<p>Smith theory provides powerful tools for understanding the geometry of singular sets of group actions on spheres. In this thesis, tools from Smith theory and spectral sequences are brought together to study the singular sets of elementary abelian groups acting locally linearly on S4. It is shown that the singular sets of such actions are homeomorphic to the singular sets of linear actions. A short review of the literature on group actions on S4 is included.</p> / Master of Science (MSc)

Zur Prozessmessung in Flüssigkeiten wird ein Konzept vorgestellt, das mittels miniaturisierter Sensorkugeln eine ortsveränderliche Aufnahme von Prozessmesssignalen – z. B. der Temperatur – ermöglicht und diese kontinuierlich aus dem Reaktionsvolumen an eine Basisstation überträgt. Das System beinhaltet nicht nur die Miniaturisierung der Messstelle auf einen Kugeldurchmesser von 7,8 mm sondern auch die Abstimmung der Gesamtdichte auf die Prozessbedingungen, um eine gleichmäßige Verteilung der Messpunkte auf das gesamte Reaktionsvolumen zu ermöglichen. Für die Verwendung im Bioprozess wurde eine bio-inerte Kapselung für die gesamte Messelektronik entwickelt und die Funktionstüchtigkeit in mehreren Bioreaktorsystemen demonstriert. Das Messsystem wird mit einer induktiv wieder aufladbaren Energiequelle betrieben und hat eine Reichweite von mehr als 30 cm durch die Flüssigkeitssäule.

Zur Prozessmessung in Flüssigkeiten wird ein Konzept vorgestellt, das mittels miniaturisierter Sensorkugeln eine ortsveränderliche Aufnahme von Prozessmesssignalen – z. B. der Temperatur – ermöglicht und diese kontinuierlich aus dem Reaktionsvolumen an eine Basisstation überträgt. Das System beinhaltet nicht nur die Miniaturisierung der Messstelle auf einen Kugeldurchmesser von 7,8 mm sondern auch die Abstimmung der Gesamtdichte auf die Prozessbedingungen, um eine gleichmäßige Verteilung der Messpunkte auf das gesamte Reaktionsvolumen zu ermöglichen. Für die Verwendung im Bioprozess wurde eine bio-inerte Kapselung für die gesamte Messelektronik entwickelt und die Funktionstüchtigkeit in mehreren Bioreaktorsystemen demonstriert. Das Messsystem wird mit einer induktiv wieder aufladbaren Energiequelle betrieben und hat eine Reichweite von mehr als 30 cm durch die Flüssigkeitssäule.

Made available in DSpace on 2015-05-15T11:46:10Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 arquivototal.pdf: 440995 bytes, checksum: d194a6a60d04b251160ec2e62f106e77 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2011-06-10 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior - CAPES / In this work, we will do some applications of the Moving Spheres method, a variant of the method of Moving Planes, in order to obtain some Liouville-type theorems and some Harnack-type inequalities in Rn, as well as in the Euclidian half space Rn +. Our study focuses on, mostly, in the article written by Yan Yan Li and Lei Zhan [32], as well as some references of the same article. We concentrate in studying some properties of positive solutions of some semilinear elliptic partial differential equations with critical exponent and giving different proofs, improvements, and extensions of some previously established Liouville-type theorems and Harnack-type inequalities. / Neste trabalho, faremos algumas aplicações do método Moving Spheres, uma variante do método Moving Planes, na obtenção de alguns teoremas tipo Liouville e de algumas desigualdades tipo Harnack em Rn, bem como no semi-espaço euclidiano Rn +. Nosso estudo se concentra, marjoritariamente, no artigo do Yan Yan Li e Lei Zhang [32], bem como algumas referências do mesmo. Nos concentramos em estudar propriedades de soluções positivas de algumas equações diferenciais parciais elípticas semilineares com expoente crítico e dar provas diversificadas, refinamentos e extensões de alguns Teoremas tipo Liouville e desigualdades tipo Harnack já estabelecidos.

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This thesis investigates the underlying causes of friction and ine ciency within an internal combustion engine, focusing on the ring-liner conjunction in the vicinity of the power-stroke top dead centre reversal. In such lubricated contacts, friction is the result of the interplay between numerous kinetics, with those at micro- and nano-scale interactions being signi cantly di erent than the ones at larger scales. A modi ed Elrod's cavitation algorithm is developed to determine the microscopic tribological characteristics of the piston ring-liner contact. Predicting lubricant tran- sient behaviour is critical when the inlet reversal leads to thin lms and inherent metal-to-metal interaction. The model clearly shows that cavitation at the trailing edge of the ring-liner contact generated pre-reversal, persists after reversal and pro- motes starvation and depletion of the oil lm. Hence, this will lead to boundary friction. A fractal based boundary friction model is developed for lightly loaded asperity con- tacts, separated by diminishing small lms, usually wetted by a layer of molecules adsorbed to the tips of the asperities. In nano-scale conjunctions, a lubricant layering e ect often takes place due to the smoothness of surfaces, which is governed by the surface and lubricant properties. A molecularly thin layer of lubricant molecules can adhere to the asperities, being the last barrier against direct surface contact. As a result, boundary friction (prevailing in such diminishing gaps) is actually determined by a combination of shearing of a thin adsorbed lm, adhesion of approaching as- perities and their plastic deformation. A model for physio-chemical hydrodynamic mechanism is successfully established, describing the formation of thin adsorbed lms between asperities. This model is e ectively integrated with separately devel- oped models that predict the adhesive and plastic contact of asperities.

People´s access to safe health care is not as common as one might think. Today with new and different health insurances and improved health policies people should in theory have safe health care. Although numerous of health insurances exist, targeting large parts of populations, there are still many issues with them. The Behavioural Model of Health Services Use and Separate Spheres are the two theories that are used in this study. Where Separate Spheres describes men´s and women´s separate worlds, their responsibilities in them and how it effects them and the Behavioural Model of Health Services Use, which describes factors that either impede or enable people’s access to health care utilization. This study´s purpose is to see what different perceptions men and women have about the insurance and how these perceptions can affect families’ choice to enroll to the insurance. The study uses a qualitative approach and is based on semi-structured interviews. Results in this study showed that men and women have very different perceptions about the insurance. Men want the insurance because they want to save money and decrease health expenses. While women wants the insurance for their children to always have access to health care. The roles between men and women in households are significant and their different responsibilities affect their priorities and perceptions.

During the synthesis of well arrayed nano/micro structures through wet chemical methods, plenty of parameters are usually involved. Consequently, it is extremely time- and cost-consuming to find out the optimized synthesis conditions by using the conventional "changing one separate factor at a time" (COST) strategy. Instead, the "statistical experimental design" method has been proven in a few works to be an efficient method for experiments involving many parameters.  With this method, the responses could be optimized efficiently by using only a few experiments. Besides, several responses can be optimized simultaneously. Also, models could be built up and the changing tendency can be plotted to predict the required experimental settings for specific tasks. Two types of well arrayed structures including monolayer arrays of silica spheres and vertically aligned ZnO rod arrays were investigated in this work. Monolayer arrays of silica spheres were synthesized by using a dual-speed spin coating method. With assistance of statistical experimental design, the accelerating rate, the second rotation speed and time of the dual-speed spin coating system were found as non-significant parameters to the ordering degree of the obtained monolayer, and thus they can be fixed. This finding could remarkably increase the feasibility of optimizing the practical process. On the other hand, the relative humidity, the first rotation speed and the suspension concentration are identified as the significant parameters to the structures of the monolayer. Moreover, the optimal values for these three parameters were identified: 23% for the relative humidity, 1000 rpm for the first rotation speed and 30 wt.% for the suspension concentration. With these optimized parameters, the area of the obtained silica sphere monolayers reached over 1 cm2 and the defect-free domain size reached over 4000 μm2. These values are considerably higher compared to the previously reported values. Vertically aligned ZnO rod arrays were fabricated by chemical bath deposition. Parameters including precursor concentration, pH value, reaction temperature, reaction time and addition of capping agent were optimized by using statistical experimental design to improve and optimize the growth quality of ZnO rod arrays. Through several stages of optimization, the growth quality of the obtained structures was remarkably enhanced from sparse or clustered ZnO rods to upright and dense ZnO rods. The boundary conditions to achieve vertically aligned ZnO rods, such as a neutral solution and a precursor concentration over 0.02M, were determined. The changing tendency of the texture coefficient and aspect ratio with the factors was also plotted to predict the required experimental settings for specific requests. The points or regions to achieve the optimal properties were identified as well. For instance, the concentration should be as close as to 0.1 M, while the reaction temperature should be limited to 80-90 ◦C, to achieve the ideal preferential growth. With the optimized parameters, the texture coefficient reached almost the perfect value 1, and the aspect ratio was elevated to 21. Moreover, to obtain a dense ZnO thin film, tri-sodium citrate was added to the reaction system. The diameter was systematically controlled through varying the parameters. When both the diameter and the texture coefficient reached the optimal values, the rods were merged together to form a dense ZnO thin film. Furthermore, comments on the statistical experimental method are proposed, and both the advantages and disadvantages are presented according to the present thesis work. This might help the researchers to avoid the disadvantages and thus to employ this method more efficiently in the future. / <p>QC 20150903</p>

High surface area gold electrodes are very good substrates for biosensors, catalysis and drug delivery. Their performance is characterized by good sensitivity, low detection limit and high signal. As a result, extensive research is being carried out in this field using different approaches of fabrication to generate high surface area porous electrodes of different morphology, pore size and structure. The morphology of the electrodes can be changed based on whether the approach involves a template or not, types of metal deposition, method and time of dealloying etc. The deposition of metal can be carried out using various approaches such as electroless deposition, electrochemical deposition, combination of electroless and electrochemical deposition, pulsed laser deposition, laser deposition etc. These electrodes can then be used in electrochemical measurements and their performance compared with an unmodified flat gold electrode. We used a template based approach, combined with electrochemical deposition, to fabricate macroporous, macro-nanoporous and nanoporous gold electrodes. To generate nanopores, in case of macro-nanoporous and nanoporous gold electrodes, we used gold-silver alloy electrochemical deposition method, followed by chemical dealloying. The morphology of electrodes was later observed under HITACHI Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) and their elemental composition studied using HITACHI Energy Dispersion Spectroscopy (EDS). The electrodes were used in electrochemical measurements and their voltammetric data was compared. These measurements involved the determination of surface area, faradaic current using redox molecules with fast and slow electron transfer and charging current in KCl. Surface adsorption of dopamine was studied and detection of dopamine in the presence of ascorbic acid was carried out.

ABSTRACT Nanostructured silica materials were synthesised by the sol-gel process using simple hydroxyacids as template precursors, and these materials were employed as supports for a low temperature iron Fischer-Tropsch (FT) catalyst. Thus, this thesis is divided into two parts: (I) the synthesis of nanostructured silica gels, and (II) their use as catalyst supports in the FT reaction. PART I The effects of synthesis conditions, acidic and basic template precursors and their amounts, synthesis temperature, duration of hydrolysis and ageing, solvent concentration, organic co-solvent, and the synthesis procedure used on the morphology of the silica materials were studied. The synthesised silica gels were characterised by TEM, SEM, BET, TGA, and XRD. Mixtures of different morphologies were obtained with all the hydroxyacids used and the studies revealed that the morphology of the resultant silica gels was largely determined by the type of the hydroxyacid used. The use of oxalic acid produced materials with 4-9 % micropores and a mixture of meso- and macropores mainly consisting of hollow tubes and hollow spheres; the use of D-gluconic and L-tartaric acids produced mesoporous materials mainly consisting of hollow spheres and sheets with folds, respectively; while the use of stearic and cinammic acids produced macroporous materials mainly consisting of solid spheres and undeveloped particles, respectively. The silica gels formed were found to be amorphous in nature, despite the different morphologies that existed in them, and were also thermally stable.Studies involving the use of oxalic and D-gluconic acids showed that the key to the shape of the resultant morphologies resided in the shape of the template crystals formed in solution under specific synthesis conditions. The template shape depended on the type of the template precursor (i.e. both the acid and the base) and its amount. It was also observed that under certain conditions, both at elevated temperatures (≥ 55 oC) and at high water concentrations (> 50 %), the template dissolved and this led to low yields of shaped morphologies (i.e. hollow spheres and tubes). The solvent concentration to produce a maximum tube yield (in the case of oxalic acid) and hollow sphere yield (in the case of D-gluconic acid) was found to require about 25- 50 % water. Very well-developed tubes were also obtained at this concentration (i.e. with oxalic acid). Long hydrolysis and ageing times (i.e. > 2 h) of the sols and gels, respectively, resulted in the formation of surface attached colloidal particles and of tubes and hollow spheres with decreased wall thicknesses. Pre-formation of the template prior to addition of TEOS produced materials with lower surface areas, higher tube yields and bigger tube sizes when compared with materials synthesised by forming the template together with the silica gel. PART II Two types of silica gels were used as supports for an iron FT catalyst; the nanostructured silica gels (tubes with surface area 109 m2/g and spheres with surface area 245 m2/g ) and a commercial silica gel (Davisil silica, surface area 273 m2/g - consisting of undeveloped particles). The effect of varying the potassium promotion levels and of the support morphology on the catalyst activity and selectivity in the FT reaction was studied at 250 oC, in a slurry operated CSTR.It was observed that an increase in the potassium loading up to 0.5 wt % in the Davisil silica catalyst led to a decrease in the catalyst FT and water gas shift (WGS) activity, and methane selectivity. However, the efficiency of the catalyst to produce hydrocarbons increased with an increase in potassium loading up to 0.5 wt %. Increasing the potassium level up to 0.9 wt % led to a slight increase in both the catalyst activity and methane selectivity, and a decrease in the catalyst efficiency. For the silica tubes catalyst, increasing the potassium loading to 0.5 wt % led to an increase in the catalyst activity and methane selectivity, while increasing the potassium level up to 0.9 wt % led to a decrease in the catalyst activity. For both supports, increasing the potassium loading led to an increase in the selectivity towards high molecular weight hydrocarbons, olefins (relative to paraffins) and terminal olefins (relative to internal olefins). While the Davisil silica and the silica tube catalysts remained more or less stable throughout the reaction, the activity of the silica spheres catalyst declined rapidly with time. The nanostructured silica gel supported catalysts both showed higher activities and methane selectivities, but lower efficiencies when compared to the Davisil silica catalyst. Although the selectivity of all three catalysts towards olefins were similar, their selectivity towards high molecular weight hydrocarbons decreased in the order Davisil silica > silica spheres > silica tubes. Elongated needlelike Fe nanoparticles (NPs) were obtained in the silica tubes catalyst, semi hexagonal Fe NPs were formed in the silica spheres catalyst, while the Fe NPs could not be distinguished from the support in the Davisil silica catalyst. After the reaction, the surface areas of all three catalysts were found to have decreased and the catalysts to have sintered. The nanostructured silica supported catalysts showed the presence of Fe nanozones surrounded by a layer of amorphous carbon, while only agglomerated particles of Fe and some carbon rich regions were observed in the Davisil silica catalyst. No evidence of alteration of the morphology of the nanostructured silica supports was observed after the reaction.