Digitized by Kansas Correctional Industries

Thesis. 1975. Ph.D.--Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Mechanical Engineering. / Vita. / Bibliography: leaves 73-77. / Ph.D.

This thesis explores the historical and contemporary cultural politics of funeral and body disposal among Indian and Chinese residents of Great Britain. The sanitation episteme launched in Britain during the eighteenth-century resulted in new systems for governing things deemed to be polluting or a threat to human health. This included the corpse/dead body and its bodily remains governed by an all-embracing state technique that I call ‘necropower’. Inspired by a Foucauldian approach to biopower, I examine how the governing of the dead is implicated in the formation of state power over non-Abrahamic ethnic groups. More specifically, in this thesis I analyze how the funeral and disposal practices of two ethnic minorities in the UK have been and are governed by the contours of state necropower. I argue that these bodies became the quintessential matter out of place in a state-regulated episteme. Beginning with funerary practices they have historically been deemed polluted and subject to state-based sanitary order, and they have emerged today through a new environmental and sanitary episteme inside a necroregime of power that is mediated by industry professionals. Drawing upon documented historical and contemporary material from the nineteenth to twenty-first century, interviews with state officials, professionals from the Death Care Industry, and Indian and Chinese minorities in Great Britain, I elaborate the various ways that these minorities seek to respond to, negotiate, and avoid expectations and regulations with respect to body and remain disposal.

Thesis (Masters of Engineering in Chemical Engineering)--Cape Peninsula University of Technology, [2018]. / Enhancing the efficiency of large scale photocatalytic systems has been a concern for decades. Engineering design and modelling for the successful application of laboratory-scale techniques to large scale is obligatory. Among the many fields of research in heterogeneous photocatalysis, photocatalytic reaction engineering can initiate improvement and application of conservative equations for the design and scale-up of photocatalytic reactors. Various reactor configurations were considered, and the geometry of choice was the annular shape. Theory supports the view that annular geometry, in the presence of constant transport flow properties, monochromatic light, and an incompressible flow, will allow a system to respect the law of conservation of mass. The degradation of a simulated dye, methyl orange (MO), by titanium dioxide (TiO2) with a simulated solar light (halogen lamp) in a continuous recirculating batch photoreactor (CRBPR) was studied. A response surface methodology (RSM) based on central composite design (CCD) was applied to study interaction terms and individual terms and the role they play in the photocatalytic degradation of MO. The studied terms were volume (L), TiO2 (g), 2 (mL), and initial dye concentration (mg/L), to optimize these parameters and to obtain their mutual interaction during a photocatalytic process, a 24 full-factorial CCD and RSM with an alpha set to 1.5 were employed. The polynomial models obtained for the chosen responses (% degradation and reaction rate constant, k) were shown to have a good externally studentized vs normal percentage probability fit with R2 values of 0.69 and 0.77 respectively. The two responses had a common significant interaction term which was the H2O2 initial dye concentration term. The optimum degradation that was obtained in this study was a volume of 20 L, TiO2 of 10 g, H2O2 of 200 mL and the initial dye concentration of 5 mg/L which yielded 64.6% and a reaction rate constant of 0.0020 min-1. The model of percentage degradation was validated on a yield of 50% and 80% over a series of set volumes and the model validation was successful.

Thesis (Master of Engineering in Chemical Engineering)--Cape Peninsula University of Technology, 2018. / Brewer’s spent grain (BSG), a solid residue obtained from brewing beer, is gaining attention in the food, cosmetics and pharmaceutical industry due to its use as natural source of colorants, texturisers, functional ingredients and preservatives. It is therefore necessary to develop an economically viable method for the extraction, isolation or enrichment of these compounds. Although literature shows the technical feasibility of extraction of bioactive compounds from BSG at laboratory bench scale, none of the reviewed literature could provide adequate information necessary to determine the economic feasibility of the process at commercial scale. The aim of this study was to investigate the technical and economic viability of a commercial process for the recovery of antioxidant rich polyphenolic compounds from brewers spent grain using organic solvents and/or water. The objectives were to select the best solvent, perform the optimisation and kinetic study, as well as to model and simulate the extraction process with the aim of performing an economic analysis. In selecting the best solvent, maceration and soxhlet extraction were used for the recovery of polyphenolic compounds. Acetone and acetone: water mixtures, ethanol and ethanol: water mixtures as well as pure water were used as solvents. The evaluation of the best solvent was measured by the total phenolic content (TPC), flavonol content, the antioxidant activity using 2.2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) assay and ferric reducing antioxidant power (FRAP) assay. The study performed optimisation for various operational parameters (time, temperature, solvent to feed ratio and shaking speed) using response surface method. The effect of temperature on the extraction kinetics was also investigated with experiments being carried out at 20°C, 40°C and 80°C. Antioxidant activity was detected in all BSG extracts, but water showed the highest global yield and rates of extraction. The optimum conditions were found at 15 min reaction time, temperature of 40 °C, shaking speed of 185 rpm and solvent to solid ratio of 27.5: 1. So-Macdonald model was a suitable fit for the experimental data with a R2-value range of (0.85 < r2 < 0.995). A processing scenario was proposed as a base case, upon which subsequent scenarios were generated to improve the operation or the economics. SuperPro Designer® (Intelligen, Inc) was used for modelling the proposed process, for simulation and for the economic evaluation. Four alternative schemes from the base case simulation were developed for optimisation of the process. The process was found to be economically feasible and attractive with a return of investment (ROI) of 48.45 % for alternative scheme 4. The results in this thesis highlight the likely economic feasibility of the extraction of polyphenolic compounds from BSG at commercial scale by the maceration method.

Disposal of dredged material has been an on-going problem in the Auckland Coastal Marine Area (CMA) since the early 1980s in New Zealand. Many disposal grounds have been established and used, but public concern over adverse effects resulted in their ultimate closure. Presently, dredged material is disposed off-shore at a site simultaneously accessed by the Royal New Zealand Navy for disposal of WWII munitions recovered from coastal areas. As early as the mid-1990s, parliamentary focus groups established the need for a more suitable disposal option for dredged material. Establishment of a disposal site north of Cuvier Island in waters deeper than 100 m was one of the key recommendations presented by these groups. The need for a new site was compounded after the establishment of the Hauraki Gulf Marine Park in 2000. Taking up the majority of the Auckland CMA this culturally significant Park makes the consent for open water disposal a complex process. A site east of Great Barrier Island in 140 m of water has been identified as a potential suitable site for disposal of dredged material. The main goal of the present study is to determine the suitability of this site and provide the necessary information required by enforcing authorities for permit submission. Investigations to determine the suitability of the site were undertaken in several ways. An extensive literature review of previous studies was carried out to gain insight into the physical and biological characteristics of the northeast coast and shelf. The main hydrodynamic features of the region and the observed behaviours were determined. Attentions were then directed at determining the more specific site characteristics. Analytical calculations were undertaken using known site parameters to estimate the potential for transport of sediment away from the site after disposal. Through analysis of known wave and current measurements it was estimated that only rarely would sediment be entrained off the seafloor. Samples were then collected from the site in November 2007, which were used for sediment textural analysis and benthic identification. It was determined that the main textural component of the site sediments is muddy/sand. Diversity of benthic species is relatively high, but abundance is low. Polychaetes were the most diverse and abundant taxon identified at sample locations across the site. Next, the 3DD model was used to numerically simulate 2-dimensional tidal currents. Depth-averaged spring tidal currents at the site were predicted to be less than 0.2 ms-1. The derived bottom velocity for such a current is 0.08 ms-1, which is much less than the velocity required for initiation of sediment movement in this case. The numerical simulation also showed that residual spring tidal flow is directed to the southeast. Finally, an assessment of potential impacts was done by reviewing previous studies of ecological impacts caused by disposal of dredged material. Based on the preliminary studies summarised above, the review of potential impacts indicates that there will only be minimal effects at and surrounding the proposed site. The result of this study is an encouraging step toward establishment of a new disposal option, but further research is required to confidently declare that the site is suitable for disposal operations.

Every attempt by the NSW State Government to site waste treatment and disposal facilities has been met by opposition from local communities. Increasing interest is being shown in community consultation and public participation in the decision-making processes concerning the siting of waste management technologies. This thesis examines the rationale behind, and potential of, community consultation through an examination of two case studies. The thesis concludes that the reasons and remedies for local opposition typically given by experts and regulatory authorities are flawed. The engineering concerns which have dominated approaches to choosing and siting waste management technologies are of little consequence to the way in which communities judge whether the facilities pose an acceptable societal risk. The issues of concern to communities include the legitimacy of the decision-making process, the relative fairness of the decision to site, and whether the institutions responsible for managing and operating the technologies are trustworthy. If waste management technologies rely on local acceptability for their siting, the approach taken to resolve the waste problem must include societal as well as engineering concerns in the design of courses of action to manage the risk. / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Thesis (M.P.H.)--Oregon State University, 2008. / Printout. Includes bibliographical references. Also available on the World Wide Web.

Thesis (M. Phil.)--University of Hong Kong, 2006. / Title proper from title frame. Also available in printed format.

Graduation date: 1996