The primary purpose of this study is to collect and record examples of music of the early inhabitants of Taylor, Arizona, as they are sung and played by their survivors and descendants.

As the world population approaches seven billion, a greater strain is put on the resources necessary to sustain life. One of the most basic and essential resources is water and while two thirds of the earth is covered by water, the majority is either salt water (oceans and seas) or it is too contaminated to drink. The purpose of this project is to develop a portable device capable of testing whether a specific source of water (i.e. lake, river, well…) is potable. There are numerous filtration techniques that can remove contaminants and make even the dirtiest water clean enough for consumption but they are for the most part, very time consuming and immobile processes. The device is not a means of water purification but rather focuses on determining the content of the water and whether it is safe. Particles within the water are separated and trapped using a combination of a Taylor Couette fluid flow system and Dielectrophoretic electrodes. This paper explores Taylor Couette flow in a large gap and low aspect ratio system through theory and experimentation with early stage prototypes. Different inner cylinder radii, 2.12cm, 1.665cm and 1.075cm, were tested at different speeds approaching, at and passing the critical Taylor number, 3825, 4713 and 6923 respectively for each cylinder. Dielectrophoretic (DEP) electrodes were designed, fabricated, coated and tested using latex beads to determine the method of integrating them within the fluid flow system. Taylor Couette theory, in terms of the formation of vortices within the large gap, small aspect ratio system, was not validated during testing. The flow pattern generated was more akin to a chaotic circular Couette flow but still served to move the particles toward the outer wall. Fully integrated tests were run with limited success. Recommendations were made to pursue both circular Couette flow as the basis for iv particle separation and dimensional changes in the setup to allow for the formation of Taylor vortices by increasing the radius ratio but still allowing for a larger volume of fluid.

This written portion of my thesis documents my process as a director in staging Taylor Mac’s play The Lily’s Revenge in collaboration with a creative team of designers, dramaturgs, and performers. I share with the reader my processes toward fostering cohesion and collaboration among a team while working on a complex play that departs from many theatrical conventions. I discuss significant learnings from several areas of dramaturgical and performance research that dovetail within the play: queer performance practice, Theater of the Ridiculous, and Noh theater, and how I used this research to support the communication with my design collaborators to design a show crossing several theatrical genres. I invite readers into the challenges and discoveries of a rehearsal process that required heightened performances from actors and creative solutions for sustaining audience engagement. This thesis includes dramaturgical research, documentation of the rehearsal process, and documentation of audience and performer experiences.

The intent of this thesis is to simulate the effect of a background magnetic field on Rayleigh-Taylor (RT) instability morphology and evolution in support of a Discovery Science campaign at the National Ignition Facility. The RT instability is relevant in High Energy Density (HED) systems including supernova remnants such as the Crab Nebula and inertial fusion confinement (ICF). Magnetic fields affect RT evolution and can suppress small-scale fluid motion. Thus far no experimental work has quantified the effect of a B-field on RT evolution morphology. RT evolution under a B-field was examined in three-dimensional magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) simulations using the hydrocode ARES, developed by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. The parameter space of the experiment is explored to determine the parameters that yield a visible effect on RT evolution. The effect of resistive MHD and conductivity is examined to further establish the desired parameter space to observe the suppression of RT morphology.

No description available.

No description available.

This dissertation explores literary-theoretical constructions arising from the consideration of certain non-narrative linguistic strategies and applies them to dance analysis. My intent is not only to provide new, functional tools for dance scholars and writers, but also to alter the theoretical terms themselves: by employing literary critical language beyond its original purpose, I hope to locate the limits of that language as it applies to dance. Moreover, I strive to identify the ways moving bodies complicate concepts normally applied to static and disembodied text. In this way my research moves in two directions: adding a specific theoretical lens to the dance-writing toolbox, and, in turn, using dance to sharpen and focus that lens. I have chosen two theoretical constructs--Julia Kristeva's explication of the semiotic aspect of language and her characterization of the abject--because of the ways they address the unsayable through body, repetition, and rhythm. Kristeva's texts, Desire in Language (1981) and Powers of Horror (1982), provide the dissertation's primary theoretical frameworks. The first text puts forth key concepts about heterogeneous meaning within her conceptualization of the semiotic; the second addresses meaning that exceeds language, and the self, and arises out of the abject (a crisis of the subject when confronted with a breakdown of boundaries between self and other). Both concepts are relevant to dance, emerging from the materiality/substance of language rather than from language as a phantom structure that ideas are placed into. This dissertation grapples with how dance strives to express that which exceeds "paraphrasable" meaning from three vantage points: 1) the assessment of the critical reception of historic choreography (Paul Taylor's Big Bertha) that plays simple narrative against the horror of the unknown; 2) an examination of participants' communications during the choreographic process of innovative choreographer, Gabrielle Lamb, and how research material was transformed during that process; 3) the documentation of my own struggle to express the unsayable during the creation of a hybrid dance/textual piece. These perspectives require different analytic strategies: 1) the casting of an artwork's meaning in historical and cultural contexts, 2) the parsing of the language used to communicate meaning between participants during the creative process, 3) the self-chronicling and reflective analysis of meaning-making during the conception and execution of a hybrid work. My objective is to show how Kristeva's theoretical constructs play out in different types of dance analysis and how the lack of a certain strain of theoretical language in dance discourse has left a hole where discussion might profitably ensue. I seek to use Kristeva's texts and post/modern techniques of the body to offer a multi-layered and technically invested understanding of dance rather than an aphoristic and imagistic one: one that substitutes multiple, specific bodies and their actions for a single idealized institution of the beautiful. / Dance

Conceptualizations of anger have suffered from a lack of research investigating the temporal dynamics of anger episodes. Furthermore, though some studies have provided valuable insights into the time course of anger, no study to date has utilized a standardized laboratory paradigm designed to mimic an interpersonal provocation. The purpose of this study was to characterize the time course of the affective, physiological, and behavioral components of anger in response to a standardized provocation. Our second aim was to assess potential effects of trait anger, trait aggression, trait hostility, and emotion regulation deficits on the time course of the different components of anger. Participants (n = 82) engaged in the Modified Taylor Aggression Paradigm (MTAP), a laboratory measure of anger/aggression in which provocation is manipulated by varying electric shocks selected for the participant by an (unbeknownst to the participant) fictitious opponent. This study utilized a modified version of the classic TAP that simulated an acute interpersonal provocation that one might encounter in the “real world.” Subjective anger, physiological arousal (as evidenced by heart rate [HR], galvanic skin response [GSR], and high-frequency heart rate variability [HF HRV]), and the behavioral expression of anger (aggression) were measured throughout the task before, during and after provocation. Consistent with previous research, results showed that the rise time to peak levels of most outcome variables was significantly faster than the return time from peak back to baseline. Additionally, results showed that the majority of the time course variables were not correlated with one another providing evidence for the idea that different components of anger have independent time courses. Contrary to our hypotheses, trait variables were largely unrelated to time course variables. The current study provides further evidence for the relationship between the rise time and return time in the time course of subjective, physiological and behavioral manifestations of anger using a standardized and ecologically valid provocation task. / Psychology

We propose two efficient automatic differentiation (AD) schemes to compute incrementally Taylor series and System Jacobian for solving differential-algebraic equations (DAEs) by Taylor series. Our schemes are based on topological ordering of a DAE's computational graph and then partitioning the topologically sorted nodes using structural information obtained from the DAE. Solving a DAE by Taylor series is carried out in stages. From one stage to another, partitions of the computational graph are incrementally activated so that we can reuse Taylor coefficients and gradients computed in previous stages. As a result, the computational complexity of evaluating a System Jacobian is independent of the number of stages. We also develop a common subexpression elimination (CSE) method to build a compact computational graph through operator overloading. The CSE method is of linear time complexity, which makes it suitable as a preprocessing step for general operator overloaded computing. By applying CSE, all successive overloaded computation can save time and memory. Furthermore, the computational graph of a DAE reveals its internal sparsity structure. Based on it, we devise an algorithm to propagate gradients in the forward mode of AD using compressed vectors. This algorithm can save both time and memory when computing the System Jacobian for sparse DAEs. We have integrated our approaches into the \daets solver. Computational results show multiple-fold speedups against two popular AD tools, \FAD~and ADOL-C, when solving various sparse and dense DAEs. / Thesis / Master of Science (MSc)

There is an element of play within all of us. It is imagination and interaction that makes us human. In this digital age, it is evident that we are losing touch with our own ability to remain imaginative and explore new and different ways to physically interact with our environment. In this thesis, it is my goal is to design in a way that does not limit human abilities, but instead promotes the idea of play between our wants and needs as well as re-sparking our imagination. In this thesis exploration, I experimented with multiple scales of playful design. I will show you how I implemented the idea of play for the design of a kite, a toy, a furniture piece, and a building. All of these projects are examples of designs that could have been static elements, but instead were designed to be dynamic to complement our everyday dynamic lives. Enjoy! / Master of Architecture