VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
Arctic science in circulation at the Royal Geographical Society c.1880–1914
Keywords: Arctic
Circulation
Knowledge
Exploration
Geography
Royal Geographical Society

Much historical scholarship has examined the events which took place as various explorers ventured into the Northernmost areas of the earth’s surface. Such analysis has sought to understand the multiple and overlapping motivations that lay behind these Arctic expeditionary practices. Importantly, studies have also shown that explorers were key actors in the production of geographical knowledge pertaining to this geographical region and it has also been demonstrated that this knowledge was to have a powerful influence over how the North was envisaged within the Western popular imagination. While the role of individual explorers in these processes has been well documented, a growing body of scholarship has turned its attention toward understanding the wider cultures in which these explorers were situated. In particular, the precise role that was played by various geographical institutions in the formation of these important Arctic discourses has begun to be investigated. This project, conducted as part of an AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Award between the University of Oxford and the Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of British Geographers), has therefore contributed to and expanded these insightful literatures. Contributing to emerging debates that have considered the geographies bound up in the circulation of scientific knowledge, the thesis draws from the extensive archival collections held at the RGS-IBG to study the ways in which geographical knowledge about the Arctic regions was produced, circulated and mediated by this hugely influential institution. Studying the Society’s close connections to three Arctic explorers – Fridtjof Nansen, Ejnar Mikkelsen and Robert Peary – it is shown that the RGS was instrumental in shaping both scientific and lay discourses about the Arctic at the turn of the twentieth century. The thesis also explores the limits to this knowledge circulation by examining the ways in which perspectives from indigenous peoples of the Arctic were marginalised within the historical records of these expeditions. Although ‘indigenous intermediaries’ assisted explorers in a number of ways during their time in the field, the thesis demonstrates that prevailing imaginaries of the Polar regions have meant that these contributions have continued to remain only ‘partially visible’ within the subsequent historical narrative.
Imaging angiogenesis in brain metastasis
Keywords: angiogenesis
brain metastasis
MPIO
arterial spin labelling
MRI

Brain metastasis is responsible for a large proportion of the mortality of cancer, and there are currently no effective treatments. The effect of treatments, particularly anti-angiogenic therapeutics, is difficult to ascertain using current imaging methods. Thus, the aim of this thesis is to develop methods for imaging angiogenesis using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in a mouse model of brain metastasis.
Arterial spin labelling (ASL) is an MRI technique that measures cerebral blood flow (CBF) non-invasively and quantitatively. The work described in this thesis optimised and validated multiphase pseudo-continuous ASL (MP pCASL) for use in mice. This sequence was then used to measure and identify areas of reduced CBF in mouse models of brain metastasis and glioma.
Integrin αvβ3 is a marker of angiogenesis expressed on tumour blood vessels, including in brain metastasis. The second major aim of the work described in this thesis was to image angiogenic blood vessels in brain metastasis in vivo using microparticles of iron oxide (MPIO) conjugated to an integrin αvβ3 targeting peptide (RGD-MPIO). The targeted MPIO showed some specific binding in vivo, but were unsuccessful at visualising angiogenesis in vivo owing to pre-existing hypointense voxels in the tumour, and non-specific uptake of the MPIO.
It was found that pre-existing hypointense voxels were caused by endogenous iron-laden macrophages resident in the tumour, and that non-specific contrast was a result of macrophage uptake of MPIO. It was also shown that non-specific macrophage uptake was reduced with antibody-targeted MPIO compared to peptide-targeted MPIO.
In conclusion, whilst the use of MP pCASL was successful for imaging angiogenesis in brain metastasis, the use of RGD-MPIO was precluded owing, in large part, to non-specific uptake of peptide targeted MPIO.
Increasing the usability of graph databases by learning SPARQL queries and RDF data
Keywords: Databases
SPARQL
Querying
Data

Semantic Web technologies and other open standards have the potential of allowing current open datasets and knowledge bases to become more interlinked and interoperable, providing interfaces for end-users to access data via powerful high-level query languages such as SPARQL. As a consequence, it becomes ever more important for these data to be efficiently and easily searchable by non-expert audiences. The challenge of increasing the usability of these database systems, therefore, becomes central. In this thesis, we approach the problem of increasing the usability of querying graph data, in the form of RDF knowledge bases, from different perspectives. We study the learning — more specifically, the reverse engineering — of SPARQL queries, including its theoretical and practical aspects. Along the way we find that a key limitation of these approaches is the completeness of the data, and therefore turn to learning — in this case, knowledge base completion — of RDF data.
Specifically, we begin by studying the definability problem for first-order logic, providing exact complexity bounds. We next provide a theoretical study of reverse engineering in the SPARQL context, formalising variants of the reverse engineering problem and giving bounds on their complexity. We develop algorithms for reverse engineering and perform experimental analyses, showing that they scale well. Additionally, we implement and present a proof-of-concept user application which demonstrates how reverse engineering is capable of guiding users who are unfamiliar with both the dataset and with SPARQL to desired queries and result sets based on a query by example paradigm. Finally, to address the issue of the completeness of data, we propose a scalable and ontology-aware graph embedding model which allows for fact inference in RDF datasets, providing a data learning approach that is complementary to query learning.
Music, spectacle, and society in ancient Rome, 168 BC - AD 68
Keywords: Rome
Music
Spectacle
Society

This thesis explores the cultural history of music in ancient Rome from the mid-second century BC to the death of the Emperor Nero in AD 68. The discussion centres on the role of music in public and private spectacle. Rather than examining the topic in isolation, the thesis seeks to pinpoint the intersections between musical performance and cultural debates about morality, luxury, education, and philhellenism, as a way of situating music within a broader historical context.
The thesis is structured chronologically. Chapter I examines Polybius’ narration of the theatrical games staged by the triumphator L. Anicius Gallus in 167 BC. Anicius’ subversive treatment of Greek musical models is interpreted as a deliberately comical gesture, playing to the theme of military conquest. The second half of the chapter analyses the episode in the light of Greek and Roman debates about musical entertainment in this period. Chapter II focuses on the late Republic. I argue that late Republican writers used music as a way of framing the political conflict between optimates and populares, associating ‘good’ music with the aristocratic mos maiorum and ‘bad’ music with a disruptive kind of popular entertainment. Chapter III, on the Augustan period, discusses the assimilation of the princeps and Apollo Citharoedus. The Augustan monuments to the lyre-playing god are examined in relation to the Palatine programme, the ‘propaganda’ campaign against Mark Antony and Cleopatra, and the ideology of the ‘Golden Age’. The fourth and final chapter is devoted to Nero, the notorious musician-emperor. Challenging the perception of Nero as a narcissistic tyrant, I suggest that the charismatic princeps used his performances on the stage as a political platform, uniting audiences through a shared love of music.
Integrated care in practice: a case study of health and social care for adults considered to be at high risk of hospital admission
Keywords: Integrated care
Ethnography
Case study
Health policy

Integrated care is pursued globally as a strategy to manage health and social care resources more effectively. It offers the promise of meeting increasingly complex needs, particularly those of aging populations, in a person-centred, co-ordinated way that addresses fragmentation and improves quality.
However, policy to integrate health and social care in England has led to programmes which have had disappointing effects on reducing hospital admissions and costs. My concern with the real-world problem of how to integrate care to reduce hospital admissions and improve quality whilst working as an NHS commissioner led to this study of integrated care in practice.
The resulting thesis offers an interpretive account of the practice of integrated care across three Clinical Commissioning Groups. I present an ethnographic case study based on fieldwork undertaken 2014- 2016. My empirical work connected policy analysis with participant observation of 20 people with multiple, long term conditions considered to be at high risk of hospital admission and aspects of the organisational context.
My main findings in relation to health policy and planning processes were that dominant discourses of integrated care (as a solution to a range of problems) are incorporated into institutional agendas and processes of power. NHS planning processes shape the context for a case of integrated care and prioritise the creation of bounded (but changing) planning units over historical and democratic configurations of places.
I found that integrated care was not foregrounded in patients’ experiences, rather it was a peripheral activity to their concerns to manage their daily routines, which required work to piece together networks of care and resources. I conceptualise integrated care as a lens through which the multiple emergent practices that comprise health care interactions with patients are viewed. Such a lens prioritises strategies to reduce hospital admissions, and marginalises aspects of integrated patient care.
My analysis of this case makes an original contribution to understanding the tensions between policy aspirations for integrated care and the sometimes disappointing outcomes for patients by considering how integrated care programmes have little effect on external social structures, with a resulting reproduction of existing outcomes, such as hospital admissions, and continued separation of health and social care, rather than desired changes.
Prophecy, history and method: how and why Isaac Newton studied chronology
Keywords: Chronology
Isaac Newton
Prophecy

Isaac Newton spent forty years of his life studying the chronology of ancient civilizations. The manuscript record that bears the fruits of these writings is in significant disarray, which has led to many misinformed conclusions about the nature of his research and his motivations for studying the topic in the first place. By devoting ample attention to Newton’s reading, note-taking, writing, and ordering practices, this thesis makes use both of evidence drawn from Newton's surviving books and of Newton’s digitised manuscripts and transcriptions to reconstruct the evolution of his chronological writings. Originally just an eight-page treatise on the origins of idolatry, ‘Theologiae Gentilis Origines Philosphicae’ (mid-1680s), Newton started expanding and revising it to eventually arrive at the posthumously published Chronology of Ancient Kingdoms Amended (1728). I show that most of the writings he composed in the interval were all part of a single treatise, the ‘Originals’ (1702–06), in which he built on his original research.
In truth, Newton’s chronological studies began even before the ‘Origines’, with his studies of the prophecies in the books of Daniel and Revelation. In order to correctly identify the four monarchies from Daniel and their role in past, present, and future, he needed a reliable timeframe. From Greek and Roman sources he derived a timeline of the kings that reigned over Babylon during the Jewish Exile, which he subsequently collated with the Scriptural record, not shunning to amend the chronological books of Ezra and Nehemiah where necessary. With the ‘‘Origines’’ and ‘Originals’, Newton constructed a timeframe from Greek history using methods from genealogy and astronomy that allowed him to incorporate all of sacred and profane history. Posthumous editorial projects and the scattered manuscript record have obscured much of the connections between Newton’s chronological and prophetic writings, yet for Newton they were part of one and the same project.
Enhancing humanity: co-creation and the moral imagination
Keywords: moral imagination
human enhancement
co-creation

The prospect of enhancing human characteristics through advancing technologies in genetic engineering, artificial intelligence and nanotechnology is generating interest in academic, commercial and popular spheres. This research focuses on anthropologies of co-creation as a potential theological response to the questions posed by human enhancement. For a theological anthropology to engage in public and cross-disciplinary debates surrounding enhancement concerns, it must first demonstrate scientific and technological literacy and the capacity to incorporate information from these fields. As the strong links between transhumanism and science fiction demonstrate the importance of the imagination for developing, communicating, and evaluating visions of future human being, a theology of co- creation that is able to engage these ideas must also feature a robust account of the imagination in epistemology and the dissemination of knowledge. Philip Hefner’s “created co-creator” incorporates scientific insights into a theological anthropology that is generally positive toward the use of technology to enhance nature. Having inherited an overly rational epistemology from his predecessors in the science and religion field, however, Hefner’s proposal reflects a deficit of imagination. J. R. R. Tolkien’s notion of sub-creation is not as developed as Hefner’s theological anthropology, being primarily a literary theory. Given the high value Tolkien accorded to the imagination and the role of narrative in discerning and conveying ultimate truths, however, his work may offer a corrective to Hefner’s in this respect. Tolkien’s critical stance to technology prevents a fruitful dialogue with human enhancement issues on the basis of his sub-creation proposal alone. A constructive theological anthropology that unites the strengths of Hefner’s and Tolkien’s models is sketched out, drawing on contemporary scholarship in metaphor studies, phenomenology and posthuman discourse, with a view to engaging debates surrounding human enhancement.
Chinese ceramics in the Islamic world from the 8th to 10th centuries CE
Keywords: Islamic
Indian Ocean
China
Trade
Ceramic

This thesis provides new angles, material and discussion to the topic of Chinese ceramics arriving in the Islamic world from the 8th to 10th centuries CE and their connections with contemporary Samarra Horizon Islamic glazed ceramics. It analyses sites with and without Chinese ceramics during this period and explores the broader question regarding the distribution of early Chinese ceramics in the Islamic world. There are varying patterns related to ceramic finds in these sites. The Persian Gulf region has the highest concentration of sites with Chinese ceramics, especially the Iranian coastal area of the Persian Gulf. There are five main types of Chinese ceramics found in the Islamic world from the 8th to 10th centuries CE. Chinese celadon stoneware is the most widely distributed Chinese ceramics in the Islamic world during this period. This is followed by Chinese white wares, Dusun wares, Changsha wares and Chinese monochrome and polychrome glazed wares. Not all Chinese ceramics in the Islamic world are luxurious traded goods. Different types of Chinese ceramics arrived in different areas and settlements in the Islamic world. They held different values and functions; their amounts in these Islamic sites vary hugely too. The scale of the circulation of Chinese ceramics in the Islamic world during this period may not have always been considerable, as most publications have claimed. It is not precise to describe the relationship between Chinese ceramics and Samarra Horizon ceramics as “imitations”, because there were more dynamic interactions than imitations only. Chinese ceramics influenced Samarra Horizon wares, which also exerted influence on Chinese ceramics.
What social movements ask for, and how they ask for it: Strategic claiming and framing, and the successes and failures of indigenous movements in Latin America
Keywords: Latin America
Bolivia
indigenous politics
social movements
mixed methods

Whether social movements can make a difference remains a perennial question of social movement scholarship. This thesis aims to make a contribution to this debate by examining the contentious collective action of indigenous people(s) in Latin America. This has the potential to enrich both the Latin American scholarship on indigenous politics, which often takes the impact of indigenous movements for granted, and the social movement scholarship on outcomes, which seems to increasingly question whether protest can have any direct impact at all. This thesis suggests that neither approach is adequate and that factors under the control of indigenous movements themselves can lead to positive outcomes. The choice of tactics, the nature of claims and the way in which they are framed, play a role, both directly and in interaction with contextual variables. Taking into account movements’ strategic claiming and framing is thus crucial for understanding social movement outcomes. Few studies have been able to show the effect of framing on movement outcomes; partially at least this is because the claiming (what) and framing (how) of social movements have not been distinguished well within framing theories. To have an impact, movements need to be able to impose material and symbolic costs on their targets that exceed the cost that meeting their demand would present. This can be done through creating enough materially costly disruption—such as by using roadblocks or sustaining mobilisation—and imposing enough symbolic costs—such as making claims framed in a way that resonates with the agendas and discourses of their targets, as well as the public. Overall, this work thus suggests that despite the empirical support for the thesis that social movements tend to rely on political opportunities for securing desired outcomes, this is not inconsistent with the fact that social movements can succeed even in unfavourable political conditions. In the latter situation, if protest can impose a high enough combination of both material and symbolic costs, it can indeed matter.
Early fourteenth century physics of the Merton school
Keywords: century
physics
Heytesbury
Merton
medieval
Dumbleton
14th
fourteenth

Until early in this century it had been customary (and in certain writings it still is) for histories of science to speak of Galileo as the father of modern physics as though nothing preceded him, except the downfall of Aristotle. During the first two decades of this century Pierre Duhem devoted untiring energy to the study or "les précurseurs parisiens de Galilée". Among other significant discoveries, he thought that he had found in the theory of 'impetus' defended by Jean Buridan and his 'school' in the early and mid-fourteenth century the modern principle of inertia, which Galileo expressed by impeto, or momento. Constantine Michalski's studies on the theological movements of scepticism and criticism during the fourteenth century did not affect Duhem’s thesis, but Michalski did point out that the Franciscan, Francis de Marchia, proposed the theory some years before Buridan. The acceptance of Duhem’s thesis encouraged historians of science, a growing group, to see other points of similarity, and even identity, between the ‘school' of Jean Buridan in the Parisian Faculty of Arts and the seventeenth century founders of classical physics.
Continued in thesis …
Using smart contracts to attract conservation investment
Keywords: blockchain
conservation investment
smart contracts

The conservation sector is facing a financial crisis. It is underfunded by billions of dollars, motivating conservationists to find alternate funding sources. It has been suggested that attracting private capital in the form of investment could solve this problem. This dissertation explores the question: can smart contracts (computer programmes that automate the transfer of funds and digital representations of objects) be used to attract conservation investment? Exploratory research into what smart contracts can afford to conservation and the creation of a model smart contract using the European Wildlife Bank as a case study were used to answer this question. It is concluded that although technologically possible to attract investment, this application is limited in scale and will not solve the financial crisis. It is recommended that the conservation sector continue to explore emerging technologies to identify more feasible solutions.
Solubilisation of carbon nanotubes with a non-conjugated polymer for device applications
Keywords: perovskite solar cells
conductive films
carbon nanotubes
CNT polymer wrapping
non-conjugated polymer

Carbon nanotubes (CNT) solubilisation represents a major challenge for their use on a large scale in electronic devices, as CNT's tendency to aggregate prevents an easy and uniform deposition of CNT films. This thesis demonstrate a novel way to solubilise CNTs using the non-conjugated polymer ethylene-vinyl acetate (EVA). The characterisation of the optical and electrical properties of the resulting EVA-CNT nano-hybrids is analysed, and their performance as a holes extraction layer in photovoltaic devices discussed.
First, it is shown that EVA can solubilise single- and multi-walled carbon nanotubes, and by photoluminescence excitation mapping is demonstrated that the polymer creates a strong binding with the CNT inducing a mechanical stress. Raman spectroscopy studies show a non-selective wrapping process, with a tendency to wrap more metallic CNTs. By atomic force microscopy it is confirmed that the nanotubes are individually wrapped. This causes the screening of the aggregation forces in solution and enables the production of uniform and aggregate-free dispersions.
These dispersions allow the fabrication of uniform thin films by spray-coating, conducting and semi-transparent, with conductivities of up to 34 S/cm, two higher of magnitudes ever reached for this combination of materials. The films have been the subject of percolation studies, showing that the films with increasing density show an increase in conductivity which can be well fitted by the expected behaviour for a 2D percolation model.
Finally, to test the electronic properties of such produced CNT films in devices, they have been used as hole transporting layers in perovskite solar cells. It is shown that despite the insulating polymer wrapping the nanotubes, it is possible to use them in conjunction with undoped 2,2',7,7'-Tetrakis[N,N-di(4-methoxyphenyl)amino]-9,9'-spirobifluorene (spiro-OMeTAD) to efficiently extract charges from the perovskite layer, obtaining solar cells with a power conversion efficiency of 16.8% with EVA-SWCNTs. and 17.3% with EVA-MWCNTs. With further optimisation it is expected that they can replace CNT wrapped with conjugated polymers, offering favourable optical properties at lower cost.