Thesis (M.S.)--University of Tennessee, Knoxville, 2008. / Title from title page screen (viewed on Sept. 23, 2009). Thesis advisor: Frank T. van Manen. Vita. Includes bibliographical references.

Soil bioengineering is a widespread science which is usually applied in Europe and North America for natural systems stabilization such as streambanks, slopes and eroded areas. It is a relatively new technical discipline, that has well developed concepts, from a practical point of view. Nevertheless, it still has some theoretical and technical issues that should be addressed. One of those issues is related with the lack of analytical methodologies and procedures for the elaboration of projects based on soil bioengineering techniques. Taking this issue into consideration, the purpose of this dissertation is to accomplish the development of a project methodology for the application of soil bioengineering techniques in infrastructure works, and to show its use in one case study for river stabilization in pipeline stream crossing. The developed methodology presents an hierarchical procedure with three project phases: conceptual, basic and executive, each of which is composed by objectives and development activities. During project elaboration this methodology has proved to be relevant to acquire, manage and analyze information in a rationalized sequence, and hence, facilitating the understanding of the problem phenomenology, the choice of techniques and the design method for each problem, as well as logistic description and quantification required for the execution of the one projected case study. This methodology has proved to be an efficient tool to standardize and generalize soil bioengineering project activities for greater responsibility applications. / A engenharia natural é bastante difundida e comumente utilizada na Europa e América do Norte para a estabilização de sistemas naturais como taludes fluviais, encostas e áreas sob processo erosivo. É uma disciplina técnica relativamente recente que tem conceitos, do ponto de vista prático-aplicativo, bem desenvolvidos. Contudo, possui questões, principalmente de caráter teórico-técnico, que ainda devem ser respondidas. Uma dessas questões diz respeito à falta de metodologias analíticas e procedimentadas para o desenvolvimento de projetos de engenharia natural em obras de infraestrutura. Neste sentido, a proposta do presente trabalho consiste em desenvolver uma metodologia para a elaboração de projetos de engenharia natural para obras de infraestrutura e demonstrar sua aplicação no desenvolvimento de um projeto de estabilização fluvial em travessia de dutos terrestres. A metodologia desenvolvida apresenta um procedimento hierarquizado composto por três fases de projeto: Conceitual, Básica e Executiva, sendo, cada uma, composta por objetivos e atividades de desenvolvimento. Na concepção do projeto a metodologia mostrou-se importante para a organização das informações em uma sequência racionalizada de obtenção e análise, facilitando, desse modo, a compreensão da fenomenologia dos problemas envolvidos, a escolha e o dimensionamento das técnicas mais adequadas a cada problema, bem como a descrição e quantificação da logística necessária à implantação da obra projetada. A metodologia se mostra uma ferramenta eficiente na uniformização e universalização das atividades de projeto de engenharia natural em aplicações de maior responsabilidade.

The southern Mozambique/ South Africa borderland is a landscape epitomised by fluctuation, contradiction and constant transformation. It is a world betwixt-and-between Mozambique and South Africa. The international border, imposed on the landscape more than a century ago, gives life to a new world that stretches across and away from it. The inhabitants of this transitional zone constantly shape and reshape their own identities vis-à-vis people on the opposite and same side of the border. This border, which was delineated in 1875, was to separate the influence spheres of Portugal and Britain in south-east Africa. On the ground it divided the once strong and unified Mabudu-Tembe (Tembe-Thonga) chiefdom. At first the border was only a line on a map. With time, however, it became infused with social and cultural meaning as the dividing line between two new worlds. This was exacerbated by Portuguese and British colonial administration on opposite sides of the border, Apartheid in South Africa and socialist modernisation and war and displacement in Mozambique. All these events and factors created cultural fragmentation and disunion between the northern and southern sides of the borderland. By the end of the Mozambican War in 1992 the northern side of the borderland was populated by displaced refugees, demobilised soldiers and bandits, as well as returnees from neighbouring countries. Many of these people did not have any ancestral ties to the land nor kinship ties to its earlier inhabitants. Whereas a common Thonga identity had previously united people on both sides of the border, South African policies of Apartheid increasingly promoted the Zulu language and culture on the southern side of the border. The end of warfare in Mozambique and of Apartheid in South Africa facilitated contact across the border. Social contact between the inhabitants of the borderland is furthermore fostered by various economic opportunities offered by the border, such as cross-border trade and smuggling. The increase in social and economic contact has in turn dissolved differences between the inhabitants of the borderland and promoted homogeneity and unity across the political divide. Fragmentation and homogeneity characterises daily life in the borderland. Inhabitants of the frontier-zone play these forces off against each other, now emphasising the differences across the border, later emphasising the similarities. The borderland is a world of multiple identities, where ethnicity, citizenship and identity, already fluid and contextual concepts in their own rights, become even more so as people constantly define and redefine themselves in this transitional environment. / Thesis (DPhil (Anthropology))--University of Pretoria, 2006. / Anthropology and Archaeology / unrestricted

The master's thesis deals with reconstruction design of Lipová Lazně railway station. The main goal is to design new platforms suitable for passengers with reduced mobility and orientation and valid standart. Another goal is to increase line speed. Part of the thesis includes modifications of railway superstructure, substructure and drainage system of the station.

This master's thesis describes basics principles of QRS complex detection. It is focused on QRS detection using zero crossing counts method. There are described princips and program realization of this method. The other part is focused on genetic optimalization algorithm. There are presented obtained optimalization results on standard CSE and MIT-BIH database. The quality of the detector is compared with other authors. The optimalized QRS detector achieves comparable results with other authors. The part of the thesis is graphical user interface which supply view on modified ECG signal and detection results.

The aim of the diploma thesis is a design of the reconstruction railway station Trutnov main station for compliance with current operations and especially with regard to persons with reduced mobility. So it was necessary to design the platform edge with a height of 550 mm above rail level. The design also deals with the drainage of reconstructed tracks and sidings connection.

The aim of the diploma thesis is to design of reconstruction of the Ždírec nad Doubravou railway station and Hlinsko v Čechách railway station, and to allow access for persons with reduced mobility. Resolving a modification of the track (reconstruction gridiron), design the reconstruction of the substructure and drainage railway stations.

[pt] Os estudos de Ciência, Tecnologia e Sociedade (CTS) e os estudos sociais e culturais das ciências abriram novos espaços ontológicos e epistemológicos que questionam a epistemologia universalista moderna, revelando as controvérsias e redes de conexões envolvidas no desenvolvimento de diferentes disciplinas científicas, antes obscurecidas pela modernidade. Com base nessas perspectivas, a presente tese visa suscitar reflexões acerca das controvérsias e particularidades históricas, ontológicas e epistemológicas no desenvolvimento dos estudos de comportamento animal, tendo em vista que se desenvolveram a partir de diálogos interdisciplinares e de dissolução de fronteiras entre conhecimento local e científico. Pretende-se discutir as diferentes apreensões de alteridades animais a partir dos estudos do comportamento animal, e suas relações com outros tipos de olhares poéticos sobre os animais. O advento da etologia abriu caminho para novas compreensões acerca das capacidades sociais, cognitivas e subjetivas dos animais não-humanos em condições de campo. Essas novas compreensões suscitaram reflexões críticas acerca da mente animal, confrontaram as ideias modernas cartesianas, mecanicistas e funcionais, dos animais como máquinas ou autômatos insensíveis e transformaram as relações entre humanos e animais não-humanos. O caráter interdisciplinar e multimetodológico que a etologia assumiu no decorrer do seu desenvolvimento no século XX como estudo biológico e evolutivo do comportamento, possibilitou o diálogo entre as ciências biológicas e as ciências sociais, bem como permitiu o atravessamento de fronteiras entre humanidade e animalidade. Embora Konrad Lorenz, Nikolaas Tinbergen e Karl von Frisch sejam considerados, pela História (Monumental) das Ciências, como os legítimos fundadores da etologia, ainda há controvérsias acerca de sua origem e constituição como disciplina científica, tendo em vista que já se falava em etologia desde antes de Charles Darwin, que já escrevia acerca da dimensão evolutiva do comportamento animal no século XIX. Antes da sua consolidação como disciplina científica no século XX, a etologia foi (re)definida através de diferentes perspectivas (behaviourismo, psicologia comparada americana, etologia objetivista européia, etologia vitalista, entre outras) constituindo uma trajetória peculiar como ciência multidimensional. Dentre controvérsias e particularidades, a presente tese enfatiza a relação de respeito mútuo e rivalidade entre dois importantes fundadores da disciplina: Konrad Lorenz e Jakob von Uexkull. Uexkull influenciou significativamente as ideias de Lorenz acerca do comportamento e subjetividade dos animais. No entanto, essa influência terminou em uma rivalidade, tendo em vista as diferentes posições epistemológicas e políticas entre o darwinista evolucionista alemão e o vitalista estoniano. Nas linhas de fuga da História e Epistemologia das ciências, é importante considerar que Uexkull, desconhecido por muitos etólogos atuais, com sua teoria dos mundos-próprios (Umwelt) e perspectiva neovitalista, reconheceu os animais somo sujeitos, revolucionando os conhecimentos sobre a ação e percepção dos animais. E é possível que Lorenz posteriormente tenha reconhecido os animais como sujeitos com base nas reflexões de Uexkull. Com estas reflexões, a presente tese pretende explicitar como a etologia desenvolveu-se de forma não linear e múltipla, incorporando diferentes perspectivas, conceitos e metodologias ao longo de sua história. Em outras palavras, serão discutidos os diferentes caminhos e linhas de fuga ontológicas e epistemológicas percorridos nos estudos do comportamento animal, que transformaram a etologia numa ciência biossocial e fronteiriça, com uma história não-fatual que abrange diferentes dimensões, métodos, conceitos, praticas, disciplinas e objetos. / [en] The Science, Technology and Society (STS) studies and the social and cultural studies of the sciences have opened up new ontological and epistemological spaces that question modern universalist epistemology, revealing the controversies and networks of connections involved in the development of different scientific disciplines previously obscured by modernity. Based on these perspectives, this thesis aims to elucidate the controversies and historical, ontological and epistemological particularities in the development of animal behavior studies, since they have developed from interdisciplinary dialogues and the dissolution of borders between local and scientific knowledge. It is intended to discuss the different apprehensions of animal alterities from the studies of animal behavior, and their relations with other types of poetic looks on animals. The advent of ethology paved the way for new insights into the social, cognitive, and subjective capacities of nonhuman animals under field conditions. These new insights have elicited critical reflections about the animal mind, confronted modern cartesian, mechanistic, and functional ideas of animals like machines or insensitive automata and transformed relations between humans and nonhuman animals. The interdisciplinary and multi-methodological character that ethology assumed in the course of its development in the twentieth century as a biological and evolutionary study of behavior, enabled the dialogue between the biological sciences and the social sciences, as well as allowed the crossing of borders between humanity and animality. Although Konrad Lorenz, Nikolaas Tinbergen and Karl von Frisch are considered by the (Monumental) History of Sciences as the legitimate founders of ethology, there is still controversy about its origin and constitution as a scientific discipline, since ethology was already spoken since before Charles Darwin, who was already writing about the evolutionary dimension of animal behavior in the nineteenth century. Before its consolidation as a scientific discipline in the twentieth century, ethology was (re) defined through different perspectives (behaviorism, american comparative psychology, european objectivist ethology, vitalist ethology, among others) constituting a peculiar trajectory as multidimensional science. Among the controversies and particularities, the present thesis emphasizes the relation of mutual respect and rivalry between two important founders of the discipline: Konrad Lorenz and Jakob von Uexkull. Uexkull influenced significantly Lorenz s ideas about animal behavior and subjectivity. However, this influence ended in a rivalry, given the different epistemological and political positions between the German evolutionist Darwinist and the Estonian vitalist. In the escape lines of the History and Epistemology of the Sciences, it is important to consider that Uexkull, unknown to many today s ethologists, with his theory of the own-worlds (Umwelt) and neovitalist perspective, recognized animals as subjects, revolutionizing knowledge about action and perception of animals. And it is possible that Lorenz later recognized the animals as subjects based on Uexkull s reflections. With these reflections, the present thesis aims to explain how ethology has developed in a non-linear and multiple way, incorporating different perspectives, concepts and methodologies throughout its history. In other words, we will discuss the different ontological and epistemological paths and escape lines routes in animal behavior studies that have turned ethology into a biossocial and frontier science with a non-factual history that encompasses different dimensions, methods, concepts, practices, disciplines and objects.

La thèse est consacrée au problème fondamental de l'excitation et de la manipulation de systèmes quantiques à spectre d'énergie discret, via des champs lasers externes. Nous examinons le problème semi-classique à deux états quantiques, dépendant du temps, lorsque le champ électromagnétique externe est résonant ou quasi résonant pour deux des nombreux niveaux du système. La thèse est centrée sur la description analytique de l'évolution non adiabatique des systèmes quantiques soumis à une excitation par des configurations de champs avec croisements de niveaux. Dans la présente thèse, nous classifions l’ensemble complet des modèles quantiques à deux états semi-classiques dépendants du temps, qui peuvent être résolus en cinq fonctions de la classe de Heun.Les principaux résultats de la thèse sont :1. Au total, 61 classes infinies de modèles à deux états (i.e. les configurations de champ laser externe) solubles en termes de fonctions de Heun générale et confluentes sont dérivées.2. Dans ces classes infinies, trois sous-modèles originaux avec croisements de niveaux sont identifiés: l'un décrit les croisements infinis de résonance (périodiques), l'autre décrit les croisements de résonance asymétrique avec un temps de processus fini et le dernier décrit les processus de croisements infinis de résonance asymétrique. Le comportement du système quantique à deux états dans ces configurations de champ est analysé de manière exhaustive.3. Les solutions des équations de Heun en termes de fonctions bêta incomplètes, de fonctions hypergéométriques confluentes de Kummer et de fonctions Hermite d'ordre non entier sont construites.4. Des solutions analytiques du problème quantique à deux états sont projetées sur les équations d'onde relativistes et non relativistes : de nouveaux potentiels pour les équations de Schrödinger et de Klein-Gordon sont dérivés et résolus. / The thesis is devoted to the fundamental problem of excitation and manipulation of quantum systems, having discrete energy spectrum, via external laser fields. We examine the semiclassical time- dependent quantum two-state problem, when the external electromagnetic field is resonant or quasi-resonant for some two of many levels of the system. The focus of the thesis is on the analytic description of the non- adiabatic evolution of quantum systems subject to excitation by level-crossing field configurations. In the present thesis we classify the complete set of the semiclassical time-dependent quantum two-state models solvable in terms of the five function of the Heun class.Main results of the thesis are:1. In total 61 infinite classes of two-state models (i.e. external laser field configurations) solvable in terms of general and confluent Heun functions are derived.2. In these infinite classes three original level-crossing submodels are identified: one describes infinite (periodical) crossings of resonance, one describes asymmetric resonance crossing with a finite time of process and the last one describes infinite asymmetric resonance crossing process. The behavior of the two-state quantum system under these field configurations is comprehensively analyzed.3. Solutions of the Heun equations in terms of incomplete Beta functions, Kummer confluent hypergeometric functions and non-integer-order Hermite functions of a shifted and scaled argument are constructed.4. Analytic solutions of the quantum two-state problem are projected on the relativistic and non-relativistic wave-equations: new potentials for the Schrödinger and Klein-Gordon equations are derived and solved.

Railway noise is a very important and growing health hazard in today´s society.Railway systems pass through towns and cities and create noise. When trainsride through or over railway bridges, switches and crossings the noise increasessubstantially, causing great annoyance to the residents in the area.At the present time, acoustic regulations exist in most countries and are set to achievea good environmental quality in residential areas, schools, hospitals, offices andhotels.A few calculation models exist for railway traffic noise, such as The NPM 1996,NORD2000 and Cnossos-EU. The NPM 1996 is currently used in Sweden to calculatenoise propagation from railway traffic. To uphold the regulations set, it is importantthat the method used is as precise as possible. All of these calculation modelsare based on several correction factors. Today, the current corrections for trackconditions, that is railway bridges, switches and crossings, are not very accurate andneed to be reconsidered.The aim of this project was to investigate and quantify the error of the NPM correctionfactors and give some indication of how they should be adjusted. This is done to makethe noise prediction from railway traffic more accurate and thus protect the residentsfrom these health risks.The specific objective was to perform significant amount of field measurements ofnoise from trains on different steel bridges, switches and crossings, as well as on afew concrete bridge according to the measurement standard Nordtest NT 098. Thefield work was carried out over the period March to May, when weather conditionsmet the criteria for field measurements, in and around the Stockholm area.The results obtained revealed that the correction factors for steel bridges andcrossings are considerably lower in the NPM than measured in this project. However,the correction factors for switches and concrete bridges are similar to the ones inthe NPM. In this thesis, a part of the correction factors have only been invalidatedto a degree. It has been shown that each bridge is unique and perhaps there is apossibility of finding similarities between some type of bridges. However, much moreiv |measurements are needed to see any correlation between each bridge type. Thus,further and more comprehensive measurements have to be carried out in order toestablish new accurate correction factors for track conditions in the Nordic PredictionMethod.