Protecting Health Data In A Pandemic: A Systematic Adversarial Threat Analysis Of Contact Tracing Apps, Leah Krehling

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

In this thesis centralized, decentralized, Bluetooth, and GPS based applications of digital contact tracing were reviewed and assessed. Using privacy principles created by a contingent of security and privacy experts from across Canada, a metric of assessing an application’s privacy was created. An attack tree was built to assess the security of the contact tracing applications. Eighteen attacks were theorized against contact tracing applications currently in use. An application’s vulnerability to the attacks was measured using a scoring system developed for this purpose. The results of the security scores were used to create a metric for assessing the security of …

Bridging Thermochemical And Biochemical Conversion: Impact Of Biochar Addition On The Anaerobic Digestion Of Aqueous Pyrolysis Condensate, Neha Batta

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Profitable treatment of low value waste biomass is one of the biggest challenges of the industry. Where most of the current treatment strategies, such as pyrolysis, are efficient in complete breakdown of hard to synthesize, low value waste biomass such as lignocellulosic wastes, it leads to the generation of secondary waste thereby compromising its efficiency. The aim of this research is to utilize the aqueous pyrolysis condensate as a feedstock for anaerobic digestion, previously adapting the microbial consortia to the acidity and other potential organic inhibitors present in the APC, to produce energy in the form of biogas following the …

Effects Of City Growth On Tall Building Cladding Fatigue, Hang You

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

As city develops there will be changes in the aerodynamic characteristics due to varying building surrounding and topology. For example, the city growth around a tall building can cause an increase in wind load due to venturi or wake effects or decrease due to sheltering effects depending on the type of surrounding. The densification of cities will also increase the turbulence level due to wake effects. In the present study, the implication of these changes on the aerodynamic forces on cladding connections is investigated. With increased fluctuations in the wind loads, the cladding connections will also experience stress fluctuations, which …

Modeling And Simulation Of Concentric And Eccentric Tube Continuum Robots, Lexuan Wang

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Unlike conventional manipulators where the robot is actuated at discrete joints, continuum robots are actuated continuously in smooth curves. These robots are often dexterous and compact, allowing them to operate in constrained environments during minimally invasive medical interventions. Since the unconventional robot structure often consists of elastic or flexible materials, the corresponding kinematics formulation is significantly more challenging to derive and simulate. This thesis introduces two different but related continuum robot designs: the concentric tube robot (CTR) and the eccentric tube robot (ETR). These designs utilize multiple pre-curved and superelastic nitinol tubes to actuate the robot. This mechanism also leads …

Characterization Of The Mechanical Performance Of The Ae44-2 And Ae44-4 High Pressure Die Cast Mg-Rare Earth Alloys, Bolin Fu

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This thesis aims to study the local mechanical properties of high pressure die cast (HPDC) AE44-2 and AE44-4 alloys at 25˚C and 200˚C and their microstructures. The chemical composition of the precipitates and grain size, the effect of cooling rate on the grains, the relationship between the grain size and mechanical properties, and the creep resistance of these two HPDC alloys were studied and discussed.

In this thesis, the spherical micro-indentation, constant Berkovich indentation tests, and tensile tests were performed on the specimens at 25˚C and 200˚C to probe their stress-strain response and creep behavior. This study used a new …

Feasibility Of Twisted Coiled Polymer Actuators For Use In Upper Limb Wearable Rehabilitation Devices, Brandon P.R. Edmonds

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Throughout your lifetime, it is nearly impossible to avoid at least one musculoskeletal condition that requires rehabilitation, and for a world containing billions of people, the costs associated with these conditions have become a huge economic burden. Nevertheless, the scientific community has become increasingly aware of the growing potential for wearable mechatronic systems to assist with upper-limb musculoskeletal rehabilitation; however, one limiting factor to their clinical acceptance lies in the development of actuation solutions. Conventional actuators are rigid and cylindrical in nature, requiring additional features to provide the proper forces, torques, and motion direction, required for human interaction. Another type …

Radiometric Correction Of Multispectral Cameras Using Photosensor Irradiance For Agronomy Applications, Nicholas S. Mitchell

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Cloud coverage has a significant impact on the reflectance maps generated by multispectral cameras mounted on UAV's in small farm settings. The current approach is to calibrate the camera once before every flight and use the radiometric calibration map for the entire flight. In this work we have designed and built a downwelling and upwelling photosensor to work in sync with our custom multispectral camera. A dual reflectance panel implementation for the time dependent radiometric calibration of the multispectral camera is completed. The solar spectral irradiance curve is approximated using the current measurements from the downwelling photosensor and the ground …

Biodegradability Of Cellulose And Its Impact On Oxygen Transfer Efficiency And Biological Nutrients Removal, Ahmed Shawki Ahmed

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Cellulose from toilet paper is a significant fraction of particulate organics, which is recoverable. For the first time, comprehensive mapping and tracking the fate of cellulose across various unit processes at full-scale in two water resource recovery facilities located in North America and Europe was undertaken. The influent cellulose content accounted for approximately one-third of the total suspended solids (TSS). More than 80% of the raw wastewater cellulose was captured in primary treatment. The high cellulose content of the primary sludge accounting for 17%-35% of the TSS facilitates cellulose recovery. Cellulose biodegradation efficiency varied between 70%-90% of the primary effluent, …

Intensification Of Clostridium Pasteurianum Fermentation Producing N-Butanol From Glycerol Using Microfiltration Cell Recycle, Colin W. Couper

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This work demonstrates lab scale intensification of the fermentation of glycerol to 1-butanol using Clostridum pasteurianum, starting with simulation and comparison of different cell recycle arrangements, development of a cell recycle apparatus with an existing bioreactor, and demonstration of fermentation with the final system. Fermentations performed with the completed system showed that the cell recycle system was not significantly inhibitory to fermentation, and achieved a maximum apparent cell dry weight of 3.14g/L and a maximum butanol productivity of 1.16g/Lh.

Geo-Structural Analysis Of Integral Abutment Bridges, Biyi Li

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Integral abutment bridges are jointless bridges where bridge decks and girders are integrated with abutments. The longitudinal displacements and rotations of the bridge are partially accommodated by the soil-pile system wherein the soil surrounding the piles generates active and reactive lateral forces when the piles deflect due to the movement of the superstructure. Since the soil stress-strain responses are inherently nonlinear, the pile deflection and the soil stiffness are interdependent. Consequently, evaluating soil-pile interactions requires a detailed geo-structural analysis. There are two common approaches used to idealize the soil-pile interactions for laterally loaded piles: the p-y and continuum mechanics approaches …

Intelligent And Low Overhead Network Synchronization Over Large-Scale Industrial Internet Of Things Systems, Pengyi Jia

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

With the extensive development of information and communication technologies and vertical industry applications, industrial IoT (IIoT) systems are expected to enable a wide variety of applications, including advanced manufacturing, networked control, and smart supply chain, which all exclusively hinge on the efficient cooperation and coordination among the involved IIoT machines and infrastructures. The ubiquitous connection among IIoT entities and the associated exchange of collaborative information necessitate the achievement of accurate network synchronization, which can guarantee the temporal alignment of the critical information. To enhance the temporal correlation of heterogeneous devices in large-scale IIoT systems, this thesis aims at designing industry-oriented …

Evolution And Flow Of Vapors In A Fluidized Bed, Hansen Mangaranap Silitonga

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Vaporization of injected liquid is a key process in many industrial fluidized beds. In Fluid Cokers, for example, quicker vaporization would increase liquid product yield and reduce fouling. A new experimental method was developed to measure the vaporization rate by injecting liquid for a certain duration to reach a constant vaporization rate while monitoring changes in pressure and vapor composition in the exhaust pipe of the fluidization column. Three processes can delay vaporization in a fluidized bed: heat flux from hot-dry particles to wet particles, vapor saturation, and wet agglomerate formation. Operating a spray nozzle at a very high atomization …

Reliability-Based Calibration Of Design Wind Load, Snow Load And Companion Load Factors Considering Climate Change Effect, Qian Tang

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Wind load and snow load are two of the environmental loads that need to be considered for structural design. This study compared the statistical characteristics of the annual maximum thunderstorm and non-thunderstorm winds based on the updated wind speed dataset and carried out the extreme value analysis for wind load by treating the synoptic and thunderstorm winds separately. The results indicated that for southern Ontario and the southern part of the Prairies, the extreme winds could be dominated by thunderstorm winds. The consideration of both thunderstorm winds and synoptic winds separately to recommend the reference wind velocity pressure for the …

Value-Added Lipids Extraction From Wet Microalgae Using Ionic Liquids, Yujie Zhang

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Microalgae have gained interest as sources of renewable lipids in the biofuel sector due to their ability to sequester carbon dioxide into triacylglycerol (TAG), a biodiesel feedstock. However, industrial-scale production of microalgae exclusively for fuel production is limited by technical and economic challenges. Some marine microalgae can accumulate large amounts of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) such as docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) and other unsaturated fatty acids, which are high-value compounds linked to the prevention of various cardiovascular diseases. This thesis therefore examines the extraction of lipids and DHA from two microorganisms (Chlorella vulgaris, a model organism for lipid production, …

Geometry Optimization Of Building-Integrated Photovoltaic Sunshade, Seyedsoroush Sadatifar

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Building-integrated photovoltaic (BIPV) systems are one of the growing applications of PV technology. These approaches allow PV panels to perform additional functions for the building, such as regulating interior lighting and incoming heat. In this work, we explore a design framework for optimizing the configuration of BIPV shading devices to optimize a combination of power generation, daylighting conditions within the building, and heating and cooling loads.

We develop a generalizable computational model and apply it to a case study for the Cornerstone Architecture Building in London, Ontario. We optimize the configuration of static and dynamic BIPV shading devices in both …

Experimental Investigation Of Inverse Liquid-Solid Fluidized Bed Hydrodynamics, Saleh A. Srabet

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Abstract

Inverse liquid-solid fluidized beds have recently received increased attention, particularly for use with wastewater treatment bioreactors (i.e., particle-supported biofilms). The flow behaviour of free-rising light particles is especially interesting because their drag coefficients deviate from the standard drag curve. For this reason, the work presented in this thesis was focussed on investigating the minimum fluidization velocity () and the steady-state bed voidage associated with four particles, with densities of 28, 122, 300, and 678 kg/m³, in a conventional inverse fluidization regime. All experimental measurements were completed using a large-scale system comprising a downer column with a diameter …

Finite Element Analyses And Random Field Modeling Of Naturally Corroded Underground Energy Pipelines, Ji Bao

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Metal-loss corrosion is one of the major threats to the integrity of oil and natural gas pipelines. The Fitness-For-Service (FFS) assessment is commonly carried out to demonstrate the integrity of the corroded pipelines. The naturally occurring corrosions on the external surfaces are irregularly shaped three-dimensional features. Due to the geometric complexity of the natural corrosion features, the research of FFS assessment in the previous studies always employed the pipe segments containing artificially induced corrosion features. However, since artificial features are in general regular-shaped, e.g. cubic or semi-ellipsoidal, they do not capture geometric characteristics of naturally occurring corrosions. The thesis develops …

Efficient Hardware Architectures For Public-Key Cryptosystems, Mohammadamin Saburruhmonfared

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Finite field arithmetic plays an essential role in public-key cryptography as all the underlying operations are performed in these fields. The finite fields are either prime fields or binary fields. Binary field elements can mainly be represented on a polynomial basis or a normal basis (NB). NB representation offers a simple squaring operation, especially in hardware. However, multiplication is typically complex, and a particular subset of NB called Gaussian Normal Basis (GNB) features an efficient multiplication operation used in this work. The first part of this thesis has focused on improving finite field arithmetic architectures over GNB. Among different arithmetic …

The Effect Of Moox Reducibility On Its Activity For Anisole Hydrodeoxygenation, Chantal Walker

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Catalytic hydrodeoxygenation (HDO) is a process for upgrading crude bio-oil as it has a high oxygen content which causes several undesirable properties. Current methods for HDO use sulfided NiMo and CoMo or supported noble metal catalysts which hydrogenate aromatic rings, leading to less valuable products and increasing the hydrogen consumption. Using 10 wt. % MoO3 supported on ZrO2, TiO2, γ-Al2O3, SiO2 and CeO2, we investigated the atmospheric HDO of anisole, a model compound, at 350 °C. All catalysts achieved C – O bond cleavage, preserving the aromatic ring. In situ UV-Vis spectroscopy showed a peak corresponding to intervalence charge transfer …

Towards Efficient And Secure Iiot: Solutions For The Sensing Domain, Elena Uchiteleva

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This work explores reduced complexity solutions for the increased efficiency and safety of the industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) sensing domain. Resource virtualization, security, and predictive modeling are the main subjects of these studies.

The first solution is a joint throughput and time-resource allocation scheme for virtualization of IEEE 802.15.4-based wireless sensor networks. Virtualization is realized through the utilization of the guaranteed time slot mechanism for scheduling on the medium access control (MAC) layer. The solution abstracts resources into logical units that are allocated to segregated applications with different service requirements. The problem is formulated in a linear optimization framework …

Longitudinal Partitioning Waveform Relaxation Methods For The Analysis Of Transmission Line Circuits, Tarik Menkad

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Three research projects are presented in this manuscript. Projects one and two describe two waveform relaxation algorithms (WR) with longitudinal partitioning for the time-domain analysis of transmission line circuits. Project three presents theoretical results about the convergence of WR for chains of general circuits.

The first WR algorithm uses a assignment-partition procedure that relies on inserting external series combinations of positive and negative resistances into the circuit to control the speed of convergence of the algorithm. The convergence of the subsequent WR method is examined, and fast convergence is cast as a generic optimization problem in the frequency-domain. An automatic …

Uncertainties In The Assessment Of Individual And Compound Flooding From River Discharge And Coastal Water Levels Under Climate Change, Shuyi Wang

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

It is widely recognized that climate change can impact the risks of flooding in many regions around the world especially the low-lying coastal areas. The concurrent occurrence of multiple flood drivers such as high river flows and coastal water levels can aggravate such impacts causing catastrophic damages. In this study, the individual and compounding effects of riverine and coastal flooding are investigated over Stephenville Crossing, a town located in the coastal-estuarine region of Newfoundland and Labrador (NL), Canada. The impacts of climate change on flood characteristics and the corresponding uncertainties associated with model inputs and structure, and emission scenarios are …

Development And Validation Of Tools For Improving Intraoperative Implant Assessment With Ultrasound During Gynaecological Brachytherapy, Jessica Robin Rodgers

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Treatment of gynaecological cancers often includes a type of conformal radiotherapy, known as brachytherapy, that allows radiation sources to be placed close to or directly into cancerous tissues, tailoring the dose to the local region around tumours and sparing surrounding normal tissues. These sources can be positioned via intracavitary applicators that are placed inside the vagina/uterus or interstitial implants, involving the insertion of multiple needles into the tissue. There is currently no standard imaging modality to visualize these applicators and needles at the time of placement, which would allow for the immediate assessment and refinement of the implant positions. Ultrasound …

The Effect Of Humeral Short Stem Positioning, Humeral Head Contact, And Head Positioning On Bone Stress Following Total Shoulder Arthroplasty, Amir Tavakoli

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Uncemented humeral stems cause stress shielding which result in bone resorption when used in total shoulder arthroplasty (TSA). Shorter length stems show a decrease in stress shielding, however the effect of humeral short stem positioning and humeral head contact and positioning on bone stress is currently not known, hence CT-based tools and Finite Element (FE) methods are used to quantify the effects of the mentioned variables on bone stresses after TSA.

Eight male cadaveric humeri were virtually constructed from computed tomography (CT) data, with a generic short humeral short stem as the implant.

The results of this work show that …

An Investigation On The Influences Of Radial Head Hemiarthroplasty Stem Fixation Techniques On Articular Mechanics, Jakub Szmit

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Radial head hemiarthroplasty design has been extensively studied with a focus on utilizing the geometrical characteristics of the native radial dish as a guide of implant placement and design. Although implant design has been studied, optimal radial head implant fixation technique remains unknown. This thesis focused on the effect of stem fit on radiocapitellar contact mechanics, using both finite element and experimental bench-top approaches. Additionally, investigation into the impact of varus/valgus malalignment of the radial head in both the native state and following hemiarthroplasty was conducted. It was found that loose fitting a smooth stem axisymmetric radial head implant through …

Inverse Mapping Of Generative Adversarial Networks, Nicky Bayat

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Generative adversarial networks (GANs) synthesize realistic samples (image, audio, video, etc.) from a random latent vector. While many studies have explored various training configurations and architectures for GANs, the problem of inverting a generative model to extract latent vectors of given input images/audio has been inadequately investigated. Although there is exactly one generated output per given random vector, the mapping from an image/audio to its recovered latent vector can have more than one solution. We train a deep residual neural network (ResNet18) architecture to recover a latent vector for a given target that can be used to generate a face …

Machine Learning Prediction Of Shear Capacity Of Steel Fiber Reinforced Concrete, Wassim Ben Chaabene

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The use of steel fibers for concrete reinforcement has been growing in recent years owing to the improved shear strength and post-cracking toughness imparted by fiber inclusion. Yet, there is still lack of design provisions for steel fiber-reinforced concrete (SFRC) in building codes. This is mainly due to the complex shear transfer mechanism in SFRC. Existing empirical equations for SFRC shear strength have been developed with relatively limited data examples, making their accuracy restricted to specific ranges. To overcome this drawback, the present study suggests novel machine learning models based on artificial neural network (ANN) and genetic programming (GP) to …

Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing System With Index Modulations For Wireless Communication, Ibrahim M Abdalla Aboharba

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) with Index Modulation (OFDM-IM) system with arbitrary and are suggested and investigated for data transmission over realistic fading and shadowing wireless communication channels. In these OFDM-IM systems, data is conveyed to the receiver using characteristics of signal mapper in the OFDM system and by using indices of active subcarriers dictated by the type of IM employed. Two types of index modulations, arbitrary and Look-Up Table (LUT), are described and examined for selection of active subcarriers in OFDM systems with OOK (ON-OFF Keying), M-QAM (M-ary Quadrature Amplitude Modulation), and M-PSK (M-ary Phase Shift Keying) signal mappers. …

Characterization And Control Of A Woven Biomimetic Actuator For Wearable Neurorehabilitative Devices, Vaughan K. Murphy

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Strokes are a major cause of death and disability, with nearly 300,000 Canadians suffering from stroke-related disability. Many survivors suffer from upper limb paresis, which makes ordinary tasks difficult. Availability of care is an issue, with only 43.3% of patients in Ontario receiving proper treatment. Robot-assisted neurorehabilitation has been used to address limited clinician availability, and has been shown to improve patient strength and range of motion faster than or comparable to traditional methods. However, the size and weight of current devices limit their use to within therapists’ offices. Incorporating actuators into clothing would make the devices more comfortable, natural …

Simulation Of Operational Extreme Wind Conditions For Horizontal Axis Wind Turbines Based On Iec Standard, Kamran Shirzadeh Ajirlo

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The possibility of simulating deterministic extreme operational conditions for horizontal axis wind turbines based on the IEC 61400-1 standard in the WindEEE Dome at Western University was investigated. WindEEE has 60 fans (a matrix of 4 by 15 with 0.8m diameter each) on one of the walls to generate straight and sheared flows. These fans were controlled by their power set-points and by their adjustable Inlet Guiding Vanes (IGV) to generate the Extreme Operational Gust (EOG), positive and negative Extreme Vertical Shear (EVS), and Extreme Horizontal Shear (EHS) cases as per IEC 61400-1 standard to be further applied for testing …