VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
Indian Muslim perceptions of the West during the eighteenth century

The present thesis, entitled "Indian Muslim Perceptions of the West during the Eighteenth century", deals with Muslim images of the West at the turn of the eighteenth century as they were formulated in the minds of Indian Muslim intellectuals. It examines the modalities of experience and categories of knowledge of the West as they were perceived by Muslim scholars who had come into contact with the contemporary West. The main purpose of the present enquiry is to analyze the origins and the nature of such perceptions as were articulated in their writings. With the expansion of British political power in the sub-continent in the late eighteenth century Britain came to be identified with Europe as a whole in the minds of our intellectuals. The Indian intelligentsia's experience of the contemporary Western civilization became in fact its experience of the British society and culture. Extensive quotations from the writings of the authors under consideration are often used to illustrate the principal arguments in this essay. The thesis is based on relatively unexplored source-material which comprises Persian manuscripts in the Bodleian Library in Oxford and the British Library in London. Our writers' perceptions of the Western civilization concentrate on various aspects of European and, particularly, British culture such as social life, religion, political ideas and institutions and scientific and technological developments. The present study also attempts to assess the impact of an alien culture on various socio-economic levels in Indian society, especially since Muslims had largely lost a centralised political control over India. The declining Muslim intelligentsia accepted uncritically the impact of the new and powerful culture but the new knowledge presented in their writings was not significantly implemented in their society; rather, the indigenous society was overwhelmed by the new culture that was imposed upon it and gave in to it and its attraction.
What makes dual career couples successful?

I use the German Socio-Economic Panel to explore three dimensions of couples' career success: career input (hours), career output (wages) and happiness. I focus on West German parents because, until recently, they faced low levels of state-level childcare support and adverse attitudes towards maternal employment.
I investigate the extent to which couples specialize in paid work in the long term. Previous approaches – even those using couple-level longitudinal data – failed to explore this fully, instead examining men and women separately, or a single transition. I develop a “dual curve” approach and find that even among the 1956-65 female birth cohort (which faced low state-level support for dual employment) only a fifth of all couples adopt full specialization in later life. A sizable proportion – a third – moves into dual fulltime employment, while half of highly educated couples adopt such employment. Highly educated women are not only less likely to permanently specialize but also more likely to try working full-time, possibly because their partners' comparative advantages are lower.
I explore whether the take-up of work hour flexibility relates to rises in both the respondent’s and their partner’s wages. Men and women benefit from working flexibly, even when controlling for selection into work hour flexibility with growth-curve and fixed effects analysis. Moreover, there is a positive cross-partner wage effect, which is particularly pronounced for mothers, suggesting that men – the main users of the policy – use this measure to support their wives' careers.
Are dual career couples (equal human capital investment) happier than specializing couples? I create a human capital measure to account for differential human capital during periods of non-employment, which has been ignored in past analyses. I find that women in dual career couples are unhappier when the child is young but happier later in life. Conversely, women who give precedence to their partner’s career in terms of human capital investment grow unhappier.

Keywords: Family Sociology
Dual Careers
Longitudinal
Panel
Advisor: Gershuny, J
Multilocus sequence analysis of the pathogen Neisseria meningitidis

Neisseria meningitidis is the bacterium responsible for meningococcal meningitis and septicaemia in humans. Meningococcal disease is primarily a disease of young children, characterized by rapid deterioration from first symptoms to death, with an 11% fatality rate and a global distribution. Patterns of genetic diversity in meningococcal populations provide an account of their evolutionary history and structure, which can be inferred by population genetics modelling. Understanding these phenomena can inform control and prevention strategies, and provides interesting case studies in evolution. The aim of this thesis is to develop population genetics techniques for inferring the evolutionary history of meningococci.
I begin by reviewing the field, and justifying the use of coalescent methods in modelling microparasite populations. Inference on carriage populations of meningococci under the standard neutral model and the neutral microepidemic model is performed using a modification to approximate Bayesian computation. AMOVA and Mantel tests are used to quantify the differentiation between carriage and disease populations, and the extent to which geography and host age structure carriage populations. The results are used to propose revised coalescent models for meningococcal evolution.
The role of natural selection in shaping meningococcal diversity is investigated using a novel method that utilises an approximation to the coalescent and reversible-jump Markov chain Monte Carlo to detect sites under selection in the presence of recombination. Having performed a simulation study to assess the statistical properties of the method, I apply it to the porB antigen locus and seven housekeeping loci in N. meningitidis. There is strong evidence for selection imposed by the host immune system in the antigen locus, but not the housekeeping loci which are functionally constrained. Finally I discuss the future direction of population genetic approaches to understanding infectious disease.

Keywords: evolution
pathogen
Neisseria meningitidis
meningitis
genetics
Advisor: McVean, G
Maiden, M
Expression and functional studies of roundabout 4

Roundabout (Robo) receptors were first identified in neurons as guidance molecules, however growing evidence suggests that they also play a role in other cells. The aim of this thesis was to characterise the expression and function of a novel endothelial specific member of this family, Robo4. This study revealed that Robo4 is expressed primarily in vessels but also differentially expressed in tumour vessels. Interestingly Robo4 was primarily located within cytoplasmic vesicles coated with clathrin, suggesting that the presence of Robo4 on the cell surface is being tightly regulated. Overexpression of Robo4 induced filopodia and pseudopodia formation and actin re-organisation into stress fibres. It co-localised with actin and tubulin suggesting an important interaction between Robo4 and the cytoskeleton. Robo4's function in endothelial cells was directly investigated using two approaches, overexpression using adenovirus and knockdown using small interfering RNA. Functional cell-based assays revealed that disrupting Robo4's level of expression negatively affects endothelial cell functions that are required during angiogenesis, such as proliferation, migration and tubulogenesis. Overexpression of a truncated version of Robo4, which lacks the C-terminus, provided clues regarding Robo4's function. The intracellular domain is critical for Robo4's localisation and its association with the cytoskeleton. It is also required for pseudopodia formation. Other findings include possible cleavage of Robo4 and Robo4 homodimerisation and heterodimerisation with Robo1. Taken together, the findings presented in this study strongly suggest a role for Robo4 in endothelial cell guidance. Cell guidance during angiogenesis is poorly understood therefore the identification of a new molecule potentially involved in this mechanism will hopefully help elucidate the process.

Advisor: Bicknell, R
Sheldon, H
The effects of turbulence length scale on heat transfer

Turbulence in the flow over a turbulent boundary layer increases the heat transfer above the level that would be expected for turbulent boundary layers in a low freestream turbulence environment.
This thesis describes a research programme aimed at understanding and quantifying this effect and, in particular, studying the relevance of the form of the turbulence spectrum. The purpose was to determine whether turbulence produced by the combustion chamber in a gas turbine affects the heat transfer to the high pressure turbine.
Two series of experiments have been carried out:
The first measured the turbulence levels and spectra produced at the exit plane of a variety of aircraft gas turbine combustors running at atmospheric exit pressure. A transient technique in which a pitot probe was only briefly exposed to the flow allowed uncooled, flush mounted, sub-miniature pressure transducers to be used to measure the turbulence spectra of combustor exhaust gases at temperatures up to 1500 K. It was found that the wavenumber spectrum above k = 100 m^-1 was essentially unaffected by the combustion, being practically the same for both hot and cold cases, and was similar for all three combustors tested.
The second used a pre-heated flat plate in a transient wind tunnel to determine heat transfer rates with freestream turbulence generated by a number of parallel bar grids. Both liquid crystals and thin film gauges were used for heat-flux studies. A correlation has been derived that defines the heat transfer enhancement in terms of turbulence intensity and integral scale, as well as extending the conclusions of previous workers to apply at high intensities and with severe anisotropy.

Advisor: Oldfield, M
Competitive behaviour-based price discrimination

Advances in information technologies have increasingly enabled firms to use consumers' past purchasing data to charge different prices to its own customers and to those customers that in some sense belong to the rival firm. At first glance this new form of price discrimination seems to be lucrative as it allows a firm to generate profitable incremental sales without damaging profits it can extract from its own customer base. However, as behaviour-based price discrimination gains popularity many interesting questions arise. Is it, really, in the best interest of firms to recognise customers with different past behaviour and to price discriminate accordingly? Or is it rather in their interest to avoid any possible learning and thereby price discrimination practices? Should consumers hide their true types, i.e., should they behave anonymously? Further, should government regulation restrict information collection and price discrimination practices?
The study of these questions is the study of the profit and welfare effects of behaviourbased price discrimination. This is the central issue of this thesis. With that in mind, this thesis addresses three theoretical models. The first one is based on the hypothesis that the ability of firms to predict the preferences of individual customers for the purpose of price discrimination is less than perfect but is constantly improving due to advances in information technologies. Here the main goal will be to investigate how profits, consumer surplus and welfare evolve as price discrimination is based on more accurate information. The second model is a natural sequel of the former as it tries to model how firms might obtain a signal of a consumer's preferences. Whether or not a given consumer bought from the firm previously might be used as an accurate signal of a consumer's preferences. A key issue here will be to examine whether or not it is in the interest of firms to avoid learning and price discrimination and how can they attain that goal. Finally, the third model studies the interaction between purely informative advertising and price discrimination based on customers' past behaviour. As without advertising consumers are left out of the market, the welfare effects of price discrimination are guided by how will price discrimination affect each firm's advertising decisions in relation to the social optimal level of advertising.

Advisor: Armstrong, M
Allelic sequence diversity at the human beta-globin locus

The investigation of genetic variation at the DMA sequence level in Drosophila has demonstrated the success of the approach for elucidating the impact of molecular, selective, and demographic evolutionary processes. However, sequence level investigation of human genetic variation has thus far been limited to a single locus, the mitochondrial DNA genome. In order to extend the analysis of DNA sequence variation to human nuclear loci, and thereby bring the power of sequence analysis to the investigation of human population origins and affinities, allelic sequence diversity at the human β-globin gene was determined.
A 3 kilobase (kb) genomic region, encompassing the human β-globin gene and associated flanking DNA, was examined. DNA sequence variation in this region was identified by direct sequence analysis of alleie-specific PCR amplification products. In total, 173 chromosomes from five human populations from Melanesia, Indonesia, and Africa, were investigated. Thirty-four polymorphisms were identified: 26 silent nucleotide differences, 2 non-silent (β haemoglobinopathies) variants, and 6 small insertion/deletion polymorphisms. These 34 polymorphisms were inherited as 53 different alleles, each defined by a unique sequence haplotype. Only 10 alleles were identified when the same genomic region was investigated by restriction enzyme analysis.
The allelic sequence diversity identified suggested much about the influence of molecular, selective, and demographic phenomena. The unexpectedly high level of sequence haplotype polymorphism was found to be consistent with the pronounced impact of interallelic recombination in sequences 5' of the β-globin gene. Despite the presence of selected β haemoglobinopathies in some of the populations investigated, neither the genomic distribution nor the frequency of silent polymorphic sites was found to be inconsistent with that expected of a neutrally-evolving locus. Geographic differences in β-globin diversity were therefore attributed to the effects of mutation in partially subdivided populations as well as in specific cases reduction in population size and gene flow, rather than the influence of natural selection, and evaluated with respect to currently debated hypotheses concerning human evolutionary origins.
The investigation of DNA sequence variation at the human β-globin locus has therefore contributed new insights into the evolution of the locus in human populations and provided an important new class of data with which to test hypotheses concerning the genetic origin of Homo sapiens sapiens.
Angiogenesis in human cancer

Angiogenesis is the formation of new vessels from existing vasculature and is essential for tumour growth and metastasis. It is controlled by angiogenic factors secreted by the tumour which regulate the matrix remodelling, endothelial cell (EC) proliferation, and capillary differentiation necessary for establishing a blood supply. This thesis has examined angiogenesis in human tumours. Immunohistochemically highlighted vessels in tumours were quantified using different methods to develop a rapid and objective method for measuring tumour angiogenesis. Significant associations between Chalkley counting, microvessel density, vascular area and perimeter were demonstrated; the Chalkley technique gave independent prognostic information and was suitable for a diagnostic service. Studies on the frequency EC of S-phase showed proliferation (labelling index 2.2%) occurs mostly at the tumour margin suggesting the growth factors controlling ECs are different from those regulating tumour cells and that remodelling the existing vasculature might play a more important role than previously recognised. To investigate further ECtumour matrix interactions, the expression of cell adhesion molecules (CAMs) was examined. CAM expression mirrored that of EC proliferation with preferential expression on endothelium at the tumour periphery: expression of CAMs was also present on neoplastic cells. Thus, acquisition of CAMs by tumour cells together with EC phenotypic modulation might promote angiogenesis and metastasis. The angiogenic factor thymidine phosphorylase (TP) was examined in normal tissues and tumours. Although TP was expressed in ECs there was no correlation between expression in normal or neoplastic tissue and vascularity. Nevertheless, TP was elevated in small low grade tumours, in accordance with TP being chemotactic but non-mitogenic for ECs. A monoclonal antibody to flt-4, a candidate angiogenic factor receptor was generated and characterised. In contrast to the in-situ mRNA expression profile, a restricted pattern of protein expression was observed in normal tissues and variable expression in tumours.

Advisor: Harris, A
A lipid fusion based method for the single molecule study of ATP synthase

ATP synthase is a ubiquitous transmembrane protein that utilises the free energy available from ion gradients across lipid membranes to synthesise adenosine triphosphate (ATP). It may be separated into two parts - the membrane-embedded (i.e. hydrophobic) FO and the hydrophilic F1. Each undergoes a rotary motion. Single-molecule studies on the rotation of the isolated hydrophilic F1 have been performed for many years; attempts to construct an experiment in which to view the rotation of the membrane-embedded F1FO complex under high space- and time- resolution (such as by attachment of a rotational probe) have not yet seen a satisfactory method emerge in the literature. Most particularly, a clear ability to generate and control a proton-motive force across the membrane in which the F1FO is sited is needed to probe ATP synthesis.
This thesis presents the development of a candidate method for such single-molecule studies.
By the use of a water-in-oil emulsion, giant unilamellar lipid vesicles are formed which entrap arbitrary components - including functionalised gold nanospheres of 60-100 nm diameter, which move freely in the internal space. A charge-based lipid fusion is developed, using mixtures of natural lipid extracts with anionic and cationic lipids. It is demonstrated that anionic giant vesicles fuse with cationic small vesicles with full content mixing and transfer of bilayer leaflets. It is shown that F1FO is functional in the cationic lipid mixture. Methods are shown to bind such a cationic proteoliposome to a surface and for it to fuse with an anionic giant vesicle containing functionalised gold nanospheres. Backscatter laser darkfield is used to search for rotation of the gold nanospheres under ATP hydrolysis conditions of the F1FO; unidirectional rotation is seen in one instance and other suggestive traces are shown with speculative analysis. Further work is proposed.

Keywords: Protein
Nanotechnology
ATP
Synthase
Darkfield
Lipid
Advisor: Berry, R
Silicon nanocrystals embedded in silicon carbide for tandem solar cell applications

Tandem solar cells are potentially much more efficient than the silicon solar cells that currently dominate the market but require materials with different bandgaps. This thesis presents work on silicon nanocrystals (Si-NC) embedded in silicon carbide (SiC), which are expected to have a higher bandgap than bulk Si due to quantum confinement, with a view to using them in the top cell of a tandem cell.
The strong photoluminescence (PL) of precursor films used to prepare Si-NC in SiC (Si-NC/SiC) was markedly reduced upon Si-NC formation due to simultaneous out-diffusion of hydrogen that passivated dangling bonds. This cannot be reversed by hydrogenation and leads to weak PL that is due to, and limited by, non-paramagnetic defects, with an estimated quantum yield of ≤5×10-7. Optical interference was identified as a substantial artefact and a method proposed to account for this.
Majority carrier transport was found to be Ohmic at all temperatures for a wide range of samples. Hydrogenation decreases dangling bond density and increases conductivity up to 1000 times. The temperature-dependence of conductivity is best described by a combination of extended-state and variable-range hopping transport where the former takes place in the Si nanoclusters. Furthermore, n-type background doping by nitrogen and/or oxygen was identified.
In the course of developing processing steps for Si-NC-based tandem cells, a capping layer was developed to prevent oxidation of Si-NC/SiC, and diffusion of boron and phosphorus in nanocrystalline SiC was found to occur via grain boundaries with an activation energy of 5.3±0.4 eV and 4.4±0.7 eV, respectively. Tandem cells with a Si-NC/SiC top cell and bulk Si bottom cell were prepared that exhibited open-circuit voltages Voc of 900 mV and short-circuit current densities of 0.85 mAcm-2. Performance was limited by photocurrent collection in the top cell; however, the Voc obtained demonstrates tandem cell functionality.

Keywords: Silicon Nanocrystal
Electrical transport
Silicon Carbide
Solar Cell
Luminescence
Diffusion
Advisor: Wilshaw, P
Janz, S