Phenomenological Basis Research Articles

Natureza, espaço e paisagem como construção humana

Tendo como ponto de partida as bases fenomenológicas, nas quais paisagem é compreendida como fruto da relação Homem/lugar/mundo, busca-se abordar as ideias de natureza, espaço e paisagem, sob a ótica do que se convencionou chamar de “experenciador”. Diante do complexo panorama contemporâneo, em que as categorias acima citadas sofrem revisões e ampliações conceituais sistemáticas, pretende-se discutir natureza, espaço e paisagem como construções humanas, historicamente determinadas. O tema é conduzido através da reflexão sobre a tessitura e sentido que se dá a partir da experiência direta, por meio da qual paisagem pode ser lida como “mediação” entre natureza e humano.

Strategies for the Study of Complex Socio-Economic Systems: an Approach Using Agent-Based Simulation

The present paper proposes a research strategy that integrates top-down and bottom-up approaches, aimed at the study of complex socio-economic systems. Through a theoretical analysis, it is demonstrated throughout the text a strategy that allows the articulation between agent-based simulation approaches and methods of deductive and phenomenological basis capable of providing social sciences with unprecedented accuracy due to ethical and methodological limitations imposed by the study object until then. This is because this type of hybrid approach allows the construction of a deep systemic articulation between the micro and the macro, as advocated by the General Theory of Systems, at the same time as it is supported by systematic experiments that give new light to the study of the socio-economic complexity.

GIMPy: a software for the simulation of X‐ray fluorescence and reflectivity of layered materials

X‐ray fluorescence (XRF) analysis is an established technique for quantitative elemental analysis. Grazing incidence X‐ray fluorescence analysis (GIXRF) extends the application of XRF to thin films because of the improved sensibility. GIXRF shares the phenomenological basis with X‐ray reflectivity, a scattering technique typically used for thin‐film metrology, offering sensitivity to elemental depth. This work presents the GIMPy (Grazing Incidence Material analysis with Python) software developed for the analysis of GIXRF spectra by combining a fundamental parameter approach to quantitative XRF analysis and the electric field calculation in stratified media, which also delivers the total reflected intensity as measured in X‐ray reflectivity experiments. An XRF experiment can be modelled from the source, modulation of the primary beam, interactions with a layered sample, absorption of the emitted fluorescence intensities, and the response function of semiconductor energy dispersive detectors obtaining a simulation of the expected spectrum that can be directly compared with the acquired one. The fundamental parameter part includes signal enhancements by cascade effect and secondary fluorescence. The code offers the possibility to take into account the effects originated by deviations from ideal conditions: non‐monochromatic excitation, beam divergence, beam size and shape, sample‐inspected area, and solid angle of detection. The functionality of the code is demonstrated on a set of semiconductor substrates (Si, Ge, and GaAs) and shallow dopant distributions of arsenic in silicon. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Philosophical Roots of the Dialogical Concept of Law

The main task which I pose for myself is to indicate the philosophical roots of the dialogical concept of law. First and foremost, I would like to present dialogue in the context of ancient Greek philosophy and in the context of the classicists of the philosophy of dialogue. Furthermore, I seek phenomenological bases for constructing the dialogical concept of law. The phenomenological method, starting with its classical Husserlian form, has undergone many changes. Thanks to the indication of new horizons of phenomenology by Emmanuel Levinas, discovering dialogical consciousness and the subject constituted in being with the Other are possible. The reference point of reflections on the concept of law is the relationship with the Other as an ethical relationship. Philosophy of dialogue is a certain possible prism of thinking about the social, public, and institutional space. It is thinking through the prism of dialogue (speaking), but also through the third who contributes discourse relevant to what is said. Law as the third, as the mediating element, is a co-constituting element of the entire legal world.

Phenomenal consciousness, access consciousness and self across waking and dreaming: bridging phenomenology and neuroscience

The distinction between phenomenal and access consciousness is central to debates about consciousness and its neural correlates. However, this distinction has often been limited to the domain of perceptual (visual) experiences. On the basis of dream phenomenology and neuroscientific findings this paper suggests a theoretical framework which extends this distinction to dreaming, also in terms of plausible neural correlates. In this framework, phenomenal consciousness is involved in both waking perception and dreaming, whereas access consciousness is weakened, but not fully eliminated, during dreaming. However, access consciousness is more active during lucid dreaming. The proposed framework accounts for different aspects of dream phenomenology, including levels of integration of perceptual, cognitive and affective features in dreams, bizarreness, dream amnesia and the occurrence of meta-awareness and accessibility in lucid dreaming. Self-related experiences and their neural substrates are suggested to be differently involved in waking cognition and dreaming. Further, phenomenal consciousness during both waking and dream experiences involve widespread recurrent interactions and convergence-divergence zones in the thalamo-cortico-limbic system, activated before conscious access in global workspace areas. Finally, we discuss the relationships of the proposed framework with other neurocognitive theories and models of consciousness and major theories of dreaming, and propose novel experimental predictions.

Multiscale damage analyis for steel structures

AbstractAn approach to model the deterioration of steel structures is presented by transferring the results of a continuum damage mechanics analysis to an extended beam model which can account for the loss of structural integrity.Damage starts at the microscopic level by the initiation, growth and coalescence of voids with decreasing material resistance followed by the formation of microcracks at the mesoscale. Nevertheless, the material behavior can be sufficiently modelled on a phenomenological basis taking into account viscoplasticity, hardening effects and damage evolution. The associated model parameters are identified with the help of an evolutionary algorithm adapting numerical to experimental results. Using the finite element method a nonlocal formulation of the damage variable is required to obtain mesh‐independent results by structural analysis. The maximum element size is limited by the small magnitude of the internal length. Therefore, numerical analyses of large scale 3D steel structures are computationally expensive.To reduce the effort a beam element is proposed to account for the plastic hinges and the loss of resistance in the course of damage evolution. The corresponding relationship of bending moment and curvature bases on the continuum damage mechanics model. (© 2016 Wiley‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)

An extended action for the effective field theory of dark energy: a stability analysis and a complete guide to the mapping at the basis of EFTCAMB

We present a generalization of the effective field theory (EFT) formalism for dark energy and modified gravity models to include operators with higher order spatial derivatives. This allows the extension of the EFT framework to a wider class of gravity theories such as Hořava gravity. We present the corresponding extended action, both in the EFT and the Arnowitt-Deser-Misner (ADM) formalism, and proceed to work out a convenient mapping between the two, providing a self contained and general procedure to translate a given model of gravity into the EFT language at the basis of the Einstein-Boltzmann solver EFTCAMB. Putting this mapping at work, we illustrate, for several interesting models of dark energy and modified gravity, how to express them in the ADM notation and then map them into the EFT formalism. We also provide for the first time, the full mapping of GLPV models into the EFT framework. We next perform a thorough analysis of the physical stability of the generalized EFT action, in absence of matter components. We work out viability conditions that correspond to the absence of ghosts and modes that propagate with a negative speed of sound in the scalar and tensor sector, as well as the absence of tachyonic modes in the scalar sector. Finally, we extend and generalize the phenomenological basis in terms of α-functions introduced to parametrize Horndeski models, to cover all theories with higher order spatial derivatives included in our extended action. We elaborate on the impact of the additional functions on physical quantities, such as the kinetic term and the speeds of propagation for scalar and tensor modes.

Integration of GMR Sensors with Different Technologies.

Less than thirty years after the giant magnetoresistance (GMR) effect was described, GMR sensors are the preferred choice in many applications demanding the measurement of low magnetic fields in small volumes. This rapid deployment from theoretical basis to market and state-of-the-art applications can be explained by the combination of excellent inherent properties with the feasibility of fabrication, allowing the real integration with many other standard technologies. In this paper, we present a review focusing on how this capability of integration has allowed the improvement of the inherent capabilities and, therefore, the range of application of GMR sensors. After briefly describing the phenomenological basis, we deal on the benefits of low temperature deposition techniques regarding the integration of GMR sensors with flexible (plastic) substrates and pre-processed CMOS chips. In this way, the limit of detection can be improved by means of bettering the sensitivity or reducing the noise. We also report on novel fields of application of GMR sensors by the recapitulation of a number of cases of success of their integration with different heterogeneous complementary elements. We finally describe three fully functional systems, two of them in the bio-technology world, as the proof of how the integrability has been instrumental in the meteoric development of GMR sensors and their applications.

The paranormal as an unhelpful concept in psychotherapy and counselling research

This paper, which opens with a description of what might be considered an instance of extrasensory perception in the therapeutic encounter, argues that the concepts of extrasensory perception and the paranormal are embedded in a debate in which therapists need not become involved. It argues that the discipline of parapsychology, and therefore the terms ‘paranormal’ and ‘extrasensory perception’ are embedded within a scientific narrative. In seeking to become accepted by the scientific establishment, parapsychology has entered into a debate with that establishment. This debate is of no consequence to therapeutic practice: the search for objectivity is irrelevant to understanding what happens in the therapeutic encounter. This paper suggests that the subjective basis of Phenomenology is more appropriate to psychotherapy and counselling research. It analyses the opening account and suggests that phenomenological description enables us to uncover some of the richness – and oddness – of the therapeutic encounter. The senses and the imagination are not separate faculties, but entangled in a way that enables us to make contact with the hidden or invisible aspects of the world. A phenomenological attitude of ‘curiosity and disciplined naiveté’ enables us to understand something of the complex, subtle and sometimes uncanny nature of communication and perception.

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ABSTRACT The objective of the article consists in proposing and solving a model of the phenomenological bases that allows characterize, quantify and predict the formation damage due fines migration and swelling clays at reservoir level from the linear mathematical methodological scheme Civan [1]. The process of understanding the phenomenon of particles on a porous medium has been for the most cases approach from the laboratory perspective, measuring the critical rates of the formation plugs and based on this it’s had been generated a mathematical model for the simulation of the particle phenomenon by laboratory conditions. It’s construct, it’s propose, it’s applied and it’s validate a methodology for transcending and scale to the reservoir scale the results of the formation damage by the flow of fines observed in the laboratory. The generated methodology is base in performing multi-rate coreflooding tests, solve and characterize the damage by particles flow in the plug in function of velocity in the linear model of Civan, construct and determine the model for estimate the profiles of damages in function of the radius, validate the scheme with field data for estimate the impact of damage and the critical radius of the producing well. At the present time more than 50% of the oil fields operate by Ecopetrol display formation damage by particle process, the quantity of the petroleum that it stop producing by this phenomenon is estimated in the thousands of barrels, with this kind of approximation it’s can be design and optimize the treatment require for mitigate the damage and recover a significate percentage of the barrels left out of production. In this project it’s show the entire process using data from the formation Barco of Cupiagua field, the scaling results indicate drops of permeability of 65% by this type of amage, damage radius between 1.9 and 4.4 ft and skin value by fines between 1.9 and 3.4. This process allows to generate the designs of the stimulating treatment for this field. Keywords: Formation Damage, Fines Migration, Phenomenological Model, Clay Swelling, Critical Rate, Cupiagua.

Critical Theory of Digital Media

Recalling the phenomenological and Hegelian bases of the critique of misplaced concreteness, and supplementing these by the contribution of Gregory Bateson, it is possible to say that a contemporary critique of digital media cannot appeal to an irrevocable concreteness nor finally defeat abstraction. Since the digital media complex is characterized by temporal decay, transversality, and singularity, a new departure for a critical theory of digital media must centre on the cultural unconscious (non-dominant translations) and the limit, or edge, of the cultural complex.

Review of Markand Thakar, Looking for the “Harp” Quartet: An Investigation into Musical Beauty (University of Rochester Press, 2011)

[1] Markand Thakar currently serves as the conductor of the Baltimore Chamber Orchestra, Director of the BCO Summer Conducting Seminar and Winter Conducting Workshop, Co-Director of Graduate Conducting at the Peabody Conservatory, and was formerly the Assistant Conductor of the New York Philharmonic. Looking for the "Harp" Quartet builds upon the ideas in his previous book, Counterpoint: Fundamentals of Music Making (1990), in considering the transcendent experience of musical beauty, the musical work as a unitarily apprehensible object, and the ways in which impulse may be generated and consequently resolved. Thakar's ideas are valuable, his exposition of them is clear, and the book is supported by materials on his website, including sound files for the musical examples, analytical graphs, and a list of omissions and corrections. While Thakar discusses only music literature from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, this book would be useful as the main text in an upper-level or graduate seminar, or as a component of a survey of analytical techniques or aesthetics.[2] The text is arranged as a sequence of five dialogues between a conservatory teacher and a violin student, allusively named "Daedalus" and "Icarus." These dialogues occur periodically during Icarus's imagined senior year, as he rehearses and performs Beethoven's "Harp" Quartet (op. 74) with another coach. He and Daedalus begin by discussing what constitutes a "musical object," and then consider the contributions of the listener, composer, and performer in the ultimate experience of musical beauty. The final dialogue summarizes their conclusions and provides direction for further study.[3] Although the dialogues present the principal ideas, Thakar includes three supplemental essays at the end of the book. These provide more focused, technical discussions of the phenomenological basis for the conception of the "musical object," the conception of tonicization and musical structure as "patterns of energy" created by the composer, and finally, techniques for the "dynamic analysis" intended to uncover this patterning. These articles are intended to supplement the dialogues, and Daedalus actually refers to them at specific points in the text, but they may be read independently without any loss of coherence.[4] Thakar's primary theme is that masterworks of art are those that can be perceived as single "objects in time," and it is this essential property that allows the ultimate aesthetic experience. Composers contribute the potential for this experience by suggesting a succession of tones in which the energy can be created and resolved within a singular hierarchy. Performers, in turn, must realize this potential, recognize the hierarchy and craft their spectra of intensity and tempo in accordance with its inherent design. If both the composer and the performer are successful, an experience of transcendent beauty will be available to the listener, who must only be open to receiving it.[5] Thakar's conception of the "object in time" is indebted to Edmund Husserl's The Phenomenology of Internal Time Consciousness (1964), and the substance of the first dialogue, concerning the essential qualities of a piece of music, also recalls ideas from phenomenology. Unlike other theorists writing from a phenomenological standpoint, such as Lawrence Ferrara and Thomas Clifton, however, Thakar is less concerned with description than he is with a pragmatic understanding of how transcendent experiences are achieved. As he argues, the experience of transcendence involves a "loss of self" that is, the separation between subject (the one perceiving the work of art) and object (the work of art) is erased. Thus, it follows that any distraction from the perception of the artwork as a single object in time eliminates the possibility for the experience. As one might expect, this leads to a discussion of intonation, articulation, balance, and so forth, not as objective, quantifiable entities, but rather as contextual parameters. …

Perception of Outdoor History Teaching in Theory and Practice: Opinions of Teachers and Prospective Teachers

Outdoor learning as an experiential process which is based on the contact with environment, learning by doing and living can be used in teaching of different fields from mathematics to history. Understanding of history education in recent years provides opportunity to this kind of a teaching (style). However, expanding the use of these activities in teaching is closely related with the knowledge, skills and attitudes of teachers and prospective teachers. To develop knowledge, skills and attitudes of teachers and prospective teachers on Outdoor History Teaching (OHT), pre-service and in-service needs, goals and plans should be determined and realized firstly. This research intends to contribute determining these pre-service and in-service needs, goals and plans by getting the opinions of teachers and prospective teachers about the subject. The research implemented by getting opinions of 12 history teachers and 12 prospective history teachers in spring semester of 2013-2014 and fall semester of 2014-2015 academic years. In the research which was carried out on the basis of phenomenology that is one of the qualitative research designs, opinions of teachers and prospective teachers were collected as based on the semi-structured interview technique. Then interview data were typed and content analysis was made. As the result of analysis it was seen that the awareness of the prospective teachers towards the concept is higher. Moreover, it was identified that all of the teachers and prospective teachers found OHT relevant to history course, similarly majority of them was feeling themselves insufficient in this subject and thought that a special education is necessary to perform these activities. However, unlike teachers, prospective teachers could associate different types of methods with OHT. In contrast, awareness of prospective teachers in questions related with practice and curriculums is lower than the teachers’. In the research suggestions were offered according to the results.

Phenomenology in a Different Key: Narrative, Meaning, and Madness

Phenomenology in a Different Key: Narrative, Meaning, and Madness Philip Thomas (bio) and Eleanor Longden (bio) Keywords childhood adversity, existentialism, hearing voices, hermeneutics, narrative, phenomenology, recovery Henriksen et al. (2015) use phenomenology as a tool to clarify the status of what they regard as the abnormal experiences of the condition called schizophrenia. This reveals phenomenology as a method of detailed scrutiny of these experiences to establish a theory about them in terms of the “dissolution of certain structures of self-consciousness” (p. 165, elaborated as “pathological changes in the experience of space” (p. 165) and “morbid objectification of inner speech” (p. 165). Our commentary is in two parts. In the first, we set out a contrasting view of phenomenology, and its use in madness.1 In the second, we exemplify this use of phenomenology and the meaningful nature of voices through evidence that links madness with childhood adversity, trauma and abuse. Our position is that recovery from madness becomes possible once the person is able to organize her experiences within a narrative framework. Although we broadly concur with some aspects of Henriksen et al.’s (2015) view of Merleau-Ponty and Heidegger, we disagree fundamentally with their argument that “pathological changes in the experience of space in schizophrenia result from disturbances or instabilities in the most fundamental relation to space, namely the primordial presence in the world” (p. 173). This statement and what follows is at conflict with the spirit of the work of Merleau-Ponty and Heidegger. Both philosophers regarded our pre-reflective immersion in the world and sense of self as inseparable. We disagree that the separation they describe between the two is a prodrome, and argue instead that it is an artefact of the use of phenomenology as a tool to analyze experience, which fragments experience to explain it through the methods of science. We are not arguing that the experiences of madness are not fragmented. Many who experience madness do indeed have terrifying and frightening experiences that may be described in terms of fragmentation and dissolution, but a different view of phenomenology opens up the possibility of narrative understanding of such experiences within the life history of the person. Indeed, another way of looking at this is that these fragments are part of chaos narratives (Frank 1995). Although Henriksen et al. (2015) do not refer to it, the presence of Karl Jaspers is in the background of their piece. In General Psychopathology, Jaspers (1963) sees phenomenology as providing precise [End Page 187] and accurate descriptions of the signs and symptoms of mental illness. Right from the outset he is clear about the scientific, and thus ultimately Cartesian, basis of phenomenology: The first step towards a scientific knowledge of the psyche is the selection, delimitation, differentiation and description of particular phenomena of experience which then, through the use of the allotted term, become defined and capable of identification time and again. (Jaspers 1963, 25, emphasis in the original) and Phenomenology presents us with a series of isolated fragments broken out from a person’s total psychic experience. (ibid, 27, emphasis in the original) In this view, phenomenology is not concerned with weaving fragments into a meaningful whole. This is precisely what we encounter in Henriksen et al.’s paper. The work of Merleau-Ponty and Heidegger questions such an approach to human experience, and it is pertinent that Henriksen et al. (2015) make no reference to the most important element of these philosophers’ work, being-in-the-world.2 Merleau-Ponty (1962) begins Phenomenology of Perception by examining scientific accounts of sensation and perception from neurology and psychology. It is not possible, he argues, for such theories to generate a complete account of these phenomena. In part this is because scientific modes of thought are derivative of pre-objective experience, that is to say our experience of the world as it is already present before us. It follows that the starting point for any account of sensation and perception is not our theories about these phenomena, but the phenomena themselves. Scientific inquiry is a product of human experience and history, one that involves a particular approach to the world. This is apparent in Henriksen et...

Nonlinear deformation–wave processes in various rank coal specimens loaded to failure under varied temperature

Aiming to build up a phenomenological basis for the theory of interaction between geomechanical, thermal and physicochemical processes in methane-bearing coal in Kuzbass, the authors performed a set of laboratory bench tests on uniaxial stiff loading of various rank coal specimens. The pressure versus temperature dependences are obtained for coal specimens with granite gaskets using high-precision scanning computerized thermal imager. It is shown that temperature changed in coal specimens subjected to loading to failure is connected with volatile content and internal energy relaxation of methane in Kuzbass coal. Using jointly thermal imaging and laser measuring equipment ALMEC-tv for high-precision and detail control of deformation–wave processes in loaded coal specimens by speckle-method, it has for the first time been proved that nonlinear pendulum-type movements of structural elements are possible in coal specimens with varied temperature field, which is of fundamental importance for actualization of previously ignored mass and gas exchange processes in high-stress coal beds of different grade composition under mining,

Biotechnology as End Game: Ontological and Ethical Collapse in the “Biotech Century”

I argue in this paper that animal biotechnology constitutes a dangerous ontological collapse between animals and the technical-economic apparatus. By ontological collapse, I mean the elimination of fundamental ontological tensions between embodied subjects and the principles of scientific, technological, and economic rationalization. Biotechnology imposes this collapse in various ways: by genetically “reprogramming” animals to serve as uniform commodities, by abstracting them into data and code, and, in some cases, by literally manipulating their movements with computer technologies. These and other forms of ontological violence not only lead to profound physical suffering for the animals involved, but also distort the phenomenological basis of their existence, especially their perceptual experience and expression of subjective time and space. In subordinating nonhuman animals to the logic of “technological rationality” or “technique,” to borrow Herbert Marcuse and Jacques Ellul’s respective terms, biotechnology perpetuates the productive extermination of animals. Biotech animals are exterminated in the sense of being “drive[n] beyond the boundaries” of meaningful existence and “destroyed completely” or “completely wiped out” as subjects. But they are also exterminated in the sense of being “overproduced” and “overgenerated,” both quantitatively and qualitatively. I go on to argue that the collapse of the ontological is accompanied by a collapse of the ethical. This ethical collapse is characterized by the internalization of the logic of technique and the corresponding failure both within technoscientific culture itself and within some scholarly discourses about biotechnology to evaluate from a genuinely critical vantage point the fundamental ethical issues that animal biotechnology raises. The aim of this paper is to offer an alternative analysis of the ontological and ethical implications of biotechnology from the standpoint of Marcuse and Ellul’s critical theory of technology. To explore other ramifications of animal biotechnology, I draw on Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer’s insights into ideologies of extermination and Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenology of embodiment.

Non-Hermitian Hamiltonian approach to quantum transport in disordered networks with sinks: Validity and effectiveness

We investigate the validity of the non-Hermitian Hamiltonian approach in describing quantum transport in disordered tight-binding networks connected to external environments, acting as sinks. Usually, non-Hermitian terms are added, on a phenomenological basis, to such networks to summarize the effects of the coupling to the sinks. Here, we consider a paradigmatic model of open quantum network for which we derive a non-Hermitian effective model, discussing its limit of validity by a comparison with the analysis of the full Hermitian model. Specifically, we consider a ring of sites connected to a central one-dimensional lead. The lead acts as a sink that absorbs the excitation initially present in the ring. The coupling strength to the lead controls the opening of the ring system. This model has been widely discussed in literature in the context of light-harvesting systems. We analyze the effectiveness of the non-Hermitian description both in absence and in presence of static disorder on the ring. In both cases, the non-Hermitian model is valid when the energy range determined by the eigenvalues of the ring Hamiltonian is smaller than the energy band in the lead. Under such condition, we show that results about the interplay of opening and disorder, previously obtained within the non-Hermitian Hamiltonian approach, remain valid when the full Hermitian model in presence of disorder is considered. The results of our analysis can be extended to generic networks with sinks, leading to the conclusion that the non-Hermitian approach is valid when the energy dependence of the coupling to the external environments is sufficiently smooth in the energy range spanned by the eigenstates of the network.

Irigaray's Ecological Phenomenology: Towards an Elemental Materialism

This article provides an interpretation of the ecophenomenological dimension of Luce Irigaray's work. It shows that Irigaray builds upon Heidegger's recovery of the ancient sense of nature as physis, self-emergence into presence. But, against Heidegger, Irigaray insists that self-emergence is a material process undergone by fluid elements, such as air and water, of which the world is basically composed. This article shows that this “elemental materialist” position need not conflict with modern science. However, the article criticises Irigaray's claim that men and women inhabit radically different sexuate worlds. Although this claim has some phenomenological basis, ultimately it is undercut by Irigaray's own elemental materialism, which implies that sexuate difference colours our perception but does not cleave it down a radical difference in kind. We can therefore accept and develop Irigaray's contribution to ecophenomenology without her insistence on radical sexuate duality.

Seismic signals from large, tabular icebergs drifting along the Dronning Maud Land coast, Antarctica, and their significance for iceberg monitoring

AbstractIn this study, we analyze a large dataset of seismic signals, recorded by station TROLL in Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica. The signals, recorded in April–December 2012, came from sources near the edge of the ice shelves, at distances of 230–500 km from TROLL. The sources, which moved westward with time, could be associated with four large, tabular icebergs, drifting between 15° E and 8° W. Combining the seismological data with information from satellite remote sensing, we find that one-third of the signals can be attributed to individual icebergs. The trajectories of three of the associated icebergs are known through iceberg-tracking databases, whereas the fourth, a fragment of one of the other three, is untracked, and only scarce information is available from satellite imagery. The observed seismic signals exhibit a wide variety of frequency characteristics, from unstructured episodes to occurrences of iceberg harmonic tremor. Although we are not able to determine the exact cause of the signals, we classify them into five classes on a phenomenological basis. This study demonstrates the potential of regional seismic networks for iceberg monitoring as supplementary resources to information obtained with remote-sensing technologies.

Full-Potential KKR calculations for Lattice Distortion around Impurities in Al-based dilute alloys, based on the Generalized-Gradient Approximation

The presence of a point defect in a crystal, such as a vacancy or an impurity atom, generally cause a displacement of the neighboring host atoms from their ideal lattice positions. For examples, the experimental results are shown in Refs.1–3. From the theoretical point of view the treatment of structural relaxation due to defects in crystals is a difficult task. The problem of the lattice distortion has been mostly dealt with on a phenomenological basis, e.g., by applying models of lattice statics or continuum theory. A reliable microscopic description of lattice relaxation effects based on first-principles electronic structure calculations requires very accurate total energies or forces and has mostly been attempted so far for simple metals and semiconductors on the basis of pseudopotential treatments. The difficulty arises mainly from the fact that energy differences due to local atomic displacements are quite small, of the order of 0.1 ev, compared with, e.g., the cohesive energy (~5eV) of the solid. At present we can calculate accurately the atomic volumes of impurities in transition metals, by using ab-initio all-electron calculations of the electronic structure of solids, based on the FPKKR Green’s function method and the density functional theory. Papanikolaou et al succeeded in calculating the atomic volumes of 3d, 4sp, 4d, and 5sp impurities in Cu [4]. We also succeeded in calculating the lattice relaxation energies of vacancies in Cu and Al [5].