This research was undertaken to develop state-of-the-art interfacially polymerized (IP) defect-free thin-film composite (TFC) membranes and understand their structure-function-performance relationships. Recent research showed the presence of defects in interfacially polymerized commercial membranes which potentially deter performance in liquid separations and render the membranes inadequate for gas separations. Firstly, a modified method (named KRO1) was developed to fabricate interfacially polymerized defect-free TFCs using m-phenylene diamine (MPD) and trimesoyl chloride (TMC). The systematic study revealed the ability to heal defects in-situ by tweaking the reaction time along with considerably improving the membrane crosslinking by controlling the organic solution temperature. The two discoveries were combined to produce highly crosslinked, defect-free MPD-TMC polyamide membranes which showed exceptional performance for separating H2 from CO2. Permeance and pure-gas selectivity of the membrane increased with temperature. H2 permeance of 350 GPU and H2/CO2 selectivity of ~100 at 140 °C were obtained, the highest reported performance for this application using polymeric materials to date. Secondly, the membranes produced using KRO1 were tested for reverse-osmosis (RO) performance which revealed significantly improved boron rejection compared to commercial membranes reaching a maximum of 99% at 15.5 bar feed pressure at pH 10. The study also unveiled direct correlations between membrane crosslinking and salt separation performance in addition to the membrane surface roughness. Thirdly, this was followed by replacing the conventional IP TMC monomer with a large, rigid and contorted tetra-acyl chloride (TripTaC) monomer to enhance the performance of IP TFCs. The fabricated TFCs showed considerable performance boosts especially for separating of small solutes from organic solvents such as methanol. A rise in H2 permeance was also observed compared to the conventional MPD-TMC TFCs while reaching a maximum H2/CO2 selectivity of 9 at 22 °C. Finally, the research was completed by showing the potential of KRO1 for fabrication of defect-free TFCs using a range of aqueous diamine monomers. KRO1 enabled defect-free gas properties for all monomers used showing exceptional performance for separating H2-CO2 and O2-N2 mixtures. It was further shown that the formulation could also improve the RO separation of interfacially polymerized polyamide TFCs beyond those shown by commercially available TFCs.

Many different types of features can appear on the surface of wooden boards, lineals or parts. Some of these features should not appear on the surfaces of wood products. These features then become undesirable or removable defects for those products. To manufacture these products boards are cutup in such a way that these undesirable defects will not appear in the final product. Studies have shown that manual cutup of boards does not produce the highest possible yield of final product from rough lumber. Because of this fact a good deal of research work has been done to develop automatic defect detection systems. Color images contain a lot of valuable information which can be used to locate and identify features in wood. This is evidenced by the fact that the human color vision system can accurately locate and identify these features. A very important part of any automatic defect detection system based wholly or impart on color imagery is the location of areas that might contain a wood feature, a feature that depending on the product being manufactured may or may not be a defect. This location process is called image segmentation. While a number of automatic defect detection systems have been proposed that employ color imagery, none of these systems use color imagery to do the segmentation. Rather these systems typically average the red, green, and blue color channels together to form a black and white image. The segmentation operation is then performed on the black and white image. The basic hypothesis of this research is that the use of full color imagery to locate defects will yield better segmentation results than can be obtained when only black and white imagery is used. To approach the color wood image segmentation problem, two conventional clustering procedures were selected for examination. Experiments that were performed clearly showed that these procedures, ones that are similar in flavor to other unsupervised clustering methods, are unsuitable for wood color image segmentation. Based on the experience that was gained in examining the unsupervised clustering procedures, a model based approach is developed. This approach is based on the assumption that the distribution of colors in clear wood is Gaussian. Since boards that are used by the forest products secondary manufacturing industry are all such that most of their surface area is clear wood, the idea is to use the most frequently occurring colors, i.e., the ones that must represent the most likely colors of clear wood, to estimate the mean and covariance of the Normal density function specifying the possible colors of clear wood. Deviations from this model in the observed histogram are used to identify colors that must be caused by features other than clear wood that appear on the surface of the board. / Master of Science

La surcharge ventriculaire droite (VD), volumétrique ou barométrique, est devenue depuis quelques années un problème de santé publique chez les patients atteints de cardiopathie congénitale.Grâce aux progrès de la prise en charge de ces patients, cette population est grandissante avec des complications spécifiques. La défaillance ventriculaire gauche (VG) est une des complications les plus graves des pathologies de surcharge du VD.L’objectif de ce travail est de déterminer s’il existe des signes d’atteinte précoce du VG chez ces patients grâce à l’étude de 2 modèles chirurgicaux de surcharge du VD (volumétrique : tétralogie de Fallot TOF et barométrique : HYPPE), et si la cardiométrie peut être un outil de dépistage.La première partie de ce travail a consisté en la validation de la technique de cardiométrie électrique chez l’homme pour mesurer le débit cardiaque mais aussi évaluer la volémie.La deuxième partie a consisté en l’analyse du VG des maladies de surcharge du VD : les résultats mettent en évidence, principalement dans le modèle HYPPE plutôt que dans le modèle TOF, une fibrose, des anomalies des tubules T, des anomalies du couplage excitation-contraction associées à une altération de la contraction et de la relaxation sarcomèrique. Même si ces premiers résultats chez le gros animal sont prometteurs, ils nécessitent d’être confirmés par l’inclusion de plus de sujets.En conclusion, la cardiométrie a montré son excellente corrélation au cathéter de conductance pour évaluer la contractilité du VG en situation de stress de façon non invasive, confirmant l’utilité de cet appareil dans le diagnostic et suivi hémodynamique de nos patients. / Right heart overload is become since few years a real public health problem in congenital heart disease. Grow up with congenital heart disease patients have become a large population and suffer from many specific complications, like left ventricular failure. Right heart overload come mainly from two ways, volume or pressure that we reproduce thanks to two porcine models: tetralogy of Fallot (TOF) for volume and pulmonary hypertension (HYPPE). We try to determine on these models if there is early left heart failure and if electrical cardiometry can detect it.First part of this work is a validation of electrical cardiometry as cardiac output evaluation and fluid management reliable tool in healthy newborns and congenital heart disease patients.Second part is a left ventricle analysis of these models: we highlighted early left ventricle lesions of fibrosis, t-tubules disorganization, excitation-contraction coupling abnormalities associated with alteration of sarcomere relaxation and contraction. Even if first results are promising on large animals, we need to include more subjects to confirm these data.In conclusion, we highlighted than electrical cardiometry had an excellent and strong correlation with conductance catheter to evaluate LV contractility by noninvasive way. These results confirm this device usefulness in diagnosis and screening of our patients.

京都大学 / 0048 / 新制・論文博士 / 博士(医学) / 乙第13068号 / 論医博第2123号 / 新制||医||1019(附属図書館) / 33219 / 京都大学大学院医学研究科医学専攻 / (主査)教授 妻木 範行, 教授 開 祐司, 教授 戸口田 淳也 / 学位規則第4条第2項該当 / Doctor of Medical Science / Kyoto University / DFAM

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Keeping track of requirements from eliciting data to making decision needs an effective path from data to decision [43]. Visualization science helps to create this path by extracting insights from flood of data. Model helps to shape the transformation of data to visualization. Defect Detection and Prevention model was created to assess quality assurance activities. We selected DDP and started enhancing user interactivity with requirements visualization over basic DDP with implementing a visual requirements analytics framework. By applying GQM table to our framework, we added six visualization features to the existing visual requirements visualization approaches. We applied this framework to technical and non-technical stakeholder scenarios to gain the operational insights of requirements-driven risk mitigation in practice. The combination of the first and second scenarios' result presented the multiple stakeholders scenario result which was a small number of strategies from kept tradespase with common mitigations that must deploy to the system.

Additively manufactured parts produced using selective laser melting (SLM) are prone to defects created during the build process due to part shrinkage while cooling. Currently defects are found only after the part is removed from the printer. To determine whether cracks can be detected before a print is completed, this project developed print parameters to print a test coupon with inherent defects – warpage and cracking. Data recorded during the build was then characterized to determine when the defects occurred. The test coupon was printed using two sets of print parameters developed to control the severity of warpage and cracking. The builds were monitored using an accelerometer recording at 12500 samples per second, an iphone recording audio at 48000 samples a second, and a camera taking a photo every build layer. Data was analyzed using image comparison, signal amplitude, Fourier Transform, and Wavelet Decomposition. The developed print parameters reduced warpage in the part by better distributing heat throughout the build envelope. Reducing warpage enabled the lower portion of the part to be printed intact, preserving it to experience cracking later in the build. From physical evidence on the part as well as time stamps from the machine script, several high energy impulse events in the accelerometer data were determined to be when cracking occurred in the build. This project’s preliminary investigation of accelerometers to detect defects in selective laser melting will be used in future work to create machine learning algorithms that would control the machine in real time and address defects as they arise.

The inclusion of human fetal skeletons in the archaeological record can reveal much about past cultures' perception of life and death. The preservation of fetal remains in the archaeological record is a rarity, and the discovery of pathological skeletons is even rarer. A fetal skeleton from a Roman period cemetery (c. 31BC - 303AD) in the Dakhleh Oasis, Egypt, displays what are thought to be classic skeletal indicators of the neural tube defect, anencephaly. The published literature concerning the skeletal diagnosis of anencephaly is scant so in order to diagnose this individual it is pertinent to create a diagnostic standard. The purpose of this thesis is twofold - first to create a quantitative standard from which researchers can determine the presence of anencephaly in the archaeological record, thus ruling out trauma or taphonomic processes as reasons for missing cranial elements. The second objective of this research is to conduct a qualitative comparison in order to diagnose the individual from the Dakhleh Oasis. A comparative analysis of nine documented anencephalic skeletal remains housed at the Smithsonian Institute was conducted to create a diagnostic standard for the skeletal characteristics of anencephaly. The comparative analysis of the Dakhleh specimen supports the diagnosis of anencephaly.

No / Little has been written about the functional outcome of patients treated with bone transport to reconstruct a distal tibial defect. The aim of this study was to investigate the functional capabilities of patients who had undergone reconstruction with distraction osteogenesis for the treatment of a distal tibial defect in one lower limb. At least eighteen months after completion of treatment, eight patients who had no pain and were able to walk and climb stairs without difficulty performed isometric ankle plantar flexion maximum voluntary contractions while the electromyographic activity of the tibialis anterior and triceps surae muscles was simultaneously recorded. Seven of the patients also underwent gait analysis. Data for the involved limb were compared with those collected for the contralateral limb. During gait, stance time (p = 0.01), the plantar flexion angular displacement and peak moment developed during the second half of stance (p < 0.046), and the amount of ankle power generated (p = 0.02) were significantly decreased in the involved limb compared with the contralateral limb. Similar decreases were observed in the plantar flexion (p = 0.01) and dorsiflexion (p = 0.01) maximum voluntary contractions and the corresponding electromyographic activity (p = 0.01). These results suggest that adaptive changes had occurred at the level of the transported muscles, which affected both routine and maximal effort capabilities. These findings contribute to our understanding of the functional limitations of patients who have undergone bone transport with its obligatory shortening of muscle length.

This dissertation covers the study of the thermoelectric properties of GeTe and SnTe. The goal of this research is to develop high-performance lead-free thermoelectric materials that can replace PbTe-based systems so that thermoelectric technology could be bring into real application. During the study, extensive investigations on the electrical and thermal transport behaviors were conducted both experimentally and theoretically. In Chapter 1 ~ 3, the origin of thermoelectricity, modelling and characterization methods are discussed in detail. In Chapter 4, study on the thermoelectric properties of Bi, Zn and In co-doped GeTe was presented. Initial doping with Bi enhanced the performance by tuning the electronic properties and bringing down the thermal conductivity. Subsequent Zn doping permitted to maintain the high power factor by increasing carrier mobility and reducing carrier concentration. Subsequent In doping boosted the density of state effective mass. A peak zT value of 2.06 and an average zT value of 1.30 have been achieved in (Ge0.97Zn0.02In0.01Te)0.97(Bi2Te3)0.03. In Chapter 5, we thoroughly investigated the transport properties of SnTe-Sb2Te3 alloying system, provided useful insight of the mechanism of the enhanced Seebeck coefficient. To also overcome the poor carrier mobility, Pb compensation was performed which effectively optimized the carrier mobility. Meanwhile, Pb compensation broke the charge balance, allowing Sb to precipitate out of the structure. These second-phase particles provided additional source of phonon scattering, effectively suppressing the lattice thermal conductivity. As a result, a peak zT of 1.1 at 778K and an average zT of 0.56 from 300K to 778K was achieved in (Sn0.98Ge0.05Te)0.91 (Sb2Pb0.5Te)0.09, which is one of the best SnTe-based thermoelectric systems. / Thesis / Master of Science (MSc) / Thermoelectric materials can generate energy from temperature gradient, making them potential solutions for the escalating energy crisis. The state-of-the-art thermoelectric material is PbTe which shows outstanding performance and high stability. However, the toxicity of Pb element limits its practical application. It is the purpose of this work to develop high-performance GeTe and SnTe-based thermoelectrics to reduce the usage of PbTe. Combining theoretical calculations and experimental characterizations, detailed investigation on the transport properties, crystal structure and microstructure were performed on both GeTe and SnTe. Relations between their thermoelectric properties and their composition, synthesis method and microstructure were revealed. This work paves the path for the development of environmentally friendly and high-performance thermoelectric systems.