This thesis deals with the redundancy of employees and then providing outplacement services. The aim is to understand and analyze the services of outplacement provided by consulting organization Tres Consulting, Ltd. The work is divided into three parts. The first part describes the theoretical background to the planning of human resources, the possibility of redundancy and subsequent assistance to redundant employees. The second part consists of research of EQUAL association focused on knowledge of the concept outplacement in Prague and Usti nad Labem. The third part of the thesis is an interview at Tres consulting company. Topics are continually commented and evaluated during this interview.

MOSPD1 belongs to a class of proteins that have a major sperm protein (MSP) domain at the N terminus and two transmembrane domains at the C terminus and are thought to act as membrane adaptor proteins. Previous work in the laboratory indicated that the closely related, mammalian-specific, Mospd 3 plays a role in the development and function of the heart as homozygous Mospd 3 gene trap neonates displayed a right ventricle defect characterised by a thinning of the right ventricle wall. The function of Mospd 1 is not known. Whilst Mospd 3 is mammalian specific Mospd 1 is conserved in all vertebrates including Danio rerio (zebrafish). The aims of this thesis were to investigate the possibility of genetic redundancy between Mospd 1 and Mospd 3 by identifying the sub-cellular localisation of MOSPD1 and MOSPD3 in both cells and tissues and to investigate the function of MOSPD1. Mouse monoclonal antibodies specific for MOSPD1 and MOSPD3 were generated and tested to ensure they did not cross react. MOSPD1 was found to be localised to the nucleus whilst MOSPD3 was located in the nucleus and cytoplasm. The sub-cellular localisation of these proteins changes during the cell cycle as they were localised to the cytoplasm during cell division, possible due to the breakdown of the nuclear membrane during cell division. To investigate the function of Mospd 1 during early development Mospd 1 gene expression was knocked down using morpholino anti-sense knockdown technology. A morpholino was generated against the splice-site between exons 2 and 3 of the zebrafish Mospd 1 gene and injected into early embryos. At doses that significantly reduced the level of Mospd 1, to below 50 %, the embryos developed normally and did not exhibit any gross morphological phenotypes when compared to both noninjected and 5 mispair control morpholino-injected embryos. A morpholino targeted to the start site of the Mospd 1 gene confirmed the lack of a gross morphological phenotype. In conjunction with the zebrafish functional tests the tools were generated to assess the role of Mospd 1 in a mammalian system. A conditional allele of Mospd 1 was generated in mouse embryonic stem (ES) cells which could be used to generate a conditional Mospd 1 mouse. The electroporation of a Cre recombinase plasmid into the conditional Mospd 1 ES cell line resulted in the generation of Mospd 1 null ES clones which could be used for functional studies both in vitro and in vivo. The Mospd 1 null ES cells were able to self-renew, expressed ES cell specific markers and were able to differentiate into cardiomyocytes. However, Mospd 1 null cells showed a reduced ability to differentiate into osteoblasts compared to wild type cells and showed changes in the expression of genes involved in Epithelial to mesenchymal transition (EMT) indicating Mospd 1 may be involved in this process.

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This thesis defines the Energy Balance Load ( BL E ) as the difference between the heating requirements plus the electric gains in the building and the cooling coil loads. It then applies a first law energy balance in conjunction with the concepts of analytical redundancy (AR) and trend checking to demonstrate that measured values of BL E can be compared with the simulated characteristic ambient temperature-based BL E to serve as a useful tool to identify bad data. Uncertainty and sensitivity analysis are introduced to analyze the impact of each building or system parameter to the simulated values of BL E . A Visual Basic for Application (VBA) program has been developed through this research work, which applies the methodology illustrated in this thesis to automatically prescreen the measured building energy consumption data with the inputs of several key parameters. Through case studies of six on-campus buildings, the methodology and the program successfully identified monitored consumption data that appears to be erroneous, which may result from incorrect scale factors of the sensors and the operational changes to the building that may enormously affect the key parameters as the simulation inputs. Finally, suggestions are given for the on-line diagnostics of sensor signals.

As technology continues to scale to smaller geometries and newer dimensions (3-D), with increasingly complex manufacturing processes, the ability to reliably manufacture 100% defect-free circuitry becomes a significant challenge. While implementing additional circuitry to improve yield is economically justifiable, this thesis addresses the cost of defect tolerance by providing lower cost solutions or alternatively more defect tolerance for the same cost in state-of-the-art ICs, including three-dimensional ICs (3-D ICs). Conventional defect tolerance techniques involve incorporating redundancy into the design. This thesis introduces novel designs to maximize the utility of spare elements with minimal circuitry overhead, thereby improving the yield. One idea proposed is Selective Row Partitioning (SRP), a technique which allows a single spare column to be used to repair multiple defective cells in multiple columns. This is done by selectively decoding the row address bits when generating the select signals for the column multiplexers. This logically segments the spare column allowing it to replace different columns in different partitions of the row address space. All the chips are identical, but fuses are used to customize the row decoding circuitry on a chip-by-chip basis. An implementation procedure and results are presented which show improvement in overall yield at a minimal overhead cost. Moreover, new yield-enhancing design techniques for 3-D ICs are introduced. When assembling a 3-D IC, there are several degrees of freedom including which die are stacked together, in what order, and with what rotational symmetry. This thesis describes strategies for exploiting these degrees of freedom to reduce the cost and complexity of implementing defect tolerance. One strategy is to enable asymmetric repair capability within a 3-D memory stack by exploiting the degree of freedom that the order of the die in the stack can be selected. This technique optimizes the number of fuses, and in some cases, the number of spares as well, required to implement defect tolerance. Another innovative technique is to exploit rotational symmetry of the dies to do implicit reconfiguration to implement defect tolerance. Results show that leakage power and performance overhead for defect tolerance can be significantly reduced by this technique. / text

Electromigration is re-emerging as a significant problem in modern integrated circuits (IC). Especially in power-grids, due to shrinking wire widths and increasing current densities, there is little or no margin left between the predicted EM stress and that allowed by the EM design rules. Statistical Electromigration Budgeting estimates the reliability of the grid by considering it as a series system. However, a power grid with its many parallel paths has much inherent redundancy. In this work, we propose a new model to estimate the MTF and reliability of the power grid under the influence of EM, which accounts for these redundancies. To implement the mesh model, we also develop a framework to estimate the change in statistics of an interconnect as its effective-EM current varies. The results indicate that the series model gives a pessimistic estimate of power grid MTF by a factor of 3-4.

ABSTRACT Introduction: Human newborn and animal studies provide support for the intersensory redundancy hypothesis, which posits that learning is more effective when information is presented simultaneously in two modalities than one alone. Whether the same is true in the human fetus is unknown and was examined in this study. Methods: 63 low-risk fetuses (≥36 weeks gestation) were randomly assigned to one of 6 experimental groups: each group included one of 3 stimulus conditions [unimodal (music), unimodal (maternal sway) or bimodal (music and maternal sway)], and one of 2 pieces of music (music A, 4/4 time; music B, 3/4 time) composed for the study. Laboratory pre-testing included a 2 min no-music, 2 min music (A or B), 2 min no-music observation while fetal heart rate (FHR) and body movements were recorded. Subsequently, mothers carried out the assigned intervention at home, twice a day for 5 days. On day 6, laboratory testing was repeated first with the familiar (A or B) and then the novel music. Results: The initial testing showed a difference between Music A and Music B, F (1, 61) = 8.203, p <.01, where FHR decreased to Music A and increased to Music B. The same FHR response was found when fetuses were exposed to the opposite music for the first time in the novelty testing, F (1, 44) = 4.543, p <.05, following intervention. Music A elicited a response in both the unimodal music only and sway only groups, F (29, 203) = 1.871, p < .01, and F (29, 174) = 1.818, p < .01, respectively. In music B only the multimodal group showed an effect of intervention, F = (29, 203) = 1.914, p < .005. Conclusions: Fetal response to music A and B was qualitatively different. During pretesting, FHR decreased to music A and increased to music B. When the stimulus elicited an attention response (FHR decrease) learning was observed in both the unimodal or multimodal conditions. This is seen with music A (4/4 time) music where the fetus learns the stimulus. When the stimulus did not elicit a FHR decrease (Music B, 3/4 time), there was evidence that a multimodal stimulus was more effective providing some support for the intersensory redundancy hypothesis. / Thesis (Master, Nursing) -- Queen's University, 2007-10-18 16:52:55.68

Electromigration is re-emerging as a significant problem in modern integrated circuits (IC). Especially in power-grids, due to shrinking wire widths and increasing current densities, there is little or no margin left between the predicted EM stress and that allowed by the EM design rules. Statistical Electromigration Budgeting estimates the reliability of the grid by considering it as a series system. However, a power grid with its many parallel paths has much inherent redundancy. In this work, we propose a new model to estimate the MTF and reliability of the power grid under the influence of EM, which accounts for these redundancies. To implement the mesh model, we also develop a framework to estimate the change in statistics of an interconnect as its effective-EM current varies. The results indicate that the series model gives a pessimistic estimate of power grid MTF by a factor of 3-4.

In today’s business environment, cost-cutting practices such as downsizing and layoffs remains a widespread phenomenon. Although, the understanding of the effects that these practices has on the remaining individuals, defined as the survivors, is poor. The focus in this paper is therefore to examine how survivors of layoffs can be affected on an individual level, and by what causes. The study was conducted using open-ended, qualitative interviews with three individuals with different experiences of layoffs. The empirical data was analyzed by extracting quotations from the interviews. The study found that layoffs affected the morale and attitude towards management of the individual, and that perceived justice and uncertainty are two causes of negative effects from layoffs.

Maintenance management is to design, operate, and maintain the reliability and availability of assets at a required performance level using the lowest possible cost. The standby redundancy is one of the means to achieve highly reliable system with less dependable units. As commonly used performance indicator, the reliability and availability should be precisely analysed for a repairable standby system. The reliability of a standby system is mainly studied in the framework of lifetime approach. Most existing models are developed for a two-unit standby system and a Kout- of-N system with identical units. The system units are assumed to be binary-state and the failures of system units are modelled as sudden failures. The deteriorations of units are modelled as time-dependent failure rate and are assumed to be independent. In addition, most of the existing models do not consider maintenance is carried out on the system. In reality, the deteriorations and the resultant failures in real-world systems are often interactive with each other. The systems normally experience several, often imperfect, restorations before a complete renewal. Therefore, the study of different repair policies, such as opportunistic and individual policies, in multi-unit systems need also be investigated. To address the problem, the reliability and availability models for a 2-out-of-3 cold standby system will be studied in a multi-state system reliability framework. A multistate multi-path failure mode is proposed to model the interactive deteriorations. The concept of repair matrix will be adopted to model the effect of unit level restorations on system reliability. The availabilities under individual repair policy and opportunistic repair policy will be developed.