Grain quality in chickpea (<i>Cicer arietinum</i> L.) is a major factor affecting its consumption for human nutrition and health benefits. Some of the major factors affecting chickpea grain quality are: seed weight, size, colour, protein, starch and amylose concentration, and amylopectin structure. The objectives of this study were to: 1) determine variation, repeatability and genotype by environment interaction on thousand seed weight, starch, amylose and protein concentration of chickpea cultivars adapted to western Canada; 2) assess variations in global chickpea germplasm for thousand seed weight, seed size, protein, starch and amylose concentrations; and 3) characterize the desi and kabuli type chickpea for starch concentration, composition, and amylopectin structure to study their effect on starch enzymatic hydrolysis. Limited variation was observed in seed composition of chickpea cultivars adapted to the western Canadian prairies. Significant genotype by environment interaction occurred for starch, amylose, and protein (except for kabuli) concentrations, seed yield and thousand seed weight indicating that testing over a wide range of environments is needed to identify genotypes for grain quality improvement. Repeatability of starch, amylose, and protein concentrations was low and inconsistent across chickpea market classes. Broad sense heritability was higher than repeatability across all traits for all market classes implying that repeatability estimates do not set upper limits to heritability if significant genotype by environment interaction is present. The negative relationship between seed constituents and yield indicates that selection for chickpea cultivars with desired seed composition may require compromise with yield and indirect selection. All the mini core accessions that had above average seed diameter score in both desi and kabuli also had above average score for thousand seed weight. Selecting mini core with promising intrinsic and extrinsic quality characteristics may reduce yield. Slowly digestible starch was negatively correlated with hydrolysis index in both pure starch and meal starch of desi and kabuli. Amylose had a strong relationship with resistant starch but not with rate of starch hydrolysis. Genotypes with a significantly higher rate of starch hydrolysis had significantly lower 60-80 µm starch granule size volume. Amylopectin B2 chains were related to slowly digestible starch of meal (except kabuli) and extracted starch. Resistant starch positively correlated with B1 fraction of amylopectin chain length in both desi and kabuli meal starch. Our results suggest that there is no major difference between starch composition in the two chickpea market classes, although only three genotypes of each class were tested. The meal components affect the starch hydrolytic properties and the effect is genotype specific. The results also show that amylopectin structure influences starch hydrolytic properties. These observations emphasize that complete characterization of seed components is needed to obtain meaningful results regarding the desired nutritional and health benefits attributed to any grain.

Grain quality in chickpea (<i>Cicer arietinum</i> L.) is a major factor affecting its consumption for human nutrition and health benefits. Some of the major factors affecting chickpea grain quality are: seed weight, size, colour, protein, starch and amylose concentration, and amylopectin structure. The objectives of this study were to: 1) determine variation, repeatability and genotype by environment interaction on thousand seed weight, starch, amylose and protein concentration of chickpea cultivars adapted to western Canada; 2) assess variations in global chickpea germplasm for thousand seed weight, seed size, protein, starch and amylose concentrations; and 3) characterize the desi and kabuli type chickpea for starch concentration, composition, and amylopectin structure to study their effect on starch enzymatic hydrolysis. Limited variation was observed in seed composition of chickpea cultivars adapted to the western Canadian prairies. Significant genotype by environment interaction occurred for starch, amylose, and protein (except for kabuli) concentrations, seed yield and thousand seed weight indicating that testing over a wide range of environments is needed to identify genotypes for grain quality improvement. Repeatability of starch, amylose, and protein concentrations was low and inconsistent across chickpea market classes. Broad sense heritability was higher than repeatability across all traits for all market classes implying that repeatability estimates do not set upper limits to heritability if significant genotype by environment interaction is present. The negative relationship between seed constituents and yield indicates that selection for chickpea cultivars with desired seed composition may require compromise with yield and indirect selection. All the mini core accessions that had above average seed diameter score in both desi and kabuli also had above average score for thousand seed weight. Selecting mini core with promising intrinsic and extrinsic quality characteristics may reduce yield. Slowly digestible starch was negatively correlated with hydrolysis index in both pure starch and meal starch of desi and kabuli. Amylose had a strong relationship with resistant starch but not with rate of starch hydrolysis. Genotypes with a significantly higher rate of starch hydrolysis had significantly lower 60-80 µm starch granule size volume. Amylopectin B2 chains were related to slowly digestible starch of meal (except kabuli) and extracted starch. Resistant starch positively correlated with B1 fraction of amylopectin chain length in both desi and kabuli meal starch. Our results suggest that there is no major difference between starch composition in the two chickpea market classes, although only three genotypes of each class were tested. The meal components affect the starch hydrolytic properties and the effect is genotype specific. The results also show that amylopectin structure influences starch hydrolytic properties. These observations emphasize that complete characterization of seed components is needed to obtain meaningful results regarding the desired nutritional and health benefits attributed to any grain.

Roughness is an important indicator of pavement riding comfort and safety. It is a condition indicator that should be carefully considered when evaluating primary pavements. At the same time, the use of roughness measurements plays a critical role in the pavement management system.There are many devices used for roughness evaluation. The major tools used for road roughness quantify are the road profilers. In the thesis research, in order to obtain useful pavement surface condition data for pavement evaluation, an inertial based pavement roughness measuring system was developed with the combination of modern sensor technology and computer technology. The research will focus on the development of new method to get the profile in order to improve the repeatability of the inertial based pavement roughness system, the hardware design and the software development which is used for data sampling and data analysis. Finally maximum entropy spectral analysis method was used to evalu ate the road profile spectrum.In order to get evaluate the accuracy and correction of the laser profiler system, different roughness devices (including Dipstick, direct type profiler and the laser profiler developed) were operated in the test sites. The research focused on several performance measures, such as repeatability (before and after new method analysis), impact of operating speed and sample interval, correlativity and etc. IRI from these devices were analyzed to evaluate the correlativity between these devices. Some regression models were developed in this research. Test results show that the new method can improve the repeatability of the profiler system. The laser profiler system has good repeatability and the operating speed and sample interval do not have a significant impact on the inertial based roughness measuring system. With the reliable results, the system is ready to be used in the field application within the speed and sample interval range. Through the spectrum an alysis, it shows that the spectrum has a qualitative relation with pavement roughness conditions.

Establishing a valid, reliable, and objective method for determining the number of functioning motor units in a muscle is important clinically, as it would provide a quantitative means of documenting changes in neuromuscular health over time. This thesis addressed the reliability of motor unit number estimates (MUNEs) derived using decomposition-based quantitative electromyography (DQEMG) from the extensor digitorum brevis (EDB) and abductor hallucis (AH) muscles. Additionally, the effect of the mean surface motor unit potential (SMUP) parameter averaging method (arithmetic/ensemble), the size-related parameter used to calculate MUNE (amplitude/area), and the type of SMUP marker editing (automatic/manual) was investigated in terms of MUNE values. Two separate analyses on a single data set collected from twenty healthy subjects on two occasions were conducted. MUNEs were calculated by dividing a size-related parameter (amplitude/area) of the compound muscle action potential (CMAP) by the same size-related parameter of a representative mean SMUP. First, paired t-tests investigated differences in MUNEs calculated using arithmetic and ensemble averaged SMUP parameters. Within- and between-day reliability of the two measurements was established using intra-class correlation coefficients (ICCs), coefficients of variation (CV), mean absolute differences (MAD), and Bland Altman limits of agreement (LOA). Second, MUNEs (using both parameters) derived from automated and manually edited SMUPs were compared. The effect of the size-related parameter and editing type was identified using a two-factor, repeated measures analysis of variance. Reliability was determined as described above. Arithmetic averaged SMUP parameters produced smaller MUNEs than those derived from ensemble averaging (p<0.001). SMUP area produced higher MUNEs than SMUP amplitude (p<0.05), except when using arithmetic averaged parameters in AH. Interaction effects between editing type and size parameter were present in both muscles (F>6.68, p<0.001). Between-day MUNEs had lower CVs and MADs, higher ICCs, and narrower LOAs than within-day MUNEs. MUNEs derived from arithmetic averaged SMUP parameters showed the highest reliability (ICCs>0.91). MUNEs calculated from automated SMUP marker placements were highly correlated (r>0.86) and displayed comparable reliabilities to those derived from manual marker placement (ICCs>0.90). To optimize the reproducibility of MUNEs calculated using DQEMG, while minimizing processing time, between-day automated estimates using arithmetic averaged SMUP amplitude is recommended. / Thesis (Master, Rehabilitation Science) -- Queen's University, 2012-08-30 08:32:06.141

Purpose: The aim of the present study was to compare and investigate morphometric characteristics of limbal vasculature within the superior and inferior limbal regions using ultra-high resolution optical coherence tomography. Method: Cross-sectional images of the human corneo-scleral limbus were acquired with a research grade ultra-high resolution optical coherence tomographer (UHR-OCT) from 14 healthy subjects after manual retraction of the upper and lower eyelid. The UHR-OCT provides an axial and lateral resolution in biological tissue of ~3μm and ~18μm, respectively. 3D stacks of OCT images (1000 x 1024 x 256) were acquired of the transition from cornea to bulbar conjunctiva at the superior and inferior limbal region. All visible vessels within the limbal region were measured using an Image J circle or ellipse tool. Vessel depth and size measurements were repeated for the same vessel and the concordance correlation coefficient was computed. Quantitative differences in vessel size and depth in the limbal region were analyzed using repeated measured ANOVA. R and SPSS were used for all data analysis procedures. Results: The average vessel size for superior and inferior limbus were 29.28µm ± 17.649 µm (SD) and 23.68µm ± 18.118µm (SD) respectively. The average vessel depth for superior and inferior limbus were 176.76µm ± 108.698µm (SD) and 205.62µm ± 131.991µm (SD) respectively. The concordance correlation coefficient for superior and inferior limbal vessel size were 0.95 (95% CI, 0.935 to 0.964) and 0.994 (95% CI, 0.991 to 0.995) respectively, while that of vessel depth were 0.998 (95% CI, 0.997 to 0.999) and 0.998 (95% CI, 0.997 to 0.998) respectively. The vessels within the superior limbus were larger than the vessels found in the inferior limbus (RM-ANOVA POS p = 0.004), and the vessels within the inferior limbus were on average deeper than the vessels found within the superior limbus (RM-ANOVA POS p = 0.042). There was a positive linear relationship between limbal vessel depth and size within the superior and inferior limbus with a Pearson correlation coefficient of 0.803 and 0.754, respectively. There were on average 9 vessels per subject within the superior limbal region as compared to 13 vessels per subject with the inferior limbal region. Conclusion: This study provided evidence that the UHR-OCT was capable of imaging (and therefore measuring) morphometric characteristics such as the size and depth of vessels within the limbus in a repeatable manner. A positive linear association between vessel depth and size was identified in the superior and inferior limbal regions. The results of this study suggest a definite difference in the size and depth of vessels across different positions of the limbus, and this may be indicative of adaptations to chronic hypoxia caused by the constant covering of the superior limbus by the upper eyelid.

No description available.

The calibration of modern internal combustion engines requires ever improving measurement data quality such that they comply with increasingly stringent emissions legislation. This study establishes methodology and a software tool to improve the quality of steady-state emissions measurements from engine dynamometer tests. Literature shows state of the art instrumentation are necessary to monitor the cycle-by-cycle variations that significantly alter emissions measurements. Test methodologies that consider emissions formation mechanisms invariably focus on thermal transients and preconditioning of internal surfaces. This work sought data quality improvements using three principle approaches. An adapted steady-state identifier to more reliably indicate when the test conditions reached steady-state; engine preconditioning to reduce the influence of the prior day’s operating conditions on the measurements; and test point ordering to reduce measurement deviation. Selection of an improved steady-state indicator was identified using correlations in test data. It was shown by repeating forty steady-state test points that a more robust steady-state indicator has the potential to reduce the measurement deviation of particulate number by 6%, unburned hydrocarbons by 24%, carbon monoxide by 10% and oxides of nitrogen by 29%. The variation of emissions measurements from those normally observed at a repeat baseline test point were significantly influenced by varying the preconditioning power. Preconditioning at the baseline operating condition converged emissions measurements with the mean of those typically observed. Changing the sequence of steady-state test points caused significant differences in the measured engine performance. Examining the causes of measurement deviation allowed an optimised test point sequencing method to be developed. A 30% reduction in measurement deviation of a targeted engine response (particulate number emissions) was obtained using the developed test methodology. This was achieved by selecting an appropriate steady-state indicator and sequencing test points. The benefits of preconditioning were deemed short-lived and impractical to apply in every-day engine testing although the principles were considered when developing the sequencing methodology.

Assessment and diagnosis of dry eye disease (DED) is a challenging task. The conventional ways of diagnosing DED are problematic due to their invasiveness, poor test reliability and significant test duration. Previously, ocular surface thermography has been shown to be able to detect early inflammation and dry eye. However, its diagnostic ability and ocular temperature metrics that can best diagnose DED are not clear. The objectives of this thesis were manyfold. First, the prevalence of dry eye in Singapore population was investigated as a helpful basis for the rest of the project. A cross-sectional dry eye survey was carried out using McMonnies dry eye questionnaire. Members of the public were interviewed at 46 (out of 62) selected mass rapid transit stations in Singapore and its vicinity. 1004 questionnaires were collected from participants aged 15 - 83 years and various ethnicity. Prevalence of symptomatic dry eye (SDE) was found to be 12.3% (about 0.5 million Singaporeans). Risk factors associated with SDE were found to be age, gender, ethnicity, hypertension and contact lens wear. Smoking was not associated with SDE.The main part of this thesis sought to evaluate the efficacy of ocular thermography in diagnosing DED. A new infrared detector (NEC Thermo Tracer TH 9260) with relatively high resolution was used. Inter-image, inter-occasion and inter-examiner repeatability was first studied on 21 healthy and 15 DED subjects. Ocular surface marking and ocular surface temperature (OST) acquisition was performed with a novel 'diamond' method using a custom-designed OST analysis V2 software. Ten out of the twelve tested OST indices were shown to be highly repeatable for three studied time points: 0 s, 5 s and 10 s. They were temperatures of the geometric center of the cornea (GCC), mean temperature (MOST) of the region of interest (ROI), maximum (MaxT) and minimum (MinT) temperatures of the ROI, extreme temporal (T1) and nasal conjunctiva (T4), mid temporal (CT) and nasal conjunctiva (CN) and temporal (LT) and nasal limbal (LN). Another 62 DED and 63 age- and sex-matched controls were then recruited and the ten static and dynamic OST indices were evaluated. Static measures were study of absolute OST at t = 0 s, 5 s and 10 s after eye opening. Dynamic measures were study of mean change and net change in OST over 10 s of sustained eye opening. Static measures on eight OST indices (GCC, MOST, MinT, MaxT, T4, CT, LT and LN) at t = 0 s, 5 s and 10 s and dynamic measures on two OST indices (T4 at 3 s onward and MaxT at 5 s onward) were found to be valuable in detecting DED. The temperature metrics (static and dynamic) were identified for further investigation. Thereafter, the diagnostic ability of the temperature metrics were evaluated singly and as combinations in terms of their area under the curve (AUC), Youden index and discrimination power. Receiver operating characteristic curves were plotted for each metric. Best detectors for DED were found to be the T4 temperature metrics: particularly T4-5 and T4-10 (i.e. absolute temperature of the extreme nasal conjunctiva at 5 s and 10 s). Values of T4-5 of < 34.8 °C were found to give sensitivity and specificity of 87.1% and 50.8% respectively and values of T4-10 of < 34.6 °C were found to give sensitivity and specificity of 77.6% and 61.9% respectively. The two temperature metrics had highest Youden index as compared to other metrics and were shown to be useful in view of AUC > 70% but of limited performance in view of their discrimination power. Nevertheless, measuring T4-5 and T4-10 was found to be comparable to other conventional methods for DED. T4-10 was better than T4-5 in view of higher AUC and Youden index. None of the tested dynamic metrics was good detector for DED and combining metrics were not able to increase the diagnostic ability. The last part of this thesis was to validate the effectiveness of some common conventional dry eye tests, to study their correlation with T4 temperature metrics and derive the best composite/combined tests for DED. Sixty two DED patients and 82 controls were studied. The conventional clinical tests examined were: symptom evaluation using McMonnies dry eye questionnaire (Mscore) and symptom count (Scount), fluorescein break-up time (FBUT) and corneal epithelial staining (CES), non-invasive break-up time (NIBUT) and tear meniscus height (TMH). Mscore and Scount was the best detectors for DED, followed by FBUT and CES. Discordance between signs and symptoms for DED was further confirmed. Combining CES with T4-10 (series) can be future objective tests for DED. Further research is warranted, particularly to (1) validate the ability of T4-10 as a stand-alone test for DED and (2) work out an algorithm and validate the diagnostic ability of the recommended combined test (CES and T4-10) using newly recruited subjects.

A competitividade no mercado atual, aliado a uma demanda por qualidade e produtividade dos produtos, tem gerado um aumento significativo no emprego de robôs nos processos produtivos das indústrias. Entretanto, estes equipamentos estão sujeitos a apresentar problemas, mais especificamente, erros de exatidão e repetitividade em suas operações. Nesse contexto, a proposta deste trabalho consiste em aperfeiçoar o entendimento da metodologia existente para avaliação de desempenho de robôs industriais, apresentada pela norma ISO 9283, "Manipulating industrial robots - Performance criteria and related test methods", de modo a viabilizar sua aplicabilidade em testes instrumentalizados para robôs industriais. O dispositivo de avaliação de desempenho elaborado consiste num sistema conhecido como cubo-berço, projetado, construído e aplicado em um robô industrial, pertencente ao laboratório de usinagem e robótica da Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul - UFRGS. As características de exatidão e repetitividade unidirecionais de posicionamento foram mensuradas experimentalmente com base nos critérios constantes na norma específica. Os dados foram obtidos da medição dos erros tridimensionais entre as posições atingidas nos ensaios e as posições programadas no robô de teste, através de um sistema de medição prático e de baixo custo. O dispositivo de medição é constituído por três relógios digitais, montados ortogonalmente em cada eixo do sistema de coordenadas do robô, sob uma estrutura metálica rígida, e conectados a um sistema informatizado, para a coleta e registro dos dados. Os resultados apresentados se mostraram satisfatórios, viabilizando o uso da metodologia apresentada na norma, assim como, do dispositivo de avaliação de desempenho projetado neste estudo. / The competitiveness in the current market, ally to a demand for quality and productivity of the products, has generated a significant increase in the job of robots in the productive processes of the industries. However, these equipments can present some problems, more specifically, errors precision and repeatability errors in operations. The proposal of this paper consists of perfecting the agreement of the existing methodology for evaluation of industrial robots performance, presented for norm ISO 9283, "Manipulating industrial robots - Performance criteria and related test methods", to make possible its applicability in instrumentation tests for industrial robots. The projected device consists of a known system as cube-cradle, projected, constructed and applied in an industrial robot installed on the robotics laboratory of the Rio Grande do Sul Federal University - UFRGS. The precision and repeatability characteristics of positioning had been experimentally measures on the constant criteria basis in the specific norm. The data had been gotten of the three-dimensional measurement errors between the test positions reached and the robot programmed positions, through a practical measurement system and low cost. The measurement device is constituted by three digital gages, assembled in each axle of the robot coordinate basis system, under a metallic structure, and connected to a electronic system, for the data collection and registers. The presented results had shown satisfactory, making possible the use of the methodology presented in the norm, as well, of the projected device of performance evaluation in this study.

Various aspects of performance (e.g., sprint speed, grip strength) are thought to be important determinants of the success of animals in natural activities such as foraging, mating, and escaping from predators. However, it is generally known that morphological properties enhancing one type of performance (e.g., speed) can lead to a reduction in another (e.g., strength). Such performance trade-offs have been quantified at the inter-specific level, but evidence at the inter-individual level remains equivocal. To test for the presence of a performance trade-off, I initiated a study on wild white-footed mice (Peromyscus leucopus). In summer 2016, I captured a total of 186 individuals, 87 of which were repeatedly phenotyped for grip strength and sprint speed. A significant positive relationship was found between body mass and grip strength (but not for sprint speed). Individual differences in performance were repeatable through time for both grip strength and sprint speed. Using a bivariate mixed model, I detected a significant negative correlation between grip strength and sprint speed at the among-individual level. By contrast, the within-individual correlation between grip strength and sprint speed tended to be positive, suggesting that some unquantified aspects of the mouse phenotype (e.g., body condition, age) may have a positive effect on both performance traits. Given the relatively low repeatability of grip strength and sprint speed, a failure to properly partition the correlation at the among- and within-individual level generates a counter-intuitive, positive correlation. This study is one the first to detect a performance trade-off at the among-individual level in a wild animal population.