Doctor of Philosophy / Security Studies Interdepartmental Program / Andrew G. Long / David R. Stone / This dissertation research examines the effect of organizational lethality on the longevity of terrorist groups. The current scholarship has sought to understand the demise of terrorist groups through means such as group success, government repression, negotiations, internal conflict, reorientation of goals, defeat, leadership decapitation and loss of public support. However, little research is available on the determinants of terrorists’ target selection and its implications for the group’s longevity. This study evaluates the targeting patterns and preferences of 480 terrorist groups that were operational between 1980 and 2011 and disaggre- gates the victims of all terrorist attacks into combatant versus non-combatant target-types. It is hypothesized that organizational lethality – defined as the average number of civilian killings generated by each group in its home-base country – is associated with negative group reputation, which results in faster group mortality. Popular support for violence, however, can influence and result from terrorism at the same time and has been found to be inherently endogenous by many previous studies. Therefore, a Seemingly Unrelated Bivariate Probit Model is employed to examine this endogenous relationship, and the results confirm that there is a significant correlation between negative group reputation and group mortality. Moreover, the study differentiates between terrorist group activity – defined as average at- tacks generated by a group – and group lethality, and employs the Cox Proportional Hazard Model to estimate group duration. The study includes covariates like group size, ideology, positive consistency reputation and other factors affecting group longevity and mortality. The results imply that organizational lethality is associated with higher political risks for terrorist groups and tends to backfire by decreasing their survival probability. However, on the other hand, the study finds that an escalation in terrorist activity (launching more attacks) significantly increase the group longevity over time. The results of this study are tested by conducting group-specific case studies on the Afghan and Pakistani Taliban in Pak- istan using information collected from the English language Pakistani newspaper archives, and Harmony Database from Combat Terrorism Center at West Point, NY.

Ageing and senescence remain among the most intriguing questions in biology. Saccharomyces cerevisiae has become well established as a fertile model system for the investigation of ageing. Remarkable conservation has been found to exist between interventions extending lifespan in higher animals and yeast – genetic, chemical, and nutritional – suggesting a network of common regulatory pathways controlling large-scale shifts in gene expression involved in senescence. While it has been proposed that epigenetic regulation controls these shifts, evidence remains incomplete. To address this question, novel longevity mutants were isolated in S. cerevisiae using a purpose-designed high-precision screen based on ageing culture outgrowth. A novel long-lived mutant in uncharacterised gene YDR026C was discovered and found to participate in a pathway distinct from TOR signalling, but share epistasis with the histone deacetylase SIR2Δ, a well established regulator of replicative longevity and rDNA maintenance. Through equilibrium density centrifugal separation of culture subpopulations, SIR2Δ and Ydr026cΔ cultures were found to demonstrate reduced and improved maintenance of post-diauxic quiescence respectively, previously shown to underlie chronological survival in strains including snf1Δ. Development of a quantified TUNEL-based assay for genome fragmentation indicated early apoptotic-like behaviour in the SIR2Δ strain. Microdissection experiments and sectored-colony assays of strains containing an rDNA-embedded ADE2 reporter determined that Ydr026cΔ cells also exhibit extended replicative lifespan, and reduced recombination at the rDNA spacer region hotspot, abrogated in SIR2Δ strains. SIR2Δ is well established to repress RNA polymerase II-derived transcripts in the rDNA spacer region, including IGS1-R. Northern analysis determined Ydr026c also silences transcription in the spacer, possibly through preventing termination of the main rRNA transcript, interfering with IGS1-R expression. By transformation with a vector overexpressing IGS1-R, partial reconstitution of the SIR2Δ phenotype was observed, including rDNA hyperrecombination, shortened replicative longevity, and higher-order chromatin structure restoration. These data suggests a model whereby non-coding rDNA spacer transcripts epigenetically determine rDNA maintenance through recombination, leading to physiological phenotypes of replicative and chronological ageing.

As human life expectancy continues to increase, longevity risk has become a major concern for pension plan sponsors and annuity providers. To hedge the risk, longevity-linked securities have been developed. Since these securities often have payoffs linked to mortality rates of multiple populations, it is important to investigate the relationship between them. In this thesis, we use England and Wales (EW) and Canadian mortality data for illustration. We consider the long-term equilibrium between the mortality indexes of the two populations through cointegration analysis. Our test shows that structural change occurred in the equilibrium. To capture changes in both equilibrium and autoregression structure, we adopt the Threshold Vector Error Correction Model (TVECM). We find that the TVECM model provides adequate fit to our data. This model is further applied to pricing an illustrative longevity bond. Our numerical results indicate that the changes in the long-term equilibrium have a significant impact on longevity bond prices. / October 2016

Birth weight (BW) (n =1277) and weaning weight (WW) (n = 1090) of calves, pregnancy rate (PR) (n = 1386), calf crop born (CCB) (n = 1386), calf crop weaned (CCW) (n = 1294), cow’s weight at palpation (CW) (n = 1474) and cow body condition score (BCS) (n = 1473) were evaluated from 1994 to 2006 in 143 F1 cows sired by Brahman (B), Boran (Bo) and Tuli (T) bulls and born to Angus and Hereford cows. Mouth scores (MS) (n = 139) were assigned to the remaining cows in 2004 and 2005. Fixed effects included sire breed of cow, dam breed of cow, and calf’s birth year/age of cow; random effects included cow and sire of cow. BW and WW were evaluated using the same model and adding gender for both and age for WW. All two-way interactions were tested for significance. Calf’s birth year/age of dam was significant for all traits (P < 0.05) except WW. BW for calves out of F1 B, Bo and T bulls were 35.08, 34.76 and 34.87 kg, respectively, and were not different. WW differed (P < 0.05) for calves out of F1 B, Bo and T cows (235.87, 221.10 and 208.35 kg, respectively). PR (0.922, 0.955 and 0.936, respectively), CCB (0.881, 0.931, 0.890, respectively), CCW (0.848, 0.898 and 0.869, respectively), did not differ among F1 B, Bo and T cows. CW when cows were 8- or 9-year old were 600.78, 514.63 and 513.14 kg, respectively, for F1 B, Bo and T cows, with those sired by B being heaviest (P < 0.05). BCS for B-, Bo- and T-sired cows were 5.23, 5.48 and 5.18, respectively, with F1 Bo cows having highest scores. Higher MS (P < 0.05) were assigned to Bo and B-sired cows (0.95 and 0.94, respectively) compared to T-sired cows (0.78), when both broken and solid incisors were scored 1, and smooth scored 0. When both smooth and broken were scored 0, and solid were scored 1, higher scores were assigned to B- (0.53) compared to T-sired cows (0.24), the Bo-sired cows being intermediate. Higher reproductive rates were found for Boran-sired cows, but Brahman-sired cows weaned heavier calves.

The study of fine roots (FR) (roots < 2 mm in diameter) in the boreal forests has become a focus of many forest researchers in the past decade in an effort to better understand belowground processes and improve current carbon (C) models to better predict possible C sinks and sources. The objectives of this study were: 1) to determine the inter-annual variability in FR C production in relation to C cycling and other fluxes for four Saskatchewan boreal sites during a four year period, 2) to determine if minirhizotron (MR) estimates of root biomass were similar to root coring estimates, 3) to determine how root production, mortality, turnover, and longevity vary with root diameter class and soil depth, and 4) to determine if image collection orientation influenced estimates of FR biomass and production. Four Saskatchewan boreal sites including aspen (Populus tremuloides) (OA), black spruce (Picea mariana) (OBS), and two jack pine (Pinus banksiana) (mature OJP, young HJP94) stands were selected and MR were installed in July of 2002. Minirhizotron images were collected monthly from the end of May through September from 2003 to 2006. Total ecosystem C was estimated to be 47.5, 78.1, 163.1, and 450.5 Mg ha-1 for HJP94, OJP, OA, and OBS, respectively. The FR component of the ecosystem carbon storage ranged from 0.7 Mg ha-1 (1%) at HJP94 to 1.2 Mg ha-1 (< 1%) at OBS. Fine roots were found to contribute a very large portion of C production with estimates of 1.0, 0.6, 1.2, and 1.5 Mg ha-1 yr-1 accounting for 47, 27, 25, and 54% of total ecosystem C production at HJP94, OJP, OA, and OBS, respectively. In a one time comparison of MR and soil cores, FR biomass estimates were found to be similar at OJP, OA, and OBS, with MR estimates being significantly greater at HJP94. Approximately 85, 90, 96, and 96% of FR measured in this study were found to be less than 0.5 mm in diameter with median diameters of 0.250 ± 0.237, 0.225 ± 0.208, 0.175 ± 0.149 and 0.150 ± 0.149 (median ± SD) mm at HJP94, OJP, OA, and OBS, respectively. Fine root longevity was found to increase with increasing diameter and soil depth while turnover decreased. In many cases, it was found that even within a diameter interval of < 0.1 mm, differences in biomass, production, turnover, and longevity were detectable. This brings into question the use of the traditional 2 mm diameter class in FR studies. Fine root data, such as presented in this thesis, help to fill in some of the gaps in the knowledge base, enabling researchers to better understand the underground processes of the boreal forest and develop more complex and accurate C models.

In product pricing and reserving, actuaries are often required to make predictions of future death rates. In the past, this has been performed by using deterministic improvement scales that give only a single mortality trajectory. However, there is enormous likelihood that future death rates will turn out to be different from the projected ones, and so a better assessment of longevity risk would be one that consists of both a mean estimate and a measure of uncertainty. Such assessment can be performed using a stochastic mortality model, which is the core of this thesis. The Lee-Carter model is one of the most popular stochastic mortality models. While it does an excellent job in mean forecasting, it has been criticized for providing overly narrow prediction intervals that may have underestimated uncertainty. This thesis mitigates this problem by relaxing the assumption on the distribution of death counts. We found that the generalization from Poisson to negative binomial is equivalent to allowing gamma heterogeneity within each age-period cells. The proposed extension gives not only a better fit, but also a more conservative prediction interval that may reflect better the uncertainty entailed. The proposed extension is then applied to the construction of mortality improvement scales for Canadian insured lives. Given that the insured lives data series are too short for a direct Lee-Carter projection, we build an extra relational model that could borrow strengths from the Canadian population data, which covers a far longer period. The resultant scales consist of explicit measures of uncertainty. The prediction of the tail of a survival distribution requires a special treatment due to the lack of high quality old-age mortality data. We utilize the asymptotic results in modern extreme value theory to extrapolate death probabilities to the advanced ages, and to statistically determine the age at which the life table should be closed. Such technique is further integrated with the Lee-Carter model to produce a stochastic analysis of old-age mortality, and a prediction of the highest attained age for various cohorts. The mortality models we considered are further applied to the valuation of mortality-related financial products. In particular we investigate the no-negative-equity-guarantee that is offered in most fixed-repayment lifetime mortgages in Britain. The valuation of such guarantee requires a simultaneous consideration of both longevity and house price inflation risk. We found that house price returns can be well described by an ARMA-EGARCH time-series process. Under an ARMA-EGARCH process, however, the Black-Scholes formula no longer applies. We derive our own pricing formula based on the conditional Esscher transformation. Finally, we propose some possible hedging and capital reserving strategies for managing the risks associated with the guarantee.

ABSTRACT The molecular mechanisms controlling longevity have been subject to intense scrutiny in recent years. It is clear that genomic stability, stress response and nutrient signaling all play critical roles in lifespan determination, but the precise molecular mechanisms and their often subtle influence on cellular function remain largely unknown. The Anaphase Promoting Complex (APC) is an evolutionarily conserved ubiquitin-protein ligase composed of 13 subunits in yeast, required for M and G1 cell cycle progression, and is associated with cancer and premature aging in many model systems when defective. The APC targets substrates for proteasome-dependent degradation, yet the full range of APC substrates and their role in mediating genomic stability, stress response and longevity are largely unknown. In this study, we use the model organism Saccharomyces cerevisiae to investigate the results of two screens designed to identify novel APC targets, regulators and/or modifiers, in an effort to better understand the function of the APC. Both of these screens made use of the Apc5 subunit. This subunit is likely an important structural component of the APC and may be targeted by many APC regulatory enzymes. This subunit is essential, but a temperature sensitive (ts) allele of Apc5 was available for these studies. First, a Yeast 2-Hybrid (Y2H) screen utilizing Apc5 as bait recovered the lifespan determinant Fob1 as a potential APC substrate. We hypothesized that the APC targets Fob1 for proteasome- and ubiquitin-dependent degradation. Authenticating Fob1 as a novel APC substrate makes up the first part of this thesis. We have found that Fob1 is unstable specifically in G1, and cycles throughout the cell cycle in a manner similar to Clb2, an APC target. Consistent with the APC mediating Fob1 degradation, Fob1 is stabilized in APC and proteasome mutants. Disruption of FOB1 in WT cells increased replicative lifespan, a measure of how many daughter cells a single mother will produce prior to senescence; moreover, FOB1 disruption improved APC mutant replicative lifespan defects. Increased FOB1 expression decreased replicative lifespan in WT cells, while increased expression in APC mutant cells did not reduce replicative lifespan further, suggesting an epistatic interaction. FOB1 deletion also suppressed cell cycle progression, and rDNA recombination defects observed in apc5CA cells. Mutation to a putative Destruction Box-like motif (Fob1E420V) disrupted Fob1 modification, stabilized the protein and increased rDNA recombination. These results support our hypothesis that Fob1 is a novel APC target and that Fob1 dosage may be regulated by the APC in response to cell cycle and environmental cues to regulate APC-dependent genomic stability and longevity. Second, an aptamer (small peptide) based screen identified peptides capable of suppressing the ts defect of the apc5CA mutant. One aptamer of interest is Y65, which has homology to the ubiquitin ligase Elc1. A Y2H found that this peptide Y65 binds the unstable stress response transcription factor Cin5. We hypothesized that this peptide may stabilize Cin5 by masking ubiquitin-dependent degradation. Stabilized Cin5 may in turn alleviate some apc5CA mutant defects. Characterizing Cin5 and confirming that Cin5 is subject to proteasome and ubiquitin-dependent degradation makes up the second portion of this thesis. During our investigation of Cin5 we identify a phospho-inhibited degradation motif within Cin5 that prevents ubiquitination and subsequent degradation when phosphorylated. We also provide evidence suggesting Cin5 may be targeted by a previously unidentified ubiquitin ligase subcomplex including Elc1 and Grr1. These data have helped elucidate the ubiquitin dependent regulation of Cin5. In summary, this research demonstrates the feasibility of using the Y2H and aptamer screens to identify and characterize molecular networks that interplay with the APC. Additionally, identifying and characterizing proteins where APC activity or function can be modified by aptamer binding has the potential to classify drug targets for therapeutic use in higher eukaryotes. Further understanding of the role the APC plays in cell cycle progression, chromatin assembly, genomic stability, stress response and longevity will be valuable to fundamental biological science, and may also have applications in health science and medicine.

In product pricing and reserving, actuaries are often required to make predictions of future death rates. In the past, this has been performed by using deterministic improvement scales that give only a single mortality trajectory. However, there is enormous likelihood that future death rates will turn out to be different from the projected ones, and so a better assessment of longevity risk would be one that consists of both a mean estimate and a measure of uncertainty. Such assessment can be performed using a stochastic mortality model, which is the core of this thesis. The Lee-Carter model is one of the most popular stochastic mortality models. While it does an excellent job in mean forecasting, it has been criticized for providing overly narrow prediction intervals that may have underestimated uncertainty. This thesis mitigates this problem by relaxing the assumption on the distribution of death counts. We found that the generalization from Poisson to negative binomial is equivalent to allowing gamma heterogeneity within each age-period cells. The proposed extension gives not only a better fit, but also a more conservative prediction interval that may reflect better the uncertainty entailed. The proposed extension is then applied to the construction of mortality improvement scales for Canadian insured lives. Given that the insured lives data series are too short for a direct Lee-Carter projection, we build an extra relational model that could borrow strengths from the Canadian population data, which covers a far longer period. The resultant scales consist of explicit measures of uncertainty. The prediction of the tail of a survival distribution requires a special treatment due to the lack of high quality old-age mortality data. We utilize the asymptotic results in modern extreme value theory to extrapolate death probabilities to the advanced ages, and to statistically determine the age at which the life table should be closed. Such technique is further integrated with the Lee-Carter model to produce a stochastic analysis of old-age mortality, and a prediction of the highest attained age for various cohorts. The mortality models we considered are further applied to the valuation of mortality-related financial products. In particular we investigate the no-negative-equity-guarantee that is offered in most fixed-repayment lifetime mortgages in Britain. The valuation of such guarantee requires a simultaneous consideration of both longevity and house price inflation risk. We found that house price returns can be well described by an ARMA-EGARCH time-series process. Under an ARMA-EGARCH process, however, the Black-Scholes formula no longer applies. We derive our own pricing formula based on the conditional Esscher transformation. Finally, we propose some possible hedging and capital reserving strategies for managing the risks associated with the guarantee.

The study of fine roots (FR) (roots < 2 mm in diameter) in the boreal forests has become a focus of many forest researchers in the past decade in an effort to better understand belowground processes and improve current carbon (C) models to better predict possible C sinks and sources. The objectives of this study were: 1) to determine the inter-annual variability in FR C production in relation to C cycling and other fluxes for four Saskatchewan boreal sites during a four year period, 2) to determine if minirhizotron (MR) estimates of root biomass were similar to root coring estimates, 3) to determine how root production, mortality, turnover, and longevity vary with root diameter class and soil depth, and 4) to determine if image collection orientation influenced estimates of FR biomass and production. Four Saskatchewan boreal sites including aspen (Populus tremuloides) (OA), black spruce (Picea mariana) (OBS), and two jack pine (Pinus banksiana) (mature OJP, young HJP94) stands were selected and MR were installed in July of 2002. Minirhizotron images were collected monthly from the end of May through September from 2003 to 2006. Total ecosystem C was estimated to be 47.5, 78.1, 163.1, and 450.5 Mg ha-1 for HJP94, OJP, OA, and OBS, respectively. The FR component of the ecosystem carbon storage ranged from 0.7 Mg ha-1 (1%) at HJP94 to 1.2 Mg ha-1 (< 1%) at OBS. Fine roots were found to contribute a very large portion of C production with estimates of 1.0, 0.6, 1.2, and 1.5 Mg ha-1 yr-1 accounting for 47, 27, 25, and 54% of total ecosystem C production at HJP94, OJP, OA, and OBS, respectively. In a one time comparison of MR and soil cores, FR biomass estimates were found to be similar at OJP, OA, and OBS, with MR estimates being significantly greater at HJP94. Approximately 85, 90, 96, and 96% of FR measured in this study were found to be less than 0.5 mm in diameter with median diameters of 0.250 ± 0.237, 0.225 ± 0.208, 0.175 ± 0.149 and 0.150 ± 0.149 (median ± SD) mm at HJP94, OJP, OA, and OBS, respectively. Fine root longevity was found to increase with increasing diameter and soil depth while turnover decreased. In many cases, it was found that even within a diameter interval of < 0.1 mm, differences in biomass, production, turnover, and longevity were detectable. This brings into question the use of the traditional 2 mm diameter class in FR studies. Fine root data, such as presented in this thesis, help to fill in some of the gaps in the knowledge base, enabling researchers to better understand the underground processes of the boreal forest and develop more complex and accurate C models.

Abstract This study investigated the reproductive behaviors of Formosan macaques (Macaca cyclopis) from July 2000 to July 2002 with 608 field hours in Mt. Lonvegity. I followed troops C and Cd that resulted from a fission of troop C in Dec. 2000. During these two mating seasons, 19 sexually mature males and 19 females were involved in 188 mounting/thrusting series. These included 139 single and 49 multi-mounting thrusting series. The peak frequency of copulation was in Dec. in both years with means of 1.34/hr and 0.94/hr. However, the maximum number of males and females involved were in Nov and Nov~Dec.. with 18 (9M9F, 2001) and 22 (12M10F, 2001) individuals. The residency and ranks of males influence their copulation strategies. Alpha males performed over half of the multi-mount copulations (55.1%), followed by non-troop males and other troop males (each, 22.45¢M). On the other hand, the highest proportion of single mount copulations were from OTM (38.13%)¡CBiting and copulation calls occurred more frequently in multi-mount than in single mount copulation. The duration of thrust was longest in the last mount of multi-mount copulation series (10.9 sec ¡Ó5.4, n=45), next in single mount (8.16 sec ¡Ó4.2). Male dominant rank influenced the occurrence of consortships between heterosexual pairs. Nearly all of consortships observed were performed by troop males (94/105 = 89.4%), NTM just 10.48¢M(11/105 = 10.48%)¡CHigh-ranking males guarded estrous females and interfered low-ranking males' copulation. The later used sneaky mating during the absence of dominant males or in the peripheral part of a social troop with poor visibility.¡C Troop C was dominant to troop Cd in habitat utilization and intertroop interaction. Troop C often chased troop Cd away (78.3%) or troop C withdrew voluntarily (21.7%). After the troop fission, the peak of monthly frequency of copulation in Cd was higher than that in troop C (two mating seasons: 3.33/hr versus 1.44/hr, 2.80/hr versus 0.74/hr). The birth rates of these two troops both increased from 2001 to 2002 (C: 37.5% to 81.3%; Cd: 50.0% to 100%)¡C