We study the Diophantine transference principle over function fields. By adapting the approach of Beresnevich and Velani [‘An inhomogeneous transference principle and Diophantine approximation’, Proc. Lond. Math. Soc. (3) 101 (2010), 821–851] to function fields, we extend many results from homogeneous to inhomogeneous Diophantine approximation. This also yields the inhomogeneous Baker–Sprindžuk conjecture over function fields and upper bounds for the general nonextremal scenario.

Nonlinear-optical investigations of new materials are important for 2 complementary reasons. first, the requirements for materials to be used in device applications that utilize nonlinear interactions are very demanding. New approaches to materials research can yield materials with favorable properties compared to traditional nonlinear materials, as shown recently in several supramolecular systems (Cox et a1. 1990; Stucky and MacDougall 1990; Clays et a1. 1993; Kelderman et a1. 1993; Kauranen et a1. 1995; Lehn 1995). This is particularly true for 2nd-order nonlinear optics that require noncentrosymmetric materials (Prasad and Williams 1991). On the other hand. nonlinear-optical processes can provide new techniques to study the properties of new materials. The nonlinear techniques have the potential of being more sensitive than the existing techniques or providing information that is not accessible at all using the existing techniques (Shen 1984). Here again, 2nd-order processes are particularly important because they provide an extremely sensitive tool to study symmetry properties of materials.

Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) including high-resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM) and analytical electron microscopy (AEM) were used to study the fine clay fraction (<0.1 μm) from the eluvial E horizon of podzols located in central Finland that had developed from till materials. Soils of increasing age (6500-9850 y BP) were selected to represent a chronosequence of soil development. Expandable phyllosilicates (vermiculite, smectites) are formed in the eluvial E horizon of podzols in a short time (6500 y). TEM observations show that dissolution and physical-breakdown processes affect the clay particles. As the age of the soils increases, fragmentation and exfoliation of large precursor minerals lead to thinner clay particles of two to three layers thick. The chemical compositions of individual particles obtained by AEM indicate that expandable phyllosilicates from the E horizon of podzols are heterogeneous, involving a mixture of vermiculite, Mg-bearing smectites, and aluminous beidellite. Results suggest that heterogeneity is related to the nature of their precursors. Vermiculite and Mg-bearing smectites are derived from biotite and chlorite weathering whereas phengitic micas alter to aluminous beidellite. Because the transformation of biotite and chlorite is more rapid than phengitic micas, biotite and chlorite contributes predominantly to smectites in the younger soils, as long as ferromagnesian phyllosilicates are present in the E horizons. If not, a larger proportion of smectites is derived from phengitic micas in the older soils. Direct measurement of d(001 ) values on lattice fringe images from alkylammonium-saturated samples shows that interlayer charge varies from high-charge expandable minerals (0.6–0.75 per half unit cell) in the younger soils to 0.5–0.6 per half unit cell in the oldest soils. Thus, the proportion of the components in the clay assemblage, as well as their chemistry and interlayer charge, change over time with soil evolution.

Is anthropology a science? To put the question today amounts to a reply in the negative. The representatives of the ‘true’ sciences are not alone in suggesting a conjunctural or crippling lacuna which would preclude membership by right of the prestigious world, which, however, the name ‘humanistic sciences’ seems to demand. We should remember that some years ago Claude Lévi-Strauss caused a shudder to run through his discipline by describing it as a ‘flattering imposture’. Since then denigration has spread constantly, and it no longer consists of deploring a slowness, an equivocation or a handicap which we would have the hope of remedying: it is definitely a fatality which we are from now on invited to confirm.

Bentonite- and sepiolite-supported copper catalysts have been prepared either by adsorption of Cu(II) from aqueous solutions of copper nitrate at pH ~4.5 or by adsorption of a [Cu(NH3)4]2+ complex from an ammonia solution of CuSO4 at pH ~9.5. The structure and composition of the calcined preparations have been studied by X-ray diffraction, chemical analysis, and energy dispersive X-rays. Textural characteristics have derived from the analysis of the adsorption-desorption isotherms of N2. All catalysts have been tested for the dehydrogenation of methanol to methyl formate. For this reaction, bentonite-based catalysts were found to have very little activity, which indicates that copper located in the inter-lamellar spaces is inaccessible to methanol molecules. On the contrary, copper-sepiolite catalysts showed a very high specific activity even for those catalysts with a very low copper content. The chemical state of copper in the catalysts on-stream has been revealed by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and X-ray-induced Auger techniques. In most of the catalysts Cu+ is the dominant copper species.

The oxidation state of structural Fe greatly alters surface chemistry, which may have a large influence on clay-organic interactions. The effect of structural-iron oxidation state on chlorinated hydrocarbons at the clay-water interface was examined. Pentachloroethane (5CA) was reacted with oxidized, reduced, and reoxidized forms of three different smectites: montmorillonite, ferruginous smectite, and nontronite in aqueous suspension under controlled-atmosphere conditions. Pentachloroethane was found to adsorb at different rates for the three smectites. A series of 5CA-adsorption rate constants in the presence of these clays showed a strong correlation with the Fe(II) content of the clay (r2 = 0.98). The clay surface behaves as a Brønsted base and promotes 5CA dehydrochlorination. The adsorption kinetics at the clay-water interface were described by the formation of a precursor complex prior to 5CA dehydrochlorination.

A dusky red Oxisol forming on a tholeiitic basalt is found to contain varying proportion of aluminous hematite (Hm) and titanoaluminous maghemite (Mh) in the different size fractions. Maghemite is the main iron oxide in the sand and silt fractions whereas Hm is dominant in the clay fraction, together with gibbsite (Gb), kaolinite (Ka), rutile (Rt) (and probably anatase, An) and Mh. Maghemite is also the major oxide mineral in the magnetic separates of soil fractions (sand, about 65% of the relative Mössbauer spectral area; silt, 60%). Hematite (sand, 30%; silt, 15%) and ilmenite (Im) (sand, 5%; silt, 16%) are also significantly present in the magnetic extract. Accessory minerals are Rt and An. No magnetite (Mt) was detected in any soil fraction. Sand- and silt-size Mh have similar nature (a 0= 0.8319 ± 0.0005 nm; about 8 mol% of Al substitution; saturation magnetization of 49 J T−1 kg−1), and certainly a common origin. Lattice parameters of clay-Mh are more difficult to deduce, as magnetic separation was ineffective in removing nonmagnetic phases. Al content in Hm varies from 14 mol% (clay and silt) to 20 mol% (sand). The proposed cation distribution on the spinel sites of the sand-size Mh is:

$[{\text{Fe}}_{0.92}{\text{Al}}_{0.08}]\hspace{0.17em}\left\{{\text{Fe}}_{1.43}{\text{Ti}}_{0.18}\hspace{0.17em}{\square }_{0.39}\right\}{\text{O}}_4$

(◻ = vacancy, [ ] = tetrahedral sites and { } = octahedral sites), with a corresponding molar mass of 208.8 g mol−1. The predicted magnetization based on this formula is σ ≅ 68 J T−1 kg−1, assuming collinear spin arrangement. The large discrepancy with the experimentally determined magnetization is discussed.

To vernacularize a language is to reduce it to a vernacular. In 1953, UNESCO defined a vernacular as the language of a group that is politically or socially dominated by a group that speaks another language. This paper argues that this domination need not be colonial or racial, and that in fact many postindependence African rulerships are more comfortable in situations that are contrived to ensure that the indigenous languages of their own countries continue to be vernacularized. The same foreign language that was used in the past by a racist colonial minority is now used by an indigenous elitist minority to keep the majority disempowered by making grassroots participation in national issues and debates difficult or impossible.

Hindu texts call into question our own gender conceptions; they tell us that desire for bisexual pleasure and the wish to belong to both sexes at the same time are very real, but unrealizable, except by those with magic gifts. Many myths bear witness to the existential perception of human beings as bisexual and to active bisexual transformations. Some may show the desire to be androgynous and, contrary to the dominant homophobic paradigm, present veiled images of a bisexuality fulfilled in happiness and satisfaction. The episode evoking Chudala as a mistress of initiation and some variants in the magical forests of Shiva and Parvati illustrate this carefree, joyous way of crossing the gender barrier.

The OH-stretching region in curve-fitted micro-Raman, photoacoustic and transmission IR spectra of St. Claire dickite was investigated. Polarized Raman spectra recorded from th. (001) an. (010) faces of the dickite crystal displayed six prominent OH bands. The relative intensities depend strongly on both the orientation of the crystallographic axes and the direction of the electric vector of the laser beam. Four out-of-plane vibrations, AA, Az, CA and Cz, at ~3710, 3706, 3654 and 3643 cm-1 respectively, predominate when the electric vector is perpendicular to the dickite plates. Two in-plane vibrations, Dz and DA at 3627 and 3623 cm-1, intensify when the electric vector is parallel to the plane. The relationship between band intensity and crystal orientation was interpreted in terms of longitudinal optic (LO) and transverse optic (TO) crystal vibration modes. These LO and TO crystal modes were also observed in curve-fitted photoacoustic and transmission IR spectra of coarse, non-oriented crystals of the dickite.

‘My name is Ephraïm Naana, I have already told you on one of these many occasions when you have come here before closing time to speak about my school. In my village, since you ask me, there are not all the things which are to be found on the market here, there are only those which grow there: mangoes, potatoes, maize, bananas, papayas. And my primary school teacher told me that in other places there might be even fewer things; he said that in the market in Khartoum, in Sudan, the nation is vast but on the stalls there are only onions and white and red beans; and even though they were nicely arranged in piles, they were still only white beans, red beans and onions; and then he said that the world was big and that the hunger we experienced was not the worst of famines.

Western tradition has always been fundamentally anthropocentric. With the scientific mind, modern humans have achieved a sort of colonization of the rest of nature, where only their own benefit makes any sense. This conception has been in a period of crisis since the second half of the 20th century, particularly the final third, and we are witnessing the toppling of some of the ontological principles that made western humanity. Greek philosophy, the Judeo-Christian tradition, the Renaissance, these are the three great moments of this anthropocentrism; the fourth was human domination of nature and the cosmos. Since the second half of the 20th century this situation has produced a counter-consciousness, western anthropocentrism's consciousness of hybris, the awareness of having overstepped every limit and every frontier with the self-destruction brought by the atom bomb. The dual posture of pride and fall into hybris forms the grand philosophical backdrop to the ethical, political and ideological debates that are currently going on around developments in biology and genetics. This being so, is it possible for human beings, in philosophical, intellectual and artistic terms, to transcend anthropocentrism? Yes, it is, through selfrestraint, the ancient sofrosyne, which demanded moderation when faced with hybris. But westerners are afraid of transcending anthropocentrism; the idea that humans are nothing strikes fear into their hearts (pancosmic cold). An intermediate way is wanted: we need to rediscover awareness of a certain animism, rediscover the soul of the world.

A stable 8.4 Å hydrate of kaolinite was prepared by exchanging ethylene glycol for water in the 10.8 Å intercalate of ethylene glycol in kaolinite. The hydrate of kaolinite was characterized by XRD, FTIR and TGA/DSC. From the TGA data, one can estimate that there is 0.60 water molecule per Al2Si2O5(OH)4 units. The IR data suggest a similarity of the local environment of the intercalated water in this 8.4 Å hydrate of kaolinite and the 8.4 Å hydrate of nacrite previously described by Wada (1965).

Smectite and fine-grained quartz were separated from 6 volcanic ash samples collected in Japan from Shinmoe-dake Volcano, southern Kyushu, and Mt. Usu Volcano, southern Hokkaido. Oxygen isotope ratios of smectite in the volcanic ash range from +6.9 to +12.9 per mill (‰), which are comparable to the values of smectite (δ18O = +6.5 and +9.4‰) from currently active geothermal fields. Evaluation of the oxygen isotope data from smectite (δ18O = +6.9 and +8.4‰) and quartz (δ18O = +6.6 to +11.2‰) in volcanic ash erupted from Shinmoe-dake in 1959 indicates a hydrothermal origin at elevated temperatures (150 to 270 °C) from waters that have calculated 8180 values (8180 = -3 to +5%o) that are enriched relative to local meteoric water (δ18O = -7 to -8‰). This precludes an authigenic formation of the smectites under ambient temperatures in crater lakes and/or somma-atrios which had been previously proposed as a plausible mechanism. A peculiar clay flow was extruded on the somma-atrio of Mt. Usu Volcano. The isotopic composition of the clay (<0.5 μm, δ18O = + 12.2‰) and evidence from geophysical exploration over volcanic vents of Shinmoe-dake support the concept that extensive hydrothermal alteration is taking place within volcanic vents.

Homoionic Ca-saturated clay pastes were prepared and drying curves were obtained by applying suction pressures from 1 kPa to 100 MPa, A transmission device was used to study particle orientation by placing the clay in a cell specially designed to obtain diagrams corresponding to different sample orientations. The 00l and hk0 reflections were compared to determine the best reflections for studying clay-particle orientation. Depending on the clay, 00/ reflections or the 020 reflection and/or hkl bands can be used to analyze orientation. In many cases the 020 reflection is preferred because the intensity of the peak is high and appears to be independent of the H2O content and the degree of stacking order of layers along the [001] direction.

For interstratified clays, the conditions required to obtain 00l reflections depended on several factors, the most important of which is the water content. Also, the intensity relating to particie orientation depends on (1) particle extension (size) in the (001) plane and (2) the crystal structure. Illite crystals of <1000 A gave a poorly oriented clay matrix. In contrast, large aggregates of illite, smectite, and kaolinite particles (>10,000 Å) showed a strongly oriented system. The particles of smectites may be curved and the dry material was poorly oriented owing to weak cohesion forces between the layers in comparison to illite.

The study of the orientation of particles by X-ray diffraction on hydrated samples may be affected by sample mounting techniques. Any change in the content or the way the sample is mounted may modify the microstructure of a material.

Clay containing a high water content affects the disorientation of particles, whereas, for the dry samples, pore size, pore volume, and solid continuity are associated with the geometry and crystal structure of the clay matrix.

Forty years ago, Roger Caillois approached the International Council for Philosophy and Humanistic Sciences and proposed that the Council establish a most unusual journal. At the request of UNESCO, the council had brought together a number of learned organizations in the realm of the humanities; Jacques Rueff had just assumed the presidency. In Caillois's mind, the objective was to put an end to the isolation enjoyed by most disciplines, which jealously guarded their prestige and authority and cared little to have their neighbors meddle in their affairs. For Caillois, the musicologist needed the classicist, the prehistorian the philosopher and, of course, the religious historian the linguist and the economist. The interdisciplinarian, at that time, attracted a fair amount of attention. But Caillois was not satisfied. Too often, it seemed to him, the interdisciplinarian was content with arbitrary and superficial juxtapositions. Caillois wanted to raise the transdisciplinary to the level of a methodology, and he wanted to try to draw together the different scholarly sectors reluctant to step beyond historical boundaries all too often frozen by time. Haunted by the theme of the chess board at least as much as by the medusa or by fulgora lantern flies, he coined a term of his own for all this, a term destined to a brilliant future: the lateral sciences.

This paper proposes a historical and anthropological re-reading of the Mediterranean arena over and above all the lines of thought and action that have directed its history, in particular since Islam's emergence as a conquering force. The political theologies of Islam and Christianity have operated as ideologies legitimating Islam's conquests between 632 and 1258, then 1453-1830 or thereabouts. Rivalry continues today, with the two great symbolic figures of the struggle between Good and Evil: JIHAD versus McWORLD. Few archeological analyses of religions, then modernity, as legitimating ideologies have been offered. This essay takes its place in this perspective, which has been made indispensable by 9/11 and the vengeful reactions of the Holy Alliance against terrorist barbarity. Its aim is to strengthen intellectually the quest for a horizon of meaning, hope and action in order finally to enter an era of history where there is solidarity with peoples beyond the powerful wealthy states, which show little understanding for societies, whether rich or underdeveloped, that are historically out of phase with modernity.

Who would have thought twenty-five years ago that the term “bioethics,” a neologism coined by an American biologist, would have met with such success, becoming one of the cornerstones of philosophical and juridical reflection at the end of the twentieth century? For it was in 1970 that the biologist and oncologist Van Rensalear Potter published his book, Bioethics, Science of Survival.