A study of composition, abundance, and fatty acid profiles of zooplankton in Albemarle Sound and Chowan River, North Carolina during spring and early summer

In the Albemarle Sound and Chowan River, North Carolina, river herring (alewife and blueback herring) once comprised a commercially important fishery; however, this fishery has since collapsed and a moratorium on river herring harvest is currently in place. River herring stocks have not recovered despite this moratorium. These rivers are critical nursery habitat for larval river herring and one potential reason for the lack of river herring recovery may be related to poor water quality that could affect the zooplankton nutrition and therefore larval river herring nutrition. The goal of this thesis was to examine the species composition, abundance, and nutritional quality of zooplankton, measured using fatty acid profiles, to determine if the zooplankton prey available to larval river herring are of sufficient quality to support the nutritional needs of larval fish.  In the western Albemarle Sound and Chowan River, the zooplankton fatty acid profiles and community structure changed over time and space. In April, the zooplankton composition for 200 µm mesh size was comprised of freshwater species, mainly Cyclopoids and Bosmina spp. The most noticeable change in the zooplankton species composition occurred during the month of May when precipitation was very low. This resulted in a salt intrusion that reached midway up on the Chowan River. The salt intrusion caused a decline in the freshwater species, and an increase in brackish water species in the middle to lower estuary. The upper river sites were dominated by Leptodora spp., a freshwater, predatory zooplankter. This was followed by a wet June, which led to an influx of freshwater, returning the salinity to zero. The zooplankton species composition then returned to one dominated by freshwater species as an increase in water flow moved this community down river, resulting in higher overall abundances. The results demonstrated that there are two distinct size classes of prey for larval river herring, as evidenced by the distinct communities represented by the two mesh sizes. The rotifers, a small bodied zooplankton that have high reproductive rates, were abundant in the 60 µm mesh size samples. In contrast, the 200 µm mesh size samples showed variability in the dominant species, suggesting that a wide range of potential prey for larger herring larvae exists.  The May saltwater intrusion also changed the fatty acid profiles of the zooplankton. The amount of DHA in the system increased due to the higher abundance of a dominant brackish water copepod species, Acartia spp. Overall, zooplankton fatty acid profiles during the salinity increase in May were higher in PUFAs, DHA and EPA. Salinity played the most important role in structuring the zooplankton community which, in turn, explained the fatty acid profiles seen. This change in the overall fatty acid composition over the spring period suggests that larval river herring may experience a range of prey items that vary considerably in fatty acid composition. Therefore, the fatty acid profiles of the zooplankton prey field likely have considerable influence over the growth and development of larval river herring. At first feeding, larval river herring consume rotifers and smaller bodied cladoceran which have lower PUFAs compared to larger bodied zooplankton. This study suggests that adequate prey abundance and prey types exist for larval river herring; however, more work is needed to determine the influence of the fatty acid profiles of the zooplankton community on larval herring growth and survival.  M.S

Comparison of the vocabularies of the Gregg shorthand dictionary and Horn-Peterson's basic vocabulary of business letters

This study is a comparative analysis of the vocabularies of Horn and Peterson's The Basic Vocabulary of Business Letters1 and the Gregg Shorthand Dictionary.2 Both books purport to present a list of words most frequently encountered by stenographers and students of shorthand. The, Basic Vocabulary of Business Letters, published "in answer to repeated requests for data on the words appearing most frequently in business letters,"3 is a frequency list specific to business writing. Although the book carries the copyright date of 1943, the vocabulary was compiled much earlier. The listings constitute a part of the data used in the preparation of the 10,000 words making up the ranked frequency list compiled by Ernest Horn and staff and published in 1926 under the title of A Basic Writing Vocabulary: 10,000 Words Lost Commonly Used in Writing. The introduction to that publication gives credit to Miss Cora Crowder for the contribution of her Master's study at the University of Minnesota concerning words found in business writing. With additional data from supplementary sources, the complete listing represents twenty-six classes of business, as follows 1. Miscellaneous 2. Florists 3. Automobile manufacturers and sales companie

Pathology of amoebic gill disease in Atlantic Salmon (Salmo salar L.)

Although AGD has affected the Tasmanian salmonid industry for nearly 20 years, several fundamental questions regarding the pathology of this condition remain unanswered. This thesis elucidates the requirements for AGD outbreaks and how AGD progresses within the commercial culture environment. Atlantic salmon Salmo salar L. gills, affected with amoebic gill disease, were analysed by routine histology to identify lesion morphology and distribution patterns. Interlamellar cyst (or vesicle) function was hypothesised as a host defence mechanism leading to entrapment of trophozoites and clearance from hyperplastic tissues by host cellular processes. The degree of conformity between clinical signs and histological lesions was investigated in commercially reared Atlantic salmon. Micro-stereoscopic analysis showed that grossly affected tissue regions correspond to areas of hyperplastic lamellae fusion generally in association with attached amoebae. Agreement between gross signs of AGD and histopathological diagnosis, as indicated by Kappa, was moderate to good (0.52 — 0.74). Stage of disease development, lesions derived from other pathogens, assessor interpretation / experience, sampling methods, histological technique and/or experience all featured as potential factors leading to individual case disagreement. The causal mechanisms for AGD lesion development and the primary role of Neoparamoeba sp. were investigated. AGD only occurred when fish were exposed to viable trophozoites. A progressive host response and significant increases (P<0.001) in the numbers of attached amoebae was apparent over the 48 h duration. Attachment of Neoparamoeba sp. to damaged gill filaments was significantly lower than upon damaged filaments (P<0.05) by 48 h post exposure. Histopathological observations of AGD from smolts, sampled weekly, following transfer to estuarine/marine sites were investigated. Results suggest that AGD progression was linked to retraction of the estuarine halocline and increases in water temperature. The host response to gill infection with Neoparamoeba sp. is characterized by a focal fortification strategy concurrent with a migration of irnmunoregulatory cells to lesion affected regions. Subsequently, the progression of re-infection (post-treatment) was investigated using a similar sequential investigation. Halocline cessation and increased water temperature appeared to drive the rapid onset of initial infection prior to bathing. Freshwater bathing cleared lesions of attached trophozoites and associated cellular debris. During the post-bath period, non AGD lesions including haemorrhage, necrosis and regenerative hyperplasia were occasionally observed though no evidence of secondary colonization of these lesions by Neoparamoeba sp. was noted. We conclude that pathogenesis, during the inter bath period, was identical to initial infection although the source of re-infection remains to be established. Together, these data have addressed the need for an improved understanding of AGD associated pathology during commercial culture of Atlantic salmon in Tasmania primarily by defining an improved pathological model of AGD. This work forms the basis for not only differential diagnosis per se but also a foundation and/or reference for future research dependent upon histopathological outcomes as an evaluative endpoint

"Unspoken sermons": Christian preaching in British fiction, 1979-2004

Declining church attendance in pluralist Britain indicates that the Christian sermon, once a vibrant literary genre, has become an increasingly unfamiliar form to most readers and writers of fiction. Yet, as this thesis will argue, fictional sermons are still successfully used by novelists. The thesis examines sermons in three genres, and representing three Christian traditions, the Roman Catholic, Anglican and Free Church. The genres discussed are chronicles, as represented by Antonia Byatt and David Lodge, historical novels written by Geraldine Brooks and Jane Rogers and fiction by John Murray and Michael Arditti sited in specific religious, spiritual or ecclesiastical environments. The thesis develops an analytical toolkit, based mainly on rhetorical narratology and cognitive poetics, to examine the current status of fictional sermons. Five case studies follow. The first discusses issues of authority and inspiration in texts, preachers and preaching. The second considers how novelists communicate religious experience, particularly experiences of epiphany and conversion. The third describes contemporary novels' portraits of the troubled preacher. The fourth analyses the language used by novelists in their sermons and the fifth studies how sermons construct discourse communities and religious community. The thesis concludes with a discussion of the significance of memory, imagination and embodiment as agents by which readers - and hearers of actual sermons - are enabled to respond to suasory speech and engage with its proposed alternative world. The thesis is intended as a contribution to the study of religion and literature, to discourse analysis, to homiletical theory and practice and to criticism of contemporary literature

Physics division annual report 2005.

This report highlights the research performed in 2005 in the Physics Division of Argonne National Laboratory. The Division's programs include operation of ATLAS as a national user facility, nuclear structure and reaction research, nuclear theory, medium energy nuclear research and accelerator research and development. The mission of Nuclear Physics is to understand the origin, evolution and structure of baryonic matter in the universe--the matter that makes up stars, planets and human life itself. The Division's research focuses on innovative new ways to address this mission and 2005 was a year of great progress. One of the most exciting developments is the initiation of the Californium Rare Ion Breeder Upgrade, CARIBU. By combining a Cf-252 fission source, the gas catcher technology developed for rare isotope beams, a high-resolution isobar separator, and charge breeding ECR technology, CARIBU will make hundreds of new neutron-rich isotope beams available for research. The cover illustration shows the anticipated intensities of low-energy beams that become available for low-energy experiments and for injection into ATLAS for reacceleration. CARIBU will be completed in early 2009 and provide us with considerable experience in many of the technologies developed for a future high intensity exotic beam facility. Notable results in research at ATLAS include a measurement of the isomeric states in {sup 252}No that helps pin down the single particle structure expected for superheavy elements, and a new low-background measurement of {sup 16}N beta-decay to determine the {sup 12}C({alpha},{gamma}){sup 16}O reaction rate that is so important in astrophysical environments. Precise mass measurements shed new light on the unitarity of the quark weak-mixing matrix in the search for physics beyond the standard model. ATLAS operated for 4686 hours of research in FY2005 while achieving 95% efficiency of beam delivery for experiments. In Medium-Energy Physics, radium isotopes were trapped in an atom trap for the first time, a major milestone in an innovative search for the violation of time-reversal symmetry. New results from HERMES establish that strange quarks carry little of the spin of the proton and precise results have been obtained at JLAB on the changes in quark distributions in light nuclei. New theoretical results reveal that the nature of the surfaces of strange quark stars. Green's function Monte Carlo techniques have been extended to scattering problems and show great promise for the accurate calculation, from first principles, of important astrophysical reactions. Flame propagation in type 1A supernova has been simulated, a numerical process that requires considering length scales that vary by factors of eight to twelve orders of magnitude. Argonne continues to lead in the development and exploitation of the new technical concepts that will truly make an advanced exotic beam facility, in the words of NSAC, 'the world-leading facility for research in nuclear structure and nuclear astrophysics'. Our science and our technology continue to point the way to this major advance. It is a tremendously exciting time in science for these new capabilities hold the keys to unlocking important secrets of nature. The great progress that has been made in meeting the exciting intellectual challenges of modern nuclear physics reflects the talents and dedication of the Physics Division staff and the visitors, guests and students who bring so much to the research

Diseases of the Head

"Diseases of the Head is an anthology of essays from contemporary philosophers, artists, and writers working at the crossroads of speculative philosophy and speculative horror. At once a compendium of multivocal endeavors, a breviary of supposedly illicit ponderings, and a travelogue of philosophical exploration, this collection centers itself on the place at which philosophy and horror meet. Employing rigorous analysis, incisive experimentation, and novel invention, this anthology asks about the use that speculation can make of horror and horror of speculation, about whether philosophy is fictional or fiction philosophical, and about the relationship between horror, the exigencies of our world and time, and the future developments that may await us in philosophy itself. From philosophers working on horrific themes, to horror writers influenced by heresies in the wake of post-Kantianism, to artists engaged in projects that address monstrosity and alienation, Diseases of the Head aims at nothing less than a speculative coup d'état. Refusing both total negation and absolute affirmation, refusing to deny everything or account for everything, refusing the posture of critique and the posture of all-encompassing unification, this collection of essays aims at exposition and construction, analysis and creation – it desires to fight for some thing, but not everything, and not nothing. And it desires, most of all, to speak from the position of its own insufficiency, its own partiality, its own under-determinacy, which is always indicative of the practice of thinking, of speculation. Considering themes of anonymity, otherness and alterity, the gothic, extinction and the world without us, the end times, the apocalypse, the ancient and the world before us, and the uncanny or unheimlich, among other motifs, this anthology seeks to articulate the cutting edge which can be found at the intersection of speculative philosophy and speculative horror.

Amrit Singh and the Birmingham Quean: fictions, fakes and forgeries in a vernacular counterculture

For a literary critic preparing a scholarly edition of a text like this within an epistème that disparages the theory underpinning it for being tainted with the gestural idealism of 1968 and the neon-glare of 1980s high postmodernism, the crucial question is how to reconcile the commitment to authenticity ingrained in historicist textual studies (perhaps the critic’s only viable disciplinary inheritance) with the author’s implicit antagonism to any such quietist approach. The encounter inevitably becomes a battle of wills. In the course of the current project, this theoretical struggle escalates exponentially as doubts concerning the authenticity (and indeed the existence) of both writer and manuscript are multiplied. If a thesis can be retrospectively extrapolated from this project, it is the argument that fiction is demonstrably a tractable forum for research in the Arts and Social Sciences: all the more tractable for its anti-authenticity. The critic’s loss is the novelist’s gain. Specifically, in this case, the faithful historian of late twentieth century literatures, languages and cultures can solve the key dilemma of the subject by working under the auspices of Creative Writing. Only in this way can justice be done to the most cogent intellectual trend of the posmodern period (perhaps its defining feature): one that revelled in its own pluralities, ambiguities and contradictions, and resisted all the unifying, teleological models of ‘history’ that had been implicated in the century’s terrible ‘final solutions’. In other words, only fiction can tell the history of a culture that rejects that history. If this means condoning forgery… so be it

The voice behind the curtain: Hollywood, the metamodern and the sense of loss & Dinosaurs: a novel

This thesis will reflect upon specific narrative structures, and the application of narrative devices, explored in the creation of my novel Dinosaurs. The object of this research is to examine the effects/affects of these creative choices within a critical framework using comparative texts and films that employ similar techniques or share, to my eye, similar aesthetic and thematic concerns that could be said to interrupt a habituative reading of the novel form. The central focus of this thesis will be to examine how effective I have been in creating empathy towards a misogynistic, solipsistic protagonist who has little regard for the people in his life, or society at large. As with Meursault, Walter exhibits signs of anomie that prevent him from engaging with the world in a meaningful way, and thus excuse his behaviour by a process of sophisticated self-rationalisation. As the novel progresses, there are questions surrounding Walter’s perception of reality: of who is narrating the novel and from what point of view are we experiencing the narrative. This raises questions of male identity and selfhood predominant in contextual works from the 80s and 90s within this thesis, while also examining the schizophrenic nature of certain texts. I intend to explore the effectiveness of distancing my subject as a means of creating empathy. This technique of a narrator perceived at a distance from subject to create a sense of danger can be seen in several of my comparative texts and bares exploration in terms of its application to a single individual. By examining contemporary novels and films that have experimented with various postmodern and metamodern techniques, I hope to understand how specific characteristics of such fiction negotiate the space between signifier and signified, and thus afford an opportunity for a discourse between reader and text that occupies a space outside of the narrative. I am also aware that much of my contextual fiction is based in the 90s and focuses, it seems, on the fragility of the male ego. I have therefore experimented with certain references and technologies within my novel that deliberately blur time in order to reflect similar themes that might serve to critique the male ego and highlight a lack of emotional progression within my own protagonist