京都大学 / 新制・課程博士 / 博士(工学) / 甲第23919号 / 工博第5006号 / 新制||工||1781(附属図書館) / 京都大学大学院工学研究科分子工学専攻 / (主査)教授 今堀 博, 教授 田中 庸裕, 教授 跡見 晴幸 / 学位規則第4条第1項該当 / Doctor of Philosophy (Engineering) / Kyoto University / DGAM

<p>The Canadian prevalence for all food allergies is estimated to be 7.5%. The only management strategy for an allergic individual is a strict avoidance diet, which is heavily reliant on the effectiveness of food labels used on commercial food products. This thesis explores the effects of food allergen labels on the well-being of affected Canadians, using a social constructionist framework and a mixed methods approach.</p> <p>The quantitative portion of this study drew upon primary survey data. Respondents were asked to self-report household allergic status, as well as purchasing behavior and attitudes towards precautionary statements (n=1380). Results from the quantitative analysis were used to inform and develop the qualitative interview schedule for the second phase of this thesis. Qualitative interviews in a grocery store setting were conducted with 12 anaphylactic individuals, or parents of anaphylactic children.Respondents were observed during the course of product selection and questioned about their shopping habits, perceptions of and preferences for allergen labels.</p> <p>Results indicate that current Canadian allergen labels are not as effective as expected, since affected consumers reported not heeding precautionary statements. Allergic families were found to be less diligent than indirectly affected families, and also less likely to find precautionary statements helpful. Through qualitative interviews, it was found that prior experience, not allergen information, is the primary factor guiding purchasing decisions. Even though precautionary statements were found to be easy to understand, terminology, font sizes, and contrast issues on labels were reported to be key areas of improvement. Results from the two phases reflect differences in individuals‟ social constructions of risk, which ultimately shape purchasing and consumption behaviors. This research is the first to explore the effects of allergen labels on affected Canadians, using a social constructionist approach. Ultimately, results will help effective policy change in Canada and help affected consumers make safe consumption choices.</p> <p>This research contributes to the number of health studies that utilized a mixed methods approach, which is an emerging paradigm. The use of mixed methods allowed for extension and refinement of results. Future research directions identified in this research include the need for pharmaceutical labeling in Canada, as well as the need to explore purchasing behaviors of indirectly affected families, as they also utilize allergen labels to guide consumption choices when shopping for allergy-controlled environments.</p> / Master of Arts (MA)

When released from prison, sex offenders are typically required to register with designated law enforcement officials as a condition of their parole. These officials can warn local community members, organizations, and establishments of the offender's incoming presence. Research indicates that community notification can adversely affect sex offenders in terms of their interpersonal and family relationships, employment opportunities and housing, and can lead to offender harassment that extends to the family members of sex offenders (Burchfield & Mingus, 2008; Levenson & Cotter, 2005a, 2005b; Levenson, D'Amora, & Hern, 2007; Tewksbury, 2004, 2005; Tewksbury & Lees, 2007; Zevitz & Farkas, 2000b). The current analysis seeks to build on and extend the existing literature by investigating the consequences of sex offender registration and community notification from the perspective of registered sex offenders and sexually violent predators in Pennsylvania. Using multiple methods of data collection (i.e., survey and interview research) and analyses, the present study contributes to the current understanding of how sex offenders experience registration and community notification and focuses on the positive and negative effects (e.g., unintended and unanticipated consequences) of being labeled and subject to community notification. Data for the present study were collected in collaboration with four providers of sex offender treatment. These treatment facilities are non-profit mental health organizations that provide both outpatient examinations and treatment services for sex offenders. All treatment providers are located in Pennsylvania, and will remain anonymous in the current study. The survey sample consists of 200 adult male sex offenders. For the purposes of making comparisons, 181 of the sampled sex offenders were further classified as the following three subsamples: (1) registered sex offenders (RSOs) (n = 121), (2) sexually violent predators (SVPs) (n = 13), and (3) non-registered sex offenders (and non-sexually violent predators) (n = 47). Nine of the SVPs elected to participate in the face-to-face interview portion of this research where topics focused on the impact of active community notification, the process whereby the state police are required to mail out letters to community members about an offender's physical description and home address. The age of the interview sample ranged from 35 to 63, and the average was 49.22 years old. Descriptive results of the complete survey sample reveal that most sex offenders are White or African American, middle-aged, and not married, and have relatively little formal education. Most sex offenders are working in some capacity, self-identify as "working class," and earn less than $20,000 per year. The majority of the total sample of sex offenders has been convicted of indecent assault/indecent sexual assault (24.6%) followed by possession of child pornography (12%) and then rape (11.4%). Overall, most victims are minor-aged females who were known by - but not related to - the offender. Findings from the anonymous survey also indicate that over 40 percent of the sampled RSOs are restricted by a 1,000-foot-rule, have primary group members who sustained some type of harm, and have had meaningful, personal relationships severed. Sexually violent predators experienced job loss, denial of employment, loss of housing, and denial of a place to live, and were treated rudely in public, and had primary group members who experienced emotional harm and, separately, had personal relationships severed at a higher rate (i.e., at least 10 percentage points) than RSOs. None of the SVPs were physically assaulted, whereas six RSOs (i.e., 5 percent of 120 RSOs) were physically assaulted. Using only a combination of two of the three subsamples of sex offenders (i.e., RSOs and SVPs), the multivariate contingency table analyses assessed how sex offenders' selection of victim-type, relationship to victim, and race influenced the fifteen different economic, residency-related, and harassment outcomes. Specifically, if offenders victimized a child (i.e., victims from age 5 to 17), as opposed to an adult (i.e., 18 or older), they were significantly more likely to be restricted by a 1,000-foot-rule, as expected. Offenders who victimized children were also more likely than offenders who victimized adults (by at least 10 percentage points) to experience job loss and receive harassing telephone calls, and to have primary group members who sustained some form of emotional harm and, separately, have personal relationships severed. Findings gleaned from the interviews indicate that SVPs are experiencing several of the problems identified in the previous and related literature. Specifically, six of the interviewees (66.67 percent) indicated that, since the notification process began, they have had a difficult time locating and obtaining affordable housing. Analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) was used to examine the effect of sex offenders' socio-demographics, offender characteristics, victim characteristics, and negative experiences resulting from registration and/or notification on self-esteem (Rosenberg, 1965), mastery (Pearlin et al., 1981; Pearlin & Schooler, 1978), stigma (Link, 1987; Link et al., 1997), and depression using the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D). The multivariate regression results were quite unexpected. After controlling for sex offenders' sociodemographics, offender characteristics, and victim characteristics, none of the scales devised to measure the impact of registration and/or community notification significantly predicted any of the four outcomes. The significance of these findings for criminological theory, and offender rehabilitation and reintegration are discussed. / Criminal Justice

Labeling is the process of giving a set of data a descriptive name. This thesis dealt with documents with no additional information and aimed at clustering them using topic modeling and labeling them using Wikipedia as a second source. Labeling documents is a new field with many potential solutions. This thesis examined one method in a practical setting. Unstructured data was preprocessed and clustered using a topic model. Frequent words from each cluster were used to generate a search query sent to Wikipedia, where titles and categories from the most relevant pages were stored as candidate labels. Each candidate label was evaluated based on the frequency of common cluster words among the candidate labels. The frequency was weighted proportional to the relevance of the original Wikipedia article. The relevance was based on the order of appearance in the search results. The five labels with the highest scores were chosen to describe the cluster. The clustered documents consisted of exam questions that students use to practice before a course exam. Each question in the cluster was scored by someone experienced in the relevant topic by evaluating if one of the five labels correctly described the content. The method proved unreliable, with only one course receiving labels considered descriptive for most of its questions. A significant problem was the closely related data with all documents belonging to one overarching category instead of a dataset containing independent topics. However, for one dataset, 80 % of the documents received a descriptive label, indicating that labeling using secondary sources has potential, but needs to be investigated further. / Märkning handlar om att ge okända data en beskrivning. I denna uppsats behandlas data i form av dokument som utan ytterligare information klustras med temamodellering samt märks med hjälp av Wikipedia som en sekundär källa. Märkning av dokument är ett nytt forskningsområde med flera tänkbara vägar framåt. I denna uppsats undersöks en möjlig metod i en praktisk miljö. Dokumenten förbehandlas och grupperas i kluster med hjälp av en temamodell. Vanliga ord från varje kluster används sedan för att generera en sökfråga som skickas till Wikipedia där titlar och kategorier från de mest relevanta sidorna lagras som kandidater. Varje kandidat utvärderas sedan baserat på frekvensen av kandidatordet bland titlarna i klustret och relevansen av den ursprungliga Wikipedia-artikeln. Relevansen av artiklarna baserades på i vilken ordning de dök upp i sökresultatet. De fem märkningarna med högst poäng valdes ut för att beskriva klustret. De klustrade dokumenten bestod av tentamensfrågor som studenter använder sig av för att träna inför ett prov. Varje fråga i klustret utvärderades av någon med erfarenhet av det i frågan behandlade ämnet. Utvärderingen baserades på om någon av de fem märkningarna ansågs beskriva innehållet. Metoden visade sig vara opålitlig med endast en kurs som erhöll märkningar som ansågs beskrivande för majoriteten av dess frågor. Ett stort problem var att data var nära relaterad med alla dokument tillhörande en övergripande kategori i stället för oberoende ämnen. För en datamängd fick dock 80 % av dokumenten en beskrivande etikett. Detta visar att märkning med hjälp av sekundära källor har potential, men behöver undersökas ytterligare.

This thesis is based on a content analysis of the website Familjeliv.se. The aim of this essay is to examine parents' perceptions of teenagers, as well as to investigate whether there are any differences in the parents' perceptions of girls and boys. The reason this is being examined is to increase teachers' awareness of parents' perceptions of teenagers and thus increase their ability to adress to these in their interactions with parents'. The result showed several perceptions thar parents at Familjeliv.se had about teenagers. These perceptions were; that teenagers are spoiled, they fight a lot and are defiant, they are self-centered and that they are school-fatigue and do not behave the way they are expected in school. The differences that could be discerned in the perceptions of girls and boys were differences in how they are expected to behave, the expectation of housework and performance and behaviour in school. In the final part of the thesis, the result is discussed and conclusions are presented in relation to previous research about the subjekt and the theoretical approach of the thesis, wich is social constructivism and labeling theory. A conclusion that is presented and discussed concerns the negativity that characterizes parents' percpetions of teenagers. Several different thematically presented perceptions were presented in the thesis result, all of which were of a negative nature. In the final part of the thesis, it is discussed whether this conslusion affects the teenagers. According to the theoratical approach, these negative perceptions may result in teenagers acting on these perceptions and expectations that parents of Familjeliv.se have about teenagers.

Cell surface RNA (csRNA) is a recent discovery in the field of RNA biology and has been implicated in playing important roles in many biological processes due to its extracellular properties. To understand the biogenesis, regulation, and function of csRNA, it is critical to develop methods to detect, isolate, and confidently characterize membrane-bound csRNA. Previously, csRNA has been profiled using methods based on cell membrane isolation that are expensive, laborious, and with unsatisfactory specificity and sensitivity . In this study, we use metabolic labeling and chemical cross-linking techniques to specifically label csRNA with biotin handles. We intended to use this technique for separating biotin-labeled csRNA from total RNA samples for characterization purposes. The primary materials that were used to label such csRNAs are 4-Thiouridine (4sU), an unnatural nucleotide analogue, and S-(2-aminoethyl)-ester-methanesulfonothioic-acid-biotin (MTSEA-biotin), a crosslinker designed specifically to label 4sU. By deploying these tools to cell lines such as HEK293T and HeLa, csRNA is detectable by Enhanced Chemiluminescent detection via Dot Blot. Furthermore, to separate biotin-labeled csRNA from total RNA, streptavidin-coated magnetic bead separation procedures could be used as a promising method for purifying csRNA from total RNA, for RNAseq characterization. This study highlights the processes of establishing the csRNA detection protocol and describes the current status and issues with developing the streptavidin-coated magnetic beads separation method. / Master of Science in Life Sciences / The 'central dogma' is a term that describes the process of DNA (a template-like molecule that holds all genetic coding within cells) transcribing into mRNA (a messenger molecule that transports this message to the ribosome) which is then translated into proteins (large, complex molecular machinery that is responsible for many biochemical functions within the body). However, RNA has been found to have a much wider range of functions than just being an intermediate messenger between DNA and proteins. Recently, short snippets of single nucleotide RNA strands have been discovered to be present on the outer cell membrane of certain mammalian cell types. The function of cell surface RNA (csRNA) is largely undiscovered, however, csRNA are likely involved in cell-cell interactions similar to outer membrane proteins, lipids, and carbohydrates. Currently, methods involved in detecting and characterizing csRNA are laborious, time extensive, and with unsatisfactory specificity and sensitivity. This study aims to develop novel methods to detect csRNA on different cell types in an undemanding and trustworthy manner to speed up research timelines while maintaining high confidence in results. Our design is to use metabolic labeling and click-chemistry to 'label' the csRNA. In this study, we describe early signs of detecting csRNA and how this was achieved. Additionally, the current status for separating and profiling csRNA sequences is discussed.

The National Labeling and Education Act of 1990 (NLEA) mandates that the Food and Drug Administration overhaul existing food labeling regulations and provide the consumer with a standardized, informative food-labeling policy. The intended benefit is the elimination of the confusion currently surrounding food labeling and an improvement in the dietary practices of the American public. The aim of this study was to measure the differences in the food-label reading habits, attitudes, and understanding of low-income women participating in the Supplemental Food Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) and of women from the general population. All subjects were the primary household food shoppers. In both groups, 90% "almost always" or "sometimes" read a food label. The food label influenced a purchase decision "a great deal" for 47% of the WIC group and 56% of the control group. Of the two groups, a significant number of WIC participants found the food label significantly easier to understand yet scored significantly lower on the test of nutrition knowledge and label understanding than the control group, particularly on the subject of dietary fat. In addition to calories, the WIC group looked for iron, vitamins, calcium, and protein information, while the control group was more interested in fat, sodium, and cholesterol. Both groups relied upon the media, doctors and food labels for nutrition information. This study suggests that the education component of the NLEA must address the nutrition needs of low-income WIC participants (who are pregnant or have small children). This nutritionally at-risk population would greatly benefit from the education portion of the forthcoming labeling reform. / Master of Science

Labeling is a product differentiation mechanism which has increased in prevalence across many markets. This study investigated the potential for a labeling program applied in ornamental plant sales, given key ongoing issues affecting ornamental plant producers: irrigation water use and plant disease. Our research investigated how to better understand the market for plants certified as disease free and/or produced using water conservation techniques through segmenting the market by consumers' environmental preferences. Latent class analysis was conducted using choice modeling survey results and respondent scores on the New Environmental Paradigm scale. The results show that when accounting for environmental preferences, consumers can be grouped into two market segments. Relative to each other, these segments are considered: price sensitive and attribute sensitive. Our research also investigated market segments' preferences for multiple certifying authorities. The results strongly suggest that consumers of either segment do not have a preference for any particular certifying authority. / Master of Science

Described is the development of a multispectral image labeling system with emphasis on Unmanned Ground Vehicles(UGVs). UGVs operating in unstructured environments face significant problems detecting viable paths when LIDAR is the sole source for perception. Promising advances in computer vision and machine learning has shown that multispectral imagery can be effective at detecting materials in unstructured environments [1][2][3][4][5][6]. This thesis seeks to extend previous work[6][7] by performing pixel level classification with multispectral features and texture. First the images are spatially registered to create a multispectral image cube. Visual, near infrared, shortwave infrared, and visible/near infrared polarimetric data are considered. The aligned images are then used to extract features which are fed to machine learning algorithms. The class list includes common materials present in rural and urban scenes such as vehicles, standing water, various forms of vegetation, and concrete. Experiments are conducted to explore the data requirement for a desired performance and the selection of a hyper-parameter for the textural features. A complete system is demonstrated, progressing from the data collection and labeling to the analysis of the classifier performance. / Master of Science

This thesis introduces Comquest, an adaptive framework designed for the large-scale collection and integration of user comments from the Web. User comments are featured on many websites and there is growing interest in mining and studying user comments in applications, such as opinion mining and information diffusion. However, crawling user comments generally requires hard-coded solutions that are tethered to specific websites, which is hard to scale and maintain. To achieve a generalizable and scalable comment crawling solution, Comquest employs two website-agnostic approaches for comment crawling: Web API querying and HTML data extraction. When the target Web page is integrated with a third-party commenting system whose Web API that is in Comquest’s knowledge base, it retrieves comments by sending HTTP requests to the API’s URL with parameters extracted from the target webpage. The approach has several challenges. Firstly, extracting accurate parameter values to construct HTTP requests is difficult since they are buried deep within the HTML string of web documents (if they exist). Secondly, the solution needs to generalize both vertically (within a website) and horizontally (across unseen websites). To tackle these challenges, the parameter extraction problem is treated as a variant of the multiclass Named Entity Recognition (NER) problem, where the entities represent the values of the parameters. Comquest leverages a sequential labeling deep learning model to identify parameter values within HTML source codes. When the commenting system is native to the website or unknown, Comquest detects and extracts user comments from fully rendered Web pages. However, comments are often hidden until triggered by specific user interaction, such as clicking on a designated page element among many other clickable elements. Furthermore, comments are typically presented as structured record-like Web data with high structure variations, making them difficult to detect and extract from the target Web page along with other record-like Web data. Comquest utilizes deep learning models and Web record extraction algorithms to automate the process of triggering, extracting, and classifying comments. Comquest has been implemented as a comprehensive system that consists of an administration web portal, a task controller, and a crawler backend. It provides a useful tool for collecting comments that represent a wider range of opinions, stances, and sentiments from websites on a global scale. / Computer and Information Science