MODELISATION DU FONCTIONNEMENT THERMIQUE D'UN FOUR DE POTERIE. DETERMINATION DU REGIME STATIQUE OPTIMAL DE CUISSON. APRES DES TRANSFORMATIONS DU MODELE, ON CALCULE UNE LOI DE COMMANDE EN BOUCLE FERMEE PAR RETOUR D'ETAT EN MINIMISANT UN CRITERE QUADRATIQUE A HORIZON FINI. LE CALCUL D'UN ESTIMATEUR DE L'ETAT EST EXPOSE POUR LA RECONSTITUTION DU PROFIL DANS LA CHARGE A PARTIR DE MESURES FAITES DANS LE GAZ. CONDUITE NUMERIQUE DU FOUR PAR MICROCALCULATEUR

Title from PDF of title page (University of Missouri--Columbia, viewed on March 10, 2010). The entire thesis text is included in the research.pdf file; the official abstract appears in the short.pdf file; a non-technical public abstract appears in the public.pdf file. Thesis advisor: James Calvin. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (doctoral)--Universität, Münster (Westfalen), 2002. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 441-486).

Recent interest in using passive dynamic walkers (PDWs) for gait rehabilitation studies has presented a need for a robust, easily built mechanism. Unfortunately, these passive robots are hypersensitive to many variables outside of the usual design considerations that are studied when constructing them. By accentuating previous failures instead of suppressing them, this thesis presents a number of problematic situations commonly experienced when testing and tuning a PDW. Further, through a complete design of a 4-legged PDW with knees, simple design axioms brought about by myself and others are put into a practical context and applied directly to design. This thesis aspires to present a systematic design process, and highlight how a computational model can be used with both hand calculations and CAD packages. Using the insight from those researchers before me, I strive to further their designs and present relevant information in a design compendium that makes it more useful to those who have an application for the device. This thesis resulted in two novel designs for a PDW. First, a changing radius foot was developed to increase knee flexion upon toe off. The decrease in radius increases joint angular velocity resulting in ramp up. Further investigation of these feet could result in more stable and efficient walking patterns. The other design brought to attention is the planar crossbar mechanism for coupling the inner and outer legs. The crossbar provides a rigid coupling without changing the rotational inertia between the coupled pair about the hip axis.

It has become more important for operators to be able to predict the future number of public transport passengers when consider to place a tender for operating public transport in a city or region, this is due to the new types of operator contracts was introduced quite recently. There are models in use today that can predict this, but they are often time consuming and complex and therefore it can be expensive to perform a forecast. Aside from this, most models in use for Sweden today are adapted for larger cities. Thus, the aim of this thesis is to propose a model that requires minimal input data with a short set up and execution time that can be used to predict a forecast for the public transport system in smaller cities without notably affecting the quality of the result. The developed model is based on a forecast model called LuTrans, which in turn is based on a common method, the four step model. The aim of the model lies within public transportation but it also consider other modes. The input data used by the model mainly consists of socio-economic data, the travel time and distance between all the zones in the network. The model also considers the cost for traveling by car or public transport. The developed model was applied to the Swedish city, Örebro, where a forecast was conducted for a future scenario. It is easily to apply the model to different cities to estimate a forecast for the public transport system. The developed model for the base scenario predicts trips for individual bus lines with an accuracy of 85 % for the city of Örebro. The developed model gave the result that the trips made by public transport in the future scenario of Örebro 2025 will increase annually by 0.94 %. The conclusion is that it is possible to develop a simple model that can be easily applied for a desired city. Although the developed model produced a plausible result for Örebro, further work such as implementation on other cities are required in order to fully evaluate the developed model.

Spacecraft trajectory optimization is a topic of crucial importance to space missions design. The less fuel required to accomplish the mission, the more payload that can be transported, and the higher the opportunity to lower the cost of the space mission. The objective is to find the optimal trajectory through space that will minimize the fuel used, and still achieve all mission constraints. Most space trajectories are designed using the simplified relative two-body problem as the base model. Using this patched conics approximation, however, constrains the solution space and fails to produce accurate initial guesses for trajectories in sensitive dynamics. This dissertation uses the Circular Restricted Three-Body Problem (CR3BP) as the base model for designing transfer trajectories in the Circular Restricted Four-Body Problem (CR4BP). The dynamical behavior of the CR3BP guides the search for useful low-energy trajectory arcs. Two distinct models of the CR4BP are considered in this research: the Concentric model, and the Bi-Circular model. Transfers are broken down into trajectory arcs in two separate CR3BPs and the stable and unstable manifold structures of both systems are utilized to produce low-energy transfer arcs that are later patched together to form the orbit-to-orbit transfer. The patched solution is then used as an initial guess in the CR4BP model. A vital contribution of this dissertation is the sequential process for initial guess generation for transfers in the CR4BP. The techniques discussed in this dissertation overcome many of the difficulties in the trajectory design process presented by the complicated dynamics of the CR4BP. Indirect optimization techniques are also used to derive the first order necessary conditions for optimality to assure the optimality of the transfers and determine whether additional impulses might further lower the total cost of the mission. / text

In the school political debate that is conducted in Sweden the question of grading is an ongoing topic of discussion. During the past year there has been a lively discussion about introducing grade from year four as suggested by the right wing parties. The purpose of this study is to set the teaching faculties’ view and arguments in relation to the politicians' opinion in the ongoing debate about the proposal of introducing grades from year four. Furthermore, the aim is to investigate how central the didactic arguments are in relation to other arguments in the current debate. To achieve the purpose of this study, the following questions was created: How do the teaching faculty and the politicians argue around the proposal of introducing grades from year four? Which beliefs about the functions of grades exist among these actors? Which learning models and didactic perspectives exist in the debate and how does these relate to the beliefs about the functions of grades? This study is based on a qualitative method in terms of a contextual idea analysis. The theoretical basis is composed of theories about the different functions of grades, didactic perspective and learning models. The focus consist of investigating how the teaching faculty and politicians discuss the proposal in different articles. The reason for choosing this focus is to highlight the teaching faculties’ point of view in the debate which commonly is overshadowed by the politicians. The results show that the teaching faculty is critical of the proposal of introducing grades from year four, whereas the opinions among the politicians varies. The main criticism is that the proposal would involve a further waste of the school's already inadequate resources. Further criticism is that grades from year four would not work beneficial to the pupils due to different reasons.

The Middle Jurassic Entrada Sandstone of the Four Corners region, USA, is composed predominantly of very fine-grained, red, silty sandstone with poorly defined sedimentary structures. The origin of this facies is enigmatic, even though it is common both on the Colorado Plateau and globally, and is spatially situated between deposits recording unambiguous marine and aeolian environments. Eleven sections were measured along an 85 km transect from the Blanding Basin in southeastern Utah to the San Juan Basin in northwestern New Mexico. Outcrop and laboratory analyses distinguish eight facies: (1) silty shale, (2) shallow subaqueous reworked, fine- to medium-grained sandstone, (3) brecciated, very fine-grained sandstone, (4) crinkly laminated, very fine-grained sandstone with preserved wind ripples and abundant silty laminae, (5) weakly laminated, fine-grained sandstone with occasional silty laminae, (6) planar-laminated, fine-grained, wind-rippled sandstone, (7) cross-stratified, fine- to medium-grained aeolian cross-stratified sandstone, and (8) micritic limestone. Lateral and vertical relationships of these facies show a proximal to distal transition from cross-bedded wind-lain facies to loess-dominated sabkha facies with increasing abundance of water-lain facies basinward. The well known Todilto Limestone (facies 8) is situated stratigraphically below loess-dominated sabkha facies (facies 4 and 5) within the Entrada Sandstone, reinforcing previous interpretations that the unit represents a catastrophic flooding event and not a local groundwater flux. / text

Sonate for trumpet and piano / Paul Hindemith -- Stucke im Volkston, op.102 for cello and piano / Robert Schumann -- Hungarian dances for piano, four hands / Johannes Brahms -- Grand duo concertant, op.48 for clarinet and piano / Carl maria Von Weber / text

The intentions expressed by second career individuals about entering the field of education, to make a difference in the lives of young people, mirror many of the philosophical frameworks of teaching for democracy that are found in the literature (Banks, 2005; Nieto, 1999; Dewey, 1916; Parker, 2003). An interest in how the interconnections of teaching to make a difference and teaching for democracy are enacted in second career teacher's classrooms. Four dimensions of teaching for democracy are suggested as a model of socially responsive teaching to study how teaching to make difference is enacted in the beliefs and practices of two second career teachers. The four dimensions include: 1) An ethic of care (Noddings, 1994); 2) Reflexive action (Grant & Zeichner, 1996; Schon, 1987); 3) Learning communities (Brooks & Brooks, 1999; Nieto, 1999; Richardson, 1997); and 4) Managed chaos (Bruner, 1986; Jenlink, 2004).Qualitative case study research was conducted to investigate how two newly certified second career male teachers articulate the beliefs they hold and conduct their practices to teach all children. From the constant comparison analysis common themes of classroom environment, curricular choices, and instructional approaches were identified and anchored the development of the cases. Across cases, the theme of 'life history' emerged as influential in the beliefs and practices to teach to make a difference. An extended analysis was conducted across cases to examine the links of the four dimensions of teaching for democracy present in the stories of each teacher's first year of teaching.Findings of this research study indicates 'life history' impacts the beliefs and practices of second career teachers to teach all students and can be linked to dimensions of teaching for democracy. Students' personal stories are sources for understanding and enhancing an awareness of racial, cultural, and economic diversity in teacher preparation programs (LaBoskey, 2006). This understanding is at the heart of the democratic ideal and a fundamental belief of those "directly responsible for ...creating and sustaining processes of conscious, self-guided evolution...the design of a future society" (Jenlink, 2002, p. 395).