Fiber association and network formation in PLA/lignocellulosic fiber composites.

PLA composites were prepared in an internal mixer with a lignocellulosic fiber having relatively large aspect ratio. Fiber content changed between 0 and 60 vol% and the homogenized material was compression molded to 1 mm thick plates. The composites showed anomalous behavior above certain fiber content. Their modulus and especially their strength decreased drastically and modeling also proved the loss of reinforcement at large fiber contents. Micromechanical testing showed that the mechanism of deformation and failure changes at a critical fiber content. Microscopic analysis indi-cated the formation of a network purely from geometrical reasons. The inherent strength of the network is very small because of the weak forces acting among the fibers. This weak inherent strength makes the structure of the composites very sensitive to pro-cessing conditions, and decreases strength, reproducibility as well as reliability

Debating the urban dimension of territorial cohesion

The Territorial Cohesion goal was only included in the EU Treaty by 2009, with a view to promote a more balanced and harmonious European territory. One year earlier (2008), the European Commission (EC) published the ‘Green Paper on Territorial Cohesion—Turning territorial diversity into strength’. Neither one, nor the other, clearly defines the meaning of the Territorial Cohesion concept. The later, however, proposes three main policy responses towards more balanced and harmonious development: (i) Concentration: overcoming differences in density; (ii) Connecting territories: overcoming distance; and (iii) Cooperation: overcoming division. Although not explicitly, this document identifies several ‘urban questions’ to be dealt when promoting territorial cohesive policies: avoiding diseconomies of very large agglomerations and urban sprawl processes, combating urban decay and social exclusion, avoiding excessive concentrations of growth, promoting access to integrated transport systems and creating metropolitan bodies. In this light, this chapter proposes to debate the importance of the urban dimension to achieve the goal of territorial cohesion at several territorial levels.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

Re-conceptualising Territorial Cohesion Through the Prism of Spatial Justice : Critical Perspectives on Academic and Policy Discourses

Peer reviewe

Introduction: A handbook on territorial impact assessment (TIA)

Territorial Impact Assessment (TIA) is a relatively ‘new kid on the block’ of policy evaluation. Resting upon the holistic notion of territory, which encompasses multiple analytic dimensions (economy, society, environment, governance, spatial planning), TIA is the most complex, yet with the policy evaluation procedure with the largest potential to assess projects, programmes and policies. Indeed, policy evaluation procedures are now deeply rooted in sub-national, national and transnational territorial development strategies and processes. However, unlike the plethora of published books on Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) and other Impact Assessment (IA) methodologies, presently no TIA handbook has been published by any major international publisher. As such, this one intends to add a substantial contribution to available literature by presenting to the interested reader the most relevant TIA methodologies that have been produced so far. Furthermore, all the chapters, written by the authors of each TIA methodology presented, provide a detailed, updated and scientifically accurate explanation of their particular purpose and methodological operation. In the end, the reader is presented with a complete set of TIA methodologies to select from based on their advantages/disadvantages for a particular case-study. For a better understanding of how all the presented TIA methodologies work, concrete examples are presented in each chapter.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

Anti-Nirvana: crime, culture and instrumentalism in the age of insecurity

‘Anti-Nirvana’ explores the relationship between consumer culture, media and criminal motivations. It has appeared consistently on the list of the top-ten most-read articles in this award-winning international journal, and it mounts a serious neo-Freudian challenge to the predominant naturalistic notion of ‘resistance’ at the heart of liberal criminology and media studies. It is also cited in the Oxford Handbook of Criminology and other criminology texts as a persuasive argument in support of the theory that criminality amongst young people is strongly linked to the acquisitive values of consumerism and the images of possessive individualism that dominate mass media

PLA/WOOD BIOCOMPOSITES: IMPROVING COMPOSITE STRENGTH BY CHEMICAL TREATMENT OF THE FIBERS

A resol type phenolic resin was prepared for the impregnation of wood particles used for the reinforcement of PLA. A preliminary study showed that the resin penetrates wood with rates depending on the concentration of the solution and on temperature. Treatment with a solution of 1 wt% resin resulted in a considerable increase of composite strength and decrease of water absorption. Composite strength improved as a result of increased inherent strength of the wood, but interfacial adhesion might be modified as well. When wood was treated with resin solutions of larger concentrations, the strength of the composites decreased, first slightly, then drastically to a very small value. A larger amount of resin results in a thick coating on wood with inferior mechanical properties. At large resin contents the mechanism of deformation changes; the thick coating breaks very easily leading to the catastrophic failure of the composites at very small loads

Jekyll and Hyde: men's constructions of feminism and feminists

Research and commentary on men's responses to feminism has demonstrated the range of ways in which men have mobilised both against and for feminist principles. This paper argues that further analyses of men's responses require a sophisticated theory of discourse acknowledging the fragmented and contradictory nature of representation. A corpus of men's talk on feminism and feminists was studied to identify the pervasive patterns in men's accounting and regularities in rhetorical organisation. Material from two samples of men was included: a sample of white middle-class 17-18 year old school students and a sample of 60 interviews with a more diverse sample of older men aged 20 to 64. Two interpretative repertoires of feminism and feminists were identified. These set up a 'Jekyll and Hyde' binary and positioned feminism along with feminists very differently as reasonable versus extreme and monstrous. Both repertoires tended to be deployed together and the paper explores the ideological and interactional consequences of typical deployments along with the identity work accomplished by the men as they positioned themselves in relation to these

Biocomposite from polylactic acid and lignocellulosic fibers: structure-property correlations

ABSTRACT PLA biocomposites were prepared using three corncob fractions and a wood fiber as reference. The composites were characterized by tensile testing, scanning electron (SEM) and polarization optical (POM) microscopy. Micromechanical deformation processes were followed by acoustic emission measurements. The different strength of the components was proved by direct measurements. Two consecutive micromechanical deformation processes were detected in composites containing the heavy fraction of corncob, which were assigned to the fracture of soft and hard particles, respectively. The fracture of soft particles does not result in the failure of the composites that is initi-ated either by the fracture of hard particles or by matrix cracking. Very large particles debond easily from the matrix resulting in catastrophic failure at very low stresses. At sufficiently large shear stresses large particles break easily during compounding, thus reinforcement depending on interfacial adhesion was practically the same in all composites irrespectively of initial fiber characteristics

Living for the weekend: youth identities in northeast England

Consumption and consumerism are now accepted as key contexts for the construction of youth identities in de-industrialized Britain. This article uses empirical evidence from interviews with young people to suggest that claims of `new community' are overstated, traditional forms of friendship are receding, and increasingly atomized and instrumental youth identities are now being culturally constituted and reproduced by the pressures and anxieties created by enforced adaptation to consumer capitalism. Analysis of the data opens up the possibility of a critical rather than a celebratory exploration of the wider theoretical implications of this process

Sustainable product design education: current practice

Current production and consumption patterns are unsustainable, causing irreversible damage to the environment and human health and well-being. Designers play a vital role in resolving this problem their decisions affect product manufacturing, distribution, use, and disposal and hence they must be aware of the positive and negative impacts of their design deci-sions. Sustainable product design education is key to developing the knowl-edge, skills, and responsibility required for future generations of product designers and their educators to make informed and responsible decisions within their practice, and also enhance the social and environmental per-formance of their creations and effectively communicate the value of such decisions within a commercial context. In this article, we present insights and challenges in contemporary sustainable product design education in higher education. We document the experiences of six academics involved in teaching and researching sustainable product design in the United Kingdom, Australia, Denmark, the Netherlands, and the United States. We hope to provide a useful reference for academics seeking to adopt sustainable product design practices in their existing programs, develop new sustainable product design education programs, or reflect on their own existing product design practice