Landscaping Hispaniola Moreau de Saint-Méry's border politics

This article focuses on Médéric Louis Élie Moreau de Saint-Méry's <i>Description Topographique et Politique de la partie espagnole de l'Isle Saint-Domingue </i>(1796) and his <i>Description Topographique, Physique, Civile, Politique et Historique de la partie française de l'Isle Saint-Domingue </i> (1797). The Descriptions were both written before the beginning of the French Revolution and the 1791 slave revolt in Saint Domingue but were published when the colonial frontier had been abolished (at least de jure if not de facto) by the 1795 Peace of Basle. Overall, the article argues that the two Descriptions are ultimately committed to the (re)inscription of the colonial frontier but intriguingly oscillate between its erasure and its reinforcement. It begins by focusing on Saint-Méry's territorial projections and appropriative landscaping of the Spanish colony; it highlights the important role played by the border in the racial politics of Hispaniola and then revisits Saint-Mery's border politics on the island in the light of the author's conviction that France should reannex Louisiana, given to Spain in 1762

Researching mobile learning: overview, September 2006 to September 2008

This is the summary of the report, which brought together the findings from the third phase of a two-year development and research project that focused on the impact of one-to-one personal ownership of mobile devices. Two areas emerged from the analysis as important in relation to impact, namely students' use of and attitudes to their mobile devices and the professional development of teachers

Optical control and switching of excitation transfer in nano-arrays

The possibility of influencing resonance energy transfer through the input of off-resonant pulses of laser radiation is the subject of recent research. Attention is now focused on systems in which resonance energy transfer is designedly precluded by geometric configuration. Here, through an optically nonlinear mechanism - optically controlled resonance energy transfer - the throughput of non-resonant pulses can facilitate energy transfer that is, in their absence, completely forbidden. The system thus functions as an optical buffer, with excitation throughput switched on by the secondary beam. For applications, a system based on two parallel nano-arrays is envisaged. This paper will establish and discuss the principles - those that can be exploited to enhance switching characteristics and efficiency, and others (such as off-axis excitation transfer) that may represent cross-talk limitations. Principles to be explored in detail are the interplay between geometric features, including the array architecture and repeat distance (lattice constant), the array spacing and translational symmetry, the orientations of the transition dipoles, and the magnitude of the relevant components of the nonlinear response tensors. The aim is, through a determination of key parameters, to inform a program of optimization that can deliver specific criteria for realizing the most efficient systems for implementation