The species of Amomum Roxb. (Zingiberaceae) in Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam are revised. Thirty-five species and two varieties are recognised, all names are typified, and detailed descriptions and a key are provided. Nine new species are described and one species is validated. Whilst revising Amomum for the Flore du Cambodge, du Laos et du Viêtnam, we have proposed to conserve the name Amomum villosum Lour. with a recent collection from Laos, which was not included in the protologue, as its type. Our research on the use of Amomum focuses on the use of plants during pregnancy, parturition, postpartum recovery and infant healthcare among three ethnic groups, the Brou, Saek and Kry. The investigations aim to identify culturally important traditions that may facilitate implementation of culturally appropriate healthcare. Data were collected in Khammouane province, Lao PDR, through group and individual interviews with women by female interviewers. More than 55 plant species are used in women's healthcare, of which > 90 % are used in postpartum recovery. This wealth of novel insights into plant use and preparation will help to understand culturally important practices such as confinement, dietary restrictions, mother roasting and herbal steam baths and their incorporation into modern healthcare. Through chemical analyses of Amomum we have recorded compounds with antimicrobial, analgesic and sedative effects that point to an empirical development of the traditional treatments around childbirth. Essential oils of three species used in hotbed and mother roasting, Amomum villosum Lour. Amomum microcarpum C.F.Liang & D.Fang and Blumea balsamifera (L.) DC. were found to contain significant amounts of the following terpenes: b-pinene, camphor, bornylacetate, borneol, linalool, D-limonene, fenchone, terpinen-4-ol and a-terpinene.

This is a story about Lao Pako. Lao Pako is located on a small hill on the southern bank of the river Nam Ngum in central Laos. Four seasons of archaeological fieldwork have yielded considerable amounts of pottery, metallurgical remains, glass beads, stone artefacts, spindle whorls as well as other material and structural information that have created a foundation for interpretation. The archaeological interpretation presents Lao Pako as a place where people came to perform rituals c. 1500 years ago. In these rituals, sophisticated combinations of pottery depositions, infant burials and iron production produced a narrative about what it means to be in the world. Things in and on the ground created, and continue to create, non-verbal sentences about life and death, fertility, decay and worldly reproduction. The archaeological interpretation is, however, not the only valid story about Lao Pako. This is a place where spirits are; it is also a tourist resort and a national treasure. These other stories all work to create Lao Pako as a place of interest and are used in this thesis to define the archaeological story, and to visualize the aims and agendas inherent in the production of archaeological knowledge. Using the conceptual apparatus of postcolonial and other critical theory, the thesis aims to critically deconstruct the archaeology performed by the author and others. It entails an explicit critique of the deterministic temporal unilinearity that is inherent in the archaeological narrative of the evolution of humankind, as well as against essentialist notions of culture and the dissociation of the past as exotic otherness. Thus, the stories about Lao Pako demonstrate the need to critically revise the role of archaeology in a postcolonial world, and create archaeological stories by which we are touched, moved and disturbed, without resorting to imperialist notions of time and progress.

Cette thèse d'anthropologie sociale soutenue en 1973 à l'université Paris 5 aborde les relations entre une population montagnarde proto indochinoise, les Lavé, et les Lao des vallées bouddhistes durant la guerre du Viêtnam à la fin des années 60. On observe une démultiplication des rites dédiés aux génies qui sont décrits en détail, illustrant une régression par l'excès.

Haematophagous parasites and disease vectors such as leeches, ticks, mites, lice, bed bugs, mosquitoes, and myiasis-causing fly larvae are common health problems in Lao Peoples Democratic Republic (Lao PDR). A main aim of my field work in Lao PDR in 2006-2010 was to document traditional knowledge among different ethnic groups about plants that people use to repel or to kill blood-feeding invertebrates. We carried out structured interviews in 66 villages comprising 17 ethnic groups, covering a range of ethnic group, throughout Lao PDR and recorded a total of 92 plant species - in 123 different plant-ectoparasite combinations - that are used as traditional repellents and/or as “pesticides” to kill "pest" invertebrates. Traditional use was confirmed in the scientific literature for 74 of these plant species, and for an additional 13 species based on literature on closely related species. We concluded that repellents and pesticides from many plant species are commonly used in the Lao countryside. We also investigated traditionally used Lao plants for their activity to repel or to kill certain disease vectors and parasites. Target organisms were mosquitoes (Diptera, Culicidae), fly larvae (Diptera, Cyclorrhapha) in fermented fish production, and terrestrial blood-sucking leeches (Hirudinea, Haemadipsidae). The potential mosquito repellent activities of essential oils of Croton roxburghii (Euphorbiaceae), Hyptis suaveolens (Lamiaceae), and Litsea cubeba (Lauraceae) were evaluated in the field near Vientiane. Oils at concentrations of 1.7-6.7 µg/cm2 were significantly repellent to Aedes, Armigeres and Culex attracted to human baits. The activities against fly larvae, infesting fermenting fish, of three plant species, Tadehagi triquetrum (Fabaceae), Uraria crinita (Fabaceae) and Bambusa multiplex (Poaceae) were investigated: When fresh material of the plants was added on top of fermenting fish infested with fly larvae significant proportions of the larvae were repelled or killed. The total protective effect, i.e., repellent and killing effect combined, of T. triquetrum, U. crinita, and B. multiplex was 60-83 %, 77-90 %, and 60-93 %, respectively. Field evaluation of the potential leech repellent activities of water extracts of Sapindus rarak (Sapindaceae), Catunaregam spathulifolia (Rubiaceae) and Vernonia elaeagnifolia, (Asteraceae) impregnated on stockings and worn by persons in two leech-infested biotopes revealed leech repellent activities of 82.6%, 62.6% and 63.0%, respectively. The corresponding repellencies of deltamethrin and diethyl-3-methyl-benzamide (DEET) were 73.1% and 88.4%, respectively. Identification of the active components in certain of the plants with the ultimate aim to develop more optimal, less costly repellents, insecticides, acaricides, and anti-leech compounds as alternatives to synthetic repellents and pesticides against blood-feeding insects, ticks, mites, and leeches is in progress.

This thesis deals with an analysis and comparison of tourism within Thailand and Lao PDR. The paper discusses global tourism trends with a special interest dedicated to southeast Asia. Based on studies of history, geography and government programmes of each individual country, conditions for conducting tourism activities were defined. History of tourism as well as develompent of individual destinations were concerned, too. The conclusion summarising present and future possibilities of travel industry in Thailand and Lao PDR also involves information about knowledge and personal approach of Czech public to both countries. The data were collected through an exploratory questionnaire. The next part offers a list of destinations provided by Czech and German travel agencies. Based on the list, an overview of available destinations provided by major Czech and German official mediators was created. One of the chapters also deals with legal conditions governing the rights for setting up a travel agency by non-residents.

Graphene is a material suitable for electronic applications including sensors and biosensors operating in atmospheric conditions and at varying relative humidities. This work concerns the charge diffusion in Hall bar shaped graphene based field effect transistor that is simultaneously investigated by Kelvin probe force microscopy and macroscopic transport measurement. Furthemore it studies the possibilities of graphene Hall bar modification by local anodic oxidation, local cathodic hydrogenation and mechanical lithography.

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Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) has been a fundamental player in the studies of superconducting materials for many decades. This local probe technique allows for the study of the static electronic properties as well as the low energy excitations of the electrons in the normal and the superconducting state. On that account it has also been widely applied to Fe-based superconductors from the very beginning of their discovery in February 2008. This dissertation comprises some of these very first NMR results, reflecting the unconventional nature of superconductivity and its strong link to magnetism in the investigated compounds LaO(1-x)F(x)FeAs and LiFeAs.

Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) has been a fundamental player in the studies of superconducting materials for many decades. This local probe technique allows for the study of the static electronic properties as well as the low energy excitations of the electrons in the normal and the superconducting state. On that account it has also been widely applied to Fe-based superconductors from the very beginning of their discovery in February 2008. This dissertation comprises some of these very first NMR results, reflecting the unconventional nature of superconductivity and its strong link to magnetism in the investigated compounds LaO(1-x)F(x)FeAs and LiFeAs.:1. Introduction 2. Basic Principles of NMR 3. NMR in the Superconducting State 4. Iron-based Superconductors 5. Experimental Setup 6. NMR on LaO(1-x)F(x)FeAs in the Normal State 7. MR and NQR on LaO(1-x)F(x)FeAs in the Superconducting State 8. NMR and NQR on LiFeAs 9. Conclusions