In the antisaccade task participants are required to saccade to the mirror image location of a sudden onset target. As such, the task provides a powerful tool with which to investigate the cognitive processes underlying goal-directed behaviour. In healthy participants antisaccade errors (prosaccades directed towards the target) occur on approximately 20% of trials, and increased antisaccade error rate is widely used as a measure of “cognitive disinhibition” in clinical settings. One aspect of antisaccade performance that has received relatively little attention is the large variability in error rate typically observed within healthy participants. Whilst there are many studies describing increased antisaccade error rates in patient populations, there has been comparatively little research into what individual differences might underlie the dramatic variations that are observed within healthy participants. This thesis presents five papers, each of which explores potential sources of variability in antisaccade performance in healthy participants. The first paper used a cueing manipulation to explore the extent to which individual differences in the ability to maintain the task goal in mind will influence antisaccade error rate. The second paper addressed the potential role of differences in motivation, by determining the extent to which antisaccade performance is moderated by a range of incentives. In paper 3, the role of strategic influences was investigated by altering the task instructions that participants were given. In paper 4, task instructions and working memory load were manipulated in order to determine their effect on antisaccade error awareness. The final paper, based on data gathered across the preceding experiments, explored the extent to which individual differences in factors such as working memory capacity, processing speed, and personality measures (schizotypy and impulsivity) correlated with antisaccade performance. Across all studies, the data is used to test predictions made by current parallel programming models of antisaccade performance. The data suggests that a range of “top-down” factors can influence antisaccade performance, but that the most important individual difference in explaining antisaccade error rate in healthy participants is prosaccade latency.

Aims The aim of this PhD research project was to investigate the application of dental pulp stem cells (DPSC) as a treatment for traumatic and degenerative eye diseases. The accuracy and reliability of counting retinal ganglion cells (RGC) in radial retinal section was also assessed. Methods Numbers of RGC in radial retinal sections were compared to numbers in retinal wholemounts. DPSC were cultured with RGC and survival and neuritogenesis were quantified. DPSC were also transplanted intravitreally into rat models of optic neuropathy (optic nerve crush) and glaucoma and surviving RGC and regenerated axons were quantified in radial retinal sections. Results Quantifying RGC in radial retinal sections was as reliable and accurate as the current gold standard Thus, retinal wholemounts with Brn3a proved to be the most reliable marker for RGC. DPSC protected RGC from optic nerve crush-/glaucoma-induced death, promoting significant regeneration of RGC axons in the former and preserving visual function (as measured by electroretinography) in the latter. The mechanism of action, as determined in vitro, appeared to be through the secretion of multiple neurotrophic factors (NTF). Conclusions In conclusion, DPSC is a potent cell therapy in the treatment of traumatic and degenerative eye disease.

Abstract It has been a long time that Taiwan is always promoting its tourism industry in every aspect, and this policy not only arouses the development of economy but also promotes the status of Taiwan in the world. It is considered that the foreigners may have a deeper understanding of Taiwan by visiting this Island, and also expand the civil diplomacy, as well as increase the tourism revenue. Due to the trend of globalization, the city connects directly with global economy, the communications between cities, the sharing of resources and the interaction of cultures, the importance has exceeded upon nations, the competition relationship as well. Therefore, the city must set up its unique character, combined the city marketing with the enterprise, in order to develop the regional resources with area planning and reach the goal of win-win situation. The Ambassador Hotels and the Tokyu Hotels Chain, Japan have been cooperated closely for a long time, not only in sales promotion, the Tohyu Hotels also provide construction design, operation know-how, management concepts and personnel training manuals. The Ambassador Hotel Taipei renovated and expanded to be a 477 room¡¦s hotel in 1979, more catering and convention facilities are added to meet the increasing tourist numbers, due to the world economic booming. In 1981, the largest international hotel in southern Taiwan- the Ambassador Hotel, Kaohsiung opened, which made the Ambassador Hotels become the first domestic hotel chain in Taiwan. Furthermore, the Ambassador Hotel Hsinchu opened in 2000, attracting the nobles of electronic scientists and engineers in Hsinchu Science Industrial Park. The Ambassador Hotel Kaohsiung being re-positioned itself as The Urban Resort Hotel now is the only five stars hotel adjacent to the beautiful Love River, and proudly represents the gorgeous and elegant atmosphere of Kaohsiung Harbor. The Hotel has built the latest poolside outdoor restaurant- Le blé d'or, and has also been awarded as the top international hotel in Kaohsiung by Business Traveler magazine. By re-positioning, re-adjusting the marketing strategies, re-forming the organization, re-inforcing the internal controls and focusing on new products developments, the Ambassador Hotel Kaohsiung has turned into profits by 2004, and is still blooming. It is considered that the re-positioning and re-adjusting marketing strategies did work by analyzing the customer demographics, with the majority of domestic travelers.

This essay attempts to outline Jacques Derrida’s envisaged rewriting of transcendental aesthetics, hinted at in De la grammatologie. Focusing mainly on the texts published during the 1960’s (especially La voix et le phénomène) and the early 1970’s, I try to situate Derrida’s thought within the horizon of transcendental philosophy. Special attention is devoted to Immanuel Kant and Edmund Husserl given the importance that Derrida ascribes to them. My intention is to capture Derrida’s position towards these previous attempts of formulating a transcendental aesthetics. In Derrida’s view – the way I interpret it – transcendental aesthetics is a set of issues concerning (i) the philosophy of time and space and the constitution of time and space, (ii) a theory concerning the constitution of conditions (iii) a theory concerning the lowest level of cognition. I will try to support the claim that Derrida’s famous notion, la différance, entails a recasting of previous notions of transcendental aesthetics. Derrida is well known for his claim that experience is not direct; it must be given through re-presentations, which synthesize sense (ideal objects) and the sensed. Ideal objects are themselves dependent on language and hence experience cannot be brought about without the mediation of language. In this essay the claim that neither space nor time would be without the sign is substantiated. With this in mind I attempt to show that Derrida’s rewriting of transcendental aesthetics amounts to promoting the concept of spacing, which represents the-becoming-spaceof-time and the-becoming-time-of-space. Without the deferring and differing involved in the movement of la différance and the writing of the unconscious there would be neither time nor space. One of the most important outcomes of this essay is the presentation of the interplay between activity and passivity involved in the constitution of ideality performed by unconscious writing.

Since the business surroundings become fast-moving, the enterprises implement BRP to keep pace with.While some enterprises got dramatic performance improvement,still many failed ,which made BPR be doubted.In this information-era,changing happen very often ,so BPR has it ¡¦s value on business practices and applications in the future. Moreover, Information Technology make great progesses in recent years and become powerful tool for BPR. How can enterprises make IT-related decision on BPR¡HHow to choose adequate BPR strategies¡H This thesis will foucus on these topics.In the text will appear ¡uIT-involvement matrix¡v and ¡uBPR strategies sets¡v to explain what relations live between business objectives,strategies,activiries and performance valuations.

Chemotaxis and cell migration are important processes for life, involved in organism development and homeostasis and implicated in a number of disease states. Dictyostelium discoideum, an amoeba, is a useful model for investigation of chemotaxis and development, due to its ability to undergo chemotactic aggregation and development upon starvation. Although cell migration has been well described on planar transparent surfaces, it is uncertain how well these conditions replicate the natural environment of a cell. However, attempts to better replicate these environments generally make use of opaque substrates and 3D matrices, in which it is more challenging to image cell migration. Protocols were developed to enable optical coherence tomography, a 3D structural imaging technique which requires no sample processing or staining, to be successfully employed in imaging Dictyostelium cell migration in time-lapse on non-transparent substrata and within an agarose gel. I compared the effects of two substrates, a nitrocellulose filter and a polystyrene Petri dish on aggregating cells and found differences in speed but not persistence. Extension of this to include cells within agarose revealed that these cells exhibited less directed migration, but their velocity was unaffected. I showed that cells lacking myosin II failed to complete development within an agarose gel and had significantly reduced velocity and directional migration when compared to their parent strain. Furthermore, the velocities of cells migrating within agarose gel were bimodally distributed, potentially indicating two distinct cell populations, fast and slow, and fast movement was shown to be largely myosin II dependent. Great potential therefore exists for cell-substrate and cell-matrix interactions to affect the migration character of cells, even those, such as Dictyostelium, which do not form strong focal adhesions. Moreover a properly ordered cytoskeleton is implicated in enabling cells to effectively utilise different modes of cell motility.

No description available.

No description available.

Canadian universities are challenged by the lack of graduating enough dentists to meet the future needs of the Canadian population. Foreign-trained dentists (FTD) represent a valuable resource to society and the economy. Dental programs have trained FTD for various reasons: public need for healthcare services, income generation for universities, and demand by FTD who desire to practice dentistry in Canada. Changes implemented by the National Dental Examining Board (NDEB) of Canada in 2000 have resulted in FTD no longer being able to gain Canadian dental licensure through a certification examination. FTD are now required to complete a two-year advanced placement qualifying or degree program at a Canadian dental school prior to receiving licensure. In 2003, the University of Manitoba launched a two-year International Dentist Degree Program (IDDP). In Part I of the study, 19 transcribed interviews of IDDP graduates between 2004-2008 were analyzed manually. Five qualitative themes emerged from the dataset. The themes are identified as: (1) isolation and physical relocation issues (i.e., from friends, family and their culture), (2) personal and professional demands of the program (i.e., maintaining home life with spouse and /or children as well as the professional demands of a dental student), (3) emotional stress associated with the program, (i.e., personal struggles and financial stresses), (4) re-learning a system (i.e., both cultural and professional), and (5) overall program satisfaction. In Part II of the study, the mean differences between the outcome variables (Clinical Grades, Didactic Grades, Final Grade Point Average, and NDEB Written and OSCE scores) were statistically analyzed between the 37 IDDP graduates and 246 regular-stream dental graduates from 2003-2011. Based on analysis of the data, the IDDP graduates performed better than the regular-stream dental graduates in all the variables. The mean scores in each of the outcome variables were higher than the regular-stream group, the only variable that was found to be statistically significant was observed in the NDEB Written scores (p>0.05).

Canadian universities are challenged by the lack of graduating enough dentists to meet the future needs of the Canadian population. Foreign-trained dentists (FTD) represent a valuable resource to society and the economy. Dental programs have trained FTD for various reasons: public need for healthcare services, income generation for universities, and demand by FTD who desire to practice dentistry in Canada. Changes implemented by the National Dental Examining Board (NDEB) of Canada in 2000 have resulted in FTD no longer being able to gain Canadian dental licensure through a certification examination. FTD are now required to complete a two-year advanced placement qualifying or degree program at a Canadian dental school prior to receiving licensure. In 2003, the University of Manitoba launched a two-year International Dentist Degree Program (IDDP). In Part I of the study, 19 transcribed interviews of IDDP graduates between 2004-2008 were analyzed manually. Five qualitative themes emerged from the dataset. The themes are identified as: (1) isolation and physical relocation issues (i.e., from friends, family and their culture), (2) personal and professional demands of the program (i.e., maintaining home life with spouse and /or children as well as the professional demands of a dental student), (3) emotional stress associated with the program, (i.e., personal struggles and financial stresses), (4) re-learning a system (i.e., both cultural and professional), and (5) overall program satisfaction. In Part II of the study, the mean differences between the outcome variables (Clinical Grades, Didactic Grades, Final Grade Point Average, and NDEB Written and OSCE scores) were statistically analyzed between the 37 IDDP graduates and 246 regular-stream dental graduates from 2003-2011. Based on analysis of the data, the IDDP graduates performed better than the regular-stream dental graduates in all the variables. The mean scores in each of the outcome variables were higher than the regular-stream group, the only variable that was found to be statistically significant was observed in the NDEB Written scores (p>0.05).