The Gender Agenda: Transphobia and the Perceived Erasure of Women

The aim of this chapter is to contribute to the discussion about gender politics which focuses on women's oppression and trans liberation. It examines the claim by some that acknowledging transwomen would lead to the erasure of woman as a unique social category. Because transgender and gender fluidity are not new issues, this chapter looks at firstly, how concepts such as cis, transgender, gender fluidity, non-binary and gender dysphoria have emerged in our vocabulary. The second part of the chapter concerns Judith Butler's work Gender Trouble which uses concepts such as performativity and examines whether they are useful in an analysis of gender / transgender issues and erasure of women. Butler argues that gender as a set of binary categories is outdated and interrogates the social constructionist view of gender to move towards the possibility of agency and transformation. This is followed by a discussion on UK policy and legislation which can serve to make trans people visible or invisible and how this is vulnerable to pressure from outside government. The chapter also discusses the controversy surrounding trans exclusionary radical feminist thought regarding who can claim to be a woman and the perceived erasure of women. It includes the voices of feminist thinkers who have commented that there are many ways of being female and male, with trans people widening the spectrum of gender expression which includes the global south

Work-life Balance in Architecture

This book examines work-life balance in architecture to enhance the lives and wellbeing of architects. It seeks to improve the work lives of architects of diverse demographics who do not fit, or want to replicate, the traditional white-male architect lifestyle of working a 24-7 work life. It is written to support changing work life for an assorted range of architectural students, educators and practitioners of different gender, race/ethnicity, class, and age to enable them to sustain and flourish in their professional life by offering their design and practice voice to enhance a built environment for all

Troubling French Feminist Diplomacy with the National Context

Feminist Foreign Policy is increasingly a strategic tool for states to (re)brand themselves as ‘feminist’ actors and norm-setters on the international stage. In the FFP story, states claim the intellectual foundation of feminism and construct themselves as bastions of gender equality. Yet, by imagining feminism and gender equality to be ‘homed’ in these states, FFP obscures real and potential gendered tensions that occur at the domestic level. This chapter illustrates this problem with ‘French feminist diplomacy’, a priority in Macron’s presidency since 2018, and draws on a narrative conceptual framework to trouble the narrative that France is entirely and unequivocally a feminist state. I focus on four domestic issues which reveal France’s internal struggles with gender and feminism: the ‘modèle Républicain’, the democratisation of sexual politics, the racialisation of gender equality, and the rise of (state-sponsored) anti-genderism since the 2000s. By shedding light on a complex politics of gender in the French national context, this chapter constitutes a contribution to postcolonial scholarship on Feminist Foreign Policy, a growing body of literature that challenges the idea that feminism and gender equality belongs to the Global North

Combined effect of the magnetic field, orientation, and filling ratio on cylindrical pulsating heat pipe using distilled water and distilled water/Fe3O4 nanofluid

To investigate the effect of the magnetic field, a pulsating heat pipe was made in the shape of a cylinder and Fe3O4 nanoparticles (%0.1 wt) were used with the base fluid of distilled water as the working fluid. (Tetramethyl ammonium hydroxide) TMAH surfactant was used as a stabilizer. To investigate the effect of gravity on the performance of the pipe, the device was tested at different angles from zero to 90 degrees. In this research, the effect of different variables, including the type of working fluid (distilled water vs. nanofluid), filling ratio, slope, and amount of heat input to the evaporator (30–300 W), in two different states, once without the influence of the magnetic field and once again with the application of a magnetic field was investigated. The results of the tests showed that the performance of the device at 50 % filling ratio is better than 60 % filling ratio. The use of nanoparticles improved the performance of the device. Inclining the device increases the thermal resistance so that the device performs poorly in the horizontal mode in all modes except when it is under the influence of a magnetic field. The use of nanofluid, as well as the application of a magnetic field, makes the start-up time of the device decrease by 37 % and 30 %, respectively, compared to distilled water. The temperature of the start of fluctuations also decreases by 24 % and 32 %, respectively

A wearable sensor and framework for accurate remote monitoring of human motion

Remote monitoring and evaluation of human motion during daily life require accurate extraction of kinematic quantities of body segments. Current approaches use inertial sensors that require numerical time differentiation to access the angular acceleration vector, a mathematical operation that greatly increases noise in the acceleration value. Here we introduce a wearable sensor that utilises a spatially defined cluster of inertial measurement units on a rigid base for directly measuring the angular acceleration vector. For this reason, we used computational modelling and experimental data to demonstrate that our new sensor configuration improves the accuracy of tracking angular acceleration vectors. We confirmed the feasibility of tracking human movement by automatic assessment of experimental fall initiation and balance recovery responses. The sensor therefore presents an opportunity to pioneer reliable assessment of human movement and balance in daily life

Constrained estimation of intracranial aneurysm surface deformation using 4D-CTA

Background and objective Intracranial aneurysms are relatively common life-threatening diseases, and assessing aneurysm rupture risk and identifying the associated risk factors is essential. Parameters such as the Oscillatory Shear Index, Pressure Loss Coefficient, and Wall Shear Stress are reliable indicators of intracranial aneurysm development and rupture risk, but aneurysm surface irregular pulsation has also received attention in aneurysm rupture risk assessment. Methods The present paper proposed a new approach to estimate aneurysm surface deformation. This method transforms the estimation of aneurysm surface deformation into a constrained optimization problem, which minimizes the error between the displacement estimated by the model and the sparse data point displacements from the four-dimensional CT angiography (4D-CTA) imaging data. Results The effect of the number of sparse data points on the results has been discussed in both simulation and experimental results, and it shows that the proposed method can accurately estimate the surface deformation of intracranial aneurysms when using sufficient sparse data points. Conclusions Due to a potential association between aneurysm rupture and surface irregular pulsation, the estimation of aneurysm surface deformation is needed. This paper proposed a method based on 4D-CTA imaging data, offering a novel solution for the estimation of intracranial aneurysm surface deformation

A three-wave longitudinal study on the underlying metacognitive mechanism between depression and Internet gaming disorder

AbstractBackground and aims: Internet Gaming Disorder (IGD) and depression have negative consequences on individuals' mental health, but their relationships are complex. This three-wave longitudinal study aimed to detect the metacognitive mechanisms underlying the association between IGD tendency and depression based on the self-regulatory executive function model. Methods: A total of 1,243 Chinese undergraduate student gamers (57% female, M = 19.77, SD = 1.29) were recruited at the baseline survey (Wave 1 [W1]), with 622 and 574 of them taking part in the two follow-up surveys (Wave 2 [W2] at 6 and Wave 3 [W3] at 12 months later), respectively. Results: The three-wave path model demonstrated, after controlling for the autoregressive effect of each variable, that depression consistently predicted IGD tendency but not vice versa, while negative but not positive metacognitions about online gaming (MOG) significantly predicted both depression and IGD tendency. Moreover, two statistically significant mediation paths: (i) negative MOG [W1] → depression [W2] → IGD tendency [W3]; and (ii) depression [W1] → negative MOG [W2] → IGD tendency [W3] were identified. Discussion and conclusions: These findings extend the understanding of the associations among depression, IGD tendency, and MOG, highlighting how negative MOG has a stronger prospective effect than positive MOG on depression and IGD tendency, and also reveal the mutual mediation effects of depression and negative MOG on IGD tendency. Integrated programmes with both emotional regulation training and Metacognitive Therapy are recommended for IGD treatment

Theoretical and experimental investigations on conformal polishing of microstructured surfaces

Microstructured surfaces play a pivotal role in various fields, notably in lighting, diffuser devices, and imaging systems. The performance of these components is intricately related to the accuracy of their shapes and the quality of their surfaces. Although current precision machining technologies are capable of achieving conformal shapes, the post-machining surface quality often remains uncertain. To appropriately address this challenge, this paper introduces a novel conformal polishing methodology, specifically designed to enhance the surface quality of microstructured surfaces while maintaining their shape accuracy. As part of the investigations, specialized tools, namely the damping tool and profiling damping tool, are methodically developed for polishing rectangular and cylindrical surfaces. A shape evolution model is established based on the simulation of individual microstructures, incorporating the concept of finite-slip on the microstructured surface. The findings reveal that principal stresses and velocities experience abrupt variations at the convex and concave corners of rectangular surfaces as well as at the ends of cylindrical surfaces. The numerically predicted surface shape errors after polishing demonstrate reasonably good agreement with experimental results such that their discrepancies are less than 1 μm. Additionally, this method is able to successfully eradicate pre-machining imperfections such as residual tool marks and burrs on the microstructured surfaces. The arithmetic roughness (Ra) of the rectangular surface is measured to be an impressively low 0.4 nm, whereas the cylindrical surface exhibits Ra = 6.2 nm. These results clearly emphasize the effectiveness of the conformal polishing method in achieving high-quality surface finishes

Biomechanics in anthropology

Biomechanics is the set of tools that explain organismal movement and mechanical behavior and links the organism to the physicality of the world. As such, biomechanics can relate behaviors and culture to the physicality of the organism. Scale is critical to biomechanical analyses, as the constitutive equations that matter differ depending on the scale of the question. Within anthropology, biomechanics has had a wide range of applications, from understanding how we and other primates evolved to understanding the effects of technologies, such as the atlatl, and the relationship between identity, society, culture, and medical interventions, such as prosthetics. Like any other model, there is great utility in biomechanical models, but models should be used primarily for hypothesis testing and not data generation except in the rare case where models can be robustly validated. The application of biomechanics within anthropology has been extensive, and holds great potential for the future