The Humanitarian Aid Regime in the Republic of NGOs: The Fallacy of ‘Building Back Better\u27

In recent years, the international community has questioned the efficacy of international humanitarian aid based on the lack of results following the Haiti earthquake, leading to calls for reform and broader discussions of aid effectiveness. This paper proposes the contested existence of an international humanitarian aid regime consistent with broader definitions of regimes proposed by Stephen Krasner and Bruce Bueno de Mesquita. Delving into the manifold reasons for the ineffective response to the Haiti earthquake, the humanitarian aid regime itself proved its own worst enemy. The lack of efficacy is evident through examples drawn from key elements of the humanitarian aid regime including the relationship between political power and aid decisions, the principles of particular interests, and norms of the humanitarian aid regime. These characteristics lead to a lack of harmonization between donors and implementing partners, minimal accountability to beneficiaries, and little coordination between peer agencies competing for scarce resources. Drawing conclusions from Haiti’s pitfalls, the paper offers best practices and lessons learned as alternatives to traditional humanitarian aid, upholding new reforms within the regime as progress toward a more effective future response

Irish Pop Music in a Global Context

There are a number of reasons that motivate the undertaking of research on the topic of the music section of the culture industry in its present form. In Ireland today it is very hard for people not to have heard of some of the bands, which are going to be examined in this thesis because we hear so much about them in the media and because they are Irish we are expected to be proud of them. In a way its like supporting the national football team no one who knows anything about football likes their style of play but they feel that they are representing Ireland so it is their duty to support them. The same can be said about the treatment many of these bands receive in the Irish media people are afraid to question them because they are Irish and we should criticise our own. As this thesis will show, not only is there very little unique about these bands, also there is very little Irish about them unlike many of the other internationally successful Irish music groups before them who in some way drew creatively from their Irishness, the music examined here could have been produced by anyone, anywhere. Another reason motivating this research is the opportunity to look at an early neo-Marxist theory in an age when many believe that Marxism and Socialist theories are things that should be consigned to history along with the cold war. A further reason is that this early neo-Marxist theory on the culture industiy has never been more relevant in attempting to explain the music section of the culture industry as it is today

Biotransormations with plant coenzyme A-dependent acyltransferases

The acylation of plant natural products is widely observed in nature and this modification often confers novel bioactivities. In nature, each of these acylations is selectively catalysed by a coenzyme A-dependent acyltransferase and biotransformations with these enzymes offer several potential advantages, including pre-disposed regio- and substrate- selectivity, reduced side-reactions and increased yield. The enzymatic introduction of non-natural acyl groups into natural product biosynthesis has the potential to diversify the application of these acylating enzymes, with several examples of unnaturally acylated natural products being reported to have novel bioactivity. To explore the potential for biosynthesising such acylated- derivatives in vivo, feeding studies with both natural and fluorinated phenylpropanoids were carried out in Arabidopsis thaliana and Petunia hybrida. In petunia, feeding with natural phenylpropanoids caused hyper-accumulation of acylated flavonoid products. This enhancement was particularly apparent when spraying the plants with the phenylpropanoyl methyl ester. Using the methyl esters, 4- hydroxycinnamic acid and its 4- fluorocinnamic acid analogue were apparently incorporated into quercetin 3- O- diglycoside biosynthesis in petunia. However, only the endogenous phenylpropanoids were able to be incorporated into acylated- anthocyanin biosynthesis in arabidopsis. In order to understand the factors that govern substrate selectivity in coenzyme A- dependent acyltransfer, the associated enzymic mechanisms were investigated in vitro. Plants utilise a coenzyme A acyl donor substrate formed through the action of an ATP-dependent CoA ligase, and the respective enzyme (At4CLl) from Arabidopsis was cloned and expressed in E. coli. The purified enzyme was shown to form a diverse range of CoA esters with phenylpropanoid derivatives bearing 4- or 3- 4- hydro, hydroxyl, fluoro and / or methoxy groups, in addition to 4- azidocinnamic acid substituents. These aromatic substituents were found to have a strong influence upon acyl substrate selectivity. A CoA-dependent acyltransferase which acylates cyanidin 3- 5- O- diglucoside in Gentiana triflora with phenylpropanoids was also cloned, expressed in E. coli and biochemically characterised. The acyltransferase was able to transfer various 4- and 3- 4- substituted phenylpropanoids. However, in this instance substrate selectivity was not as strongly influenced by phenylpropanoid aromatic substitution, which was indicative of a 'pre-screening' role of the CoA ligase with respect to acyl substrates. The in vitro biosynthesis of acylated flavonoids was optimised to transfer aromatic acids onto natural product acceptors using a one-pot biosynthetic approach, combining 4CL and acyltransferase activities. Consequently, coenzyme A was able to be efficiently re-cycled and was used on a much reduced scale. In addition, new strategies have been developed to isolate interesting acyltransferase biocatalysts based on their inhibition by a biotinylated fluorophosphonate probe. This approach showed that it was possible to identify CoA-dependent acyltransferases from crude protein preparations by recovering affinity labelled enzymes using a streptavidin sepharose solid support. The reactivity of the probe toward BAHD acyltransferases could be enhanced in the presence of UV irradiation, whilst labelling was abolished in the presence of the acyl acceptor. This afforded the ability to isolate enzyme activities according to their substrate recognition

Jet fuel property changes and their effect on producibility and cost in the U.S., Canada, and Europe

The effects of changes in properties and blending stocks on the refinery output and cost of jet fuel in the U.S., Canada, and Europe were determined. Computerized refinery models that minimize production costs and incorporated a 1981 cost structure and supply/demand projections to the year 2010 were used. Except in the West U.S., no changes in jet fuel properties were required to meet all projected demands, even allowing for deteriorating crude qualities and changes in competing product demand. In the West U.S., property changes or the use of cracked blendstocks were projected to be required after 1990 to meet expected demand. Generally, relaxation of aromatics and freezing point, or the use of cracked stocks produced similar results, i.e., jet fuel output could be increased by up to a factor of three or its production cost lowered by up to $10/cu m. High quality hydrocracked stocks are now used on a limited basis to produce jet fuel. The conversion of U.S. and NATO military forces from wide-cut to kerosene-based jet fuel is addressed. This conversion resulted in increased costs of several hundred million dollars annually. These costs can be reduced by relaxing kerosene jet fuel properties, using cracked stocks and/or considering the greater volumetric energy content of kerosene jet fuel