Multi-Scale Dynamic Study of Secondary Impact During Drop Testing of Surface Mount Packages

This dissertation focuses on design challenges caused by secondary impacts to printed wiring assemblies (PWAs) within hand-held electronics due to accidental drop or impact loading. The continuing increase of functionality, miniaturization and affordability has resulted in a decrease in the size and weight of handheld electronic products. As a result, PWAs have become thinner and the clearances between surrounding structures have decreased. The resulting increase in flexibility of the PWAs in combination with the reduced clearances requires new design rules to minimize and survive possible internal collisions impacts between PWAs and surrounding structures. Such collisions are being termed ‘secondary impact’ in this study. The effect of secondary impact on board-level drop reliability of printed wiring boards (PWBs) assembled with MEMS microphone components, is investigated using a combination of testing, response and stress analysis, and damage modeling. The response analysis is conducted using a combination of numerical finite element modeling and simplified analytic models for additional parametric sensitivity studies.

Karl-Ernst Ackermann / Oliver Musenberg / Judith Riegert (Hrsg.): Geistigbehindertenpädagogik!? Disziplin – Profession – Inklusion. Oberhausen: Athena 2013 (443 S.) [Rezension]

Rezension von: Karl-Ernst Ackermann / Oliver Musenberg / Judith Riegert (Hrsg.): Geistigbehindertenpädagogik!? Disziplin – Profession – Inklusion. Oberhausen: Athena 2013 (443 S.; ISBN 978-3-89896-477-7)

Modernizing Mount Royal Park : Montréal’s Jungle in the 1950s

Durant les années 1950, les autorités municipales, sous la pression du département de la police, ont demandé le déboisement d’une section du parc du Mont-Royal. Cette section, communément appelée la « Jungle » et principalement composée de broussailles, de buissons et d’arbres, était fréquentée par une clientèle considérée comme indésirable. Cette dernière comprenait, essentiellement, des alcooliques, des voyous, des pervers, et, surtout, des homosexuels. Leur éradication s’est alors déployée selon un plan en trois étapes qui avait pour objectif de simplifier les techniques de surveillance utilisées par le département de la police. D’abord, une augmentation de l’éclairage, puis, le déboisement de la « Jungle », et, finalement, la construction d’une route, aujourd’hui connue sous le nom de Camillien-Houde. Le parc devenait ainsi plus accessible et plus sécuritaire. Les coupes, que l’on a appelées les « coupes de la moralité », ont eu un effet considérable sur l’environnement et la composition écologique du parc, donnant, entre autres, aux Montréalais, l’impression que le parc était devenu chauve (ce qui lui conféra d’ailleurs le surnom de Mont Chauve). Les transformations du parc du Mont-Royal n’étaient cependant pas limitées à sa Jungle. En fait, des modifications furent aussi mises en application dans d’autres sections considérées comme sous-développées. La métamorphose du parc et de sa « Jungle » était un acte de développement caractéristique de l’ère moderniste de la planification du Montréal d’après-guerre. La re-planification du parc du Mont-Royal témoigne ainsi d’une volonté sans bornes des autorités d’instaurer la moralité et la modernité dans la ville, volonté qui aura pour conséquence d’altérer la composition écologique du parc. C’est ce qui sera à l’origine d’une campagne nommée « Save-the-Mountain Movement », qui a cherché à empêcher la modernisation de l’espace et milité pour la réhabilitation du parc en tant que boisé paisible.

SLOPE STABILITY ANALYSIS OF MOUNT MEAGER, SOUTH-WESTERN BRITISH COLUMBIA, CANADA

The Mount Meager Volcanic Complex (MMVC) in south-western British Columbia is a potentially active, hydrothermally altered massif comprising a series of steep, glaciated peaks. Climatic conditions and glacial retreat has led to the further weathering, exposure and de-buttressing of steep slopes composed of weak, unconsolidated material. This has resulted in an increased frequency of landslide events over the past few decades, many of which have dammed the rivers bordering the Complex. The breach of these debris dams presents a risk of flooding to the downstream communities. Preliminary mapping showed there are numerous sites around the Complex where future failure could occur. Some of these areas are currently undergoing progressive slope movement and display features to support this such as anti-scarps and tension cracks. The effect of water infiltration on stability was modelled using the Rocscience program Slide 6.0. The main site of focus was Mount Meager in the south- east of the Complex where the most recent landslide took place. Two profiles through Mount Meager were analysed along with one other location in the northern section of the MMVC, where instability had been detected. The lowest Factor of Safety (FOS) for each profile was displayed and an estimate of the volume which could be generated was deduced. A hazard map showing the inundation zones for various volumes of debris flows was created from simulations using LAHARZ. Results showed the massif is unstable, even before infiltration. Varying the amount of infiltration appears to have no significant impact on the FOS annually implying that small changes of any kind could also trigger failure. Further modelling could be done to assess the impact of infiltration over shorter time scales. The Slide models show the volume of material that could be delivered to the Lillooet River Valley to be of the order of 109 m3 which, based on the LAHARZ simulations, would completely inundate the valley and communities downstream. A major hazard of this is that the removal of such a large amount of material has the potential to trigger an explosive eruption of the geothermal system and renew volcanic activity. Although events of this size are infrequent, there is a significant risk to the communities downstream of the complex.

DOING MORE WITH SHORT PERIOD DATA: DETERMINING MAGNITUDES FROM CLIPPED AND OVER-RUN SEISMIC DATA AT MOUNT ST. HELENS

How can we calculate earthquake magnitudes when the signal is clipped and over-run? When a volcano is very active, the seismic record may saturate (i.e., the full amplitude of the signal is not recorded) or be over-run (i.e., the end of one event is covered by the start of a new event). The duration, and sometimes the amplitude, of an earthquake signal are necessary for determining event magnitudes; thus, it may be impossible to calculate earthquake magnitudes when a volcano is very active. This problem is most likely to occur at volcanoes with limited networks of short period seismometers. This study outlines two methods for calculating earthquake magnitudes when events are clipped and over-run. The first method entails modeling the shape of earthquake codas as a power law function and extrapolating duration from the decay of the function. The second method draws relations between clipped duration (i.e., the length of time a signal is clipped) and the full duration. These methods allow for magnitudes to be determined within 0.2 to 0.4 units of magnitude. This error is within the range of analyst hand-picks and is within the acceptable limits of uncertainty when quickly quantifying volcanic energy release during volcanic crises. Most importantly, these estimates can be made when data are clipped or over-run. These methods were developed with data from the initial stages of the 2004-2008 eruption at Mount St. Helens. Mount St. Helens is a well-studied volcano with many instruments placed at varying distances from the vent. This fact makes the 2004-2008 eruption a good place to calibrate and refine methodologies that can be applied to volcanoes with limited networks.

Syndromic scalp defects : genotype-phenotype studies in Johanson-Blizzard syndrome and Adams-Oliver syndrome

Otto-von-Guericke-Universität Magdeburg, Fakultät für Naturwissenschaften, Dissertation, 2016

Modernizing Mount Royal Park : Montréal’s Jungle in the 1950s

Durant les années 1950, les autorités municipales, sous la pression du département de la police, ont demandé le déboisement d’une section du parc du Mont-Royal. Cette section, communément appelée la « Jungle » et principalement composée de broussailles, de buissons et d’arbres, était fréquentée par une clientèle considérée comme indésirable. Cette dernière comprenait, essentiellement, des alcooliques, des voyous, des pervers, et, surtout, des homosexuels. Leur éradication s’est alors déployée selon un plan en trois étapes qui avait pour objectif de simplifier les techniques de surveillance utilisées par le département de la police. D’abord, une augmentation de l’éclairage, puis, le déboisement de la « Jungle », et, finalement, la construction d’une route, aujourd’hui connue sous le nom de Camillien-Houde. Le parc devenait ainsi plus accessible et plus sécuritaire. Les coupes, que l’on a appelées les « coupes de la moralité », ont eu un effet considérable sur l’environnement et la composition écologique du parc, donnant, entre autres, aux Montréalais, l’impression que le parc était devenu chauve (ce qui lui conféra d’ailleurs le surnom de Mont Chauve). Les transformations du parc du Mont-Royal n’étaient cependant pas limitées à sa Jungle. En fait, des modifications furent aussi mises en application dans d’autres sections considérées comme sous-développées. La métamorphose du parc et de sa « Jungle » était un acte de développement caractéristique de l’ère moderniste de la planification du Montréal d’après-guerre. La re-planification du parc du Mont-Royal témoigne ainsi d’une volonté sans bornes des autorités d’instaurer la moralité et la modernité dans la ville, volonté qui aura pour conséquence d’altérer la composition écologique du parc. C’est ce qui sera à l’origine d’une campagne nommée « Save-the-Mountain Movement », qui a cherché à empêcher la modernisation de l’espace et milité pour la réhabilitation du parc en tant que boisé paisible.

Climate seasonality limits leaf carbon assimilation and wood productivity in tropical forests.

The seasonal climate drivers of the carbon cy- cle in tropical forests remain poorly known, although these forests account for more carbon assimilation and storage than any other terrestrial ecosystem. Based on a unique combina- tion of seasonal pan-tropical data sets from 89 experimental sites (68 include aboveground wood productivity measure- ments and 35 litter productivity measurements), their asso- ciated canopy photosynthetic capacity (enhanced vegetation index, EVI) and climate, we ask how carbon assimilation and aboveground allocation are related to climate seasonal- ity in tropical forests and how they interact in the seasonal carbon cycle. We found that canopy photosynthetic capacity seasonality responds positively to precipitation when rain- fall is < 2000 mm yr-1 (water-limited forests) and to radia- tion otherwise (light-limited forests). On the other hand, in- dependent of climate limitations, wood productivity and lit- terfall are driven by seasonal variation in precipitation and evapotranspiration, respectively. Consequently, light-limited forests present an asynchronism between canopy photosyn- thetic capacity and wood productivity. First-order control by precipitation likely indicates a decrease in tropical forest pro- ductivity in a drier climate in water-limited forest, and in cur- rent light-limited forest with future rainfall < 2000 mm yr-1.

The birth of a tragic hero(ine) On tragic excess in contemporary theatre

The idea of the tragic is unthinkable. It is precisely within the moment in which an ordinary human being, a heroine or a hero – incapable of scrutinizing fully their own position within the whole – is invited to respond, to accept or refuse it all, that the tragic unfolds, changing their life irremediably. What are the causes and the consequences of "god’s arrival", as in case of Dionysus who visits Pentheus’ home in Euripides’ "The Bacchae"? Through episodes in the stories of characters from Ancient Greek dramas – such as Oedipus, Antigone, Ajax, Io, through Dostoevsky’s or Kafka’s imagery, in Prince Myshkin’s, the Ridiculous Man’s or Gregor Samsa’s experiences, this doctoral research proposes to examine the aspects which compete in the creation of a tragic hero. Theatrical performances – such as Jan Fabre’s "Mount Olympus: To Glorify the Cult of Tragedy, a 24-Hour Performance", immersed in a cycle of life, death and re-birth; Oliver Frljić’s "Trilogija o hrvatskom fašizmu", in its careful analysis of the wounds of a heritage of war; and Cristian Ceresoli’s and Silvia Gallerano’s tragic testimony of an estranged, almost soulless body in "La Merda" – open up the dialogue on our contemporary idea of the tragic. This doctoral work chooses excess as its privileged channel through which to approach the concept of the tragic – by its nature elusive, hostile to any definition, strictly personal and, thus, visible only through one’s own lens. In an excess of pain, devotion, desire, rage, arrogance or beauty, opposites collide, time concentrates into a moment and the hero is invited to choose, to live or die, to transform.

Cheaper Faster Drug Development Validated By The Repositioning Of Drugs Against Neglected Tropical Diseases.

There is an urgent need to make drug discovery cheaper and faster. This will enable the development of treatments for diseases currently neglected for economic reasons, such as tropical and orphan diseases, and generally increase the supply of new drugs. Here, we report the Robot Scientist 'Eve' designed to make drug discovery more economical. A Robot Scientist is a laboratory automation system that uses artificial intelligence (AI) techniques to discover scientific knowledge through cycles of experimentation. Eve integrates and automates library-screening, hit-confirmation, and lead generation through cycles of quantitative structure activity relationship learning and testing. Using econometric modelling we demonstrate that the use of AI to select compounds economically outperforms standard drug screening. For further efficiency Eve uses a standardized form of assay to compute Boolean functions of compound properties. These assays can be quickly and cheaply engineered using synthetic biology, enabling more targets to be assayed for a given budget. Eve has repositioned several drugs against specific targets in parasites that cause tropical diseases. One validated discovery is that the anti-cancer compound TNP-470 is a potent inhibitor of dihydrofolate reductase from the malaria-causing parasite Plasmodium vivax.

O enigma da "reação espermatofórica": breve síntese do conhecimento sobre a estrutura e o funcionamento dos espermatóforos dos cefalópodes (Mollusca: Cephalopoda)

Cefalópodes coleóides (lulas, sépias e polvos) produzem espermatóforos muito complexos que são transferidos à fêmea durante a cópula por meio do hectocótilo, um apêndice modificado nos machos. Durante a transferência à fêmea, ocorre a chamada "reação espermatofórica", complexo processo de evaginação do aparato ejaculatório do espermatóforo, que conduz à exteriorização da massa espermática e corpo cimentante. A presente revisão sintetiza o conhecimento acerca da morfologia e funcionamento desta estrutura exclusiva dos coleóides, identificando lacunas e definindo estratégias que possibilitem avanços na área. Poucos trabalhos abordam com detalhes a morfologia e anatomia funcional dos espermatóforos dos cefalópodes, grande parte do conhecimento acerca da estrutura do espermatóforo tendo sido gerada por trabalhos clássicos do século XIX e início do século XX. Investigações acerca do funcionamento dos espermatóforos são consideravelmente mais raras, estando o conhecimento básico sobre a reação espermatofórica restrito a apenas 19 espécies de coleóides. A revisão da literatura especializada permite sugerir que existem dois tipos básicos de fixação de espermatóforos em Decapodiformes (lulas e sepióides): fixação superficial e implante profundo (ou intra-dérmico). Na fixação superficial, comum em diversas espécies (e.g., Loliginidae, Sepiidae, Ommastrephidae), a base dos espermatângios é aderida ao tecido-alvo aparentemente por meio do corpo cimentante, a partir de substâncias adesivas e, em alguns casos, estruturas de fixação. No implante profundo, comum em alguns grupos de lulas oceânicas e de águas profundas (e.g., Architeuthidae, Cranchiidae, Octopoteuthidae, Sepiolidae), os espermatóforos implantam-se inteiramente no corpo da fêmea, de forma autônoma. Permanece desconhecido o mecanismo responsável pelo implante profundo. Em Octopodiformes (polvos), o espermatóforo é inserido no gonoduto feminino, alcançando a glândula oviducal, onde estão localizadas as espermatecas, ou a cavidade do ovário. Como o funcionamento extracorpóreo dos espermatóforos depende exclusivamente da intrincada estrutura e organização de seus componentes (e.g., membranas e túnicas), somente investigações detalhadas dessas estruturas proverão as bases para a compreensão do funcionamento e da exata função do complexo espermatóforo dos coleóides. Recomenda-se o desenvolvimento de um protocolo simples e eficiente para coloração e preparação total de espermatóforos, de forma que seja possível expandir as descrições morfológicas do espermatóforo em estudos taxonômicos e anatômicos, permitindo, portanto, ampliação do conhecimento acerca desta enigmática estrutura.

A closer look at multiple-clone Plasmodium vivax infections: detection methods, prevalence and consequences

The naturally occurring clonal diversity among field isolates of the major human malaria parasite Plasmodium vivax remained unexplored until the early 1990s, when improved molecular methods allowed the use of blood samples obtained directly from patients, without prior in vitro culture, for genotyping purposes. Here we briefly review the molecular strategies currently used to detect genetically distinct clones in patient-derived P. vivax samples, present evidence that multiple-clone P. vivax infections are commonly detected in areas with different levels of malaria transmission and discuss possible evolutionary and epidemiological consequences of the competition between genetically distinct clones in natural human infections. We suggest that, when two or more genetically distinct clones are present in the same host, intra-host competition for limited resources may select for P. vivax traits that represent major public health challenges, such as increased virulence, increased transmissibility and antimalarial drug resistance.

Autoria no ensino de química: análise de textos escritos por alunos de graduação

A utilização de textos de divulgação científica no ensino formal tem sido discutida por pesquisadores da área de educação em ciências. Tais discussões sugerem que esses textos podem funcionar como instrumento de motivação em sala de aula, organizando explicações e estimulando debates. Nesta perspectiva, foi aplicada uma proposta de ensino pautada no uso de capítulos do livro Tio Tungstênio: Memórias de uma Infância Química, de Oliver Sacks. A proposta, que envolveu a produção de textos, pelos estudantes, sobre conteúdos do livro, foi aplicada em uma disciplina do Ensino Superior de química. Os textos foram analisados segundo a Análise do Discurso de linha francesa, especificamente com relação à noção de autoria.