Universal modes of awareness? A “pre-reflective” premise

Mark Rowlands holds that creatures endowed with pre-reflective awareness may qualify as persons: In pre-reflective awareness, the self and the unity of mental life are implicit in the stream of experience. Rowlands generalizes from an introspective analysis of pre-reflective consciousness in humans to pre-reflective awareness in general. I describe three examples of empirical findings that corroborate the assumption that animal minds have some of the same basic modes of pre-reflective awareness as human minds

Thermal Conversion of Guanylurea Dicyanamide into Graphitic Carbon Nitride via Prototype CNx Precursors

Guanylurea dicyanamide, [(H2N)C(-O)NHC(NH2)2][N(CN)2], has been synthesized by ion exchange reaction in aqueous solution and structurally characterized by single-crystal X-ray diffraction (C2/c, a = 2249.0(5) pm, b = 483.9(1) pm, c = 1382.4(3) pm, β = 99.49(3)°, V = 1483.8(5) × 106 pm3, T = 130 K). The thermal behavior of the molecular salt has been studied by thermal analysis, temperature-programmed X-ray powder diffraction, FTIR spectroscopy, and mass spectrometry between room temperature and 823 K. The results were interpreted on a molecular level in terms of a sequence of thermally induced addition, cyclization, and elimination reactions. As a consequence, melamine (2,4,6-triamino-1,3,5-triazine) is formed with concomitant loss of HNCO. Further condensation of melamine yields the prototypic CNx precursor melem (2,6,10-triamino-s-heptazine, C6N7(NH2)3), which alongside varying amounts of directly formed CNxHy material transforms into layered CNxHy phases without significant integration of oxygen into the core framework owing to the evaporation of HNCO. Thus, further evidence can be added to melamine and its condensation product melem acting as “key intermediates” in the synthetic pathway toward graphitic CNxHy materials, whose exact constitution is still a point at issue. Due to the characteristic formation process and hydrogen content a close relationship with the polymer melon is evident. In particular, the thermal transformation of guanylurea dicyanamide clearly demonstrates that the formation of volatile compounds such as HNCO during thermal decomposition may render a large variety of previously not considered molecular compounds suitable CNx precursors despite the presence of oxygen in the starting material

A Process for Stochastic Material Analysis based on Empirical Data

Material properties are often dominated by imperfections and geometrical variations in micro-scale. The manufacturing process of complex parts as stringers and their assembly creates specific microscopic imperfections whose influence to phenomena like delamination growth can not be understood with a deterministic homogenised material model. This paper describes a general approach to develop a stochastic model of anisotropic micro-structure on the basis of high-resolution image data. This approach uses a surrogate model for approximating material properties of meso-scale material blocks. The empirical material properties provided by the surrogate model are analysed for their marginal distribution and spatial covariance

Ultrafast polychromatic ionization of dielectric solids

The modeling of the laser-induced damage processes can be divided into thermal and electronic processes. Especially, electronic damage seems to be well understood. In corresponding models, the damage threshold is linked to the excitation of valence electrons into the conduction band, and often the damage is obtained if a critical density of free electrons is exceeded. For the modeling of the electronic excitation, rate equation models are applied which can vary in the different terms representing different excitation channels. According to the current state of the art, photoionization and avalanche ionization contribute the major part to the ionization process, and consequently the determination of laser-induced damage thresholds is based on the calculation of the respective terms. For the theoretical description of both, well established models are available. For the quantitative calculation of the photoionization, the Keldysh theory is used most frequently, and for the avalanche processes the Drude theory is often applied. Both, Drude and Keldysh theory calculations depend on the laser frequency and use a monochromatic approach. For most applications the monochromatic description matches very well with the experimental findings, but in the range of few-cycle pulses the necessary broadening of the laser emission spectrum leads to high uncertainty for the calculation. In this paper, a novel polychromatic approach is presented including photo-and avalanche ionization as well as the critical electron density. The simulation combines different ionization channels in a Monte-Carlo procedure according to the frequency distribution of the spectrum. The resulting influence on the wavelength and material dependency is discussed in detail for various pulse shapes and pulse durations. The main focus of the investigation is concentrated on the specific characteristics in the dispersion and material dependency of the laser-induced damage threshold respecting the polychromatic characteristics of the ultra-short pulse (USP) laser damage. © 2016 SPIE. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.Ministry for Science and Culture of Lower SaxonyVolkswagen Stiftun

Succession of the sea-surface microlayer in the coastal Baltic Sea under natural and experimentally induced low-wind conditions

The sea-surface microlayer (SML) is located within the boundary between the atmosphere and hydrosphere. The high spatial and temporal variability of the SML's properties, however, have hindered a clear understanding of interactions between biotic and abiotic parameters at or across the air-water interface. Among the factors changing the physical and chemical environment of the SML, wind speed is an important one. In order to examine the temporal effects of minimized wind influence, SML samples were obtained from the coastal zone of the southern Baltic Sea and from mesocosm experiments in a marina to study naturally and artificially calmed sea surfaces. Organic matter concentrations as well as abundance, (3)H-thymidine incorporation, and the community composition of bacteria in the SML (bacterioneuston) compared to the underlying bulk water (ULW) were analyzed. In all SML samples, dissolved organic carbon and nitrogen were only slightly enriched and showed low temporal variability, whereas particulate organic carbon and nitrogen were generally greatly enriched and highly variable. This was especially pronounced in a dense surface film (slick) that developed during calm weather conditions as well as in the artificially calmed mesocosms. Overall, bacterioneuston abundance and productivity correlated with changing concentrations of particulate organic matter. Moreover, changes in the community composition in the field study were stronger in the particle-attached than in the non-attached bacterioneuston. This implies that decreasing wind enhances the importance of particle-attached assemblages and finally induces a succession of the bacterial community in the SML. Eventually, under very calm meteorological conditions, there is an uncoupling of the bacterioneuston from the ULW

Prion type 2 selection in sporadic Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease affecting peripheral ganglia

In sporadic Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease (sCJD), the pathological changes appear to be restricted to the central nervous system. Only involvement of the trigeminal ganglion is widely accepted. The present study systematically examined the involvement of peripheral ganglia in sCJD utilizing the currently most sensitive technique for detecting prions in tissue morphologically. The trigeminal, nodose, stellate, and celiac ganglia, as well as ganglia of the cervical, thoracic and lumbar sympathetic trunk of 40 patients were analyzed with the paraffin-embedded tissue (PET)-blot method. Apart from the trigeminal ganglion, which contained protein aggregates in five of 19 prion type 1 patients, evidence of prion protein aggregation was only found in patients associated with type 2 prions. With the PET-blot, aggregates of prion protein type 2 were found in all trigeminal (17/17), in some nodose (5 of 7) and thoracic (3 of 6) ganglia, as well as in a few celiac (4 of 19) and lumbar (1 of 5) ganglia of sCJD patients. Whereas aggregates of both prion types may spread to dorsal root ganglia, more CNS-distant ganglia seem to be only involved in patients accumulating prion type 2. Whether the prion type association is due to selection by prion type-dependent replication, or due to a prion type-dependent property of axonal spread remains to be resolved in further studies

Phenotypic indicators to identify methionine rich European grain legumes and the correlation of grain methionine contents with the sulphur supply

Home grown legumes are a valuable protein source for pure on-farm diets for livestock in organic farming. Whereas protein of Glycine max naturally has higher contents of methionine nand also lysine typical European grain legumes (Pisum sativum L., Vicia faba L., Lupinus angustifolius L.) used in organic farms as component of animal food are relatively low in those amino acids