Qua Re qui possum non esse popularis: The representation of Populares in the Late Roman Republic.

The terms popularis and optimate have been employed in both ancient and modern literature to interpret late Roman Republican politics. The purpose of this work is to express the diversity and change of the popularis label from 133 to 88 B.C. as a consequence of developing political practices. A chronological assessment of five key popularis tribunes in this period; Ti. Sempronius Gracchus, G. Sempronius Gracchus, L. Appuleius Saturninus, M. Livius Drusus and P. Sulpicius Rufus determines the variation in political methodologies exploited by these men in response to an optimate opposition. An assessment of Cicero’s works then considers how the discrepancies exhibited by these politicians could be manipulated for oratorical advantage. This subsequently reveals the perception of pre-Sullan populares in the time of Cicero, a generation later. This work ultimately aims to demonstrate the individualistic nature of late Republican politicians, the evolution of political practice in the period and the diverse employment of political labels in contemporary sources

New manufacturing techniques for antennas

This paper is a discussion of new manufacturing techniques for antennas. Many existing manufacturing methods, including conductive ink printing, plastic plating, hot foil printing, etching, sintering and die cutting, are investigated to determine their usefulness in the manufacture of antennas. The advantages and disadvantages of each are discussed, and the most promising method—plating on plastic—is further analysed. The method of adapting the plating technique so that it can be used for antennas is discussed. Two prototype antennas (a PIFA and omni antenna) were manufactured to test the plating method’s effectiveness as a manufacturing technique for antennas. Results showed a frequency shifted VSWR pattern for the PIFA antenna of 10% on each notch. The gain plot for the omni antenna showed a higher gain for the plated antenna at a frequency shifted by approximately 0.4 GHz. A cost analysis was also performed to complete the investigation of the new manufacturing method. A saving of up to 4 000% can be realised on the substrate material, and the metal costs can be lowered by 700% for each PIFA antenna

Cultural Resources Reconnaissance-Level Survey of the LCRA–SAWS Water Project Colorado, Matagorda, and Wharton Counties, Texas

Atkins conducted a reconnaissance-level cultural resources survey and constraints analysis on behalf of the Lower Colorado River Authority (LCRA) and the San Antonio Water System (SAWS). The LCRASAWS Water Project (LSWP) was a partnership aimed at developing a plan to provide a reliable water supply (up to 150,000 acre-feet/year) to San Antonio for 40 years, with an option for 30 additional years, and to provide a more reliable long-term water supply for the lower Colorado River basin while protecting and benefiting said river basin. The purpose of this study was to assist LCRA and SAWS in their compliance with the Antiquities Code of Texas and Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act (NHPA) of 1966, as amended. The records review was performed by professional archeologists meeting the Secretary of the Interior standards and identified potential cultural resources that may be encountered by the proposed project. A reconnaissance-level survey was performed by archeologists and professional historians to verify the results of the records review and to identify any additional resources observed in the field. Participants included Clell Bond, Michael Nash, Meg Cruise, Wayne Glander, Tricia Blackistone, Sally Victor, and Robert Rogers. Atkins obtained Antiquities Permit No. 3797 in compliance with the Antiquities Code of Texas to conduct the survey. This permit was for an intensive survey; however, the project was cancelled before one occurred. Because the exact size of the footprint of the potential infrastructure was never finalized, the archeological resources assessment initially focused on a study area spanning three counties. Eventually, the study area was narrowed to a handful of potential sites, but a final alignment or reservoir locations were never determined. The project shut down before the intensive survey began; therefore, the entire project area will need to be surveyed archeologically should the project resume in the future

Hypnotic Age Regression and the Occurrence of Transitional Object Relationships

A transitional object, as defined by object-relation theorists is the first treasured possession of the infant (teddy bear, blanket, etc.) usually first appearing in the second half of the first year, and terminating between the ages of four and six. Object relations theory and subsequent empirical investigations have demonstrated that, for almost all three year old children, the relationship with the transitional object: is spontaneously desired during periods of isolation and mild stress, is characterized by attachment to a specific object, and is affectively intense. The present study used these three characteristics of the three year old child\u27s mode of object relating, to test the validity of hypnotic age regression; this problem was approached by assessing the adequacy of a conceptualization of hypnotic age regression based solely on motivated response to demand characteristics. Using a real-simulating design, it was hypothesized that high susceptible, hypnotised subjects, when regressed to age three and presented with stress situations, should produce spontaneous, specific, and affectively intense relationships with a transitional object. It was further hypothesized that low susceptible, simulating controls, when presented with an otherwise identical experimental treatment, would be less able to approximate these three age appropriate responses. Results indicated that on all three variables, spontaneity, specificity and intensity, hypnotised subjects behaved in a significantly more age appropriate manner than the Simula tin;.\u27, controls. These results suggest the inadequacy of a taskmotivation conceptualization of hypnosis, and further, suggest, but do not establish, the existence of a trance component in hypnosis

Wittgenstein and Aesthetic Reasoning with Stories in the Bioethics Classroom

Wittgenstein once remarked that the same kind of reasoning that occurs in ordinary conversations about works of art can be found “in Ethics, but also in Philosophy.” That observation has been almost entirely overlooked by his commentators. What is aesthetic reasoning? What does it look like in conversations about art? And where might we find examples of such reasoning “in Ethics”? To set the stage for my answers, I begin with an overview of the early Wittgenstein’s view of ethics and aesthetics, emphasizing two ideas that were retained in his later view of aesthetic reasoning: the moral importance of non-moral descriptions, and the power of a “picture” to regulate action and thought. I illustrate those ideas by considering the moral influence of Tolstoy’s parable of the Good Samaritan on Wittgenstein. Next, I examine the passage in which Wittgenstein introduced aesthetic reasoning, and I articulate some general features of that concept. I also contend that we learn more about aesthetic reasoning by understanding Wittgenstein’s invention of the language-game concept as his reasoning aesthetically “in Philosophy.” Furthermore, I argue that the later Wittgenstein’s notions of aspect perception and grammatical pictures further inform aesthetic reasoning, revealing that it involves the introduction of grammar that can draw a person’s attention to unnoticed aspects of an object and equip him with further descriptions of that object. To illustrate that characterization of aesthetic reasoning, and to offer an example of such reasoning “in Ethics,” I return to Tolstoy’s parable and show that my interacting with it in a particular way involves aesthetic reasoning. Finally, I argue that aesthetic reasoning continues to occur in ethics in that it is woven into discussions of stories in bioethics classes. A student can have her grammatical picture of the case that a story presents reshaped as she sees and accepts aspects of that story that she had not noticed, and this, in turn, might influence her ways of seeing and responding morally to other cases. I close by considering whether aesthetic reasoning occurs in ethics in other ways, and I articulate some implications of my work for further Wittgenstein studies

Single-molecule and Single-cell Approaches in Molecular Bioengineering

Protein sequences inhabit a discrete set in macromolecular space with incredible capacity to treat human disease. Despite our ability to program and manipulate protein sequences, the vast majority of protein development efforts are still done heuristically without a unified set of guiding principles. This article highlights work in understanding biophysical stability and function of proteins, developing new biophysical measurement tools and building high-throughput screening platforms to explore functional protein sequences. We highlight two primary areas. First, molecular biomechanics is a subfield concerned with the response of proteins to mechanical forces, and how we can leverage mechanical force to control protein function. The second subfield investigates the use of polymers and hydrogels in protein engineering and directed evolution in pursuit of new molecular systems with therapeutic applications. These two subdisciplines complement each other by shedding light onto sequence and structural features that can be used to impart stability into therapeutic proteins

Analysis of an oscillating plate coupled with fluid

Thesis (M.S.) University of Alaska Fairbanks, 2013The mechanical vibration of an oscillating cantilever plate is studied to determine the interaction of a plate coupled with air and with water. Experimental data was collected and analyzed using multiple methods including Fast Fourier Transform, wavelet analysis, and the Hilbert-Huang Transform (HHT) to characterize the behavior of the plate. The HHT is able to process nonlinear and nonstationary signals and provides more meaningful information compared to the traditionally used Fourier transform for similar applications. The HHT was found to be appropriate and more descriptive for the analysis of coupled fluid-structure systems. Digital Particle Image Velocimetry (DPIV) was also used to analyze the circulation and energy transferred to the fluid.Chapter 1. Introduction -- Chapter 2. Method -- 2.1. Equipment setup -- 2.2. Data collection parameters -- 2.3. Analysis methods -- 2.3.1. Fast Fourier transform -- 2.3.2. Wavelet -- 2.3.3. Hilbert-Huang transform -- 2.3.4. Digital particle image velocimetry -- Chapter 3. Experiment -- 3.1. Design of experiment -- Chapter 4. Analysis -- 4.1. Raw data -- 4.2. Data analysis -- 4.2.1. Waveform -- 4.2.2. Fast Fourier transform -- 4.2.3. Wavelet -- 4.2.4. Hilbert-Huang transform -- 4.2.5. Digital particle image velocimetry -- Chapter 5. Conclusions -- References

Ethics in Times of Plague: Home Care, Obligations to Treat, End of Life, and Public Policies

Almost exclusively, clinical bioethicists pose and answer questions in the context of day-to-day, medical practice in the West. This setting abounds with therapeutic procedures, drugs, and other resources to restore comfort and health to persons who suffer. In making moral judgments, we focus on patients, attend at times to their families, and—most rarely—consider the well-being of the rest of society as it is affected by particular treatment decisions. Although this approach has resulted in a measure of moral progress with respect to our standard, clinical setting, it all but neglects the unique and compelling questions that arise in the context of an outbreak of a highly-virulent, infectious disease. In this setting—which I call the plague context—illness is acute, often violent and incurable, and persons who are infected necessarily pose a grave danger to those around them. In this paper, I examine a range of ethical questions in relationship to such an outbreak. Some of these questions are concerned with personal relationships (e.g. marriage, friendship) in the plague context. For example, when one member of a personal relationship is infected and the other is not, what is the specific nature of the responsibilities of each person in this situation? I argue that home care—which is the non-infected person’s caring for her infected loved one in the home—is consistent with the responsibilities that are entailed by their relationship. Furthermore, I contend that, under certain circumstances, their engaging in home care would be respectful toward the interests of the community and, as such, might be sanctioned justifiably by public policy. Next, I seek to assess the moral responsibilities of health professionals in the plague context, giving special attention both to the likelihood that their care will be effective and to the risks that their providing care would bring upon themselves. I propose that health professionals have no standing obligation either to treat or to comfort infected persons. However, I argue that it would be morally good (i.e. supererogatory) of health professionals to enter a contractual obligation to provide such care. This conclusion has implications for the ways in which health officials and administrators should prepare for outbreaks; these I address as well. Finally, I evaluate various courses of action that are open to an infected person as he nears the end of his life. I contend that, whenever it appears that he can avoid infecting others, he does not have a duty to take his own life. However, in light of the threat that he poses to others, there are many reasons that it would be morally good for a dying, infected person to commit suicide

Comparison of long-term CIDR-based protocols to synchronize estrus in postpartum beef cows

Title from PDF of title page (University of Missouri--Columbia, viewed on June 7, 2012).The entire thesis text is included in the research.pdf file; the official abstract appears in the short.pdf file; a non-technical public abstract appears in the public.pdf file.Thesis advisor: Dr. David J. PattersonVita.Includes bibliographical references.M.S. University of Missouri--Columbia 2011."December 2011"Estrus synchronization and artificial insemination are two of the most important management practices available to producers to increase reproductive performance in a beef cow-calf operation. Unfortunately, a small number of producers utilize these practices due to increased labor requirements. The use of fixed-time artificial insemination (FTAI) reduces the amount of time and labor required to detect estrus, leading to decreased input requirements. The following experiments were performed in order to compare the use of long-term controlled internal drug release (CIDR) insert-based estrus synchronization protocols prior to FTAI in estrous-cycling and anestrous postpartum beef cows. In experiments 1 and 2, two long-term CIDR-based estrus synchronization protocols were compared on the basis of physiological characteristics, including serum steroid hormone concentrations, estrous response, and follicular dynamics, as well as pregnancy rates resulting from FTAI. From these intensive trials, it was determined that both protocols yielded comparable pregnancy rates and similar physiological responses when used in postpartum beef cows. In experiment 3, the use of either a long- or short-term CIDR-based estrus synchronization protocol was compared prior to FTAI in a large-scale field trial. Results indicated that pregnancy rate resulting from FTAI was similar for both protocols. These data provide preliminary support for the use of long-term CIDR-based estrus synchronization protocols prior to FTAI in postpartum beef cows