El título de este trabajo académico tiene como referencia a una obra maestra del cine: El Padrino de Francis Ford Coppola. Este clásico del sétimo arte es una de esas películas que uno ve cada cierto tiempo y descubre nuevos detalles que en un primer momento no había advertido. Asimismo, es de esas películas que tienen un sinnúmero de frases que se integran a la cultura o al día a día de las personas, frases como “sé cercano a tus amigos, pero más cercano a tus enemigos”, “le haré una oferta que no podrá rechazar”, “deja el arma, toma el cannoli”, entre otros. Precisamente, el título en mención proviene de una línea dicha por Al Pacino en su papel de Michael Corleone, aunque para ser más exactos, la línea reza “No es personal, Sonny, es estrictamente negocios”. / Tesis

by Fu Siu Ngor. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 1996. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 117-124). / abstract --- p.I / acknowledgments --- p.III / contents --- p.V / list of figures --- p.VII / list of tables --- p.VIII / Chapter chapter 1: --- introduction / Chapter 1.1 --- Dance and jump --- p.1 / Chapter 1.2 --- Research objectives --- p.4 / Chapter 1.3 --- Research hypothesis --- p.5 / Chapter 1.4 --- Definition of terms --- p.7 / Chapter chapter 2 : --- dance injuries / Chapter 2.1 --- Epidemiology of dance injuries --- p.12 / Chapter 2.2 --- Etiology of dance injuries --- p.19 / Chapter 2.3 --- Implication to this study --- p.30 / Chapter chapter 3 : --- biomechanical studies on landing from vertical jumps / Chapter 3.1 --- Biomechanics on landing from vertical jumps --- p.31 / Chapter 3.2 --- Biomechanical studies on ballet jumps --- p.46 / Chapter 3.3 --- Kinetics and kinematics studies on jumping sports --- p.49 / Chapter 3.4 --- Implication to this study --- p.57 / Chapter CHAPTER 4 : --- MATERIAL AND METHOD / Chapter 4.1 --- Study design --- p.58 / Chapter 4.2 --- Subject and sampling method --- p.58 / Chapter 4.3 --- Instrumentation --- p.60 / Chapter 4.4 --- Method --- p.70 / Chapter CHAPTER 5 : --- RESULTS / Chapter 5.1 --- Demographic characteristics --- p.79 / Chapter 5.2 --- "kinetic and kinematics changes on landing with ""pull-up""" --- p.82 / Chapter 5.3 --- "kinetics and kinematics changes on landing with and without ""pull-up""" --- p.92 / Chapter CHAPTER 6 : --- DISCUSSION / Chapter 6.1 --- Kinetic changes --- p.96 / Chapter 6.2 --- Kinematics changes --- p.102 / Chapter 6.3 --- Correlation between kinetics and kinematics --- p.105 / Chapter 6.4 --- "Effects of'pull-up""" --- p.107 / Chapter 6.5 --- Limitation of the study --- p.108 / Chapter 6.6 --- Suggestion for future studies --- p.110 / Chapter 6.7 --- Implication of this study --- p.112 / Chapter CHAPTER 7 : --- CONCLUSIONS --- p.115 / REFERENCES --- p.117-124 / APPENDIX 1 : Demographic characteristics --- p.i / APPENDIX 2 : Kinetic data --- p.v / APPENDIX 3 : Kinematics data --- p.x / APPENDIX 4 : Summary of kinetic and kinematics results --- p.xiv / APPENDIX 5 : Statistical results --- p.xv

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a chronic inflammatory autoimmune disease which predominantly affects the synovial joints. Local gene therapy represents an approach to produce therapeuticmolecules (i.e. soluble TNF receptor (sTNFR)-Fc and interleukin-1 receptor antagonist (IL-1Ra)) directly in arthritic joints. Gene therapy could be designed to link the level of therapeutic gene expression directly to disease activity, through the use of transcriptional and posttranscriptional regulatory elements. The experiments in this thesis describe the construction of multi-responsive, composite synthetic promoters, comprised of the binding sites for an array of transcription factors activated in arthritic joints. Optimal spatial arrangements of binding sites in relation to each other and to the TATA box were determined by Assembly PCR cloning and the functionality of the resulting synthetic promoters revealed additive or synergistic induction of luciferase reporter gene expression in response to combined stimulation. Candidate synthetic promoters were cloned into a lentiviral vector between insulator elements and displayed significantly enhanced induction, in excess of 1,500 fold in response to combined stimulation. Inflammation-specific activation of lentiviral synthetic promoters was confirmed in a carrageenan-induced paw inflammation mouse model, which demonstrated the strong correlation between local luciferase gene expression and paw inflammation. Post-transcriptional gene regulation was also investigated by exploiting the differential expression of endogenous miR-23b during inflammation. Insertion of miR-23b target sites into the 3’UTR of the luciferase gene subjected luciferase mRNA to regulation by miR-23b. Experiments demonstrated that high basal gene expression driven by constitutive and inducible promoters was significantly downregulated by miR-23b without significantly impairing high gene expression upon stimulation. Overall, the experiments in this thesis have confirmed the induction of inflammation-specific gene expression, regulated by inflammationresponsive endogenous transcriptional and post-transcriptional elements.

Total hip replacement (THR) is one of the most successful and most frequently performed operations. For most implants the published rate of revision at 10 years is less than 10%. However the revision rates are higher for younger and more active patients who are likely to outlive their implants. The most frequent cause of THR failure is aseptic loosening, commonly accompanied by bone loss at the implant site. THR revisions give worse functional results and fail sooner than primary THR and are complicated by this loss of bone stock. A resurfacing hip prosthesis replaces the diseased surface layer of bone and cartilage and retains the majority of the femoral head. The stress distribution in the proximal femur is closer to that in an intact hip. A conservative resurfacing prosthesis will present the surgeon with no greater problems at revision than encountered at primary conventional 11-JR. Early designs of resurfacing prosthesis conserved femoral bone stock at the expense of acetabular bone. Revision rates were high and while some failures were caused by avascular necrosis and femoral neck fracture the predominant cause was acetabular loosening. The design of a bone conserving prosthesis requires knowledge of the shape of the bony surfaces of the hip joint. A survey of the morphology of the acetabulum showed a wide variation in shape. While early resurfacing designs had hemispherical acetabular cups the bony surface is less than hemispherical. The morphology and desired range of hip motion constrain prosthesis thickness and shape. A novel resurfacing design using a polyacetal femoral component and an UHMWPE acetabular component is proposed. This bearing combination has a lower volumetric wear rate than an equivalent Co-Cr on UHWMPE bearing. Computer modelling of the resurfacing concept showed that lower moduli materials reduced stress shielding and distributed implant-bone interface stresses more evenly. Mechanical testing of polyacetal following immersion in Ringer's solution showed substantial decreases in Young's modulus while strength was unaffected.

This thesis is concerned with the solutions to several issues, including the problems of joint localisation, motion de-noising/smoothing, and soft tissue artefacts correction, in skeletal motion reconstruction for motion analysis, using marker-based optical motion capture technologies. We propose a very efficient joint localisation method, which only needs to optimise over three parameters, regardless of the total numbers of markers and frames. A framework powered by this joint localisation solution is also developed, which can automatically find all the joints in an articulated body structure, and significantly reduce the total number of markers needed in a typical motion capture session, by implementing a solvability propagation process. This framework is also configured to operate in a hybrid scheme, which can automatically switch between the primary joint estimator and a slower solution having fewer conditions regarding the required number of markers on a given body segment. This makes the framework workable even for extreme scenarios in which there are fewer than three markers on any body segment. A non-linear optimisation method for 3D trajectory smoothing is also proposed for de-noising the estimated joint paths. By immobilising a series of characteristic points in the trajectory, this method is able to effectively preserve detailed information for vigorous motion sequences. Various other smoothing techniques in the literature are also discussed and compared, concluding that a size-3 weighted average filter implemented in an automatic manner is a good real-time solution for low intensity activities. The effects of skin deformation on marker position data, known as soft tissue artefacts, are learned via a behavioural study on the human upper-body, with specific emphasis on combined limb actions. Based on the experimental findings, mathematical models are proposed to characterise the development of different types of artefacts, including translational, rotational, and transverse. We also theoretically demonstrate the feasibility of using a Kalman filter to correct the soft tissue artefacts, using the mathematical models.

Made available in DSpace on 2019-03-29T23:42:06Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 2011-02-02 / For multinational enterprises there are still limitations for the mode of market entry in China, especially in industry-sectors (automotive industry). Enterprises have to follow sector-specific requirements, such as establishing a Joint Venture (JV) with a Chinese partner and sharing the knowledge. This enforced way of collaboration,together with an often unknown business behaviour, causes (cultural) conflicts. The dissertation evaluates how internationalization strategies can be extended in the context of explaining the establishment process of an International JV in China.Because of that, we are going to show the relationships to the institutional environment. The target is to find out the important factors for establishing a JV in China. Therefore, after reviewing the organizational impact of cultural models, we have reviewed the literature about the cultural differences between German and Chinese companies.The findings of the research show,on one hand the reasons for the companies to establish an IJV in China are internationalization advantages, but on the other hand, the requirements of the Chinese Government to establish a JV for entering the Chinese market. As basic factors for German/Chinese JV, we identified the knowledge-networks and ownership advantages. Dependent on the business sector, specific requirements need to be considered. In addition, it is important to know about the business behaviour and the cultural background ofthe Business partner from China.If recognized and used by the enterprise, our proposed framework, which we created during this research process, provides a holistic picture for international companies about establishing an IJV in China.Besidesexplaining the interrelations of the different factors, the framework provides new knowledge and new research findings from our case and can be a useful tool for further researches in China or forlate starter to make successful business in China. Keywords: Internationalization strategies, Joint Venture, Institutions, SWOTAnalysis, OLI, Cross-Cultural Management / Para as empresas multinacionais ainda existem limitações para o modo de entrada no mercado da China, especialmente em setores industriais (indústria automotiva). As empresas devem seguir exigências específicas do setor, como a criação de uma joint venture (JV) com um parceiro chinês e compartilhar o conhecimento. Esta maneira forçada de colaboração, em conjunto com um comportamento empresarial, muitas vezes desconhecido, ocasiona conflitos (culturais).Esta dissertação avalia como as estratégias de internacionalização podem ser ampliadas, no contexto de explicar o processo de criação de umaJV Internacional na China. Por isso, será mostrado as relações com o ambiente institucional. O objetivo é descobrir os fatores importantes para o estabelecimento de uma IJV na China. Portanto, após analisar o impacto organizacional dos modelos culturais, uma revisão da literatura foi realizada sobre as diferenças culturais entre empresas alemãs e chinesas. Os resultados da pesquisa mostram, por um lado,que as vantagens da internacionalização são as razões para as empresas a estabelecer uma IJV na China, por outro lado, as exigências do governo chinês para estabelecer uma JV para entrar no mercado da China. Como fatores básicos para uma IJV Alemã-Chinesa, identificamos o conhecimento de redes e vantagens da propriedade. Dependendo do setor, requisitos específicos precisam ser considerados. Além disso, é importante conhecer sobre o comportamento empresarial e dobackground cultural da empresa parceirana China. Se reconhecida e utilizada pela empresa, o frameworkproposto nesta pesquisa fornece um retrato global para as empresas internacionais sobre a criação de uma IJV na China. Além de explicar as inter-relações dos diferentes fatores, o framework oferece novos conhecimentos e resultados provenientes do caso descrito neste estudo e pode ser uma ferramenta útil para futuras pesquisas na China ou para empresas que iniciaram mais tarde para fazer negócios de sucesso na China. Palavras-chave: Estratégias de internacionalização; Joint Venture, Instituições, Análise SWOT, OLI, Gestão transcultural

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences, and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, 1990. / Vita. / Includes bibliographic references. / by Kevin Todd Michael Johnson. / Ph.D.

Thesis (M.S.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, 1991. / Bibliography: p.151-155. / by Huai-Min Zhang. / M.S.

Thesis (M.S.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, 1991. / Bibliography: p. 103-105. / by Elise Ann Ralph. / M.S.

Thesis (M.S.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences, and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, 1995. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 70-73). / by Gwyneth Ellin Hufford. / M.S.