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Plugged and abandoned well pads throughout the Uintah Basin face reclamation challenges due to factors including a harsh climate, invasive species, and high salt loads. Finding ways to alleviate soil sodicity could improve soil reclamation success. Gypsum, sulfur, activated carbon, and Biochar are being applied to improve soil parameters negatively impacted by sodicity, but the direct impact of these amendments on Uintah Basin soils is still largely unknown. The aim of this study was two-fold. (1) Evaluate the effectiveness of gypsum, sulfuric acid, Biochar, activated carbon, and combinations of these amendments in reducing the impact of soil sodicity of the Desilt and Conglomerate soils by measuring amendment impact on percent dispersion, saturated hydraulic conductivity, crust bulk density, infiltration, and crust formation. (2) Compare a crust bulk density method using ImageJ to the clod wax density method and a modified linear extensibility percent equation to the linear extensibility percent equation to assess whether the novel methods can be used to accurately measure and calculate soil crust bulk density and shrink swell potential while reducing human error and analysis time.

I have worked on many projects, but there are several things that they all had in common. First, nearly all projects involved searching for the structural parameters that governed the macroscopic properties of the polymers and composite materials. A second common denominator is that even though my work was performed in an “academic context”, the goals were targeted toward industrial needs. Lastly, the methods and procedures were similar; they were all based on experimental results obtained for various scales of measurement (see Fig. 1). Hence, multi-scale modeling was very useful and beneficial for these projects. The models developed (mainly numerical and sometimes analytical) were initially derived from experimental evidence and then validated and improved with further experimentation. The refined models provided an efficient means of: (i) optimizing the composites according to specific needs, (ii) better understanding the hierarchical relations between the different scales, (iii) controlling the micro or meso structure and thereby the macroscopic properties. This study of the relations between structure and properties was performed on a wide variety of physical properties and materials. However, the electric and dielectric properties of composites constituted the major- ity of it and will be presented in this report. The remaining property investigations provided supplemental but valuable information. This work often requires altering various conventional experimental techniques or using well-known techniques for new purposes. I also developed, when needed, several unconventional but necessary measurement techniques. This report contains two major parts which are separated according to the nature of the fillers: Part I : Conducting fillers. In the first part, the main interest both for application and fundamental point of view, is related to the changes in properties in the vicinity of the sharp percolation transition. After a brief introduction to the percolation theory, this part will be subdivided in three chapters: Chapter 1. presents a numerical method that correlates the mesostructure to the macroscopic electrical properties both in two and three dimensions. Chapter 2. will show that an external variable (the mechanical stress) may largely alter the microstruc- ture of the percolating network within composites as revealed the macroscopic conductivity. The understanding of the mesoscale changes will be based on the chemical structure of the polymer matrix. Chapter 3. is devoted to the description of a unique case in term of percolation behavior, which made possible the control of the phase arrangement within the composite and thereby the control of the macroscopic resistivity. p. 2 Multiscale relationships in polymer–based heterogeneous systems. . . Part II : Insulating fillers. In the second part, the main interest is to obtain good electrical insulators, i.e. that can withstand large electric fields. This part thus starts with a brief introduction to the common failure mechanisms, associated with the dielectric breakdown and is also divided in three chapters: Chapter 4. is devoted to the description of a numerical simulation of the relationships between mesostructure and dielectric breakdown. Chapter 5. reveals the influence of the processing conditions of a composite utilized in the industry on the microstructure and the quantitative consequences on breakdown properties. Chapter 6. presents the aging of these composites under “real word” conditions which will further be compared to accelerated aging performed in controlled conditions, in the laboratory. A comparison of the two aging situations will furnish a quantitative understanding of the relative influence of the chemical and physical contributions to the aging process. This report will then be concluded with a description of the current and future projects.

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Synuclein, Parkinson's disease, network activity, neuron, tau protein, neurodegeneration, connectivity, cAMP,

Title: The subnuclear localisation of Notch responsive genes. Candidate Name: Matthew Jones Notch signalling is a highly conserved cell-cell communication pathway with critical roles in metazoan development and mutations in Notch pathway components are implicated in many types of cancer. Notch is an excellent and well-studied model of biological signalling and gene regulation, with a single intracellular messenger, one receptor and two ligands in Drosophila. However, despite the limited number of chemical players involved, a striking number of different outcomes arise. Molecular studies have shown that Notch activates different targets in different cell types and it is well known that Notch is important for maintaining a stem cell fate in some situations and driving differentiation in others. Thus some of the factors affecting the regulation of Notch target genes are yet to be discovered. Previous studies in various organisms have found that the location of a gene within the nucleus is important for its regulation and genome reorganisation can occur following gene activation or during development. Therefore this project aimed to label individual Notch responsive loci and determine their subnuclear localisation. In order to tag loci of interest a CRISPR/Cas9 genome-editing method was established that enabled the insertion of locus tags at Notch targets, namely the well-characterized Enhancer of split locus and also dpn and Hey, two transcription factors involved in neural cell fate decisions. The ParB/Int system is a recently developed locus tagging system and is not well characterised in Drosophila. It has a number of advantages over the traditional LacO/LacI-GFP locus tagging system as it does not rely on binding site repeats for signal amplification and can label two loci simultaneously in different colours. This thesis characterised the ParB/Int system in the Drosophila salivary gland and larval L3 neuroblast. Using 3D image segmentation hundreds of nuclei were reconstructed and a volume based normalisation method was applied to determine the subnuclear localisation of several Notch targets with and without genetic manipulations of the Notch pathway.

Tato práce popisuje přehled standardních a pokročilých metod používaných k diagnose glaukomu v ranném stádiu. Na základě teoretických poznatků je implementován internetově orientovaný informační systém pro oční lékaře, který má tři hlavní cíle. Prvním cílem je možnost sdílení osobních dat konkrétního pacienta bez nutnosti posílat tato data internetem. Druhým cílem je vytvořit účet pacienta založený na kompletním očním vyšetření. Posledním cílem je aplikovat algoritmus pro registraci intenzitního a barevného fundus obrazu a na jeho základě vytvořit internetově orientovanou tři-dimenzionální vizualizaci optického disku. Tato práce je součásti DAAD spolupráce mezi Ústavem Biomedicínského Inženýrství, Vysokého Učení Technického v Brně, Oční klinikou v Erlangenu a Ústavem Informačních Technologií, Friedrich-Alexander University, Erlangen-Nurnberg.