Open Access Books

The publication is concerned with Évariste Désiré Parny, the author of “The Songs of Madagascar”(1787) as well as the history of Madagascar and other islands in the context of their colonization by the French in the 17th and the 18th century. The reader is presented with three translations of Parny’s Enlightenment work: by Kazimierz Brodziński (1819), a modern philological translation by the Translation Group of Romance Studies Faculty and an outstanding translation by Małgorzata Sokołowicz. The book also contains a Creole translation of several songs.

Filming the End of the Holocaust considers how the US Government commissioned the US Signal Corps and other filmmakers to document the horrors of the concentration camps during the April-May 1945 liberation. The evidence of the Nazis' genocidal actions amassed in these films, some of them made by Hollywood luminaries such as John Ford and Billy Wilder, would go on to have a major impact at the Nuremberg Trials; they helped to indict Nazi officials as the judges witnessed scenes of torture, human experimentation and extermination of Jews and non-Jews in the gas chambers and crematoria. These films, some produced by the Soviets, were integral to the war crime trials that followed the Holocaust and the Second World War, and this book provides a thorough, close analysis of the footage in these films and their historical significance.

The electrical demands in several countries around the world are increasing due to the huge energy requirements of prosperous economies and the human activities of modern life. In order to economically transfer electrical powers from the generation side to the demand side, these powers need to be transferred at high-voltage levels through suitable transmission systems and power substations. To this end, high-voltage transmission systems and power substations are in demand. Actually, they are at the heart of interconnected power systems, in which any faults might lead to unsuitable consequences, abnormal operation situations, security issues, and even power cuts and blackouts. In order to cope with the ever-increasing operation and control complexity and security in interconnected high-voltage power systems, new architectures, concepts, algorithms, and procedures are essential. This book aims to encourage researchers to address the technical issues and research gaps in high-voltage transmission systems and power substations in modern energy systems.

The ‘blockchain’ is the core mechanism for the Bitcoin digital payment system. It embraces a set of inter-related technologies: the blockchain itself as a distributed record of digital events, the distributed consensus method to agree whether a new block is legitimate, automated smart contracts, and the data structure associated with each block. We propose a permanent distributed record of intellectual effort and associated reputational reward, based on the blockchain that instantiates and democratises educational reputation beyond the academic community. We are undertaking initial trials of a private blockchain or storing educational records, drawing also on our previous research into reputation management for educational systems.

Available open access digitally under CC-BY licence. This book shares insights from the Healthy Ageing Challenge, bringing research, business, policy and practice together to create age-friendly homes, workplaces and communities. Spanning co-design with older people, business collaboration and innovations in design, work, housing, culture and health, it explores the real-world impact of ageing research and the possibilities for business in developing an ageing market. From age-friendly homes to climate-resilient communities, the book provides a rich evidence base for healthier, more connected lives.

This book provides a resource for the scientist or medical professional interested in the topic of insulin resistance. With a mix of review and primary data articles, emerging paradigms in insulin resistance are highlighted. The topics are succinctly presented, and distinct viewpoints are represented. An introduction to the Special Issue that provides summaries of the studies included, is provided by the Guest Editor, Dr. Susan Burke, and her colleague at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center, Dr. Jason Collier.

Batteries are a ubiquitous presence in equipment carried by soldiers. These batteries are acquired through a supply chain driven by commercial applications and predominately based in Asia. RAND found that government and industry representatives of military battery suppliers have concerns associated with this foreign-dependent supply chain. The report discusses alternative policy options to address these concerns.

"This book provides a comparative overview of asylum seekers’ reception throughout Europe by adopting a theoretical framework based on an analytical approach to the notion of multilevel governance. It challenges the tendency of the multilevel governance literature to overlook political controversies and conflicts and questions the assumption that it represents the best policymaking arrangement for promoting policy convergence. In doing so, it explores the functioning of the reception component of the Common European Asylum System in centralised states and federal/regional states and analyses its implementation at both national and local levels. The book reveals the heterogeneous development of reception policies not only across Member States but also within each country where solutions adopted at the local level generally diverge substantially. Furthermore, the overall centralization of policymaking on reception regardless the institutional structure, seems to leave little room for MLG arrangements tailored to specific localities and triggers tensions between central governments and local authorities. This book will be of key interest to scholars and students of migration and asylum studies, immigration, (multilevel) global governance and more broadly to comparative politics, European studies/politics, and public policy."

Sporting and sport psychological accomplishments are an important part of Scandinavian culture. Psychological factors have been demonstrated to have a major impact on both participation and achievements in sport. Sport psychology is about precisely these factors. The diversity of sport psychology research in Scandinavia is presented for the first time in this scholarly volume. Contributors from key sport psychology research teams in Sweden, Denmark and Norway present resarch covering a wide range of issues in the book’s twelve chapters. By publishing the contributions collectively as an Open Access anthology, the authors wish to reach researchers in the field of sport psychology, sport psychology advisers and professionals throughout Scandinavia. The volume will also be relevant to anyone with any interest in sport. The editors of the book are Tommy Haugen and Rune Høigaard, who are both affiliated with the Department of Public Health, Sport and Nutrition in the Faculty of Health and Sport Sciences at the University of Agder.

Innowacyjność jest tematem niezwykle popularnym i szeroko analizowanym. Jej istotność powinna być szczególnie podkreślana w obszarze rolnictwa, ze względu na dostarczanie żywności z tego sektora. Wdrażanie innowacji daje możliwość nie tylko unowocześniania majątku, lecz także dostosowania procesów produkcyjnych i wytwarzanych produktów do zachodzących zmian klimatycznych. Proces innowacyjny charakteryzuje się jednak kosztochłonnością, a związane z nim wysokie ryzyko może dodatkowo utrudniać pozyskanie kapitału. Książka jest pierwszą, w której w szeroki i kompleksowy sposób poruszono problematykę finansowania działalności innowacyjnej gospodarstw rolnych. Rozważania teoretyczne w zakresie możliwości, jakie dostarcza podmiotom rolnym polski rynek finansowy, zostały uzupełnione wywiadami kwestionariuszowymi przeprowadzonymi w województwie łódzkim w 2018 roku.

This work focuses on gaseous reactive flows in ideal and non-ideal reactors. The objective of this research is the development of models for the numerical simulation of homogeneous reactive flows under vacuum carburizing conditions of steel with propane and acetylene. These models can be used for further investigations of heterogeneous reactions during vacuum carburizing of steel to predict the carbon flux on the complex shaped steel parts to understand and, eventually, optimize the behavior of the whole reactor.arburizing is the case-hardening process in which carbon is added to the surface of low-carbon steels at temperatures generally between 850 and 1050 °C. In the conventional gas carburizing at atmospheric pressure, the carbon potential is controlled by adjusting the flow rate of the carburizing gas. Carbon potential of the furnace atmosphere can be related to partial pressure of CO2 or O2 or vapour pressure of water by equilibrium relationships and a sensor can be used to measure it. This method of carbon-potential control cannot be used for vacuum gas carburizing due to the absence of thermodynamic equilibrium which is one of the main difficulties of the vacuum carburizing process. The formation of soot during carburization isalso undesirable and the process parameters should be selected such that the formation of soot is minimized. The amount of carbon available for carburizing the steel depends on the partial pressure of the carburizing gas, carbon content in the carburizing gas and the pyrolysis reactions of the carburizing gas. The pyrolysis reactions of the carburizing gas are also affected by the contacting pattern or how the gas flows through and contacts with the steel parts being carburized. This work focuses on gaseous reactive flows in ideal and non-ideal reactors. The objective of this research is the development of models for the numerical simulation of homogeneous reactive flows under vacuum carburizing conditions of steel with ropane and acetylene. These models can be used for further investigations of heterogeneous reactions during vacuum carburizing of steel to predict the carbon flux on the complex shaped steel parts to understand and, eventually, optimize the behavior of the whole reactor. Two different approaches have been used to model the pyrolysis of propane and acetylene under vacuum carburizing conditions of steel. One approach is based on formal or global kinetic mechanisms together with the computational fluid dynamics (CFD) tool. The other approach is based on detailed chemistry with simplified or ideal flow models. Two global mechanisms developed at the Engler-Bunte-Institut for pyrolysis of propane and acetylene respectively were used in this work. One detailed mechanism developed at the Institute of Chemical Technology by the research group of Professor Deutschmann was used for modeling the pyrolysis of both the propane and acetylene. Experimental data from investigations on vacuum carburizing conducted at the Engler-Bunte-Institut were used to validate the modeling results.

W publikacji zostały przedstawione wizerunki staropolskich władczyń z uwzględnieniem kontekstu historyczno-kulturowego okresu zaborów i ogólnych tendencji w historiografii. Co historycy czasów narodowej niewoli sądzili o polskich księżnych i królowych, które jako żony i matki towarzyszyły mężczyznom sprawującym władzę? Czy miały one jakiś udział w rządach? Którzy dziejopisowie XIX i początku XX wieku zajmowali się tematyką kobiecą? Zagadnienia te są przedmiotem badań autorki, która oparła swoje analizy na 12 syntezach historycznych oraz ponad 350 artykułach i szkicach. Książka jest adresowana nie tylko do humanistów różnych specjalności, lecz także do pasjonatów historii zainteresowanych pozycją i rolą kobiet w dawnej Polsce.

Silicon nitride is used for challening applications like cutting inserts or forming rolls. The extreme strength and toughness of the material is achieved by an interaction between the microstructure and fracture behaviour on the microlevel. In order to understand these mechanisms, detailed unit cells have been defined and used for the determination of the effective fracture properties. The results have been used for the implementation of an effective continuum damage mechanics model.

This book controversially argues that Al Qaeda has clear aims, and that the only way to defeat it is to engage with its arguments in a serious way. Since the publication of the first edition in 2006, Mohamedou has brought the text right up-to-date. Starting with Al Qaeda's creation almost twenty years ago, and sketching its global mutation, Mohamedou explains that there is a cogent strategy to Al Qaeda's actions. He shows that the 'war on terror' is failing, only serving to recruit more terrorists to Al Qaeda's cause. He also puts forward a case for how the international community can best respond. Arguing that it is dangerous to dismiss Al Qaeda as illogical and irrational, this incisive and original book is important for policy-makers and ideal for undergraduates in international relations, Middle East studies and peace/conflict studies.