Archaeomagnetism is an area of research that utilises the magnetic properties of archaeological materials to date past human activity. This research aimed to use the evidence of past geomagnetism, as recorded by archaeological and geological materials, to identify and characterise short timescale changes in the Earth¿s magnetic field. This contribution to the discipline focused on the first millennium BC, as there is evidence that during this time the Earth¿s magnetic field experienced rapid changes in direction. This work focused on an established weakness in archaeomagnetic studies, i.e. the application of archaeological information to assign a date range to the magnetic directions. The date ranges for 232 magnetic directions from 98 Iron Age sites were reviewed and a programme of fieldwork produced 25 new magnetic directions from 11 Iron Age sites across Britain. The approach developed in this thesis has made significant improvements to the data examined, which represent the prehistoric section of the British secular variation curve (SVC). These data have been incorporated into the British archaeomagnetic dataset that now comprises over 1000 magnetic directions and will be used to generate future British SVCs. The potential of the near continuous records of geomagnetic secular variation from British lake sediment sequences to SVCs was explored. This showed that these sediments have recorded the relative changes in the Earth¿s magnetic field but the dating and method of constructing the British master curve requires revision. As SVCs are predominately used as calibration curves for archaeomagnetic dating, this work provides a foundation for a revised and extended British SVC. This revision would be to the mutual benefit of studies in archaeology and archaeomagnetism, as the latter could potentially enable highresolution dating of Iron Age material, providing a viable alternative to radiocarbon dating. / Available full-text since June 30th 2013, at the end of the embargo period. / Lab data and appendices 3 and 4 are unavailable online.

Evapotranspiration (ET) is the sum of the evaporation of water from the Earth’s surface and the total transpiration from plants.  Spatially calculating ET is necessary because it is a major component in quantifying a water budget, and maps provide the spatial ability to display the distribution.  Geographic information systems (GIS) are a powerful and capable tool which can spatially process and integrate equations in order to quantify ET rates.  Probable ET equation types that best fit with ArcMap software were investigated, and the methodology of España et al was evaluated in terms of usefulness and ease of replication, while beneficial areas for future expansion were also commented on.  Interpolation of some weather and other variables, as well as the use of the raster calculator in ArcMap was the basis of the project methodology.  Temperature based ET equations were selected as the best equation category, and then specifically the Blaney-Criddle, Thornthwaite, and Hargreaves equations were used to calculate potential evapotranspiration (PET) rates in British Columbia (BC), Canada. The methodology of España et al provided a relatively easy way to spatially display algebraic evapotranspiration equations.  The results were compared to values of sixteen reference stations, which had been computed by the Penman-Monteith equation.  PET values that were interpolated were not as accurate as hoped, however the Hargreaves and Blaney-Criddle methods produced better results than the Thornthwaite method, which resulted in underestimates.  Nonetheless, the PET distribution pattern was displayed, and of use to show the areas of highest and lowest rates of PET.  In order to produce more accurate values, regional or crop coefficients could be applied to calculate actual evapotranspiration (AET), but time constraints placed on the project restricted the trial of this.

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This BC Digitization Survey Results presentation was one of several presentations delivered at the BC Digitization Symposium 2008 held on December 1 & 2, 2008. For more information, please visit the BC Digitization Symposium 2008 website at: http://symposium.westbeyondthewest.ca.

Appien est l’auteur d’une histoire universelle, l’Histoire romaine, allant de la fondation de Rome jusqu’à l’époque de Trajan. Parmi les livres qui la composent, nous pouvons remarquer la présence d’un Livre Parthique. Bien qu’Appien lui-même manifeste à plusieurs reprises l’intention d’écrire un Livre Parthique, la tradition manuscrite ne nous a transmis qu’un texte très problématique, intitulé Παρθική, qui n’est qu’un centon d’extraits tirés du Livre Syriaque d’Appien et des Vies d’Antoine et de Crassus de Plutarque. Il est évident que la nature de ce texte a engendré un vif débat sur son authenticité. C’est pour trancher la question que notre thèse fournit une nouvelle édition critique du texte de la Παρθική, prenant en compte les études les plus récentes sur la tradition manuscrite de l’Histoire Romaine ; mais surtout elle vise à prendre parti sur la question de l’authenticité de ce texte, en étudiant la méthode historiographique d’Appien et l’usage qu’il fait de ses sources. Compte tenu de cette analyse, nous pouvons conclure que la Παρθική n’accomplit pas ce que l’historien s’était fixé et que son contenu ne correspond pas aux informations qu’il avait déjà à sa disposition. C’est pourquoi il ne paraît pas possible de considérer authentique la Παρθική. / Appian’s principle surviving work, known as Roman History, inspects the events occurred from Rome foundation until the reign of the Emperor Trajan. Among its different books, we can notice the Parthian History. Despite Appian’s intention of writing a Parthian History, the test that reached us – called Παρθική – is made only of excerpts from Appian’s Syrian History and from Plutarch’s Life of Crassus and Life of Antony. It is clear that the characteristics of this test have generated an intense debate on its authenticity. Object of this work is to shed light on this issue, writing a new critical edition of Παρθική, that takes into account the latest studies of the Roman History manuscript tradition. Furthermore, this work has the aim of taking a position on the question of authenticity through a deep study of Appian’s historiographical method and his use of sources. From this analysis it results that Παρθική is not adherent to Appian purposes and its contents does not match with the information he had available. For these reasons it doesn’t seems possible to take the position of the book authenticity.

Esta dissertação tem como objeto de estudo a tragédia Helena de Eurípides e sua reinterpretação do mito de Helena. Para tanto, está dividida em duas partes, sendo a primeira um estudo e a segunda uma tradução completa da tragédia em versos. O estudo tem dois capítulos: o primeiro aborda o problema do gênero dramático da peça e alguns aspectos de sua encenação; e o segundo discute imagens tradicionais do mito de Homero a Eurípides, enfatizando a síntese da composição euripideana. / This thesis focuses on the tragedy Helen by Euripides and its reinterpretation of the Helen myth. It is divided in two parts. The first one contains a study and the second offers a complete verse translation of the tragedy. The study presents two chapters. The first deals with the problem of Helens dramatic genre and some aspects of its staging. The second discusses traditional images of the myth from Homer to Euripides, emphasizing the synthesis of the Euripidean composition.

In British Columbia (BC) foresters registered with the Association of BC Forest Professionals (ABCFP) have been given the exclusive right to practise professional forestry. As with all professions there is an expectation that Registered Professional Foresters (RPFs) conduct their activities in an ethical manner and are therefore obligated to act as an ethical agent on behalf of society regarding forest resources. If a certain level of ethical agency is desired of professionals we need to understand whether or not an RPF possesses the ability (defined as their discretion) to sufficiently fulfil this responsibility. Rule-based and principle-based standards of forest management, an RPF’s scope of practice, and the socio-political framework of public forest management in BC all come together to define an RPF’s discretionary context, which sets the limits to an RPF’s discretion. This context is highly idiosyncratic to a specific situation or decision and this makes the RPF’s discretion similarly idiosyncratic. This suggests that an RPF should not be accountable for a standard of ethical agency that does not reflect the context-dependent level of discretion they possess. Fifteen interviews of RPFs were conducted for this study to discuss their approach to ethical decision making. The analysis of the interviews revealed 12 major themes, several of which appear to be highly idiosyncratic to the situations described by the participants. The way these themes were perceived by the participants revealed the differences in the discretionary context of their situations. Several aspects of ethical deliberation emerged from the data that appear to be particular to broad employer categories, including delegated decision-making (government), economic and forest health considerations (industry), and the tension between personal and professional values (consultants).

Ο υπολογισμός της χωρητικότητας Shannon ενός τηλεπικοινωνιακού καναλιού είναι ένα από τα κλασικά προβλήματα της θεωρίας πληροφορίας. Η τιμή της προσδιορίζει το μέγιστο δυνατό ρυθμό αξιόπιστης μετάδοσης μέσα από το κανάλι και αποτελεί ρυθμιστική παράμετρο κατά το σχεδιασμό κάθε τηλεπικοινωνιακού συστήματος. Στις πιο ενδιαφέρουσες περιπτώσεις ο υπολογισμός καταλήγει σε ένα πρόβλημα βελτιστοποίησης για το οποίο δε μπορεί να δοθεί αναλυτική λύση, οπότε καταφεύγουμε στη χρήση προσεγγιστικών μεθόδων ή στη διατύπωση φραγμάτων. Στα πλαίσια της εργασίας μελετάται η χωρητικότητα Shannon τηλεπικοινωνιακών καναλιών ενός ή πολλαπλών χρηστών. Η μελέτη ξεκινά από την απλές περιπτώσεις του διακριτού καναλιού χωρίς μνήμη (DMC) και του καναλιού AWGN και επεκτείνεται στις πιο ενδιαφέρουσες περιπτώσεις των σύμφωνων ή μη (coherence/non-coherence) καναλιών διάλειψης, σε κανάλια με μνήμη, κανάλια πολλαπλών κεραιών και κανάλια πολλαπλών χρηστών. Σε κάθε περίπτωση καταγράφονται τα σημαντικότερα ερευνητικά αποτελέσματα σχετικά με το πρόβλημα προσδιορισμού της χωρητικότητας, τη συμπεριφορά της σε σχέση με τους παράγοντες του τηλεπικοινωνιακού μοντέλου, του αλγοριθμικού υπολογισμού της και τα χαρακτηριστικά που πρέπει να έχει η είσοδος ώστε να επιτυγχάνεται η τιμή της. / Computing the Shannon Capacity of a communication channel is one of the classic problems of information theory. Its value determine the maximum possible rate of reliable transmission through the channel and constitutes a design parameter during the designing of the communication system. In most interesting cases the problem ending to an optimization problem which can’t be solved analytically, so we refuge to approximating methods and we can only state bounds for the region in which capacity belongs. In this thesis we study the Shannon Capacity of single user and multiple user communications systems. The study begins with the simple cases of Discrete Memoryless Channel (DMC) and AWGN channel and goes further to more interesting cases like coherence/non-coherence fading channels, channels with memory, multiple antenna channels and channels with multiple users. In each case, we present the most important scientific results considering the problem of capacity, its behavior in relation to the parameters of the communication model, its algorithmic computation and the characteristics of the optimal input.

From fighting microbial infections to preparing for pandemics, Brett Finlay is discovering how the body's own defenses could boost our chances in the battle against infectious diseases.