Book designers and manuscript artists have inserted illustrations into narrative works for centuries now. This practice is an intelligent behaviour that requires specialised knowledge of the text and the external parameters affecting the selection and placement criteria. This thesis offers a model for automation of illustration insertion into a narrative discourse. The model presented here is a significant improvement to the crudest method of dividing the text into equal parts and inserting one illustration into each part. This study starts from the position that narratives are expressions of mental representations of a sequence of events in various modes of discourse. Here, this mental representation is referred to as ‘the story’. When coupled with a mode of discourse, the story becomes a narrative. Thus, a story can be expressed as oral, written, pictorial, or film narratives. If they all express the same sequence of events, they are telling the same story. In an illustrated narrative, while the written discourse expresses the event sequence in the form of sentences, illustrations depict them using pictorial elements. The insertion of illustration into written narrative is analogous to collating two texts into one, based on their event content. In this process, sentential representation of events are collated against the pictorial expressions of the same events. Thus, for the purposes of automation, this study claims that an investigation into the locations of events can lead to potential locations for illustration insertions. However, the list of potential illustration locations can be improved further through eliminating the events that are not depictable. This model is also able to further improve on the insertion policy by incorporating event constraints as parameters for event priorities. If a set of event types is given preference in the illustration policy, the model is able to prioritise the list accordingly. Furthermore, the model is able to allow the samedegree of customisation for preferred characters, locations, or time in the story. The prioritisation can be applied to the entire narrative, or smaller chunks of the narrative text such as chapters or sections. The model is developed via the study of the verb roots of sentences – denoting the event types – in the discourse of Mohl’s critical edition of the Shāhnāma, the Persian epic composed by Abu al Qāsium Firdausī in 400/1010. A collection of 109 illustrated manuscripts of the Shāhnāma was considered in this study. These manuscripts come from various traditions of Persian paintings and cover a long period from the early 14th century to the late 19th century. A population of nearly 6,000 Shāhnāma illustrations were annotated. Each illustration is linked to a sentence in the narrative. The bottom-up approach to the study of verb distribution in the written discourse against the illustration location distribution indicates that illustration distribution follows the same trend as that of the depictable event distribution in the discourse. Particular event tokens displayed a high rate of illustration rendering them as all time favourite events. In summary, this study claims that investigation into the distribution of events in a narrative discourse provides a model for the insertion of illustrations into a narrative work.

Fused Filament Fabrication (FFF) is a layer manufacturing process which can manufacture highly complex components from CAD files using a polymer extruder. RepRap is an open-source project to produce a rapid prototyping machine which can manufacture its own parts using the FFF process. This thesis focuses on the mechanical design of the ‘RepRap printer’ and documents how it was conceived, developed, tested, and finally used to make a set of its own parts. Self-manufacture was demonstrated by assembling this set of parts into a working copy of the original machine. The child machine went on to demonstrate replication without degeneracy by successfully manufacturing one of its own parts. A part count analysis of the child machine, not including the fasteners it needed in its early development phase, identified a self-manufacturing ratio of 48%. This proportion is relatively low because the design adopts modularity and redundancy principles to encourage development. Should the machine’s design be adapted to fully demonstrate self-manufacture, this ratio could rise to 67% in the near future. To increase the ratio further, the machine needs three new tool heads to print resin, conductive alloy, and flexible polymer. These developments are achievable in the mid-future and could increase the self manufactured parts ratio to 94%. As this machine is the first version of the RepRap printer, these results are encouraging. Parts which the RepRap printer is unlikely to make until the far-future include some of the electronic components, motors, conductive cable, solenoids and a heating element. However, a 94% self-manufacturing ratio will qualify it as an assisted self-replicating machine. As with natural self-reproducing organisms, the printer will benefit from geometric growth and evolution. The author discusses how, by trading power, computing, feedstock and assembly for manufacturing capability with human beings, the RepRap printer may become a household item, offering a radical alternative to the way our society manufactures and consumes.

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Previous research on paper history has tended to be conducted from an economic perspective and/or as part of the field of book history within a broadly literary framework. This has resulted in understandings of paper history being book-centric and focused on production. We now have a great deal of knowledge about the physical process of hand paper-making, a good knowledge of the actors involved and where in the country paper was manufactured, but there is still very little scholarly discussion of the people, processes and practices associated with paper outside of the mill. Taking inspiration from eighteenth-century ‗it-narratives‘, this thesis takes a holistic approach to the paper trade – loosely based around the framework of social life theory as expounded by Arjun Appadurai and Igor Kopytoff. It encompasses a case study of the rag-collection and paper-wholesale operations of a single Edinburgh firm, a wider examination of paper-retailing in Edinburgh, a look at the ownership of desks in Edinburgh alongside a consideration of advice and instruction relating to desk-use, and closes with an examination of the papers owned by a notable Edinburgh family. The first three chapters consider the scope of the Edinburgh paper trade. Moving through distinct stages in the life of paper, these chapters begin with an account of the Edinburgh rag-trade. Business records relating to the Balerno Company‘s rag-buying operations reveal an active and organised network with connections to a variety of trades. Continuing the focus on the Balerno Company, the second chapter considers the company as paper-wholesalers. It demonstrates that the driving force behind their operations was not the supply of paper for the booktrade but rather the provision of wrapping papers for the purposes of commerce. Using advertisements in local newspapers the third chapter looks at the reach of paper-selling beyond the booktrades. The final two chapters move gradually from the commercial to the personal. Chapter four considers the presentation of desk-use in penmanship manuals and the evidence of desk-ownership in confirmation inventories. Both of which are suggestive of a growing mercantile interest in desk furniture. Finally, this thesis closes by looking at the paper archives of the Innes family of Stow in order to examine the extent to which the findings of previous chapters is reflected in the collection, retention and use of papers across two generations of this family. Overall, this thesis demonstrates the value of adopting an inclusive approach to the study of paper history, as doing so opens up a multifaceted world of paper. Paper history has tended to be understood as the history of writing and printing paper sold by booksellers and stationers. The social life approach allows connections to be made between materials, artefacts and trades; to gain a fuller understanding of the role paper played in people‘s lives.

Traditional routes to the manufacture of timber based composite materials such as particleboard rely on platen pressing a premix of carefully chosen and prepared timber particles and an adhesive to produce flat sheets. Historically such routes have made very inefficient use of forest resources, and because of the planar nature of the composite produced, the finished articles have enjoyed a reputation of being of poor quality and "cheap". The work documented in this thesis sought to examine alternatives to the traditional manufacturing methods in terms of both raw materials and processing route, and to establish technical, economic, and environmental boundaries for the use of the alternatives. Having settled upon extrusion as the most likely technique with which to proceed, the investigation was carried forward by the construction of a series of experimental instruments with the joint aims of refining the technique to a realistic working level and investigating the underlying mechanical principles behind the process. Recourse to the literature of polymer rheology, fluid mechanics, and soil mechanics gave the basis for a crude mechanism hypothesis, and iterative improvements in the instrumental techniques yielded data with which this could be refined. Although some correlation between the extrusion behaviour of this system with other more easily quantifiable systems was found, there is still considerable work required in defining the dynamic changes in the material properties as the raw material is extruded. Small scale production experiments proved successful, however, and an elementary financial model of a suitable production facility indicated that the techniques developed could be used as the basis of an environmentally acceptable, economically viable, low technology industry.

The recycling rate of post-consumer apparel waste is low. This is compounded by our limited understanding of the fibre recovered from apparel waste and a lack of development in novel applications. Motivated by the growing rate of accumulation in unwanted clothing, this study focused on a number of integrated research themes aimed at understanding the nature of reclaimed cotton fibre, its use in paper-based materials and its utilisation in apparel related applications. Initially, the investigation characterised reclaimed cotton fibres from two different recovery machines (pinned air-layer and cutting mill). The results showed that neither process was capable of producing adequate fibre quality for fine yarn manufacture. The fibres exhibited extensive surface damage, length shortening and an increase in length distribution. After the initial characterisation, studies were undertaken to investigate the use of paper technology to increase the possibility of using reclaimed fibre in apparel. Strength is an important property in apparel related applications, therefore, the strength of reclaimed cotton-based paper was enhanced. The effects of a 4% sodium hydroxide pre-treatment on the beating performance and resultant sheet properties of reclaimed fibre pulp were investigated. At low beating levels, the results showed a significant 35% and 39% increase in tensile strength and energy absorption, respectively. With the treatment it is, therefore, possible to obtain a strong paper with high bulk, which can be further utilised to improve surface softness. Optimum dry and wet strength enhancement of the resultant paper was obtained with the combined addition of 1% carboxymethyl cellulose and 2% polyamideamine-epichlorhydrin. The development of wet strength was vital in order to facilitate uniform twist insertion in subsequent paper yarn manufacture. This study was one of the first to test the viability of using reclaimed cotton fibre in the production of paper yarns suitable for apparel manufacture. The wet-strengthened reclaimed-fibre paper was slit into 3 mm width ribbons, dampened, then twisted into yarns. The resultant yarns (46–193 tex) were uniform but lacked sufficient strength for use in weaving and knitting processes. Analysis of a commercial paper yarn, OJO+ , suggested that strength could be improved if fibre orientation was increased in the machine direction. A further application, in the form of a jacket, was trialled. The focus here was to test sewability using a variety of seam and stitch formations to sew together denim-derived cotton paper. A simple design using lap seams with straight stitching was established as the most effective construction. The final jacket satisfied industry requirements on seam strength and efficiency, however, further investigation into improving comfort and wear-ability will be essential.

In this thesis, novel regimes of mode locking in quantum dot semiconductor laser diodes have been investigated by exploiting the unique features offered by quantum dots. Using an unconventional approach, the role of excited state transitions in the quantum dots was exploited as an additional degree of freedom for the mode locking of experimental quantum dot lasers. For the first time, passive mode locking via ground (1260nm) or excited state (1190nm) was demonstrated in a quantum dot laser. Picosecond pulses were generated at a repetition rate of 21GHz and 20.5GHz, for the ground and excited states respectively, with average powers in excess of 25mW. Switching between these two states in the mode-locking regime was achieved by changing the electrical biasing conditions, thus providing full control of the operating spectral band. A novel regime for mode locking in a quantum-dot laser was also investigated, where the simultaneous presence of cw emission in the excited-state band at high injection current levels, dramatically reduced the duration of the pulses generated via the ground state, whilst simultaneously boosting its peak power. This represents a radically different trend from the one typically observed in mode-locked lasers. From this investigation, it was concluded that the role of the excited state can not be neglected in the generation of ultrashort pulses from quantum-dot lasers. Stable passive mode locking of a quantum-dot laser over an extended temperature range (from 20ºC to 80ºC) was also demonstrated at relatively high output average powers. It was observed that the pulse duration and the spectral width decreased significantly as the temperature was increased up to 70ºC. The process of carrier escape in the absorber was identified as the main contributing factor that led to a decrease in the absorber recovery time as a function of increasing temperature which facilitated a decrease in the pulse durations. These results are shown to open the way for the ultimate deployment of ultra stable and uncooled mode-locked semiconductor diode lasers.