The Evolution of the Russian Romance Through the Nineteenth and Twentieth centuries

This performance dissertation traced the evolution of the Russian romance from 1800 to the present. The Russian romance is a relatively unknown and greatly neglected genre of classical art songs. It is commonly believed that the Russian romance began with Dargomizhsky and Glinka proceeding directly to Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff. Forgotten are the composers before Dargornizhsky and Glinka, the bridge composers, and the post-Tchaikovsky and post-Rachmaninoff composers. This may be, in part, because of the difficulties in obtaining Russian vocal scores. While most of the musical world is acquainted with the magnificent Russian instrumental music, the "true soul" of the Russian people lies in its romances. I presented examples of the two different schools of composition, reflecting their philosophical differences in thinking that came about in the 1860s: (1) Russian National school, (2) Western European school. Each school's influence on generations of Russian composers and their pupils have been represented in the recital programs. Also represented was the effect of the October Revolution on music and the voice of the Russian people, Anna Akhmatova. The amount of music that could be included in this dissertation greatly exceeds the amount of available performance time and represents a selected portion of the repertoire. The first recital included repertoire from the beginning of the romance in the early nineteenth century to the beginning of the twentieth century and the second recital focused on the music of the twentieth century, pre and post, the October Revolution. Finally, given the status of Anna Akhmatova and her contributions, the third recital was devoted entirely to her poetry. The "Russian soul" is one of deep, heartfelt emotions and sorrow. Happiness and joy are also present, but always with a touch of melancholy. The audience did not simply go through a musical journey, but took a journey through the "Russian soul". With the strong response of the audience to these recitals, my belief that this repertoire deserves a prominent place in recital programming was confirmed.

Dynamic evolution of the alpha (α) and beta (β) keratins has accompanied integument diversification and the adaptation of birds into novel lifestyles.

BACKGROUND: Vertebrate skin appendages are constructed of keratins produced by multigene families. Alpha (α) keratins are found in all vertebrates, while beta (β) keratins are found exclusively in reptiles and birds. We have studied the molecular evolution of these gene families in the genomes of 48 phylogenetically diverse birds and their expression in the scales and feathers of the chicken. RESULTS: We found that the total number of α-keratins is lower in birds than mammals and non-avian reptiles, yet two α-keratin genes (KRT42 and KRT75) have expanded in birds. The β-keratins, however, demonstrate a dynamic evolution associated with avian lifestyle. The avian specific feather β-keratins comprise a large majority of the total number of β-keratins, but independently derived lineages of aquatic and predatory birds have smaller proportions of feather β-keratin genes and larger proportions of keratinocyte β-keratin genes. Additionally, birds of prey have a larger proportion of claw β-keratins. Analysis of α- and β-keratin expression during development of chicken scales and feathers demonstrates that while α-keratins are expressed in these tissues, the number and magnitude of expressed β-keratin genes far exceeds that of α-keratins. CONCLUSIONS: These results support the view that the number of α- and β-keratin genes expressed, the proportion of the β-keratin subfamily genes expressed and the diversification of the β-keratin genes have been important for the evolution of the feather and the adaptation of birds into multiple ecological niches.

Evaporation-induced evolution of the capillary force between two grains

© 2014, Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.The evolution of capillary forces during evaporation and the corresponding changes in the geometrical characteristics of liquid (water) bridges between two glass spheres with constant separation are examined experimentally. For comparison, the liquid bridges were also tested for mechanical extension (at constant volume). The obtained results reveal substantial differences between the evolution of capillary force due to evaporation and the evolution due to extension of the liquid bridges. During both evaporation and extension, the change of interparticle capillary forces consists in a force decrease to zero either gradually or via rupture of the bridge. At small separations between the grains (short & wide bridges) during evaporation and at large volumes during extension, there is a slight initial increase of force. During evaporation, the capillary force decreases slowly at the beginning of the process and quickly at the end of the process; during extension, the capillary force decreases quickly at the beginning and slowly at the end of the process. Rupture during evaporation of the bridges occurs most abruptly for bridges with wider separations (tall and thin), sometimes occurring after only 25% of the water volume was evaporated. The evolution (pinning/depinning) of two geometrical characteristics of the bridge, the diameter of the three-phase contact line and the “apparent” contact angle at the solid/liquid/gas interface, seem to control the capillary force evolution. The findings are of relevance to the mechanics of unsaturated granular media in the final phase of drying.

Creating a modern database from archive material - The Norman Holme archive: Interpretation of marine field research notebooks in the historical context of the MBA, 1958-83

This document provides details of the transfer of the Norman Holme archive data held in the National Marine Biological Library onto a modern database, specifically Marine Recorder. A key part in the creation of the database was the retrieval of a large amount of information recorded in field notebooks and on loosely-bound sheets of paper. As this work involved amending, interpreting and updating the available information, it was felt that an accurate record of this process should exist to allow scientists of the future to be able to clearly link the modern database to the archive material. This document also provides details of external information sources that were used to enhance and qualify the historical interpretation, such as estimating volumes and species abundances.

Evolution of the Diatoms: VIII. Re-Examination of the SSU-Rrna Gene Using Multiple Outgroups and a Cladistic Analysis of Valve Features.

The resolution of the SSU rRNA gene for phylogenetic analysis in the diatoms has been evaluated by Theriot et al. who claimed that the SSU rRNA gene could not be used to resolve the monophyly of the three diatoms classes described by Medlin and Kaczmarska. Although they used both only bolidomonads and heterokonts as outgroups, they did not explore outgroups further away than the heterokonts. In this study, the use of the multiple outgroups inside and outside the heterokonts with the rRNA gene for recovering the three monophyletic clades at the class level is evaluated. Trees with multiple outgroups ranging from only bolidophytes to Bacteria and Archea were analyzed with Bayesian and Maximum Likelihood analyses and two data sets were recovered with the classes being monophyletic. Other data sets were analyzed with non-weighted and weighted maximum parsimony. The latter reduced the number of clades and lengthened branch lengths between the clades. One data set using a weighted analysis recovered the three classes as monophyletic. Taking only bolidophytes as the only outgroup never produced monophyletic clades. Multiple outgroups including many heterokonts and certain members of the crown group radiation recovered monophyletic clades. The three classes can be defined by clear morphological differences primarily based on auxospore ontogeny and envelope structure, the presence or absence of a structure (tube process or sternum) associated with the annulus and the location of the cribrum in those genera with loculate areolae. A cladistic analysis of some of these features is presented and recovers the three classes.

AUSTRALIA’S STRATEGIC CULTURE: An investigation of the concept of strategic culture and its application to the Australian case

The notion that each state in the international system approaches matters of war and peace somewhat differently because they each possess a unique strategic culture is not a new or obscure one – but it nevertheless remains controversial. While some scholars dismiss the utility or practicality of examining states’ cultures when seeking to explain or predict those states’ patterns of strategic decision-making, even amongst those who accept that we should pay attention to cultural differences between states when carrying out strategic analysis there remains a frustratingly eclectic range of offerings from scholars regarding how best to do so. In short, significant uncertainty remains regarding both whether strategic culture should be used as an analytical tool and, if it is so utilized, how one should go about doing so. This thesis therefore explores the concept of strategic culture in great detail, both theoretical and empirical. The opening three chapters examine why the more traditional rationalist/materialistic theories should not exclusively dominate strategic analysis, then the various existing strategic cultural offerings are considered and critiqued and, finally, a new conceptual model for strategic cultural analysis is proposed which draws from the hitherto largely neglected psychological and sociological literature. Both of these fields, it is submitted in Chapter 3, have spent more time and effort developing ways of understanding and analyzing culture than the field of IR has to date, and therefore the models and methods debated and developed in these fields should, it is argued, be ‘imported’ into IR to drive further strategic cultural research. The thesis then moves in the following six chapters to consider Australia’s strategic culture. The purpose of this part of the thesis is two-fold: first, it illustrates how the model offered in Chapter 3 works and, by implication, suggests how scholars may go about applying it to other cases. Second, and perhaps more importantly, the latter six chapters explore the twists and turns of Australia’s substantive strategic decision-making over the course of the last century or more, thereby explaining how Australia’s strategic history can be understood from a cultural perspective.

Evolution of the nervous system in Paraphanostoma (Acoela)

According to recent molecular studies, the Acoela are the earliest extant bilaterian group. Their nervous system displays a striking variety of patterns. The aim of the present investigation was to study the variability of the nervous system in a monophyletic group of the Acoela. Six species of Paraphanostoma were chosen for the study. Using immunocytochemical methods and confocal scanning laser microscopy, the immunoreactive patterns of serotonin (5-HT) and the neuropeptide GYIRFamide were described in detail. The study has demonstrated that the brains in Paraphanostoma species, although diverse in detail, still follow the same general pattern. 18S rDNA sequences were used to generate a hypothesis of the phylogeny within the group. Characters of the nervous system revealed in this study were coded and analysed together with 18S rDNA data. Several synapomorphies in the nervous system characters were identified. However, numerous parallelisms in the nervous system evolution have occurred. Data obtained demonstrate that the genus Paraphanostoma is closely related to Childia and should belong to the same family, Childiidae.

The evolution of the UK charity Statement of Recommended Practice: The influence of key stakeholders

In the early 1980s, a landmark study identified significant poor reporting practice in UK charities. As a consequence, a journey was commenced with the aim of improving accounting and reporting as a basis for enhancing accountability by charities. Much of this change has been effected through the publication of evolving Statements of Recommended Practice (SORPs) on accounting and reporting by charities. This paper analyses the evolution of the SORP through time using insights from stakeholder theory, and argues that the key stakeholders influencing the evolving SORP have been government and the accounting profession.

Dynamic evolution of the genetic search region through fuzzy coding

A technique for automatic exploration of the genetic search region through fuzzy coding (Sharma and Irwin, 2003) has been proposed. Fuzzy coding (FC) provides the value of a variable on the basis of the optimum number of selected fuzzy sets and their effectiveness in terms of degree-of-membership. It is an indirect encoding method and has been shown to perform better than other conventional binary, Gray and floating-point encoding methods. However, the static range of the membership functions is a major problem in fuzzy coding, resulting in longer times to arrive at an optimum solution in large or complicated search spaces. This paper proposes a new algorithm, called fuzzy coding with a dynamic range (FCDR), which dynamically allocates the range of the variables to evolve an effective search region, thereby achieving faster convergence. Results are presented for two benchmark optimisation problems, and also for a case study involving neural identification of a highly non-linear pH neutralisation process from experimental data. It is shown that dynamic exploration of the genetic search region is effective for parameter optimisation in problems where the search space is complicated.