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Spicy Personality: On the Relationship Between Personality Traits and the Preference for Spicy Foods
Get PDFThis narrative historical review assesses the relationship between personality traits and the preference for spicy foods. While genetic, cultural, and personality factors have all been shown to influence taste preferences, the evidence that has been published to date suggests that personality plays a greater role in the liking and consumption of spicy food than for those basic tastes linked to the essential elements of a healthy diet. Archaeological and historical data illustrate the global dissemination and cultural integration of Capsicum into the human diet. Meanwhile, physiological and psychophysical research highlight that the pungent quality of capsaicin, together with the gustatory and olfactory cues associated with the flavour of chilli, affects hedonic evaluation, with repeated exposure often increasing acceptance through a process of desensitisation. Developmental factors, such as prenatal taste/flavour transmission and benign risk learning during childhood, underpin adult preferences. Cross-cultural studies reveal that the tolerance for pungency varies by country/culture and is also markedly shaped by personality traits. Recent social media trends have also increased some people's exposure to very spicy foods, linked to their sensation-seeking tendencies. As such, those theories that focus solely on biological sensitivity and cultural exposure likely fail to capture personality-driven factors like sensation seeking and reward sensitivity that drive the liking for spicy foods
Ecological Feedbacks in the Earth System
Get PDFPlain Language Summary: Organisms in the ocean, lakes, rivers, and on land, interact together, affecting each other and modifying their physical and chemical environments. These ecological interactions form feedback loops, where a change in one part of an ecosystem has knock‐on effects that lead to further changes that enhance or reduce the change. Whilst we know these ecological feedbacks are important, we have limited understanding of how they work within and between ecosystems and over larger scales across the world. Ecological feedbacks are also likely to be disrupted due to ongoing climate change and destructive human activities (e.g., deforestation, pollution). Major gaps in our understanding of ecological feedbacks make it difficult to predict how ecosystems are affected by change and the larger scale impacts. Here, we explore what is currently known about ecological feedbacks, how they affect the physical environment and chemical processes, how they may be affected by human‐driven environmental changes, and what this means for advising policy makers. We also highlight three priority areas of future research, and the need for rapid development of understanding of ecological feedbacks and their role in globally important processes
Multi-scale compositional and optoelectronic characterisation of photovoltaic devices
Get PDFAs the dominant photovoltaic technology, the crystalline silicon solar cell industry has experienced significant technological advancements. Tunnelling Oxide Passivated Contact (TOPCon) has emerged as the mainstream architecture due to its contact selectivity that enables higher energy conversion efficiencies. TOPCon designs benefit from further processing optimisations to further reduce energy losses in current collection and contact recombination. Improving the understanding of the remaining loss mechanisms in TOPCon provides the context for the detailed optoelectronic and compositional characterisation work in this thesis.
An innovative photoluminescence imaging (PL) based characterisation method for evaluating contact recombination in TOPCon structure is presented with advantages of being in-situ and widely applicable. The method leverages the inherent spatial periodicity of the metallisation grid to extract a metal-induced PL variation signal from the spatial frequency spectrum. Numerical device simulations complement this methodology by interpreting the correlation between the periodic PL variation and metal contact recombination. Applying this approach of contact recombination assessment, together with contact resistivity measurements, enables comprehensive evaluation of TOPCon contact selectivity. Industrially fabricated TOPCon samples with structural adaptations and performance variation provide the subject of the characterisation work. Additionally, microstructural analysis through SEM-EDX and volumetric analysis via FIB slicing elucidate microstructural characteristics that correlate to the enhancement or degradation of contact selectivity.
As hydrogen passivation is a key processing in ensuring TOPCon passivation, two complementary chemical characterisation techniques, Elastic Recoil Detection (ERD) and Atom Probe Tomography (APT), are employed to analyse hydrogen distribution in TOPCon. Deuterate (2D) substituted samples are examined to mitigate ambient 1H background interference. The ERD characterisation shows excellent mass separation between D and 1H, but its spatial resolution deteriorates with increasing depth. The APT analysis enables clear depiction of the layered structure but faces ambiguity in quantitative H/D analysis. The H/D signal complications in APT is thoroughly discussed, along with experimental conditions for reducing detection ambiguity. APT results from associate enhanced passivation with increased hydrogen incorporation at the TOPCon tunnelling oxide interface. The combined information from ERD and APT reveals inaccuracies in the standard H chemical profiling approach using Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry (SIMS).
Furthermore, an independently developed optoelectronic method, Laser Beam Induced Current (LBIC), is presented, demonstrating sub-micronmetre resolution capability in detecting spatial variations in current collection. The technique is applied on both silicon and perovskite solar cell samples to reveal spatial photocurrent variations linked to structure defects and surface morphology.
Overall, the characterisation work presented in the thesis reveals valuable insights into energy losses primarily at TOPCon interfaces, as well as in other device architectures. The established corrections between structural design and performance provides useful guidance for the future optimisation of solar cell contacts and interfaces
The Aptness of Anger: Amia Srinivasan Interviewed by Stephen Law
Get PDFAmia Srinivasan is interviewed about her classic paper ‘The Aptness of Anger’, which challenges a common response to those who express anger at injustice: that their anger is counterproductive
The politics of sacred space: rethinking the origins and architecture of the Temple of Onias
No full textBeyond the rhetoric of ‘sustainable aviation’: a counterfactual confrontation
Get PDFAmid evidence of rising emissions, the aviation industry continues to promote demand growth while offering long-term sustainability reassurances communicated as ‘facts’. Using counterfactual analysis, this paper examines how industry rhetoric constructs and defends these discursive strategies. Drawing on a content analysis of 211 sources - including airline websites, industry reports, and manufacturer statements – the study identifies seven discursive strategies. The findings reveal a novel theoretical mechanism, ‘future soothing’: projecting technological salvation into a perpetually deferred future to ease public concern and postpone regulation. By transforming delay into the illusion of progress, discourses operate as rhetorical governance, sustaining growth under the guise of climate responsibility. The paper contributes to scholarship on the temporal politics of sustainability, showing how appeals to the future enable inaction in the present and illustrating how rhetoric, temporality, and power intertwine in shaping societal responses to climate change. Breaking aviation's ‘cycle of blame’ requires policymaker action
Auditory-conceptual associations in Peter and the Wolf and Carnival of the Animals: Evidence from 6- to 9-year-old children
Get PDFThis study investigated auditory-conceptual associations in children using complex audiovisual stimuli, namely musical excerpts from the Western classical repertoire and drawings. In Experiment 1, we examined whether 6- to 9-year old children were able to consistently match musical excerpts from Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf with corresponding black-and-white images of the characters. The results confirmed robust associations, particularly for the bird, wolf and duck, while other pairings were more variable. In Experiment 2, we extended this approach by using the musical suite Saint Saëns’s Carnival of the Animals, testing whether timbre influences children’s audiovisual associations. Children were presented with colour images of animals alongside orchestral or piano versions of the musical excerpts that the composer associated with the animal. The results revealed that, in line with a similar study conducted recently in adults (Di Stefano et al., 2025), participants made significantly above-chance associations for the characters of the lion and the swan. However, unlike in adults, timbre had no significant effect on children’s audiovisual pairings. These findings highlight the robustness of auditory-semantic associations presented through audiovisual stimuli in childhood, supporting the idea that certain audiovisual correspondences are developmentally stable, while showing that subtle nuances (i.e., differences in timbre) might emerge later on during development
Negligent valuations and the margin for error
Get PDFDiscusses Bratt v Jones (CA) on whether, for the purposes of a professional negligence claim, valuation falling outside the permitted margin was determinative as to liability unless the valuer could prove he was not negligent. Highlights the ambiguous dicta in various cases concerning the law on valuations, criticising the precondition approach in Merivale Moore Plc v Strutt & Parker (CA)
The positive perspective paradigm: proposal of a model to mitigate the impact of chronic inflammatory arthritis through comprehensive and early intervention
Get PDFMany people with chronic inflammatory arthritis (IA) experience significant disease impact, even with well-controlled disease activity. For rheumatoid arthritis (RA), 20-50% of patients in remission still report pain, disability, fatigue or negative illness perceptions, leading to poorer long-term outcomes. However, evidence shows that long-term patient-reported outcomes improve when remission is achieved early, and that this is at least partly explained by a positive influence on psychological factors like illness perceptions. Based on these insights and a narrative literature review, we propose a conceptual framework to support clinical practice and further research in the prevention of long-term impact of chronic IA, using the example of RA. Building on Leventhal’s Model of Self-Regulation, the “positive perspective paradigm” postulates that the early stages of a chronic inflammatory disease present an optimal time window where appropriate intervention might positively influence one’s health perspective, in turn contributing to reduced long-term disease impact. Through the model, we discuss how pharmacological control of inflammation can be integrated with patient education and psychosocial support, emphasising early intervention and positive communication whenever possible. We hypothesise that these interventions have both direct effects on the long-term impact of chronic IA and indirect effects through a positive influence on the patient’s health perspective. Fostering a positive perspective is thus the focal point of the model. By proposing this paradigm, we aim to provide a foundation for further validation in independent cohorts or other chronic inflammatory conditions, with the ultimate goal of implementing it to reduce long-term disease impact and promote wellbeing
The emergence of Peronismo
Get PDFInterpretations of the coming of peronismo have been diverse and often irreconcilable. One reason for this is obvious; it reflects controversies over a movement which, while it was in power, deeply divided Argentinian society over central issues such as those of class, of fascism, and of the role of opposition to an exclusive government, and which continued to dominate political debate after 1955. A further reason for the attention given to, and controversy over Perón's government derives from the common desire to ascribe blame for the contradiction between the expectations of the pre-1930 generation and subsequent performance. Analyses of the causes of the decline, which concentrate on the political as well as the economic sphere, are not only divergent but also tend to focus on Perón, and indeed, controversies over the whole direction of 20th century Argentine history tend to centre on Perón's period of power. Of course, it is difficult to make a clear assessment of the origins of Perón's movement before 1946 given the complex and rapidly changing series of events in which his rise to power must be traced.
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