Experiments were conducted in a free-surface, re-circulating water channel to determine the dependence of spanwise flow uniformity in the near wake of a circular cylinder on the end conditions using Particle Image Velocimetry. The Reynolds number was 10,000. The end conditions consisted of plates with different leading edge geometries and configurations. A cylinder bounded by two endplates with sharp leading edge geometry generated the most uniform near wake. The horseshoe vortex dynamics in the cylinder/ wall and cylinder/endplate junctions were also studied. Upstream flow separation significantly altered the behavior of the horse shoe vortices. Periodic horse shoe vortex oscillation was found for experiments with the upstream flow attached; this periodic oscillation was disrupted with the presence of upstream flow separation. The endplate leading edge distance was also investigated. The oscillation frequency of the horse shoe vortex system was found to decrease with increasing leading edge distance.

Although end-user support is an important aspect of EMR implementation, it is not known in what ways it affects EMR success. To investigate this topic, a case study of end-user support for an open-source EMR was conducted in an Ontario Family Health Organization using 7 semistructured interviews based on the DeLone and McLean Model of Information System Success. Second, documentation for an open-source and proprietary EMR was analyzed using Carroll’s Minimalism as a theoretical framework. Finally, themes from this thesis were compared and contrasted with a multiple case study that examined support for a commercial EMR in 4 Ontario family health teams. Main findings include the role of informal support, which was important for ensuring that data are documented consistently, which in turn enabled information retrieval for providing better preventive care services. Also, formal support was important for mitigating problems of system quality, which had potential implications for patient safety.

Experiments were conducted in a free-surface, re-circulating water channel to determine the dependence of spanwise flow uniformity in the near wake of a circular cylinder on the end conditions using Particle Image Velocimetry. The Reynolds number was 10,000. The end conditions consisted of plates with different leading edge geometries and configurations. A cylinder bounded by two endplates with sharp leading edge geometry generated the most uniform near wake. The horseshoe vortex dynamics in the cylinder/ wall and cylinder/endplate junctions were also studied. Upstream flow separation significantly altered the behavior of the horse shoe vortices. Periodic horse shoe vortex oscillation was found for experiments with the upstream flow attached; this periodic oscillation was disrupted with the presence of upstream flow separation. The endplate leading edge distance was also investigated. The oscillation frequency of the horse shoe vortex system was found to decrease with increasing leading edge distance.

Although end-user support is an important aspect of EMR implementation, it is not known in what ways it affects EMR success. To investigate this topic, a case study of end-user support for an open-source EMR was conducted in an Ontario Family Health Organization using 7 semistructured interviews based on the DeLone and McLean Model of Information System Success. Second, documentation for an open-source and proprietary EMR was analyzed using Carroll’s Minimalism as a theoretical framework. Finally, themes from this thesis were compared and contrasted with a multiple case study that examined support for a commercial EMR in 4 Ontario family health teams. Main findings include the role of informal support, which was important for ensuring that data are documented consistently, which in turn enabled information retrieval for providing better preventive care services. Also, formal support was important for mitigating problems of system quality, which had potential implications for patient safety.

The development of X-ray Beam Position Monitors (XBPM) used on the Canadian Light Source front ends is described in this thesis, from the design concepts to the practical implementation and commissioning. Surveyed into position to provide a fiducialized point of origin for incoming synchrotron radiation, the primary purpose of the XBPM is to provide a measure of synchrotron beam motion. Currently XBPMs have been installed on three beamlines at the Canadian Light Source, a 2.9 GeV third generation synchrotron radiation source. Two of the XBPMs are comprised of chemical vapour deposition synthetic diamond blades coated with gold and installed on insertion device beamlines, while the third makes use of molybdenum blades for a dipole beamline. By incrementally scanning the blades of the XBPM through the synchrotron beam it is possible to determine the monitors� spatial resolution to beam motion. For the commissioned XBPM a typical spatial resolution of +/- 1 micron of beam motion was achieved; and the thermal power loading capacity has been tested to the 2/5 of maximum value. An independent white beam profiler, comprised of a converter crystal and image acquisition software, was constructed to corroborate the functionality of the XBPM.

Alzheimer’s disease (AD), a chronic terminal disease, progressively impairs cognitive function resulting in deterioration of intellect, memory, and personality. With disease progression, the surrogate decision-maker becomes more involved in intervention choices and end-of-life (EOL) care, which may or may not be based on patients’ wishes or best practice guidelines. Yet surrogate decision outcomes involve important issues of medical futility, quality of life and death. The purpose of this study was to examine factors that influence surrogate health care decision-making for a family member during the terminal stage of AD. A descriptive, predictive design was used to address the research questions: 1.What is the relationship between surrogate gender and decision motives?; 2. Do structure (surrogate age and gender, attachment, interpersonal conflict), interactional context (elder image, caregiving beliefs), situational context (dementia level), and perception (burden) variables predict the type of decision motive (reward seeking, altruistic, distress reduction, punishment avoidance) used by surrogates’ when making healthcare decisions for their family member with AD?; 3. What healthcare decision choices do surrogate decision-makers make for a family member with AD? A convenience sample of 58 women (67.2%) and men surrogates between the ages of 43 to 84 years of age (M = 62.22, SD = 9.67) living in one urban and several rural cities in a southeastern state were recruited. Participants were recruited during facility meetings for families at 15 long-term care facilities and 1 dementia care assisted living facility. The majority of participants were Caucasian (84.5%). Questionnaires were distributed to participants at a facility meeting. After the study was explained, written informed consent was obtained. Each participant was asked to complete the questionnaire booklet and return via mail in a stamped self-addressed envelope to the researcher. Data were analyzed with descriptive and inferential statistics including frequencies, percentages, means, standard deviations, t-tests, and multiple linear regressions. Types of decision motives did not differ by gender. For the regression models, the independent variables included gender, feelings of attachment, interpersonal conflict with the elder, beliefs about caregiving, dementia level and caregiver burden. For the model predicting punishment avoidance decision motive, simultaneous multiple linear regression results indicated that the overall model significantly predicted the dependent variable. The regression model predicting reward seeking decision motive results indicated that the overall model significantly predicted the dependent variable. Two of the variables, dementia level and surrogate burden, significantly contributed to the variance in the reward seeking decision motive. When asked about the decisions they have been asked to make in the past 12 months, surrogates were asked to make life supportive interventions (pain management and nutritional supplements) more frequently than life extending interventions. The most frequent life extending interventions chosen in descending order of frequency include surgery, central line placement, and feeding tube placement. This study supports the importance of providing surrogate and family information on AD and end-of-life healthcare interventions in a therapeutic and supportive environment. Nursing implications address pain management of the cognitively impaired patient, advocacy for advance directive completion and non-futile care, and patient and family AD education. Health care implications include process for completion of an advance directive and the burden of medical futility.

Americans often face end-of-life with ineffective pain/symptom control. While hospice care prevents suffering for the terminally ill, only around 40% of individuals access services. Although few studies describe differences in terms of cancer vs. non- cancer diagnoses, hospice utilization/access disparities appear to exist. Analyzing 14 sociodemographic and clinical variables for 3,905 hospice discharge cases, this study highlights observed disproportions between cancer and non-cancer groups, identifying significant relationships amongst patient characteristics and hospice diagnosis. Factors found significantly related to diagnosis include components of the following: age, primary payment source, mortality status at discharge, hospice initiation location, length of stay, physical function, cognitive function, and presence of pain symptoms. Results confirm low overall hospice utilization rates, while validating diagnosis-specific differences driven by individual and population-based characteristics. In order to increase utilization/access rates and eliminate current disparities, patients presenting with certain terminal diseases may require greater provider flexibility in terms of hospice eligibility requirements.

The Analog to Digital Converter (ADC) is an inevitable part of video AnalogFront Ends (AFE) found in the electronic displays today. The need to integratemore functionality on a single chip (there by shrinking area), poses great designchallenges in terms of achieving low power and desired accuracy.The thesis initially focuses upon selection of suitable Analog to Digital Converter(ADC) architecture for a high definition video analog front end. SuccessiveApproximation Register (SAR) ADC is the selected architecture as it scales downwith technology, has very less analog part and has minimal power consumption.In second phase a mathematical model of a Time-Interleaved Successive ApproximationRegister (TI-SAR) ADC is developed which emulates the behavior ofSAR ADC in Matlab and the errors that are characteristic of the time interleavedstructure are modeled.In the third phase a behavioral model of TI-SAR ADC having 16 channels and12 bit resolution, is built using the top-down methodology in Cadence simulationtool. All the modules were modeled at behavioral level in Verilog-A. The functionalityof the model is verified by simulation using signal of 30 MHz and clockfrequency of 300 MHz, using a supply voltage of 1.2 V. The desired SNDR (Signalto Noise Distortion ratio) 74 dB is achieved.In the final phase two architectures of comparators are implemented in 65nmtechnology at schematic level. Simulation results show that SNDR of 71 dB isachievable with a minimal power consumption of 169.6 μWper comparator runningat 300 MHz.NyckelordKeywords

In the assembly process of airframe structures there are many drilled holes and on some parts the holes are mainly drilled manually with pneumatic handheld drilling machines. During conventional drilling in metal, burrs appear. To remove these burrs the parts of the structure must be separated and deburred before they can be put together for fastening. This is a time consuming measure and therefore expensive. To facilitate this process and lower production costs some parts of the process needs to be automated. A part of this thesis was a project in co-operation with Saab, Novator, Specma Automation and the University of Linköping. The purpose of this project was to investigate the ability of an industrial robot to drill holes in aeroplane structures using orbital drilling. How the project tests were carried out and the results of these tests are presented in the first part of this thesis. The tests showed that slip-stick appeared when a force was applied on the working object by the robot. Because of the movement of the pressure foot the drilled hole will be in the wrong position and if the movement appears during drilling the quality of the hole is being poor. Several different tests were performed using different amounts of forces and different pressure feet trying to prevent slip-stick from appearing. Finally tests were performed with good results concerning the quality of the holes. In the second part of this thesis the proceeding tests that were carried out are presented. The purpose of these tests was to find out how the robot acts when a static pressure is applied on a work object by the robot and try to find out what the cause of the slip-stick was. Several tests were done where the robot applied a force on several different points on the fixture and the slip-stick was measured. The tests that were carried out during this thesis showed that an industrial robot can be used to drill holes in aeroplane structures. To make sure that the quality of the drilled holes is sufficient for the high demands of the aeroplane industry the working area of the robot is limited to a small area in front of the robot. The slip-stick that appears when the robot is extended into a position on the far side of the robot is too large for the robot to drill the hole in an accurate position. / Vid flygplansmontering borras det många olika hål och på vissa delar borras större delen av dessa hål manuellt med pneumatiska handborrmaskiner. Vid konventionell borrning i metall bildas oönskade grader. Strukturen plockas därför isär så att graderna kan tas bort innan strukturens delar kan passas samman igen för att sammanfogas. Detta är en tidskrävande åtgärd och därmed dyr och i ett steg att förenkla denna process och få en billigare produktion vill man automatisera vissa steg i denna process. En del av detta examensarbete var ett projekt i samarbete med Saab, Novator, Specma Automation och Linköpings Universitet vars syfte var att klargöra en robots förmåga att borra hål i flygplansmaterial med orbitalborrningsteknik. I första delen av detta examensarbete redovisas genomförande och resultat av projektets tester. Testerna visade att tryckfoten gled på testmaterialets yta när roboten lade en tryckkraft på testplåten, så kallad slip-stick uppkom. Denna glidning gör att det borrade hålet inte hamnar på rätt position och sker glidningen under borroperationen så försämras hålets kvalité. Flera olika tester gjordes med varierad tryckkraft och med olika tryckfötter för att försöka förhindra att slip-stick uppkom. Tester genomfördes där hål borrades med bra kvalité. I den andra delen av denna rapport redovisas fortsättningen på examensarbetet som var en vidareundersökning av de tidigare genomförda testerna. Syftet med denna del var att undersöka hur en industrirobot beter sig när den används för att lägga på en tryckkraft mot ett material samt att försöka ta reda på vad som är orsaken till slip-sticken. Fler tester gjordes där roboten tryckte på olika punkter på en fixtur och de uppkomna slip-sticken mättes upp. Testerna under detta examensarbete har visat att det går att använda en industrirobot till att borra hål i flyglansmaterial. För att kvaliteten på de borrade hålen ska klara de höga krav som ställs inom flygplansindustrin är robotens arbetsområde begränsat till ett litet fönster mitt framför roboten. De glidningar som uppkommer när robotarmen är utsträckt långt åt sidan om roboten är alldeles för stora för de positioneringskrav som är på hålens placering på flygplansstrukturen.

End users must regularly agree to lengthy software agreements prior to installing software or using software services. However, despite the fact that these agreements contain terms of direct concern to users—e.g., data collection policies—software agreements are typically read by less than 2% of the population [30]. This thesis presents techniques and heuristics for improving the presentation and visual design of software agreements, to better capture reader attention and improve comprehension. In contrast to other techniques, these techniques are applied to the full agreement content, rather than a summary, as summaries have been found to distract readers from the full content of the agreement [44,56]. This thesis introduces two techniques for improving software agreements: narrative pictograms and textured agreements. Narrative pictograms are a pictorial technique designed to improve the communication of agreement terms to non-native readers of the language of an agreement. An experimental study shows that they can successfully communicate the basic concepts of a data collection policy without words. Textured agreements are visually redesigned software agreements that highlight information relevant to users. A pair of experimental studies shows that they increase both reading time—by 30 seconds, from 7 in the first experiment and 20 in the second—and comprehension of agreement content—by 4/16 points, from 0. Finally, a solid understanding of users’ attitudes towards specific agreement content is needed to inform the design of improved software agreements. To that end, this thesis presents an analysis of EULAscan, an online community of anonymous reviewers of software agreements. An open coding is used to categorize 191 EULAscan reviews. From this analysis, functionality emerges as the most prevalent concern. The wide variety of other concerns across reviews suggests that static designs of software agreements would inadequately serve a large population of users. Instead, this thesis proposes a focus on end-user tools that identify and highlight clauses of possible interest to a given user—for example, terms that the user has not seen before.