Six Degrees of Alteration: The obstacles soldier memoirs face in their quest to convey an experience of war

ABSTRACT Soldier memoirs have been used as an historical source for centuries. Their factual accuracy is less than that of official reports and histories that incorporate a wide range of sources, but they have become valued as a means to gain insight into the mindset of soldiers and have some of their experience transmitted to the reader. The experience transmitted to the reader is altered vastly from what the soldier experienced directly, due to the nature of human perception, memory, and the process of writing down his or her thoughts. This paper proposes a conceptual framework to assist in tracking the amount of distortion from the original event. This model is called the six degrees of alteration, in which the reader takes an active role during the final stage. This paper uses the memoirs written by Dieppe veterans to chart changes from the experience of battle, through the writing process, and ending with the reader. One memoir in particular, that of Clifford Sewell, provides the main vehicle for examining this process, due to the additional material accompanying it. Some of his handwritten notes, plus an interview with his daughter who transcribed it, allow for an especially in-depth analysis of the role played by the editor in shaping the final product. Although Clifford’s goal of warning future generations about the horrors of war remains evident, the message is made less effective due to the editorial changes. It becomes clear that when reading military memoirs, the message is not solely due to what the soldier chose to convey

The Biocomplexity Project

Due to the character of the original source materials and the nature of batch digitization, quality control issues may be present in this document. Please report any quality issues you encounter to [email protected], referencing the URI of the item.Includes bibliographical references (leaf 48).The ultimate goal of the Texas A&M Biocomplexity Project is to numerically and visually simulate a complete chemical mechanism for a simplified cell. It will incorporate the rapidly growing knowledge about cellular components, and will highlight some of the emergent properties arising from the interactions among these components, providing a greater understanding of certain cellular processes. This thesis describes the completed work with which I have been involved in this project, including several related subproblems. A complete set of chemical reactions was written to model selected metabolic and cell-cycle processes in the simplest prokaryotes. A computer program was written to read, analyze, and stochastically simulate such mechanisms, and a 3D computer animation was produced to visualize the cell-cycle reactions. In order to better understand the properties of regulation in a cell, six mechanisms were written and analyzed mathematically. The models examined the effects of negative feedback, cooperativity, oligomerization, transcription, and transcription feedback on the sensitivity of the binding of a protein to its gene and on the range of synthesis and degradation "perturbments" the system could tolerate. A data-fitting program was developed using a searching algorithm known as simulated annealing in order to find values of rate constants that best fit data for the desired realistic behavior of the mechanical cell. This algorithm was used to fit experimental data involving the enzyme acetyl CoA synthase (which is present in simple chemoautotrophic prokaryotes) to mechanistic models. Therefore, the groundwork has been laid for the project. An initial mechanism has been written, a program is available to simulate it, regulatory mechanisms are better understood, and a method to fit concentration data has been established. The next step is to divide the system into modules, incorporating the best regulatory mechanisms, and to fit each model to realistic data and link the solved, regulated modules into a complete system

Macro to Nano: Scaling Effects of Bi2Te3 Thermoelectric Generators for Applications in Space

For decades research and development has been committed to improving the Figure of Merit (ZT) of Bismuth Telluride (Bi2Te3) Thermoelectric Generators (TEG) and has reached its limit at ≈1. This Meta-study aims to determine if further improvements can be made when the size of TEGs decrease. To quantify the change from macro to nano scale the change in ZT, thermal and electrical conductance, Seebeck coefficient and power factor as the size of the thermoelements decrease has been investigated as well as how Wiedemann-Franz (WF) law holds on the nanoscale. This meta-study was conducted by evaluating and comparing developments in TEGs for the past three decades.    Based on theory it was expected that increases in ZT would occur as the thermoelement dimensions are reduced due to increased scattering of electrons and phonons as well as the increased density of electronic states. Increases to ZT due to these effects was not observed in experimental data due to difficulties in nanoscale production. This meta-study observed some indicators that the theory is correct in reduced thermal conduction from increased phonon and electron scattering and that phonon scattering was greater than electron scattering. Furthermore, a weak indication that WF law is not applicable on the nanoscale due to the scattering suggesting a decoupling of electrical and thermal conduction which is not achievable in macro scale TEG

A Comparison of Physical Activity Between Home-Based and Centre-Based Pulmonary Rehabilitation:A Randomised Controlled Secondary Analysis

Background: Pulmonary rehabilitation (PR) is a highly effective intervention for individuals with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Physical activity (PA) has been shown to increase after a centre-based programme, yet it is not clear if a home-based programme can offer the same benefit. This study aimed to evaluate the effect of home-based PR compared with the centre-based PR on the PA levels post 7 weeks of PR and 6 months follow-up.Method: In this study, 51 participants with COPD, of them, 36 (71%) men completed physical activity monitoring with a SenseWear Armband, at three time points (baseline, 7 weeks, and 6 months). The participants were randomly assigned to either centre-based supervised PR (n = 25; 69 ± 6 years; FEV1 55 ± 20% predicted) or home-based PR (n = 26; 68 ± 7 years; FEV1 42 ± 19% predicted) programmes lasting 7 weeks. The home-based programme includes one hospital visit, a self-management manual, and two telephone calls. The PA was measured as step count, time in moderate PA (3–6 metabolic equivalent of tasks [METs]) in bouts of more than 10 min and sedentary time (<2 METs).Results: Home-based PR increased step count significantly more than the centre-based PR after 7 weeks (mean difference 1,463 steps: 95% CI 280–2,645, p = 0.02). There was no difference in time spent in moderate PA was observed (mean difference 62 min: 95% CI −56 to 248, p = 0.24). Sedentary behaviour was also significantly different between the centre and home-based groups. The home group spent 52 min less time sedentary compared with the centre-based (CI −106 to 2, p = 0.039). However, after 6 months, the step count and time spent in moderate PA returned to baseline in both the groups.Conclusion: This study provides an important insight into the role of home-based PR which has the potential to be offered as an alternative to the centre-based PR. Understanding who may best respond from the centre or home-based PR warrants further exploration and how to maintain these initial benefits for the long-term.Trial Registry: ISRCTN: No.: ISRCTN81189044; URL: isrctn.com

Investigating the effectiveness of the Mediterranean diet in pregnant women for the primary prevention of asthma and allergy in high-risk infants: protocol for a pilot randomised controlled trial

This research is funded by the Chief Scientist Office of The Scottish Government/Chief Medical Officer Directorate (Grant CZG/2/558). The authors would like to acknowledge the staff involved in the NHS ethical and research and development review processes, and staff at the Health Records Department of the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary for their help in getting the recruitment material to potential participants. The staff at the ultrasound/X-ray clinics at the two NHS Lothian sites where the participants are met by the researcher are most helpful and accommodating. The authors thank Anne Galloway (dietitian) who, when available, is delivering the intervention at one of the sites. They would also like to thank the participants for volunteering to take part, Dr Rob Elton the independent statistician, and Julia Clark (dietitian), Dr Ulugbek Nurmatov (researcher), and our Consumer Involvement Group for their input.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Understanding the National Student Survey: investigations in languages, linguistics and area studies

This report is a summary of interviews and focus groups with around 100 students and 50 members of academic staff in departments of languages, linguistics or area studies at nine universities in the UK. In recent years, concerns have been expressed about the ambiguity of some of the statements which students are asked to respond to in the National Student Survey (NSS). This project set out to get a better understanding of how students and staff understand the questions. The interviews and focus groups were carried out by members of academic staff at the nine institutions who each then wrote an individual report of their findings. This summary is designed to enable wider distribution of these findings without identifying individual staff, institutions `or departments

Enhancing the Functionality of a Microscale Bioreactor System as an Industrial Process Development Tool for Mammalian Perfusion Culture

Without a scale-down model for perfusion, high resource demand makes cell line screening or process development challenging; therefore potentially successful cell lines or perfusion processes are unrealised and their ability untapped. We present here the re-functioning of a high capacity microscale system that is typically employed in fed-batch process development to allow perfusion operation utilising in situ gravity settling and automated sampling. In this low resource setting, which involved routine perturbations in mixing, pH and dissolved oxygen concentrations, the specific productivity and the maximum cell concentration were higher than 3.0x106 mg/cell/day and 7x107 cells/ml, respectively, across replicate microscale perfusion runs conducted at one vessel volume exchange per day. A comparative analysis was conducted at bench scale with vessels operated in perfusion mode utilising a cell retention device. Neither specific productivity nor product quality indicated by product aggregation [6%] was significantly different across scales 19 days post inoculation, thus demonstrating this setup to be a suitable and reliable platform for evaluating the performance of cell lines and the effect of process parameters relevant to perfusion mode of culturing