Apprenticeship: a strategy for growth.

Referring to issues raised by recent reforms and future expansion of apprenticeship, this report reveals the consequences serious skills shortages have on the economy as a whole. It calls for radical improvements to the provision of apprenticeship training in Britain in order to close the skills gap and bring Britain in to line with other countries.

Large employers and apprenticeship training in Britain

We consider two aspects of the link between apprenticeship and large employers in Britain: the contributions of apprenticeship to employers supplies of intermediate skills and of employers to the Advanced Apprenticeship programme. Evidence is taken from interviews with managers in twenty-nine organisations. We find that apprenticeship does function outside Advanced Apprenticeship, primarily because of trainee ineligibility. Employers use of apprenticeship depends on its cost-effectiveness relative to recruitment and upgrade training within HRM practice. Some employers value apprenticeship as a source of long-term employment and career progression. The intensity of training depends on ownership attributes, with family firms operating larger programmes. Employers participate in Advanced Apprenticeship, in terms of contractual role and programme delivery, in diverse ways. The implications of their choices for training quality are not unambiguous. -- In dem Papier werden zwei Aspekte zum Zusammenhang von betrieblichen Ausbildungen und Großunternehmen in Großbritannien analysiert: Einmal der Beitrag betrieblicher Erstausbildungen zur Bereitstellung von Facharbeiter-Qualifikationen und zum anderen der Beitrag der Arbeitgeber für das Programm Advanced Apprenticeship. Die gewonnenen Erkenntnisse stützen sich auf Interviews mit Managern in 29 Organisationen. Es wurde deutlich, dass betriebliche Ausbildungen außerhalb des Advanced Apprenticeship-Programms funktionieren, vor allem wegen Nichtzulassung zu dem Advanced Apprenticeship Programm auf Grund fehlender Erfüllung der Zulassungskriterien. Der Umfang, in dem Arbeitgeber die Möglichkeiten betrieblicher Erstausbildungen nutzen, hängt ab von dem Vergleich der Ausbildungskosten zu den Kosten von Neueinstellungen und von betrieblichen Weiterbildungen im Rahmen betrieblicher Personalentwicklungsmaßnahmen. Einige Arbeitgeber schätzen betriebliche Erstausbildungen vor allem insofern, als sie förderlich sind für eine lange Betriebszugehörigkeit und eine positive berufliche Entwicklung. Es gibt einen Zusammenhang von Ausbildungsqualität und Eigentumsstruktur: familiengeführte Unternehmen bieten umfangreichere Ausbildungsprogramme an. Unternehmen nehmen in unterschiedlicher Weise an dem Advanced Apprenticeship- Programm teil, bezogen auf ihre vertraglich vereinbarte Rolle und der Art ihres Angebots. Die Auswirkungen und Folgen ihrer Entscheidungen hinsichtlich der Qualität der von ihnen angebotenen Ausbildung sind nicht eindeutig.

Bayesian inference in high-dimensional linear models using an empirical correlation-adaptive prior

In the context of a high-dimensional linear regression model, we propose the use of an empirical correlation-adaptive prior that makes use of information in the observed predictor variable matrix to adaptively address high collinearity, determining if parameters associated with correlated predictors should be shrunk together or kept apart. Under suitable conditions, we prove that this empirical Bayes posterior concentrates around the true sparse parameter at the optimal rate asymptotically. A simplified version of a shotgun stochastic search algorithm is employed to implement the variable selection procedure, and we show, via simulation experiments across different settings and a real-data application, the favorable performance of the proposed method compared to existing methods.Comment: 25 pages, 4 figures, 2 table

My Tattoos Make Me, Me : Constructing Personal Identities through Tattoos

The following thesis consists of a research project that seeks to understand how individuals construct personal identities through tattoos. The thesis contains background information on why the author has a personal connection and interest with the subject. The thesis also includes a review of the literature that informs the readers about the origins of tattoos, historicization of tattoos, cultural appropriation and commodification, motivations for tattooing, tattoos and the body, and identity construction. There is also a methods section that explains how the author utilized the interviewing process to gather and conduct research in the field to answer the research question: How do people with tattoos construct and communicate their identities through their tattoos? Lastly, the thesis concludes with an analysis section that provides the readers with the authors findings. The findings consist of interviewees\u27 responses to how their tattoos construct their identities. Those who gave consent to be photographed have kindly allowed pictures of their tattoos to be included in the research process

Musical Rhetoric, Narrative, Drama, and Their Negation in Morton Feldman\u27s Piano and String Quartet

Though Morton Feldman famously expressed his aversion to conventional compositional rhetoric early in his career, an examination of his music from the late 1970s onward reveals a more complex and ambiguous relationship with musical rhetoric than has often been acknowledged. In his own writings Feldman hinted at the notion of illusory function and directionality in his music, as well as to the phenomenon of negation. It is my contention that the extended-length works written in the last years of the composer\u27s life, which frequently feature tantalizing suggestions of conventional musical narrative, provide rich opportunity for readings of these statements. My examination focuses upon Piano and String Quartet, one of the composer\u27s very last works, which, I argue, exemplifies compositional approaches characteristic of much of Feldman\u27s music from this period in its evocation and simultaneous negation of a sense of traditional narrative linearity

Modeling dewetting, demixing, and thermal effects in nanoscale metal films

Thin film dynamics, particularly on the nanoscale, is a topic of extensive interest. The process by which thin liquids evolve is far from trivial and can lead to dewetting and drop formation. Understanding this process involves not only resolving the fluid mechanical aspects of the problem, but also requires the coupling of other physical processes, including liquid-solid interactions, thermal transport, and dependence of material parameters on temperature and material composition. The focus of this dissertation is on the mathematical modeling and simulation of nanoscale liquid metal films, which are deposited on thermally conductive substrates, liquefied by laser heating, and subsequently dewet into nanoparticles, before cooling and resolidifying. Both single- and multi-metal configurations are considered. In the former case, continuum theory is used to describe the thermohydrodynamics. Separation of length scales (in-plane length scales are larger than those in the out-of-plane direction) allows for formulation of asymptotic theory that reduces the fluid dynamics problem, involving Navier-Stokes equations in evolving domains, to a fourth order nonlinear partial differential equation for the fluid thickness. Similarly, a leading order thermal model is developed that is novel, computationally efficient, and accurate. The resulting coupled fluid dynamics and thermal transport model is then used to simulate metal film evolution in both two and three dimensional domains, and to investigate the role of various material parameters. Thermal effects are found to play an important role; in particular it is found that the inclusion of temperature dependence in the metal viscosity modifies the time scale of the evolution significantly. On the other hand, in the considered setup the Marangoni (thermocapillary) effect turns out to be insignificant. The rate of heat lost in the substrate, measured by a Biot number (Bi) is found to influence peak metal film temperatures and liquid lifetimes (time from film melting to resolidification) more strongly than substrate thickness (H s ). Nevertheless, changes in both Bi and H s can lead to films that freeze in place prior to full dewetting due to the strong dependence of viscosity on temperature. n the case of multi-metal configurations, molecular dynamics simulations are used to investigate the competition between chemical instabilities and Rayleigh-Plateau type dewetting behavior in NiAg alloys of various geometries. Phase separation occurs for decreasing temperatures and results in Ag@Ni core-shell particles. During the breakup, phase separation and the Rayleigh-Plateau instability either compete or cooperate depending on the relative positioning of Ag and Ni. When the phase separation length scale is sufficiently large, axial migration of Ag onto Ni can result in both Ag@Ni core-shell and pure Ag nanoparticles. Chemical instabilities, therefore, can strongly affect the dewetting mechanism

Target profiling of PARP inhibitors and necroptosis inhibitors using photoaffinity labelling

Target profiling of a small molecule therapeutic is essential to fully understand how that compound works in the clinic. Photoaffinity labelling (PAL) has become a widely utilised strategy for in-cell target identification campaigns for reversible, small molecule drugs. After an overview of target profiling and PAL, this Thesis discusses the application of PAL to two classes of molecules with incomplete target profiles. The Thesis focusses initially on the generation of the first photo-activatable probe for inhibitors of the PARP family of enzymes, PARPYnD, based on a novel anti-cancer PARP1/2/6 inhibitor AZ0108 with unexplained off-target toxicity. The design, synthesis and validation of the probe is discussed, along with the application of PARPYnD to PAL studies. Herein, simultaneous live-cell target engagement of PARP1/2 is shown for the first time by a photo-activatable probe, and this labelling is used to quantify live-cell engagement of these PARPs by known PARP inhibitors in competitive PAL experiments. For AZ0108 and clinical PARP inhibitor olaparib, novel off-targets are identified, demonstrating the power of PAL to capture weaker, secondary binders. Finally, PARPYnD fails to label PARP6 in live cells, but is able to label recombinant PARP6, highlighting a biomolecular disparity that raises questions about the proposed mechanism of action of AZ0108. PAL is then applied to a novel series of inhibitors of necroptosis, an inflammatory form of cell death, with an unknown mechanism of action. Design and synthesis of cell-active photo-activatable probe 7PQYnD1 is presented, along with the development of a bespoke live-cell necroptosis assay to evaluate necroptosis inhibitors in-house. 7PQYnD1 is then applied to the PAL workflow and five bona fide target proteins are identified through proteomics. Preliminary functional analysis of these hits is then undertaken to begin to identify the target interaction(s) responsible for the anti-necroptosis phenotype of these compounds.Open Acces

On the 3-Dimensional Fluid-Structure Interaction of Flexible Fibers in a Flow

We discuss the equilibrium configurations of a flexible fiber clamped to a spherical body and immersed in a flow of fluid moving with a speed ranging between 0 and 50 cm/s. Experimental results are presented with both two-dimensional and three-dimensional numerical simulations used to model this problem. We present the effects of flow speed and initial configuration angle between the fiber and the direction of the flow. Investigations reveal that both the orientation of the fiber and the fiber length have a significant impact on the deformation of the fiber as well as on the forces it experiences. Specifically, we measure the drag and lift experienced by the system and measure them against known values in literature. We note, additionally, that longer fibers (i) bend significantly more than shorter fibers and (ii) display oscillatory or flapping motion at much lower flow speeds than their shorter counterparts. In the two-dimensional simulations we reveal that the drag on the fiber is noticeably affected by the size of the sphere. The analysis of the drag is done in terms of Vogel exponents, computed in both 2-D and 3-D, and is compared with the literature. The validity of the reduction of dimensionality is tested against the three-dimensional simulations and qualitatively compared. Both mesh density and convergence studies are performed in 2-D and 3-D to balance the accuracy and convergence rates. We also discuss the robustness of the three-dimensional model and the practicalities of using a lower-dimensional model