The development of the notion of libraries in the ancient world with special reference to the Middle East, the Roman Republic and the Royal Alexandrian Library

Bibliography: leaves 252-256.The Royal Alexandrian Library (RAL) is considered by modern scholarship to represent the epitome of the development of ancient librarianship. Its extensive holdings imply the application of modern organizational procedures such as collection development, information retrieval and promotion of use - terms identifiable as elements embodied in the conceptual framework of librarianship (for the purposes of this study the latter two concepts - information retrieval and promotion of use - are combined into the simplified general concept of "collection accessibility"). The RAL therefore constitutes a key development phase in the evolution of modern librarianship. However, scholars have disputed the origins of the RAL and Mouseion or university it was attached to. The socalled "Greek thesis" emphasizes the purely Greek origins of both the Mouseion and the RAL. Conversely, the "Ptolemaic thesis", while acknowledging the Greek origins of the Mouseion, argues that the RAL (as an independent institution distinguishable from the Mouseion proper) is derived from Middle Eastern institutions. This study traces the origins of the RAL from the textual collections of the early Mediterranean and Middle Eastern civilizations, through the period of Greek and the subsequent Hellenistic cultural dominance - culminating in the legacy of Hellenistic librarianship as inherited by the Roman Republic, since the newly emerging Roman empire was to exert a deciding influence upon the historical development of the RAL. Within these civilizations and regions a brief overview is undertaken to gauge the extent of literacy and literary output prevalent in each as well as a general assessment of librarianship and library practices. The major and most noteworthy archival and book collections are then analysed according to the organizational procedures identified in the outlined conceptual framework of librarianship. For this purpose sufficient information has been obtained from archaeological evidence and primary and secondary sources to allow for the analysis of forty-three libraries throughout the ancient world. In this way predominantly Middle Eastern as well as Greek elements have been identified as contributing to the creation, organization and functioning of the RAL

Single nucleotide polymorphism array analysis in copy number variant detection: assessment of its feasibility in the diagnostic setting

Intellectual disability/developmental delay (ID/DD) is a significant problem in child health affecting 2 to 3% of the population worldwide. While the underlying aetiology of ID/DD in a large proportion (about 50%) of these patients is unknown, 15 to 20% of the internationally reported cases detected using microarray technologies are due to copy number variants (CNVs), whereas only 3 to 5% of ID/DD can be identified with conventional cytogenetics. The Affymetrix® Cytoscan™ High Density (HD) Array (Affymetrix, Santa Clara, CA) containing over 2.4 million markers for copy number (CN) was used to detect genome-wide high resolution CN and single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in a cohort of 27 carefully selected patient samples. The patient selection was done based on relevant phenotypes, which included dysmorphism, ID/DD, suspected syndromes, and family history. Data analysis was performed using the Affymetrix Chromosome Analysis Suite (ChAS) (Affymetrix, Santa Clara, CA, USA software). Seven of the patients demonstrated pathogenic CNVs. Diagnoses included Kleefstra syndrome, Mowat-Wilson syndrome, Wolf-Hirschhorn syndrome, tetrasomy 9p, and a susceptibility locus for neurodevelopmental disorders due to a deletion of chromosome 1q21.1. This indicated a 26% detection rate in this cohort. In addition, three variants of unknown significance (VOUS) were detected. The aim of this study was to determine the potential relevance and applicability of microarray technologies for the detection of CNVs in the Western Cape ID/DD population of South Africa (SA) and in so doing, to introduce and develop molecular cytogenetics skills in the routine diagnostic cytogenetic environment. The results obtained in this study confirmed the significant improvement in the detection rate of CNVs in patients with ID/DD and thus the diagnostic utility of this technology for the detection of CNVs in ID/DD patients was confirmed

Memory cell based on a φ\varphi Josephson junction

The $\varphi$ Josephson junction has a doubly degenerate ground state with the Josephson phases $\pm\varphi$. We demonstrate the use of such a $\varphi$ Josephson junction as a memory cell (classical bit), where writing is done by applying a magnetic field and reading by applying a bias current. In the "store" state, the junction does not require any bias or magnetic field, but just needs to stay cooled for permanent storage of the logical bit. Straightforward integration with Rapid Single Flux Quantum logic is possible.Comment: to be published in AP

Kranc: a Mathematica application to generate numerical codes for tensorial evolution equations

We present a suite of Mathematica-based computer-algebra packages, termed "Kranc", which comprise a toolbox to convert (tensorial) systems of partial differential evolution equations to parallelized C or Fortran code. Kranc can be used as a "rapid prototyping" system for physicists or mathematicians handling very complicated systems of partial differential equations, but through integration into the Cactus computational toolkit we can also produce efficient parallelized production codes. Our work is motivated by the field of numerical relativity, where Kranc is used as a research tool by the authors. In this paper we describe the design and implementation of both the Mathematica packages and the resulting code, we discuss some example applications, and provide results on the performance of an example numerical code for the Einstein equations.Comment: 24 pages, 1 figure. Corresponds to journal versio

The effect of normal and insulating layers on 0-πtransitions in Josephson junctions with a ferromagnetic barrier

Using the Usadel approach, we provide a formalism that allows us to calculate the critical current density of 21 different types of Josephson junctions (JJs) with a ferromagnetic (F) barrier and additional insulating (I) or/and normal (N) layers inserted between the F layer and superconducting (S) electrodes. In particular, we obtain that in SFS JJs, even a thin additional N layer between the S layer and F layer may noticeably change the thickness ${d}_{{\rm{F}}}$ of the F layer at which the 0-π transitions occur. For certain values of ${d}_{{\rm{F}}},$ a 0-π transition can even be achieved by changing only the N layer thickness. We use our model to fit experimental data of SIFS and SINFS tunnel junctions