Vulnerability,Partnerships and the Pursuit of Survival: Urban Livelihoods and Apprenticeship Contracts in a West African City

This paper analyses local level apprenticeship contracts and networks to highlight informal urban livelihoods within the context of socio-economic vulnerability and wider contemporary changes taking place in Koforidua, Ghana. It does so by specifically examining the complex entanglements of interpersonal relationships that characterize apprenticeship contracts within which home-based entrepreneurs and artisans in Koforidua engage in to sustain both current livelihoods, as well as to shore themselves against socio-economic vulnerability triggered in part by adjustment. As a result of the changing geography of the city, network entanglements, comprising resilient ties and egalitarian relations, have become vital to urban livelihoods in this community. However, apprenticeship contracts and the networks they engender can be a double-edged sword. For instance, demands of reciprocity or support from co-network members, neighbours and family, can be so taxing that some individuals opt out of the network. This tension notwithstanding, this paper contends that apprenticeship contracts and the network spaces they create have created a new social cohesion and community that transcend the traditionally known spaces of social support, i.e. ethnic ties, family ties or even institutional support.     

Understanding governance and networks: EU-US interactions and the regulation of genetically modified organisms

EU-US (European Union-United States) interactions in relation to the regulation of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) have been examined in detail in recent years. To do this scholars have tended to focus on a small number of high profile processes, such as the formal complaint of the US to the World Trade Organisation regarding the regulation of GMOs in the Europe. It is important to analyse developments of this kind but overemphasis on them has also lead to a distorted view of the case and a failure to appreciate the significance of other, less visible, types of interaction. In this paper we focus instead on trying to understand the roles played by various EU-US transnational networks—The Transatlantic Business Dialogue, The Transatlantic Economic Partnership, The Transatlantic Consumer Dialogue, The Transatlantic Environmental Dialogue and the EU-US Consultative Forum on Biotechnology. These networks have been trying to shape the regulation of GMOs in both jurisdictions since the mid 1990s. By analysing them through a ‘governance lens’ we find that we can better understand EU-US interactions and the dynamics and influences around the regulation of GMOs. This gives us valuable insights into processes of contemporary governance.     

GYD-20型全液压动力头工程钻机的研制

针对传统工程钻机生产制造周期长、自动化程度低、劳动强度大、施工效率低等弊端,研制了GYD-20型全液压动力头工程钻机。介绍了该钻机的结构特点及其应用于大口径基础桩孔、煤矿通风孔钻进的情况和效果。     

人工神经网络在桩基工程中的应用综述

对人工神经网络在桩基工程中的应用研究工作进行了回顾与评述。总结了神经网络在单桩承载力、荷载－位移关系预测以及基桩动测完整性判释等方面的技术成果与水平，并分析和探讨了进一步的研究方向和应用前景。     

贝叶斯网络在水资源管理中的应用

为了解决水资源管理中具有不确定性的多目标决策问题,将贝叶斯网络方法引入水资源管理中。通过对实例系统中变量间相互关系的分析,构建描述变量间不确定性关系的贝叶斯网络模型,其中包括表示其依赖关系的有向无环图和表示其具体概率依赖程度的条件概率表,并在6个目标变量均达到预期目标的前提下进行概率推理。实例结果表明：当补偿款数额增加到500元/亩时,所有的目标变量均可达到最优,因此确定出政府应给农民补偿款的数额为500元/亩的合理水资源决策方案。贝叶斯网络以图模型的方式直观地表达了实例系统中变量之间的不确定性关系,概率推理的结果兼顾了环境效益以及农民的利益,使多个预期目标均达到了最优,有效地解决了水资源管理中具有不确定性的多目标决策问题。     

Nitrogen and carbon dioxide occurrence in UK coal seams

Conclusions Some bituminous coals, mostly of high volatile rank, sampled from various coalfields contained on average 0.5 m³ t^–1 nitrogen and 0.13 m³ t^–1.Nitrogen is released more readily than methane during coal winning but the volumes of nitrogen released are small compared with ventilation quantities and are only likely to be of significance for detailed oxygen deficiency studies.     

`Our resistance will be as transnational as capital': Convergence space and strategy in globalising resistance

This paper analyses the emerging globalising networks of communication, solidarity, and information-sharing between social movements and other resistance formations in opposition to neoliberal globalisation. In particular, the paper focuses upon People's Global Action – a network of various social movemnets and grassroots intitiatives from around the world. The paper argues that such a network represents not an organisation, but rather a convergence space – a heterogenous affinity of common ground between resistance formations wherein certain interests, goals, tactics and strategies converge. The paper analyses how space and strategy are negotiated in these globalising terrains of resistance, and argues that place-specific struggles are engaging with alliances and collaborations across diverse boundaries of gender, generation, class, and ethnicity – globalising the common ground between different struggles. Explaining how the internet has been crucial to the development of these networks, the paper argues that the strategies of such networks can be interpreted, in part, through the Taoist text, The Art of War, especially the Taoist notions of terrain, knowing others, and form/lessness. In addition, the paper argues that convergence spaces are fragmented by important issues of language, power, and mobility.     

具有随机扰动和混合时滞的两层异质网络的同步研究

在现实生活中,很多复杂的系统不是由单个网络来表示,而是由一组相互依赖的网络系统来表示的.本文研究了具有随机扰动和混合时滞的两层异质网络的对应节点的同步控制问题.基于随机微分时滞方程的LaSalle不变原理和Lyapunov稳定性理论,采用牵制控制方法,对部分节点实施控制,给出了实现同步的充分条件.为了降低反馈控制的增益,结合自适应控制的方法,进一步弱化了两层异质网络实现同步的条件.最后,通过数值仿真,验证了理论结果的有效性.     

分布式传感器网络系统的网络预测控制

本文针对分布式传感器网络系统的Fornasini-Marchesini （FM）状态空间模型,对系统的预测控制器设计问题进行研究.特别是针对所考虑的二维FM传感器网络系统,提出了一种新的网络预测控制方案来补偿通信时滞.首先,根据李雅普诺夫稳定性理论,给出了二维系统保持稳定的充分条件;然后利用稳定性条件,提出了一种新的预测控制器设计策略并保证系统的控制性能;最后,通过一个数值实例验证了所设计控制器的有效性.     

广西气候与建筑设计

对广西建筑设计所涉及的气候参数进行了计算和分析,给出了南宁、桂林的基本风压、采暖通风和空调室外气象参数和建筑采光系数,为建筑部门提供了科学依据。