Refine
Year of publication
- 2002 (33) (remove)
Document Type
- Doctoral Thesis (33) (remove)
Language
- English (33) (remove)
Is part of the Bibliography
- yes (33)
Keywords
- 'Peer To Peer' (1)
- Adipozyt (1)
- Aggression (1)
- Anden (1)
- Anden / Störung <Geologie> / Strukturgeologie / Magnetotellurik / Chile <Nord> (1)
- Andes (1)
- Ausreisser (1)
- Bioelektrokatalytisches Recycling (1)
- Biokatalytisches Recyc (1)
- Biosensor (1)
Institute
- Institut für Physik und Astronomie (11)
- Institut für Ernährungswissenschaft (4)
- Department Linguistik (3)
- Institut für Mathematik (3)
- Institut für Umweltwissenschaften und Geographie (3)
- Department Psychologie (2)
- Institut für Biochemie und Biologie (2)
- Institut für Geowissenschaften (2)
- Institut für Informatik und Computational Science (2)
- Wirtschaftswissenschaften (1)
Modeling and analysis of production systems = Modellierung und Analyse von Produktionssystemen
(2002)
Weak Hypersubstitutions
(2002)
Value education of youth
(2002)
The value priorities of students and teachers were measured at eight different schools at the beginning and the end of the school year 2000/2001. This study once again confirmed the theoretical model of a universal structure of human values (Schwartz, 1992). At both measurement times, similar gender differences, as well as positive correlations between religiosity and school commitment were found. The students from the non-religious schools determined Hedonism as their highest, and Tradition as their lowest value priority. In the religious schools, Benevolence and Self-Direction were the highest values, whereas Power was found to be the lowest value priority. The change of the values Conformity, Hedonism, and Universalism was predicted both through the students′ religiosity and their type of school. The change of the values Power, Tradition, Benevolence, and Achievement, however, was mainly predicted through their religiosity. In three out of four schools the student-teacher similarity correlated positively with the school commitment of the students. Across all schools student-teacher similarity correlated positively with academic achievement.
In recent years, there has been a dramatic increase in available compute capacities. However, these “Grid resources” are rarely accessible in a continuous stream, but rather appear scattered across various machine types, platforms and operating systems, which are coupled by networks of fluctuating bandwidth. It becomes increasingly difficult for scientists to exploit available resources for their applications. We believe that intelligent, self-governing applications should be able to select resources in a dynamic and heterogeneous environment: Migrating applications determine a resource when old capacities are used up. Spawning simulations launch algorithms on external machines to speed up the main execution. Applications are restarted as soon as a failure is detected. All these actions can be taken without human interaction. A distributed compute environment possesses an intrinsic unreliability. Any application that interacts with such an environment must be able to cope with its failing components: deteriorating networks, crashing machines, failing software. We construct a reliable service infrastructure by endowing a service environment with a peer-to-peer topology. This “Grid Peer Services” infrastructure accommodates high-level services like migration and spawning, as well as fundamental services for application launching, file transfer and resource selection. It utilizes existing Grid technology wherever possible to accomplish its tasks. An Application Information Server acts as a generic information registry to all participants in a service environment. The service environment that we developed, allows applications e.g. to send a relocation requests to a migration server. The server selects a new computer based on the transmitted resource requirements. It transfers the application's checkpoint and binary to the new host and resumes the simulation. Although the Grid's underlying resource substrate is not continuous, we achieve persistent computations on Grids by relocating the application. We show with our real-world examples that a traditional genome analysis program can be easily modified to perform self-determined migrations in this service environment.
In order to face the rapidly increasing need for computational resources of various scientific and engineering applications one has to think of new ways to make more efficient use of the worlds current computational resources. In this respect, the growing speed of wide area networks made a new kind of distributed computing possible: Metacomputing or (distributed) Grid computing. This is a rather new and uncharted field in computational science. The rapidly increasing speed of networks even outperforms the average increase of processor speed: Processor speeds double on average each 18 month whereas network bandwidths double every 9 months. Due to this development of local and wide area networks Grid computing will certainly play a key role in the future of parallel computing. This type of distributed computing, however, distinguishes from the traditional parallel computing in many ways since it has to deal with many problems not occurring in classical parallel computing. Those problems are for example heterogeneity, authentication and slow networks to mention only a few. Some of those problems, e.g. the allocation of distributed resources along with the providing of information about these resources to the application have been already attacked by the Globus software. Unfortunately, as far as we know, hardly any application or middle-ware software takes advantage of this information, since most parallelizing algorithms for finite differencing codes are implicitly designed for single supercomputer or cluster execution. We show that although it is possible to apply classical parallelizing algorithms in a Grid environment, in most cases the observed efficiency of the executed code is very poor. In this work we are closing this gap. In our thesis, we will - show that an execution of classical parallel codes in Grid environments is possible but very slow - analyze this situation of bad performance, nail down bottlenecks in communication, remove unnecessary overhead and other reasons for low performance - develop new and advanced algorithms for parallelisation that are aware of a Grid environment in order to generelize the traditional parallelization schemes - implement and test these new methods, replace and compare with the classical ones - introduce dynamic strategies that automatically adapt the running code to the nature of the underlying Grid environment. The higher the performance one can achieve for a single application by manual tuning for a Grid environment, the lower the chance that those changes are widely applicable to other programs. In our analysis as well as in our implementation we tried to keep the balance between high performance and generality. None of our changes directly affect code on the application level which makes our algorithms applicable to a whole class of real world applications. The implementation of our work is done within the Cactus framework using the Globus toolkit, since we think that these are the most reliable and advanced programming frameworks for supporting computations in Grid environments. On the other hand, however, we tried to be as general as possible, i.e. all methods and algorithms discussed in this thesis are independent of Cactus or Globus.
Today, analytical chemistry does not longer consist of only the big measuring devices and methods which are time consuming and expensive, which can furthermore only be handled by the qualified staff and in addition the results can also only be evaluated by this qualified staff. Usually, this technique, which shall be described in the following as 'classic analytic measuring technique', requires also rooms equipped especially and often a relative big quantity of the test compounds which should be prepared especially. Beside this classic analytic measuring technique, limited on definite substance groups and requests, a new measuring technique has gained acceptance particularly within the last years, which one can often be used by a layman, too. Often the new measuring technique has very little pieces of equipment. The needed sample volumes are also small and a special sample preparation isn't required. In addition, the new measuring instruments are simple to handle. They are cheap both in their production and in the use and they permit even a continuous measurement recording usually. Numerous of this new measuring instruments base on the research in the field of Biosensorik during the last 40 years. Since Clark and Lyon in the year 1962 were able to measure glucose with a simple oxygen electrode, completed by an enzyme the development of the new measuring technique did not have to be held back any longer. Biosensors, special pickups which consists of a combination from a biological component (permits a specific recognition of the analyte also without purification of the sample previously) and a physical pickup (convert the primary physicochemical effect into an electronically measurable signal), conquered the market. In the context of this thesis different tyrosinasesensors were developed which fulfilling the various requests, depending on origin and features of the used tyrosinase. One of the tyrosinasesensors for example was used for quantification of phenolic compounds in river and sea water and the results could correlated very well with the corresponding DIN-test for the determination of phenolic compounds. An other developed tyrosinasesensor showed a very high sensitiveness for catecholamines, substances which are of special importance in the medical diagnostics. In addition, the investigations of two different tyrosinases, which were carried out also in the context of this thesis, have shown, that a special tyrosinase (tyrosinase from Streptomyces antibioticus) will be the better choice as tyrosinase from Agaricus bisporus, which is used in the area of biosensor research till now, if one wants to develop in future even more sensitive tyrosinasesensors. Furthermore, first successes became reached on a molecular biological field, the production of tyrosinasemutants with special, before well-considered features. These successes can be used to develop a new generation of tyrosinasesensors, tyrosinasesensors in which tyrosinase can be bound directionally both to the corresponding physical pickup or also to another enzyme. From this one expects to achieve ways minimized which the substance to be determined (or whose product) otherwise must cover. Finally, this should result in an clearly visible increase of sensitivity of the Biosensor.
Combined structural and magnetotelluric investigation across the West Fault Zone in northern Chile
(2002)
The characterisation of the internal architecture of large-scale fault zones is usually restricted to the outcrop-based investigation of fault-related structural damage on the Earth's surface. A method to obtain information on the downward continuation of a fault is to image the subsurface electrical conductivity structure. This work deals with such a combined investigation of a segment of the West Fault, which itself is a part of the more than 2000 km long trench-linked Precordilleran Fault System in the northern Chilean Andes. Activity on the fault system lasted from Eocene to Quaternary times. In the working area (22°04'S, 68°53'W), the West Fault exhibits a clearly defined surface trace with a constant strike over many tens of kilometers. Outcrop condition and morphology of the study area allow ideally for a combination of structural geology investigation and magnetotelluric (MT) / geomagnetic depth sounding (GDS) experiments. The aim was to achieve an understanding of the correlation of the two methods and to obtain a comprehensive view of the West Fault's internal architecture. Fault-related brittle damage elements (minor faults and slip-surfaces with or without striation) record prevalent strike-slip deformation on subvertically oriented shear planes. Dextral and sinistral slip events occurred within the fault zone and indicate reactivation of the fault system. Youngest deformation increments mapped in the working area are extensional and the findings suggest a different orientation of the extension axes on either side of the fault. Damage element density increases with approach to the fault trace and marks an approximately 1000 m wide damage zone around the fault. A region of profound alteration and comminution of rocks, about 400 m wide, is centered in the damage zone. Damage elements in this central part are predominantly dipping steeply towards the east (70-80°). Within the same study area, the electrical conductivity image of the subsurface was measured along a 4 km long MT/GDS profile. This main profile trends perpendicular to the West Fault trace. The MT stations of the central 2 km were 100 m apart from each other. A second profile with 300 m site spacing and 9 recording sites crosses the fault a few kilometers away from the main study area. Data were recorded in the frequency range from 1000 Hz to 0.001 Hz with four real time instruments S.P.A.M. MkIII. The GDS data reveal the fault zone for both profiles at frequencies above 1 Hz. Induction arrows indicate a zone of enhanced conductivity several hundred meters wide, that aligns along the WF strike and lies mainly on the eastern side of the surface trace. A dimensionality analysis of the MT data justifies a two dimensional model approximation of the data for the frequency range from 1000 Hz to 0.1 Hz. For this frequency range a regional geoelectric strike parallel to the West Fault trace could be recovered. The data subset allows for a resolution of the conductivity structure of the uppermost crust down to at least 5 km. Modelling of the MT data is based on an inversion algorithm developed by Mackie et al. (1997). The features of the resulting resistivity models are tested for their robustness using empirical sensitivity studies. This involves variation of the properties (geometry, conductivity) of the anomalies, the subsequent calculation of forward or constrained inversion models and check for consistency of the obtained model results with the data. A fault zone conductor is resolved on both MT profiles. The zones of enhanced conductivity are located to the east of the West Fault surface trace. On the dense MT profile, the conductive zone is confined to a width of about 300 m and the anomaly exhibits a steep dip towards the east (about 70°). Modelling implies that the conductivity increase reaches to a depth of at least 1100 m and indicates a depth extent of less than 2000 m. Further conductive features are imaged but their geometry is less well constrained. The fault zone conductors of both MT profiles coincide in position with the alteration zone. For the dense profile, the dip of the conductive anomaly and the dip of the damage elements of the central part of the fault zone correlate. This suggests that the electrical conductivity enhancement is causally related to a mesh of minor faults and fractures, which is a likely pathway for fluids. The interconnected rock-porosity that is necessary to explain the observed conductivity enhancement by means of fluids is estimated on the basis of the salinity of several ground water samples (Archie's Law). The deeper the source of the water sample, the more saline it is due to longer exposure to fluid-rock interaction and the lower is the fluid's resistivity. A rock porosity in the range of 0.8% - 4% would be required at a depth of 200 m. That indicates that fluids penetrating the damaged fault zone from close to the surface are sufficient to explain the conductivity anomalies. This is as well supported by the preserved geochemical signature of rock samples in the alteration zone. Late stage alteration processes were active in a low temperature regime (<95°C) and the involvement of ascending brines from greater depth is not indicated. The limited depth extent of the fault zone conductors is a likely result of sealing and cementation of the fault fracture mesh due to dissolution and precipitation of minerals at greater depth and increased temperature. Comparison of the results of the apparently inactive West Fault with published studies on the electrical conductivity structure of the currently active San Andreas Fault, suggests that the depth extent and conductivity of the fault zone conductor may be correlated to fault activity. Ongoing deformation will keep the fault/fracture mesh permeable for fluids and impede cementation and sealing of fluid pathways.
Semi-arid areas are, due to their climatic setting, characterized by small water resources. An increasing water demand as a consequence of population growth and economic development as well as a decreasing water availability in the course of possible climate change may aggravate water scarcity in future, which often exists already for present-day conditions in these areas. Understanding the mechanisms and feedbacks of complex natural and human systems, together with the quantitative assessment of future changes in volume, timing and quality of water resources are a prerequisite for the development of sustainable measures of water management to enhance the adaptive capacity of these regions. For this task, dynamic integrated models, containing a hydrological model as one component, are indispensable tools. The main objective of this study is to develop a hydrological model for the quantification of water availability in view of environmental change over a large geographic domain of semi-arid environments. The study area is the Federal State of Ceará (150 000 km2) in the semi-arid north-east of Brazil. Mean annual precipitation in this area is 850 mm, falling in a rainy season with duration of about five months. Being mainly characterized by crystalline bedrock and shallow soils, surface water provides the largest part of the water supply. The area has recurrently been affected by droughts which caused serious economic losses and social impacts like migration from the rural regions. The hydrological model Wasa (Model of Water Availability in Semi-Arid Environments) developed in this study is a deterministic, spatially distributed model being composed of conceptual, process-based approaches. Water availability (river discharge, storage volumes in reservoirs, soil moisture) is determined with daily resolution. Sub-basins, grid cells or administrative units (municipalities) can be chosen as spatial target units. The administrative units enable the coupling of Wasa in the framework of an integrated model which contains modules that do not work on the basis of natural spatial units. The target units mentioned above are disaggregated in Wasa into smaller modelling units within a new multi-scale, hierarchical approach. The landscape units defined in this scheme capture in particular the effect of structured variability of terrain, soil and vegetation characteristics along toposequences on soil moisture and runoff generation. Lateral hydrological processes at the hillslope scale, as reinfiltration of surface runoff, being of particular importance in semi-arid environments, can thus be represented also within the large-scale model in a simplified form. Depending on the resolution of available data, small-scale variability is not represented explicitly with geographic reference in Wasa, but by the distribution of sub-scale units and by statistical transition frequencies for lateral fluxes between these units. Further model components of Wasa which respect specific features of semi-arid hydrology are: (1) A two-layer model for evapotranspiration comprises energy transfer at the soil surface (including soil evaporation), which is of importance in view of the mainly sparse vegetation cover. Additionally, vegetation parameters are differentiated in space and time in dependence on the occurrence of the rainy season. (2) The infiltration module represents in particular infiltration-excess surface runoff as the dominant runoff component. (3) For the aggregate description of the water balance of reservoirs that cannot be represented explicitly in the model, a storage approach respecting different reservoirs size classes and their interaction via the river network is applied. (4) A model for the quantification of water withdrawal by water use in different sectors is coupled to Wasa. (5) A cascade model for the temporal disaggregation of precipitation time series, adapted to the specific characteristics of tropical convective rainfall, is applied for the generating rainfall time series of higher temporal resolution. All model parameters of Wasa can be derived from physiographic information of the study area. Thus, model calibration is primarily not required. Model applications of Wasa for historical time series generally results in a good model performance when comparing the simulation results of river discharge and reservoir storage volumes with observed data for river basins of various sizes. The mean water balance as well as the high interannual and intra-annual variability is reasonably represented by the model. Limitations of the modelling concept are most markedly seen for sub-basins with a runoff component from deep groundwater bodies of which the dynamics cannot be satisfactorily represented without calibration. Further results of model applications are: (1) Lateral processes of redistribution of runoff and soil moisture at the hillslope scale, in particular reinfiltration of surface runoff, lead to markedly smaller discharge volumes at the basin scale than the simple sum of runoff of the individual sub-areas. Thus, these processes are to be captured also in large-scale models. The different relevance of these processes for different conditions is demonstrated by a larger percentage decrease of discharge volumes in dry as compared to wet years. (2) Precipitation characteristics have a major impact on the hydrological response of semi-arid environments. In particular, underestimated rainfall intensities in the rainfall input due to the rough temporal resolution of the model and due to interpolation effects and, consequently, underestimated runoff volumes have to be compensated in the model. A scaling factor in the infiltration module or the use of disaggregated hourly rainfall data show good results in this respect. The simulation results of Wasa are characterized by large uncertainties. These are, on the one hand, due to uncertainties of the model structure to adequately represent the relevant hydrological processes. On the other hand, they are due to uncertainties of input data and parameters particularly in view of the low data availability. Of major importance is: (1) The uncertainty of rainfall data with regard to their spatial and temporal pattern has, due to the strong non-linear hydrological response, a large impact on the simulation results. (2) The uncertainty of soil parameters is in general of larger importance on model uncertainty than uncertainty of vegetation or topographic parameters. (3) The effect of uncertainty of individual model components or parameters is usually different for years with rainfall volumes being above or below the average, because individual hydrological processes are of different relevance in both cases. Thus, the uncertainty of individual model components or parameters is of different importance for the uncertainty of scenario simulations with increasing or decreasing precipitation trends. (4) The most important factor of uncertainty for scenarios of water availability in the study area is the uncertainty in the results of global climate models on which the regional climate scenarios are based. Both a marked increase or a decrease in precipitation can be assumed for the given data. Results of model simulations for climate scenarios until the year 2050 show that a possible future change in precipitation volumes causes a larger percentage change in runoff volumes by a factor of two to three. In the case of a decreasing precipitation trend, the efficiency of new reservoirs for securing water availability tends to decrease in the study area because of the interaction of the large number of reservoirs in retaining the overall decreasing runoff volumes.
Deep convection is an essential part of the circulation in the North Atlantic Ocean. It influences the northward heat transport achieved by the thermohaline circulation. Understanding its stability and variability is therefore necessary for assessing climatic changes in the area of the North Atlantic. This thesis aims at improving the conceptual understanding of the stability and variability of deep convection. Observational data from the Labrador Sea show phases with and without deep convection. A simple two-box model is fitted to these data. The results suggest that the Labrador Sea has two coexisting stable states, one with regular deep convection and one without deep convection. This bistability arises from a positive salinity feedback that is due to the net freshwater input into the surface layer. The convecting state can easily become unstable if the mean forcing shifts to warmer or less saline conditions. The weather-induced variability of the external forcing is included into the box model by adding a stochastic forcing term. It turns out that deep convection is then switched "on" and "off" frequently. The mean residence time in either state is a measure of its stochastic stability. The stochastic stability depends smoothly on the forcing parameters, in contrast to the deterministic (non-stochastic) stability which may change abruptly. The mean and the variance of the stochastic forcing both have an impact on the frequency of deep convection. For instance, a decline in convection frequency due to a surface freshening may be compensated for by an increased heat flux variability. With a further simplified box model some stochastic stability features are studied analytically. A new effect is described, called wandering monostability: even if deep convection is not a stable state due to changed forcing parameters, the stochastic forcing can still trigger convection events frequently. The analytical expressions explicitly show how wandering monostability and other effects depend on the model parameters. This dependence is always exponential for the mean residence times, but for the probability of long nonconvecting phases it is exponential only if this probability is small. It is to be expected that wandering monostability is relevant in other parts of the climate system as well. All in all, the results demonstrate that the stability of deep convection in the Labrador Sea reacts very sensitively to the forcing. The presence of variability is crucial for understanding this sensitivity. Small changes in the forcing can already significantly lower the frequency of deep convection events, which presumably strongly affects the regional climate. ----Anmerkung: Der Autor ist Träger des durch die Physikalische Gesellschaft zu Berlin vergebenen Carl-Ramsauer-Preises 2003 für die jeweils beste Dissertation der vier Universitäten Freie Universität Berlin, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Technische Universität Berlin und Universität Potsdam.
Motivated by recent proposals on the experimental detectability of quantum gravity effects, the present thesis investigates assumptions and methods which might be used for the prediction of such effects within the framework of loop quantum gravity. To this end, a scalar field coupled to gravity is considered as a model system. Starting from certain assumptions about the dynamics of the coupled gravity-matter system, a quantum theory for the scalar field is proposed. Then, assuming that the gravitational field is in a semiclassical state, a "QFT on curved space-time limit" of this theory is defined. In contrast to ordinary quantum field theory on curved space-time however, in this limit the theory describes a quantum scalar field propagating on a (classical) random lattice. Then, methods to obtain the low energy limit of such a lattice theory, especially regarding the resulting modified dispersion relations, are discussed and applied to simple model systems. Finally, under certain simplifying assumptions, using the methods developed before as well as a specific class of semiclassical states, corrections to the dispersion relations for the scalar and the electromagnetic field are computed within the framework of loop quantum gravity. These calculations are of preliminary character, as many assumptions enter whose validity remains to be studied more thoroughly. However they exemplify the problems and possibilities of making predictions based on loop quantum gravity that are in principle testable by experiment.
Structural and spectroscopical study of crystals of 1,3,4-oxadiazole derivatives at high pressure
(2002)
In recent years the search for new materials of technological interest has given new impulses to the study of organic compounds. Organic substances possess a great number of advantages such as the possibility to adjust their properties for a given purpose by different chemical and physical techniques in the preparation process. Oxadiazole derivatives are interesting due to their use as material for light emitting diodes (LED) as well as scintillators. The physical properties of a solid depend on its structure. Different structures induce different intra- and intermolecular interactions. An advantageous method to modify the intra- as well as the intermolecular interactions of a given substance is the application of high pressure. Furthermore, using this method the chemical features of the compound are not influenced. We have investigated the influence of high pressure and high temperature on the super-molecular structure of several oxadiazole derivatives in crystalline state. From the results of this investigation an equation of state for these crystals was determined. Furthermore, the spectroscopical features of these materials under high pressure were characterized.
Comparative study of gene expression during the differentiation of white and brown preadipocytes
(2002)
Introduction Mammals have two types of adipose tissue: the lipid storing white adipose tissue and the brown adipose tissue characterised by its capacity for non-shivering thermogenesis. White and brown adipocytes have the same origin in mesodermal stem cells. Yet nothing is known so far about the commitment of precursor cells to the white and brown adipose lineage. Several experimental approaches indicate that they originate from the differentiation of two distinct types of precursor cells, white and brown preadipocytes. Based on this hypothesis, the aim of this study was to analyse the gene expression of white and brown preadipocytes in a systematic approach. Experimental approach The white and brown preadipocytes to compare were obtained from primary cell cultures of preadipocytes from the Djungarian dwarf hamster. Representational difference analysis was used to isolate genes potentially differentially expressed between the two cell types. The thus obtained cDNA libraries were spotted on microarrays for a large scale gene expression analysis in cultured preadipocytes and adipocytes and in tissue samples. Results 4 genes with higher expression in white preadipocytes (3 members of the complement system and a fatty acid desaturase) and 8 with higher expression in brown preadipocytes were identified. From the latter 3 coded for structural proteins (fibronectin, metargidin and a actinin 4), 3 for proteins involved in transcriptional regulation (necdin, vigilin and the small nuclear ribonucleoprotein polypeptide A) and 2 are of unknown function. Cluster analysis was applied to the gene expression data in order to characterise them and led to the identification of four major typical expression profiles: genes up-regulated during differentiation, genes down-regulated during differentiation, genes higher expressed in white preadipocytes and genes higher expressed in brown preadipocytes. Conclusion This study shows that white and brown preadipocytes can be distinguished by different expression levels of several genes. These results draw attention to interesting candidate genes for the determination of white and brown preadipocytes (necdin, vigilin and others) and furthermore indicate that potential importance of several functional groups in the differentiation of white and brown preadipocytes, mainly the complement system and extracellular matrix.
The length of the vegetation period (VP) plays a central role for the interannual variation of carbon fixation of terrestrial ecosystems. Observational data analysis has indicated that the length of the VP has increased in the last decades in the northern latitudes mainly due to an advancement of bud burst (BB). This phenomenon has been widely discussed in the context of Global Warming because phenology is correlated to temperatures. Analyzing the patterns of spring phenology over the last century in Southern Germany provided two main findings: - The strong advancement of spring phases especially in the decade before 1999 is not a singular event in the course of the 20th century. Similar trends were also observed in earlier decades. Distinct periods of varying trend behavior for important spring phases could be distinguished. - Marked differences in trend behavior between the early and late spring phases were detected. Early spring phases changed as regards the magnitude of their negative trends from strong negative trends between 1931 and 1948 to moderate negative trends between 1948 and 1984 and back to strong negative trends between 1984 and 1999. Late spring phases showed a different behavior. Negative trends between 1931 and 1948 are followed by marked positive trends between 1948 and 1984 and then strong negative trends between 1984 and 1999. This marked difference in trend development between early and late spring phases was also found all over Germany for the two periods 1951 to 1984 and 1984 to 1999. The dominating influence of temperature on spring phenology and its modifying effect on autumn phenology was confirmed in this thesis. However, - temperature functions determining spring phenology were not significantly correlated with a global annual CO2 signal which was taken as a proxy for a Global Warming pattern. - an index for large scale regional circulation patterns (NAO index) could only to a small part explain the observed phenological variability in spring. The observed different trend behavior of early and late spring phases is explained by the differing behavior of mean March and April temperatures. Mean March temperatures have increased on average over the 20th century accompanied by an increasing variation in the last 50 years. April temperatures, however, decreased between the end of the 1940s and the mid-1980s, followed by a marked warming after the mid-1980s. It can be concluded that the advancement of spring phenology in recent decades are part of multi-decadal fluctuations over the 20th century that vary with the species and the relevant seasonal temperatures. Because of these fluctuations a correlation with an observed Global Warming signal could not be found. On average all investigated spring phases advanced between 5 and 20 days between 1951 and 1999 for all Natural Regions in Germany. A marked difference be! tween late and early spring phases is due to the above mentioned differing behavior before and after the mid-1980s. Leaf coloring (LC) was delayed between 1951 and 1984 for all tree species. However, after 1984 LC was advanced. Length of the VP increased between 1951 and 1999 for all considered tree species by an average of ten days throughout Germany. It is predominately the change in spring phases which contributes to a change in the potentially absorbed radiation. Additionally, it is the late spring species that are relatively more favored by an advanced BB because they can additionally exploit longer days and higher temperatures per day advancement. To assess the relative change in potentially absorbed radiation among species, changes in both spring and autumn phenology have to be considered as well as where these changes are located in the year. For the detection of the marked difference between early and late spring phenology a new time series construction method was developed. This method allowed the derivation of reliable time series that spanned over 100 years and the construction of locally combined time series increasing the available data for model development. Apart from analyzed protocolling errors, microclimatic site influences, genetic variation and the observers were identified as sources of uncertainty of phenological observational data. It was concluded that 99% of all phenological observations at a certain site will vary within approximately 24 days around the parametric mean. This supports to the proposed 30-day rule to detect outliers. New phenology models that predict local BB from daily temperature time series were developed. These models were based on simple interactions between inhibitory and promotory agents that are assumed to control the developmental status of a plant. Apart from the fact that, in general, the new models fitted and predicted the observations better than classical models, the main modeling results were: - The bias of the classical models, i.e. overestimation of early observations and underestimation of late observations, could be reduced but not completely removed. - The different favored model structures for each species indicated that for the late spring phases photoperiod played a more dominant role than for early spring phases. - Chilling only plays a subordinate role for spring BB compared to temperatures directly preceding BB.
The primary focus on the present study was to identify early risk factors for infant aggression in a sample of high risk, low-income teenager mothers and their infants. Despite the amount of research on externalizing behavior, relatively little is known about its development in early childhood. Because chronically aggressive school-age children tend to be those who first display symptoms during preschool years, an examination of the early manifestations of aggressive behavior and the development of measurements for infants is needed. The present study explored a model of infant aggression development that emphasized infant aggression developing largely through the interaction of infant′s dispositional characteristics with their caregiving environment. The study addressed the following relations: (1) Maternal psychosocial functioning with reported and observed infant aggression and negative emotionality, (2) reported measurements of infant aggression and negative emotionality with observed infant measurements of infant aggression and negative emotionality, (3) infant negative emotionality and infant aggression, (4) infant emotion regulation with infant aggression and negative emotionality, (5) the interaction between emotion regulation and negative emotionality in relation to infant aggression, and (6) attachment classification with infant aggression and negative emotionality. Finally, the question of whether these six relations would differ by gender was also addressed. Maternal psychosocial functioning was assessed with self-reported measurements. Infant aggression, negative emotionality and emotion regulation were measured during two standardized assessments, the Strange Situation and the Bayley Scales of Infant Development Assessment and maternal reported with the Infant-Toddler Social and Emotional Assessment. Several interesting findings emerged. One of the main findings concerned maternal attribution and its possible role as a risk factor for later externalizing behaviors. That is, mothers, especially depressed and stressed mothers, tended to report higher levels of infant aggression and negative emotionality than was noted by more objective observers. This tendency was particularly evident in mothers with girl infants. Another important finding concerned emotion regulation. Even at this early age, clear differences in emotion regulation could be seen. Interestingly, infants with high negative emotionality and low emotion regulation were observed to be the most aggressive. Also significant relations emerged for infant negative emotionality and aggression and vise versa. Thus, for purposes of treatment and scientific study, the three constructs (emotion regulation, negative emotionality, and aggression) should be considered in combination. Investigating each alone may not prove fruitful in future examinations. Additionally, different emotion regulation behaviors were observed for girl and boy infants. Aggressive girls looked more at the environment, their toys and their mother, whereas aggressive boys looked less at the environment and their mother and explored their toys more, although looked at the toys less. Although difficult to interpret at this point, it is nonetheless interesting that gender differences exist at this young age in emotion regulatory behaviors. In conclusion, although preliminary, findings from the present study provide intriguing directions for future research. More studies need to conducted focusing on infant aggression, as well as longitudinal studies following the infants over time.
New polymers and low molecular compounds, suitable for organic light emitting devices and organic electronic applications, have been synthesised in this years in order to obtain electron transport characteristics compatible with requirements for applications in real plastic devices. However, despite of the technological importance and of the relevant progress in devices manufacture, fundamental physical properties of such class of materials are still not enough studied. In particular extensive presence of distributions of localised states inside the band gap has a deep impact on their electronic properties. Such presence of shallow traps as well as the influence of the sample preparation conditions on deep and shallow localised states have not been, until now, systematically explored. The thermal techniques are powerful tools in order to study localised levels in inorganic and organic materials. Thermally stimulated luminescence (TSL), thermally stimulated currents (TSC) and thermally stimulated depolarisation currents (TSDC) allow to deeply look to shallow and deep trap levels as well as they permit to study, in synergy with dielectric spectroscopy (DES), polarisation and depolarisation effects. We studied, by means of numerical simulations, the first and the second order kinetic equations characterised by negligible and strong re-trapping respectively. We included in the equations Gaussian, exponential and quasi-continuous distributions of localised states. The shapes of the theoretical peaks have been investigated by means of systematic variation of the two main parameters of the equations, i. e. the energy trap depth E and the frequency factor a and of the parameters regulating the distributions, in particular for a Gaussian distribution the distribution width s and the integration limits. The theoretical findings have been applied to experimental glow curves. Thin films of polymers and low molecular compounds. Polyphenylquinoxalines, trisphenylquinoxalines and oxadiazoles, studied because of their technological relevance, show complex thermograms, having several levels of localised states and depolarisation peaks. In particular well ordered films of an amphiphilic substituted 2-(p-nitrophenyl)-5-(p-undecylamidophenyl)-1,3,4-oxadiazole (NADPO) are characterised by rich TSL thermograms. A wide region of shallow traps, localised at Em = 4 meV, has been successfully fit by means of a first order kinetic equation having a Gaussian distribution of localised states. Two further peaks, having a different origin, have been characterised. The peaks at Tm = 221.5 K and Tm = 254.2 have activation energy of Em= 0.63 eV and Em = 0.66 eV, frequency factor s = 2.4x1012 s-1 and s = 1.85x1011 s-1, distribution width s = 0.045 eV and s = 0.088 eV respectively. Increasing the number of thermal cycle, a peak, probably connected with structural defects, appears at Tm = 197.7 K. The numerical analysis of this peak was performed by means of a first order equation containing a Gaussian distribution of traps. The activation energy of the trap level is centred at Em = 0.55 eV. The distribution is perfectly symmetric with a quite small width s = 0.028 eV. The frequency factor is s = 1.15 x 1012 s-1, resulting of the same order of magnitude of its neighbour peak at Tm = 221.5 K, having both, probably, the same origin. Furthermore the work demonstrates that the shape of the glow curves is strongly influenced by the excitation temperature and by the thermal cycles. For that reason Gaussian distributions of localised states can be confused with exponential distributions if the previous thermal history of the samples is not adequately considered.
Jets are highly collimated flows of matter. They are present in a large variety of astrophysical sources: young stars, stellar mass black holes (microquasars), galaxies with an active nucleus (AGN) and presumably also intense flashes of gamma-rays. In particular, the jets of microquasars, powered by accretion disks, are probably small-scale versions of the outflows from AGN. Beside observations of astrophysical jet sources, also theoretical considerations have shown that magnetic fields play an important role in jet formation, acceleration and collimation. Collimated jets seem to be systematically associated with the presence of an accretion disk around a star or a collapsed object. If the central object is a black hole, the surrounding accretion disk is the only possible location for a magnetic field generation. We are interested in the formation process of highly relativistic jets as observed from microquasars and AGN. We theoretically investigate the jet collimation region, whose physical dimensions are extremely tiny even compared to radio telescopes spatial resolution. Thus, for most of the jet sources, global theoretical models are, at the moment, the only possibility to gain information about the physical processes in the innermost jet region. For the first time, we determine the global two-dimensional field structure of stationary, axisymmetric, relativistic, strongly magnetized (force-free) jets collimating into an asymptotically cylindrical jet (taken as boundary condition) and anchored into a differentially rotating accretion disk. This approach allows for a direct connection between the accretion disk and the asymptotic collimated jet. Therefore, assuming that the foot points of the field lines are rotating with Keplerian speed, we are able to achieve a direct scaling of the jet magnetosphere in terms of the size of the central object. We find a close compatibility between the results of our model and radio observations of the M87 galaxy innermost jet. We also calculate the X-ray emission in the energy range 0.2--10.1\,keV from a microquasar relativistic jet close to its source of 5 solar masses. In order to do it, we apply the jet flow parameters (densities, velocities, temperatures of each volume element along the collimating jet) derived in the literature from the relativistic magnetohydrodynamic equations. We obtain theoretical thermal X-ray spectra of the innermost jet as composition of the spectral contributions of the single volume elements along the jet. Since relativistic effects as Doppler shift and Doppler boosting due to the motion of jets toward us might be important, we investigate how the spectra are affected by them considering different inclinations of the line of sight to the jet axis. Emission lines of highly ionized iron are clearly visible in our spectra, probably also observed in the Galactic microquasars GRS 1915+105 and XTE J1748-288. The Doppler shift of the emission lines is always evident. Due to the chosen geometry of the magnetohydrodynamic jet, the inner X-ray emitting part is not yet collimated. Ergo, depending on the viewing angle, the Doppler boosting does not play a major role in the total spectra. This is the first time that X-ray spectra have been calculated from the numerical solution of a magnetohydrodynamic jet.