An international conflict between pro- and anti-whaling countries has been a concern. While many Western countries condemn whaling, Japan conducts ‘research whaling’ under the special permission of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) along with Norway and Iceland, who also engage in commercial whaling. Especially Japan and Australia have been divided...
The positions of Japan and Australia have been in sharp contrast over whaling; Japan seeks to expand whaling and is not concerned about protecting whales while Australia attempts to halt whaling and strengthen whale conservation. In this study, we hypothesize that this sparked difference reflects different levels of willingness to...
Humanities have been craving more freedom and conveniences in whatever form. Carriages evolved to cars and ultimately to aircraft so that one can reach any place in the globe within a day. The mobile phone has enabled people to make a phone call without a need to find a phone...
The multimedia capabilities of computers have recently become the focus of computer developers due to the increasing demand for advanced computer graphics and new media capabilities, such as video conferencing, 3-D visualization, and animation. To support these multimedia capabilities, specialized graphics hardware, such as MPEG encoding/decoding card, 3-D graphics card,...
Most flexible manufacturing systems (FMS) presently in use have generated only modest productivity increases in proportion to capital in vested in the process, or they have not been favorably reviewed when compared to the investment costs of other improved manufacturing systems. This thesis presents a simulator program which will assist...
Chemistry of preparing dense film from solution deposition is explored with several cases in this thesis. Surface dense structure, conversion at melting point, and ion exchange in aqueous solution are the main topics covered here for the thin films of aluminum oxide phosphate and tin dioxide. Thin film density, optical...
In the 21st century, environmental deterioration is now an indisputable fact. Reliable and economically viable electricity systems based on renewable sources are urgently needed to replace the environmentally detrimental fossil fuels. The feasibility of incorporating renewable-but-intermittent solar and wind energy heavily depends on the development of cost-effective and safe technologies,...
In this dissertation, the primary objective is to discover more sustainable electrode materials and study new reaction mechanisms using aqueous electrolytes. The first study conducted reveals a reversible conversion reaction from copper to Cu2CO3(OH)2. The reaction mechanism uses OH- and CO32- as charge carriers at the cathode. The results open...
Femtosecond stimulated Raman spectroscopy (FSRS) is a powerful ultrafast technique which can track photoinduced excited state structural events on femtosecond (fs) to picosecond (ps) timescales. In addition to high temporal and spectral resolutions, FSRS provides a broad spectral window from ca. 100—2000 cm-1 for detection, enabling the direct mapping of...
In this dissertation, excited state proton transfer (ESPT) and its inhibition in solution and protein environments are revealed using both femtosecond transient absorption (fs-TA) spectroscopy and femtosecond stimulated Raman spectroscopy (FSRS). Using a tunable Raman pump to enhance transient vibrational features of the photoacidic chromophore HPTS in methanol and methanol...