Cette thèse est consacrée à la géométrie des variétés de Fano et des fibrés projectifs sur une courbe projective lisse.Dans la première partie on étudie la géométrie des variétés de Fano pas trop singulières admettant un diviseur premier de nombre de Picard 1. En étudiant les contractions associées aux rayons extrémaux dans le cône de Mori de ces variétés nous fournissons un théorème de structure en dimension 3 pour les variétés dont le nombre de Picard est maximal. Ensuite, nous traitons le cas des variétés toriques et nous étendons le théorème de structure aux variétés toriques de dimension supérieure à 3 dont le nombre de Picard est maximal. Enfin, nous traitons les relèvements des contractions extrémales aux espaces de revêtement universels en codimension 1.Dans la deuxième partie on étudie les corps de Newton-Okounkov sur les fibrés projectifs sur une courbe projective lisse. En nous inspirant des estimations de Wolfe utilisées pour calculer la fonction de volume sur ces variétés, nous calculons tous les corps de Newton-Okounkov par rapport aux drapeaux linéaires et nous étudions comment ces corps dépendent de la décomposition en cellules de Schubert par rapport aux drapeaux linéaires compatibles avec la filtration de Harder-Narasimhan du fibré. De plus, nous caractérisons les fibrés vectoriels semi-stables sur une courbe projective lisse à l'aide des corps de Newton-Okounkov. / This thesis is devoted to the geometry of Fano varieties and projective vector bundles over a smooth projective curve.In the first part we study the geometry of mildly singular Fano varieties on which there is a prime divisor of Picard number 1. By studying the contractions associated to extremal rays in the Mori cone of these varieties, we provide a structure theorem in dimension 3 for varieties with maximal Picard number. Afterwards, we address the case of toric varieties and we extend the structure theorem to toric varieties of dimension greater than 3 and with maximal Picard number. Finally, we treat the lifting of extremal contractions to universal covering spaces in codimension 1.In the second part we study Newton-Okounkov bodies on projective vector bundles over a smooth projective curve. Inspired by Wolfe's estimates used to compute the volume function on these varieties, we compute all Newton-Okounkov bodies with respect to linear flags and we study how these bodies depend on the Schubert cell decomposition with respect to linear flags which are compatible with the Harder-Narasimhan filtration of the bundle. Moreover, we characterize semi-stable vector bundles over smooth projective curves via Newton-Okounkov bodies.

No description available.

Established interspecific metabolic allometric relationships do not adequately describe the complexity and variable physiological states of developing animals. Consequently, intraspecific allometric relationships of oxygen consumption and carbon dioxide production as a function of body mass; the respiratory quotient; the function of the silk cocoon; and body composition were investigated for each distinct developmental stage of the silkworm, Bombyx mori. Whole animal O2 consumption in Bombyx ranged from 0.00064 + 0.000047 ml O2 .hr-1 at larval instar I to 0.77 + 0.06 ml O2 .hr-1 in pre-pupal, falling to 0.21+ 0.01 ml O2 .hr-1 in the pupae. Those instars having a significant relationship between O2 consumption as a function of body mass, the slope of the line relating O2 consumption to body mass varied between 0.99 and 1.02, while across all instars the slope was 0.82. Developmental allometry should be presented for individual developmental stages because the individual allometric exponents of the stages can be significantly different from the overall allometric exponent throughout development and in some cases, the overall allometric exponent can be a statistical artifact. The first larval instar of Bombyx mori has the lowest cross sectional area of high metabolic tissue of the midgut (27%) and had one of the highest percentages of some metabolically inert tissues (i.e. lipid, 7.5%). Body composition of the first instar does not support the idea that smaller mass animals having the highest O2 consumption are composed of a greater percentage of metabolically active organs when compared to larger animals. However, this developmental stage has the highest percentage of the mitochondrial marker cytochrome oxidase, which correlates well with the high O2 consumption rate of the smaller mass. Therefore, established interspecific principles should not be assumed to function as valid models for intraspecific developmental relationships of metabolism as a function of body mass. Developmental allometry should include an analysis of individual stages of development as well as an analysis of development as a whole to gain a comprehensive understanding of the complexity of allometry of the developing animal such as the silkworm.

In 2016 Chile adopted a new law (Ley N° 20.915) that aims to strengthen the public and democratic character of the political parties and facilitate their modernization. For the political parties in the country this means a set of measures imposing obligations concerning their transparent and democratizing internal processes. The aim of this paper is to examine how the transparency within the Chilean political parties has changed since the introduction of the law 20.915 and how the citizens trust for these political entities has changed during the same period. What have the political parties done to increase the transparency? How has the relationship between transparency and trust in the political parties developed since the introduction of the law 20.915? What factors are important for understanding the relationship between transparency and trust? Is the increased trust in political parties due to the introduction of the law 20.915 or are there other aspects to consider? The theoretical framework resulted in two hypotheses. The first is based on the idea that increased transparency in political parties leads to higher trust for the political parties and therefore expect trust in parties in Chile to increase. The second hypothesis take into account that this effect might be stronger in the short run, but over time the effect will diminsh because there are other aspects to take into consideration as well, and if these are not seen to, the trust won’t continue to increase alongside the transparency. The expectations of the first hypothesis received support as both transparency and trust increased after the introduction of transparency reforms. But the indication of such relationship diverged at the end of the period, when trust decreased despite the continued improvement of transparency. This could be seen as an indication of support for the expected outcome of the second hypothesis, and the discussion concerning the reason for this result focused on the role of perception of corruption, time, medial attention and social media platforms among others. The analysis has been conducted through a qualitative case study based on various documents and scientific articles. The method used is both descriptive and theory trying since the paper aims to answer both questions as “how”, “what” and “which”, and also aims to test the stated hypotheses on the empirical material.

This dissertation examines the role of aesthetics in Japanese literary discourse, with attention to the emergence of new cross-cultural perspectives, from the late 1880s through the 1920s. Modernity in Japan was marked by the rapid and often jarring juxtapositions of new techniques and ideas from Western sources against older Japanese traditions, and my project considers how literary authors envisioned and interpreted this cultural eclecticism. In particular, I focus on their reactions to Western paintings and sculptures. The visual arts seemed to offer viewers a direct access to `universal' aesthetic values though their non-linguistic nature, and thus appealed to those seeking to attain cosmopolitan perspectives. Through analyzing Japanese writers' literary responses to foreign artworks, and their ideas on vision as an avenue of information, I investigate the changing nature of representation and signification in this new age, and the role of literary language within it. I take as the main subjects of my dissertation Mori Ogai (1862-1922), the members of the Shirakaba School such as Mushanokôji Saneatsu (1885-1976) and Shiga Naoya (1883-1971) during the period of their eponymous publication Shirakaba (1910-1923), and Akutagawa Ryûnosuke (1892-1927). Each of these authors has been both praised and denigrated for the high-minded idealism and aestheticism of his works, in no small part because of a marked tendency to employ foreign literary and artistic references. I argue that despite assessments that their works had been composed at an intellectual remove from the social and material contexts in which they lived, the ideal of aesthetics they had upheld as a fixed and transcendental principle that allowed for their appreciation of imported images and ideas of beauty, in fact catalyzed their critical assessments of their own discursive positions within Japanese society. These writers explored the links and the disjunctions between their artistic ideals--which spanned across disparate cultural and national boundaries--and their more immediate awareness of themselves as citizens of modern Japan. They discovered that for them, any attempt at cosmopolitanism had to take place within the contexts of their Japanese realities, and any thoughts about it had to be voiced through the medium of Japanese literary language. Even visual images could not ultimately elide the viewer's conceptual frameworks, and were interpreted in light of them. What resulted was thus a distinctly hybrid outlook in which their conceptions of Japan, the world, their individual identities, and their creative and critical productions, were indelibly linked with each other.

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Canterbury, 2007. / Typescript (photocopy). Includes bibliographical references (leaves 185-200). Also available via the World Wide Web.

La communication phéromonale chez les lépidoptères, si sensible et spécifique, constitue un modèle de choix pour l'étude des bases moléculaires de la réception olfactive. La spécificité de ce système serait assurée dès le niveau périphérique, dans l'antenne, par l'intervention d'une diversité de protéines impliquées dans la chimioréception des odorants. Le ver à soie, Bombyx mori, est une espèce particulièrement appréciée pour l'étude des mécanismes olfactifs : la réponse des mâles à la phéromone est connue, l'espèce est manipulable génétiquement et les séquences génomiques sont accessibles sur Internet. Au cours de mon travail de thèse, j'ai pu identifier et caractériser au niveau moléculaire une diversité de gènes olfactifs appartenant à différentes familles par des techniques bioinformatiques d'analyse du génome et de biologie moléculaire. Leurs patrons d'expression ont notamment été analysés afin de vérifier si leur localisation tissulaire était compatible avec une fonction chimiosensorielle. Certains de ces gènes (BmPBP2, BmPBP3, BmAOX2) pourraient coder pour des protéines spécifiquement impliquées dans la réception phéromonale alors que d'autres (BmAOX1, BmSNMP2) pourraient intervenir aussi dans la réception de molécules moins spécifiques. Par leurs interactions combinées et séquentielles avec les molécules odorantes, ces différentes familles de protéines permettraient d'assurer leur reconnaissance spécifique au cours des différentes étapes périphériques de la réception olfactive. Par ailleurs, j'ai pu participer à la mise au point chez le ver à soie d'un outil novateur d'analyse fonctionnelle in vivo basé sur l'expression par transgenèse de RO dans les antennes du ver à soie. Ce système a été développé avec un récepteur phéromonal mâle-spécifique, BmOR1. Les femelles des lignées transgéniques exprimaient fortement le récepteur dans leurs antennes, mais se sont révélées incapables de répondre au composé phéromonal (Bol) au cours d'enregistrements électrophysiologiques. L'utilisation future d'un nouveau promoteur spécifique des neurones olfactifs, pOR2, pourrait permettre de développer le premier système stable d'analyse fonctionnelle in vivo chez un lépidoptère.

The goal of the thesis is to incorporate materials with either fluorescent or conductive properties in silk fibers, by feeding silkworms with a diet containing these materials. To achieve this, one would have to breed (rear) silkworm from eggs into larvaes, then to feed the silkworms with this special diet containing fluorescent or conductive materials. Samples of silk were then collected either from spun cocoons or via removing the silk producing organs (silk glands) from the silkworms via dissection. The samples were then analyzed with absorbance spectrometer, spectrofluorometer or via photoluminesecent measurement to determine if any materials had been incorporated into the silk fibers.   Silkworms were successfully reared from eggs up to moths, once the silkworm larvae had grown enough in size their diet were switches from their regular food (silkworm chow) to food containing conjugated molecules or polymers with fluorescent or conductive properties. A total of 14 materials were tested. One material gave a clear positive result and that was from the fluorescent compound Rhodamine B. Other fluorescent materials, Nile red and POWT yielded some results indicating their presence in the silk but the results were not conclusive. The rest of the materials all failed with being incorporated within the silk fibers; this was due to their lethality, size, lack of zwitterionic properties and such.  The properties of the materials are of great importance for the uptake process, where a small zwitterionic molecule has a great change of being taken up and incorporated in the silk fibers. Whereas a big materials such as a polymer without any zwitterionic will in most cases just follow through the food in the digestive track without any uptake.

Syftet med min uppsats är att jag vill påminna om människans egen förgänglighet. Jag vill upplysa att allting lever under samma princip. Förgängligheten finns i allt, att allting är underständig förändring och att det bara är en fråga om olika lång tid innan allt försvinner. Jag vill att människan ska bli mer påmind om att allt och alla, människor, naturen, och alla ting lever undersamma principer och på så sätt inte är särskilt skilda från varandra.Jag vill påvisa hur förgängligheten har analyserats och analyseras, samt ge en inblick i vad förgänglighetsteori handlar om. Förgängligheten har flitigt avbildats inom konsten.Jag kommer undersöka varför två betydelsefulla konstnärer har arbetat med förgängligheten och jämföraderas tolkningar. Mina frågeställningar är följande: • Hur definieras idén om förgängligheten historiskt och symboliskt? • Varför har Andy Warhol och Damien Hirst arbetat med förgängligheten?

Zugl.: Trier, Univ., Diss., 2003