The problem of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of certain predictors of reading success and to determine which combination of these predictors was most reliable in predicting reading success.

A growing number of Community Artists are doing work with potential relevance to the field of historic preservation. They have seen a need for action in low-income communities and communities of color that are losing their historic, physical, and social character through dilapidation, redevelopment, and displacement. These artists have found nontraditional ways to bolster communities while preserving neighborhood buildings, histories, and social structures. This thesis analyzes three community art case studies as a means to evaluate changes proposed to our current preservation system by leaders in historic preservation concerned with issues of equity and social justice. This study finds that these projects offer many useful examples for preservationists interested in better serving underrepresented communities through the field of historic preservation.

DNA nanotechnology has been developed in order to construct nanostructures and nanomachines by virtue of the programmable self-assembly properties of DNA molecules. Although DNA nanotechnology initially focused on spatial arrangement of DNA strands, new horizons have been explored owing to the development of the toehold-mediated strand-displacement reaction, conferring new dynamic properties to previously static and rigid structures. A large variety of DNA reconfigurable nanostructures, stepped and autonomous nanomachines and circuits have been operated using the strand-displacement reaction. Biological systems rely on information processing to guide their behaviour and functions. Molecular computation is a branch of DNA nanotechnology that aims to construct and operate programmable computing devices made out of DNA that could interact in a biological context. Similar to conventional computers, the computational processes involved are based on Boolean logic, a propositional language that describes statements as being true or false while connecting them with logic operators. Numerous logic gates and circuits have been built with DNA that demonstrate information processing at the molecular level. However, development of new systems is called for in order to perform new tasks of higher computational complexity and enhanced reliability. The contribution of secondary structure to the vulnerability of a toehold-sequestered device to undesired triggering of inputs was examined, giving new approaches for minimizing leakage of DNA devices. This device was then integrated as a logic component in a DNA-based computer with a retrievable memory, thus implementing two essential biological functions in one synthetic device. Additionally, G-quadruplex logic gates were developed that can be switched between two topological states in a logic fashion. Their individual responses were detected simultaneously, establishing a new approach for parallel biological computing. A new AND-NOT logic circuit based on the seesaw mechanism was constructed that, in combination with the already existing AND and OR gates, form a now complete basis set that could perform any Boolean computation. This work introduces a new mode of kinetic control over the operation of such DNA circuits. Finally, the first example of a transmembrane logic gate being operated at the single-molecule level is described. This could be used as a potential platform for biosensing.

Submitted by Aline Batista (alinehb.ufpel@gmail.com) on 2017-03-24T19:58:57Z No. of bitstreams: 2 license_rdf: 0 bytes, checksum: d41d8cd98f00b204e9800998ecf8427e (MD5) Comparação de diferentes topologias de portas XOR em uma tecnologia de 45 nm.pdf: 6133925 bytes, checksum: 1acf2c33bd1187b626943c709eb21b2f (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Aline Batista (alinehb.ufpel@gmail.com) on 2017-04-05T19:13:36Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 2 Comparação de diferentes topologias de portas XOR em uma tecnologia de 45 nm.pdf: 6133925 bytes, checksum: 1acf2c33bd1187b626943c709eb21b2f (MD5) license_rdf: 0 bytes, checksum: d41d8cd98f00b204e9800998ecf8427e (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-04-05T19:13:47Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 Comparação de diferentes topologias de portas XOR em uma tecnologia de 45 nm.pdf: 6133925 bytes, checksum: 1acf2c33bd1187b626943c709eb21b2f (MD5) license_rdf: 0 bytes, checksum: d41d8cd98f00b204e9800998ecf8427e (MD5) Previous issue date: 2016-09-16 / Sem bolsa / Sistemas digitais estão presentes em grande parte das atividades humanas, e cada vez mais as pessoas interagem diariamente com uma série de circuitos nos mais diversos tipos de equipamentos. As dimensões nanométricas dos atuais dispositivos integrados geram uma série de desa?os a serem superados, entre eles a otimização de circuitos para que tenham alto desempenho e baixo consumo, preenchendo requisitos cada vez mais rígidos para que sejam apropriados ao uso em sistemas portáteis de alto desempenho. As portas lógicas XOR (Ou-Exclusivo) possuem papel fundamental para a funcionalidade de diversos circuitos lógicos e o projeto de portas lógicas XOR de alto desempenho, com imunidade a ruídos e baixo consumo de energia constitui importante frente de pesquisa na área de projeto de circuitos integrados. Baseando-se nas regras dos estilos lógicos mais utilizados, CMOS e PTL, muitos arranjos de portas XOR têm sido propostos. Este trabalho apresenta uma investigação sobre estes arranjos e as técnicas que fundamentam seu projeto, bem como os estilos híbridos que têm sido propostos. São avaliados vinte e dois arranjos XOR propostos na literatura com os resultados obtidos em simulações de consumo e atraso para uma tecnologia de 45-nm. / Digital systems are present in most human activities, and an increasing number of people interact daily with a series of circuits in a wide range of equipments. The nanometric dimensions of the current integrated devices generate a series of challenges to be overcome, including the circuit optimization in order to have high performance and low consumption, filling increasingly stringent requirements to be suitable for use in high-performance portable systems. The XOR logic gates (Exclusive-OR) play a fundamental role for the functionality of various logic circuits and the project of high performance XOR logic gates, with noise immunity and low power consumption, consists in an important line of research in the ?eld of integrated circuits project. Based on the rules of the most used logic styles, CMOS and PTL, many XOR gates arrangements have been proposed. This paper presents an investigation into these arrangements and the techniques that underlie their design, as well as hybrid styles that have been proposed. There’s an evaluation of twenty-two XOR arrangements proposed in literature, with the results obtained from consumption and delay simulations for a 45-nm technology.

Orientador: Fernando de Azevedo Silva / Banca: João Zangrandi Filho / Banca: Anselmo Monteiro Ilkiu / Resumo: O objetivo desta pesquisa foi apresentar um método de análise para a solução de problemas de contato por elementos finitos e o cálculo dos componentes mecânicos que fazem parte do projeto de uma roda de aço. Foi demonstrado passo a passo à execução de um cálculo analítico da roda de uma Comporta Vagão, calculando as cargas radial e axial presentes, verificando a tensão de Hertz, as tensões localizadas no cubo da roda, as tensões atuantes no eixo e a seleção do rolamento. Após esta etapa retiraram-se os parâmetros iniciais que foram utilizados no cálculo analítico para buscar o cálculo por elementos finitos. Assim, foram definidas as superfícies de contato, a geometria dos componentes, a malha, as restrições, as condições de contorno e por fim a análise dos resultados encontrados antes e após o projeto. Dessa maneira, podê-se determinar com precisão os pontos de concentração de tensão para eliminação as falhas. Com a busca deste cálculo, usando a análise por Elementos Finitos, respaldado pelo cálculo analítico, foi possível reduzir o diâmetro da roda para obter ganhos em massa para este tipo de equipamento que usa uma quantidade alta de rodas (acima de 100 rodas), sem alteração da confiabilidade das peças durante seu funcionamento. / Abstract: The objective of this research was to present an analysis method for the solution of contact problems for finite elements and the calculation of the mechanical components that are part of the project of a steel wheel. It was demonstrated step by step the execution of an analytic calculation of the wheel of a Fixed Wheel Gate, calculating the radial and axial loads present, verifying the Hertz pressure, the concentrated stresses in the hub of the wheel, the acting stresses in the shaft and hub, and the selection of the roller bearings. After this stage the initial parameters were used in the analytic calculation in order to obtain the calculation using finite elements. After this, it was defined the contact surfaces, the geometry of the components, the mesh, the restrictions, the real constraints and finally the analysis of the results found before and after the project. After this calculation, the other analysis was established in order to determine the points of concentration stress accurately for the elimination of fails. In order to obtain the calculation, using Finite Elements, by the analytic calculation it was possible to reduce the diameter of the wheel to obtain earn in mass for this type of equipment that uses a high amount of wheels (above 100 wheels), without alteration of the reliability of the parts during the operation. / Mestre

The purpose of the study was to determine if instruction and practice in using the cloze procedure significantly affected the reading comprehension of a group of sixth grade students.The population consisted of 157 students in eight intact classes in two middle schools in east-central Indiana. The experimental group, four classes at one school, received cloze instruction, while the control group, four classes at the second school, worked with basal reading materials.Findings1. There were no significant differences in reading comprehension achievement between students who had cloze instruction and students who did not have cloze instruction, without regard to sex or reading ability levels.2. Students in the above average reading ability subgroup, whether or not they received cloze instruction, gained significantly more in reading comprehension on one criterion measure than did students in the average and below average reading ability subgroups.3. There were no significant differences in reading comprehension achievement between males or females in the group that had cloze instruction and males or females in the group that did not have cloze instruction.Conclusions1. Instruction and practice in using the cloze procedure did not significantly affect the reading comprehension achievement of the study population.2. Whether or not they had cloze instruction, students in the above average reading ability range gained more in reading comprehension achievement than did students classified as average or below average readers.3. Reading comprehension achievement was not significantly different for males or females, regardless of whether or not they received cloze instruction

Olaudah Equiano or Gustavas Vassa may have had abolitionist motivations when writing The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano or Gustavas Vassa, the African, Written by Himself, but the function of the text is much different and self-serving. Specifically, in looking closely at the wording of the text, with its language of we versus they, in group versus out group, ours versus theirs, Equiano clearly feels he at no time belongs fully to any specific group or place; rather, he only partially belongs anywhere, and thus, creates this work of autobiography and appropriation of fiction and oral tradition to negotiate and cultivate his own liminal, or even heterotopic, space. In other words, I suggest he may have used the writing of this text to define his sense of self, creating a space in which he was both in control and fully belonged.

The present work consists of three parts. In the first part (chapters III and IV), the dynamics of Lorentz lattice gases (LLG) on graphs is analyzed. We study the fixed scatterer model on finite graphs. A tight bound is established on the size of the orbit for arbitrary graphs, and the model is shown to perform a depth-first search on trees. Rigidity models on trees are also considered, and the size of the resulting orbit is established. In the second part (chapter V), we give a complete description of dynamics for LLG on the one-dimensional integer lattice, with a particular interest in showing that these models are not capable of universal computation. Some statistical properties of these models are also analyzed. In the third part (chapter VI) we attempt to partition a pool of workers into teams that will function as independent TSS lines. Such partitioning may be aimed to make sure that all groups work at approximately the same rate. Alternatively, we may seek to maximize the rate of convergence of the corresponding dynamical systems to their fixed points with optimal production at the fastest rate. The first problem is shown to be NP-hard. For the second problem, a solution for splitting into pairs is given, and it is also shown that this solution is not valid for partitioning into teams composed of more than two workers.

With decreasing feature sizes, lowered supply voltages and increasing operating frequencies, the radiation tolerance of digital circuits is becoming an increasingly important problem. Many radiation hardening techniques have been presented in the literature for combinational as well as sequential logic. However, the radiation tolerance of clock generation circuitry has received scant attention to date. Recently, it has been shown that in the deep submicron regime, the clock network contributes significantly to the chip level Soft Error Rate (SER). The on-chip Phase Locked Loop (PLL) is particularly vulnerable to radiation strikes. In this thesis, we present a radiation hardened PLL design. Each of the components of this design-the voltage controlled oscillator (VCO), the phase frequency detector (PFD) and the charge pump/loop filter-are designed in a radiation tolerant manner. Whenever possible, the circuit elements used in our PLL exploit the fact that if a gate is implemented using only PMOS (NMOS) transistors then a radiation particle strike can result only in a logic 0 to 1 (1 to 0) flip. By separating the PMOS and NMOS devices, and splitting the gate output into two signals, extreme high levels of radiation tolerance are obtained. Our design uses two VCOs (with cross-coupled inverters) and charge pumps, so that a strike on any one is compensated by the other. Our PLL is tested for radiation immunity for critical charge values up to 250fC. Our SPICE-based results demonstrate that after exhaustively striking all circuit nodes, the worst case jitter of our hardened PLL is just 37.4 percent. In the worst case, our PLL returns to the locked state in 2 cycles of the VCO clock, after a radiation strike. These numbers are significant improvements over those of the best previously reported approaches.

ABSTRACT TOWARDS PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS FOR MOLECULAR LOGIC GATES: &ldquo / AND&rdquo / LOGIC AS AN ADDITIONAL LAYER OF SELECTIVITY IN SINGLET OXYGEN RELEASE FOR PHOTODYNAMIC THERAPY &Ouml / zlem, Suriye M.S., Department of Chemistry Supervisor: Prof. Dr. Engin Umut Akkaya June 2008, 54 pages There have been many examples of individual molecular logic gates and molecular equivalents of more complex digital designs in recent years such as half adder, half subtractor, multiplexer. Neverethless, the unresolved issues of addressability and lack of communication between logic gates remain to be the Achille&rsquo / s heel for molecular logic gates. A few years ago we have demonstrated that appropriately decorated bodipy dyes can be very efficient generators for singlet oxygen, thus act as a satisfactory photodynamic agents. As a bonus, these dyes absorb very strongly at 660 nm which is considered to be within the therapeutic window of mammalian tissue. So, combining our earlier experience in molecular logic gates and rational design of photodynamic agents, we proposed a photodynamic therapy agent that would release singlet oxygen at a much larger rate when the cancer related cellular parameters are above a threshold value at the same location. Following the survey of the relevant literature for cancer related parameters, we decided that sodium ion concentration and pH (H+ concentration) could be very promising targets. In the tumor regions the pH can drop below 6 and the Na+ concentration is also significantly higher then normal tissues. As a result, in the proposed logic system the chemical inputs could be Na+ and H+. The system in fact is an automaton which is to seek higher concentration of both hydrogen and sodium ions, and release the toxic agent (singlet oxygen) only when both concentrations are high. Thus, the proposed logic gate is an AND logic gate, the output of which is singlet oxygen. Keywords: Photodynamic therapy, singlet oxygen, molecular logic gates, AND logic operation