Megnin re-analysed: the case of the newborn baby girl, Paris, 1878

This paper analyses acarological evidence from a 130-year-old forensic investigation. It was the first case in forensic acarology, i.e., the first case where mites provided substantial information to estimate the post-mortem interval (PMI). In 1878, the mites found in the mummified body of a newborn baby girl in Paris, France, were studied by acarologist and forensic entomologist Jean Pierre M,gnin. M,gnin estimated around 2.4 million mites in the skull and identified them as Tyroglyphus longior (Gervais), a junior synonym of Tyrophagus longior. He suggested that the arrival of these mites at the corpse would have occurred by phoresy on carrier insects, roughly 5 months before the autopsy. There is no doubt about the identification of the mites, M,gnin was a highly respected acarologist. However, two main factors affecting the biology of Tyrophagus mites were not included in the original analysis. First, M,gnin stated that the mites were phoretic. However, he probably did not have access to information about the natural history of the species, because as a rule Tyrophagus mites are non-phoretic. Considering the omnipresence of Tyrophagus mites in soil, most likely the mites will have arrived almost immediately after death. Second, temperature was not taken into account during the estimations of the mite population growth rate. The new analysis is based on current knowledge of Tyrophagus biology and includes temperature, estimated following a handful of weather reports of the years 1877 and 1878. The new projections indicate that non-phoretic mites may have colonised the body just after death and the colony would have built up over 8 months, contrary to the 5 months proposed by M,gnin. This new lapse of time agrees with the PMI proposed by Brouardel: on 15 January 1878 he postulated the death of the newborn to have occurred some 8 months before the autopsy.

The vibrations and tunnelling of malonaldehyde on a Moller-Plesset surface

The vibrations and tunnelling motion of malonaldehyde have been studied in their full dimensionality using an internal coordinate path Hamiltonian. In this representation there is one large amplitude internal coordinate s and 3N - 7 (=20) normal coordinates Q which are orthogonal to the large amplitude motion at all points. It is crucial that a high accuracy potential energy surface is used in order to obtain a good representation for the tunneling motion; we use a Moller-Plesset (MP2) surface. Our methodology is variational, that is we diagonalize a sufficiently large matrix in order to obtain the required vibrational levels, so an exact representation for the kinetic energy operator is used. In a harmonic valley representation (s, Q) complete convergence of the normal coordinate motions and the internal coordinate motions has been obtained; for the anharmonic valley in which we use two- and three-body terms in the surface (s, Q(1), Q(2)), we also obtain complete convergence. Our final computed stretching fundamentals are deficient because our potential energy surface is truncated at quartic terms in the normal coordinates, but our lower fundamentals are good.

International investment, ownership and risk in the City of London office market: an analysis of trends 1972-1997

Office returns in the City of London are more volatile than in other UK markets. This volatility may reflect fluctuations in capital flows associated with changing patterns of ownership and the growing linkage between real estate and financial markets in the City. Using current and historical data, patterns of ownership in the City are investigated. They reveal that overseas ownership has grown markedly since 1985, that owners are predominantly FIRE sector firms and that there are strong links between ownership and occupation. This raises concerns about future volatility and systemic risk.

‘Uncanny’ repetitions in Lillian Hellman’s 'The Children’s Hour'

This article addresses Lilian Hellman’s The Children’s Hour in terms of “the uncanny,” that is as a play concerned with doubling and instability. Although this is not in itself an original approach the play, it is claimed that the unsettling iterations of the work can be understood to extend further than has been read within the handful of critical accounts thus far produced. In following Sigmund Freud’s “The Uncanny” and Judith Butler’s ‘Imitation and Gender Insubordination” in their understanding of the disruptive effects of retrospection and repetition, the article works through various threats to identity and structure in Hellman’s play, concluding with a questioning account of recent moves to situate the work within a contextual frame of performance history.