This study is generally concerned with the assumption that the contemporary global flows of people, capital, and commodities, which accelerated dramatically in the age of globalization, have significant impacts on the land use patterns of global cities. With this assumption, the study further questions in the context of polycentric US metropolis, whether or not the distribution of transnational advanced producer service firms define a new form of centrality, in which the traditional central business districts and suburban centers differ from each other in terms of spatial clustering patterns and sectoral distributions of transnational advanced producer service firms. Spatial clustering patterns of advanced producer service firms are evaluated according to high-rise and high-density criteria. In ten selected cities, clusters of advanced producer service firms and high-rise office buildings are identified through the Nearest Neighbor Hierarchical Clustering Method in CrimeStat. To define the polycentric US metropolis, the research employs Lang et al's (2006) classification of metropolitan office space. The results show significant differences between former manufacturing belt cities and Sunbelt cities. / Ph. D.

Effective daylighting can substantially reduce the energy use and greenhouse gas emissions of commercial buildings. Daylight is also healthy for building occupants, and contributes to occupant satisfaction. When productivity improvements are considered, effective daylighting is also highly attractive financially. However, successful daylighting of sub-tropical buildings is a very difficult task, due to high direct irradiances and excessive solar shading. A device was created that combined effective solar shading and efficient daylight redirection. The micro-light guiding shade panel achieves all objectives of an optimal daylighting device placed on the façade of a sub-tropical, high rise office building. Its design is based on the principles of non-imaging optics. This provides highly efficient designs offering control over delivered illumination, within the constraints of the second law of thermodynamics. Micro-light guiding shade panels were constructed and installed on a test building. The tested devices delivered daylight deep into the building under all conditions. Some glare was experienced with a poorly chosen translucent material. Glare was eliminated by replacing this material. Construction of the panels could be improved by application of mass-manufacturing techniques including metal pressing. For the micro-light guiding shade panel to be utilised to its full potential, building designers must understand its impact on building performance early in the design process. Thus, the device must be modelled with lighting simulation software currently in use by building design firms. The device was successfully modelled by the RADIANCE lighting simulator. RADIANCE predictions compared well with measurements, providing bias generally less than 10%. Simulations greatly aided further development of the micro-light guiding shade panel. Several new RADIANCE algorithms were developed to improve daylight simulation in general.