The Devil’s Daughters and a question of translation between Occitan and Anglo-Norman French: ‘De las .vii. filhas del diable’ (British Library Add. MS 17920).

The evidence for vernacular-to-vernacular translation is hard to demonstrate in medieval Romance languages. This article analyses a hypothesis published a century ago that there is an identifiable Anglo-Norman source for an Occitan prose text. Both texts spring from a Latin exemplum in which the seven capital vices are personified as the Devil's daughters, married off to seven social categories (the clergy, knights, peasants, etc.). Although the hypothesis is disproved, it remains that the dialogue between Anglo-Norman French and Occitan has been overlooked, and deserves further exploration.

Impact of Resolution on the Tropical Pacific Circulation in a Matrix of Coupled Models

Results are presented from a matrix of coupled model integrations, using atmosphere resolutions of 135 and 90 km, and ocean resolutions of 1° and 1/3°, to study the impact of resolution on simulated climate. The mean state of the tropical Pacific is found to be improved in the models with a higher ocean resolution. Such an improved mean state arises from the development of tropical instability waves, which are poorly resolved at low resolution; these waves reduce the equatorial cold tongue bias. The improved ocean state also allows for a better simulation of the atmospheric Walker circulation. Several sensitivity studies have been performed to further understand the processes involved in the different component models. Significantly decreasing the horizontal momentum dissipation in the coupled model with the lower-resolution ocean has benefits for the mean tropical Pacific climate, but decreases model stability. Increasing the momentum dissipation in the coupled model with the higher-resolution ocean degrades the simulation toward that of the lower-resolution ocean. These results suggest that enhanced ocean model resolution can have important benefits for the climatology of both the atmosphere and ocean components of the coupled model, and that some of these benefits may be achievable at lower ocean resolution, if the model formulation allows.

U.K. HiGEM: The New U.K. High-Resolution Global Environment Model—Model Description and Basic Evaluation

This article describes the development and evaluation of the U.K.’s new High-Resolution Global Environmental Model (HiGEM), which is based on the latest climate configuration of the Met Office Unified Model, known as the Hadley Centre Global Environmental Model, version 1 (HadGEM1). In HiGEM, the horizontal resolution has been increased to 0.83° latitude × 1.25° longitude for the atmosphere, and 1/3° × 1/3° globally for the ocean. Multidecadal integrations of HiGEM, and the lower-resolution HadGEM, are used to explore the impact of resolution on the fidelity of climate simulations. Generally, SST errors are reduced in HiGEM. Cold SST errors associated with the path of the North Atlantic drift improve, and warm SST errors are reduced in upwelling stratocumulus regions where the simulation of low-level cloud is better at higher resolution. The ocean model in HiGEM allows ocean eddies to be partially resolved, which dramatically improves the representation of sea surface height variability. In the Southern Ocean, most of the heat transports in HiGEM is achieved by resolved eddy motions, which replaces the parameterized eddy heat transport in the lower-resolution model. HiGEM is also able to more realistically simulate small-scale features in the wind stress curl around islands and oceanic SST fronts, which may have implications for oceanic upwelling and ocean biology. Higher resolution in both the atmosphere and the ocean allows coupling to occur on small spatial scales. In particular, the small-scale interaction recently seen in satellite imagery between the atmosphere and tropical instability waves in the tropical Pacific Ocean is realistically captured in HiGEM. Tropical instability waves play a role in improving the simulation of the mean state of the tropical Pacific, which has important implications for climate variability. In particular, all aspects of the simulation of ENSO (spatial patterns, the time scales at which ENSO occurs, and global teleconnections) are much improved in HiGEM.

Proceedings of the Ninth Annual Conference of the British Association for Biological Anthropology and Osteoarchaeology, Department of Archaeology, University of Reading

The Proceedings of the Ninth Annual Conference of the British Association for Biological Anthropology and Osteoarchaeology (BABAO) held at the University of Reading in 2007. Contents: 1) A life course perspective of growing up in medieval London: evidence of sub-adult health from St Mary Spital (London) (Rebecca Redfern and Don Walker); 2) Preservation of non-adult long bones from an almshouse cemetery in the United States dating to the late nineteenth to the early twentieth centuries (Colleen Milligan, Jessica Zotcavage and Norman Sullivan); 3) Childhood oral health: dental palaeopathology of Kellis 2, Dakhleh, Egypt. A preliminary investigation (Stephanie Shukrum and JE Molto); 4) Skeletal manifestation of non-adult scurvy from early medieval Northumbria: the Black Gate cemetery, Newcastle-upon-Tyne (Diana Mahoney-Swales and Pia Nystrom); 5) Infantile cortical hyperostosis: cases, causes and contradictions (Mary Lewis and Rebecca Gowland); 6) Biological Anthropology Tuberculosis of the hip in the Victorian Britain (Benjamin Clarke and Piers Mitchell); 7) The re-analysis of Iron Age human skeletal material from Winnall Down (Justine Tracey); 8) Can we estimate post-mortem interval from an individual body part? A field study using sus scrofa (Branka Franicevec and Robert Pastor); 9) The expression of asymmetry in hand bones from the medieval cemetery at Écija, Spain (Lisa Cashmore and Sonia Zakrezewski); 10) Returning remains: a curator’s view (Quinton Carroll); 11) Authority and decision making over British human remains: issues and challenges (Piotr Bienkowski and Malcolm Chapman); 12) Ethical dimensions of reburial, retention and repatriation of archaeological human remains: a British perspective (Simon Mays and Martin Smith); 13) The problem of provenace: inaccuracies, changes and misconceptions (Margaret Clegg); 14) Native American human remains in UK collections: implications of NAGPRA to consultation, repatriation, and policy development (Myra J Giesen); 15) Repatriation – a view from the receiving end: New Zealand (Nancy Tayles).

Determination of the impact of continuous defoliation of Lolium perenne and Trifolium repens on bacterial and fungal community structure in rhizosphere soil

To determine the effects of defoliation on microbial community structure, rhizosphere soil samples were taken pre-, and post-defoliation from the root tip and mature root regions of Trifolium repens L. and Lolium perenne L. Microbial DNA isolated from samples was used to generate polymerase chain reaction-denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis molecular profiles of bacterial and fungal communities. Bacterial plate counts were also obtained. Neither plant species nor defoliation affected the bacterial and fungal community structures in both the root tip and mature root regions, but there were significant differences in the bacterial and fungal community profiles between the two root regions for each plant. Prior to defoliation, there was no difference between plants for bacterial plate counts of soils from the root tip regions; however, counts were greater in the mature root region of L. perenne than T. repens. Bacterial plate counts for T. repens were higher in the root tip than the mature root region. After defoliation, there was no effect of plant type, position along the root or defoliation status on bacterial plate counts, although there were significant increases in bacterial plate counts with time. The results indicate that a general effect existed during maturation in the root regions of each plant, which had a greater impact on microbial community structure than either plant type or the effect of defoliation. In addition there were no generic consequences with regard to microbial populations in the rhizosphere as a response to plant defoliation.

Exudation of alcohol and aldehyde sugars from roots of defoliated Lolium perenne L. grown under sterile conditions

Root exudates were collected over a 27 day period from defoliated and non-defoliated Lolium perenne L. plants grown under sterile conditions in microlysimeters. Eleven individual sugars, including both aldehyde and alcohol sugars, were identified and quantified with a gas chromatograph-mass spectrometer (GC-MS). There was no change in the number of sugars present between 7 and 27 days, but the exudation of alcohol sugars decreased rapidly at about day 12. Xylose and glucose were present in the largest amounts. Defoliation initially increased the total amount of sugars in the exudates, but continuous defoliation reduced total sugar exudation by 16% and induced changes in the exudation patterns of individual sugars. Defoliation enhanced exudation of erythritol, threitol, and xylitol, reduced exudation of glucose and arabitol, but had little effect on the amounts of other sugars exuded. The more complex 6 C, 5 OH aldehyde sugars, especially glucose, showed changes earlier and to a greater extent (17 days), than the 5 C, 4 OH (xylose and ribose) and 6 C 4 OH (fucose) aldehyde groups. These findings confirm the general finding that repeated defoliation reduces the quantity of total sugars exuded, but the pattern of release of individual sugars is complex and variable.

Synthesis of S-linked carbohydrate analogues via a Ferrier reaction

In this work, the synthetic utility of the Ferrier reaction to access S-linked disaccharides and S-linked glycoamino acids has been probed. Significantly, entry to a range of 1,4- and 1,6-S-linked disaccharides has been achieved using glycals derived from glucose and galactose, and sulfur containing coupling partners derived from methyl α-d-glucopyranoside. Access to S-linked glycoamino acids and glycopeptides has also been achieved using protected cysteine and homocysteine coupling partners within the Ferrier reaction. Functionalisation of the Ferrier products, for example, via dihydroxylation using OsO4 or amino acid coupling, and deprotection of the targets have also been achieved. In this way, entry to materials of interest as mimics of biologically interesting disaccharides and glycopeptides has been realised, including targets derived from rare sugars such as talopyranose and gulopyranose.

Information processing: US Patent 4,409,617

An information processor for rendering input data compatible with standard video recording and/or display equipment, comprizing means for digitizing the input data over periods which are synchronous with the fields of a standard video signal, a store adapted to store the digitized data and release stored digitized data in correspondence wiht the line scan of a standard video monitor, the store having two halves which correspond to the interlaced fields of a standard video signal and being so arranged that one half is filed while the other is emptied, and means for converting the released stored digitized data into video luminance signals. The input signals may be in digital or analogue form. A second stage which reconstitutes the recorded data is also described.

A benchmark method for global optimization problems in structure determination from powder diffraction data

Quasi-Newton-Raphson minimization and conjugate gradient minimization have been used to solve the crystal structures of famotidine form B and capsaicin from X-ray powder diffraction data and characterize the chi(2) agreement surfaces. One million quasi-Newton-Raphson minimizations found the famotidine global minimum with a frequency of ca 1 in 5000 and the capsaicin global minimum with a frequency of ca 1 in 10 000. These results, which are corroborated by conjugate gradient minimization, demonstrate the existence of numerous pathways from some of the highest points on these chi(2) agreement surfaces to the respective global minima, which are passable using only downhill moves. This important observation has significant ramifications for the development of improved structure determination algorithms.

Synthesis, structure, and redox states of homoleptic d-block metal complexes with bis-1,2,4-triazin-3-yl-pyridine and 1,2,4-triazin-3-yl-bipyridine extractants

it has been established that triazinyl bipyridines (hemi-BTPs) and bis-triazinyl pyridines (BTPs), ligands which are currently being investigated as possible ligands for the separation of actinides from lanthanides in nuclear waste, are able to form homoleptic complexes with first row transition metals such as cobalt(IT), copper(II), iron(II), manganese(II), nickel(II) and zinc(II). The metal complexes exhibit six-co-ordinate octahedral structures and redox states largely analogous to those of the related terpyridine complexes. The reactivity of the different redox states of cobalt bis-hemi-BTP complex in aqueous environments has been studied with two-phase electrochemistry by immobilisation of the essentially water-insoluble metal complexes on graphite electrodes and the immersion of this modified electrode in an aqueous electrolyte. It was found that redox potentials for the metal-centred reactions were pH-independent whereas the potentials for the ligand-centred reactions were strongly pH-dependent. The reductive degradation of these complexes has been investigated by computational methods. Solvent extraction experiments have been carried out for a range of metals and these show that cobalt(II) and nickel(II) as well as palladium(II), cadmium(II) and lead(II) were all extracted with the ligands 1e and 2c with higher distribution ratios that was observed for americium(III) under the same conditions. The implications of this result for the use of these ligands to separate actinides from nuclear waste are discussed. (c) 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.