Reincarnation in Philo of Alexandria

Avhandlingen undersöker Filon av Alexandrias (ca. 20 f.Kr. - 50 e.Kr.) ståndpunkt gällande reinkarnationsläran. Från 1600-talet och framåt var den rådande uppfattningen att den judiske bibeltolkaren godkände läran. Sedan 1800-talet har det dock rått delade meningar bland de forskare som har tagit ställning i frågan och två grupper med sinsemellan motsägande svar har bildats. Gemensamt för dessa två grupper är emellertid att deras åsikter inte är baserade på forskning speciellt i den här frågan. Yli-Karjanmaas avhandling fyller det tomrummet. Filons hänvisningar till de ofullkomliga själarnas öde efter döden är mycket sällsynta, vilket leder till att man nödgas ta i beaktande alla tillgängliga indirekta bevis, det vill säga Filons antropologiska, etiska och soteriologiska åsikter. Avhandlingen kommer fram till att dessa åsikter är sådana att de – trots enstaka textavsnitt som verkar medge en motsatt tolkning – gott och väl kan omfatta reinkarnationsläran. Filons dualistiska människosyn, hans fullkomligt immateriella förståelse av frälsningen samt det faktum att han stöder sig på Platons åsikter och tillämpar dennes texter om reinkarnation är alla tecken på detta. Yli-Karjanmaa granskar fyra textavsnitt som direkta bevis (Somn. 1.137–139, Cher. 114, QE 2.40 och fragment 7.3 i Harris samling), och konklusionen blir att Filon i dem alla talar om reinkarnation och att han gör så med godkännande. Sålunda överensstämmer resultaten av granskningen av både de indirekta och de direkta bevisen, och leder till slutsatsen att Filon omfattade reinkarnationsläran. Författaren tillämpar denna slutsats på ett betydligt större antal texter av Filon, i avsikt att reflektera över de sätt på vilka Filon skriver om reinkarnation. Förtäckta hänvisningar till läran visar sig utgöra en organisk del av ett omfattande nätverk av sammanlänkade termer, begrepp, föreställningar och bilder som Filon använder för att beskriva själens resa tillbaka till den okroppsliga, eviga tillvaron med Gud, genom sin egen strävan och Guds nåd.

Analysis of Alpha CA Genes in Early Vertebrates and ; High-Invertebrates

Carbonic anhydrases are enzymes that are ubiquitously found in all organisms that are engaged in catalyzing the hydration of carbon dioxide to form bicarbonate and proton and vice versa. They are crucial in the process of respiration, bone resorption, pH regulation, ion transport, and photosynthesis in plants. Out of the five classes of carbonic anhydrase α, β, γ, δ, ζ this study focused in the α carbonic anhydrases. This class of CAs constitute of 16 subfamilies in mammals that include 3 non-active enzymes known as Carbonic Anhydrase Related Proteins. The inactiveness of these enzymes is due to the loss of one or more Histidine residues in the active site. This thesis was conducted based on the aim of studying evolutionary analysis of carbonic anhydrase sequences from organisms spanning from the Cambrian age. It was carried out in two phases. The first phase was the sequence collection, which involved many biological sequence databases as a source. The scope of this segment included sequence alignments and analysis of the sequence manually and in an automated form incorporating few analysis tools. The second Phase was phylogenetic analysis and exploring the subcellular location of the proteins, which was key for the evolutionary analysis. Through the medium of the methods conducted with respect to the phases mentioned above, it was possible to accomplish the desired result. Certain thought-provoking sequences were come across and analyzed thoroughly. Whereas, Phylogenetics showed interesting results to bolster previous findings and new findings as well which lay bedrock for future intensified studies.

Recovery and refining of manganese as by-product from hydrometallurgical processes

The consumption of manganese is increasing, but huge amounts of manganese still end up in waste in hydrometallurgical processes. The recovery of manganese from multi-metal solutions at low concentrations may not be economical. In addition, poor iron control typically prevents the production of high purity manganese. Separation of iron from manganese can be done with chemical precipitation or solvent extraction methods. Combined carbonate precipitation with air oxidation is a feasible method to separate iron and manganese due to the fast kinetics, good controllability and economical reagents. In addition the leaching of manganese carbonate is easier and less acid consuming than that of hydroxide or sulfide precipitates. Selective iron removal with great efficiency from MnSO4 solution is achieved by combined oxygen or air oxidation and CaCO3 precipitation at pH > 5.8 and at a redox potential of > 200 mV. In order to avoid gypsum formation, soda ash should be used instead of limestone. In such case, however, extra attention needs to be paid on the reagents mole ratios in order to avoid manganese coprecipitation. After iron removal, pure MnSO4 solution was obtained by solvent extraction using organophosphorus reagents, di-(2-ethylhexyl)phosphoric acid (D2EHPA) and bis(2,4,4- trimethylpentyl)phosphinic acid (CYANEX 272). The Mn/Ca and Mn/Mg selectivities can be increased by decreasing the temperature from the commonly used temperatures (40 –60oC) to 5oC. The extraction order of D2EHPA (Ca before Mn) at low temperature remains unchanged but the lowering of temperature causes an increase in viscosity and slower phase separation. Of these regents, CYANEX 272 is selective for Mn over Ca and, therefore, it would be the better choice if there is Ca present in solution. A three-stage Mn extraction followed by a two-stage scrubbing and two-stage sulfuric acid stripping is an effective method of producing a very pure MnSO4 intermediate solution for further processing. From the intermediate MnSO4 some special Mn- products for ion exchange applications were synthesized and studied. Three types of octahedrally coordinated manganese oxide materials as an alternative final product for manganese were chosen for synthesis: layer structured Nabirnessite, tunnel structured Mg-todorokite and K-kryptomelane. As an alternative source of pure MnSO4 intermediate, kryptomelane was synthesized by using a synthetic hydrometallurgical tailings. The results show that the studied OMS materials adsorb selectively Cu, Ni, Cd and K in the presence of Ca and Mg. It was also found that the exchange rates were reasonably high due to the small particle dimensions. Materials are stable in the studied conditions and their maximum Cu uptake capacity was 1.3 mmol/g. Competitive uptake of metals and acid was studied using equilibrium, batch kinetic and fixed-bed measurements. The experimental data was correlated with a dynamic model, which also accounts for the dissolution of the framework manganese. Manganese oxide micro-crystals were also bound onto silica to prepare a composite material having a particle size large enough to be used in column separation experiments. The MnOx/SiO2 ratio was found to affect significantly the properties of the composite. The higher the ratio, the lower is the specific surface area, the pore volume and the pore size. On the other hand, higher amount of silica binder gives composites better mechanical properties. Birnesite and todorokite can be aggregated successfully with colloidal silica at pH 4 and with MnO2/SiO2 weight ratio of 0.7. The best gelation and drying temperature was 110oC and sufficiently strong composites were obtained by additional heat-treatment at 250oC for 2 h. The results show that silica���supported MnO2 materials can be utilized to separate copper from nickel and cadmium. The behavior of the composites can be explained reasonably well with the presented model and the parameters estimated from the data of the unsupported oxides. The metal uptake capacities of the prepared materials were quite small. For example, the final copper loading was 0.14 mmol/gMnO2. According to the results the special MnO2 materials are potential for a specific environmental application to uptake harmful metal ions.

Combustion properties of biomass residues rich in phosphorus

Tillgången på traditionella biobränslen är begränsad och därför behöver man ta fram nya, tidigare outnyttjade biobränslen för att möta de uppställda CO2 emissionsmålen av EU och det ständigt ökande energibehovet. Under de senare åren har intresset riktats mot termisk energiutvinning ur olika restfraktioner och avfall. Vid produktion av fordonsbränsle ur biomassa är den fasta restprodukten ofta den största procesströmmen i produktionsanläggningen. En riktig hantering av restprodukterna skulle göra produktionen mera lönsam och mer ekologiskt hållbar. Ett alternativ är att genom förbränning producera elektricitet och/eller värme eftersom dessa restprodukter anses som CO2-neutrala. Målsättningen med den här avhandlingen var att studera förbränningsegenskaperna hos några fasta restprodukter som uppstår vid framställning av förnybara fordonsbränslen. De fyra undersökta materialen är rapskaka, palmkärnskaka, torkad drank och stabiliserat rötslam. I studien används ett stort urval av undersökningsmetoder, från laboratorieskala till fullskalig förbränning, för att identifiera de huvudsakliga utmaningarna förknippade med förbränning av restprodukterna i pannor med fluidiserad bäddteknik. Med hjälp av detaljerad bränslekarakterisering kunde restprodukterna konstateras vara en värdefull källa för värme- och elproduktion. Den kemiska sammansättningen av restprodukterna varierar stort jämfört med mera traditionellt använda biobränslen. En gemensam faktor för alla de studerade restprodukterna är en hög fosforhalt. På grund av de låga fosforkoncentrationerna i de traditionella biobränslena har grundämnet hittills inte ansetts spela någon större roll i askkemin. Experimenten visade nu att fosfor inte mera kan försummas då man studerar kemin i förbränningsprocesser, då allt flera fosforrika bränslen tränger in på energimarknaden.

Urapolut ja niihin vaikuttavat tekijät S-ryhmässä

Urateoriat ovat murroksessa, kun urat ovat muuttumassa perinteisistä urapoluista rajattomiin, monisuuntaisiin uriin. Samaan aikaan erilaisten trainee-ohjelmien määrä lisääntyy vauhdilla. Urapolkujen tutkiminen on tästä syystä erittäin ajankohtaista. Tämän tutkielman tarkoituksena on tutkia, miten S-ryhmässä työskentelevien kaupallisen kenttäkoulutuksen käyneiden ja sen käymättömien urapolut eroavat toisistaan. Viimeaikaisten teorioiden mukaan urat voidaan jakaa objektiivisiin ja subjektiivisiin uriin sekä perinteisiin ja rajattomiin uriin. Aikaisempien tutkimustulosten pohjalta tarkastellaan yksilöiden uravalintoja ja käsityksiä hyvästä urasta. Myös yksilön sosiaalistuminen organisaatioon vaikuttaa sitoutumiseen ja tätä kautta uraan. Tutkimuksessa on käytetty kvalitatiivisia menetelmiä ja havaintoaineisto on kerätty sähköpostikyselyiden avulla S-ryhmässä työskenteleviltä henkilöiltä. Tutkimustulokset osoittavat, että urapolut ovat erilaisia. Kaikki tutkimukseen osallistuneet kenttäkoulutetut ovat johtaja-asemassa, vertailuryhmän henkilöt asiantuntija- tai päällikköasemassa. Tulosten mukaan ei kuitenkaan voida todeta, että näiden kahden ryhmän urakäsitykset olisivat huomattavasti erilaisia. Onnistunut ura nähdään useimmin subjektiivisesti haastavana, omien tavoitteiden ja kehittymisen saavuttamisena.

Conservation Laws in Cellular Automata

Conservation laws in physics are numerical invariants of the dynamics of a system. In cellular automata (CA), a similar concept has already been defined and studied. To each local pattern of cell states a real value is associated, interpreted as the “energy” (or “mass”, or . . . ) of that pattern.The overall “energy” of a configuration is simply the sum of the energy of the local patterns appearing on different positions in the configuration. We have a conservation law for that energy, if the total energy of each configuration remains constant during the evolution of the CA. For a given conservation law, it is desirable to find microscopic explanations for the dynamics of the conserved energy in terms of flows of energy from one region toward another. Often, it happens that the energy values are from non-negative integers, and are interpreted as the number of “particles” distributed on a configuration. In such cases, it is conjectured that one can always provide a microscopic explanation for the conservation laws by prescribing rules for the local movement of the particles. The onedimensional case has already been solved by Fuk´s and Pivato. We extend this to two-dimensional cellular automata with radius-0,5 neighborhood on the square lattice. We then consider conservation laws in which the energy values are chosen from a commutative group or semigroup. In this case, the class of all conservation laws for a CA form a partially ordered hierarchy. We study the structure of this hierarchy and prove some basic facts about it. Although the local properties of this hierarchy (at least in the group-valued case) are tractable, its global properties turn out to be algorithmically inaccessible. In particular, we prove that it is undecidable whether this hierarchy is trivial (i.e., if the CA has any non-trivial conservation law at all) or unbounded. We point out some interconnections between the structure of this hierarchy and the dynamical properties of the CA. We show that positively expansive CA do not have non-trivial conservation laws. We also investigate a curious relationship between conservation laws and invariant Gibbs measures in reversible and surjective CA. Gibbs measures are known to coincide with the equilibrium states of a lattice system defined in terms of a Hamiltonian. For reversible cellular automata, each conserved quantity may play the role of a Hamiltonian, and provides a Gibbs measure (or a set of Gibbs measures, in case of phase multiplicity) that is invariant. Conversely, every invariant Gibbs measure provides a conservation law for the CA. For surjective CA, the former statement also follows (in a slightly different form) from the variational characterization of the Gibbs measures. For one-dimensional surjective CA, we show that each invariant Gibbs measure provides a conservation law. We also prove that surjective CA almost surely preserve the average information content per cell with respect to any probability measure.