Advantage of the single QD active layer is its potential for very low threshold current density, which in turn can produce low internal optical loss. The low threshold current density and low internal loss thus enable a significant increase in laser diode cavity length. Because of the importance of the threshold current density in heatsinking, future technology of broad-area monolithic laser diodes can be implemented. The dissertation describes the development and the unique characteristics of single QD active layer laser with long cavity. The data are presented on single layer QD laser diodes that reach threshold current densities values of 11.7 A/cm2 in a p-up mounted 2 cm long cavity and as low as 10 A/cm2, with CW output power of 2 W in a p-down mounted 1.6 cm long cavity. The 8.8 A/cm2 in a p-down mounted 2 cm long cavity is reported. To our knowledge the value 8.8 A/cm2 is the lowest threshold current density ever reported for a room temperature laser diode. These single layer QD laser diodes reach an internal loss of ~0.25 cm-1, which is also the lowest ever reported for a room temperature laser diode. These unique characteristics of single layer QD and laser diode size are potentially promising for the monolithic mode-locked laser because of relatively high peak power with a low repetition rate that is on the order of a few GHz, which can be the novel device for external clocking in the optical interconnect applications. In this dissertation, the stable optical pulse train in a 40 µm wide stripe with a repetition rate of 3.75 GHz with 1.1 cm cavity length through the passive mode-locked onto the monolithic two-section device fabricated from this single layer QD laser is observed.

In the printing industry quality is key, this is because a product is printed for a better appearance or to convey information. If the packaging for a product looks bad customers will get a bad first impression of the product. The quality of the print can be affected by many different factors. The material properties of the paperboard such as stiffness, surface roughness, and thickness. It could also be affected by the coating of the paperboard, the properties of the ink, the material properties of the printing form, etc.  In this thesis, the effect of the contact time and the maximum pressure in the nip of a flexographic printing press was studied. To separate these variables six different desirable pressure pulses were decided upon. Three of them where the contact time remains constant while the maximum pressure changes, and three other pulses where the maximum pressure is constant while the contact time changes. The printing was done in an IGT F1 laboratory printing press. The different pressure pulses were achieved by using three different printing forms and varying the force settings in the printing press. The mottle results from the mottle analysis do not show a clear reliance on the contact time or maximum pressure. Instead, the stiffness of the printing forms influences the results to such an extent that it overshadows any effect that the contact time or maximum pressure has. In the case of dot gain, it can be determined that a larger impression leads to more dot gain. However here the stiffness of the printing plays a large role, and no clear conclusions can be drawn when strictly comparing contact time or maximum pressure. / Inom den grafiska industrin är kvalitet avgörande, detta eftersom en produkt trycks för att se bra ut eller för att förmedla ett budskap. Om förpackningen för en produkt ser dålig ut så får kunderna ett dåligt första intryck av produkten. Kvaliteten på trycket kan påverkas av många olika faktorer. Kartongens materialegenskaper såsom styvhet, ytjämnhet och tjocklek. Det kan också påverkas av kartongens beläggning, bläckets egenskaper, tryckplåtens materialegenskaper etcetera. I denna uppsats undersöktes effekten av kontakttiden och det maximala trycket i trycknypet i en flexografisk tryckpress. För att separera dessa variabler bestämdes sex olika önskvärda tryckpulser. Tre av dem var pulser med konstant kontakttid medan det maximala trycket justeras, och tre andra pulser där det maximala trycket hölls konstant medan kontakttiden justerades. Experimenten genomfördes i en IGT F1 laboratorietryckpress. De olika tryckpulserna uppnåddes genom att använda tre olika tryckplåtar och variera kraftinställningarna i tryckpressen. Analysen av provens flammighet visar inte ett tydligt beroende av kontakttiden eller maximalt tryck. Det är i stället tryckplåtarnas styvhet som påverkar resultaten mest, de påverkar resultaten i en sådan stor utsträckning att det inte går att dra några slutsatser om kontakttiden och det maximala tryckets påverkan på resultatet. Från resultaten av punktförstoring kan slutsatsen dras att högre intryckning ger mer punktförstoring. Men även i detta fall så spelar styvheten för tryckplåtarna väldigt stor roll och inga slutsatser kan dras för vare sig kontakttid eller maximalt tryck.

The economic prosperity of the late 1990s was characterized by a perceived expansive growth that increased the expectations of a company's performance. WorldCom, a telecommunications company, was a victim of these expectations that led to the evolution of a fraud designed to deceive the public until the economic outlook improved. Through understanding what led to the fraud, how the fraud grew, and what its effects were, lessons can be derived to gain a better understanding of the reasons behind a fraud and to prevent future frauds from occurring or growing as big as the WorldCom fraud did.

No description available.

<p>Semiconductor laser diode has been a popular research topic for longer than half a century and plays a crucial role in optical communication systems. The work in this thesis focuses on the development of the semiconductor laser diode with rapid-evolving nanotechnologies: by incorporating specific semiconductor or metal structures in the nanometer scale into the laser cavity, several key advantages are achieved.</p> <p>One category of the nano-materials is semiconductor quantum dots (QD). QD laser is a promising product by providing three-dimensional confinement to the injected electrons and holes. However, in order to realize the single-longitudinal-mode operation, which is critical to optical communications in purpose of reducing the dispersion and partition noise, the Fabry-Perot (FP) QD laser still needs further development to suppress the gain-broadening effects; otherwise the mode-selective structure must be adopted, such as the distributed feedback (DFB) cavity. In this thesis, the QD FP laser and QD DFB laser are both researched by advanced modelling techniques and the work is summarized as follows.</p> <p>1) For the QD FP laser, a comprehensive rate-equation model has been applied for simulation, with the emphasis on describing the interplay of inhomogeneous and homogeneous gain-broadening effects. According to the laser-behaviour simulations, it is found that for each given inhomogeneous broadening, the optimum homogeneous broadening can be obtained for the single longitudinal-mode selectivity. Based on the optimal gain-broadening parameters, the single-mode QD FP laser is designed and analysed. The quantitative conditions for the performance feasibility are examined with respect to the gain-broadening parameters.</p> <p>2) A one-dimensional (1D) standing wave model is developed for the QD DFB laser. This model can provide more information for the laser operation and better describe the dynamic behaviour compared with the rate-equation model. Based on it, the statistic operation and output spectrum of a typical QD DFB laser are simulated; and then the dynamic properties of the laser are analysed.</p> <p>The other category is the metal nano-structure, including the metal nano-particle and the metal nano-strip Bragg grating. The related work is summarized as follows.</p> <p>1) The optical properties of a single metal nano-particle with different size, composition and shape are researched by Mie theory, with respect to the localized surface plasmon polariton (LSPP) effect. It shows that both the resonance wavelength and Q-factor can be tuned in a large scale by proper methods.</p> <p>2) A novel metal nano-strip distributed Bragg grating (DBR) laser is proposed and investigated theoretically. Firstly the metal nano-strip Bragg grating is simulated by the couple-mode theory and the mode-matching method. It shows that the coupling constant and reflection spectrum can be tuned to meet different requirements when varying the grating parameters. Then for the designed metal-grating DBR laser, the rate-equation simulation results show that it works under the single-mode operation for a broad range of the design parameters.<br /> <strong></strong></p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

BTX biodegradation rates, biochemical expression patterns and microbial ecology were studied under anoxic (denitrifying), anoxic/microaerobic/aerobic, and anoxic/microaerobic conditions in activated sludge sequencing batch reactors. The studies showed that toluene and m-xylene were denitrified via benzoyl-CoA reductase. Although benzene, o-, and p-xylene were recalcitrant under denitrifying conditions, they were biodegraded under microaerobic (< 0.2 mg/L dissolved oxygen) and nitrate or nitrite (NOx)-supplemented microaerobic conditions. The patterns of the specific enzymes associated with BTX biodegradation under microaerobic conditions indicated that the three compounds were metabolized by oxygen-dependent pathways. The expression levels of catechol 1, 2-dioxygenase and catechol 2, 3-dioxygenase under microaerobic conditions were induced to levels as high as under aerobic conditions (> 4 mg/L dissolved oxygen). Benzene, o-, and p-xylene biodegradation rates were twice as fast under NO_x-supplemented compared to NO_x-free microaerobic conditions, and the specific biodegradation rates under aerobic and NO_x-supplemented microaerobic conditions were comparable. 16S rRNA probes targeting representative toluene-degraders were used to investigate the microbial communities in the three sequencing batch reactors by using a dot blot hybridization technique. The hybridization results suggest that multiple redox environments fostered a more diverse microbial community and the activities of the target organisms in the reactors with multiple redox environments were higher than in the single redox reactor. Additionally, facultative toluene-degraders appeared to play a less significant role than the strict anoxic and aerobic toluene-degraders in all three SBRs. / Ph. D.

The purpose of this study was to determine whether three typeface variations of dot matrix print [single density, dual density, and photocopied dot matrix type] and two formatting variations [fully justified and left justified] had any effect on the reading rates or reading comprehension of college students when compared to the same typewritten material. A pretest/posttest design with experimental and control groups utilized the Cloze Reading Test and the Nelson Denny Reading Test to measure reading comprehension and reading rates respectively to college students [N= 240]. Subjects were randomly assigned to the groups to test the effects of the six treatment levels and two control groups of the independent variables [typefaces and type formatting] on the dependent variables [reading comprehension and reading rates. Four test sessions were used to collect the data and answer the research question: Do either of the three typeface variations of dot matrix print or the two formatting variables have any effect on reading comprehension or reading rates of the subjects when compared to typewriter type? A factorial analysis of covariance [p. < .05] was used to analyze reading comprehension; and a two way analysis of variance [p. < .05] was used to analyze reading rates. The findings indicated that typefaces or formatting made no significant difference in the reading rate or reading comprehension scores of the subjects tested. / Ph. D.

Property Management, one functional area within Right-of-Way offices in state transportation agencies, is responsible for managing the property acquired for highway projects. These activities are data and document intensive and efficiency for performing them would be improved through the implementation of an information management system. Because of the geospatial nature of many of these activities, geographic information systems (GIS) would increase the effectiveness of this system. A literature review and survey were conducted to understand the current state of practice for the use of GIS and information management systems in Property Management. There is no identified comprehensive system that covers all Property Management activities. An initial step in developing a geospatially-enabled enterprise-level information management system, a logical model was developed. This included developing the business process diagram, business process models, and use case models based on the principles of systems engineering using the Computer Aided Software (CASE) Enterprise Architecture. Activities that would benefit from a geospatial component have been identified and included in the models. The developed models have been validated by working with PennDOT staff. The resulting model serves as a standard template for state transportation agencies and helps conceptualize the advantages of integration and interaction with other systems, and geospatial enablement prior to investment in an information management system. / Master of Science

<p dir="ltr"> Nowadays, inkjet printers are widely used all around the world. But how do they transfer the digital image to a map that can control nozzle firing? In this preliminary report, we briefly illustrate that part of the printing pipeline that starts from a halftone image and ends with Hardware Ready Bits (HRBs). We also describe the implementation of the multi-pass printing method with a designed print mask. HRBs are used to read an input halftone CMY image and output a binary map of each color to decide whether or not to eject the corresponding coloranr drop at each pixel position. In general, for an inkjet printer, each row of the image corresponds to one specific nozzle in each swath so that each swath will be the height of the printhead \cite{torpey1997multipass}. To avoid visible white streaks due to clogged or burned out color nozzles, the method called multi-pass printing is implemented. Subsequently, the print mask is introduced so that we can decide during which pass each pixel should be printed. Once we figure out how to transfer the digital image to our printing signals. We start to think about improving the color performance for the inkjet printer. In one of our previous papers \cite{wang2020developing}, we described the color management pipeline that was applied to our nail inkjet printer, which is used to map the source gamut to the destination printer gamut. However, the resulting prints are not as vivid as we would like to have, since those prints are not well saturated. To obtain more saturated prints, we propose a saturation enhancement method based on image segmentation and hue angle. This method will not necessarily give us the closest representation of the colors within the input image but could give us more saturated prints. The main idea of our saturation enhancement method is to keep the lightness and hue constant, while stretching the chroma component.</p><p><br></p><p dir="ltr"> In one of our previous papers \cite{hu2021improving}, we mostly focused on the color saturation problem in our inkjet printer. However, our partner reported that there are some boundary noise pixels on the background, which are quite visible when the background is white. By checking the pipeline of our printing procedure, we realized that the noise stray dots are generated during the halftoning procedure. This part of the dissertation is dedicated to separating the white background from the foreground, which enables us to constrain the error diffusion process inside the white background. The main idea is to apply image segmentation, which could help us to precisely extract the background.</p><p><br></p><p dir="ltr"> Lastly, inspired by the paper \cite{smith2023chiral}, we decided to design an aperiodic clustered-dot screen, which may have better performance compared to the current DBS screen. This screen generation method is offline, so the time cost is not our main consideration. The output halftone result is what we concentrate on. This screen is generated based on a polygon shape, which is called tile(1,1) defined by the paper \cite{smith2023chiral}. We keep extending this single polygon shape to obtain the combination aperiodic shape that is called a supertile. After obtaining the final supertile, we assigned each tile(1,1) shape to either a dot or a hole based on the complementary symmetry property. Finally, based on some interpolation methods, we generate the threshold matrix. </p>

Kvantsammanflätning har varit ett populärt ämne bland fysiker i snart 100 år då det tydligt belyser hur annorlunda kvantmekanikens värld är jämfört med den klassiska verklighet vi lever i. Med tiden har kvantsammanflätning blivit mer och mer välförstått och teknologier ämnade att utnyttja det har de senaste årtionden kommit allt närmare till industriell använding. Kvantdatorer är fortfarande i forskningsstadiet men idag excisterar det en kvantdator som kan lösa vissa problem betydligt mycket snabbare än en klassisk dator. På grund av algorithmer som Shors faktoriseringsalgoritm och Grovers sökalgoritm så riskerar dagens krypteringsprotokoll för kommunikation att bli otillräckliga. Som svar på detta har en fysikalisk icke-hackbar krypterings metodik tagits fram i form av QKD. Det baseras på att generara krypteringsnycklar från slumptal och att dessa distribueras tack vare kvantsammanflätning. För att lyckas med detta så krävs generering av sammanflätade kvanttillstånd, kvantbitar, samt singel-fotonsdetektorer. I den här masteruppsatsen har en kvantprick karaktäriserats och används för att generera sammanflätade kvantbitar i QNP-gruppens lab på KTH samt för att skicka enstaka fotoner via Stockholms fibernät till Ericsson i Kista där de detekteras av singel foton detectorer. Multifoton sannolikheten har uppmäts till 0.049 för exciton fotoner samt 0.169 för biexciton fotoner i labbet medan ett värde på 0.176 har uppmäts för exciton fotoner detekterade hos Ericsson, vilket är betydligt lägre än singel emission gränsen 0.5 (dvs foton källan sänder ut singel fotoner). Synkronisering av data är avgörande för att få QKD att fungera varpå en post process-tidssynkroniserings metod baserad på biexciton-exciton kaskad-sönderfall har implementerats i lab. / Quantum entanglement has been a popular topic amongst physicists for almost 100 years as it clearly illuminates the extreme difference between the quantum mechanical world and our classical reality. Over time, the quantum physical property of entanglement became more and more well understood and technologies utilizing entanglement are coming closer to reach industry. Quantum computers are still in the research stage but there already exists a quantum computer capable of solving tailored problems significantly faster than a classical computer. Due to algorithms like Shor’s factorization algorithm and Grover’s search algorithm the current cryptography schemes used to ensure secure communication risk rendering obsolete. A response to this was the invention of the theoretically un­hackable Quantum key Distribution (QKD) scheme, based on generating and distributing random cryptography keys by using quantum entanglement. To achieve this, the generation of entangled photons, or qubits, as well as detection of single photons is required. In this thesis a Quantum Dot (QD) is characterized and used to generate quantum entangled states in the Quantum Nano Photonics (QNP)­group lab at KTH as well as sending single photons via the metropolitan fiber network in Stockholm to Ericsson in Kista, where they are detected using single photon detectors. A multi­photon emission probability of 0.049 was measured for the exciton emission and 0.169 for the biexciton emission in the KTH lab as well as a probability of 0.176 was measured for the exciton photons sent to Kista which is significantly lower than the single emitter limit of 0.5 (i.e. the source is emitting pure single photons). Synchronization of data is of high importance in order to implement a working QKD scheme, therefore a post process temporal synchronization method based on the biexciton­exciton cascaded decay is implemented in the lab.