature of 95°F (35°C) db for cycle times of 6, 10, 15, and 24 minutes. Indoor relative humidities of 40%, 50%, and 60% were also considered. The evaporator airflow study consisted of twenty-four steady-state tests conducted with an indoor condition of 67°F (19.4°C) wet-bulb (wb) for evaporator airflows ranging from 50% below to 37.5% above rated airflow. Outdoor temperatures of 85°F (29.4°C) db, 95°F (35°C) db, and 105°F (40.6°C) db were also considered. The coil fouling study used a total of six condensers that were exposed to an outdoor environment for predetermined amounts of time and tested periodically. Three of the condensers were cleaned and retested during the periodic testing cycles. Testing consisted of thirty-three steady-state tests conducted with an indoor condition of 67°F (19.4°C) wb for outdoor exposure times of 0, 2000, 4000, and 8000 hours. Outdoor temperatures of 82°F (27.8°C) db and 95°F (35°C) db were also considered.

LCModel has been widely used for MR spectroscopy analysis. LCMgui, which is the built-in user interface of LCModel, based on Linux system, provides the functionality to convert MRS data of various formats to match the format of LCModel raw file, except for GE MRSI data which can be analyzed by LCModel only with GE Sage/IDL software. Hence, the first part of this work was to develop a multi-platform tool with LCModel to support all GE data, including GE MRSI data and phased array data. With this tool, users can analyze MRS data with LCModel on their familiar environment such as Windows, and Linux. The MR spectroscopy experiments with phased array coils provide optimized SNR which lead to more accurate absolute quantification by some sophisticate combination algorithms of phased array coils. Thus, the second part of this work was to propose an algorithm of combining data obtained from phased array coils by doing phase correction and calculation of weighting factor. In addition, the comparison of the accuracy between using quadrature coil and phased array coils with different combination algorithms was investigated in order to demonstrate the efficiency of using phased array coils and the combination program.

There is a large number of measurement techniques that is used for a surface inspection and a characterization of different types of materials. One of these techniques is a contact potential difference (CPD) scanning technique. In this project a non-vibrating contact potential difference (nvCPD) method is utilized to measure a work function and a topographical structure of a sample surface. A sample is mounted on a spindle that rotates at high speed. A nvCPD sensor detects work-function variations during movement above the sample surface. There are certain factors that create difficulties during the measurement process. A nonplanar sample surface, the spindle wobble and an incline of a mounted sample impede the safe (without impacting the surface) scanning at a close distance. The goal of this thesis was to implement a height sensor as a feedback device to dynamically control and adjust a CPD sensor flying height. Since a CPD signal is inversely proportional to the flying height, minimization of this height will enhance the signal magnitude, the signal-to-noise ratio and the resolution of measurements.