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Perforated encroachment: a critical re-imagining of subdivision neighbourhoods in the desert landscape of Apache Junction, Arizona
No full textThe suburbs have been developed to
operate as machines of mass-production and
‘functionalism’ through the division of zones,
uniform tracts of housing, and isolated office
parks and strip malls. This system separates
us from one another, from amenities and
from landscape within detached zones of
residential areas. We must drive to box stores
for groceries, serving thousands of people from
different areas. We must drive long distances
and sit in traffic to get to work. We do not
know our neighbours, we value privacy over
human connection and without the proper civic
framework, we lack a sense of community.
This system that glorifies the usage of the
automobile has left us divided. The urban form
of the past provided the potential for collective
action and for connections among people of
different economic and social classes.
1 Many
people are unaware of the radical shift that
took place from the generations of strong
urban planning that came before World War II,
because the cities and suburbs of today are all
that we have known.
2 With the onset of climate
change, the numerous social revolutions and
shifts in our demographics and new technology,
we must rethink not only how we develop our
neighbourhoods, but how we live.
Today’s renters and home buyers primarily
choose between living within the city or in the
suburbs. Both options have not been congruent
with our economic, social, and environmental
needs for some time. Suburban sprawl, however,
carries a more damaging effect due to the
amount of carbon emitted from daily travel.
An alternative form of suburban development
is necessary to combat the effects of climate
change and respond to the needs of our
evolved societ
Marché du travail et immigration au Canada à l’ère de la mondialisation : Relationalité et interdisciplinarité
Get PDFLe phénomène du marché du travail et de l’immigration à l’ère de la mondialisation présente, malgré ses avantages, des défis qui peuvent s’expliquer aux niveaux individuel et collectif, national et international des défis difficiles à surmonter sans comprendre fondamentalement les facteurs économiques, mais aussi sociaux et politiques, difficiles à séparer, impliqués dans le processus de recrutement, d’intégration et de la rétention sur le marché du travail. La recherche d’une solution durable consiste, cependant, avant tout, à reconnaître la complexité qu’englobe la problématique du marché du travail et de l’immigration à l’ère de la mondialisation. L’organisation du marché du travail des pays doit étayer cette réalité afin de promouvoir et d’engager pleinement les forces productives sur le marché du travail.
Cette thèse examine, dans une perspective interdisciplinaire, ce phénomène au-delà de la conception purement économique, régie par la loi de l’offre et de la demande. Grâce aux contributions de 423 participants (natifs et immigrants, travailleurs et employeurs), la thèse a permis de mieux comprendre, sur la base d’une approche quantitative, les divergences et les similitudes entre les différents groupes sur divers facteurs liés au marché du travail et à l’immigration en Ontario. Elle propose des pistes pour permettre une prise de décision efficace devant la problématique du marché du travail et de l’immigration à l’ère de la mondialisation. Elle mène à des conclusions qui intègrent la modélisation trialectique en s’inspirant de la théorie de la « circulation des biens, des idées et des personnes » ; cela a permis de comprendre les relations dialectiques entre les trois catégories analytiques qui dépendent les unes des autres. Ce travail de recherche contribue donc, à bien des égards, à une meilleure compréhension de la complexité du marché du travail et de l’immigration à l’ère de la mondialisation où une grande diversité sera simplement la réalité.Doctorat en philosophie (PhD) en sciences humaines et interdisciplinarit
Multi-label emotion classification using machine learning and deep learning methods
No full textEmotion detection in online social networks benefits many applications like personalized
advertisement services, suggestion systems, etc. Emotion can be identified from various
sources like text, facial expressions, images, speeches, paintings, songs, etc. Emotion detection
can be done by various techniques in machine learning. Traditional emotion detection
techniques mainly focus on multi-class classification while ignoring the co-existence of
multiple emotion labels in one instance. This research work is focussed on classifying multiple
emotions from data to handle complex data with the help of different machine learning and
deep learning methods. Before modeling, first data analysis is done and then the data is cleaned.
Data pre-processing is performed in steps such as stop-words removal, tokenization, stemming
and lemmatization, etc., which are performed using a Natural Language Processing toolkit
(NLTK). All the input variables are converted into vectors by naive text encoding techniques
like word2vec, Bag-of-words, and term frequency-inverse document frequency (TF-IDF). This
research is implemented using python programming language. To solve multi-label emotion
classification problem, machine learning and deep learning methods were used. The evaluation
parameters such as accuracy, precision, recall, and F1-score were used to evaluate the
performance of the classifiers Naïve Bayes, support vector machine (SVM), Random Forest,
K-nearest neighbour (KNN), GRU (Gated Recurrent Unit) based RNN (Recurrent Neural
Network) with Adam optimizer and Rmsprop optimizer. GRU based RNN with Rmsprop
optimizer achieves an accuracy of 82.3%, Naïve Bayes achieves highest precision of 0.80,
Random Forest achieves highest recall score of 0.823, SVM achieves highest F1 score of 0.798
on the challenging SemEval2018 Task 1: E-c multi-label emotion classification dataset. Also,
One-way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) test was performed on the mean values of
performance metrics (accuracy, precision, recall, and F1-score) on all the methods
Assessing patterns and biogeochemical impacts of shrubification in sedge fens of the Hudson Bay subarctic tundra
No full textMean annual air temperatures in Arctic regions have increased by about 2–3°C over the past 50
years. As a result, the abundance and maximum height of woody shrub species has increased
(shrubification) at sites around the circumpolar Arctic. This paper examines the extent and
impact of shrubification on relevant nutrient cycling, soil microbial community and GHG
production potential at a fen environment in the Hudson Bay Lowlands near Churchill, MB.
Greening during 1984-2017 was analyzed using Google Earth Engine, a 10-year litterbag study
was conducted to compare nutrient release patterns between a sedge and shrub dominated site,
soil microbial DNA was extracted from sites and compared, and active layer samples were
incubated to determine potential GHG production. We found that greening was extensive in the
area, methane production was lower in soils from shrub-dominated sites and shrub litters
decomposed significantly slower than sedge litters in the first year. These results suggest that it is
unlikely that permafrost is sustainable where shrubs encroach, yet the effects of permafrost thaw
on carbon cycling could be in part offset by lower microbial methane production associated with
shrubs in near surface soils.Master of Science (M.Sc.) in Biolog
A retrospective analysis of the Vancouver Island marmot (Marmota vancouverensis) conservation breeding and release program: Conservation physiology and hibernation
Get PDFThe Vancouver Island marmot (Marmota vancouverensis) is an endangered mammal whose
population is being recovered with a conservation breeding and release program. This involves
management both in and ex situ, so it is vital to understand how the different environments are
affecting the populations to maximize program outcomes. The purpose of this thesis was to
retrospectively analyze data collected from this program to address questions relevant to
population recovery. The first chapter compared the physiology of the managed populations
using the neutrophil: lymphocyte ratio and found significant differences in this metric among
targeted comparisons. The second chapter assessed factors that may be contributing to
hibernation-related mortality of marmots during their first winter post-release. I found a
combination of environmental and intrinsic factors influencing this mortality. Overall, this thesis
contributes to a growing body of literature surrounding the efficacy of conservation breeding and
release programs to recover critically endangered species
Critically exploring the acculturative journeys of forced immigrant youth and the role YMCA sport programs can play in providing support during re-settlement
Get PDFThe number of people worldwide who had been forced to flee their home country at the end of
2019 was 26 million (UNCHR, 2019). Canada has a history of providing a home to those in need
and the number of asylum seekers and refugees (i.e., forced immigrants) who have been offered
safe haven has steadily increased (GOC, 2018). Forced immigrants arriving in Canada, and other
countries of re-settlement, face numerous challenges, including the task of acculturating to a new
society. Forced immigrant youth are often the most in need of help, as they are often the ones
who suffer the most from conflict. Sport has been recognized as one method of helping
newcomers with social integration, but it is not a context that is always free of exclusionary and
discriminatory practices. The aim of the project that underpins this dissertation was to use a
community based participatory action research (CBPAR) approach to engage forced immigrant
youth in the process of bringing about transformative change to sport programs they were
involved in so that community sport programs could become more meaningful and inclusive for
all participants. The research presented in this dissertation stems from my role in the CBPAR
process of working with forced immigrant youth and YMCA settlement staff members to
develop a deeper understanding about the meaning of sport in youths’ lives and the way they
storied their involvement in community sport programs in Sudbury, Ontario. The research
process began with a meta-synthesis of qualitative research conducted with forced immigrants
engaged in sport and physical activity from which we drew upon synthesized lessons related to
understanding forced immigrants’ acculturative journeys from a critical lens and the importance
of psychological and cultural safety during this journey. Arts-based conversational interviews
and a collaborative reflexive thematic analysis were used to develop two polyphonic vignettes
that (re-)storied the changing meaning of sport in forced immigrant youths’ lives and the role sport played in helping them feel a sense of belonging (or not) in Sudbury. Polyphonic vignettes
which featured multiple composite characters were used as the method of sharing forced
immigrant youths’ stories so that the anonymity and confidentiality of the youth was preserved,
while bringing new co-generated knowledge to a diverse range of audiences in an evocative and
engaging manner. The reflexive and interdiscipinary approach to this project enabled me to
ensure disciplinary, as well as my own personal, assumptions were not privileged, but rather that
I remained open to the insights and directions provided by the community members I worked
with. Centralizing forced immigrant youth and YMCA Settlement Services staff members meant
knowledge developed through the vignettes was locally relevant and meaningful. Finally, the
collaborative process engaged in with forced immigrant youth, YMCA Immigrant Services staff
members and academic project team members in the development of the two vignettes was
critically examined. Lessons are shared from the twists and turns that defined the research
process and led to the development of a community of practice between forced immigrant
families and the YMCA that will be sustained beyond the involvement of the academic team.Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in Human Studie
Effects of blade angle on the force and work during sharp force trauma of porcine ribs
No full textForensic anthropologists interpret bony injuries to reconstruct what occurred during a homicide,
including estimating the amount of force needed to create sharp-force trauma. Because a qualitative
scale —mild, moderate and severe— is currently used for predicting the forces involved, recent
studies have focused on providing more quantitative data. A stabbing is a dynamic event where both
participants may be moving, so the wounds can be expected to occur over a range of orientations.
This study analysed the effects of angle on sharp-force injuries. A pneumatic device that can create
consistent overhand stabs was used to analyse the change in force and work at angles of 0°, 45°
and 90° relative to the long axis of the ribs. The results indicate that the angle of the blade does
affect the force and work required to create bony injuries. Therefore, the blade angle needs to be
considered in forensic analyses.Master of Applied Science (MASc) in Engineering Science (Mechanical
A rule based sentiment analysis of whatsapp reviews in Telugu language
No full textSentiment analysis is one of the major fields of research for any case regarding natural
language processing. For this purpose, the data is often some form of review or a feedback so
that the emotion and the main sentiment behind the feedback can be assessed using machine
learning techniques. A similar approach is performed in this research, In this report,
Whatsapp reviews of customers in Telugu language were analysed and the sentiment polarity
was calculated using a rule based approach. Telugu language is from the southern part of
India and uses different sets of fonts from the general sets. The strings are treated as similarly
as they are in any other machine learning process since the meaning behind them is captured
through the patterns that emerge from the text. All the text processing is carried oput
similarly to most NLP scenarios. To find out the overall sentiment in the review that is
collected from the internet, a manual rule-based algorithm is developed which can apply
certain sets of rules to a sentence to check the polarity, which can be positive, negative, or
neutral. These rules check the presence of words such as major negative words and major
positive words, and even auxiliary verbs and their position with respect to the negative and
positive words. This rule-based approach was then used to train a machine learning model
using a few parametric classifiers like K-nearest neighbours (KNN), XGBoost and support
vector machines (SVM). The classifiers also fetched a decent accuracy of 81%, 82% and 78%
respectively, which indicated towards the good performance of the rule-based approach and
its effectiveness with error counts of 0.296, 0.288 and 0.252 with TF-IDF and 0.285, 0.285 and 0.234 with Bag of Words. Along the process, manual observation was also used to
compare the assigned sentiments to the sentence to find the errors in the method. The best
performance with respect to results was given by SVM classifiers that returned an f1 score of
79% and the lowest error count of 0.23 which is better among all the classifiers. The metrics
which were used to judge these classifiers were the precision, recall, f1 scores and the mean
squared error.M.Sc. in Computational Sciences
Cultivation of microorganisms from sulfidic mine waste and genomic insights into acidibacillus ferrooxidans and penicillium sp
No full textWith increasing pressure to support sustainable mining initiatives, the
advancement of biotechnologies is essential for dealing with mine waste in Canada and around
the world. These improvements require a thorough understanding of microorganisms that inhabit
different waste materials. This study used classic culturing techniques to isolate acidophilic ironoxidizing bacteria and genomic sequencing to characterize microbial isolates from different
source materials. Two organisms were isolated from an enrichment culture that was inoculated
with low-sulfur waste rock from a Canadian mine site. They were identified as a strain of
Acidibacillus ferrooxidans and a fungus of the genus Penicillium. Some of the genes that were
annotated from the sequenced prokaryotic genome were absent in available genomes of Ab.
ferrooxidans and others were associated with metabolic abilities that have not been described in
this organism, such as respiratory nitrate reduction. A total of 59 stress response genes were
identified including for resistance to several heavy metals and multiple antibiotics. Fungal
biomass displayed iron oxidation as well as accumulation, and 4 genes encoding for multicopper
oxidase enzymes were annotated which have been associated with the adaptation of fungi in
metal-rich environments. This study also tailored selective media with the aim of isolating
bacteria from the genera Leptospirillum and Sulfobacillus from sulfidic bioreactor cultures.
These groups were not identified but we started to isolate at least 2 different colonies of interest.
This project provides insight into microorganisms from these waste materials and their potential
in biotechnologies. It also emphasizes the importance of assessing fungi in these environments
L’expérience d’un échec à l’examen professionnel infirmier NCLEX-RN des diplômées du programme francophone de baccalauréat en sciences infirmières
No full textAfin de devenir infirmière en Ontario, les diplômées d’un programme de sciences
infirmières doivent réussir un examen d’admission à la profession pour obtenir leur permis
d’exercice. En 2015, l’examen canadien a changé de format et il est devenu similaire à celui des
États-Unis, soit le « National Council Licensure Examination – Registered Nurse » (NCLEXRN). Les premiers résultats canadiens à l’examen d’admission à la profession infirmière
NCLEX-RN ont démontré de nombreux échecs, qui touchaient davantage les francophones que
les anglophones. L’échec à un tel examen peut être dévastateur pour les candidates, tant sur le
plan professionnel que personnel. Les candidates qui ne réussissent pas l’examen NCLEX-RN
peuvent devenir déprimées et isolées et subir des difficultés financières. De plus, le parcours de
la vie ainsi que leur perspective d’emploi sont souvent remis en question. Puisque le phénomène
d’un échec à l’examen NCLEX-RN canadien auprès d’une population francophone reste encore
peu connu, à l’aide d’une approche phénoménologique, l’expérience de cet échec est expliquée
par des diplômées du baccalauréat en sciences infirmières francophones de l’Université
Laurentienne (UL) de Sudbury. Les participantes ont été recrutées à l’aide d’un échantillonnage
non-probabiliste, notamment l’échantillonnage de convenance. Les données ont été recueillies à
l’aide d’entrevues individuelles semi-dirigées. Les résultats de cette étude ont démontré que les
participantes francophones ont vécu des difficultés supplémentaires lors de la préparation et lors
de l’examen NCLEX-RN peu importe la langue choisie qui, entre autres, est reliée à un ou
plusieurs échecs de cet examen