Communicating Climate Change In Internet Discussion Fora: Processes and Implications

Communicating climate change issues in the Internet era requires new strategies that incorporate online communication. The rapid growth of new media and widespread use of the internet has marked everyday lifestyles in modern society. Information on a wide range of social issues, including climate change, is disseminated and debated through online discussions in internet fora. In this research, communication on internet fora and other potential forms of online social interaction are explored, to identify ways to enhance climate change communication on the Internet. The thesis raises three research questions to explore the communication context of internet fora discussion, namely: what are characteristics of the communication process on internet fora? Who is involved in the communication process? What influences do these online communication activities have on users’ everyday activities? The research applies a mixed-methods approach of analysing the usage of Internet fora and the contents of fora communication activities to explore these questions. This includes qualitative reviews of topic-thread discussions to reveal users’ roles in discussions, as well as surveys of fora users. It is argued that with increasing levels of interaction among communicators (people who post or reply to articles in order to express or respond ideas) on internet fora, these communicators are mobilised to join the online discussion process, competing for opinion leadership. The online discussions further contribute to the formation of opinions on climate change, as climate change and related issues are discussed The thesis thereby aims to contribute to the development of effective approaches for opinion formation and climate change communication online, and to encourage individuals to discuss changing behaviour patterns and public engagement of greenhouse gas reduction actions

Exponential inequalities for exit times for stochastic Navier-Stokes equations and a class of evolutions

Exponential estimates for exit from a ball of radius r by time T for solutions of the two-dimensional stochastic Navier-Stokes equations are first derived, and then studied in the context of Freidlin-Wentzell type large deviations principle. The existence of a similar estimate is discussed for a suitable class of stochastic evolution equations with multiplicative noise

Oxygen Vacancy Induced Ferromagnetism in V2_2O5−x_{5-x}

{\it Ab initio} calculations within density functional theory with generalized gradient approximation have been performed to study the effects of oxygen vacancies on the electronic structure and magnetism in undoped V$_2$O$_{5-x}$ ($0 < x < 0.5$). It is found that the introduction of oxygen vacancies would induce ferromagnetism in V$_2$O$_{5-x}$ with the magnetization being proportional to the O vacancy concentration $x$. The calculated electronic structure reveals that the valence electrons released by the introduction of oxygen vacancies would occupy mainly the neighboring V $d_{xy}$-dominant band which then becomes spin-polarized due to intra-atomic exchange interaction, thereby giving rise to the half-metallic ferromagnetism.Comment: To be published as a Letter in J. Phys. Soc. Japa

Observation of the stacking faults in In0.53Ga0.47As by electron channeling contrast imaging

The observation and interpretation of Frank stacking faults, Shockley stacking faults, Lomer dislocations, and 60 degrees misfit dislocations, which have similar line shapes in the (001) In0.53Ga0.47As crystalline surface, are performed with the electron channeling contrast imaging (ECCI) technique. To minimize the backscattered electron (BSE) contrast that resulted from the surface morphology, a relatively flat region is first selected and compared with an atomic force microscopy (AFM) image and then, subsequently, examining ECCI with transmission electron microscopy (TEM)-like invisibility criteria. By orthogonally choosing the diffraction vector g between (220) and (2-20), misfit dislocations seem to be always visible but partially faint in the g parallel to the line direction on the surface. With respect to the image contrast, Frank stacking faults and Lomer dislocations are likely to be completely invisible for parallel g. The criteria are further confirmed by cross-sectional TEM analysis, which shows a preferred homogeneous surface nucleation