Organizing for individuation: alternative organizing, politics and new identities

Organization theorists have predominantly studied identity and organizing within the managed work organization. This frames organization as a structure within which identity work occurs, often as a means of managerial control. In our paper our contribution is to develop the concept of individuation pursued through prefigurative practices within alternative organizing to reframe this relation. We combine recent scholarship on alternative organizations and new social movements to provide a theoretical grounding for an ethnographic study of the prefigurative organizing practices and related identity work of an alternative group in a UK city. We argue that in such groups, identity, organizing and politics become a purposeful set of integrated processes aimed at the creation of new forms of life in the here and now, thus organizing is politics is identity. Our study presents a number of challenges and possibilities to scholars of organization, enabling them to extend their understanding of organization and identity in the contemporary world

Regulation and Identity of Florigen: Flowering Locus T Moves Center Stage

The transition from vegetative to reproductive growth is controlled by day length in many plant species. Day length is perceived in leaves and induces a systemic signal, called florigen, that moves through the phloem to the shoot apex. At the shoot apical meristem (SAM), florigen causes changes in gene expression that reprogram the SAM to form flowers instead of leaves. Analysis of flowering of Arabidopsis thaliana placed the CONSTANS/FLOWERING LOCUS T (CO/FT) module at the core of a pathway that promotes flowering in response to changes in day length. We describe progress in defining the molecular mechanisms that activate this module in response to changing day length and the increasing evidence that FT protein is a major component of florigen. Finally, we discuss conservation of FT function in other species and how variation in its regulation could generate different flowering behaviors

“The dice are loaded”: Men’s Experiences of Help-Seeking for Female Perpetrated Domestic Abuse

A paucity of research investigating men as a group has been in observed in the psychological literature, and researchers have further highlighted the need for psychologists to better understand and attend to men’s mental health needs. This study explored the help-seeking experiences of male victims of female-perpetrated domestic abuse. Patterns observed in the literature on men’s help-seeking behaviour have uncovered consistent under-utilisation of mental health resources, as well as the presence of gender role and masculinity-related issues in how mental health issues are perceived and responded to. Various internal and external barriers to help-seeking in male victims of female-perpetrated domestic abuse have also been observed. Review of the relevant theory and literature produced a rationale for exploring male domestic abuse victims using an indepth, qualitative approach. This UK-based study investigated the help-seeking experiences of eight research participants via semi-structured interviews. The resultant data were analysed using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA), and produced five superordinate themes: ‘Blind spots’; ‘Reasons for pause’; ‘Vulnerability’; ‘Invalidation’; and ‘Finding help’. Findings were considered in the context of psychological theory and the current literature, with a focus on aspects of invisibility, masculinity and female privilege. The findings suggest that gender role-related tensions may be a salient issue in helpseeking for men abused by women, that representation of abused men in domestic abuse discourse needs to be increased, and that aspects of female privilege may be used against male victims by female abusers, which can have a detrimental impact on victims’ ability to access help. Clinical implications are discussed, which include the need to challenge stereotypes about domestic abuse, develop gender-informed interventions and harnessing positive aspects of masculinity in designing mental health interventions

Biodiversity offsets can be a valuable tool in achieving sustainable development: Developing a holistic model for biodiversity offsets that incorporates environmental, social and economic aspects of sustainable development

The interpretation and use of biodiversity offsets in planning and development is a contentious issue because they rarely encompass each of the environmental, social and economic aspects of sustainable development. While currently agreed best practice for biodiversity offsets includes consideration of scope, scale, location, timing and duration, and monitoring, current literature on these components does not consider all aspects of sustainable development. Furthermore, much of the current agreed best practice focusses on the design of biodiversity offsets, without consideration of ongoing management or end-of-life. This manuscript reviews current best practice for biodiversity offsets, giving consideration to the environmental, social and economic aspects of sustainable development. In particular, we report that consideration of cost and risk is key and the use of planning frameworks, bonds and advanced offsets could mitigate these risks and allow for long-term success. Following this approach, a holistic model for design, implementation and ongoing management of direct biodiversity offsets that balances all aspects of sustainable development is presented

Time series forecasting using a TSK fuzzy system tuned with simulated annealing

In this paper, a combination of a Takagi-Sugeno fuzzy system (TSK) and simulated annealing is used to predict well known time series by searching for the best configuration of the fuzzy system. Simulated annealing is used to optimise the parameters of the antecedent and the consequent parts of the fuzzy system rules. The results of the proposed method are encouraging indicating that simulated annealing and fuzzy logic are able to combine well in time series prediction

Coherent microscopy and optical coherence tomography for biomedical applications

This paper was presented at the 3rd Micro and Nano Flows Conference (MNF2011), which was held at the Makedonia Palace Hotel, Thessaloniki in Greece. The conference was organised by Brunel University and supported by the Italian Union of Thermofluiddynamics, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, University of Thessaly, IPEM, the Process Intensification Network, the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, the Heat Transfer Society, HEXAG - the Heat Exchange Action Group, and the Energy Institute.In recent years many new methods of 3D optical imaging have been introduced that are applicable to the study of micro- and nano-scale flows. Coherent microscopy and optical coherence tomography join more established methods such as coherence scanning interferometry and confocal microscopy. These methods are very closely related and, using linear systems theory, can be compared in terms of their point spread and transfer functions. This paper introduces linear theory, demonstrates the main differences between the methods and discusses their use in micro- and nano-scale flow measurement. It is shown that coherent microscopy is currently the only method capable of single shot recording and consequently simultaneous whole-field flow measurement. Its use is limited to sparsely seeded flows however, such that individual particles can be identified. The other techniques provide increased 3D discrimination. Using a large numerical aperture, confocal microscopy and coherence scanning interferometry provide the most detailed 3D images making use the additional information available when the object is illuminated with plane waves propagating at different angles. In contrast optical coherence tomography uses the information that is available when the object is illuminated with different wavelengths. It is shown that the fundamental difference between these approaches is that the lateral and axial resolutions are decoupled in OCT making the technique easily scalable. This and the development of modern tunable laser sources, make OCT the method of choice for many biomedical applications

Monitoring of liquid flow through microtubes using a micropressure sensor

The pressure-driven liquid flow through microtubes was studied in a range of very low Reynolds numbers (<0.15) by monitoring the pressure change in situ. Cylindrical microtubes with diameters ranging from 50 ?m to 500 ?m were examined and two types of tube material, namely PEEK polymer and fused silica were compared. A good linear relation for the pressure drop versus flow rate was obtained. Apparent deviations between the measured slopes with those calculated using conventional theory were attributed to uncertainties in the calculated values which are dominated by the uncertainties in the microtube diameters. It was found that a period of stabilisation time was required for reaching a steady flow after the syringe pump was switched on/off or to a different flow rate. The stabilisation time was likely due to the compressibility of the fluid. Insignificant difference between PEEK polymer and fused silica microtubes in terms of flow resistance was observed. The in-situ measurement of pressure drops provides a convenient approach for monitoring fluid flow through microtubes and detecting dimensional changes within microchannels in Lab-on-a-Chip and microreactor systems