A self-contained quantum harmonic engine

We propose a system made of three quantum harmonic oscillators as a compact quantum engine for producing mechanical work. The three oscillators play respectively the role of the hot bath, the working medium and the cold bath. The working medium performs an Otto cycle during which its frequency is changed and it is sequentially coupled to each of the two other oscillators. As the two environments are finite, the lifetime of the machine is finite and after a number of cycles it stops working and needs to be reset. We analyse the entanglement and quantum discord generated during the strokes and show that high work generation is always accompanied by large quantum correlations.Comment: Updated, published version. See also related but independent work from Pozas-Kerstjens et al. arXiv:1708.0636

Perceptions of Equality and National Identity amongst Young British South Asian Muslims in Bradford, England

In the wake of urban riots and terror attacks in the United Kingdom, British public debate and policy have focused on the nation\u27s immigrant communities. These debates have commonly called into question whether immigrant communities in Britain are sufficiently integrated into mainstream society and included in the nation. These questions have been particularly focused on the country\u27s immigrant Muslim communities because they have, over the years, been accused of segregating themselves from, and within, British society. This study explored the local and national identities of young British South Asian Muslims in Bradford, which is one of the largest Muslim communities in Britain. National identity is commonly thought to be predicated upon equality, but there is limited empirical data to support the theory. Through survey-based research, this study adds a layer of data to support the theory as it found young British South Asian Muslims were more likely to identify with the nation if they felt as if they were equal members of society, thought they had equal access to education, or thought British South Asians had equal access to education. This study also explored the educational priorities of the Muslim community because it has struggled to attain a high rate of educational qualifications. This study found the educational goals of British South Asian Muslims differed from those of the White British population. These differing priorities may further explain the communities\u27 educational qualifications gap. As such, this study offers valuable insight for policy makers and educators as they consider consumer demands while allocating scarce resources in the city\u27s education sector

Systematics of targeted flat sedges (Cyperus, Cyperaceae) of the Americas, including a floristic analysis of an imperiled sedge-rich prairie community

The sedge family, Cyperaceae, is a large group with approximately 5,000 species distributed among ca. 100 genera. Sedges are economically and ethnobotanically important. They are conspicuous members of many floras around the world and provide vital food and cover for wildlife. The focus of this dissertation is on the genus Cyperus, which includes about 900 species. Due to its large size, advancements in knowledge of Cyperus are made in small “bites”. The molecular phylogenetics component of this research focused on New World Cyperus. Chapter 2 presents a phylogentic analysis employing sequences from the nuclear ITS region. Chapter 3 presents a more robust analysis using five genic loci, including sequences from nuclear ITS plus four plastid loci. This research was the first to estimate the phylogenetic position of the monotypic genus Karinia. Karina has been included in Cyperus in the past, and is here resolved as a member of the Ficinia clade which is consistently estimated as sister to the Cyperus clade in molecular studies. Karinia was embedded in a clade with Sciproides. Its morphology, including perennial habit, dense head-like inflorscences, and spirally-arranged floral scales, are consistent with that of Scirpoides. Another important result of this work is the resolution of the predominantly Central American Cyperus andinus and C. seslerioides as belonging to section Leucocephali. This study strongly supports section Leucocephali, whose members utilize C3 photosynthesis, as sister to C4 Cyperus. Members of section Leucocephali are adapted to open seasonally dry grasslands, which may be the ecological intermediary to the evolution of C4 photosynthesis. Sampling for molecular studies included in this research enabled assessment of two taxonomic sections: Luzuloidei and Diclidium. The New World section Luzuloidei, which is composed of C3 members, is strongly supported as monophyletic. A morphological synapomorphy in section Luzuloidei is the presence of two-keeled floral scales. Section Diclidium, which is diagnosed as having spikelets which break into one- to two-fruited segments upon maturity, is polyphyletic. Therefore, this unique mode of spikelet shattering arose independently at least twice. Results provided some insight into several taxonomic problems in the Umbellati group and in section Strigosi; however, a greater number of samples are needed to assess these problems. The suspected relationship of the North American prairie species Cyperus cephalanthus to the South American Cyperus rigens species group was confirmed by the molecular phylogenetic analyses, as was the monophyly of the C. rigens group. Cyperus cephalanthus strongly resembles the South American C. impolitus. It was hypothesized that these taxa were morpholically indistinguishable. Morphometric analysis showed that several characters are statistically different, includeing floral scale dimensions, achene width, and achene shape. However, results of Principal Components Analisis (PCA) suggest that Cyperus cephalanthus and C. impolitus are the same morphological species. Results of PCA of Cyperus rigens and several of its infraspecific taxa were inconclusive, highlighting the need for more work with this highly variable South American taxon. Coastal prairie is one of the most imperiled habitats in North America. It is in this habitat where Cyperus cephalanthus is found, with fewer than 20 known populations in North America (Louisiana and Texas). This research included a floristic survey of wet coastal prairie sites in southwestern Louisiana. This work was partly stimulated by the preference of Cyperus cephalanthus for this habitat, and further motivated by the discovery of several promising prairie remnants quadrupaling the aerial extent of known coastal prairie in Louisiana. The wet coastal prairie flora included 512 minimum-rank taxa, with 461 being native. A total of 255 were estimated to be ecological conservative and characteristic of coastal prairie, with the balance consisting of weedy elements taking advantage of disturbance and habitat alteration. The wet coastal prairie was rich in sedges, with 72 species among nine genera. Cyperus was the most species rich genus in the entire wet prairire flora with 20 species. Coefficients of conservatism (C-values) were assigned to each taxon in the wet prairie flora. These C-values will allow computation of various Floristic Quality Indices (FQI) for sites ranging from unplowed prairie remnants to de novo restorations

Perceptions of Equality and National Identity amongst Young British South Asian Muslims in Bradford, England

In the wake of urban riots and terror attacks in the United Kingdom, British public debate and policy have focused on the nation\u27s immigrant communities. These debates have commonly called into question whether immigrant communities in Britain are sufficiently integrated into mainstream society and included in the nation. These questions have been particularly focused on the country\u27s immigrant Muslim communities because they have, over the years, been accused of segregating themselves from, and within, British society. This study explored the local and national identities of young British South Asian Muslims in Bradford, which is one of the largest Muslim communities in Britain. National identity is commonly thought to be predicated upon equality, but there is limited empirical data to support the theory. Through survey-based research, this study adds a layer of data to support the theory as it found young British South Asian Muslims were more likely to identify with the nation if they felt as if they were equal members of society, thought they had equal access to education, or thought British South Asians had equal access to education. This study also explored the educational priorities of the Muslim community because it has struggled to attain a high rate of educational qualifications. This study found the educational goals of British South Asian Muslims differed from those of the White British population. These differing priorities may further explain the communities\u27 educational qualifications gap. As such, this study offers valuable insight for policy makers and educators as they consider consumer demands while allocating scarce resources in the city\u27s education sector

Bookreview: The politics of life itself: biomedicine, power, and subjectivity in the twenty-first century. By Nikolas Rose. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press 2006. ISBN 9780691121918

525BookreviewThepolitics of life itself: biomedicine, power, and subjectivity in the twenty-firstcentury. By Nikolas Rose. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. 2006.$25.95/£14.95. ISBN: 9780691121918SAGE Publications, Inc.2008DOI: 10.1177/14744740080150040708SimonReid-HenryQueen Mary, University of LondonInthe classic analyses of Foucault, the 18th and 19th centuries saw the emergenceof a biopolitical state, in which the very vitality of individual citizenscame to be the subject of systems of management (through state provision forhealth and welfare, for example). Such a politics centred on the human bodyis today being reconfigured, claims the sociologist Nikolas Rose, in his newbook The Politics of life itself. To summarize brutally, new ways of understandinglife have resulted in new forms of managing, shaping and contesting it. Thus,vital politics today, Rose suggests, `is concerned with our growing capacitiesto control, man- age, engineer, reshape, and modulate the very vital capacitiesof human beings as living crea- tures' (p. 3). There is much to admire inhis account of the forms that such a politics is taking, and I would encouragethe reader to engage with this work. But two aspects of Rose's account warrantbrief commentary. First, both life and politics are given, in my view, toonarrow a definition in this book. Central to what Rose seeks to analyse, forexample, is the emergence of a particular `style of thought' – drawingon Ludwig Fleck's phrase – based upon a shift in the scale at whichwe think to understand, act on, and act in relation to, human life: from aclinical gaze cen- tred upon the body, to a molecular gaze that understandslife at the level of its component526parts(sequences of nucleotide bases, transporter genes and the like). This approachis in many ways quite helpful, but to its detriment, I think, it emphasizesquestions of techno- logical novelty at the expense of questions about thedistribution and control of those novel systems, not to mention the socialinequalities from which they actively divert attention and in some cases maybe contributing towards. As in the very western biomedical practices the bookseeks to analyse, the infectious diseases, poverty and inequality that structurethe pol- itics of life for most of the world's population are given scanttreatment. This is not, in fair- ness, Rose's intention, but my point is thatit could have been. That it is not is indicative of a widening gap betweenthe literature on public health and the literature on biomedicine and thebiological sciences. Much is made in this book of the new choices and newresponsibil- ities facing the individual. There is considerable scope forsetting alongside this a fuller appre- ciation of how those choices are shapedby the often rather older and more mundane limits set by one's social andgeographical location. Second, there is a profusion of spatial metaphors andreasoning that I think geographers might usefully elaborate, contest and refine.There is something not just inherently but con- stitutively geographical aboutmany of the changes wrought by the life sciences and biomed- icine in particularthat Rose describes in this book and that many geographers are actively engagedin researching. In addition to using geography as a shorthand for thinkingabout the wider implications and distributional effects of these new technologies,therefore (Rose speaks for example of a `cartography of the future' in lieuof a `history of the present'), geograph- ical notions of space, place andscale might well be usefully brought to bear upon this emer- gent social andscholarly field

Chromatographic characterisation of poly (vinyl alcohol)

Poly (vinyl alcohol) (PVOH), the partially hydrolysed form of poly(vinyl acetate) (PVAc), is a complex multicomponent polymer exhibiting a number of broad molecular property distributions and is therefore somewhat difficult to characterise by analytical techniques. Coupled column chromatography (CCC) is a technique whereby such a complex polymer may be characterised by cross-fractionation from one separation method to another and may be performed using size exclusion chromatography (SEC) and reversed phase chromatography (RPC) to produce a molecular size distribution superimposed onto a compositional vinyl acetate (VAc) distribution. [Continues.

A statistical study of the mass and density structure of Infrared Dark Clouds

How and when the mass distribution of stars in the Galaxy is set is one of the main issues of modern astronomy. Here we present a statistical study of mass and density distributions of infrared dark clouds (IRDCs) and fragments within them. These regions are pristine molecular gas structures and progenitors of stars and so provide insights into the initial conditions of star formation. This study makes use of a IRDC catalogue (Peretto & Fuller 2009), the largest sample of IRDC column density maps to date, containing a total of ~11,000 IRDCs with column densities exceeding N_{H2} = 1 X10^{22} cm^{-2} and over 50,000 single peaked IRDC fragments. The large number of objects constitutes an important strength of this study, allowing detailed analysis of the completeness of the sample and so statistically robust conclusions. Using a statistical approach to assigning distances to clouds, the mass and density distributions of the clouds and the fragments within them are constructed. The mass distributions show a steepening of the slope when switching from IRDCs to fragments, in agreement with previous results of similar structures. IRDCs and fragments are divided into unbound/bound objects by assuming Larson's relation and calculating their virial parameter. IRDCs are mostly gravitationally bound, while a significant fraction of the fragments are not. The density distribution of gravitationally unbound fragments shows a steep characteristic slope. (see paper for full Abstract).Comment: 15 pages, accepted for publication in Ap

An introduction to the local-to-global behaviour of groups acting on trees and the theory of local action diagrams

The primary tool for analysing groups acting on trees is Bass--Serre Theory. It is comprised of two parts: a decomposition result, in which an action is decomposed via a graph of groups, and a construction result, in which graphs of groups are used to build examples of groups acting on trees. The usefulness of the latter for constructing new examples of `large' (e.g. nondiscrete) groups acting on trees is severely limited. There is a pressing need for new examples of such groups as they play an important role in the theory of locally compact groups. An alternative `local-to-global' approach to the study of groups acting on trees has recently emerged, inspired by a paper of Marc Burger and Shahar Mozes, based on groups that are `universal' with respect to some specified `local' action. In recent work, the authors of this survey article have developed a general theory of universal groups of local actions, that behaves, in many respects, like Bass--Serre Theory. We call this the theory of local action diagrams. The theory is powerful enough to completely describe all closed groups of automorphisms of trees that enjoy Tits' Independence Property (P). This article is an introductory survey of the local-to-global behaviour of groups acting on trees and the theory of local action diagrams. The article contains many ideas for future research projects.Comment: Survey article based on Simon M Smith's lecture at Groups St Andrews 202