abstract: The construction industry has been growing over the past few years, but it is facing numerous challenges, related to craft labor availability and declining productivity. At the same time, the industry has benefited from computational advancements by leveraging the use of Building Information Modeling (BIM) to create information rich 3D models to enhance the planning, designing, and construction of projects. Augmented Reality (AR) is one technology that could further leverage BIM, especially on the construction site. This research looks at the human performance attributes enabled using AR as the main information delivery tool in the various stages of construction. The results suggest that using AR for information delivery can enhance labor productivity and enable untrained personnel to complete key construction tasks. However, its usability decreases when higher accuracy levels are required. This work contributes to the body of knowledge by empirically testing and validating the performance effects of using AR during construction tasks and highlights the limitations of current generation AR technology related to the construction industry. This work serves as foundation of future industry-based AR applications and research into potential AR implementations. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Civil, Environmental and Sustainable Engineering 2019

Cette thèse porte sur la gestion des risques associés aux marchés financiers au sein des grandes organisations financières européennes. A partir d’un travail ethnographique approfondi et d’entretiens, elle vise à améliorer la compréhension de la gestion des risques de marchés financiers dans les banques et les compagnies d'assurance de la zone euro. Cette recherche montre que les gestionnaires de risque construisent leur connaissance et leur évaluation des risques avec un but premier : celui de satisfaire les exigences de d’acteurs extérieurs à l’organisation davantage que de couvrir les risques générés par les activités de celle-ci. Plusieurs acteurs ont en effet la possibilité de mettre en danger la santé de l’organisation, par exemple les régulateurs ou les actionnaires et les contreparties. Les gestionnaires de risque se préoccupent surtout de l’évaluation par le régulateur. Dans la limite de ce que leur permettent les possibilités de calcul et la comptabilité, ils essayent de répondre au mieux aux pressions de ces acteurs. Par une communication qui reflète ce qu’ils anticipent des souhaits des acteurs externes, les gestionnaires de risque essayent d’éviter des sanctions de la part de ces derniers. / Risks taken in the financial sector have been in the public eye since the financial crisis of 2008. This thesis explores the internal workings of the large organisations that take financial market risks, banks and insurance companies. It follows their risk managers, analysing their work and output. The thesis is based on an ethnography with 84 semi-structured interviews and two participant observations in risk management. EU regulation and literature on financial risk state that risk managers control risk taking of their organisations. This thesis shows that is not the case. The risk managers do not have the resources to make the control stick. They focus on another aspect, namely on keeping the organisation alive. The risk managers prevent negative consequences from happening to their organisation by handling the communications to resourceful outsiders. Regulators, shareholders and counterparties all have the power to bring down a financial organisation. The risk managers manage communications about the state of the organisation to these outsiders. With the help of their risk assessments, they want to avoid the negative effects an outsider could bring. Accounting rules and mathematical standards restrict the malleability of the risks, depending on enforcement of powerfull outsiders. The risk managers juggle the different limits to show an organisation in good health.

The purpose and aim of this study are to examine how quality control and assurance is performed and how it varies in different regions around the world and strive towards international standardization of quality assurance. The foundation to the idea of this study is a Swedish company, called Runway Safe, working with international affairs regarding a safety solution for airport runways. To complete the study, cultural differences and structural differences in organizations comes to consideration.

The success of a clinical trial is largely dependent on the clinical sites that enroll the subjects, complete the follow-up visits, and collect the data. Many clinical trials are conducted using multiple site locations. Choosing such sites to participate in a clinical trial is an important aspect of study implementation. In the past, multi-center clinical trials were conducted mainly using university-based centers. In the last few decades, private practice, or community-based, centers have been included more often in clinical trial research. As more community-based centers participate in clinical trials, it is crucial to examine how these centers might differ from university-based centers. The purpose of this project was to compare community-based and university-based centers participating in a multi-center randomized trial evaluating treatments for diabetic macular edema. Aspects of recruitment, retention, protocol adherence, data collection, and observance of study required procedures were compared. Data from 102 participating centers were examined with 40 centers categorized as university-based and 62 centers categorized as community-based. Various measures of trial performance were compared using Wilcoxon rank-sum test, repeated measures logistic regression, and repeated measures analysis of variance (ANOVA), depending on the variable being compared. Characteristics of the centers and baseline subject characteristics were compared to evaluate for possible confounding. We found that university-based and community-based centers performed similarly in almost all performance aspects compared. Notable differences included community-based centers becoming certified for participation in the study 90 days sooner on average and university-based centers having half the percentage of ungradable fundus photographs. Overall, it is recommended that community-based centers be included more often in multi-center clinical trials.

Design of computing systems — from pocket-sized smart phones to massive cloud based data-centers — have one common daunting challenge : minimizing the power consumption. In this effort, power management sector is undergoing a rapid and profound transformation to promote clean and energy proportional computing. At the hardware end of system design, there is proliferation of specialized, feature rich and complex power management hardware components. Similarly, in the software design layer complex power management suites are growing rapidly. Concurrent to this development, there has been an upsurge in the integration of third-party components to counter the pressures of shorter time-to-market. These trends collectively raise serious concerns about trust and security of power management solutions. In recent times, problems such as overheating, performance degradation and poor battery life, have dogged the mobile devices market, including the infamous recall of Samsung Note 7. Power outage in the data-center of a major airline left innumerable passengers stranded, with thousands of canceled flights costing over 100 million dollars. This research examines whether such events of unintentional reliability failure, can be replicated using targeted attacks by exploiting the security loopholes in the complex power management infrastructure of a computing system. At its core, this research answers an imminent research question: How can system designers ensure secure and reliable operation of third-party power management units? Specifically, this work investigates possible attack vectors, and novel non-invasive detection and defense mechanisms to safeguard system against malicious power attacks. By a joint exploration of the threat model and techniques to seamlessly detect and protect against power attacks, this project can have a lasting impact, by enabling the design of secure and cost-effective next generation hardware platforms.

Due to the widespread use of drilled shafts in state and federal highway bridges, strict regulation of the design and construction has been imposed by the respective agencies. However, documented cases of anomalies and/or poorly performing shafts continue to arise. To this end, this thesis investigates several aspects of drilled shaft construction that may affect the quality of the finished product. These areas include bentonite slurry properties and performance as well as reinforcement cage and concrete flow interactions. Recent research indicates tremie poured concrete does not flow as predicted. Instead of even rising, a differential between the height of concrete inside and outside the reinforcement cage has been observed. Compounding this problem is the fact that bentonite slurry used to support boreholes may settle suspended sand at the toe of the shaft or on the surface of rising concrete during long wait periods, affording the possibility of soil inclusions in the shaft. This thesis examines two methods of inquiry to quantify the behavior of concrete in a tremie pour drilled shaft and sand suspension behavior of bentonite slurry. Conclusions and recommendations are made to improve pertinent construction regulations to ensure quality of drilled shafts.

The construction of phantoms for testing imaging parameters has been well documented in the literature. As computers have been introduced into the different areas of medicine, they have become more and more relied upon to replace conventional technologies. One specific example is that of plane film X-rays. Digitally Reconstructed Radiographs (DRR's) are computer generated images that are generated from a 3 D volume of data, such as CT or MRI axial scans, and can be used in place of conventional X rays. The computer can generate a DRR image for any position, orientation and magnification, and geometries not physically possible in the real world. In this work a technique is developed to generate phantoms that can be used for testing the accuracy of DRR's. A computer generated phantom can produce multiple test cases that can be used to test specific variables of the DRR's. A series of 12 different standard phantoms were used to test the ability of three different commercially available treatment planning or virtual simulation systems to generate DRR's. A virtual simulation system under development by the author and collaborators and seeking approval from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), was used as a development platform for this work. Initial evaluation of the usefulness of the digital phantoms for testing showed immediate results. The first virtual simulation system tested with the phantoms revealed a major error in its ability to generate accurate DRR's. Subsequently tests of the three commercially available systems further demonstrated the usefulness of the work. The tests revealed errors in two of the three systems evaluated but it was determined that they were not clinically significant. In conclusion, the digital phantoms developed in this work are a fast, accurate method for testing digitally reconstructed radiographs. It is an extremely versatile testing method, as the phantoms can be generated with ease for any geometry without needing access to a CT scanner. This method of testing can be used to test a number of different DRR image parameters. Should an error be found, it can be used to isolate errors that might exist in the imaging device. It is an extremely versatile testing method, as the phantoms can be generated with ease for any geometry without needing access to a CT scanner. This method of testing can be used to test a number of different DRR image parameters. Should an error be found, it can be used to isolate errors that might exist in the imaging device.

Dans la présente thèse, nous cherchons à définir le positionnement de la révision dans le contexte de la gestion de la qualité des traductions spécialisées. Dans ce but, nous décrivons les spécificités du processus de traduction spécialisée, nous recensons les moyens permettant d'assurer la qualité des prestations et nous soulignons le rôle déterminant de l'assurance de qualité et du contrôle de la qualité. Les définitions des principales formes d'intervention sur les traductions - relecture, correction, révision et édition - sont également clarifiées. Une fois la révision posée comme l'examen complet et la mise à niveau d'une traduction, nous cherchons à décrire le cadre didactique et professionnel de cette pratique. Des données sur les conditions socio-économiques de l'exercice de la révision sont rassemblées ; les formes de révision et les critères de qualité applicables sont étudiés ; enfin, on analyse la place de la révision dans la formation et la recherche. L'enquête sur la pratique de la révision et la gestion de la qualité des traductions spécialisées, réalisée par voie de questionnaire auprès de professionnels de la traduction, contribue à combler le manque de connaissances constaté. Des données quantitatives sont ainsi obtenues sur l'ampleur de la pratique, la perception du rôle de la révision, les méthodes appliquées, les autres formes d'intervention sur les traductions et le niveau de conformité des pratiques avec la norme européenne de traduction NF EN 15038. La diversité des usages et des attitudes face à la révision est confirmée par l'enquête.

Les catastrophes naturelles et industrielles sont des risques majeurs qui ont pour particularité commune d'avoir une forte empreinte géographique. Leur principale différence est que l'indemnisation des risques naturels repose sur la solidarité, alors que les risques industriels relèvent de la responsabilité privée de l'industriel. Cette thèse apporte des éléments d'évaluation des politiques publiques de prévention et de couverture des risques naturels et technologiques. Chacun des chapitres propose des éléments d'évaluation de ces politiques en analysant notamment les liens entre politiques d'assurance et d'urbanisme (chapitre 2), entre politiques d'assurance et de prévention collective (chapitre 3), entre politiques d'assurance et d'aides publiques (chapitre 4), entre politiques de prévention et immobilier (chapitre 5). Les différents chapitres prennent en compte les liens entre les politiques publiques nationales et locales.

Dans les deux dernières décennies, le logiciel libre a pris un essor considérable. Des distributions qui au début comptaient une centaine de paquets, en ont maintenant des dizaines de milliers, tous de provenance très différente. Ceci engendre des problèmes pour la gestion de qualité. Les outils et procédures ne sont plus adaptés à la taille et la complexité des distributions d'aujourd'hui. Dans cette thèse, nous commençons par présenter une modélisation mathématique des points communs entre les différents types de distribution (Debian et RPM); notamment le concept des paquets et des relations qui existent entre eux: les dépendances et les conflits. Cette modélisation est en partie formalisé avec l'assistant de preuves Coq. Cette modélisation sera ensuite utilisée pour proposer des relations 'sémantiques', qui sont plus adaptés que les relations existantes pour repérer et corriger des erreurs dans les distributions. Nous présentons aussi des algorithmes pour calculer ces relations d'une façon efficace, et nous utiliserons Coq pour prouver formellement les théorèmes les plus importantes utilisées par ces algorithmes. Finalement, nous avons validé les algorithmes sur des distributions existantes. Nous présenterons une analyse de la structure des distributions qui est le résultat de cette validation, ainsi qu'une discussion de la phénomène du "petit monde" en rapport avec les distributions.