Smart materials have been widely used for control actuation. A robotic hand can be equipped with artificial tendons and sensors for the operation of its various joints mimicking human-hand motions. The motors in the robotic hand could be replaced with novel electroactive-polymer (EAP) actuators. In the three-finger gripper proposed in this paper, each finger can be actuated individually so that dexterous handling is possible, allowing precise manipulation. In this dissertation, a microscale position-control system using a novel EAP is presented. A third-order model was developed based on the system identification of the EAP actuator with an AutoRegresive Moving Average with eXogenous input (ARMAX) method using a chirp signal input from 0.01 Hz to 1 Hz limited to 7 ± V. With the developed plant model, a digital PID (proportional-integral-derivative) controller was designed with an integrator anti-windup scheme. Test results on macro (0.8-mm) and micro (50-μm) step responses of the EAP actuator are provided in this dissertation and its position tracking capability is demonstrated. The overshoot decreased from 79.7% to 37.1%, and the control effort decreased by 16.3%. The settling time decreased from 1.79 s to 1.61 s. The controller with the anti-windup scheme effectively reduced the degradation in the system performance due to actuator saturation. EAP microgrippers based on the control scheme presented in this paper will have significant applications including picking-and-placing micro-sized objects or as medical instruments. To develop model-based control laws, we introduced an approximated linear model that represents the electromechanical behavior of the gripper fingers. Several chirp voltage signal inputs were applied to excite the IPMC (ionic polymer metal composite) fingers in the interesting frequency range of [0.01 Hz, 5 Hz] for 40 s at a sampling frequency of 250 Hz. The approximated linear Box-Jenkins (BJ) model was well matched with the model obtained using a stochastic power-spectral method. With feedback control, the large overshoot, rise time, and settling time associated with the inherent material properties were reduced. The motions of the IPMC fingers in the microgripper were coordinated to pick, move, and release a macro- or micro-part. The precise manipulation of this three-finger gripper was successfully demonstrated with experimental closed-loop responses.

Scholars globally are under increasing pressure to publish in international, highly-ranked, and usually English-language journals. This has created a need for insights into the evolving discourses, genres, and publication practices of disciplinary discourse communities. This thesis reports an exploration of textual and contextual facets of writing for publication in the academy. More specifically, the overarching aim was to investigate the relationship between discipline, and the rhetorical features, genres, languages and dissemination outlets used by scholars. The thesis comprises four qualitative studies, and employs a variety of methods to explore this relationship across four disciplines: anthropology, history, linguistics and pure mathematics. The results reveal some connections between epistemological characteristics of the disciplines investigated and scholars’ rhetorical choices. The structure of the research article in pure mathematics is shown to reflect the process of knowledge construction in the discipline, and patterns of self-mentions in anthropology and history articles are attributed to disciplinary methodology. Furthermore, insights into the relationship between discipline, and genre use, language selection, and access to publication outlets are obtained. The results reveal disciplinary differences in terms of scholars’ opportunities to publish in the local language and in English. Based on my findings, I argue that while discipline is a significant factor in understanding how scholars construct and disseminate their research-based writing, these practices are also subject to local, international and digital developments. As such, the relationship between discipline, genre, language and publication should be understood as dynamic. / <p>At the time of the doctoral defense, the following papers were unpublished and had a status as follows: Paper 1: In press. Paper 3: Submitted. Paper 4: Submitted.</p>

English as an Additional Language (EAL) students’ perceptions of academic writing practices play an essential role in helping to better understand their academic literacy development processes and in meeting their actual learning needs in second language (L2) EAP writing (Leki, 1995). However, there is a scarcity of research pertaining to pre-university EAL students’ perceptions of academic writing learning experiences in English-medium higher education settings. This study investigated pre-university EAL students’ perceptions of coping strategies of academic writing practices in an EAP program in a Canadian university with case study. Findings indicated that Chinese EAL students in this study employed different coping strategies to deal with their EAP writing challenges. Also, Chinese EAL students specified their urgent learning needs in academic writing at the EAP program. Meanwhile, some pedagogical recommendations proposed to EAL academic writing instructors and EAP program administrators to impact teaching objectives and practices in pre-university EAP academic programs.

English as an Additional Language (EAL) students’ perceptions of academic writing practices play an essential role in helping to better understand their academic literacy development processes and in meeting their actual learning needs in second language (L2) EAP writing (Leki, 1995). However, there is a scarcity of research pertaining to pre-university EAL students’ perceptions of academic writing learning experiences in English-medium higher education settings. This study investigated pre-university EAL students’ perceptions of coping strategies of academic writing practices in an EAP program in a Canadian university with case study. Findings indicated that Chinese EAL students in this study employed different coping strategies to deal with their EAP writing challenges. Also, Chinese EAL students specified their urgent learning needs in academic writing at the EAP program. Meanwhile, some pedagogical recommendations proposed to EAL academic writing instructors and EAP program administrators to impact teaching objectives and practices in pre-university EAP academic programs.

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) / Abstract This thesis explores the use of the interpersonal resources of English in argumentative/persuasive essays (APEs) constructed by undergraduate international students from East-Asian regions (EAS), in particular, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, and also by Australian-born English speakers (ABS). High-graded essays (HGEs) were compared with the low-graded essays (LGEs) in order to identify the relationship between their deployment of interpersonal features and the academic grades given by markers. In addition, the essays constructed by the EAS writers were compared with those written by ABS writers. A major complaint of academic staff about ESL Asian students concerns their lack of analytical, critical voice and formality in their arguments. The linguistic evidence for this explored in this thesis is based mainly on interpersonal systems of interaction and evaluation recently developed within Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) (Iedema et al., 1994; Iedema, 1995, 2003, 2004; Martin, 2000a, 2003c; White, 1998, 2004; Martin and Rose, 2003; Macken-Horarik and Martin, 2003; Martin and White, 2005). Within interaction, the thesis draws on work dealing with the metaphorical realisations of commands in a bureaucratic administration context. Evaluation is based on appraisal theory, which is concerned with the linguistic inflection of the subjective attitudes of writers, and also their evaluative expressions and intersubjective positioning. In order to explore the use of interpersonal resources from a perspective of writer and reader interaction, this study incorporates a social interactive model derived from ‘Interaction in writing’ alongside Bakhtin’s (1981, 1986) dialogic literacy. Under this broad interdisciplinary approach, the interpersonal aspects in APEs are examined from three main perspectives: Interactive (schematic structures), Interactional (the metaphorical realisation of commands), and InterPERSONAL meanings (the three main appraisal systems: ATTITUDE, ENGAGEMENT, and GRADUATION). The sample comprised six overseas students and six Australian-born native English speakers. They were all participants in the English for Academic Purposes class in the Modern Language Program offered by a regional university in southern New South Wales. These students were required to write APEs as a part of their course. Discourse analysis was applied to the essays at the genre, discourse semantic and the lexico-grammatical levels. Interviews were undertaken with markers to identify the relationship between text analysis results and markers’ comments on the essays and the grades. The results indicated that students’ use of interpersonal resources is a good indicator for judging quality of APEs. The analysis reveals significant differences in the extent to which HGEs are interactive by showing awareness of audience in argument structure, and making interactional choices focusing on command and interPERSONAL choices of appraisal systems. These differences are reflected in the use both of strategies of involvement by being interactional, and strategies displaying distance by being formal. The differences are also reflected in the presentation of personal opinions by being evaluative and of intersubjective claims supported by evidence. While there were no significant differences between the EAS and ABS writers in terms of the argument structure, ABS texts are more interactional, having a high degree of authority and conviction characterised by a formal tone. ABS writers also display a stronger voice through frequent exploitation of GRADUATION resources of appraisal. Overall, it can be said that while EAS students display problems with raising their own voices in argument, ABS students display problems in supporting persuasion. Educational implications for English for Academic Purposes (EAP) writing curriculum design include the desirability of enhancing a context-sensitive approach in writing, raising audience awareness of language teachers in relation to the interpersonal use of English, and promoting the dialogic nature of argument by reconciling individual creativity with social voices and community conventions.

Submitted by Anna Luisa Lopes Alves (annalopes.alves@gmail.com) on 2018-06-08T22:15:57Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação de mestrado Anna Luisa Lopes Alves.pdf: 2081259 bytes, checksum: 32e721e4f4fb4a131e1c4124214549e2 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Elza Mitiko Sato null (elzasato@ibilce.unesp.br) on 2018-06-11T13:12:04Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 alves_all_me_sjrp.pdf: 2081259 bytes, checksum: 32e721e4f4fb4a131e1c4124214549e2 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2018-06-11T13:12:04Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 alves_all_me_sjrp.pdf: 2081259 bytes, checksum: 32e721e4f4fb4a131e1c4124214549e2 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2018-04-10 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES) / A escrita de abstracts tem sido estudada por pesquisadores de diferentes áreas (BATHIA; 1993; SWALES; FEAK, 2009; DAYRELL, 2011) para que seja possível observar quais padrões são mais utilizados por autores de revistas de impacto internacional a fim de preparar pesquisadores para a escrita deste gênero textual. Nesta dissertação, objetivamos analisar como a Linguística de Corpus e o Corpus de aprendizes (DUTRA, et al, 2016), composto por textos de alunos brasileiros de universidades públicas, e o Corpus MICUSP (RÖMER, 2012), contendo textos de alunos nativos e não-nativos de língua inglesa da Universidade de Michigan, podem ser utilizados no desenvolvimento da escrita acadêmica de abstracts (BIBER, 2007; SWALES e FEAK, 2009; GLASMAN-DEAL, 2010) e como alunos universitários utilizam as that-clauses para reportarem as descobertas, resultados e conclusão de seus trabalhos em abstracts. Após coleta e compilação dos nossos corpora de análises, utilizamos o programa linguístico e computacional Sketch Engine (KILGARRIFF, et al, 2014) para criar linhas de concordância com a palavra that e, a partir dos resultados, foi possível observar que tanto na escrita de abstracts de alunos de universidades brasileiras, quanto na escrita de abstracts de alunos da Universidade de Michigan, as estruturas mais utilizadas no desenvolvimento da escrita das descobertas, resultados e conclusões, foram as seguintes: sujeito + verbo no passado simples + that e sujeito + verbo no presente simples + that, respectivamente, se alinhando com resultados de pesquisa de autores como Biber, et al. (2007) e Glasman-Deal (2010). O resultado final demonstrou que é possível utilizar a Linguística de Corpus para o ensino e aprendizagem de Inglês com Fins Acadêmicos e obter um desfecho positivo na escrita acadêmica de abstracts, de acordo com a verificação das estruturas utilizadas pelos alunos em seus resumos e, também é possível desenvolver atividades didáticas utilizando Corpus de aprendizes para que a autonomia do aluno como pesquisador seja desenvolvida. Ademais, notamos com esta pesquisa que a LC é uma área muito abrangente que permite diversos tipos de trabalhos e aplicações, visando análises de dados linguísticos para os mais diversos fins, e, ressaltamos, de acordo com Berber Sardinha (2004), que a utilização de corpus no ensino de línguas estrangeiras é uma maneira de auxiliar o ensino e aprendizagem de uma segunda língua tornando seu aprendiz mais autônomo. / The writing of abstracts has been studied by researchers from different areas (BATHIA, 1993; SWALES e FEAK, 2009; DAYRELL, 2011) so that it is possible to observe which standards are most used by authors of international impact journals in order to prepare researchers for the writing of this textual genre. In this dissertation, we aim to analyze how Corpus Linguistics and Learner Corpus (DUTRA, et al., 2016), composed of texts by Brazilian students of public universities, and Corpus MICUSP (RÖMER, 2012), with texts written by native and non-native speakers of English can be used to help academic writing (BIBER, 2007, SWALES and FEAK, 2009; GLASMAN-DEAL, 2010) and how college students use that-clauses to report discoveries, results and conclusion of their researchs in abstracts. After collecting and compiling our corporus of analysis , we used the linguistic and computational program Sketch Engine (KILGARRIFF, et al, 2014) to generate concordance lines with the search word “that” and, based on the results, it was possible to observe that in both, writing abstracts of students of Brazilian universities, as well as in the writing of abstracts of University of Michigan students, the most used structures in the development of the writing of discoveries, results and conclusions, were the following structures: subject + verb in past simple + that, and subject + present simple + that, respectively, aligning with search results of authors such as Biber, et al. (2007) and Glasman-Deal (2010). The final result showed that it is possible to use Corpus Linguistics for teaching and learning English for Academic Purposes and to obtain a positive result in the academic writing of abstracts, according to the verification of the structures used by the students in their abstracts. It is also possible to develop teaching activities using Learner Corpus so that the autonomy of the student as a researcher is developed. In addition, we observed with this research that Corpus Linguistics is a very broad area that allows different types of works and applications, aiming at analysis of linguistic data for the most diverse purposes, and, according to Berber Sardinha (2004), that the use of corpus in the teaching of foreign languages is a way of helping the teaching and learning of a second language making learners more autonomous.

The importance of curriculum in education is uncontested. Nevertheless, this has not translated into a thorough examination of what constitutes a ‘quality’ curriculum. Extant educational quality models mostly investigated ‘quality’ from students’ perspective and were predominantly conducted in the business and engineering fields. Some of these models encompass curriculum quality dimensions, nonetheless, given their focus on student perspectives, emerging curriculum themes were limited to issues of interest to students only, such as the number of courses, and the courses enhancing students’ job perspectives. To date, only a few studies pertaining to quality and service quality have been conducted in the field of Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages. Thus, this exploratory sequential mixed-methods case study was conducted in an English for Academic Purposes programme in the State of Qatar to uncover teachers’ perceptions of curriculum quality and its attributes. Additionally, this study seeks to discover whether teachers’ perceptions of ‘quality’ affected their curriculum implementation. Qualitative data indicates that participants understood a quality curriculum as one that meets stakeholders’ needs in addition to meeting twenty-five attributes pertaining to curriculum design, course content, and resources. The findings reveal that curriculum design is the most important aspect of quality followed by course content and resources. Qualitative data also revealed that the exclusion of teachers from curriculum decision-making, students’ admission criteria, and lack of trust were detrimental to the quality of curriculum design. Curriculum relevance to students is of concern to some participants, since students and the wider community do not perceive the English for Academic Purposes courses as relevant. Although the participants’ do not deem quality of resources as an essential attribute of curriculum quality, it affects their curriculum implementation. Overall, the quantitative data supports the qualitative findings with respect to the importance of the curriculum quality attributes. Two curriculum quality attributes emerge from two participants’ comments related to curriculum design section in the questionnaire. Based on the study findings, it is recommended that the needs and situation analyses be modified at the study site to address concerns raised by the participants. It is also suggested that the university explores different options of English for Academic Purpose programmes to enhance students’ perceptions of the relevance of the English for Academic Purposes courses.

This thesis describes the draft and implementation of a new security with 802.1x in the corporate environment. The work is divided into two parts. The first part outlines the topic theoretically and the second part solves specific draft using 802.1x and its implementation in the corporate environment. The implementation is outlined with configuration of end clients, switches including RADIUS server and settings in AD. During the implementation, there is also described the authentication of devices by Mac Authentication Bypass.

SAPS is currently implementing an EAP. Supervisors are an important link in the EAP process because they are the first persons to identify a troubled employee and to refer the employee to the EAP. Owing to her knowledge of an EAP and her interest in supervisory training, the researcher was asked to assist with the development of a supervisory training programme. The researcher has been employed as a social worker in the SAPS for ten years. In practice it happens that commanders refer troubled employees to the EAP when the commanders do not know what else to do with the troubled employees. At that stage the problems that the employees experience are of such a nature that long-term therapy is needed to attend to them. At times the commanders will act as social workers instead of referring the employee to the EAP. The researcher wanted to establish empirically what the role, knowledge and the attitude of commanders within the SAPS are regarding the EAP. The researcher decided to explore the topic by means of a literature study regarding the EAP in the SAPS and supervisory training and to interview several experts in the EAP in the SAPS and two experts in private organisations. An interview schedule was compiled and tested on one respondent. The information gained from the interview was sufficient and the researcher could go ahead with the data collection. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with two percent (2%) of the commanders in area West-Metropole. The researcher interviewed one (1) Senior superintendent, two (2) Superintendents, four (4) Captains and three (3) Inspectors. None of the respondents had previous training in the EAP. A stratified random sample was used to select the respondents. From the information gathered from the respondents, the researcher achieved the objectives of the study and provide answers to the three (3) research questions, namely: • What is the knowledge of SAPS commanders regarding the EAP? • What is the knowledge of SAPS commanders regarding their role within the EAP? • What is the attitude of SAPS commanders towards the EAP? The researcher determined that the respondents had limited knowledge regarding the EAP and the services rendered by the EAP professionals in the SAPS. The respondents all knew that they had to refer the troubled employee to the EAP but some of them first tried to be the social worker before they referred to the EAP. Therefore it is important that the distinctive roles of the commander/supervisor and the EAP are identified. All the respondents felt positive towards the EAP in the SAPS and said that they self would make use of the services of the EAP. Although the researcher could not generalise the findings, sufficient information was provided to make the following valuable recommendations: recommendations regarding the content of a supervisory training programme, the marketing of the services rendered by the EAP in the SAPS and the steps that could be taken to ensure confidence in the EAP. / Dissertation (MSD (Employee Assistance Programme))--University of Pretoria, 2008. / Social Work and Criminology / unrestricted

The need for an EAP in a sport environment is considered on the basis of a questionnaire completed by a group of Netball players and an overview of the high performance environment of elite athletes. The questionnaire covered the personal, work(career), home and sporting environments of the respondents with a view to identify those stressors that could possibly impact on performance on the playing field. The particular profile of the responding group of Netball players is taken into consideration. Responses received from the group of Netball players together with the characteristics of the high pressure world of high performance or “elite” athletes provides insight into the nature of the related factors at work in this environment. General principles involved in EAP, as applicable in normal workplace situations, are reviewed and the support services provided compared with the support services generally available to athletes. Support services provided by sports organisations are essentially focused on the physical well-being of the athlete and very little is available to attend to the emotional needs of athletes. The stressful environment within which elite athletes function impact the mental well-being of athletes dramatically and interventions are required to ensure that performance quality is not affected. It is concluded that existing support services for athletes are deficient with respect to their emotional needs. By extending traditional athlete support systems to include the basic principles of EAP it is possible to support both the physical and emotional needs of elite athletes. Guidelines for such a sport specific EAP is provided. Copyright 2004, University of Pretoria. All rights reserved. The copyright in this work vests in the University of Pretoria. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the University of Pretoria. Please cite as follows: Basson, T 2004, Guidelines for a sport specific Employee Assistance Programme, MSD dissertation, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, viewed yymmdd < http://upetd.up.ac.za/thesis/available/etd-10182005-105208 / > / Dissertation (MSD (Employee Assistance Programme))--University of Pretoria, 2006. / Social Work / unrestricted