The inability of language to convey complete meaning and truth is a central point of address for much post-structuralist literary theory and criticism. When these theories are applied to a first-person narrative structure, whether it is a work of fiction or non-fiction, certain specific incongruities arise. When a narrative seeks to recall certain events, a presupposed reexamination takes place as the narrative unfolds text comes into being. If a narractice is contructed in this way then the intent of the text then is to convey comprehensive meanings or truths of those cataloged experiences. According Deconstructive Theory, it is language's inherent nature to resist ultimate meaning. This focus on the articulation of truth is futile because meaning, like language, is always already in a state of fragmentation. This project explores five individual works from different literary traditions-ranging from the canonical to the relatively obscure. The works exhibit various approaches to articulation; including varying degrees of self-definition, personal fiction, and narrative movement toward inarticulation.

This thesis introduces two ortho-planar MEMS devices that can be used to position microcomponents: the XZ Micropositioning Mechanism and the XYZ Micromanipulator. The displacement and force relationships are presented. The devices were fabricated using surface micromachining processes and the resulting mechanisms were tested. A compliant XYZ Micromanipulator was also designed to reduce backlash and binding. In addition, several other MEMS positioners were fabricated and tested: the Micropositioning Platform Mechanism (MPM), the Ortho-planar Twisting Micromechanism (OTM), and the Ortho-planar Spring Micromechanism (OSM).

Nanopositioners have been developed with electrostatic, piezoelectric, magnetic, thermal, and electrochemical actuators. They move with as many as six degrees of freedom; some are composed of multiple stages that stack together. Both macro-scale and micro-scale nanopositioners have been fabricated. A summary of recent research in micropositioning and nanopositioning is presented to set the background for this work. This research project demonstrates that a dual-stage nanopositioner can be created with microelectromechanical systems technology such that the two stages are integrated on a single silicon chip. A nanopositioner is presented that has two stages, one for coarse motion and one for fine motion; both are fabricated by surface micromachining. The nanopositioner has one translational degree of freedom. Thermal microactuators operate both stages. The first stage includes a bistable mechanism: it travels 52 micrometers between two discrete positions. The second stage is mounted on the first stage and moves continuously through an additional 8 micrometers in the same direction as the first stage. Two approaches to the control of the second stage are evaluated: first, an electrical input is transmitted to an actuator that moves with the first stage; second, a mechanical input is applied to an amplifier mechanism mounted on the first stage after completing the coarse motion. Four devices were designed and fabricated to test these approaches; the one that performed best was selected to fulfill the objective of this work. Thermal analysis of the actuators was performed with previously developed tools. Pseudo-rigid-body models and finite element models were created to analyze the mechanical behavior of the devices. The nanopositioners were surface micromachined in a two-layer polysilicon process. Experiments were performed to characterize the resolution, repeatability, hysteresis, and drift of the second stages of the nanopositioners with open-loop control. Position measurements were obtained from scanning electron micrographs by a numerical procedure, which is described in detail. The selected nanopositioner demonstrated 170-nanometer resolution and repeatability within 37 nanometers. The hysteresis of the second stage was 6% of its full range. The nanopositioner drifted 25 nanometers in the first 60 minutes of operation with a time constant of about 6 minutes. The dual-stage nanopositioner may be useful for applications such as variable optical attenuators or wavelength-specific add--drop devices.

<p>Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) is a chronic intestinal inflammation that has caused many challenges for healthcare providers in treating the disease and also altered the quality of life of the patients. The cure for IBD is still symptomatic-based; the causes mechanism and pathogenesis of IBD are to be further investigated. Currently, IBD has been considered as an excessive immune response to commensal flora that in normal condition is tolerable to the host. Antigen presenting cells (APCs) play an important role in the pathogenesis of IBD. Macrophage is one of the professional APCs that present antigen information to T cells and induce the T cell subtype proliferation. Aside from this role, macrophages also phagocytose pathogens and clean cell debris in thebody.</p> <p>T cell immunoglobulin and mucin domain (TIM)-4 is a glycoprotein expressed on the surface of macrophage, which recognizes phosphatidylserine (PS) that is expressed mainly on the surface of the early apoptotic cell phospholipid membrane; the latter is a negatively charged molecule that can bind to the TIM-4 to enhance the phagocytosing activity. In IBD, the loss of intestinal epithelial cells (IECs) due to apoptosis is prominent in the site of inflammation especially in ulcerative colitis (UC).</p> <p>The aim of this study is to elucidate whether there is an increase of TIM-4 expression in colitis mice model after exposure to excessive number of apoptotic IECs and whether TIM-4 plays a role in the development of colitis in mice.</p> <p>The expression of TIM-4 is measured with several tests; including flow cytometry, immunohistochemistry, western blotting and real time RT-PCR. In the first step, we tried to see if there is a difference in the TIM-4 expression in colitis mice and ethanol control mice. After the association was established, we further observed the role of TIM-4 in the pathogenesis of IBD by injecting TIM-4+ macrophages into the mice prior to inducing a mild colitis in the mice and finally injected neutralizing anti TIM-4 antibodies to block the available TIM-4 receptors.</p> <p>We found that TIM-4 expression was higher in a colitis mouse model compared to the control. Also by injecting TIM-4+ macrophages into the mice, the frequency of intestinal T regulatory (Treg) cells was decreased significantly. Finally in the group treated with anti-TIM-4 neutralizing antibodies prior to colitis induction, the frequency of intestinal Treg cells increased significantly and the inflammation response was less severe than the colitis control group. This study revealed, for the first time in the world, that TIM-4 expression in the colon of colitis mice was significantly increased, which suppressed Tregs and promoted T effector cells.</p> / Master of Science in Medical Sciences (MSMS)

This thesis compares the later poetry of Breyten Breytenbach and Lucebert from the phenomenological approach of landscape as dwelling. The metaphor of landscape as dwelling is derived from the art philosophy of Martin Heidegger, which emphasises the importance of truth as aletheia (or “disclosure”), the cultural geography of John Wylie, which illuminates the notion of landscape as tension, and the anthropology of Tim Ingold with reference to the dwelling perspective, adopted from Heidegger’s philosophy on dwelling. The thesis destructs the Cartesian idea of landscape, which relates to the constructivist description of landscape as a way of seeing. The destructive reading shows that mortals’ dwelling on earth is inherently part of the landscape, which means that landscape opens up as an expression of Dasein’s fundamental being-in-the-world, rather than a scene looked upon from afar. Furthermore, this thesis uses Ingold’s distinction between the landscape and the taskscape (Ingold, 2000:195), and Heidegger’s notion of the fourfold (Heidegger, 1989:172), to make a desctructive reading of the poets’ work, with specific reference to William Spanos’s destructive criticism. It investigates a number of poems from Breytenbach’s Nine landscapes of our time bequeathed to a beloved (Nege landskappe van ons tye bemaak aan ʼn beminde, 1993), Paper flower (Papierblom, 1998), The wind-catcher (Die windvanger, 2007), The principle of dust (Die beginsel van stof, 2011) and Catalects (Katalekte, 2012), and Lucebert’s Harvests in the roaming garden (Oogsten in de dwaaltuin, 1981), The swamp rider from paradise (De moerasruiter uit het paradijs, 1982), Console the hysterical robot (Troost de hysterische robot, 1989), Of the malt-like profligate (Van de maltentige losbol, 1993) and Of the motionless agitator (Van de roerloze woelgeest, 1994). The analyses focus specifically on the destruction of the traditional landscape idea by emphasising Dasein’s everyday activities, and his/her dis-covering approach toward the elements of the fourfold. The thesis concludes with a comparison of the work of the poets in terms of their destruction of the notion of landscape, the temporality of the taskscape, the taskscape as an ensemble of tasks, and a systematic reading of dwelling. / PhD (Afrikaans en Nederlands), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2015

This thesis compares the later poetry of Breyten Breytenbach and Lucebert from the phenomenological approach of landscape as dwelling. The metaphor of landscape as dwelling is derived from the art philosophy of Martin Heidegger, which emphasises the importance of truth as aletheia (or “disclosure”), the cultural geography of John Wylie, which illuminates the notion of landscape as tension, and the anthropology of Tim Ingold with reference to the dwelling perspective, adopted from Heidegger’s philosophy on dwelling. The thesis destructs the Cartesian idea of landscape, which relates to the constructivist description of landscape as a way of seeing. The destructive reading shows that mortals’ dwelling on earth is inherently part of the landscape, which means that landscape opens up as an expression of Dasein’s fundamental being-in-the-world, rather than a scene looked upon from afar. Furthermore, this thesis uses Ingold’s distinction between the landscape and the taskscape (Ingold, 2000:195), and Heidegger’s notion of the fourfold (Heidegger, 1989:172), to make a desctructive reading of the poets’ work, with specific reference to William Spanos’s destructive criticism. It investigates a number of poems from Breytenbach’s Nine landscapes of our time bequeathed to a beloved (Nege landskappe van ons tye bemaak aan ʼn beminde, 1993), Paper flower (Papierblom, 1998), The wind-catcher (Die windvanger, 2007), The principle of dust (Die beginsel van stof, 2011) and Catalects (Katalekte, 2012), and Lucebert’s Harvests in the roaming garden (Oogsten in de dwaaltuin, 1981), The swamp rider from paradise (De moerasruiter uit het paradijs, 1982), Console the hysterical robot (Troost de hysterische robot, 1989), Of the malt-like profligate (Van de maltentige losbol, 1993) and Of the motionless agitator (Van de roerloze woelgeest, 1994). The analyses focus specifically on the destruction of the traditional landscape idea by emphasising Dasein’s everyday activities, and his/her dis-covering approach toward the elements of the fourfold. The thesis concludes with a comparison of the work of the poets in terms of their destruction of the notion of landscape, the temporality of the taskscape, the taskscape as an ensemble of tasks, and a systematic reading of dwelling. / PhD (Afrikaans en Nederlands), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2015

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-26T18:16:04Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Renata Sertorio Fernandes.pdf: 2532547 bytes, checksum: 594e58a0c595ac136656cf253d17fd85 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2006-10-04 / Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico / This master degree main objective searched to evaluate the communication strategies of the marks of the companies of mobile telecommunication Tim and Vivo through theirs main manifestations, being considered as being exactly: names, logotypes, logomarks and slogans, these in turn, presented in the media printed. The objects of the analysis are announcements published in media printed, divulged in the two main ones reviewed weekly Brazilians: Veja e Época. Two of them, institutional advertisings (one of each company) are studied at great length, excessively they will be briefly analyzed. The mark and its manifestations are constituted by complex processes of meaning and directly are related to the language and the communication between company and consumers. The semiotics offers ways to investigate the existing potential of communication in the elements that constitute the representation of the mark, as well as its presentation through the different manifestations of marketing. The intention is to investigate the effect of the potential generated by the announcement advertising executive in general, and mainly for the mark through its main manifestations, in more specific way. From there, we ask: what strategies the companies promote to create and to keep this image to the consumers, by means of communications contracts established in the relation between sender and receiver / Esta dissertação de mestrado avalia as estratégias comunicativas das marcas das empresas de telecomunicação móvel Tim e Vivo em suas principais manifestações na mídia impressa: nome, logotipos, logomarcas e slogan. Os objetos da análise são anúncios publicados em mídia impressa, divulgados nas duas principais revistas semanais brasileiras: Veja e Época. Serão analisados em detalhe dois anúncios institucionais (um de cada empresa), entre outros, em que a análise incidirá de modo menos pontual. A marca e suas manifestações são constituídas por complexos processos de significação e estão diretamente relacionadas à linguagem e à comunicação entre empresa e consumidores. A semiótica peirceana oferece o enfoque metodológico para investigarmos o potencial comunicativo existente nos elementos que constituem a representação da marca, assim como sua apresentação através das diferentes manifestações de marketing. Trata-se de investigar os efeitos de sentido gerados pelos anúncios publicitários, e principalmente pela marca em suas principais manifestações. A partir daí, perguntamos: que estratégias as empresas promovem para criar e manter sua imagem perante os consumidores, por meio dos contratos comunicativos estabelecidos na relação entre emissor e receptor

Understanding transmedial storytelling is particularly important to fairy-tale studies. Monomedial views have long been unable to account for all of fairy tale tradition. Although the form originated in oral culture, it has long been a liminal, hybrid form that retains aspects of orality even while its principal mode of transference for some time has been something other than face-to-face communication. Transformations and adaptations across different media and contexts has resulted in a system of fairy-tale tradition that is massively intertextual and transmedial. No one medium can claim primary control over the fairy-tale tradition. Throughout time, oral tellings have inspired literary adaptations; literary renditions have influenced oral and theater performances; oral, print, and theater performances have spawned any number of retellings and adaptations within audiovisual media. This case study, investigates one example of adaptation to social media and integration across media: Tim Manley's satirical blog Fairy Tales for Twenty-somethings and his book Alice in Tumblr-land. In Manley's fairy tale creations, we see an instance of what Henry Jenkins calls convergence culture. This convergence should be of particular interest to folklorists because corporate and mass-media systems continue to influence and integrate with existing forms of interaction. Manley's overall narrative approach integrates two media, which permits him to use fairy tales to express a broader range of narrative impulses than would a project tied to only one medium. Media integration is an important concept to recognize and investigate because so many individuals see different media as inherently combative rather than mutually beneficial systems. Just as intertextuality has become a foundational concept in many humanistic studies, intermediality needs to enter the folklorist's discussions as well. With only some media under consideration, we only get some of the message.

<p>Sveriges 16 miljökvalitetsmål utgör ett politiskt handlingsprogram för att nå en ekologisk hållbar utveckling och Miljöbalken utgör de rättsliga verktygen för att nå dessa miljökvalitetsmål. Miljöbalkens tillämpning i praktiken övervakas av tillsynsmyndigheterna. Naturvårdsverkets projekt Tillsyn och Miljömål (TIM) skapade år 2003 en modell för tillsynsplanering som är styrd av miljökvalitetsmålen, dvs. miljömålstyrd tillsyn.</p><p>Syftet med denna uppsats är att studera hur miljömålstyrd tillsyn fungerar i praktiken på kommunal nivå. För att uppfylla syftet har ett antal frågeställningar formulerats kring implementeringen av miljömålen i tillsynsplaneringen, arbetssättet med målstyrd tillsyn, fördelar och nackdelar med TIM-modellen, dess utvecklingsbehov och framtida miljötillsyn samt det miljörättsliga perspektivet på miljömålstyrd tillsyn. Detta gjordes genom intervjuer med ett urval av inspektörer från kommuner som arbetar med målstyrd tillsyn. Resultatet av intervjuerna analyserades och diskuterades i jämförelse med tidigare studier inom området.</p><p>Slutsatserna visar att generellt sett verkar TIM-modellen fungera bra för kommunerna som målstyrningsverktyg för tillsynsplaneringen och många av målstyrningens fördelar syns i resultatet. Men det finns fortfarande en del områden som TIM-modellen behöver utveckla för att underlätta användningen och göra den mer användbar. Slutsatserna är redovisade som rekommendationer ur två perspektiv, den ena är riktad mot kommuner med råd och tips medan den andra är inriktad mot Naturvårdsverket och modellens utvecklingsmöjligheter.</p>

Sveriges 16 miljökvalitetsmål utgör ett politiskt handlingsprogram för att nå en ekologisk hållbar utveckling och Miljöbalken utgör de rättsliga verktygen för att nå dessa miljökvalitetsmål. Miljöbalkens tillämpning i praktiken övervakas av tillsynsmyndigheterna. Naturvårdsverkets projekt Tillsyn och Miljömål (TIM) skapade år 2003 en modell för tillsynsplanering som är styrd av miljökvalitetsmålen, dvs. miljömålstyrd tillsyn. Syftet med denna uppsats är att studera hur miljömålstyrd tillsyn fungerar i praktiken på kommunal nivå. För att uppfylla syftet har ett antal frågeställningar formulerats kring implementeringen av miljömålen i tillsynsplaneringen, arbetssättet med målstyrd tillsyn, fördelar och nackdelar med TIM-modellen, dess utvecklingsbehov och framtida miljötillsyn samt det miljörättsliga perspektivet på miljömålstyrd tillsyn. Detta gjordes genom intervjuer med ett urval av inspektörer från kommuner som arbetar med målstyrd tillsyn. Resultatet av intervjuerna analyserades och diskuterades i jämförelse med tidigare studier inom området. Slutsatserna visar att generellt sett verkar TIM-modellen fungera bra för kommunerna som målstyrningsverktyg för tillsynsplaneringen och många av målstyrningens fördelar syns i resultatet. Men det finns fortfarande en del områden som TIM-modellen behöver utveckla för att underlätta användningen och göra den mer användbar. Slutsatserna är redovisade som rekommendationer ur två perspektiv, den ena är riktad mot kommuner med råd och tips medan den andra är inriktad mot Naturvårdsverket och modellens utvecklingsmöjligheter.