This thesis examines the nature of what I have termed "the sacramental vision" of Gerard Manley Hopkins and David Jones: it is an exploration of the mutually sustaining relationship between poetry and religion; or, as Jones puts it, between art and sacrament. The key to the relationship is to be found in language: the inherited language of theologian and poet is saturated with metaphor, sign and symbol, linguistic forms of a particularly resistant and irreducible kind. In literature, as in religion, such forms represent ultimate points of vision, to which in trust we assent, and from which we infer belief, that is, we are required to convert what begins as "an impression upon the Imagination" into a belief which may be tested by reason. The poet's renewal of such sacramental signs is a necessary exercise of the religious imagination if each generation is to remake the beliefs it has inherited. The opening chapter is an examination of the origins of Hopkins's and Jones's use of the sacramental sign and the subsequent chapters scrutinise the value of sign-making to the development of the poetic method of both poets. I suggest that this method is best elucidated through three controlling principles: the Coleridgean view of the sacramental potential of language helps to define the verbal content of the poem; the Thornist sacramental schema instresses the form of the poem; and the Newmanesque process of notional and real assent determines the grammar or inscape of the total oeuvre as a chronicle of the development of the poet's spiritual growth. Hopkins and Jones deepen our understanding of a grammar common to faith and belief, shared by poet and theologian, by claiming that poetry should be the tranforming crucible of the encounter between the experience of the poet, the reader and the divine.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Architecture and Planning, 1993. / Vita. / Includes bibliographical references (v. 2, leaves 330-351). / Inigo Jones's collection of books is a unique and early survival of an architect's annotated library. The combination of standard sixteenth century Italian and French editions of classics, mathematical and scientific treatises, and specialized architectural books, comprised the library of a professional whose approach to his field was based on an understanding of practical humanism and the study of antique precedent. The library is the starting point for an investigation of the relationship of humanist learning and the creation in England of a classical architectural vocabulary. The forty~s ix books record in Jones's marginal annotations to the text and plates his interpretation of continental architecture and textual exegesis. For Jones, books were a crucial resource for the study of classical architecture as practiced in continental Europe; and necessary for an understanding of the intellectual precepts inherent in that architectural vocabulary. Jones's architectural self~education reflected and repeated the desire by patrons for a visible document of their humanist learning and aspirations. From the evidence of the marginal annotations by Jones, I discuss three central themes of the shift in architectural style in England during the period 1580 to 1640: the role of reading as an essential professional skill for the architect and its mnemonic function in design method; the use and significance of the orders as a system for representing ideas of personal and public decorum and learning; and Jones's use of the methods and resources of English antiquarians in his study of ancient architectural precedent. Each of these themes are located within the cultural and intellectual history of Renaissance England. The descriptive language created for architecture, and the images used to encourage its study, was the language of education and classical learning, and specifically, the language of books. The appropriation by Jones and his patrons of the Vitruvian notion of decorum- the distinction between the exterior of a building and its internal distribution- formed a central tenet of English classicism, in Jones's terms the creation of an architecture "masculine and unaffected." The library of Inigo Jones represented one of the architect's essential professional tools, a repository of ideas and models which could serve as an ever present resource and comparable to other professional collections created by those seeking advancement within the late Tudor and early Stuart court. An annotated and descriptive bibliography of the surviving volumes, and further likely titles, attests to Jones's wide~ranging interests and design acumen. / by Christy Jo Anderson. / Ph.D.

Measuring the Mueller matrix with optical coherence tomography (OCT) makes it possible to acquire the complete polarization properties of scattering media with three-dimensional spatial resolution. We first proved that the measured degree-of-polarization (DOP) of the backscattered light by OCT remains unity-a conclusion that validated the use of Jones calculus in OCT. A multi-channel Mueller-matrix OCT system was then built to measure the Jones-matrix, which can be transformed into a Mueller matrix, images of scattering biological tissues accurately with single depth scan. We showed that when diattenuation is negligible, the round-trip Jones matrix represents a linear retarder, which is the foundation of conventional PS-OCT, and can be calculated with a single incident polarization state although the one-way Jones matrix generally represents an elliptical retarder; otherwise, two incident polarization states are needed. We discovered the transpose symmetry in the roundtrip Jones matrix, which is critical for eliminating the arbitrary phase difference between the two measured Jones vectors corresponding to the two incident polarization states to yield the correct Jones matrix. We investigated the various contrast mechanisms provided by Mueller-matrix OCT. Our OCT system for the first time offers simultaneously comprehensive polarization contrast mechanisms including the amplitude of birefringence, the orientation of birefringence, and the diattenuation in addition to the polarization-independent intensity contrast, all of which can be extracted from the measured Jones or the equivalent Mueller matrix. The experimental results obtained from rat skin samples, show that Mueller OCT provides complementary structural and functional information on biological samples and reveal that polarization contrast is more sensitive to thermal degeneration of biological tissues than amplitude-based contrast. Finally, an optical-fiber-based multi-channel Mueller-matrix OCT was built and a new rigorous algorithm was developed to retrieve the calibrated polarization properties of a sample. For the first time to our knowledge, fiber-based polarization-sensitive OCT was dynamically calibrated to eliminate the polarization distortion caused by the single-mode optical fiber in the sample arm, thereby overcoming a key technical impediment to the application of optical fibers in this technology.

Ellipsometry is an optical technique used for studies of thin films and surfaces. The technique is based on measurement and analysis of the changes in the state of polarization that occur when polarized light is reflected on a sample surface. The multichannel Mueller matrix ellipsometer is a new system that is about to enter the commercial market. It can measure the full 4x4 Mueller matrix of a sample. The Laboratory of Applied Optics at the Department of Physics, Chemistry and Biology at Linköpings University has purchased one such multichannel Mueller matrix ellipsometer, called RC2, from J.A. Woollam Co., Inc. This project has the objective to investigate potentials and limitations of this new ellipsometer. This is done by comparing measurements carried out on RC2 with similar measurements made on a different, well known ellipsometer system, the VASE ellipsometer. A study of the theoretical background of ellipsometry has been made including a description of the Jones formalism of describing optical properties as well as the Stokes/ Mueller formalism. A short theoretical description of the RC2 principles, in order to better understand the new ellipsometer is also given. Measurements have been made on samples of varying complexity, including isotropic and anisotropic samples with in-plane anisotropy and out-of-plane anisotropy. On samples with no depolarization there should be no difference between the two ellipsometers. As can be seen in the experimental results there is some difference, but very little. Both for the isotropic samples, where Δ and ψ have been measured, and anisotropic, where the full Mueller matrix has been measured, we find a good match between VASE and RC2. When the samples are depolarizing, we expect to see a difference in the Mueller matrix. We do notice a significant difference in the measurements on tilted nanometer rods of TiO2, which has an advanced nano-structure in the upper layer. We can thus conclude that samples with depolarizing properties reveal this when measured with the new RC2 ellipsometer.

This thesis researches to which extent companies use earnings management in times of CEO turnover, which is a continuing, complex and rather complicated issue. Earnings management was tested on different attribute such as: firm industry, firm size, CEO’s age, and the CEO’s origin (internal or external). The data was gathered through a quantitative study based on public companies’ financial reports. The sample includes 252 firms listed on Nasdaq OMX Stockholm and have been subject of a CEO change at some occasion during 2005-2011. The statistical result from the mixed-model ANOVA tests showed in general significant result of upward earnings management the year of CEO change, but not the following year. While there are many explanations to the findings of how earnings management is used on the Swedish market, the analysis and conclusion elaborate the reason that ought to be the blueprint of reality.

The problem of finding the crossing number of an arbitrary knot or link is a hard problem in general. Only for very special classes of knots and links can we solve this problem. Often we can only hope to find a lower bound on the crossing number Cr(K) of a knot or a link K by computing the Jones polynomial of K, V(K). The crossing number Cr(K) is bounded from below by the difference between the greatest degree and the smallest degree of the polynomial V(K). However the computation of the Jones polynomial of an arbitrary knot or link is also difficult in general. The goal of this thesis is to find closed formulas for the smallest and largest exponents of the Jones polynomial for certain classes of knots and links. This allows us to find a lower bound on the crossing number for these knots and links very quickly. These formulas for the smallest and largest exponents of the Jones polynomial are constructed from special rational tangles expansions and using these formulas, we can extend these results to for [sic] special cases of Montesinos knots and links.

No description available.

<p>Ellipsometry is an optical technique used for studies of thin films and surfaces. The technique is based on measurement and analysis of the changes in the state of polarization that occur when polarized light is reflected on a sample surface.</p><p>The multichannel Mueller matrix ellipsometer is a new system that is about to enter the commercial market. It can measure the full 4x4 Mueller matrix of a sample.</p><p>The Laboratory of Applied Optics at the Department of Physics, Chemistry and Biology at Linköpings University has purchased one such multichannel Mueller matrix ellipsometer, called RC2, from J.A. Woollam Co., Inc.</p><p>This project has the objective to investigate potentials and limitations of this new ellipsometer. This is done by comparing measurements carried out on RC2 with similar measurements made on a different, well known ellipsometer system, the VASE ellipsometer.</p><p>A study of the theoretical background of ellipsometry has been made including a description of the Jones formalism of describing optical properties as well as the Stokes/ Mueller formalism.</p><p>A short theoretical description of the RC2 principles, in order to better understand the new ellipsometer is also given.</p><p>Measurements have been made on samples of varying complexity, including isotropic and anisotropic samples with in-plane anisotropy and out-of-plane anisotropy.</p><p>On samples with no depolarization there should be no difference between the two ellipsometers. As can be seen in the experimental results there is some difference, but very little. Both for the isotropic samples, where Δ and ψ have been measured, and anisotropic, where the full Mueller matrix has been measured, we find a good match between VASE and RC2.</p><p>When the samples are depolarizing, we expect to see a difference in the Mueller matrix. We do notice a significant difference in the measurements on tilted nanometer rods of TiO2, which has an advanced nano-structure in the upper layer. We can thus conclude that samples with depolarizing properties reveal this when measured with the new RC2 ellipsometer.</p>

No description available.

Inaug.--Diss.--Bern. / Issued also without thesis statement. Vita. Bibliography: p. 107-109.