Sharif Digital Repository

Ability to differentiate induced pluripotent stem cells to cardiomycocytes has attracted attentions,considering crucial role of the heart in the human body and great potential applications of these cells like disease modeling, new treatment methods and basic research. We are able to analyze the performance of beating cells through recording extracellular field potentials of cardiomyocytes using multi-electrode array (MEA) technology. This analysis is an essential step to use cardiac cells in any future development and experiment. Currently, the electrophysiology experts analyze recorded extracellular field potentials of induced cardiomyocytes by observing all the episodes of each record.... 

Size and number of high-performance data centers are fast growing all over the world in recent years. The growth in the leakage power consumption of servers along with its exponential dependency on the ever increasing process variation in nanometer technologies have made it inevitable to move toward variation-aware power reduction strategies. In this thesis, we simultaneously apply thermal- and variation-aware server placement and chassis consolidation methods to reduce total power consumption of data centers. We introduce two server placement heuristics as well as an Integer Linear Programming (ILP)-based server placement method based on power consumption of each server and the data center... 

During an earthquake, if the seat width provided at the joint is less than the relative joint opening, the bridge’s superstructure becomes unseat which leads to potential collapse due to the lack of support. Because of the catastrophic consequences of loss of support and the perception that the damage could easily be prevented at relatively low cost, some retrofitting programs focus on preventing such failures involved the addition of longitudinal restrainer cables and bars to limit the relative movements at expansion joints. Noticing the weaknesses of usual restrainers including the transmission of excessive forces to substructures, weak capability of energy dissipation during severe... 

The building sector consumes a significant amount of potable water. It also consumes 30-40% of the world's end-use energy, and this will be even higher, considering the amount of energy consumed in water and wastewater treatment processes. In Iran, buildings account for about 35% of end-use energy consumption. Therefore, the focus on green buildings has increased as a response to growing concerns about climate change and global warming. This study seeks to develop an optimal model to meet the energy and water demand of a building considering the water and energy nexus. This model has been developed for the Energy Engineering Department in order to become a green building. As a result, the... 

In this thesis, light transmission in dielectric slit arrays on metallic and magneto-optical material has been analyzed by mode matching method together with numerical simulations on commercial softwares such as Comsol Multiphysics and CST microwave studio. It has been shown that light transmission can be attributed to either the Fabry-Perot resonances or a collective resonance phenomenon across the array. In the first case, the transmission resonance is related to the slit depth and is confined to a single slit. In the second case; however, the resonant mechanism affects several neighboring slits. Surprisingly the former is converted to the latter by increasing the slit depth. Furthermore... 

A lot of researchers have suggested that ostracism as a disruptive behavior, has been widespread among organizations and a lot of researches has been studied its consequences in recent years.This research studies ostracism’s consequences and proposes a theoretical model of organizational ostracism with affective commitment, intention to turnover and organizational dependability as one of affective commitment’s antecedents. This study has been done on 231 employees of three medium knowledge-based organizations to identify the effects of ostracism on employee’s turnover behavior. Results show that ostracism, due to its impact on the affective commitment of ostracized peoples, reduces this type... 

Purpose: The purpose of this thesis was to identify active followership behaviors of followers in interaction with autocratic leaders. An active follower thinks critically and takes initiatives.
Design: Given that Followership literature is still in its infancy, the research questions needed a qualitative approach, in this case grounded theory. In total, 19 top- & middle-level managers were interviewed as leaders and followers, accordingly, using semi-structured interviews.
Findings: 4 categories of active followership were found, each having 3-4 specific behaviors. These categories are: precautionary behaviors, facilitating behaviors, modificating behaviors, and consolidating... 

There is no consensus definition of cynicism in literature. In this research different definitions of cynicism have been investigated and two concept of organizational cynicism and trait cynicism have been taken into consideration. Organizational cynicism is a negative attitude that is prevalent in employees. In literature some antecedents and consequences of organizational cynicism have been suggested. It seems organizational cynicism can be investigated in a more complex relations. The focus of this research is on the mediating role of organizational cynicism on the likely relations between politics perception and organizational commitment. That is to say organizational cynicism can... 

Feedback-seeking behavior is the effort of employees to get feedback from the environment and around people about their performance. One of the research questions in this field is about the factors that increase this behavior in the staff. Transformational leadership as a leadership style, stimulates, and motivates followers to achieving desirable operational results. In addition, an important consequence of this style could be increasing the followers' capabilities. Transformational leaders are trying to empower their followers to build and empower them, which can provide a strong incentive for employees to move and grow, which may encourage them to have a better performance. One of... 

Although existing literature on organizational culture and its change process contains meaningful and rich theories but our studies show that there is no perfect and detailed framework on linking organizational culture change and corporate entrepreneurship culture. In addition to that, Gamification –defined as taking the game design elements into non-game contexts– is a fruitful and academically rich research area. Fortunately an idea proposed recently to explain a method for enhancements in organizational culture in general, and in corporate entrepreneurship culture in particularby Yavari and Jafarian based on using game mechanisms. In their paper "A Gamification-Based Method for Corporate... 

Considering the importance of biocompatibility of implantable prothesis’, metallic alloys have weaker corrosion resistance than ceramics. In order to extend usage of nanomaterials to improve the bio-properties of materials, Nano-structured ceramic coatings are being suggested to improve corrosion resistance and biocompatibility of prosthesis. Meanwhile, very good properties of TiN, such as corrosion resistance and mechanical properties as a thin film coating are undeniable. In this study, TiN and Ti2N thin film were deposited on Ti-based substrate, using PVD and Magnetron sputtering at different argon to nitrogen ratio. The crystal structure of the films was examined using Grazing XRD... 

There are several methods proposed for the instruction and assessment of interlanguage pragmatic competence of foreign language learners. Dynamic assessment as one of the recent methods arising from Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory of mind incorporates assessment and instruction by engaging learners in a process of interaction with the mediator while the learners are trying to perform a challenging task. The present study aimed to explore the advantage of Dynamic Assessment as an instructional instrument over the Non-dynamic (traditional) Assessment and Non-assessment approaches and their effects on the Iranian intermediate level students. The target speech acts of apology, complaint, and... 

Fiber optic sensors have found industrial applications due to their unique characteristics and wide range of environmental parameters. Specifically, distributed optical fiber sensors which have applications in borders protection, intrusion detection, oil and gas leakage detection and smart irrigation of farms and gardens, have attracted significant attention from research groups around the world in recent years. According to the forecasts, among all kind of optical fiber sensors, the temperature and acoustic/vibration sensors will seize the market during the coming years. In this thesis, three kind of optical fiber sensors are proposed for environment health monitoring. First, distributed... 

The accurate assessment of biomarkers likes proteins, hormones or other biomolecules that amount of them changes with state of disease or level of treatment and gives diagnostic information is a difficult duty. In these samples, pathogens exist in small quantity compared to other background molecules. Therefore, appropriate sampling process for concentrating and separating pathogens from the matrix should be developed in order to provide rapid and accurate pathogen detection test. In this thesis design and fabrication of microfluidic biosensors based on the modified nanofibrous membranes were investigated and explained. PES nanofibrous membrane with carboxyl functional groups for covalent...