This thesis is a critical inquiry of the relationship between the architectural aspects of the museum space and the collection on display, regarding to the concept of flexibility. Inside the museum, displayed object can be thought as a two folded representation which can be termed as labeling. Museum space can be thought as the juxtaposed condition of these two bodies of the object. The flexible spatial organization of the museum space is accepted to support the ephemeral character of labeling. Within this context, the concept of flexibility will be analyzed through the cooperative reading of George Pompidou Center and Grand Egyptian Museum. With the aid of concepts of flexibility and hypertextuality that are adopted in these two cases, the study tries to reveal the relationship between the architectural potentials of museum space and the collection belongs to these particular museums. In that respect, the architectural programs of these competitions will be critically reconsidered in order to reveal how the institutions conceive the collections with their expected physical ramifications.

Mutants showing developmental hyper-responsiveness to limited light were screened and designated as seedlings hyper-responsive to light (shl). These mutants showed an etiolated phenotype similar to wild type in the dark, yet had shorter hypocotyls, larger cotyledons, and more advanced development of true leaves than wild type in low light. The SHL genes act (genetically) as light-dependent negative regulators of photomorphogenesis, possibly in a downstream signaling or developmental pathway that is shared by the major photoreceptor genes (CRY1, PHYA, and PHYB) and other photoreceptors (CRY2, PHYC, PHYD, and PHYE). shl1 and shl2 were shown to be partially dependent on HY5 activity for their light-hyperresponsive phenotypes. shl1-1 showed a defect in responding to auxin in its root development in both white and yellow light conditions, and showed a defect in responding to auxin in hypocotyl elongation in yellow light. Compared to wild type, both shl1-1 and shl2-2 showed increased hypocotyl length in response to cytokinin in white light. Gibberellin (GA) partially recovered shl1-1 mutant phenotype in yellow light, whereas showed no effect on hypocotyl elongation of shl2-2 in this light condition. These altered responses of shl1-1 and shl2-2 to multiple phytohormones in different light regimes suggests that cross-talks among light and hormones regulate SHL1 and SHL2. One of the SHL genes, SHL2 was cloned by map-based positional cloning and shown to be allelic to the previously identified locus designated murus3(mur3) and katamari1(kam1). MUR3/KAM1 encodes a XyG galactosyltransferase. Sequence analysis demonstrated that our original EMS generated reference allele shl2-2 is probably not a null mutant, therefore the phenotypes of T-DNA insertion null mutant in SHL2, SALK_074435 were studied in different light conditions. Unlike shl2-2, SALK_074435 had a slightly short hypocotyl phenotype in the dark (though not to the extent of the det/cop/fus mutants). A consideration of the phenotypes and molecular lesions of shl2-2 and mur3 alleles, along with the phenotypes of null alleles kam1 and SALK_74435, suggests that SHL2/MUR3/KAM1 may be involved in hypocotyl elongation in low light through the modification of xyloglucan in the plant cell wall, and may play a role in hypocotyl elongation in the dark through proper organization of the endomembrane.

During the 1950s, Venezuela embarked in an architectural venture marked by aesthetic, programmatic, and technological explorations. Politically framed by the international tension of the Cold War, this period was distinguished by multiple commercial exchanges between Venezuela and the United States, specially based on the oil industry. Many cultural aspects of the Venezuelan life, including its urban and architectural production, changed because of this interrelationship. Yet the conventional view is that architecture in Venezuela was torn between the repetition of U.S. models and the purest creativity of its local designers. Based on periodical publications of that time, and methodologically framed by the contemporary notion of transculturation and Gianni Vattimo’s weak though, this research demonstrates that modern architecture in Venezuela, produced by both locals and Americans, went beyond a unilateral center-periphery influence, and ended up being the hyperrealization (intensified version) of U.S. ideals. In this sense, the research analyzes an aspect not studied yet in depth: the connection between the long-term geographical profile of Venezuela and a unique geopolitical situation, as the basis for an outstanding architecture. The dissertation examines how the Edificio Creole in Caracas, designed by American architect Lathrop Douglass for Standard Oil, and completed in 1955, was not the subsequent version but the advanced prototype of the Esso office buildings both in Louisiana and New Jersey. It shows as well how the Electricity Building in Caracas (1955), also designed by Douglass, and whose authorship has remained unknown until now, represented a unique opportunity both to explore the insertion of an “horizontal skyscraper” in downtown, and to reveal a complex network of professional and political relations. By examining Higuerote Beach Resort, a vacation and residential complex located near Caracas, the dissertation also demonstrates how American magazines were used by Venezuelans as the basis for an architecture that became original without the inspiration of a genius designer. Finally, this research analyzes the production of a supernatural architecture through the Helicoid Shopping Center in Caracas (designed by Arquitectura y Urbanismo C.A. in 1955), one of the most paradigmatic examples of modern Venezuelan creativity, and probably the utmost realization of the American Utopia. / text

Afin de poursuivre et d'améliorer la tâche de détection qui est en cours à l'INSA, nous nous sommes concentrés sur la fusion des informations visibles et infrarouges du point de vue de reconnaissance des obstacles, ainsi distinguer entre les véhicules, les piétons, les cyclistes et les obstacles de fond. Les systèmes bimodaux ont été proposées pour fusionner l'information à différents niveaux: des caractéristiques, des noyaux SVM, ou de scores SVM. Ils ont été pondérés selon l'importance relative des capteurs modalité pour assurer l'adaptation (fixe ou dynamique) du système aux conditions environnementales. Pour évaluer la pertinence des caractéristiques, différentes méthodes de sélection ont été testés par un PPV, qui fut plus tard remplacée par un SVM. Une opération de recherche de modèle, réalisée par 10 fois validation croisée, fournit le noyau optimisé pour SVM. Les résultats ont prouvé que tous les systèmes bimodaux VIS-IR sont meilleurs que leurs correspondants monomodaux.

This thesis describes a set of software applications for real-time gesturally con- trolled interactions with music and sound. The applications for each system are varied but related, addressing unsolved problems in the field of audio and music technology. The three systems presented in this work capture 3D human motion with spatial sensors and map position data from the sensors onto sonic parameters. Two different spatial sensors are used interchangeably to perform motion capture: the radiodrum and the Xbox Kinect. The first two systems are aimed at creating immersive virtually-augmented environments. The first application uses human ges- ture to move sounds spatially in a 3D surround sound by physically modelling the movement of sound in a space. The second application is a gesturally controlled self- organized music browser in which songs are clustered based on auditory similarity. The third application is specifically aimed at extending musical performance through the development of a digitally augmented vibraphone. Each of these applications is presented with related work, theoretical and technical details for implementation, and discussions of future work. / Graduate

Since the introduction of modern computers, numerical methods for atmospheric simulations have routinely been applied for weather prediction, and in the last fifty years, there has been a steady improvement in the accuracy of forecasts. Accurate numerical models of the atmosphere are also becoming more important as researchers rely on global climate simulations to assess and understand the impact of global warming. The choice of grid in a numerical model is an important design decision and no obvious optimal choice exists for computations in spherical geometry. Despite this disadvantage, grid-based methods are found in all current circulation models. A different approach to the issue of discretizing the surface of the sphere is given by meshless methods, of which radial basis function (RBF) methods are becoming prevalent. In this thesis, RBF methods for simulation of atmospheric flows are explored. Several techniques are introduced to increase the efficiency of the methods. By utilizing a novel algorithm for adaptively placing the node points, accuracy is shown to improve by over one order of magnitude for two relevant test problems. The computational cost can also be reduced by using a local finite difference-like RBF scheme. However, this requires a stabilization mechanism for the hyperbolic problems of interest here. A hyper-viscosity scheme is introduced to address this issue. Another stability issue arising from the ill-conditioning of the RBF basis for almost-flat basis functions is also discussed in the thesis, and two algorithms are proposed for dealing with this stability problem. The algorithms are specifically tailored for the task of creating finite difference weights using RBFs and are expected to overcome the issue of stationary error in local RBF collocation.

Freiburg i. Br., Univ., Diss., 2008.

No description available.

In this thesis, the anaerobic co-digestion of thickened waste activated sludge (TWAS) and, fat, oil and grease (FOG) was investigated as a method for TWAS:FOG treatment, stabilization, reduction and conversion to bio-methane gas as a valuable source of renewable energy. In the first phase, thermophilic and hyper-thermophilic anaerobic co-digestion of TWAS and FOG were investigated and compared. 20 – 80%FOG (based on total volatile solids) were tested using two sets of biochemical methane potential assays (BMP). Hyper-thermophilic co-digestion of TWAS with up to 60%FOG was shown to significantly increase the methane production and VS reduction as compared to the thermophilic co-digestion of the same TWAS:FOG mixture and as compared to the control (TWAS thermophilic mono-digestion). Both linear and non-linear regression models were used to represent the co-digestion results. In the second phase, the feasibility of the thermophilic and hyper-thermophilic co-digestion of TWAS and FOG were more investigated using lab scale semi-continuous reactors. The dual stage hyper-thermophilic reactor was introduced for the first time in this work for co-digesting TWAS and FOG. The dual stage co-digestion reactor was shown to significantly outperform the single-stage thermophilic mono-digestion reactor (the control) and the single-stage thermophilic co-digestion reactor at all three hydraulic retention times (HRTs) considered in the study namely, 15, 12 and 9 days. The dual-stage hyper-thermophilic co-digester digested up to 70%FOG at 15 days HRT without any stressing signs and produced a methane yield that was 148.2% higher compared to the control methane yield at the same HRT. It also produced a class A effluent at all three tested HRTs and positive net energy for 15 and 12 days HRT. The effects of microwave (MW) pretreatment, and combined alkaline-MW pretreatment on the co-digestion of TWAS:FOG mixtures with 20, 40 and 60% FOG were investigated in the third phase of this study. MW pretreatment at a high temperature of 175ᵒC was shown to be the most effective MW pretreatment option in solubilizing TWAS:FOG mixtures and in boosting the methane yield. It resulted in maximum solubilization for the 20%FOG samples and maximum methane yield for samples with 60%FOG. The combined alkaline-MW (NaOH-MW) pretreatment at a pH 10 showed to be an ineffective option for TWAS:FOG pretreatment before the anaerobic co-digestion process. In the fourth phase, the effects of the three selected pretreatments on the solubilization of TWAS and 20%FOG mixture on the molecular scale were investigated. The pretreatments used included: (i) MW pretreatment at 175ᵒC (since this was the best MW pretreatment condition according to the results of phase 3), (ii) hyper-thermophilic stage @ 70ᵒC and 2days HRT (effectively used in phases 1 and 2), and (iii) conventional heat at 70ᵒC. The analysis involved separation of the solubilized substrates after pretreatment using ultrafiltration (UF) at four different sizes (1, 10, 100 and 300 kDa). The results showed that each pretreatment method uniquely changed the particle size distribution. These changes showed to affect the biodegradability of substrates with different class size. Finally, two brief studies were performed using BMP tests to investigate the feasibility of FOG addition as a biogas booster in TWAS anaerobic digestion. First, the effect of FOG addition on TWAS and organic fraction of municipal solid waste (OFMSW) co-digestion was tested using hyper-thermophilic BMP tests. The addition of 30% FOG (based on total volatile solids) was shown very effective in improving the methane yield. The 30% FOG addition to TWAS:OFMSW mixture resulted in 59.9 and 84.4% higher methane yield compared to the methane yields of TWAS:OFMSW and TWAS samples, respectively. Second, the feasibility of using the soluble part of FOG (L-FOG) as a co-digestion substrate to increase the biogas production from the thermophilic digestion of TWAS was investigated. The results showed that co-digestion of TWAS and 20 to 80% (based on total VS) of L-FOG using a substrate to inoculum ratio (S/I) of 1 improved the biogas yield by 13.5 to 83.0%, respectively. No inhibition was reported at high L-FOG %.

The theoretical part of this thesis is devoted to familiarization with the technology of cloud computing, virtualization technology, data storage problems and Petri nets. Followed by the practical part, the first part discusses the various technologies which are VMware ESX, Citrix Xen, Hyper -V, KVM and oVirt. The following part is a summary of the characteristics of each technology and an output of this summary is a decision tree which is intended to help to select the appropriate virtualization technology. The second part is dedicated to the implementation of an application used for storing data in the database depending on the sensitivity of data. The thesis includes the final economic evaluation and discussion as well.