Synthetic, self-oscillating vocal fold (VF) models are physical models whose life-like vibration is induced and perpetuated by fluid flow. Self-oscillating VF models, which are often fabricated life-size from soft silicone elastomers, are used to study various aspects of voice biomechanics. Despite their many advantages, the development and use of self-oscillating VF models is limited by the casting process used to fabricate the models. Consequently, this thesis focuses on the development of 3D printing processes for fabricating silicone VF models. A literature review is first presented which describes three types of material extrusion 3D printing processes for silicone elastomers, namely direct ink writing (DIW), embedded 3D printing, and removable-embedded 3D printing. The review describes each process and provides recent examples from literature that show how each has been implemented to create silicone prints. An embedded 3D printing process is presented wherein a set of multi-layer VF models are fabricated by extruding silicone ink within a VF-shaped reservoir filled with a curable silicone support matrix. The printed models successfully vibrated during testing, but lacked several desirable characteristics which were present in equivalent cast models. The advantages and disadvantages of using this fabrication process are explored. A removable-embedded 3D printing process is presented wherein shapes were fabricated by extruding silicone ink within a locally-curable support matrix then curing the silicone ink and proximate matrix. The printing process was used to fabricate several geometries from a variety of silicone inks. Tensile test results show that printed models exhibit relatively high failure strains and a nearly isotropic elastic modulus in directions perpendicular and parallel to the printed layers. A set of single-material VF models were printed and subjected to vibration testing. The printed models exhibited favorable vibration characteristics, suggesting the continued use of this printing process for VF model fabrication. A micro-slicing process is presented which is capable of creating gcode for 3D printing multiple materials in discrete and mixed ratios by utilizing a previously-sliced single-material shape and a material definition. An important advantage of micro-slicing is its ability to create gcode with a mixed-material gradient. Initial test results and observations are included. This micro-slicing process could be used in material extrusion 3D printing

Personalized treatment strategies for oncological patient management can improve outcomes of patient populations with heterogeneous treatment response. The implementation of such a concept requires the identification of biomarkers that can precisely predict treatment outcome. In the context of this thesis, we develop and validate biomarkers from multimodal imaging data for the outcome prediction after treatment in patients with locally advanced rectal cancer (LARC) and in patients with newly diagnosed glioblastoma multiforme (GBM), using conventional feature-based radiomics and deep-learning (DL) based radiomics. For LARC patients, we identify promising radiomics signatures combining computed tomography (CT) and T2-weighted (T2-w) magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) with clinical parameters to predict tumour response to neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy (nCRT). Further, the analyses of externally available radiomics models for LARC reveal a lack of reproducibility and the need for standardization of the radiomics process. For patients with GBM, we use postoperative [11C] methionine positron emission tomography (MET-PET) and gadolinium-enhanced T1-w MRI for the detection of the residual tumour status and to prognosticate time-to-recurrence (TTR) and overall survival (OS). We show that DL models built on MET-PET have an improved diagnostic and prognostic value as compared to MRI.

Background: Early efficacy outcome measures in rectal cancer after total neoadjuvant treatment are increasingly investigated. We examined the prognostic role of pathological complete response (pCR), tumor regression grading (TRG) and neoadjuvant rectal (NAR) score for disease-free survival (DFS) in patients with rectal carcinoma treated within the CAO/ARO/AIO-12 randomized phase 2 trial. Methods: Distribution of pCR, TRG and NAR score was analyzed using the Pearson’s chi-squared test. Univariable analyses were performed using the log-rank test, stratified by treatment arm. Discrimination ability of non-pCR for DFS was assessed by analyzing the ROC curve as a function of time. Results: Of the 311 patients enrolled, 306 patients were evaluable (Arm A:156, ArmB:150). After a median follow-up of 43 months, the 3-year DFS was 73% in both groups (HR, 0.95, 95% CI, 0.63–1.45, p = 0.82). pCR tended to be higher in Arm B (17% vs. 25%, p = 0.086). In both treatment arms, pCR, TRG and NAR were significant prognostic factors for DFS, whereas survival in subgroups defined by pCR, TRG or NAR did not significantly differ between the treatment arms. The discrimination ability of non-pCR for DFS remained constant over time (C-Index 0.58) but was slightly better in Arm B (0.61 vs. 0.56). Conclusion: Although pCR, TRG and NAR were strong prognostic factors for DFS in the CAO/ARO/AIO-12 trial, their value in selecting one TNT approach over another could not be confirmed. Hence, the conclusion of a long-term survival benefit of one treatment arm based on early surrogate endpoints should be stated with caution.

Approximation theory is a fundamental tool in order to study the representation theory of a ring R. Roughly speaking, it consists in determining suitable additive or abelian subcategories of the whole module category Mod-R with nice enough functorial properties. For example, torsion theory is a well suited incarnation of approximation theory. Of course, such an idea has been generalised to the additive setting itself, so that both Mod-R and other interesting categories related with R may be linked functorially. By the seminal work of Beilinson, Bernstein and Deligne (1982), the derived category of the ring turns out to admit useful torsion theories, called t-structures: they are pairs of full subcategories of D(R) whose intersection, called the heart, is always an abelian category. The so-called standard t-structure of D(R) has as its heart the module category Mod-R itself. Since then a lot of results devoted to the module theoretic characterisation of the hearts have been achieved, providing evidence of the usefulness of the t-structures in the representation theory of R. In 2020, following a research line promoted by many other authors, Saorin and Stovicek proved that the heart of any compactly generated t-structure is always a locally finitely presented Grothendieck categories (actually, this is true for any t-structure in a triangulated category with coproducts). Essentially, this means that the hearts of D(R) come equipped with a finiteness condition miming that one valid in Mod-R. In the present thesis we tackle the problem of characterising when the hearts of certain compactly generated t-structures of a commutative ring are even locally coherent. In this commutative context, after the works of Neeman and Alonso, Jeremias and Saorin, compactly generated t-structures turned out to be very interesting over a noetherian ring, for they are in bijection with the Thomason filtrations of the prime spectrum. In other words, they are classified by geometric objects, moreover their constituent subcategories have a precise cohomological description. However, if the ascending chain condition lacks, such classification is somehow partial, though provided by Hrbek. The crucial point is that the constituents of the t-structures have a different description w.r.t. that available in the noetherian setting, yet if one copies the latter for an arbitrary ring still obtains a t-structure, but it is not clear whether it must be compactly generated. Consequently, pursuing the study of the local coherence of the hearts given by a Thomason filtration, we ended by considering two t-structures. Our technique in order to face the lack of the ascending chain condition relies on a further approximation of the hearts by means of suitable torsion theories. The main results of the thesis are the following: we prove that for the so-called weakly bounded below Thomason filtrations the two t-structures have the same heart (therefore it is always locally finitely presented), and we show that they coincide if and only they are both compactly generated. Moreover, we achieve a complete characterisation of the local coherence for the hearts of the Thomason filtrations of finite length.

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京都大学 / 新制・課程博士 / 博士(情報学) / 甲第24041号 / 情博第797号 / 新制||情||135(附属図書館) / 京都大学大学院情報学研究科システム科学専攻 / (主査)教授 加納 学, 教授 下平 英寿, 教授 石井 信 / 学位規則第4条第1項該当 / Doctor of Informatics / Kyoto University / DFAM

Background: This study describes the incentives and barriers of public procurement ofcellulose-based and locally produced textiles in the Swedish healthcaresector governed by the county councils and regions. The size of the publicprocurement market is substantial which makes it imperative to analyse theprocurement decisions taken by this large customer from asustainability perspective. To understand these decisions better the publicprocurement is also analysed from an organisational perspective discussingpressures from global, regional and local stakeholders and governingauthorities.Methods: Empirical and primary data was collected from three semi-structuredinterviews with procurement officers, strategic buyers and heads ofprocurement departments in three county councils and regions in Sweden.The qualitative data was supplemented with quantitative data from a surveytargeting the additional 18 county councils and regions in Sweden. All 21county councils and regions in Sweden participated in or responded to theinterview and survey study. Six (33 %) complete responses were submitted,while five (28 %) surveys were partially responded to. Seven (39 %) countycouncils and regions did not participate in the study. The quantitative surveydata was analysed through the Fisher’s exact test and a thematic analysis wasapplied jointly on the interview and survey data due to the identicalinterview and survey questions.Results: The four themes found in the empirical data were concluded to be thedecision-making in these procurement processes being affected by manystakeholders, a high trust on suppliers for information updates andsustainable responsibility, an existing knowledge gap on cellulose-based andlocally produced textiles and the challenges and opportunities surroundingthe regulation of sustainability in the contract terms in the publicprocurement of textiles. The procurement officials being in a leading or nonleadingposition did not show any statistically significant effect on theperception of the clarity in the relevant political directives and how thisinfluences the possibility to take sustainable action in the procurementprocess, nor on whether the short-term (lowest) price has a higher prioritythan the long-term (e.g. long-term societal and environmental costs) in theprocurement of textiles.Conclusion: The sustainable public procurement of textiles within the Swedish healthcaresector governed by the county councils and regions is characterized by ahigh level of organisational complexity including many global, regional andlocal stakeholders. The governing authorities as well as the procuringorganizations and suppliers show interest in implementing sustainableprocurement processes which is however aggravated by static contract terms,limited knowledge on novel textile materials and the perceived costs relatedto the procurement.

This thesis proposes a method to reconstruct a frontal facial video basedon encoding done with the facial profile of another video sequence.The reconstructed facial video will have the similar facial expressionchanges as the changes in the profile video. First, the profiles for boththe reference video and for the test video are captured by edge detection.Then, asymmetrical principal component analysis is used to model thecorrespondence between the profile and the frontal face. This allows en-coding from a profile and decoding of the frontal face of another video.Another solution is to use dynamic time warping to match the profilesand select the best matching corresponding frontal face frame for re-construction. With this method, we can reconstructed the test frontalvideo to make it have the similar changing in facial expressions as thereference video. To improve the quality of the result video, Local Lin-ear Embedding is used to give the result video a smoother transitionbetween frames.

Le problème de séparation pour une classe de langages S est le suivant : étant donnés deux langages L1 et L2, existe-t-il un langage appartenant à S qui contient L1, en étant disjoint de L2 ? Si les langages à séparer sont des langages réguliers, le problème de séparation pour la classe S est plus général que le problème de l'appartenance à cette classe, et nous fournit des informations plus détaillées sur la classe. Ce problème de séparation apparaît dans un contexte algébrique sous la forme des parties ponctuelles, et dans un contexte profini sous la forme d'un problème de séparation topologique. Pour quelques classes de langages spécifiques, ce problème a été étudié en utilisant des méthodes profondes de la théorie des semigroupes profinis.Dans cette thèse, on s'intéresse, dans un premier temps, à la décidabilité de ce problème pour plusieurs sous-classes des langages réguliers. Dans un second temps, on s'intéresse à obtenir un langage séparateur, s'il existe, ainsi qu'à la complexité de ces problèmes.Nous établissons une approche générique pour prouver que le problème de séparation est décidable pour une classe de langages donnée. En utilisant cette approche, nous obtenons la décidabilité du problème de séparation pour les langages testables par morceaux, les langages non-ambigus, les langages localement testables, et les langages localement testables à seuil. Ces classes correspondent à des fragments de la logique du premier ordre, et sont parmi lesclasses de langages réguliers les plus étudiées. De plus, cette approche donne une description d'un langage séparateur, pourvu qu'il existe. / The separation problem, for a class S of languages, is the following: given two input languages, does there exist a language in S that contains the first language and that is disjoint from the second langage ?For regular input languages, the separation problem for a class S subsumes the classical membership problem for this class, and provides more detailed information about the class. This separation problem first emerged in an algebraic context in the form of pointlike sets, and in a profinite context as a topological separation problem. These problems have been studied for specific classes of languages, using involved techniques from the theory of profinite semigroups.In this thesis, we are not only interested in showing the decidability of the separation problem for several subclasses of the regular languages, but also in constructing a separating language, if it exists, and in the complexity of these problems.We provide a generic approach, based on combinatorial arguments, to proving the decidability of this problem for a given class. Using this approach, we prove that the separation problem is decidable for the classes of piecewise testable languages, unambiguous languages, and locally (threshold) testable languages. These classes are defined by different fragments of first-order logic, and are among the most studied classes of regular languages. Furthermore, our approach yields a description of a separating language, in case it exists.