Thesis (M.S.)--West Virginia University, 2009. / Title from document title page. Document formatted into pages; contains ix, 83 p. : ill. (some col.). Includes abstract. Includes bibliographical references (p. 81-83).

This thesis examines different aspects of tradition relating to fresh water in Scotland. They include: the use of water from wells and springs for healing and divination purposes; the beliefs around the lin1inal quality of water, often considered as boundary, and around its magical association with the horse; and finally folktales featuring the water-horse, or kelpie, a supernatural creature which was said to inhabit lochs and rivers. In dealing with topics so different one from the other, within the larger field of Scottish customs and beliefs, it proved necessary to use a variety of sources and methods. Comparative study was often particularly illuminating. After presenting the history of visits to sacred wells, I deal with two main categories of customs associated with these pilgrimages, namely healing rituals and divination practices. While the former leads to the analysis of the different stages and implications of the ritual, the latter looks into the issues that were left to supernatural powers to decide upon, and examines how the questions asked of the oracle evolved with time. Consideration of these powers then leads on to further inquiry into the liminal function of fresh water in general, and its links with boundaries both spatial and temporal. That the horse, another element that is ascribed definite liminal qualities, was associated with water is therefore not fortuitous. If water provides an entry to an Other World, the horse can then take one through into this other land. Indeed, this is what is found in the corpus of tales centred on the figure of the waterhorse. As some of the tale-types are met in other geographical areas - Ireland and Scandinavia mainly - a discussion of these will provide a general background to the tales, which will result in a proposal for a revised tale-index. Two shared types -the work-horse and the abductor of children - will then be examined in the Scottish context. One type, however, - the seducer - seems to be unique to Scotland, and it will be dealt with last. The aim of this work is twofold: first, to provide an ethnological piece of research from a diachronic perspective on a subject outwith the usual themes generally chosen for studies of this nature; second, to present together, in their Scottish context, folktales that have been hitherto broken up and read in the light of their relationships to their foreign counterparts. Although recent academic studies on healing wells exist for Ireland and France, the Scottish material has never previously been treated in such a study. A number of sources available were secondary accounts, dating back mainly to the turn of the twentieth century, and part of my research involved finding the original documents used - sometimes misused - in order to present them in their original context. Similarly, part of the work on the kelpie stories involved gathering together tales kept in the Sound Archive of the School of Scottish Studies at the University of Edinburgh that had never been collected into a single corpus. I hope in this thesis to provide a sound basis for further researches on these types of Scottish customs and beliefs.

In this thesis, the carrier localization effect, the quantum confinement Stark effect (QCSE) and nonlinear optical properties of the as-grown InGaN/GaN multiple-quantum-wells (MQWs) structure and nanopillars with diameters of 100 nm and 160 nm and height of 700 nm have been investigated with linear and nonlinear photoluminescence (PL) techniques, In order to investigate the carrier localization effect and QCSE, “S-shaped” temperature dependent PL peak positions of the samples are quantitatively simulated and analyzed with the localized-state ensemble luminescence model. It is found that after nanotexturing both the carrier localization effect and QCSE become weakened. Moreover, the smaller the pillars the weaker the two effects will be. In addition, the nanotexturing introduced the new radiative recombination pathways of carriers are confirmed on the sidewalls of the nanopillars with cathodoluminescence (CL) spectrum and panchromatic CL image. Two-photon absorption (TPA) induced PL spectra of the three samples are measured to investigate the nonlinear optical properties. A peculiar excitation-power dependence, say I~P1.53, of the PL intensity is revealed. It was proposed that a mixed excitation mechanism, namely two-step successive one-photon absorption occurring in the InGaN well layers and one-step two-photon absorption mainly taking place in the GaN barrier and buffer layers, to interpret the observed phenomenon. Besides, the steady-state energetic distribution of carriers excited via this mixed excitation mechanism is very different from that of carriers via one-step one-photon excitation. In contrast with the case of one-photon PL in the samples, the influence of carrier localization effect becomes weaker in the TPA PL of the two nanopillars. / published_or_final_version / Physics / Master / Master of Philosophy

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During production from gas condensate reservoirs, significant productivity loss occurs after the pressure near the production wells drops below the dew point of the hydrocarbon fluid. Several methods such as gas recycling, hydraulic fracturing and solvent injection have been tried to restore gas production rates after a decline in well productivity owing to condensate and/or water blocking. These methods of well stimulation offer only temporary productivity restoration and cannot always be used for a variety of reasons. Significant advances have been made during this study to develop and extend a chemical treatment to reduce the damage caused by liquid (condensate + water) blocking in gas condensate reservoirs. The chemical treatment alters the wettability of water-wet sandstone rocks to neutral wet, and thus reduces the residual liquid saturations and increases gas relative permeability. The treatment also increases the mobility and recovery of condensate from the reservoir. A nonionic polymeric fluoro-surfactant in a glycol-alcohol solvent mixture improved the gas and condensate relative permeabilities by a factor of about 2 on various outcrop and reservoir sandstone rocks. The improvement in relative permeability after chemical treatment was quantified by performing high pressure and high temperature coreflood experiments on outcrop and reservoir cores using synthetic gas mixtures at reservoir conditions. The durability of the chemical treatment has been tested by flowing a large volume of gas-condensate fluids for a long period of time. Solvents used to dissolve and deliver the surfactant play an important part in the treatment, especially in the presence of high water saturation or high salinity brine. A screening test based on phase behavior studies of treatment solutions and brines has been used to select appropriate mixtures of solvents based on reservoir conditions. The adsorption of the surfactant on the rock surface has been measured by measuring the concentration of the surfactant in the effluent. Wettability of treated and untreated reservoir rocks has been analyzed by measuring the USBM and Amott-Harvey wettability indices to evaluate the effect of chemical treatment on wettability. For the first time, chemical treatments have also been shown to remove the damage caused by water blocking in gas wells and for increasing the fracture conductivity and thus productivity of fractured gas-condensate wells. Core flood experiments done on propped fractures show significant improvement in gas and condensate relative permeability due to surface modification of proppants by chemical reatment. Relative permeability measurements have been done on sandstone and limestone cores over a wide range of conditions including high velocities typical of high rate gas wells and corresponding to both high capillary numbers and non-Darcy flow. A new approach has been presented to express relative permeability as a function three non-dimensionless terms; capillary number, modified Reynolds Number and PVT ratio. Numerical simulations using a compositional simulator have been done to better understand and design well treatments as a function of treatment volume and other parameters. Injection of treatment solution and chase gas and the flow back of solvents were simulated. These simulations show that chemical treatments have the potential to greatly increase production with relatively small treatment volumes since only the near-well region blocked by condensate and/or water needs to be treated.

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