El monument funerari de l'Ardiaca Major de la Seu Vella de Lleida Berenguer Barutell

We know about the tomb of Berenguer Barutell, built in the Seu Vella of Lleid by Rotllí Gaulter, from the Work's Books and the relation of the delivery notes, registered by the same craftman and sculptor. In this study, we can offer all the execution process and the analysis stylistic and iconographic in detail.

Vanhusten hyvä kotona asuminen: tutkimusta kuntatuottavuudesta, älykodeista ja apuvälinepalveluprosesseista

The purpose of the research was to investigate operational processes related to home care of the elderly as well as use of assistive devices in smart home environments, and operational processes that are generally related to use of assistive devices – from the point of view of productivity improvement. The themes were looked into from the points of view of both the elderly and care personnel. In addition, perspectives of near relatives of the elderly, of the larger service system as well as of companies that provided assistive devices to the smart homes were taken into consideration. In the study of home care processes, 32 customer interviews and 17 employee interviews were carried out. This report contains a summary that is based on a separate report of the home care study. The study of home care was conducted in 2006. The use of technological and mechanical assistive devices and the related operational processes were investigated with the help of the smart home pilot in 2007–2008. The study is described in this report. The smart home pilot was implemented in four different housing service units for elderly people at Lahti, Nastola and Hollola. They were in use during short-term housing periods related to, for instance, end of hospitalisation, holidays of caring relatives and assessment of living and housing conditions. More than 60 different assistive devices and technologies were brought to the smart homes. During the pilot period, experiences of customers and personnel as well as processes related to the use of assistive devices were investigated. The research material consisted of 20 survey questionnaires of personnel and customers, four interviews with customers, five interviews with personnel, feedback survey responses from 14 companies, and other data that were collected, for instance, in orientation events. The research results highlighted the need for tailored services based on an elderly person’s needs and wishes, while taking advantage of innovative and technological solutions. As in the earlier home care study, also assistive device-related operational processes were looked into with the help of concepts of ‘resource focus’, ‘lost motion’ and ‘intermediate landing’. The following were identified as central operational processes in assistive device-related services (regardless of the service provider): (1) acquisition process of technologies and assistive devices as well as of rearrangement and rebuilding works in the home, (2) introduction and orientation process (of the elderly, their relatives and care personnel), (3) information and communication process, and (4) service and monitoring process. In addition, the research focused on design and desirability of assistive devices as well as their costs, such as opportunity costs. The process-based points of view gave new knowledge that may be used in the future to develop service processes and clarify their ownership so that separately managed cross-functional processes could be built with participants from different sectors to operate alongside organisations of elderly care. Development of functionality of assistive device-related services is a societally significant issue.

"A Hard Battle to Fight": Natural Theology and the Dismal Science, 1820-1850

William Whewell's and Richard Jones's criticism of Jeremy Bentham's and David Ricardo's "dismal" views on the relation of theory and evidence in political economy was motivated by the former's views on the structuring role of natural theology for questions of method and evidence in the sciences, including political economy. In comparison, natural theology was for Richard Whately as structuring on these issues as it was for the Cambridge men. Whately's view on natural theology, however, conformed with the Ricardian predilection for theory over facts. The differences between the Cambridge men and Whately became manifest after (or better: during) the publication of Jones's book on rent in 1831 and led to a somewhat acerbic exchange of views on the role of definitions in science and the use of history for establishing scientific evidence. As far as political economy was concerned, Whately's stance carried the day in Victorian England.

A Pragmatic Intellectual: Dutch Fabians, Boekman, and Cultural Policy in the Netherlands, 1890-1940

Around 1900, the notion of community art (gemeenschapskunst) served to crystallize Dutch social democratic thinking about the role of the arts in society. Drawing on the pragmatism of leading social democrats like Wibaut, and drawing on his formal education in economics and statistics, the self‐made social democrat Emanuel Boekman redressed the utopian meaning of community art to signify the dissemination of "good" culture over all layers of society in his influential 1939 dissertation on the relation of the state to the arts. Being about facts rather than opinions, Boekman set the boundaries of his work to exclude a substantial discussion of the meaning of "good" culture. On the one hand, this pragmatism helped Boekman to gain support for government intervention for the arts over most of the political spectrum. On the other hand, Boekman thus pre‐empted discussions about the tension between "quality" and "accessibility" of the arts that haunts cultural policy in the Netherlands to this day.

Making Things Technical: Paul Samuelson at MIT

This article examines how Samuelson defined his own role as an economist as a technical expert, who walked what he called the "middle of the road" to-seemingly-stay out of the realm of politics. As point of entry I discuss the highly tempting offers made by Theodore M. Schultz in the 1940s to come over to Chicago, which Schultz persistently repeated over three years and despite strong Chicago faculty resistance. A contrast between Schultz's own experiences as an economic expert at Iowa State, Samuelson's work as an external consultant for the National Resources Planning Board during the Second World War, and the firm support of the MIT administration for Samuelson's research serves to pinpoint the meaning of being technical for Samuelson, and the relation of the technical economic expert to the realm of politics.

Imprecise measurements in quantum mechanics

In this thesis the structure and properties of imprecise quantum measurements are investigated. The starting point for this investigation is the representation of a quantum observable as a normalized positive operator measure. A general framework to describe measurement inaccuracy is presented. Requirements for accurate measurements are discussed, and the relation of inaccuracy to some optimality criteria is studied. A characterization of covariant observables is given in the case when they are imprecise versions of a sharp observable. Also the properties of such observables are studied. The case of position and momentum observables is studied. All position and momentum observables are characterized, and the joint positionmomentum measurements are discussed.

Deep incision in an Aptian carbonate succession indicates major sea-level fall in the Cretaceous

Long-term relative sea-level cycles (0 5 to 6 Myr) have yet to be fully understood for the Cretaceous. During the Aptian, in the northern Maestrat Basin (Eastern Iberian Peninsula), fault-controlled subsidence created depositional space, but eustasy governed changes in depositional trends. Relative sea-level history was reconstructed by sequence stratigraphic analysis. Two forced regressive stages of relative sea-level were recognized within three depositional sequences. The first stage is late Early Aptian age (intra Dufrenoyia furcata Zone) and is characterized by foreshore to upper shoreface sedimentary wedges, which occur detached from a highstand carbonate platform, and were deposited above basin marls. The amplitude of relative sea-level drop was in the order of tens of metres, with a duration of <1 Myr. The second stage of relative sea-level fall occurred within the Late Aptian and is recorded by an incised valley that, when restored to its pre-contractional attitude, was >2 km wide and cut 115 m down into the underlying Aptian succession. With the subsequent transgression, the incision was back-filled with peritidal to shallow subtidal deposits. The changes in depositional trends, lithofacies evolution and geometric relation of the stratigraphic units characterized are similar to those observed in coeval rocks within the Maestrat Basin, as well as in other correlative basins elsewhere. The pace and magnitude of the two relative sea-level drops identified fall within the glacio-eustatic domain. In the Maestrat Basin, terrestrial palynological studies provide evidence that the late Early and Late Aptian climate was cooler than the earliest part of the Early Aptian and the Albian Stage, which were characterized by warmer environmental conditions. The outcrops documented here are significant because they preserve the results of Aptian long-term sea-level trends that are often only recognizable on larger scales (i.e. seismic) such as for the Arabian Plate.

Deep incision in an Aptian carbonate succession indicates major sea-level fall in the Cretaceous

Long-term relative sea-level cycles (0 5 to 6 Myr) have yet to be fully understood for the Cretaceous. During the Aptian, in the northern Maestrat Basin (Eastern Iberian Peninsula), fault-controlled subsidence created depositional space, but eustasy governed changes in depositional trends. Relative sea-level history was reconstructed by sequence stratigraphic analysis. Two forced regressive stages of relative sea-level were recognized within three depositional sequences. The first stage is late Early Aptian age (intra Dufrenoyia furcata Zone) and is characterized by foreshore to upper shoreface sedimentary wedges, which occur detached from a highstand carbonate platform, and were deposited above basin marls. The amplitude of relative sea-level drop was in the order of tens of metres, with a duration of <1 Myr. The second stage of relative sea-level fall occurred within the Late Aptian and is recorded by an incised valley that, when restored to its pre-contractional attitude, was >2 km wide and cut 115 m down into the underlying Aptian succession. With the subsequent transgression, the incision was back-filled with peritidal to shallow subtidal deposits. The changes in depositional trends, lithofacies evolution and geometric relation of the stratigraphic units characterized are similar to those observed in coeval rocks within the Maestrat Basin, as well as in other correlative basins elsewhere. The pace and magnitude of the two relative sea-level drops identified fall within the glacio-eustatic domain. In the Maestrat Basin, terrestrial palynological studies provide evidence that the late Early and Late Aptian climate was cooler than the earliest part of the Early Aptian and the Albian Stage, which were characterized by warmer environmental conditions. The outcrops documented here are significant because they preserve the results of Aptian long-term sea-level trends that are often only recognizable on larger scales (i.e. seismic) such as for the Arabian Plate.

A proposta curricular de química do Estado de Minas Gerais: fundamentos e pressupostos

This article presents the basic ideas that oriented the elaboration of the new Chemistry Curriculum for the High Schools in the State of Minas Gerais, Brazil. The main features of traditional Brazilian Chemistry Curriculum are critically discussed, namely, the excessive number of concepts, the overemphasis in procedures and rituals instead of chemical principles and the lack of relationship between the concepts and the social, technological and environmental contexts. Trying to overcome these features, the proposed curriculum deals with a fewer number of concepts, clearly related in a conceptual structure, opening space to a balanced emphasis on phenomena, theory and representation, and on conceptual and contextual aspects of chemical knowledge.

Síntese de biodiesel: uma proposta contextualizada de experimento para laboratório de química geral

The contextualized understanding of concepts in Chemistry by students from other areas is a challenging task. In this experiment, the synthesis of biodiesel is done by base catalyzed transesterification of refined soy oil with methanol at room temperature and common glassware found in any chemistry laboratory. The proposal permits introducing several concepts, such as that of emulsion, viscosity and catalysis to illustrate an activity based on an actual problem. In this didactic approach, some common problems of biodiesel production, such as soap formation and phase separation, are introduced into the procedure in order to raise questions and motivate the students to participate in the experimental work and stimulate reflections about critical aspects of biodiesel production. This experiment was carried out in the first semester of 2006, in experimental general chemistry taken by physics and agricultural, civil and chemical engineering students of UNICAMP.

Los Riesgos geológicos: algunas consideraciones didácticas

From the development of concepts related with Natural and Geological Hazards different exercises and activities are proposed. All of them can be used as didactic recourses in order to study such a subject for the most appropriate educative levels

PROPOSTA EXPERIMENTAL DIDÁTICA PARA O ENSINO DE ANÁLISE DE COMPONENTES PRINCIPAIS

Principal component analysis (PCA) is a chemometric method that allows for the extraction of chemical information that would otherwise be impossible to determine. Teaching chemometrics to undergraduates can contribute to the overall professional development and training of new teachers, whose profiles have been gaining attention due to the current demand for data interpretation. In this study, a didactic experiment involving PCA is proposed. Spectrophotometry was used in the ultraviolet-visible (UV-Vis) region to assess the behavior of anthocyanins extracted from red cabbage at different pH values. The results suggest the possible separation of anthocyanin structures into three distinct groups, according to their chemical characteristics displayed in acid, neutral, and basic media. The objective is to develop educational materials targeted to undergraduate courses, which encompass a larger number of concepts and introduce instrumental techniques currently being employed in both academic research and the industrial sector. Specifically, the proposed experiment introduces concepts related to spectrophotometry in the UV-Vis range and the PCA chemometric method. The materials used are easily accessible, and UV-Vis spectroscopy equipment is less expensive in comparison with other spectroscopy methods.

Sugarcane yellow leaf virus infection leads to alterations in photosynthetic efficiency and carbohydrate accumulation in sugarcane leaves

Infection by Sugarcane yellow leaf virus (ScYLV) causes severe leaf symptoms in sugarcane (Saccharum spp.) hybrids, which indicate alterations in its photosynthetic apparatus. To gain an overview of the physiological status of infected plants, we evaluated chlorophyll a fluorescence and gas exchange assays, correlating the results with leaf metabolic surveys, i.e., photosynthetic pigments and carbohydrate contents. When compared to healthy plants, infected plants showed a reduction in potential quantum efficiency for photochemistry of photosystem (PSII) and alterations in the filling up of the plastoquinone (PQ) pool. They also showed reduction in the CO2 net exchange rates, probably as a consequence of impaired quantum yield. In addition, reductions were found in the contents of photosynthetic leaf pigments and in the ratio chlorophyll a/chlorophyll b (chla/chlb). Carbohydrate content in the leaves was increased as a secondary effect of the ScYLV infection. This article discusses the relation of virus replication and host defense responses with general alterations in the photosynthetic apparatus and in the metabolism of infected plants.

Suomalaisen muotikaupan kansainvälistymisen motiivien vaikutus operaatiomuodon valintaan

Muotikaupan kansainvälistymisen motiivien vaikutusta operaatiomuodon valintaan on aikaisemmin tutkittu niukasti. Tutkijoiden painopiste on ollut lähinnä kansainvälistymisen motiivien selvittämisessä ja eri operaatiomuotojen soveltuvuuden analysoimisessa. Pro gradu -tutkielman tavoitteena on esittää, miten muotikaupan kansainvälistymisen motiivit vaikuttavat operaatiomuodon valintaan suomalaisen yrityksen näkökulmasta. Teorialähtöisen kvalitatiivisen case-tutkimuksen primääriaineisto kerättiin teemahaastatteluin Venäjälle kansainvälistymistä pohtivasta yrityksestä. Tutkimustulokset todistavat muotikaupan kansainvälistymisen motiivien vaikuttavan merkittävästi operaatiomuodon valintaan, mutta motiivien ohella vaikuttavat myös muut tekijät, tärkeimpinä kontrollin tarve ja kohdemaan markkinaolosuhteet. Lisäksi keskeisenä vaikuttavana tekijänä on huomioitava valikoiman sopeutustarve kohdemarkkinoilla. Tulokset osoittavat motiivien sekä muiden tekijöiden ja operaatiomuodon valinnan välisen, kontekstisidonnaisen, kausaalisuhteen lisäksi karkealla tasolla vaikuttavien tekijöiden keskinäistä tärkeysjärjestystä ja vaikutusastetta operaatiomuodon valintaan.

Johdon coaching: Rajanvetoja, taustateorioita ja prosesseja

Johdon coaching on henkilokohtainen johdon kehittamisen menetelma, jossa coach auttaa coachattavaa itse loytamaan omaa kehittymistaan ja toimintaansa koskevia ratkaisuja. Johdon coaching on lisaantynyt maailmalla ja Suomessa voimakkaasti viimeisten vuosien aikana. Kasvaneesta suosiosta huolimatta johdon coachingia on tutkittu vahan Suomessa. Tassa tutkimuksessa tutkittiin, miten johdon coaching maaritellaan ja miten se eroaa sita lahella olevista menetelmista, seka mitka ovat johdon coachingiin liittyvat taustateoriat ja miten johdon coachingia toteutetaan. Tutkimus pohjautuu sosiaaliseen konstruktionismiin. Tama vaitoskirja koostuu kahdesta osasta. Tyossa on kasiteanalyyttinen ja aikaisempaa teoreettista kirjallisuutta analysoiva osuus seka laadulliseen tutkimukseen pohjautuva empiirinen osuus. Tutkimuksen empiirisen osan aineisto tuotettiin teemahaastattelemalla 29:aa johdon coachingia toteuttanutta henkilda. Tutkimuksen tuloksista tulee esille johdon coachingin prosessimainen, tavoitteellinen ja systemaattinen luonne. Johdon coaching voidaan erottaa sita lahella olevista kasitteista, kuten terapia, koulutus, liikkeenjohdon konsultointi, mentorointi ja tyonohjaus, joskin rajanvedot eri kasitteiden valilla ovat epamaaraisia. Johdon coachingissa hyodynnetaan useita taustateorioita. Tyypillisesti eri taustateorioita yhdistetaan toisiinsa. Johdon coachingia voidaan toteuttaa eri lahtokohdista kasin ja eri tavoin, mutta tyypillisin toteutustapa on kuitenkin coachin ja coachattavan valinen keskustelu.