The University of Edinburgh natural history class lists 1782-1800

In 1779 Revd Dr John Walker was appointed to be the University of Edinburgh’s Professor of Natural History. Because of the institutional structure of the university, he took care to keep detailed class lists from 1782 to 1800. These are extant in the University of Edinburgh’s Special Collections Department. As many of the students on the lists would go on to have a profound impact on the practice of nineteenth century natural history, I have compiled them into a table so that they can be used as a reference tool for those interested in the study of natural history in Edinburgh during the late eighteenth century. The table is arranged into columns that state the student’s name, degree, year of attendance and geographic origin. To help the reader better understand the table, I have written a brief introductory essay that addresses Walker’s organisation of the course and the types of students who attended the lectures. It also identifies the prominent role played by chemistry in Edinburgh’s natural history community and discusses the foundation of the Student Natural History Society of Edinburgh

Bernard Palissy: Early Career - Securing Patronage and Mimicking Nature in a Moment of Crisis

Early in 1562, France was experiencing a state of high religious tension between Protestants and Catholics that would precipitate the outbreak of the Religious Wars on March 1. A week before, Bernard Palissy, a Huguenot potter, wrote a letter to his Catholic patron from prison inBordeaux where he was being held on charges associated with an iconoclastic incident in his home city of Saintes. This letter would later be published as a dedication letter for the pamphlet Architecture et Ordonnance, which featured the description of a grotto commissioned by Anne de Montmorency, Palissy’s patron, seven years earlier. This thesis analyzes the pamphlet as a single document to study Palissy’s relationship to his patron and to explore the artist’s understanding of nature as revealed by the description. In analyzing the letter, Palissy’s anxieties concerning his Reformed identity become apparent as he carefully employs a strategy that dances around his Protestantism and argues that truly ingenious art transcends confessional differences. Further, the letter itself serves as an example of patron-artisan communication between two people from vastly different social classes, in which the artisan was making a request to a high noble. This gives us insights into the vertical power dynamic of the patronage system in early modern France, a relationship that was complicated by confessional differences during a period of religious tension. The proposed grotto description reveals Palissy’s inept attempt to employ the dialogue genre at this early stage of his career, suggesting his aspirations to participate in Renaissance intellectual and cultural life. Further, the description provides insights into Palissy’s understanding of art and nature, which indicates early influences from Pliny’s Natural History and an intention of creating a grotto space that echoes Virgil’s lost Golden Age. Palissy argues that ingenious art overcomes nature, specifically a nature that is disorderly, in motion, full of variety, and in a state of decay. The ingenuity that Palissy obsesses over is characterized by the artisan’s ability to capture nature so exactly that the viewer cannot distinguish between real nature and artistic creation

Geodynamic Evolution of a Forearc Rift in the Southernmost Mariana Arc

The southernmost Mariana forearc stretched to accommodate opening of the Mariana Trough backarc basin in late Neogene time, erupting basalts now exposed in the SE Mariana Forearc Rift (SEMFR) 3.7 – 2.7 Ma ago. Today, SEMFR is a broad zone of extension that formed on hydrated, forearc lithosphere and overlies the shallow subducting slab (slab depth ≤ 30 – 50 km). It comprises NW-SE trending subparallel deeps, 3 - 16 km wide, that can be traced ≥ ~ 30 km from the trench almost to the backarc spreading center, the Malaguana-Gadao Ridge (MGR). While forearcs are usually underlain by serpentinized harzburgites too cold to melt, SEMFR crust is mostly composed of Pliocene, low-K basaltic to basaltic andesite lavas that are compositionally similar to arc lavas and backarc basin (BAB) lavas, and thus defines a forearc region that recently witnessed abundant igneous activity in the form of seafloor spreading. SEMFR igneous rocks have low Na8, Ti8, and Fe8, consistent with extensive melting, at ~ 23 ± 6.6 km depth and 1239 ± 40oC, by adiabatic decompression of depleted asthenospheric mantle metasomatized by slab-derived fluids. Stretching of pre-existing forearc lithosphere allowed BAB-like mantle to flow along SEMFR and melt, forming new oceanic crust. Melts interacted with preexisting forearc lithosphere during ascent. SEMFR is no longer magmatically active and post-magmatic tectonic activity dominates the rift

The Bessemer steel works at Troy

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/32621/1/0000764.pd

A Classificação de Rochas Sedimentares Siliciclásticas Areníticas com Matriz e o Problema de Sua Nomenclatura no Brasil e em Portugal: Conceitos e Evolução

Uma das classificações mais difundidas de rochas sedimentares siliciclásticas na fração areia foi construída com base nos aspectos descritivos de arcabouço e matriz, tendo na simplicidade sua principal característica. Esta pesquisa revisou as classificações propostas por Gilbert (1954), Dott (1964), Pettijohn, Potter Siever (1972) e Gilbert (1982), os tipos de sandstones mencionados e os parâmetros nelas utilizados. A análise verificou que as propostas tiveram várias alterações, sendo que a principal mudança ocorreu em relação à quantidade de matriz, e que atualmente as rochas terrígenas da fração areia que contêm até 5% de matriz recebem o nome de “arenitos”, aquelas que possuem mais de 5 e até 50% de matriz denominam-se “wackes”, e acima desse índice estão os “lamitos arenosos”. Porém, o principal problema observado foi que essas propostas contabilizaram parte da matriz como arcabouço, tornando as classificações inexatas. Portanto, é proposto que somente seja considerado como arcabouço a fração areia (0,0625 – 2,0 mm), enquanto a matriz abranja todas as partículas menores que 0,0625 mm. Este estudo constatou que no Brasil e em Portugal, os termos relativos às rochas sedimentares siliciclásticas na fração areia não apresentam unicidade, e que a palavra “arenito” tem sido utilizada como sinônimo de sandstone, o que está em desacordo com a classificação mundialmente vigente. Além disso, a classificação mais utilizada em português emprega equivocadamente grauvaca ou grauvaque como sinônimo de wacke, apesar de serem conceitos de utilização desaconselhada tanto para a classificação como para a descrição de rochas terrígenas na fração areia há décadas. Assim, é proposta uma padronização no uso de termos para a designação de rochas sedimentares e sedimentos da fração areia em português, sendo que entre tais normas se destaca como mais significativa a adoção da expressão “rocha arenítica” como equivalente a sandstone, reservando “arenito” para a rocha sedimentar siliciclástica na fração areia que contenha no máximo 5% de matriz, como definido na classificação proposta por Gilbert (1982)

Towards the Use of Yellow Clay in Fired Bricks

This chapter deals with the study of the possibility of using yellow clay - which was only used in pottery so far- in the civil engineering field as building materials, especially in the field of fired bricks. With the aim to improve the technological properties of yellow clay based bricks, two wastes were used as secondary raw materials. The first one is a mineral waste - pyrrhotite ash - this waste was neither characterized nor valued before by any other author. While the second waste is an organic waste - cedar sawdust - which is from the artisanal sector. Clay bricks containing yellow clay and different content of wastes were prepared and tested to evaluate their technological properties: water absorption, bulk density, porosity and mechanical strength… The test results indicate that the addition of wastes to clay bricks improves their technological properties and highlights the possibility of wastes reuse in a safe and sustainable way

Synthetic Phase with the Structure of Apatite

The previous chapters were dedicated to description of structure and properties of minerals from supergroup of apatite and introduction of method for identification and investigation of properties of phosphate minerals. The first synthesis of apatite was performed by Daubrée by passing the PCl3 vapor over red-hot lime. The fourth chapter of this book introduces techniques for the preparation of synthetic analogs of apatite minerals including solid-state synthesis, wet chemical methods, hydrothermal synthesis as well as methods for preparation of single crystals. Chapter continues with description of structure and properties of synthetic compounds of apatite type and ends with incorporation of 3d-metal ions into the hexagonal channel of apatite

Polypropylene fibers

One of the latest members of the rapidly growing therrnoplastic polymer family which appears capable of successfully competing with the currently saturated textile and chemical markets is polypropylene fiber. The objectives of this Thesis were to: (1) examine the effects of polymer characteristics and fiber processing conditions on the properties of polypropylene fibers, and (2) correlate all existing information on the physical, chemical, and mechanical properties of polypropylene fibers and comparatively evaluate this material with other fibers, natural and synthetic. Polypropylene is the first member of a new group of polymers prepared by a mechanism defined as stereospecific polymerization. From a simple monomer, this technique produces a polypropylene with an exceptionally uniform molecular structure which imparts outstanding engineering properties into the polymer. Such structural regularity can be varied to tailor the properties of the polymer to best satisfy a given requirement. The low costs of propylene monomer and the polymerization process give polypropylene a cost advantage over similar products. In addition, polypropylene fibers, because of their structural uniqueness, exhibit outstanding physical properties relative to other commercial fibers. The density of polypropylene is the lowest of any fiber available; super-tenacity polypropylene fibers have been prepared that exceed the strength of all commercial fibers - including the much more expensive nylons. Polypropylene fibers also excel in other important physical properties, such as toughness, resilience, permeability, chemical resistance, and abrasion resistance. The major problem with regard to widespread use of polypropylene is limited dyeability, a characteristic which stems from the inherent inertness of the polypropylene structure to permeants. However, in view of the major research effort devoted to this problem, it is reasonable to expect that an answer is forthcoming. In summary the relative low polymer cost and outstanding properties of polypropylene fibers rank this material as one of the important fibers of the future