La thématique principale de nos travaux est l'étude de l'intégration du mouvement au niveau de la population du cortex visuel primaire du singe éveillé : de l'identification des circuits corticaux impliqués dans le traitement du mouvement,jusqu'à l'identification et l'émergence d'un signal de mouvement. Nous avons ainsi principalement utilisé deux protocoles (mouvement réel ou apparent).La réponse neuronale de population à l'entrée du système (V1) a été comparée à une réponse comportementale en sortie, la réponse de suivi oculaire réflexe (OFR).L'activité de population dans le cortex visuel primaire est enregistrée par imagerie optique de composés sensible au potentiel.Nous avons alors montré que la réponse au contraste dans V1 est contrôlée par un bassin de normalisation dynamique qui évolue lentement via un recrutement progressif et polysynaptique des circuits récurrents locaux. Ce bassin reçoit des afférents horizontaux liés au contraste qui suppriment graduellement le gain au contraste et à la réponse neuronale.Ensuite, en comparant l'activité de population de V1 avec la réponse de suivi oculaire réflexe avec un stimulus dont l'échelle intermédiaire active à la fois l'entrée et la sortie du système, nous avons identifié deux mécanismes distincts, impliqués dans les interactions contextuelles étudiées : un mécanisme précoce et rapide agissant sur les entrées fortes provenant majoritairement de MT et un mécanisme lent et soutenu plus visible sur les entrées faibles provenant majoritairement de V1.Finalement, en étudiant l'intégration et la représentation du mouvement apparent à la surface de V1, nous avons observé que la dynamique de l'activité corticale générée par des stimuli de mouvement apparent induit une suppression non-linéaire à la surface du cortex qui permet à la population de V1 de ne représenter qu'un seul stimulus à la fois, et ferait donc émerger un signal de mouvement non-ambigu.Pour conclure, nos expériences montrent que les interactions non-linéaires entre et parmi les aires corticales entraînent la normalisation, la modulation et l'émergence de différents signaux de mouvement. / Our goal is to study motion integration at population level in V1 in the awake behaving onkey. We compare V1population recorded with optical imaging of voltage sensitive dyes with ocular following response.We have shown that contrast response function in V1 is controlled by a dynamic normalization pool. Then we identified two distinct mechanisms involved in contextual modulations: a fast transient one originating from MT and a show and sustained one, originating from V1. Finally, we have observed that cortical activity dynamics in presponse to apparent motion can induce a suppression wave at acortical surface.

Sammanfattning Officersförbundet hade i januari 2022 en mycket hög anslutningsgrad på över 91 %, jämfört med snittet på den svenska arbetsmarknaden om ca 69 %. Det finns ett antal förklaringar till denna höga siffra och beroende på vem som svarar så ges de olika tyngd och betydelse. Några exempel på förklaringar är ett positivt grupptryck då en nöjd medlem är den bästa ambassadören ”det är klart att du ska bli medlem, det är ju alla” en annan är att de militära cheferna är med i samma fack som instruktörerna och soldaterna vilket verkar sammanhållande och skapar gemenskap, slutligen finns det många praktiska fördelar såsom bättre försäkringar, juridisk rådgivning och stöd samt en kompetent organisation som tar strid då AG bryter mot kollektivavtalet. Vi har observerat att trots den stora anslutningsgraden inom Officersförbundet har lokalföreningarna fått det allt svårare med tiden att attrahera nya och yngre medlemmar till att engagera sig ideellt i lokalstyrelserna och därmed kan den svenska modellen äventyras.  Vi har dessutom noterat att många förtroendevalda vittnar om personliga erfarenheter om att ha drabbats negativt med direkt koppling till sitt fackliga engagemang. Vad motiverar dessa människor, vilka drivkrafter får dem att stå upp mot arbetsgivarens vilja och beslut med risk för negativa konsekvenser då vissa chefer har svårt att skilja på roll och individ? Syftet med vår studie är att få fördjupad förståelse för vilka motivationsfaktorer för ideellt arbete som är framträdande hos militära fackliga företrädare inom Försvarsmakten. Studien utgår ifrån egna observationer i verkligheten och syftar till att tolka och förstå vad som motiverar officersföreningarnas förtroendevalda företrädare i styrelserna då vi bedömer att det lokala fackliga arbetet och dess ställningstagande kan påverkas av representanternas personliga motivation.  Vi har utgått från ett antal centrala styrdokument och rapporter som baskunskap och kompletterat denna med datainsamling genom intervjuer och enkätundersökning riktat till förtroendevalda fackliga företrädare inom Officersförbundet, centralt och lokalt.Empirin har sedan klustrats och analyserats utifrån individuell och organisatorisk nivå där vi bland annat tittat på inre och yttre motivation samt medlemsnyttan kopplat till hårda och mjuka fokusfrågor. Vi har i vår undersökning kommit fram till ett antal slutsatser som redovisas i kapitel 7, våra slutsatser grundas på resultatets tre teman och är exempelvis: Yttre och kontrollerad motivation är av underordnad betydelse för det ideella engagemanget medan inre och autonom motivation är direkt avgörande. Yttre motivation, eller kontrollerad motivation fungerar mindre bra på ideella som redan i grund och botten har ett engagemang för sitt ideella arbete. Inre motivation, eller autonom motivation är den/de starkaste och viktigaste motivationsfaktorerna för all verksamhet, i synnerhet den ideella. Upplevelsen av att göra något bra för någon annan och att vara del av något större (medlemsnyttan) är en viktig motivationsfaktor. Fackföreningarna behövs även i framtiden som en motpart till arbetsgivarorganisationerna för att bära den svenska modellen in i framtiden. / Abstract In January 2022, the Swedish officers' union (Officersförbundet) had a very high degree of affiliation of over 91 %, compared with the average in the Swedish labor market of about 69 %. There are a number of explanations for this high number and depending on who answers, they are given different weight and significance. Some examples of explanations are a positive group pressure, a satisfied member is the best ambassador "of course you should become a member, everybody are" another is that the military commanders are in the same union as the instructors and the soldiers which creates community, finally there are many practical benefits such as better insurance, legal advice and support as well as a competent organization that takes action when the employer violates the collective agreement. We have observed that despite the large degree of affiliation within Officersförbundet, the local trade union associations have found it increasingly difficult over time to attract new and younger members to engage voluntarily in the local boards and thus the Swedish model can be jeopardized. We have also noted that many elected representatives testify to personal experiences of having been negatively affected with a direct connection to their union involvement. What motivates these people, which incentives make them stand up against the employer's will and decisions with the risk of negative consequences as some commanders have difficulty distinguishing between role and individual? The purpose of our study is to gain an in-depth understanding of which motivating factors for non-profit work are prominant among military union representatives in the Armed Forces. The study is based on our own observations and the aim is to interpret and understand what motivates the officers' associations' elected representatives on the boards as we assess that the local union work and its position can be influenced by the representatives' personal motivation.  We have used a number of central documents and reports as basic knowledge and supplemented this with data collection through interviews and surveys aimed at elected union representatives within the Officersförbundet, at central and local level.The empirical data has been clustered and analyzed on the basis of individual and organizational level, where we have looked at internal and external motivation as well as the membership benefits linked to hard and soft focus questions. In our research, we have come to a number of conclusions that are presented in Chapter 7, ourconclusions are based on the three themes of the results and are, for example:  External and controlled motivation is of secondary importance to the non-profit engagement while internal and autonomous motivation is directly decisive. External motivation, or controlled motivation works less well on nonprofits that already basically have a commitment to their nonprofit work. Internal motivation, or autonomous motivation is the strongest and most important motivator(s) of any activity, especially the non-profit. The experience of doing something good for someone else and being part of something bigger (the benefit of the member) is an important motivating factor. The unions are also needed in the future as a counterpart to the employers' organisations in order to carry the Swedish model into the future.

One of the main aims of the underlying research is to respond to continuous calls for introducing and measuring a sound economic definition for best practice disclosure quality (e.g. Beyer et al., 2010) that is derived from a reliable guidance framework (Botosan, 2004) using an innovative natural language processing technique (Berger, 2011). It also aims to examine the impact of corporate governance on best practice disclosure quality. Finally, it aims to examine the joint effect of both best practice disclosure quality and corporate governance on firm value. The thesis contributes to disclosure studies in three principal ways. First, it introduces a new measure for best practice disclosure quality. Further tests show that the proposed measure is reliable and valid. A novel feature of this measure is that it captures all qualitative dimensions of information issued by the Accounting Standards Board, 2006 (ASB) Operating and Financial Review (OFR) Reporting Statement. Second, it uses machine-readable OFR statements for financial years ending in 2006-2009, and develops a language processing technique through constructing five keyword lists. Third, it examines the extent to which disclosure quantity provides a proper proxy for disclosure quality. The analysis shows that disclosure quantity is not a good proxy for disclosure quality. Accordingly, results derived, using quantity as a proxy for quality, are questionable. Results of the association between disclosure quality and corporate governance mechanisms suggest that the most effective governance mechanisms in improving disclosure quality are leadership structure, audit committee meeting frequency, and audit firm size. Using a wide set of corporate governance mechanisms, the study also contributes to three research strands and explains the inconclusive results in relation to the association between disclosure quality, corporate governance mechanisms and firm value. It provides empirical evidence as to which governance mechanisms promote the quality of voluntarily disclosed information in large UK firms. Additionally, it provides empirical evidence as to the joint effect of best practice disclosure quality, corporate governance mechanisms on firm value in the UK. Results also show that best practice disclosure quality enjoys a substitutive relationship with two corporate governance mechanisms (audit committee independence and audit committee size) and a complementary association with board independence in relation to firm value. The study has various research and policy implications. It suggests new research avenues for re-examining disclosure relationships, especially research areas that do not have persuasive conclusions such as the economic consequences of disclosure quality. Such research may inform both regulators and managers as to the costs and benefits of disclosure quality to both firms and stakeholders. It also provides feedback on the current disclosure practices by firms so that policy-makers can modify reporting frameworks/guidance accordingly.

No description available.

Nonequilibrium work methods for determining potentials of mean force (PMF) w(z) have recently gained popularity as an alternative to standard equilibrium based methods. Introduced by Kosztin et al., the forward-reverse (FR) method is a bidirectional work method in that it requires the work to be sampled in both forward and reverse directions along the reaction coordinate z. This bidirectional sampling leads to much faster convergence than other nonequilibrium methods such as the Jarzynski equality, and the calculation itself is extremely simple, making the FR method an attractive way of determining the PMF. Presented here is an extension to the FR method that deals with sampling problems along essentially irreversible reaction coordinates. By oscillating a particle as it is steered along a reaction coordinate, both forward and reverse work samples are obtained as the particle progresses. Dubbed the oscillating forward-reverse (OFR) method, this new method overcomes the issue of irreversibility that is present in numerous soft-matter and biological systems, particularly in the stretching or unfolding of proteins. The data analysis of the OFR method is non-trivial however, and to this end a software package named the ‘OFR Analysis Tool’ has been created. This software performs all of the complicated analysis necessary, as well as a complete error analysis that considers correlations in the data, thus streamlining the use of the OFR method for potential end users. Another attractive feature of the FR method is that the dissipative work is collected at the same time as the free energy changes, making it possible to also calculate local diffusion coefficients, D(z), from the same simulation as the PMF through the Stokes-Nernst-Einstein relation Fdrag = −γv, with γ = kB T /D. While working with the OFR method, however, the D(z) results never matched known values or those obtained through other methods, including the mean square displacement (or Einstein) method. After a reformulation of the procedure to obtain D(z), i.e. by including the correct path length and particle speeds, results were obtained that were much closer to the correct values. The results however showed very little variation over the length of the reaction coordinate, even when D(z) was known to vary drastically. It seemed that the highly variable and noncontinuous velocity function of the particle being steered through the “stiff-spring” method was incompatible with the macroscopic definition of the drag coefficient, γ. The drag coefficient requires at most a slowly varying velocity so that the assumption of a linearly related dissipative work remains valid at all times. To address this, a new dynamic constraint steering protocol (DCP) was developed to replace the previously used “stiff-spring” method, now referred to as a dynamic restraint protocol (DRP). We present here the results for diffusion in bulk water, and both the PMF and diffusion results from the permeation of a water molecule through a DPPC membrane. We also consider the issue of ergodicity and sampling, and propose that to obtain an accurate w(z) (and D(z)) from even a moderately complex system, the final result should be a weighted average obtained from numerous pulls. An additional utility of the FR and OFR methods is that the permeability across lipid bilayers can be calculated from w(z) and D(z) using the inhomogeneous solubility-diffusion (ISD) model. As tests, the permeability was first calculated for H2O and O2 through DPPC. From the simulations, the permeability coefficients for H2O were found to be 0.129 ± 0.075 cm/s and 0.141 ± 0.043 cm/s, at 323 K and 350 K respectively, while the permeability coefficients for O2 were 114 ± 40 cm/s and 101 ± 27 cm/s, again at 323 K and 350 K respectively. As a final, more challenging system, the permeability of tyramine – a positively charged trace amine at physiological pH – was calculated. The final value of P = 0.89 ± 0.24 Ang/ns is over two orders of magnitude lower than that obtained from experiment (22 ± 4 Ang/ns), although it is clear that the permeability as calculated through the ISD is extremely sensitive to the PMF, as scaling the PMF by ∼ 20% allowed the simulation and experimental values to agree within uncertainty. With accurate predictions for free energies and permeabilities, the OFR method could potentially be used for many valuable endeavors such as rational drug design.

Submitted by Luciana Ferreira (lucgeral@gmail.com) on 2015-03-31T12:55:37Z No. of bitstreams: 2 Dissertação - Weine Amorim Azeredo - 2014.pdf: 1815407 bytes, checksum: 99634ec345d81a89ac5a8a975d8d5e31 (MD5) license_rdf: 23148 bytes, checksum: 9da0b6dfac957114c6a7714714b86306 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Luciana Ferreira (lucgeral@gmail.com) on 2015-04-01T10:49:54Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 2 Dissertação - Weine Amorim Azeredo - 2014.pdf: 1815407 bytes, checksum: 99634ec345d81a89ac5a8a975d8d5e31 (MD5) license_rdf: 23148 bytes, checksum: 9da0b6dfac957114c6a7714714b86306 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2015-04-01T10:49:54Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 Dissertação - Weine Amorim Azeredo - 2014.pdf: 1815407 bytes, checksum: 99634ec345d81a89ac5a8a975d8d5e31 (MD5) license_rdf: 23148 bytes, checksum: 9da0b6dfac957114c6a7714714b86306 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014-05-09 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior - CAPES / Waste frying oils (WFO) consist an environmental liability, whose use in biodiesel production of adequate quality is compromised due to poor quality of the raw material. High levels of free fatty acids, degradation products of fatty acids, peroxides, hydroperoxides, metal and large amount of water in the feedstock compromise the quality of biodiesel produced. So the use of liquid-liquid extraction (LLE) as a pretreatment of the WFO using water as the solvent showed an efficient method in reducing the levels of polar compounds. After the OFR pre-treatment with water partition followed by the removal of the absorbed water via distillation under reduced pressure, experimental designs have been performed in steps acid esterification and transesterification alkaline thereby obtaining biodiesel samples with high contents methyl ester (96-98%). For the purification of biodiesel from WFO, the use of adsorbents such as silica and alumina proved efficient in the removal of water and reduction the acidity of the biodiesel, however reduced the oxidative stability. Distillation of biodiesel proved effective in reducing the water content, although reduced the oxidative stability of biodiesel. / Os óleos de fritura residuais (OFR) constituem um passivo ambiental, cuja utilização na produção de biodiesel com qualidade adequada é comprometida devido à baixa qualidade da matéria-prima. Elevados teores de ácidos graxos livres, produtos de degradação de ácidos graxos, peróxidos, hidroperóxidos, metais e a grande quantidade de água presentes nos OFR comprometem a qualidade do biodiesel produzido a partir dessa matéria prima. Assim o uso da extração liquido-liquido (LLE) como pré-tratamento do OFR, usando água como solvente mostrou-se uma metodologia eficiente na redução dos teores de compostos polares. Após um pré-tratamento do OFR via partição com água seguido da remoção da água absorvida no OFR via destilação sob pressão reduzida foram realizados planejamentos experimentais nas etapas de esterificação ácida e transesterificação alcalina obtendo assim amostras de biodiesel metílico com elevados teores de ésteres (96-98%). Para purificação do biodiesel de OFR, a utilização de adsorventes como sílica e alumina se mostrou eficiente na remoção da água e redução do índice de acidez desse biocombustível. Por outro lado, esses adsorventes reduziram a estabilidade oxidativa do produto final. A destilação do biodiesel foi a forma mais eficiente de remover a água presente, reduzindo em 82,5 % seu teor, apesar de reduz a estabilidade oxidativa.

Although eating disorders have been the focus of much research, the inclusion of minority populations has been minimal. A recent review of the literature by Dolan (1991) has found that eating disorders were most likely to be present in non-White women who were exposed to Western societies and cultures. Thus, the purpose of this study was to examine personality, physical, and cultural correlates of bulimic symptomatology in a sample of African American college women. The Bulimia Test Revised (BULIT-R) was used to assess bulimia symptoms. The African American Acculturation Scale (AAAS), the Beliefs about Attractiveness Scale Revised (BAAR factors 1 and 2), the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (SES), the Centers for Epidemiological Depression Scale (CES-D), Body Parts Satisfaction Scale (BPSS), and body mass were the independent variables hypothesized to predict bulimic symptoms. Hierarchical regression analysis revealed that body mass, depression, and low self-esteem were the best predictors of bulimic symptomatology, together accounting for 38% of the variance. Beliefs about attractiveness and body satisfaction were related to bulimic symptoms but not when considered simultaneously with the other variables. Acculturation was not predictive of bulimic symptoms. 0-ordered correlations revealed that beliefs about attractiveness and body satisfaction were correlated with bulimic symptoms. Acculturation was not related to any variables except depression. Implications for counseling interventions as well as directions for future research are discussed.

This item contains the agenda, minutes, and attachments for the Faculty Senate meeting on this date. There may be additional materials from the meeting available at the Faculty Center.