This thesis, titled ‘Hide: A 21st century woman’s response to the first person in poetry’ is a creative and critical examination of the challenges and benefits of the first-person approach in poetry. It is in two parts, consisting of a collection of sixty poems and a critical investigation into the research leading to, and engendered by, the poems. Hide is a place from which to observe, hide is skin, hide is deliberate concealment; all of these meanings can be seen to reflect some of the concerns examined in both the creative and critical parts of the thesis. ‘Hide’s’ layers of meaning directly engage with what 'I' we choose to conceal and what 'I' we choose to show, as well as residing on the boundaries between privacy and exposure. The poems spring from investigations of my central concerns of autobiography, family history, the workings of memory, and ancestral knowledge in the form of ‘cunning’. The poems are an active investigation into the challenges and benefits of the ‘I’; the approaches and techniques for using it as well as the reasons for, and strategies involved in, avoiding the ‘I’. The critical part of the thesis is an auto-ethnographic study of the poems in the collection, together with examination of the difficulties faced by women writing in the first-person. The research includes thematic analysis of published reviews, and examination of the critical landscape within which women are writing.

No description available.

The dementias are illnesses which have significant cultural prominence and feature in a wide range of contemporary writing, often as a trope for old age. This thesis examines how stories of dementia are told in fiction and in the clinic. To do this, the work uses Arthur Frank's socio-narratology to examine twelve selected texts in which a key protagonist has dementia. Three of the selected texts have been written by authors with direct experience of dementia within their family and form a subset of texts, memoir fiction. How stories of dementia are told is considered by examining the clinic as a storytelling venue, the creation of faux medical notes from information in the texts and a Triple Analysis of the memoir fiction using three reading templates. The templates have been created from clinical practice, using the questions posed by Frank's socio-narratological practice of Dialogical Narrative Analysis, and using the parameters of Rita Charon's version of Close Reading drill in Narrative Medicine. The work is informed by autoethnography which uses my position as a clinician and reader to examine how fiction has been used in my clinical practice and how it informs my reading of the selected texts.

No description available.

Mixed valence manganites with the perovskite structure R1-xAxMnO3 (where R = La, Nd, Pr and A = Ba, Ca, Sr, Pb) have been a popular subject of contemporary research because of their interesting physical properties such as competing magnetic orders, metal-insulator transitions and colossal magnetoresistance. A complex interplay between structure, electronic and magnetic properties results in rich phase diagrams involving various metallic, insulating and magnetic phases. A review of the literature related to rare-earth managnites clearly reveals that the systems with Pb as a divalent dopant are relatively less explored. This may be due to the volatile nature of lead based compounds which are used as precursors for preparing these systems. This has motivated us to take up research on Pb doped rare earth manganites. This thesis is divided into eight chapters. The first introductory chapter gives a brief review of the work on manganites which have already been reported in the literature following which the motivation for carying out the present investigation is given. The second chapter deals with technical details of various instruments used in the present reasearch work. The third chapter is related to growth of single crystals, their preliminary characterization, magnetization and resistivity studies. Single crystals of Pr1-xPbxMnO3 are grown by flux technique for different compositions. Crystals are characterized by energy dispersive x-ray analysis (EDAX) and inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectroscopy (ICPAES) for compositional analysis. Magnetization and resistivity studies are carried out on Pr1-xPbxMnO3 for three compositions viz. x = 0.2, 0.23 and 0.3. The magnetization vs. temperature plots show that all the three compositions undergo a transition from paramagnetic to ferromagnetic state. The magnetization in the low temperature ferromagnetic region obeys Bloch`s law. The susceptibility in the paramagnetic region is fitted to Curie Weiss law. Deviation of susceptibilty from Curie Weiss law, a feature observed in all the three crystals has been attributed to formation of ferromagnetic clusters at ~ 250 K. The cluster formation has its implications on all other properties in the temperature range from TC to 250 K where TC is the magnetic transition temperature. Resistivity measurements are carried out on the same three compositions. The x = 0.2 and 0.23 compositions undergo a transition from paramagnetic insulating to ferromagnetic insulating phases. The x = 0.3 composition shows a metal – insulator transition at nearly 35 K above TC. Chapter 4 describes the critical behaviour of Pr1-xPbxMnO3 for two compositions, viz. x = 0.23 and 0.3. For critical studies, magnetization vs. field measurements are carried out in the temperature range TC ± 10 K. Using modified Arrott plots and Kouvel-Fisher method the critical exponents and precise value of TC are obtained. The x = 0.23 composition shows results which indicate a conventional second order phase transition shown by a 3D Heisenberg ferromagnet. It also obeys the universal scaling behaviour. However, the x = 0.3 composition shows deviation from this behaviour. Hence to probe further into the nature of magnetic transition of this compound the effective critical exponents are calculated as a function of reduced temperature ε (=(T-TC)/TC). Based on the behaviour of effective exponents the nature of the transition in the x = 0.3 composition is described in detail. The unconventional ordering is attributed to presence of possible magnetic frustration in the system. In chapter 5 the resistivity and magnetoresistance behaviour of the x = 0.23 and 0.3 crystals are discussed. Initially the nature of plots of temperature and field variation of resistivity are described for both the cases. Detailed measurements are carried out at the magnetic transition region. The analysis is carried out in terms of critical scattering behaviour at the transition region. The zero field resistivity is analyzed in terms of theory of Fisher and Langer, while the magnetoresistance is fitted to scaling theory at the critical region developed by Balberg and Helman. It is seen that the x = 0.23 crystal shows a critical behaviour in resistivity for zero field as well as in magnetoresistance close to TC. However, the behaviour of the x = 0.3 composition is more complex. A simpler critical scattering theory alone cannot explain its large negative magnetoresistance. Chapter 6 contains the EPR studies on the x = 0.23 and 0.3 compositions. Analysis is carried out in the paramagnetic region. The EPR signals are fitted to a modified Dysonian equation. The intensity, linewidth, and asymmetry parameter are obtained as a function of temperature from fitting. The parameters are obtained till 210 K for both compositions. The intensity is fitted to a Curie Weiss law. The linewidth shows a “bottleneck” mechanism and is proportional to conductivity. Hence it is fitted to activated behaviour. In addition, a secondary signal develops at low fields from 240 K and is present till 200 K in both the compositions. This is explained by means of phase separation. In chapter 7 the specific heat of the x = 0.23 and 0.3 compositions are discussed. The measurements are carried out from 2 to 300 K in zero field and also in the presence of 3 Tesla magnetic field. The analysis is carried out in two separate sections. The first section deals with the low temperature analysis from 2 to 80 K where apart from the usual lattice, electron and magnetic terms, presence of Schottky anomaly is also discussed. The Schottky peak occurs at a relatively higher temperature of around 40 K. Due to presence of higher order lattice terms the Schottky effect is not easily discernible. It is extracted only from fitting. In the second section, the specific heat associated with ferromagnetic – paramagnetic transition is extracted. The lattice term in the entire temperature range from 10 to 300 K except at the transition region is fitted to Einstein function. The magnetic specific heat is obtained by subtracting the Einstein specific heat from the total specific heat. The change in entropy due to magnetic transition is also calculated for both compositions. In chapter 8 the general conclusions derived from the work presented in this thesis are summarized along with the scope for future work in this system.

SABP2 (Salicylic Acid Binding Protein 2) plays a vital role in the salicylic acid signaling pathway of plants both regarding basal resistance and systemic acquired resistance against pathogen infection. SIP-428 (SABP2 Interacting Protein-428) is a Silent information regulator 2 (SIR2) like deacetylase enzyme that physically interacts with SABP2 in a yeast two-hybrid interaction and confirmed independently by a GST pull-down assay. We demonstrated that SIP- 428 is an NAD+ dependent SIR2 deacetylase enzyme. Transgenic tobacco plants silenced in SIP- 428 expression via RNAi showed enhanced basal resistance to microbial pathogens. Moreover, these SIP-428-silenced lines also exhibited a robust induction of systemic acquired resistance. In contrast, the transgenic tobacco lines overexpressing SIP-428 showed compromised basal resistance and failed to induce systemic acquired resistance. These results indicate that SIP-428 is likely a negative regulator of SA-mediated plant immunity. Experiments using a SABP2 inhibitor showed that SIP-428 likely functions upstream of SABP2 in the salicylic acid signaling pathway. It also indicates that SABP2 is dependent on SIP-428 for its role in the SA signaling pathway. Subcellular localization studies using confocal microscopy and subcellular fractionation showed that SIP-428 localized in the mitochondria. These results clearly show a role for SIP-428 in plant immunity.

Crystal growth and characterization of few multifunctional materials with perovskite (ABX3) structure are discussed in this thesis. Efforts were made to modify the magnetic and electric behaviour of these materials by selective tuning of A, B and X components. Structural, magnetic and dielectric characterization are detailed in various chapters for doped (A and B site) rare-earth manganites and organometallic compounds with different (Chloride or formate) anions. The relevant aspects of crystal structure and its relationship with ordered ground states are discussed in the introductory chapter. A detailed review of prominent theories pertaining to magnetic and ferroelectric ordering in the literature is provided. Growth of various inorganic compounds by solid-state reaction and floating zone method as well as use of solvothermal techniques for growing organometallic compounds are discussed. Material preparation, optimization of crystal growth processes and results of characterization are addressed in various chapters. The effect of Yttrium doping on structural, magnetic and dielectric properties of rare-earth manganites (RMnO3 where R = Nd, Pr) has been investigated. Neutron diffraction studies (Pr compounds) confirm A-type antiferromagnetic structure and fall in transition temperature as the Yttrium doping level increases. Diffraction experiments in conjunction with dc magnetization and ac susceptibility studies reveal magnetic frustration in excess Yttrium dopedcompounds. When mutliglass properties of 50% B-site doped Nd2NiMnO6 were investigated, evidence of re-entrant cluster glass phase was seen probably due to presence of anti-site disorder. The relaxor-like dielectric behaviour arises from crossover of relaxation time in grain and grain boundary regions. Multiferroic behaviour of the organometallic compound (C2H5NH3)2CuCl4 as well as the ferroelectric transition were investigated in detail. The role of Hydrogen bond ordering in driving structural transitions is elucidated by low temperature dielectric and Raman studies in (C2H5NH3)2CdCl4. It was found possible to tune the magnetic and ferroelectric properties in metal formate compounds (general formula AB(HCOO)3) by selectively choosing organic cations [(CH3)2NH2+; C(NH3)3+] and transition metal ion [B = Mn, Co and Cu]. The nature of magnetic ordering and transition temperature could be altered by the transition metal ion. The effect of reorientation of organic cations which leads to ferroelectric nature is discussed using dielectric and pyroelectric data. Significant results are summarized in the chapter outlining general conclusions. Future prospects of work based on these observations are also provided. The conclusions are corroborated by detailed analysis of experimental data.