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About MacSphere

MacSphere is McMaster University's Institutional Repository (IR). The purpose of an IR is to bring together all of a University's research under one umbrella, with an aim to preserve and provide access to that research. The research and scholarly output included in MacSphere has been selected and deposited by the individual university departments and centres on campus.

To contribute to McMaster's Institutional Repository, please sign on to MacSphere with your MAC ID.

If you have any questions, please contact the MacSphere Support Team.

Students wishing to deposit their PhD or Masters thesis, please follow the instructions outlined by the School of Graduate Studies.

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Communities in MacSphere

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Recent Submissions

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    "If you can see me, you can be me": Documenting the impacts of a Black entrepreneurial support program in Hamilton
    (Prepared by the McMaster Research Shop for BLK Owned, 2026-10) Cheetu, Shruti; Abdella, Sabrina; Amer, Rand; Kanwar, Priyanshita; Shen, Nianzu; Gravely, Evan
    BLK Owned is a Black-led, community-based nonprofit founded in 2020. The organization aims to support Black entrepreneurs across Southwestern Ontario by reducing systemic barriers and fostering economic empowerment through programs rooted in cultural identity and community connection. In 2025, as part of its five-year anniversary, BLK Owned partnered with the McMaster Research Shop to collect data on its impact. This project aimed to elicit both the individual and regional impact of the organization directly from BLK Owned program participants and supporters.
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    Demographic and Service Use Data Analysis and Research Infrastructure Development for Mishka Social Services
    (Prepared by the McMaster Research Shop for Mishka Social Services, 2026-01) Rubab, Raiyan; Kamran, Guloona; Singh, Gurvir; Cannella, Laila; Ahmed, Raabia; Gravely, Evan
    Mishka Social Services (Mishka) provides essential supports to Muslims and other newcomers, immigrants, and refugees across Hamilton and the Niagara region through programs focused on food security, case management, social work, community education, and wellness. While Mishka collects intake data across all programs, these efforts currently occur through separate, program-specific processes, limiting the organization’s ability to develop a clear, organization-wide understanding of who is being served and how services are accessed. This project was undertaken to consolidate available intake data, identify key demographic and service use patterns where possible, assess gaps in current data collection practices, and provide practical recommendations to strengthen Mishka’s intake system in ways that align with organizational capacity.
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    Making the Case for a Culturally Competent Youth Gang Violence Prevention Program Among the Somali Community in Hamilton
    (Prepared by the McMaster Research Shop for Somali Community in Hamilton, 2025-09) Raiyan, Rubab; Boachie, Nadia; Siyad, Sahra; Gravely, Evan
    The purpose of this project was to clarify the unique value of MCIS, a Somali community–driven initiative in Hamilton that engages parents—particularly mothers affected by youth gang violence—as leaders in prevention and healing. MCIS combines safe spaces for grieving and mobilization with family engagement, awareness campaigns, law enforcement collaboration and practical support such as safety planning and court accompaniment. To situate its novelty, this report reviewed evidence on the causes of youth gang involvement, synthesized best practices and interventions, and assessed evidence of program impacts through a literature review of systematic reviews and an environmental scan of 14 relevant programs across 3 cities in Ontario.
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    Electric Field-Dependent Charge Injection In Thermal Storage Systems
    (2025) Ghorbanpour Arani, Amirabbas
    The present study aims to investigate the effect of different charge injection functions on electrohydrodynamic-driven flows within a latent heat thermal storage system (LHTSS), focusing on three specific injection models: the Heaviside step function, Schottky, and autonomous injection. Previous research predominantly relied on the autonomous charge injection, which oversimplifies the boundary condition and neglects the influence of the electric field, resulting in space charge density distribution on the boundary and within the medium that does not accurately mimic the realistic charge injection phenomena. This study utilizes the lattice Boltzmann method (LBM) to simulate the behavior of paraffin wax, a phase change material (PCM), in an LHTSS under both autonomous and non-autonomous charge injection. Initially, the solid PCM begins melting due to thermal conduction from the hot top wall, after which electro-convection generated by charge injection from a central circular electrode in the LHTSS enhances the heat transfer rate. An LBM solver was employed to solve governing equations, which was verified against multiple experimental and numerical benchmarks. Current-voltage curves presented by Hassan and Cotton [1] were used in this study. The electrode in the simulation injects charges under 6 kV, and charges are collected by two flat electrodes at the top and bottom of the computational domain. The heat transfer coefficient, liquid fraction over time, and space charge density pattern at the boundary and within the domain were plotted for each charge injection function. The results for Schottky and Heaviside step functions of injection are very close but differ from autonomous injection with the maximum deviation of 30%, despite all cases having the same current. Moreover, higher material permittivity results in a significant divergence between autonomous and non-autonomous injection behaviors.
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    CONDITIONING AND PERCEPTION: THE MCCOLLOUGH EFFECT AND THE INDIRECT MCCOLLOUGH EFFECT
    (1994-02) Thomas Evan Eissenberg
    According to a conditioning analysis ofthe orientation-contingent colour aftereffect (McCollough effect, ME), orientation stimuli (grids) become associated with colour. Challenges to this interpretation include the suggestion that specific patterned stimuli are required to elicit the effect, that the effect is not influenced by manipulations ofthe grid colour correlation, and that some colour aftereffects appear to be elicited by stimuli that are never paired with colour (i.e. the indirect ME). The present results indicate: (a) nonpattemed stimuli — the lightness of a frame surrounding a coloured area — can contingently elicit colour aftereffects; (b) this frame lightness contingent-colour aftereffect can be used to demonstrate that correlational manipulations affect the ME; and (c) that the indirect ME is elicited by form and frame stimuli that have been previously paired with colour. Thus the present results support a conditioning analysis of both the ME and the indirect ME.