Master of Science / Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering / Dwight D. Day / Over the last several years, the use of Field Programmable Gate Arrays, or FPGAs, has become increasingly popular in the embedded systems field. However, FPGAs are typically used only as a coprocessor or dedicated DSP. This project proposes that an embedded system can realize a performance gain over a traditional microprocessor-based design and be made more flexible and extensible by using an FPGA as the primary processing device in the embedded system. Basing a design on an FPGA also allows new features to be much more rapidly developed and integrated into the system. This will be shown by designing an FPGA based embedded system for Surface Systems & Instruments’ Walking Profiler device. The system will include support for rotary encoders, an incline sensor for data collection, and an Ethernet protocol for communication with a Windows computer. The implementation of a sub sampling distance measuring algorithm will be used to demonstrate the tradeoffs between hardware, software, and development times.

The aim of this thesis is to in various ways explore protein expression in human normal tissue and in cancer and to apply that knowledge in biomarker discovery. In Paper I the prognostic significance of RNA-binding motif protein 3 (RBM3) is explored in malignant melanoma. To further evaluate the prognostic significance of RBM3 expression was assessed in 226 incident cases of malignant melanoma from the prospective populationbased cohort study Malmö Diet and Cancer Study using tissue microarray technique (TMA). RBM3 was shown to be down regulated in metastatic melanoma and high nuclear expression in the primary tumor was an independent marker of prolonged over all survival. As a tool to facilitate clinical biomarker studies the Human Protein Atlas has created a tissue dictionary as an introduction to human histology and histopathology. In Paper II this work is introduced. A cancer diagnosis can be a complex process with difficulties of establishing tumor type in localized disease or organ of origin in generalized disease. Immunohistochemically assisted diagnosis of cancer is common practice among pathologists where its application combined with known protein expression profiles of different cancer types, can strengthen or help dismiss a suspected diagnosis. In Paper III the diagnostic performance of 27 commonly used antibodies are tested in a predominantly metastatic, multicancer cohort using TMA technique. Overall these 27 diagnostic markers showed a low sensitivity and specificity for its intended use, highlighting the need for novel, more specific markers. Breast, ovarian, endometrial and ovarian cancers affect predominantly women. Differential diagnostics between these cancer types can be challenging. In Paper IV an algorithm, based on six different IHC markers, to differentiate between these cancer types is presented. A new diagnostic marker for breast cancer, namely ZAG is also introduced. In Paper V the transcriptomic landscape of the adrenal gland is explored by combining a transcriptomic approach with a immunohistochemistry based proteomic approach. In the adrenal gland we were able to detect 253 genes with an elevated pattern of expression in the adrenal gland, as compared to 31 other normal human tissue types analyzed. This combination of a transcriptomic and immunohistochemical approach provides a foundation for a deeper understanding of the adrenal glands function and physiology.

This diploma thesis deals with the criminalistic method of psychological profiling of an offender. Psychological profiling consists in analyzing the offender's behavior. This analysis is used to create an offender profile that contains offender's likely characteristics. Such a profile is intended to help investigators narrow down the range of suspects, or contribute to the success of investigations by refocusing the investigative strategy. The aim of this thesis is to present a balanced view of the method of psychological profiling and to critically evaluate the possibilities of its use for improving the quality of investigative practice. The thesis is divided into three chapters. The first chapter first defines this method, including basic theoretical approaches and bases. Furthermore, the historical development of profiling abroad and in the Czech Republic is introduced. Appropriate and inappropriate offenses for profiling are also mentioned. At the end of the first chapter, the most important methods or approaches to profiling are outlined. The second chapter is devoted to the creation of the psychological profile of an offender itself. First, the information that is necessary for the profile is mentioned, and the profile creation process is described in detail. Finally, the content and formal...

ABSTRACT INTRODUCTION: Cystic fibrosis (CF) is an autosomal recessive disease caused by mutations in the CFTR gene. The gene mutation profile is extremely heterogeneous and mutations show a variable distribution among population groups. In SA the 3120+1G->A splice site mutation has been found predominantly in Black and Coloured patients. It occurs in Black CF patients at an estimated frequency of 46%. The CF carrier frequency is estimated at 1/34 in Black and 1/55 in Coloured populations, and based on these rates, it is clear that a significant number of Black and Coloured patients remain undiagnosed. Point mutations account for the majority of the mutations that have been found in the CFTR gene. Copy number mutations are, however, increasingly being detected in CF patients through the use of gene dosage-dependant assays. These mutations have been found to occur in the CFTR gene in various African American families and exon rearrangements are thought to account for 1.3% of all CF chromosomes across all populations. AIMS: To use haplotypes to analyse the origin(s) of the 3120+1G->A mutation and the likely frequencies of the remaining unknown mutations. To increase mutation detection in the SA Black and Coloured groups by searching for CFTR gene exons for copy number mutations. METHODS: In patients with at least one copy of the 3120+1G>A mutation haplotype studies will be used to elucidate the origin(s) of this mutation in SA Black and Coloured CF patients, by analyzing pyrosequencing SNP genotype data. In patients with at least one unknown mutation, haplotype studies will reveal the likely relative frequencies of the unknown mutations in these populations. In Black and Coloured CF patients with at least one unknown mutation, a multiplex ligation dependant probe amplification (MLPA) CF kit will be used for the detection of exon copy number mutations. RESULTS: The results of the haplotype data show that there is a G-G-C-G-T-A haplotype, for markers MetD-KM19-J44-T854T-Tub18-J32, associated with the 3120+1G->A mutation in both Black and Coloured patients. Unknown mutation-associated haplotypes indicate that there are two relatively common unknown mutations in each of these populations. MLPA results show that one patient is a carrier of an exon 2 deletion. CONCLUSION: A single origin for the 3120+1G>A mutation in Black and Coloured CF patients is supported by the data. Exon copy number changes in the CFTR gene are not a major mutational mechanism leading to CF in SA Black and Coloured patients.

Thesis advisor: Bonnie Jefferson / Images of crime and authorities' attempts to protect society from evil, which saturate dramatic programming on television, have the potential to influence public perception of crime and of crime-solving tools used in the real world. Although "Criminal Minds," a popular broadcast series, shares this potential, it distinguishes itself from others of its genre through its use of criminal profiling as its crime solving mechanism. Using standards provided in Douglas et al.'s "Crime Classification Manual: A Standard System for Investigating and Classifying Violent Crimes, Second Edition," the "Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition," and the "Hare Psychopathy Checklist Revised" as theoretical frameworks, this Communication thesis examines how the criminal profiling depictions of two "Criminal Minds" episodes conform to established criminal profiling conventions utilized by law enforcement. Overall, the results of these analyses suggest that the criminal profiling portrayals in the episodes "L.D.S.K." and "Fear and Loathing" adhere to legitimate real life criminal profiling considerations. / Thesis (BA) — Boston College, 2010. / Submitted to: Boston College. College of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Communication Honors Program. / Discipline: Communication Department.

A técnica de perfilagem gama de colunas de destilação já está no mercado há pelo menos 30 anos. Acompanhando o desenvolvimento tecnológico mundial, a técnica e a indústria prosperaram e se difundiu, podendo ser encontrada em diversos países e sendo implementada por diversas empresas comerciais e centros de pesquisa. Todavia, apesar das melhorias na qualidade dos resultados bem como na rapidez e praticidade da tomada de dados; o conceito básico da técnica permaneceu inalterado. Este trabalho condensa como o aprendizado de 20 anos, em gamma scan e tomografia industrial, propiciou fundamentos para uma técnica inovadora, testada em laboratório e depois efetivamente aplicada em condições reais de campo, que permitiu obter resultados nunca antes obtidos numa perfilagem de coluna. / Distillation column gamma scanning has been in the market for more than 30 years. Following world\'s technology development the industry grew and spread worldwide. Nowadays gamma scanning can be found in many countries performed by commercial companies and research centers either. However, in spite of all development achieved, resulting in high quality data and easy data sampling; the technology concepts remains the same. This works condense how 20 years apprentice ship in gamma scanning and industrial tomography, rise up fundaments for an innovative technique, tested in laboratory scale and effectively applied in real field conditions; culminated in results that have never been obtained with a gamma scan.

A técnica de perfilagem gama de colunas de destilação já está no mercado há pelo menos 30 anos. Acompanhando o desenvolvimento tecnológico mundial, a técnica e a indústria prosperaram e se difundiu, podendo ser encontrada em diversos países e sendo implementada por diversas empresas comerciais e centros de pesquisa. Todavia, apesar das melhorias na qualidade dos resultados bem como na rapidez e praticidade da tomada de dados; o conceito básico da técnica permaneceu inalterado. Este trabalho condensa como o aprendizado de 20 anos, em gamma scan e tomografia industrial, propiciou fundamentos para uma técnica inovadora, testada em laboratório e depois efetivamente aplicada em condições reais de campo, que permitiu obter resultados nunca antes obtidos numa perfilagem de coluna. / Distillation column gamma scanning has been in the market for more than 30 years. Following world\'s technology development the industry grew and spread worldwide. Nowadays gamma scanning can be found in many countries performed by commercial companies and research centers either. However, in spite of all development achieved, resulting in high quality data and easy data sampling; the technology concepts remains the same. This works condense how 20 years apprentice ship in gamma scanning and industrial tomography, rise up fundaments for an innovative technique, tested in laboratory scale and effectively applied in real field conditions; culminated in results that have never been obtained with a gamma scan.

Geographic profiling (GP) was originally developed to solve the problem of information overload when dealing with cases of serial crime. In criminology, the model uses spatial data relating to the locations of connected crimes to prioritise the search for the criminal's anchor point (usually a home or workplace), and is extremely successful in this field. Previous work has shown how the same approach can be adapted to biological data, but to date the model has assumed a spatially homogenous landscape, and has made no attempt to integrate more complex spatial information (eg, altitude, land use). It is this issue that I address here. In addition, I show for the first time how the model can be applied to conservation data and - taking the model back to its origins in criminology - to wildlife crime. In Chapter 2, I use the Dirichlet Process Mixture (DPM) model of geographic profiling to locate sleep trees for tarsiers in dense jungle in Indonesia, using as input the locations at which calls were recorded, demonstrating how the model can be applied to locating the nests, dens or roosts of other elusive animals and potentially improving estimates of population size, with important implications for management of both species and habitats. In Chapter 3, I show how spatial information in the form of citizen science could be used to improve a study of invasive mink in the Hebrides. In Chapter 4, I turn to the issue of 'commuter crime' in a study of poaching in Savé Valley Conservancy (SVC) in Zimbabwe, in which although poaching occurs inside SVC the majority of poachers live outside, showing how the model can be adjusted to reflect a simple binary classification of the landscape (inside or outside SVC). Finally, in Chapter 5, I combine more complex land use information (estimates of farm density) with the GP model to improve predictions of human-wildlife conflict.

Protein synthesis is a fundamental and ultimate process in living cells. Cells possess sophisticated machineries and continuously carry out complex processes. Monitoring protein synthesis in living cells not only inform us about the mechanism of translation but also deepen our insights about all aspects of life. Understanding the structure and mechanism of the ribosome and its associated factors helped us enlarge our knowledge on protein synthesis. Recently, with the dramatic advances of high-throughput sequencing and bioinformatics, a new technique called ribosome profiling emerged. By retrieving mRNA fragments protected by translating ribosomes, ribosome profiling reveals global ribosome occupancy along mRNAs in living cells, which can inform us with the identity and quantity of proteins being made. Easily adapted to other organisms, ribosome profiling technique is expanding its application in revealing various cellular activities as well as the knowledge on protein synthesis. Here, we report the mechanism of translating mRNA cleavage by endoribonuclease RelE in vivo. RelE is an endoribonuclease that is induced during nutrient deficiency stress and specifically cleaves translating mRNAs upon binding to the ribosomal A site. Overexpression of RelE in living cells causes growth arrest by inhibiting global translation. We monitored RelE activity in vivo upon overexpression using ribosome profiling. The data show that RelE actively cuts translating mRNAs whenever the ribosomal A site is accessible, resulting in truncated mRNAs. RelE causes the ribosome complexes to accumulate near the 5' end of genes as the process of ribosome rescue, translation, and cleavage by RelE repeats. RelE cleavage specific sub-codon level ribosome profiling data also represent reading frame in Escherichia coli and sequence specificity of RelE cleavage in vivo. We report another ribosome profiling study on a methyltransferase TrmD in E. coli. TrmD is known to methylate G37 (the residue at 3' side of anticodon) of some tRNAs and be responsible for codon-anticodon interaction. We constructed a TrmD depletion E. coli strain, whose deletion results in lethality of cells. Resulting depletion of m1G37 in the strain leads to growth arrest. Lack of m1G37 of some tRNAs whose codons start with C showed frequent frameshift when translating the gene message in vitro. By using ribosome profiling, we successfully observed significant difference on translation process when codons interact with anticodons of tRNAs lacking m1G37. The data reveal slow translation rate or pauses on the tRNAs when missing the appropriate methylation, which corresponds to the previous biochemical data in vitro.

The goal of this research was to aid in the fight against the heroin and opioid epidemic by developing new methodology for heroin provenance determination and forensic sample comparison. Over 400 illicit heroin powder samples were analyzed using quadrupole and high-resolution inductively-coupled plasma mass spectrometry (Q-ICP-MS and HR-ICP-MS) in order to measure and identify elemental contaminants useful for associating heroin samples of common origin and differentiating heroin of different geographic origins. Additionally, 198 heroin samples were analyzed by multi-collector ICP-MS (MC-ICP-MS) to measure radiogenic strontium isotope ratios (87Sr/86Sr) with high-precision for heroin provenance determination, for the first time. Supervised discriminant analysis models were constructed to predict heroin origin using elemental composition. The model was able to correctly associate 88% of the samples to their region of origin. When 87Sr/86Sr data were combined with Q-ICP-MS elemental data, the correct association of heroin samples improved to ≥90% for all groups with an average of 93% correct classification. For forensic sample comparisons, quantitative elemental data (11 elements measured) from 120 samples, 30 from each of the four regions, were compared in order to assess the rate of discrimination (5400 total comparisons). Using a match criterion of ±3 standard deviations about the mean, only 14 of the 5400 possible comparison pairs were not discriminated resulting in a discrimination rate of 99.7%. For determining the rate of correct associations, 3 replicates of 24 duplicate samples were prepared and analyzed on separate days. Only 1 of the 24 correct pairs were not associated for a correct association rate of 95.8%. New methods for provenance determination and sample comparison are expected to be incredibly useful to intelligence agencies and law enforcement working to reduce the proliferation of heroin.