Use of ion beams in space

Ion beams of MeV energy are in routine use as depth microscopes to determine composition and impurity profiles with depth resolutions of 100-300 Å over near-surface regions. Backscattering spectrometry with He ions and proton-induced x-rays are simple to implement. These techniques have been used in studies of thin-film reactions, solid-phase epitaxy, metallurgy of integrated circuits and solar cells, oxidation and corrosion, and other near-surface phenomena. The Spacelab orbital environment provides the possibility of depositing contamination-free films on clean interfaces. Ion beam techniques for material analysis can then be used to evaluate thin-film interdiffusion, and compound formation in a contaminant-free ambient. In addition, the ion beam techniques would be available for rapid analysis of near-surface regions of other experiments, such as molecular-beam epitaxy. The instrumentation-semiconductor nuclear-particle detectors and multichannel analyzer for such measurements are simple and were used in early Surveyor lunar analyses. The accelerator is based on the tandem accelerator principle pumped by the vacuum of space. It consists of a series of eight light equispaced titanium concentric spheres which are supported on a single insulating hollow column. The largest sphere which is at the potential of the spacecraft has a diameter of 200 cm. The smallest sphere has a diameter of 30 cm and is maintained at l MV potential. Voltage is generated between the largest sphere and the smallest sphere by using an inductively charged stapled belt to physically transfer charge. The belt system operates in vacuum within the confines of the hollow insulating column and needs only energy to supply bearing losses and the work done against the electrostatic forces. A series of small holes located collinear on the concentric spheres create a region of uniform electrostatic field which accelerate negative particles to 1 MeV at the terminal. Here a small gas canal is used for stripping electrons from the particles, causing them to change sign from negative to positive. These positive particles are repelled from the terminal back to ground to give He^(++) particles with energies up to 3 MeV and H^+ of 2 MeV. Two types of ion sources would be provided with this device. The first, a simple Penning source, would produce H^- beams for proton-induced x-ray measurement. A second lithium exchange source would provide He^- for backscatter measurements

Dallas Bower: a producer for television's early years, 1936-39

Having worked in the film industry as a sound technician and then director, Dallas Bower (1907-99) was appointed in 1936 as one of two senior producers at the start of the BBC Television service. Over the next three years Bower produced as well as directed many ground-breaking live programmes, including the opening-day broadcast on 2 November 1936; the BBC Television Demonstration Film (1937, his only surviving pre-war production); a modern-dress Julius Caesar (1938), in uniforms suggestive of a Fascist disctatorship; Act II of Tristan and Isolde (1938); Patrick Hamilton’s play Rope (1939), utilising extended single camera-shots camera-shots; numerous ballets, among them Checkmate (1938); and ambitious outside broadcasts from the film studios at Denham and Pinewood. Developing the working practices of producing for the theatre, film industry and radio, Bower was a key figure in defining the role of the creative television producer at the start of the medium. Among his innovations, according to his unpublished autobiographical fragment ‘Playback’ (written 1995), was the introduction of a drawn studio plan for the four cameras employed in all live broadcasts from Alexandra Palace. Using Bower’s writings (among them his 1936 book Plan for Cinema), his BECTU History Project interview, the BBC Written Archives and contemporary industry coverage, this article reconstructs the early development of the role of staff television producer in order to consider the questions of autonomy, agency and institutional constraints at the BBC in the pre-war years

Intermedial Relationships of Radio Features with Denis Mitchell’s and Philip Donnellan’s Early Television Documentaries

Writing of the closure in early 1965 of the Radio Features Department, Asa Briggs identifies one of the reasons for the controversial decision as ‘the incursion of television, which was developing its own features.’ ‘[Laurence] Gilliam and his closest colleagues believed in the unique merits of “pure radio”. The screen seemed a barrier’ (The History of Broadcasting in the United Kingdom, Vol. 5, p. 348). Rather than the screen being ‘a barrier’ for them, a number of the creators of the emerging television documentary were from the late 1950s onwards able to transfer and transform distinctive techniques of ‘pure radio’ into highly effective visual forms. Two key figures were the producers of ‘poetic’ documentaries Denis Mitchell and Philip Donnellan, who employed layered voices, imaginative deployments of music and effects, and allusive juxtapositions of sound and image, to develop an alternative (although always marginal) tradition to the supposedly objective approaches of current affairs and, later, verité filmmakers. And a dozen years after the dismemberment of the Features Department, Donnellan paid tribute to it in his glorious but little-seen film Pure Radio (BBC1, 3 November 1977). Taking important early films by Mitchell and Donnellan as case studies, this paper explores the impact of radio features on television documentaries in the 1950s and early 1960s, and assesses the extent to which the screen in its intermedial relationships with ‘pure radio’ was a barrier or, in the work of certain creators, an augmentation

The relationship between creator and creature in science fiction

Available from British Library Document Supply Centre- DSC:DN057162 / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreSIGLEGBUnited Kingdo

Her Syndan Wælcyrian: Illuminating the Form and Function of the Valkyrie-Figure in the Literature, Mythology, and Social Consciousness of Anglo-Saxon England

The image of the warrior-woman, or Valkyrie, occurs, in a number of forms, throughout the Anglo-Saxon corpus. Her appearance and function in these writings may be subdivided into three primary registers: the named-appearances of the wælcyrge, unnamed appearances of the wælcyrge in the charms and riddles, and unnamed appearances of the wælcyrge in heroic verse. Since the mid-1800’s scholars have defined the wælcyrge in terms of the valkyrja, or Scandinavian Valkyrie figure, which is reductive and misleading and has caused an eclipse-effect in which the native elements of the wælcyrge have gone underestimated and undervalued. This is due in part to the scant amount of surviving evidence in Old English that references the wælcyrge. By closely investigating the texts in which the wælcyrge appears, I will attempt to demonstrate that the Anglo-Saxon conception of the Valkyrie figure is idiomatic, complex, and vastly different from the Old Norse conception of the valkyrja, and cannot be accurately defined by the same parameters which define the valkyrja. The differing genres in which the wælcyrge appears also showcase the differing values and forms which differing demographics of Anglo-Saxon society held for the wælcyrge. Such a disparate range of value present in one character of folklore suggests that the wælcyrge was a multivalent figure within Anglo-Saxon folklore. At the liturgical level, the epic poetic level, and the folk-verse level, the Valkyrie image is revelatory of the complexities accompanying the native folklore of the wælcyrge. Many aspects of the wælcyrge are reflected in similar war-woman figures of pre-Anglo-Saxon, Germanic cultures, as well as in later, Scandinavian verses that post-date the usage of the wælcyrge in England. The function of the wælcyrge within a long tradition of Germanic, Anglo-Saxon, and Scandinavian works shows that the native English war-woman was not a figure used in isolation, but was part of a medieval dialogic in which the female divinity as an agent of war, cunning, and death was paramount. The inherent complexities present in the Anglo-Saxon Valkyrie-figure are key to interpreting her role within the tripartite structure of Anglo-Saxon literature

The Black Archive #13 Human Nature/Family of Blood

Even in one of 21st-century Doctor Who’s more complex seasons, Human Nature / The Family of Blood (2007) is a standout story: a narrative with mythic ambitions, which illuminates the true nature and character of the Doctor through the courage and failings of his unknowing human alter ego, John Smith.Uniquely, the story is also an adaptation of an original Doctor Who novel, scriptwriter Paul Cornell’s Human Nature (1996). Though no specific incidents, and few characters, remain the same, the adaptation is remarkably faithful given the given the differing demands of context, era and medium. Both versions deal with war and trauma, humanity and the alien, school and family, though sometimes with differing emphases. In particular, the treatment of pacifism and the claims of World War I to be a ‘just war’ changes significantly.As the story of a ‘god’ who becomes human and must sacrifice his life to save the world, the two-parter also opens up questions of theology unusual in Doctor Who, which add an extra dimension to the overall season arc, and to the development of the character of David Tennant’s Doctor

Report on the Managing Impacts of Deep-seA reSource exploitation (MIDAS) workshop on environmental management of deep-sea mining

Recent years have seen an upsurge in interest in mining in the world’s deep oceans, in areas beyond national jurisdiction. Such mining activity has the potential to cause environmental impacts over large areas. As contractors plan to move from exploration to exploitation activities it is important to develop guidance to ensure that these activities are managed in a way that is as environmentally sustainable as possible. This paper presents the outcomes of an international workshop on environmental management for deep-sea mining (DSM). The workshop presented protocols for environmental management, which were tested using a comprehensive polymetallic nodule mining scenario developed with industry input. The workshop started by presenting a framework for environmental management of deep-sea mining, which introduced the use of a conceptual model as a method of storing and updating environmental data and the synthesis of that data throughout the project. The second session focused on the incorporation of the precautionary approach and adaptive management into the framework. Two discussion sessions were held to discuss Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) in the context of the scenario: the first considered scoping and screening EIAs, while the second reviewed the full EIA assessment. Subsequent discussion focussed on environmental management at the regional scale. This concentrated on the Regional Environmental Assessment (REA) - including its purpose, the scale and scope, and practicalities - and the assignment of protected areas as an approach for regional environmental management. Use of a scenario as a basis for the evaluation of protocols on the environmental management of DSM was novel amongst workshops, facilitating focussed discussion despite the high uncertainty surrounding DSM activities. The results of these discussions are summarised in the paper