In recent decades, the truth commission has become a mechanism used by states to address historical injustices. However, truth commissions are rarely used in established democracies, where the commission of inquiry model is favoured. I argue that established democracies may be more amenable to addressing historical injustices that continue to divide their populations if they see the truth commission mechanism not as a unique mechanism particular to the transitional justice setting, but as a specialized form of a familiar mechanism, the commission of inquiry. In this framework, truth commissions are distinguished from other commissions of inquiry by their symbolic acknowledgement of historical injustices, and their explicit “social function” to educate the public about those injustices in order to prevent their recurrence. Given that Canada has established a Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) on the Indian Residential Schools legacy, I consider the TRC’s mandate, structure and ability to fulfill its social function, particularly the daunting challenge of engaging the non-indigenous public in its work. I also provide a legal history of a landmark Canadian public inquiry, the Mackenzie Valley Pipeline Inquiry, run by Tom Berger. As his Inquiry demonstrated, with visionary leadership and an effective process, a public inquiry can be a pedagogical tool that promotes social accountability for historical injustices. Conceiving of the truth commission as a form of public inquiry provides a way to consider the transitional justice literature on truth commissions internationally along with the experiences of domestic commissions of inquiry to assemble strategies that may assist the current TRC in its journey.

In recent decades, the truth commission has become a mechanism used by states to address historical injustices. However, truth commissions are rarely used in established democracies, where the commission of inquiry model is favoured. I argue that established democracies may be more amenable to addressing historical injustices that continue to divide their populations if they see the truth commission mechanism not as a unique mechanism particular to the transitional justice setting, but as a specialized form of a familiar mechanism, the commission of inquiry. In this framework, truth commissions are distinguished from other commissions of inquiry by their symbolic acknowledgement of historical injustices, and their explicit “social function” to educate the public about those injustices in order to prevent their recurrence. Given that Canada has established a Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) on the Indian Residential Schools legacy, I consider the TRC’s mandate, structure and ability to fulfill its social function, particularly the daunting challenge of engaging the non-indigenous public in its work. I also provide a legal history of a landmark Canadian public inquiry, the Mackenzie Valley Pipeline Inquiry, run by Tom Berger. As his Inquiry demonstrated, with visionary leadership and an effective process, a public inquiry can be a pedagogical tool that promotes social accountability for historical injustices. Conceiving of the truth commission as a form of public inquiry provides a way to consider the transitional justice literature on truth commissions internationally along with the experiences of domestic commissions of inquiry to assemble strategies that may assist the current TRC in its journey.

Starting with tensor calculus and the variational form of the Hamiltonian functional, a generalized theory is formulated for doubly curved thin shells. The formulation avoids geometric approximations commonly adopted in other formulations. The theory is then specialized for cylindrical and toroidal shells as special cases, both of interest in the modeling of straight and elbow segments of pipeline systems. Since the treatment avoids geometric approximations, the cylindrical shell theory is believed to be more accurate than others reported in the literature. By adopting a set of consistent geometric approximations, the present theory is shown to revert to the well known Flugge shell theory. Another set of consistent geometric approximations is shown to lead to the Donnell-Mushtari-Vlasov (DMV) theory. A general closed form solution of the theory is developed for cylinders under general harmonic loads. The solution is then used to formulate a family of exact shape functions which are subsequently used to formulate a super-convergent finite element. The formulation efficiently and accurately captures ovalization, warping, radial expansion, and other shell behavioural modes under general static or harmonic forces either in-phase or out-of-phase. Comparisons with shell solutions available in Abaqus demonstrate the validity of the formulation and the accuracy of its predictions. The generalized thin shell theory is then specialized for toroidal shells. Consistent sets of approximations lead to three simplified theories for toroidal shells. The first set of approximations has lead to a theory comparable to that of Sanders while the second set of approximation has lead to a theory nearly identical to the DMV theory for toroidal shells. A closed form solution is then obtained for the governing equation. Exact shape functions are then developed and subsequently used to formulate a finite element. Comparisons with Abaqus solutions show the validity of the formulation for short elbow segments under a variety of loading conditions. Because of their efficiency, the finite elements developed are particularly suited for the analysis of long pipeline systems.

Master thesis work at ITN (Department of Science and Technology) in the areas of A/D-construction and RF-circuit design. Major goal of project were to research suitable possibilities for implementations of direct conversion in transceivers operating in the 160MHz band, theoretic study followed by development of components in the construction environment Cadence. Suitable A/D- converter and other important parts were selected at the end of the theoretic study. Subsampling technique was applied to make A/D sample requirements more realistic to achieve. Besides lowering requirements on A/D-converter it allows a more simple construction, which saves more components than subsampling adds. Subsampling add extra noise, because of that an A/D-converter based on the RSD algorithm was chosen to improve error rate. To achieve high bit-processing rate compared to the used number of transistors, pipeline structure were selected as conversion method. The receiver was that part which gained largest attention because it’s the part which is most interesting to optimise. A/D-conversion is more difficult to construct than D/A conversion, besides there’s more to gain from eliminating mixers in the receiver than in the transmitter.

The profound and observable changes in the world, including globalization, in the last decades have weakened the state power vis-&agrave / -vis non-state actors. This process naturally, has marked down the state capacity to protect and promote internationally recognized human rights and fundamental freedoms. In this context, TNCs, the principle actors of economic globalization, not only threaten the enjoyment of human rights, but also challenge to the state-centric human rights understanding. This thesis claims that the state-centric paradigm has got difficulties to locate non-state actors that violate human rights. While this study proceeds from the premise that the state is the primary responsible actor, it cannot certainly be considered as the sole responsible actor for human rights. Likewise, the thesis suggests that a new international mechanism that holds also non-state actors, particularly TNCs, responsible for human rights needs to be established.

In all of the previous pipelining methods such as conventional pipelining, wave pipelining, and mesochronous pipelining, a data wave propagating on the combinational circuit is sampled whenever it arrives to a synchronization stage. In this study, a new wave-pipelining methodology named as Wave Component Sampling Method (WCSM), is proposed. In this method, only the component of a wave, whose maximum and minimum delay difference exceeds the tolerable value, is sampled, and the other components continue to propagate on the circuit. Therefore, the total number of registers required for synchronization decreases significantly. For demonstrating the effectiveness of the proposed WCSM, an 8x8 bit carry save In all of the previous pipelining methods such as conventional pipelining, wave pipelining, and mesochronous pipelining, a data wave propagating on the combinational circuit is sampled whenever it arrives to a synchronization stage. In this study, a new wave-pipelining methodology named as Wave Component Sampling Method (WCSM), is proposed. In this method, only the component of a wave, whose maximum and minimum delay difference exceeds the tolerable value, is sampled, and the other components continue to propagate on the circuit. Therefore, the total number of registers required for synchronization decreases significantly. For demonstrating the effectiveness of the proposed WCSM, an 8x8 bit carry save adder (CSA) multiplier is implemented using 0.18&micro / m CMOS technology. A generic transmission gate logic block with optimized output delay variation depending on the input pattern is designed and used in all of the sub blocks of the multiplier. Post layout simulation results show that, this multiplier can operate at a speed of 3GHz, using only 70 latches. Comparing with the mesochronous pipelining scheme, the number of the registers is decreased by 41% and the total power of the chip is also decreased by 9.5% without any performance loss. An ultra high speed full pipelined CSA multiplier with an operating frequency of 5GHz is also implemented with WCSM. The number of registers is decreased by 45%, and the power consumption of the circuit is decreased by 18.4% comparing with conventional or mesochronous pipelining methods. WCSM is also applied to different multiplier structures employing booth encoders, Wallace trees, and carry look-ahead adders. Comparing full pipelined 8x8 bit WCSM multiplier with the conventional pipelined multiplier, the number of registers in the implementation of booth encoder, Wallace tree, and carry look-ahead adder is decreased by 30%, 51%, and %62, respectively.

Today, ethanol, as well as other biofuels, has been increasingly gaining popularity as a major alternative liquid fuel to replace conventional gasoline for road transportation. One of the key challenges for the future use of bioethanol is to increase its availability in the market via an efficient and economic way. However, one major concern in using the existing gas-pipelines to transport fuel-grade ethanol or blended fuel is the potential corrosion and stress corrosion cracking (SCC) susceptibility of carbon steel pipelines in these environments. Both phenomenological and mechanistic investigations have been carried out in order to address the possible degradation phenomena of X-65 pipeline carbon steel in simulated fuel-grade ethanol (SFGE). Firstly, the susceptibilities of stress corrosion cracking of this steel in SFGE were studied. Ethanol chemistry of SFGE was shown to have great impact on the stress corrosion crack initiation/propagation and the corrosion mode transition. Inclusions in the steel can increase local plastic strain and act as crack initiation sites. Secondly, the anodic behavior of carbon steel electrode was investigated in detail under different ethanol chemistry conditions. General corrosion and pitting susceptibility under unstressed condition were found to be sensitive to the ethanol chemistry. Low tendency to passivate and the sensitivity to ethanol chemistry are the major reasons which drive corrosion process in this system. Oxygen plays a critical role in controlling the passivity of carbon steel in ethanol. Thirdly, the detailed study was carried out to understand the SCC mechanism of carbon steel in SFGE. A film related anodic dissolution process was identified to be a major driving force during the crack propagation. Fourthly, more detailed electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) studies using phase angle analysis and transmission line simulation reveal a clearer physical picture of the stress corrosion cracking process in this environment. Fifthly, the cathodic reactions of carbon steel in SFGE were also investigated to understand the oxygen and hydrogen reactions. Hydrogen uptake into the pipeline steel and the conditions of the fractures related to hydrogen embrittlement were identified and studied.

We propose a real-time system to visualize multi-viewpoint visibility information for terrains, supporting flight path optimization for view coverage or vehicle exposure to ground. A volume rendered display and a haptic interface assist the user in selecting, assessing, and refining the computed flight path. We construct a three-dimensional scalar field representing the visibility of a point above the terrain, describe an efficient algorithm to compute visibility, and develop visual and haptic schemes to interact with the visibility field. Given the origin and destination, the desired flight path is computed using an efficient simulation of an articulated rope under the influence of the visibility gradient. The simulation framework also accepts user input, via the haptic interface, thereby allowing manual refinement of the flight path.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2002. / Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 198-201). Also available on the Internet.

中共隨經濟的高度發展對能源的消耗也愈來愈高，其能源產量除了煤炭之外，其他如石油、天然氣等石化燃料都面臨不足，已經無法靠自有石油資源來因應高消耗量，也造成日漸依賴進口的能源，而其能源進口地區主要是在中東，但是中東地區政局不穩定，且這條海上運輸線需經過索馬利亞和亞丁灣，沿線海盜猖獗，麻六甲的航道又比較狹長，若航運通道遭受阻斷，將足以對中共能源供應穩定帶來衝擊。 而中共於2009年12月啟動了第一條跨國天然氣管道—中亞天然氣管道(閥門)，該管道西起土庫曼穿越烏茲別克中部和哈薩克南部地區，經新疆霍爾果斯口岸入境;這等於打通了中共和中亞地區各國的進口原油的通道。截至2014年4月中旬，從新疆霍爾果斯口岸入境的中亞天然氣管道，已累計向中共輸送天然氣達到500億立方米。 然而新疆維吾爾自治區位於中共西北部地處，自古以來就是中共向西開放的重要門戶，有長達5,600公里的邊境線，惟新疆少數民族乃未停息的宗教不安問題，一直是北京及中亞最可能的潛在引爆點。為維持中共新疆地區社會穩定、經濟健康發展、民族團結、邊防鞏固及維護和保持新疆社會大局穩定，因此中共對新疆境內分離份子的態度（新疆境內有42﹪維吾爾族人），自然是中共關切所在。因此中共於新疆地區執行各項維穩及反恐任務，來抑制少數伊斯蘭教激進份子的東突厥斯坦獨立運動思潮，來達到其穩定內部社會秩序、並藉由與國際間的反恐合作持續在反恐建設上加強作為，鞏固政權及確保經由陸路運輸的石油氣管道安全，是當前對新疆最重要及緊迫的任務;其發展對中共的能源安全戰略、擴大與中亞、南亞的能源合作、保持邊疆穩定具有十分重要價值，使得新疆作為中共石油資源戰略接替區的戰略地位更加明朗。 / While energy consumption rises significantly with the rapid economic growth, China becomes self-insufficient in all kinds of fossil fuel, such as oil and natural gas, except coal, and depends more and more on imported resources, accordingly. China exports its energy resources from the Middle East mostly, however, stable supply from this area cannot be promised. First of all, many oil-producing countries in the Middle East suffer from regime transitions; secondly, the problem of pirate in the offshore Somalia and the Gulf of Aden cannot be overcome, and it would be highly inconvenient if the sea lines through the Strait of Malacca were interrupted. Therefore, China began to construct the first gas interstate pipeline in Central Asia, which starts from Turkmenistan, central Uzbekistan, southern Kazakhstan, and enters China through the border city in Xinjian Uyghur Autonomous region, Horgos. Until mid-April 2014, this pipeline has delivered 50 billion cbm natural from Central Asia to China. However, this region, located in the Northwest China with 5,600 borderline, has been a disturbing issue for China because of conflict among ethnic and religious minorities and Chinese people. In order to maintain the stability in the economy, society and diverse ethnics in the border, China practices several policies, such as stabilization and counter-terrorism, to suppress the independence activity by Islamic extremists in Uyghuristan. Additionally, is important for China to secure the pipeline through Central Asia and the local governance by counter-terrorism with international cooperation. Therefore, Xinjian has strategic value for China regarding energy security, not just for the resource access to Central Asia, but also for the cooperation in South Asia. Central Asia, energy security, land pipeline, stabilization in Xinjian