Durante o processo de admissão do ar em motores de combustão interna, nota-se que sua aspiração não é ideal, ou seja, o volume do cilindro não é completamente ocupado, devido à variação de sua massa específica e perdas de carga ao longo do sistema de alimentação. Conseqüentemente, a eficiência volumétrica no cilindro atinge valores ínfimos de desempenho, o que afeta diretamente a potência do motor. O trabalho consiste em um estudo numérico e experimental do sistema de admissão de um motor de combustão interna. A solução numérica foi obtida por um código comercial que resolve as equações de transporte, baseada nos princípios de conservação de massa, quantidade de movimento e energia, pelo método de discretização de volumes finitos. Os resultados numéricos foram validados através dos resultados obtidos em uma bancada experimental, que possibilitou medidas de vazão mássica, pressão e temperatura do ar admitido. A bancada é formada por um motor de combustão interna acionado por um motor elétrico e o estudo foi realizado sem a presença de combustível e por conseqüência sem a ocorrência de combustão. Através da utilização do software, demonstrou-se que foi possível construir um coletor inédito que proporcionou ao motor estudado um aumento de eficiência volumétrica de 6% a 3.500 rpm. / During the process of intake air in the internal combustion engine it has been noted that air flow is not ideal, i.e., the cylinder volume is not completely occupied concerning the variation of specific mass and the charge loss along the feed system. Consequently, the volumetric efficiency in the cylinder reaches low values of performance, affecting the engine power. The aims of this work were a numerical and experimental study of the intake manifold in an internal combustion engine. The numerical solution is obtained through a commercial code which solves the transport equations, according to the continuity, momentum and energy principles by the method of finite volume discretization. Numerical data were validated by the experimental results set-up, enabling the mass flow, pressure and temperature measures of the intake air. The flow bench is composed by an internal combustion engine turned on by an electric engine. The study was developed without fuel and combustion. Regarding the software, it was possible to build an original intake manifold which provides to engine studied an increase in the volumetric efficiency of 6% at 3,500 rpm.

Philosophiae Doctor - PhD / The main objective of this study was to advance kinetic performances of formation and decomposition of magnesium hydride by design strategies which include high energy ball milling in hydrogen (HRBM), in combination with the introduction of catalytic/dopant additives. In this regard, the transformation of Mg → MgH2 by high energy reactive ball milling in hydrogen atmosphere (HRBM) of Mg with various additives to yield nanostructured composite hydrogen storage materials was studied using in situ pressure-temperature monitoring that allowed to get time-resolved results about hydrogenation behaviour during HRBM. The as-prepared and re-hydrogenated nanocomposites were characterized using XRD, high-resolution SEM and TEM, as well as measurements of the mean particle size. Dehydrogenation performances of the nanocomposites were studied by DSC / TGA and TDS; and the re-hydrogenation behaviour was investigated using Sieverts volumetric technique.

In this thesis, the goal was to implement a method to do partial segmentation for general 3D volumetric datasets such as mummies, clay figurines or animal bodies. There are different approaches for segmenting volumes, such as automatic methods, semi-automatic methods and interactive methods. However, no automatic algorithm was found that could successfully segment any general 3D volume with high precision. Instead, the chosen approach are segmentation tools which allows the user to quickly and intuitively do partial segmentation from a 3D volume. The tools consist of a interactive 3D brush, a transfer function editor and a semi-automatic flood fill tool which performs region growing in 3D. User studies were carried out in order to evaluate the speed and effectiveness of the segmenting tools compared to the conventional method of segmenting using a stack of 2D images. Based on the user studies the results shows that the proposed method is faster compared to the old method as long as high precision is not required.

This dissertation presents a new technique for miniaturization of printed RF circuits and antennas. The technique is based on lumped circuit elements and volumetric reactive pin loadings. The vertical arrangement of the pins is shown to provide a meandered current path within the device volume enhancing the miniaturization achieved with sole application of lumped circuit components. The technique is applied for antenna and filter size reduction. In antenna applications, it is shown that due to the presence of the reactive pin loading the overall size of a printed antenna can be miniaturized without affecting the radiation efficiency performance. One of the major advantages of this approach over the existing miniaturization techniques is that it allows reducing the overall size of the antenna (i.e. the substrate size) in addition to its metallization footprint area. Specifically, three antenna designs are presented for GPS and ISM applications. Firstly, a miniaturized wide-band CDL antenna has been introduced. The antenna consists of two loops which are loaded with lumped inductors and coupling capacitors. The design is shown to exhibits 49% smaller footprint size as compared to a traditional patch antenna without degrading the bandwidth performance. Secondly, a circular polarized compact dual-band CDL GPS antenna loaded with lumped capacitors and vertical pins is shown. The antenna operates with >50% lesser area as compared to a traditional L2 patch antenna without degrading its radiation performance. Thirdly, a patch antenna with its cavity loaded with CSRRs is presented. The novelty of the design is that it provides circularly symmetric arrangement of CSRRs thereby enabling the antenna to exhibit circular polarization (CP). Apart from CSRR, further size reduction is obtained by simultaneously reducing the substrate size and ground plane metallization around the CSRRs and loading it with pins. The antenna is 44% smaller than a traditional patch antenna without causing degradation in the antenna's radiation efficiency performance. To extend the volumetric loading to filter applications, the last chapter of the dissertation presents a detailed analysis to understand how geometrical factors (e.g. periodicity, radius, width of the host transmission line, etc) affect the miniaturization performance and quality factor. As a design example, a 2GHz pin loaded hairline filter with 17% -3dB |S21| bandwidth and 1.5dB insertion loss is demonstrated. The footprint size of the filter is ~λ0/16×λ0/9 @ 2GHz and is 45% smaller than its traditional counterpart.

Ankle sprains are one of the most common musculoskeletal injuries. Physiotherapy treatment and advice to rest, use ice, use compression, and elevate the ankle (RICE advice) is believed to speed up the functional recovery and enhance healing associated with acute ankle sprains. However, there is limited evidence to support the efficacy of RICE treatment. This study investigated whether physiotherapy (including RICE advice) was as effective as RICE advice alone in improving the time to recovery in a clinical situation.The evidence for RICE advice was reviewed along with the different treatment modalities currently used by physiotherapists in New Zealand for acute ankle sprain. This review highlighted the low number and poor quality of studies investigating RICE and early intervention physiotherapy management for ankle sprains. RICE principals appear to be relatively inexpensive and somewhat effective for pain relief and may reduce further tissue damage in the acute stage of Grade I and II ankle sprains. Evidence extrapolated from studies investigating the use of post surgical ice appears to support the use of ice in the acute stage of an ankle sprain to minimise bleeding and oedema. The intermittent application of ice is more effective for pain relief in the acute phase than sustained icing. Physiotherapy interventions such as TENS for pain relief and bracing for the support of Grade II - III ankle sprains have been shown to be beneficial for pain relief in the acute phase. A need for further high quality, randomised controlled trials (RCT's) was identified.Subsequently a RCT was conducted with 28 participants to investigate the difference between (a) early intervention physiotherapy management combined with RICE advice, and (b) self management RICE advice without physiotherapy.Twenty eight individuals (males n = 22, females n = 6), between the ages of 16 and 40 with acute ankle sprains, who met the inclusion criteria, were approached by physiotherapists working on this project and invited to participate. Dependant variables were pain, function, swelling, compliance and medication use up to Day 11 post injury. Swelling, pain and function were measured over three assessments on Days 1, 3 and 11, using volumetric analysis, a visual analogue scale (VAS) and a functional question derived from a validated functional questionnaire respectively. Medication use and compliance were elicited from information gathered in a participant home diary. Both groups were similar on Day 1 in respect to their initial pain, swelling, the number of participants who were referred for X-rays, and the time taken to present to the physiotherapist. However the RICE group had significantly higher function scores (p = 0.042). The RICE group also had a significantly higher use of medication on Day 1 (p = 0.035) and Day 11 (p = 0.048). For both groups there was a statistically significant decrease in swelling (p = 0.003), pain scores (p = 0.000), and an increase in function scores (p = 0.000) in relation to time over the eleven days of assessment. The physiotherapy group had significantly improved function scores (p = 0.042) from Day 1 to Day 11 compared to the RICE group. There were no significant differences between groups for swelling, pain scores, and their first day of documented non-compliance. The within day range of error in the volumetric measurements was within 189.9 ml and 1.2 ml. Three trials were conducted per person within a Day session. The first volumetric analysis was significantly less than the subsequent two measurements (p = 0.040).It was concluded that, in the early stage of an ankle injury both physiotherapy and RICE, and RICE advice alone, resulted in significant improvements in swelling, pain and function. Early intervention physiotherapy was significantly better at improving the functional ability of participants by Day 11. Early intervention physiotherapy may also identify complications associated with ankle sprains.Despite its limitations this research could potentially lead to changes in the standard treatment protocols for soft tissue ankle injuries. Implementation of self management RICE by patients in the acute stage would initially reduce the cost of physiotherapy treatments, and may lead to equal improvements in pain and swelling outcomes. However, it appears that physiotherapy may lead to better functional outcomes which would reduce the costs associated with time off work, and rehabilitation. It is important to note that these findings are based on a small sample size and on Grade I or II ankle ligament sprains, and that treatment for more severe ankle injuries may be better with physiotherapy, or surgery, rather than self management RICE by patients. Findings contribute to the growing body of 'best practice' evidence for health practitioners. Keywords: Acute soft tissue injuries, ankle, sprain, early intervention, physiotherapy, RICE, volumetric measurement.

<p>Fluid simulation is today a hot topic in computer graphics. New highly optimized algorithms have allowed complex systems to be simulated in high speed. This master thesis describes how the graphics processing unit, found in most computer workstations, can be used to optimize the rendering of volumetric fluids. The main aim of the work has been to develop a software that is capable of rendering fluids in high quality and with high performance using OpenGL. The software was developed at Filmgate, a digital effects company in Göteborg, and much time was spent making the interface and the workflow easy to use for people familiar with Autodesk Maya. The project resulted in a standalone rendering application, together with a set of plugins to exchange data between Maya and our renderer.</p><p>Most of the goals have been reached when it comes to rendering features. The performance bottleneck turned out to be reading data from disc and this is an area suitable for future development of the software.</p>

<p>The objective of the work was to develop a basic control system for an advancedexperimental engine from scratch. The engine this work revolves around is a Saabvariable compression engine.A new control system is developed based on the naked engine, stripped of theoriginal control system. Experiments form the basis that the control system isbuilt upon. Controllers for throttles, intake manifold pressure for pressures lessthan ambient pressure and exhaust gas oxygen ratio are developed and validated.They were found to be satisfactory. The lambda controller is tested with severalparameter sets, and the best set is picked to be implemented in the engine. Modelsnecessary for the development and validation of the controllers are developed.These models include models for the volumetric efficiency, the pressure dynamicsof the intake manifold, the fuel injectors and wall wetting.</p>

Alzheimer’s disease (AD), the most common cause of dementia in the elderly, is a gradually progressive degenerative neurological disorder that is characterized by increasing cognitive impairment, characteristic degenerative pathology and brain atrophy. Studies have shown that the progression of AD pathology in the brain develops in a predictable pattern and the pathological changes that take place in brain begin at the microscopic level long before the first signs of memory loss. Structural Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI), which has exceptional soft tissue contrast and detailed resolution, is the best way to noninvasively examine changes which occur early in the course of AD. For this dissertation, our aim is to improve the methods for measuring the atrophy of brain structures in AD, as seen on MRI, and to apply these methods to subjects with cognitive impairment. This study has established a new coordinate template to replace the widely used Montreal Neurological Institute (MNI) template for the atlas-based segmentation procedure. The new template was derived from the same structural image as the one used by the Automated Anatomical Labeling (AAL) procedure. The agreement of the newly developed coordinate template and AAL helps to estimate accurate spatial transformation parameters used in warping the AAL to individual subject images. The new template combines the spatial information of the structural image and the frequency information of MNI template. Based on the same principle, a set of customized templates has been developed. The customized template, associated atlas and customized priors match more closely the aging population than the previous template, so as to improve the atlas-based segmentation of regions of interest in AD assessment. Visual Rating System (VRS) of a single coronal slice (MB slice) in MRI has been another valuable method in the assessment of medial temporal lobe atrophy. An automated procedure has been developed in this study to measure the hippocampal area on the same coronal slice so that the labor of human experts in the VRS assessment of hippocampus will be significantly reduced. Finally the methods and materials (template and atlas) developed in this dissertation were applied to cross-sectional studies of subjects with cognitive impairment. We conducted volumetric analysis on subjects and conclude that the data from the new approaches have higher correlations with clinical data, and therefore can be reliably used as part of an AD assessment tool.

Purpose. Low-dose computed tomography is an important imaging modality for screening and surveillance of lung cancer. The goal of this study was to determine the extent to which dose could be minimized while maintaining diagnostic accuracy through knowledgeable selection of reconstruction techniques. Methods. An anthropomorphic phantom was imaged on a 320-slice volumetric CT scanner. Detectability of small solid lung nodules was evaluated as a function of dose, patient size, reconstruction filter and slice thickness by means of 9-alternative forced-choice observer tests. Results. Nodule detectability decreased sharply below a threshold dose level due to increased image noise. For large body habitus, optimal (smooth) filter selection reduced dose by a factor of ~3. Nodule detectability decreased for slice thicknesses larger than the nodule diameter. Conclusions. Radiation dose can be reduced well below current clinical protocols. Smooth reconstruction filters and avoidance of large slice thickness permits lower-dose techniques without tradeoff in diagnostic performance.

Purpose. Low-dose computed tomography is an important imaging modality for screening and surveillance of lung cancer. The goal of this study was to determine the extent to which dose could be minimized while maintaining diagnostic accuracy through knowledgeable selection of reconstruction techniques. Methods. An anthropomorphic phantom was imaged on a 320-slice volumetric CT scanner. Detectability of small solid lung nodules was evaluated as a function of dose, patient size, reconstruction filter and slice thickness by means of 9-alternative forced-choice observer tests. Results. Nodule detectability decreased sharply below a threshold dose level due to increased image noise. For large body habitus, optimal (smooth) filter selection reduced dose by a factor of ~3. Nodule detectability decreased for slice thicknesses larger than the nodule diameter. Conclusions. Radiation dose can be reduced well below current clinical protocols. Smooth reconstruction filters and avoidance of large slice thickness permits lower-dose techniques without tradeoff in diagnostic performance.