Training programmes and achievement of organizational objectives of public libraries in the northern province of Sri Lanka

Public libraries are social entities of any community, thus, play significant roles in upgrading literacy of society. Especially, in remote zones of Northern Province of Sri Lanka, where resources are scarce, public libraries’ presence to help in education cannot be underestimated. With steady developmental activities taking place after ending the war in the area, public libraries are in need to transformation. Managing these libraries within limited resource-level is highly dependent on the capacity of human resources. In this regard, training in a systematic approach to enhance skills in acquisition management, reference services, circulation, current awareness services, and mobile library services will prove the worth of public libraries in rural areas. As a component of human resource development, training provides improvement in job performance of public librarians and library staff as per the expectation of their local government. This study identified a specific problem as to what extent the outcomes of the training programmes lead to achieve the objectives of the public libraries in Northern Province. Therefore, objectives are drawn to explore the beliefs and attitude of public librarians with respect to the existing training programme that expect the achievement of objectives of public libraries. Correlation between the existing training programmes and achievement of objectives in the public libraries will also be analyzed. For the purpose of establishing the relationship between the variables, a field survey was executed to collect data from the respective public libraries in Northern Province. Of 134 public libraries in the province, sample of 68 public libraries were selected applying stratified random sampling method from five district level public libraries for this study. A questionnaire, which is the commonly used tool to measure attitudes, was used as a tool for data collection. This study focused on the relationship between the training programme and its outcomes i.e. public library’s development, self-development, and performance improvement. The correlation (R) (0.610) explains a positive and moderate relationship. The coefficient of determination (R2) (0.373) explains that only 37.3% of the variance from the total variance. Hence, the statistical result of the present study concludes that training programme enhances the organisational development, self-development and performance improvement. There is a positive and moderate relationship between the training programme and the organisational development, self-development and performance improvement, which leads to the achievement of public library’s objectives. Due to the rapid change in the human resource management environment, Public Libraries have to adopt various techniques to achieve organisational objectives. Training librarians is one technique to achieve such objectives. Provision of training is the responsibility of the management of local government for the organisational development, self-development and performance improvement. Anyhow certain factors like lack of fund, inadequate number of librarians and management’s interest in training hinder training of librarians and that training could be improved through adequate funding, formulating training policy and recruiting adequate librarians

Dibenzyl 3,3′-diethyl-4,4′-dimethyl-2,2′-methylenebis(pyrrole-5-carboxylate)

In the title compound, C31H34N2O4, the two pyrrole rings are bent around the central methyl­ene C atom, making a dihedral angle of 64.83 (7)°. In the crystal, mol­ecules are linked into dimers via N—H⋯O=C hydrogen bonds. These dimers are packed through π⋯π inter­actions between neighboring pyrrole rings with a separation between the mean planes of symmetry-related pyrrole rings of 3.61 (2) Å and a centroid–centroid distance of 4.33 Å. Parallel phenyl groups in neighboring dimers also exhibit efficient π⋯π inter­actions, characterized by an inter­plane separation of 3.378 (8) Å and a centroid–centroid distance of 3.97 Å

Synthesis, crystallographic characterization and homogeneous catalytic activity of novel unsymmetric porphyrins

Unsymmetric porphyrins, containing both pentafluorophenyl (PFP = A) and 3,4-dimethoxyphenyl (DMP = B) substituents at the meso positions, were prepared using Lindsey's methodology. The isomeric trans-A2B2 (P1) and cis-A2B2 (P2) porphyrins together with the tris(pentafluorophenyl)porphyrin A3B (P3) were isolated using chromatography. The porphyrins were characterized by UV-VIS, 1H NMR spectroscopy, mass spectrometry, elemental analysis (C, H, N) and cyclic voltammetry (CV), and their molecular structures were confirmed by single crystal XRD. Their manganese complexes, MnP1, MnP2 and MnP3, were also synthesised and used as catalysts in cyclooctene and cyclohexane oxidation reactions under homogeneous conditions. The catalytic studies were supported by electrochemical measurements and showed that the number of electron-withdrawing substituents on the porphyrins rings influences the catalytic activity. These porphyrins may be used as precursors for the design of new materials, such as Polymers of Intrinsic Microporosity (PIMs)

Strategies of regioselective chemical modification of particles : towards inverse patchy colloids

Les structures colloïdales préparées par auto-assemblage ont des applications potentielles dans les domaines de la photonique, de l’électronique ou du diagnostic. L’auto-assemblage colloïdal permet une fabrication plus facile et plus économique par rapport aux méthodes de fabrication standard basées sur des approches descendantes. Cependant, cette approche ascendante est actuellement limitée par les blocs de construction disponibles, qui sont pour la plupart sphériques et par les interactions entre ces derniers, qui sont pour la plupart isotropes. Pour élargir la gamme de blocs de construction utilisables, une approche émergente consiste à décorer la surface des particules colloïdales avec des "patchs" pour leurs conférer des "instructions" prédéterminées pour guider leur assemblage. Cette étude porte sur la synthèse de micro- et nanoparticules à patchs inverses, en exploitant trois voies de modification régiosélective de la surface de colloïdes. La première voie a consisté en la fabrication de nanoparticules hybrides silice/polystyrène de type bipodes par polymérisation en émulsion ensemencée et à leur conversion en nanoparticules à patchs nodulaires. La seconde stratégie, similaire à la précédente, a quant à elle été basée sur l’utilisation de bipodes micrométriques obtenus par polymérisation en dispersion comme précurseurs. La troisième voie repose sur l’usage de masques métalliques fabriqués par électrodéposition. La dissolution sélective et séquentielle des masques entrecoupée par la fonctionnalisation régiosélective de la zone non protégée de la surface des particules nous a permis de synthétiser des microparticules à patchsColloidal structures prepared by self-assembly find applications in photonic devices, nanoscale electronicsand miniature diagnostic systems. This colloidal self-assembly enables easier and cost-effective fabrication comparedto standard fabrication methods based on top-down approaches such as optical lithography. However, this bottom-upapproach is limited by the available building blocks that are mostly spherical and by the interactions between them,which are mostly isotropic. To expand the range of building units, one emerging approach is to engineer the surfaceof the colloidal particles with “patches” to confer particles predetermined “instructions” for assembly. In this work,we focus on the synthesis of inverse patchy particles, that consist of charged patches that repeal each other andthat are attracted by the rest of the particle. We will first describe that binary bipods, which consist in a silicananoparticle surrounded by two polystyrene nodules, can be produced with a yield higher than 80 % by seededemulsion polymerization. The dissolution of the PS nodules allowed us to produce patchy particles. In our secondstrategy based on a similar approach for microparticles, binary bipods were synthezised trough two routes by seededdispersion polymerization with a yield higher than 70 % in large quantities and some of them have been derivatedinto patchy particles. Another route to fabricate patchy microparticles was developed by creating sacrificial metallicmasks by electrodeposition. The selective and sequential dissolution of the masks interspersed by the regioselectivefunctionalization of unmasqued area of particles allowed us to fabricate patchy particles

Strategies of regioselective chemical modification of particles : towards inverse patchy colloids

Les structures colloïdales préparées par auto-assemblage ont des applications potentielles dans les domaines de la photonique, de l’électronique ou du diagnostic. L’auto-assemblage colloïdal permet une fabrication plus facile et plus économique par rapport aux méthodes de fabrication standard basées sur des approches descendantes. Cependant, cette approche ascendante est actuellement limitée par les blocs de construction disponibles, qui sont pour la plupart sphériques et par les interactions entre ces derniers, qui sont pour la plupart isotropes. Pour élargir la gamme de blocs de construction utilisables, une approche émergente consiste à décorer la surface des particules colloïdales avec des "patchs" pour leurs conférer des "instructions" prédéterminées pour guider leur assemblage. Cette étude porte sur la synthèse de micro- et nanoparticules à patchs inverses, en exploitant trois voies de modification régiosélective de la surface de colloïdes. La première voie a consisté en la fabrication de nanoparticules hybrides silice/polystyrène de type bipodes par polymérisation en émulsion ensemencée et à leur conversion en nanoparticules à patchs nodulaires. La seconde stratégie, similaire à la précédente, a quant à elle été basée sur l’utilisation de bipodes micrométriques obtenus par polymérisation en dispersion comme précurseurs. La troisième voie repose sur l’usage de masques métalliques fabriqués par électrodéposition. La dissolution sélective et séquentielle des masques entrecoupée par la fonctionnalisation régiosélective de la zone non protégée de la surface des particules nous a permis de synthétiser des microparticules à patchsColloidal structures prepared by self-assembly find applications in photonic devices, nanoscale electronicsand miniature diagnostic systems. This colloidal self-assembly enables easier and cost-effective fabrication comparedto standard fabrication methods based on top-down approaches such as optical lithography. However, this bottom-upapproach is limited by the available building blocks that are mostly spherical and by the interactions between them,which are mostly isotropic. To expand the range of building units, one emerging approach is to engineer the surfaceof the colloidal particles with “patches” to confer particles predetermined “instructions” for assembly. In this work,we focus on the synthesis of inverse patchy particles, that consist of charged patches that repeal each other andthat are attracted by the rest of the particle. We will first describe that binary bipods, which consist in a silicananoparticle surrounded by two polystyrene nodules, can be produced with a yield higher than 80 % by seededemulsion polymerization. The dissolution of the PS nodules allowed us to produce patchy particles. In our secondstrategy based on a similar approach for microparticles, binary bipods were synthezised trough two routes by seededdispersion polymerization with a yield higher than 70 % in large quantities and some of them have been derivatedinto patchy particles. Another route to fabricate patchy microparticles was developed by creating sacrificial metallicmasks by electrodeposition. The selective and sequential dissolution of the masks interspersed by the regioselectivefunctionalization of unmasqued area of particles allowed us to fabricate patchy particles

Electrodeposited Negative Index Metamaterials with Visible and Near Infrared Response

Negative index metamaterials have revolutionized the field of photonics because of their unconventional electromagnetic properties absent in naturally occurring materials. It remains a challenge however, to achieve strong negative refractive index at optical frequencies over large areas in a device compatible fashion. In this work, a scalable method for the straightforward production of fishnet‐like negative index metamaterials combining soft nanoimprinting and electrodeposition is reported. In four simple steps, 2D arrays of pillars surrounded by metal–insulator–metal stacks made of gold and air gaps are created. The proper design of the geometrical features leads to negative indices from the visible to the near infrared, with values from ‐1.2 at 700 nm to ‐2.8 at 910 nm. The metamaterials are prepared on transparent conductive electrodes hence ready for device implementation. In addition, the nanostructures display high optical quality, which is corroborated with numerical simulations under normal and oblique incidence. As a proof of concept, the accessibility to the porosity of the metamaterial by studying the spectral changes produced when infiltrating different liquids through the metallic layers is demonstrated. The resonant wavelength increasing with the refractive index of the media makes the metamaterials potential platforms for both negative index structures and optical sensors.This work was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness (MINECO) through grant MAT2016‐79053‐P, the excellence program SEV‐2015‐0496, Generalitat de Catalunya program AGAUR 2017‐SGR‐00488, and by the French National Research Agency (ANR) as part of the program Initiative for Excellence IdEx Bordeaux (ANR‐10‐IDEX‐03‐02). This project received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 and innovation program (grant number 637116, ENLIGHTMENT).Peer reviewe