The stability and dynamics of a falling liquid film over an anisotropic porous medium are studied using a one-domain approach. Our stability analysis shows a significant departure from the effective no-slip boundary condition in the isotropic case. Anisotropy does not affect the threshold of linear instability. However, a non-trivial dual effect of anisotropy on the film stability is observed depending on the permeability of the porous medium. This dual effect results from the net balance of the enhancement of viscous diffusion at the top Brinkman sublayer and the mitigation of viscous damping in the core Darcy sublayer. Three-equation models have been derived from the lubrication theory approximation in terms of the exact mass balance and averaged momentum balances in the porous and liquid layers. In the nonlinear regime, anisotropy has a dual effect by damping capillary waves at large permeabilities and enhancing them at low permeabilities. Anisotropy also affects wave speeds and shapes, modifies travelling-wave branches of solutions, affects the development of a time-periodic wavetrain by inlet forcing and alters the noise-driven dynamics of the flow. These effects result from the mitigation of mass exchange at the liquid–porous interface and the contribution of the cross-stream permeability in the Brinkman top sublayer to the viscous diffusion.

Since 2015, increased numbers of newly immigrated schoolchildren in Europe have resulted in divergent, often ad hoc measures to provide for their education. Because the basis of classroom learning is information found in written texts, the development of grade-level reading skills is of central importance. However, little is known about immigrant students’ reading skills at and following transition, and no data is available for Germany, where the study was conducted. We report the results of a longitudinal study in which migrant students’ (N = 136) reading subskills after transition into mainstream were investigated at three points over the course of 2 years and compared to cohort performance (N = 517) in grades 7 through 9. Results showed that immigrant students performed significantly below mainstream students on all measures for all data points, with little evidence that they are beginning to close the gap even after several years in mainstream.

Multinationals experienced a great growth after the European postwar boom. Factors in the 1970s included increasing competition from the United States, the emerging European market, as well as ongoing economic crises and changes in the international economy. The articles analyzes three case studies of Western European chemical companies—Hoechst, Akzo, and Rhône-Poulenc—to show the consequences of structural changes on management and the workforce. This article argues that (1) domestic export-oriented supplement investments lost importance, and the domestic workforce had a harder time meeting qualification requirements; (2) organizational changes incorporated divisional competitive elements into a company’s organization of work; and (3) managers had to learn to respect national path dependencies and specific skills of the local workforce. Furthermore, it illustrates the developments of the workforce in Europe and abroad and stresses the importance of nationality within the management of multinationals.

Labour standards provisions within the Trade and Sustainable Development (TSD) chapters of EU Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) are presented as a key element of the EU's commitment to a ‘value-based trade agenda’. But criticism of TSD chapters has led the European Commission to commit to improving their implementation and enforcement, creating a critical juncture in the evolution of the EU's trade–labour linkage. This contribution synthesizes findings from academic studies that have examined the effectiveness of labour standards provisions in EU FTAs. It then considers the reform agenda as presented by the European Commission, and explains how some of the proposals could tackle failures identified. However, it also argues that there are various limitations with the Commission's current proposals, and outlines how legal obligations and institutional mechanisms created by trade agreements could better be harnessed to improve working conditions and rights at work around the world.

The article focuses on the fatigue performance after a moderate heat treatment of nanocrystalline (nc) nickel, which leads to the formation of a bimodal microstructure in the nc to ultrafine grained (ufg) regime. Electrodeposition was used to produce nc macro nickel samples with grain sizes of about 40 nm for mechanical testing. The thermal stability of the material as well as the influence on the mechanical properties and the fatigue crack propagation behavior was investigated. The results of tensile and fatigue tests are discussed in respect to the chosen production method and boundary conditions. In this context, the influence of the bath additives used during the plating process was investigated and rated as the major challenge for a further improvement of the thermal stability and mechanical properties of the material. Finally, a co-deposition of nickel and metal oxides with enhanced thermal stability is presented.

Surveys of λ21-cm absorption in the Magellanic System show that the cool phase of the HI is less abundant in the SMC than in the Milky Way, and may be so also in the LMC. The typical cool cloud temperature is colder than in the Milky Way, 30 to 40 K rather than 60 to 75 K. The lower abundance of cool phase HI can be traced to the lower heavy element abundances in the Magellanic environment. The cooler cloud temperatures are somewhat mysterious.