This work presents the integration of an elemental analyzer (EA) and an isotope ratio mass spectrometer (IRMS) into the 6 MV AMS system at the Institute for Nuclear Physics, University of Cologne. The AMS measurement of δ13C values for IAEA-C6 reference material resulted in –11.39(226)‰, compared to –10.28(32)‰ obtained by IRMS. The EA-IRMS system was also tested with IAEA-C3, IAEA-C5, and IAEA-C7 reference materials, yielding –24.79(9), –25.18(15), and –14.76(18)‰ respectively. Compared to the IAEA information values given as –24.91(49), –25.49(72) and –14.48(21)‰ respectively. To investigate an observed sample mass dependency, environmental samples from Spitzbergen were examined, showing δ13C values of –25.17(55), –25.80(31), and –26.17‰ in Cologne, while Hamburg recorded –24.8(1), –25.5(1), and –26.2(13)‰. In summary, this new setup could enable online analysis and quasi-simultaneous measurements of 14C, δ13C, and δ15N for ultra-small samples, utilizing precise δ13C values from IRMS for fractionation correction of the 14C/14C isotopic ratio.

We introduce and study two conditions on groups of homeomorphisms of Cantor space, namely the conditions of being vigorous and of being flawless. These concepts are dynamical in nature, and allow us to study a certain interplay between the dynamics of an action and the algebraic properties of the acting group. A group $G\leq \operatorname {Homeo}(\mathfrak {C})$ is vigorous if for any clopen set A and proper clopen subsets B and C of A, there is $\gamma \in G$ in the pointwise stabiliser of $\mathfrak {C}\backslash A$ with $B\gamma \subseteq C$. A nontrivial group $G\leq \operatorname {Homeo}(\mathfrak {C})$ is flawless if for all k and w a nontrivial freely reduced product expression on k variables (including inverse symbols), a particular subgroup $w(G)_\circ $ of the verbal subgroup $w(G)$ is the whole group. We show: 1) simple vigorous groups are either two-generated by torsion elements, or not finitely generated, 2) flawless groups are both perfect and lawless, 3) vigorous groups are simple if and only if they are flawless, and, 4) the class of vigorous simple subgroups of $\operatorname {Homeo}(\mathfrak {C})$ is fairly broad (the class is closed under various natural constructions and contains many well known groups, such as the commutator subgroups of the Higman–Thompson groups $G_{n,r}$, the Brin-Thompson groups $nV$, Röver’s group $V(\Gamma )$, and others of Nekrashevych’s ‘simple groups of dynamical origin’).

The Social Security Act of 1935 and its 1939 amendments included federal programs for maternal and infant welfare, child welfare services, and Aid to Dependent Children (ADC). Inclusion of these programs is largely owing to women reformers’ long advocacy for public assistance to families in need. The Social Security Act nationalized aspects of the program championed by the Children’s Bureau, itself a product of women’s civic organization and institution building. These advances laid the ground for crucial components of the contemporary American welfare state, which included surveillance and intrusion into the lives of ADC families and the perpetuation of a system of subnational administration that reproduced racial inequality. Yet critics of these female reformers have not fully considered the institutional constraints they faced and the policy transformations they did not control. This article considers the policy achievement of maternalists in terms of its policy failures by considering the bureaucratic struggles of female reformers once they reached access to federal policymaking, culminating in the Committee on Economic Security that led to the Social Security Act. We consider the strategies from a place of both access and marginalization as they jockeyed for bureaucratic territory with others with different claims to expertise.

The Pacific bryozoan, Smittoidea prolifica Osburn, 1952, is reported for the first time from the Northwest Atlantic coast. Colonies were discovered during routine benthic sampling of Casco Bay, Maine, encrusting mussel shells and barnacles. Aiming to compare specimens from native and introduced locations, uncertainties about the Pacific range of S. prolifica were resolved by re-examining specimens from Japan, southern Korea, the United States west coast, and Mexico. The occurrence of this species in Japan was confirmed but southern Korea specimens were found to be Smittoidea spinigera (Liu, 1990). Comparisons of biometrics among specimens from widely dispersed locations where S. prolifica is native and introduced showed significant trends in variation with most characters largest for California and smallest for Germany. Zooid width was largest for Maine specimens. Comparisons between oceans showed that Pacific and Atlantic specimens differed significantly in all measures except zooid length and orifice width. Low substrate specificity and broad range of temperatures and salinities in occupied habitats suggests the potential for successful introduction is high. Smittoidea prolifica was most likely introduced through commercial shipping from the North Sea where it is an established non-native species. This was the third non-indigenous species found in Casco Bay discovered within the same timeframe and which shared the same likely region of origin. This spike matched a rise in commercial shipping from the Northeast Atlantic to Portland, Maine, suggesting this seaport is shifting towards becoming a bioinvasion hotspot.

La Cour pénale internationale s’est penchée récemment sur la question nouvelle de la réparation des préjudices transgénérationnels. Dans son analyse, la cour s’appuie sur un type de préjudice qui dépasse la victime immédiate et qui en vise une qui n’a vécu l’événement traumatique original, que par l’entremise d’un transfert générationnel. En ce qui concerne la réparation, il faut établir si ce préjudice est spécifique et autonome justifiant une reconnaissance et, par conséquent, une mesure de réparation. La question de réparer un préjudice transgénérationnel est d’actualité et encore peu étudiée en droit pénal international. Le présent article vise à apporter une contribution dans ce domaine en examinant la façon dont le préjudice transgénérationnel est juridiquement élaboré dans certains exemples s’inscrivant dans un contexte de violations massives et graves des droits humains. Enfin, l’article analyse la jurisprudence de la Cour pénale internationale, mettant en lumière les difficultés et les dilemmes générés par la reconnaissance des préjudices transgénérationnels dans la sphère juridique pénale.

Designing autonomous robotic systems for monitoring tasks in critical security scenarios requires more rigorous verification criteria. The losses associated with unsuccessful practical experiments are immeasurable, ranging from the simple loss of high-value-added equipment to those related to loss of life. This reality justifies the need to adopt an extensive framework of tools for realistic, efficient, and responsive computer simulation. This article proposes a novel integration architecture and combines open-source tools to promote the successful implementation of autonomous robotic systems in monitoring tasks. The proposed solution relies on consolidated tools like Robot Operating System (ROS), Gazebo Simulator, and ArduPilot FCU (Flight Control Unit). It includes full support for implementing XITL techniques (such as Model, Software, and Hardware) – in the Loop. Experimental results demonstrate the proposal’s effectiveness for a new model of autonomous surface vehicles (ASVs) in a realistic environment, dedicated to environmental monitoring in challenging natural conditions, commonly found in a stretch of the Madeira River – Brazil, specifically at Santo Antônio hydroelectric plant.

This article examines China’s first women’s prison in the context of diplomatic disputes, legal reforms, and gender order at the turn of the twentieth century. It shows that the custody of female offenders in the Shanghai International Settlement became a battleground in which the interests and perceptions of late imperial China and the Western authorities clashed. Under pressure from the Western authorities, the first Chinese women’s prison was established in 1907, even prior to the formal introduction of custodial sentences into China’s criminal code. Notably, the Chinese officials did not embrace prison as a more benevolent punitive institution; rather, they saw it more as a tool to consolidate its judicial sovereignty and preserve gender norms. For Chinese women, the prison, functioning as a re-cloistered feminine space, further entrenched the confinement of their bodies, thereby perpetuating rather than changing orthodox values of female chastity. This article questions the universal modernity of European penalties by pointing out that the introduction of imprisonment as a supposedly more civilized and humane form of punishment may have placed Chinese women at a greater disadvantage.

During the 1930s and 1940s, a group of right-wing intellectuals, sparked by the New Deal, mounted a sustained critique of American democracy and inherited democratic principles. Believing that the progressive democratization of the state had resulted in a decadent, inefficient and morally coarse society, they attacked democracy as the root cause of the nation's problems. Examining the reactionary conservative, libertarian and fascist critiques of democracy, this article suggests that each borrowed ideas from the other, and that their beliefs in autocratic rule or a broadly countermajoritarian politics have not been adequately studied by scholars.

This article examines the rhizomatic approach to political organizing developed by the Asian American Political Alliance (AAPA). AAPA, founded in 1968 in Berkeley, CA, is an organization of historical significance, having introduced the term “Asian American” to signify a new political identity and developed the first pan-Asian nationwide social movement. Yet the scholarly treatment of AAPA has been rather cursory. This article is one of the the most extensively researched studies of AAPA. In three parts, it examines AAPA’s (a) rhizomatic approach to political organizing, (b) model of collective leadership, and (c) community-centered pedagogy. First, the article conceptualizes AAPA’s rhizomatic mode, which fostered the decentralized, interconnected participation of many people. AAPA prioritized a participatory model that also created space for women to have influence. Second, examining AAPA’s activities shows an approach to community-based organizing that affirmed the knowledge produced by ordinary people gained through their lived experiences. Third, the article explores the importance of relationship building and rhizomatic networks in AAPA’s growth across the nation. While not exclusive of vertical structures, AAPA’s focus on egalitarian, collaborative organizing infused the national movement and helped to make collective leadership a hallmark of the broader Asian American movement.

This article investigates visual communication practices among members of a disabled people's organisation (DPO) in a market in Uganda. Deaf members and many of the hearing members are proficient in Ugandan Sign Language (UgSL) and use it daily. I examine three communicative settings within the market, identifying varied modes of visual communication in use, ranging from loosely conventionalised multimodal improvisation to standard UgSL. Deaf stallholders value the varied forms of linguistic community accessed through these different modes, which are complementary rather than opposing, except at key moments of tension. By combining ‘deaf space’ theory with Silverstein's distinction between speech and language communities, I link the visual communication practices of deaf and hearing marketgoers to the varying forms of solidarity that underly linguistic communities. Deaf marketgoers creatively articulate different visual communication potentialities and the communities they arise from and index, including negotiating linguistic access through strategically opposing deaf and hearing communities. (Deaf space, sign language, language communities)*

During the nineteenth century in Ireland, agents of the colonial state like the police, along with the administrators that they served, forged an association between political motivations and Irish agrarian violence. They did so not only through the policing of Irish violence, but through the methods used by the colonial state to categorize, process, record, and archive it. Central to this endeavor was the category of “outrage.” Using this category, the Irish Constabulary created a record that impressed an association between Irish violence or criminality and political resistance. Because the British colonial state had control over the production of the archive, it also dictated the metanarratives present in this “archive of outrages” that gave form and function to the colonial state's fears that Irish violence represented a budding insurrection or a desire to fracture the Union. By perpetuating this logic in document and archival form, Dublin Castle (the seat of the British government's administration of Ireland) helped create the very demon that it sought to exorcise—that of Irish nationalist action and sentiment.

Mutual support among residents in collaborative housing for older people presents an alternative care model to family or formal social care provided in individuals’ homes or specialised care facilities. This is particularly the case in cohousing, where residents commit to mutual support and exercise autonomy through self-governance. Cohousing also supports the ageing processes by fostering greater wellbeing and significantly lessening social isolation and loneliness. Further, it offers the potential for older people to collectively maintain greater agency in later life and manage age-related health decline. Despite a growing body of literature on ageing and collaborative housing, to date little research has explored how later-life transitions are negotiated among residents of collaborative housing. Drawing on longitudinal, qualitative research on collaborative housing communities in England between 2021 and 2023, this article examines age-related challenges residents face in cohousing, and how they respond to such changing care needs individually and collectively. Analysing data from two waves of fieldwork in three cohousing communities, it examines how the mutual-support functions of the communities act as an intermediary to facilitate communication with different parties, formal and informal care provision and decision-making. The intermediary role tends not to replace the need for formal social care or the involvement of family but provides a supportive buffer between the individual and the family and formal services. Despite the lack of built-in care services placing a potentially heavier burden on residents, the ‘intentional’ commitment to mutual support in cohousing contributes significantly to extending agency in later life.

Jellyfishes have ecological and societal value, but our understanding of taxonomic identity of many jellyfish species remains limited. Here, an approach integrating morphological and molecular (16S ribosomal RNA and cytochrome oxidase I) data enables taxonomic assessment of the blubber jellyfish found in the Philippines. In this study, we aimed to resolve doubt on the taxonomy of Acromitoides purpurus, a valid binomen at the time of our research. Our morphological findings confirm that this jellyfish belongs to the genus Catostylus, and is distinct from known species of the genus inhabiting the Western Pacific, such as Catostylus ouwensi, Catostylus townsendi, and Catostylus mosaicus. Detailed morphological and molecular analyses of the type specimens from the Philippines with the other Catostylus species revive the binomen Catostylus purpurus and invalidate A. purpurus. Genetic analysis also distinguishes this Philippine jellyfish from C. townsendi and C. mosaicus. Through this study, we arranged several Catostylidae taxa into species inquirendae (Catostylus tripterus, Catostylus turgescens, and Acromitoides stiphropterus) and one genus inquirenda (Acromitoides) and provided an identification key for species of Catostylus. This comprehensive study confirms the blubber jellyfish as C. purpurus, enriching our understanding of jellyfish biodiversity. The integration of morphological and genetic analyses proves vital in resolving taxonomic ambiguities within the Catostylidae family and in the accurate identification of scyphozoan jellyfishes.

In contemporary Italy, media and public actors frame the exploitation of migrant agricultural labourers as the outcome of caporalato. This concept – translated as labour brokerage or gang mastery – connotes the violent treatment of workers and their exploitation by powerful individuals, who are today increasingly racialised and understood as being Black and immigrants. However, our fieldwork in Apulia and Sicily uncovered a more complicated picture. This article considers a variety of sources to explore how caporalato is constructed and to what effect. Our argument is that, though rooted in real dynamics, caporalato is also a reductive, sensationalised, and racialising framing device that transposes historic tenets of Italy's ‘Southern Question’ onto ‘othered’ migrant workers. It affects policy by creating categories of people who are made ‘illegal’ and ‘deportable’. In also reinforcing derogatory stereotypes about the Italian South, it makes visible further South(s) of the Italian South(s) – offering insight into how and where borders are created and what their effects are.