A Military Force on a Political Mission: The Brazilian Expeditionary Force in World War II

Despite declarations of war from several Latin American nations, The Brazilian Expeditionary Force was the only representative from the region to contribute to Allied combat operations on the European continent. The first contingent of men sailed from Rio de Janeiro on July 2, 1944, one year later, after more than two hundred days in continuous contact with enemy forces in northern Italy, the febianos (Footnote 1) returned to Brazil as national heroes. Brazil\u27s wartime alliance with the United States was a calculated risk. Brazilian President/Dictator Getulio Dornelles Vargas and his advisors believed the alliance would guarantee Brazil the economic assistance it needed to industrialize its economy and provide the weapons necessary to transform the weak Brazilian military. The FEB was one of many instruments Vargas utilized to enhance Brazil\u27s international position. As Letícia Pinheiro, a professor at the Institute of International Relations of the Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro (PUC-Rio) explained, The FEB was the core of a political project to strengthen the Armed Forces and provide Brazil with a globally prominent position as an ally of the United States. (Footnote 2) Vargas and his Foreign Minister Oswaldo Euclydes de Sousa Aranha were aware of recent Brazilian history. They knew that although Brazil declared war on the central powers in 1917, it did not send troops to Europe. In the 1920s consequently, Brazilian efforts to secure greater international prestige never blossomed; in 1926, a frustrated Brazil withdrew from the League of Nations. On Monday May 21, 1928, Time Magazine reported on its withdrawal stating: The Secretariat of the League of Nations reluctantly made public, last week, a note dated one month previous in which the Brazilian Government of Premier Octavio Mangabeira reaffirmed Brazil\u27s intention to withdraw from League membership in June 1928. In serving the original notice of withdrawal, two years ago, Brazil was joined by Spain because both nations felt that they should be accorded permanent seats on the Council of the League of Nations, at the time when Germany was admitted to the League and given a permanent Council seat (TIME, June 21, 1926). (Footnote 3) Brazilian leaders that rose to power in the 1930s must have felt that World War II provided Brazil unique opportunities to achieve the status it had failed in attain two decades earlier. They believed that if Brazil offered a sacrifice of blood it would acquire increased international respect and a prominent seat at the peace table. This thesis studies Brazilian participation in World War II, through an examination of the Brazilian Expeditionary Force. It argues that although the FEB was a military force, its mission was fundamentally political; the ever-changing political climate in Brazil repeatedly influenced the mission of the expeditionary force. What was that mission? As Leticia Pinheiro argued, its mission was to, strengthen the Armed Forces and provide Brazil with a globally prominent position as an ally of the United States. (Footnote 4) How was the FEB to accomplish this objective and was it successful? For the FEB, success was contingent upon its ability to organize, train, deploy, engage enemy forces, and attain victories on the battlefield while strengthening Brazil\u27s image on the international stage. This paper uses a chronological narrative to analyze its mission and show that the bold foreign policy objectives of Vargas and domestic political unrest directly affected the organization, combat mission, and the decision to demobilize the expeditionary force rapidly. (Footnote 1: This is the most common nickname for members of the Expeditionary Force. Footnote 2: Carlos Haag, For whom did the snake smoke? Studies show the importance of Brazil\u27s participation in the Second World War, Pesquisa (online), November 2010. http://revistapesquisa.fapesp.br/?art=2867&bd=1&pg=1&lg=en (accessed May 1, 2011). Footnote 3: The League of Nations: Brazil Out, Time Magazine, May 21, 1928. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,731754,00.html (accessed May 2, 2011). Footnote 4: Haag, For Whom did the Snake Smoke .

Development of Future Habitat Suitability Models for the Swift fox (Vulpes velox) in the American Southwest

The Swift fox (Vupes velox) is a habitat specialist species of short or mixed grass prairie. We used bioclimatic envelope models and habitat suitability models under three future climate scenarios (based on CO2 emission rates) from "www.climatewizard.org":http://www.climatewizard.org to fit species distribution models, using the maximum entropy method. Current suitable habitat for the swift fox covers an area of 161,984 km2. Under the future climate scenarios the habitat decreases by 27% in the low emission scenario, 63% for medium emissions, and 53% in the high emissions scenario. This decrease in suitable habitat corresponded to an overall decrease in total grassland landcover. The current total area of grassland is 423,440 km2. Under the future climate scenarios the grassland decreased by 12% in the low emissions scenario, 24% for medium emissions, and 16% in the high emissions scenario

Site of Accessory Pathway Block After Radiofrequency Catheter Ablation in Patients with the Wolff-Parkinson-White Syndrome

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/73717/1/j.1540-8167.1994.tb01111.x.pd

An exploration of occupation in nursing home residents with dementia

Objectives: This study evaluated the sitting room environment of two nursing homes in Ireland, using interactive occupation and social engagement as outcome measures and defining these rooms as occupational spaces. Method: Snapshot observational recordings were made in the main sitting rooms during the periods of time when the rooms were in most active use. Narrative information was also recorded. Results: Residents were more likely to occupy their time in the main sitting room passively, rather than in interactive occupation and social engagement. The nursing home residents with dementia spent approximately 70% of their daily time in the main sitting room areas in states of occupational disengagement. Discussion: Additional insight is provided through pragmatic narrative descriptions of the functioning of the main sitting room environment in terms of interactive occupation and social engagement. Relevance: The research study demonstrates a methodology for evaluating the sitting room areas of a care environment, using interactive occupation and social engagement as outcome measures,which can be used for descriptive and comparative insights into the performance of care environments

Effect of Dietary Phosphorus on Finishing Steer Performance, Bone Status, and Carcass Maturity

Yearling crossbred steers (n = 60; 386 kg) were individually fed in a completely randomized experimental design to determine their P requirement. Treatments were in a factorial arrangement with two levels of Ca (.35 or .70% of DM) and five concentrations of P (.14, .19, .24, .29, or .34% of DM). The finishing diet consisted of 34.5% dry-rolled corn, 22.5% brewers grits, 22.5% corn bran, 7.5% ground corncobs, 5% molasses, 3% fat, and 5% supplement. Supplemental P was provided as monosodium phosphate and Ca as limestone. Ash content was determined on the first phalanx bone from the lower front legs following slaughter, and rib bone breaking strength was determined with an Instron Universal Testing Machine. Carcass maturity and shear force were also evaluated on wholesale rib cuts. Because no interactions between Ca and P levels were detected, only main effects are presented. Daily gain, DMI, and feed efficiency were not affected by dietary P concentration or P intake. Bone ash (g or g/ 100 kg BW) and rib bone breaking strength were also unaffected by dietary P. Feeding .7% Ca decreased (P \u3c &#;.06) ADG and efficiency compared with feeding .35% Ca. Neither dietary Ca nor P had a significant effect on tenderness (shear force), skeletal maturity, or overall maturity. These results indicate that the P requirement for finishing yearlings is .14% of diet DM or less and that supplementing P above levels supplied by basal ingredients in many grain-based finishing diets is not necessary

Detection-Loophole-Free Test of Quantum Nonlocality, and Applications

We present a source of entangled photons that violates a Bell inequality free of the "fair-sampling" assumption, by over 7 standard deviations. This violation is the first experiment with photons to close the detection loophole, and we demonstrate enough "efficiency" overhead to eventually perform a fully loophole-free test of local realism. The entanglement quality is verified by maximally violating additional Bell tests, testing the upper limit of quantum correlations. Finally, we use the source to generate secure private quantum random numbers at rates over 4 orders of magnitude beyond previous experiments.Comment: Main text: 5 pages, 2 figures, 1 table. Supplementary Information: 7 pages, 2 figure

Strongly Variable z=1.48 FeII and MgII Absorption in the Spectra of z=4.05 GRB 060206

We report on the discovery of strongly variable FeII and MgII absorption lines seen at z=1.48 in the spectra of the z=4.05 GRB 060206 obtained between 4.13 to 7.63 hours (observer frame) after the burst. In particular, the FeII line equivalent width (EW) decayed rapidly from 1.72+-0.25 AA to 0.28+-0.21 AA, only to increase to 0.96+-0.21 AA in a later date spectrum. The MgII doublet shows even more complicated evolution: the weaker line of the doublet drops from 2.05+-0.25 AA to 0.92+-0.32 AA, but then more than doubles to 2.47+-0.41 AA in later data. The ratio of the EWs for the MgII doublet is also variable, being closer to 1:1 (saturated regime) when the lines are stronger and becoming closer to 2:1 (unsaturated regime) when the lines are weaker, consistent with expectations based on atomic physics. We have investigated and rejected the possibility of any instrumental or atmospheric effects causing the observed strong variations. Our discovery of clearly variable intervening FeII and MgII lines lends very strong support to their scenario, in which the characteristic size of intervening patches of MgII ``clouds'' is comparable to the GRB beam size, i.e, about 10^16 cm. We discuss various implications of this discovery, including the nature of the MgII absorbers, the physics of GRBs, and measurements of chemical abundances from GRB and quasar absorption lines.Comment: 14 pages, 3 figures, 1 table; ApJ Letters, accepte

Longitudinal associations between conflict monitoring and emergent academic skills: An event‐related potentials study

Identifying the links between specific cognitive functions and emergent academic skills can help determine pathways to support both early academic performance and later academic achievement. Here, we investigated the longitudinal associations between a key aspect of cognitive control, conflict monitoring, and emergent academic skills from preschool through first grade, in a large sample of socioeconomically diverse children (N = 261). We recorded event‐related potentials (ERPs) during a Go/No‐Go task. The neural index of conflict monitoring, ΔN2, was defined as larger N2 mean amplitudes for No‐Go versus Go trials. ΔN2 was observed over the right hemisphere across time points and showed developmental stability. Cross‐lagged panel models revealed prospective links from ΔN2 to later math performance, but not reading performance. Specifically, larger ΔN2 at preschool predicted higher kindergarten math performance, and larger ΔN2 at kindergarten predicted higher first‐grade math performance, above and beyond the behavioral performance in the Go/No‐Go task. Early academic skills did not predict later ΔN2. These findings provided electrophysiological evidence for the contribution of conflict monitoring abilities to emergent math skills. In addition, our findings suggested that neural indices of cognitive control can provide additional information in predicting emergent math skills, above and beyond behavioral task performance.Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/149228/1/dev21809.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/149228/2/dev21809_am.pd

Spectroscopic Discovery of the Supernova 2003dh Associated with GRB 030329

We present early observations of the afterglow of the Gamma-Ray Burst (GRB) 030329 and the spectroscopic discovery of its associated supernova SN 2003dh. We obtained spectra of the afterglow of GRB 030329 each night from March 30.12 (0.6 days after the burst) to April 8.13 (UT) (9.6 days after the burst). The spectra cover a wavelength range of 350 nm to 850 nm. The early spectra consist of a power-law continuum (F_nu ~ nu^{-0.9}) with narrow emission lines originating from HII regions in the host galaxy, indicating a low redshift of z=0.1687. However, our spectra taken after 2003 Apr. 5 show broad peaks in flux characteristic of a supernova. Correcting for the afterglow emission, we find the spectrum of the supernova is remarkably similar to the type Ic `hypernova' SN 1998bw. While the presence of supernovae have been inferred from the light curves and colors of GRB afterglows in the past, this is the first direct, spectroscopic confirmation that a subset of classical gamma-ray bursts originate from supernovae.Comment: published by ApJ Letters; additional material avilable at http://cfa-www.harvard.edu/cfa/oir/Research/GRB