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Stimulated Brillouin scattering is the most dominant nonlinear effect in single mode optical fibers. Its unique spectral characteristics, especially the narrow bandwidth of 20 - 30 MHz enable numerous applications, including optical spectrum analysis, delay and storage of light, distributed sensing and optical signal processing. Most of them would benefit from a reduction of the Brillouin gain bandwidth.This dissertation demonstrates several methods for significant reduction of the Brillouin gain bandwidth, including a multi-stage system, the superposition of the gain with two losses as well as the utilization of a frequency domain aperture. Thereby the Brillouin gain bandwidth can be reduced significantly down to 3 MHz, which equals 15% of the normal bandwidth.Furthermore, the reduced Brillouin gain bandwidth is employed for various applications. First, the resolution and the dynamic range of a Brillouin based optical spectrum analyzer are enhanced significantly. Second, a new technique for the storage of optical data packets, called Quasi-Light-Storage, is introduced and the maximum storage time is increased to 160 ns for 8 bit data packets. Finally, Brillouin scattering is used for the processing of optical frequency combs, leading to the generation high quality of mm- and THz-waves, as well as almost ideal sinc-shaped Nyquist pulse sequences.

This book in Italian is an essay about some latin inscriptions preserved in the lapidarium of the Samnium Museum (Museo del Sannio) in the town of Benevento (southern Italy). It is intended not only for readers interested in Roman political and social history and in latin inscriptions but also for those who would like to visit the lapidarium.The book tells of the public and private life of Roman Benevento drawing on first-hand historical sources: some latin inscriptions dating from the 2nd century B.C. to the 4th century A.D. The text is thematically arranged and includes 25 colour photos showing the inscriptions analysed in it. The chapters are about the political institutions of Roman Benevento; public buildings and the munificence by the rich; religion and cults; the people of Roman Benevento and the messages written on their gravestones.This essay is written in a plain style. Its language is straightforward and there is no epigraphic jargon. In the text readers will also find translations and paraphrases of the latin inscriptions used for describing the life in Roman Benevento. Difficult words and concepts are explained in some footnotes which are intended as a glossary. The latin original textes are grouped in a special appendix for those who know the language of ancient Rome and would like to enjoy the original version. A select bibliography gives more information about the history of Roman Benevento, the latin inscriptions of the town and latin epigraphy in general.

Non-globular FG domains constitute the permeability barrier of nuclear pore complexes (NPCs), which control all macromolecular exchange between nucleus and cytoplasm. Whilst objects smaller than 30kDa can passively diffuse across this barrier, larger molecules need to be chaperoned by nuclear transport receptors (NTRs). However, the modus operandi and, inextricably linked, the exact physical nature of the NPC permeability barrier are still controversially discussed. Whereas so far, most studies exclusively focused on yeast or vertebrate FG domains, the ability of FG domains from different species to form selective barriers was explored here. Interestingly, all studied species contain ¿cohesive¿ FG domains that interact with each other to form a characteristic (hydrogel) phase mimicking the permeability properties of NPCs.

This dissertation is devoted to attitudes of consumers toward luxury in two agricultural markets, horse sports and foods. Literature postulates a change of perceived luxury definitions and motives for luxury consumption. Accordingly, personally-oriented luxury consumption has gained significance while socially-oriented motives have been pushed into the background. Based on this, the following studies were aimed to reveal how far it has affected the consumer behavior in both agricultural markets. The research results are used to define the target groups for different kinds of luxury marketing and to give recommendations for the design of accordant marketing strategies.The studies provide empirical evidence for the existence of a shift of motives for luxury consumption and luxury definitions away from prestige and conspicuousness toward self-realization, hedonism, intangible values, functionality, sustainability and authenticity. Moreover, the results imply that luxury consumption can be categorized in tangible luxury goods and luxury experience. Despite intersections by means of hedonism and self-realization, the studies revealed differences in the consumption motives for both categories of luxury.

Non-proteinogenic amino acids are often important constituents of biologically potent natural products. The synthesis of these amino acids is often time-consuming, non-trivial and not sustainable. Thus, the central topic of this work was the formation of unusual amino acid structures by biocatalytic and catalytic methods. For the elucidation of the biosynthetic pathway of Streptomyces-produced muraymycins and related natural products, a ¿biosynthetic tool kit¿ was compiled and prepared. This does not only comprehend the completed synthesis of deuterium-labeled compounds, such as (3R)- and (3S)-3-hydroxy-[5-2H]-l-arginine and other potential intermediates with a nucleosidic structure, but it also includes the development of fermentation methodology including the possibility to detect the muraymycin derivatives by LC MS. Furthermore, different synthetic routes with catalytic key steps for the preparation of the non-proteinogenic amino acid enduracididine were investigated.

On 14 December 2010 the European Commission presented its Proposal to amend the most important instrument on European international civil procedure, the Regulation 44/2001 (¿Brussels I`). Against the background that European law guarantees economic freedoms cross-border recognition and enforcement of judgments within the European Union is of considerable and increasing importance. Brussels I provides for a simple and accelerated procedure to obtain the required declaration of enforceability (the exequatur) in the Member State of enforcement. In order to further enhance the free movement of judgments within the EU the general abolishment of this exequatur lies at the heart of the Proposal. It is accompanied by plans to reform the existing defences.This dissertation provides an analysis and discusses the most relevant aspects of the abolishment of the exequatur and the reform of the defences under the Proposal. After providing the background on the Proposal and its underlying principles, the cross-border enforcement regimes of Brussels I and the Commisson`s Proposal are briefly presented. The abolishment of the exequatur is critically discussed with regard to its underlying rationales and the functions of the exequatur. The chapter concludes with the implications of the abolishment for the existing defences. The reform of the defences is discussed in debt in the third chapter with regard to the questions whether the Proposal provides sufficient protection and complies with the principle of mutual recognition. Particular emphasis is put on the ordre public defence and its fundamental rights implications. Suggestions to amend the Commission`s Proposal are made throughout the paper and briefly summarised in the final conclusion.

Sloshing of cryogenic liquid propellants in launch vehicle tanks creates unwanted thermodynamic side-effects such as pressure changes in the tank.The goal of this PhD research was to develop a practical engineering model which is able to describe the influence of the sloshing of a cryogenic liquid on the heat and mass transfer and the associated temperature and pressure.The pressure changes caused by sloshing were investigated experimentally and numerically. Using the experimental and numerical results, a one dimensional (1D) engineering model was developed which is able to describe the experimental results.

Nowadays we are living in an era that is overloaded with information. Decision-making in this environment can sometimes become a nightmare. There are too many choices and we simply cannot explore them all. Therefore, it would be really helpful to have a system to help us to find the right choice. Such systems, which learn user preferences and provide personalized recommendations to them are called Recommender Systems.Evidently, the performance of recommender systems depends on the amount of information that users provide regarding items, most often in the form of ratings. This problem is amplified for new users because they have not provided any rating, which impacts negatively on the quality of generated recommendations. This problem is called new user problem or cold-start problem. A simple and effective way to overcome this problem, is by posing queries to new users so that they express their preferences about selected items, e.g. by rating them. Nevertheless, the selection of items must take into consideration that users are not willing to answer a lot of such queries. To address this problem, active learning methods have been proposed to acquire the most informative ratings, i.e ratings from users that will help most in determining their interests.The aim of this thesis is to take inspiration from the literature of active learning for machine learning and develop new methods for the new user problem in recommender systems. In the recommender system context, new users play the role of the Oracle and provide labels (ratings) to the queries (items). In this approach, we will take into consideration that although there are no data for new users, but there is abundant data for existing users. Such additional data can help us to develop scalable and accurate active learning methods for the new user problem in recommender systems.The thesis consists of two parts. In the first part, to be consistent with the settings of active learning in machine learning and the related works on the new user problem in recommender system, it is assumed that the new user is always able to rate the queried items. Next, this constraint is relaxed and new users are allowed not to rate the items.Most of the developed active learning methods exploit the characteristics matrix factorization because nevertheless, recent research (especially as has been demonstrated during the Netflix challenge) indicates that matrix factorization is a superior prediction model for recommender systems compared to other approaches.

La Meteorología se ha convertido en los últimos años en una de las más importantes disciplinas en el mundo actual que junto con la Climatología nos describen los fenómenos físicos desarrollados en la atmósfera, complementándose con el análisis para enfocar los efectos hacia los seres vivos y de manera particular a los humanos, ecosistemas. Las dos disciplinas han tomado la posición que desde siglos ya les pertenecía, todo esto gracias al flujo de información mundial y antes de nada por el manejo de datos de los elementos meteorológicos y climáticos por la comunidad científica mundial apoyándose en la bondad de las súper computadoras que pueden analizar millones de datos en los modelos desarrollados para de esta manera predecir futuros acontecimientos en tiempos muy cortos.El libro contiene 13 capítulos. Los cuatro primeros capítulos se relacionan con principios básicos de la atmósfera. Desde el capítulo 5 hasta el 7 se hace una recopilación de las fuerzas mecánicas que actúan sobre la Tierra. Los capítulos 8 y 9 corresponden a la Radiación proveniente del Sol que maneja la mayor parte de la energía del planeta. El capítulo 10 se ocupa de la descripción de la Termodinámica aplicada a los procesos en la atmósfera. Los movimientos del aire están especificados en los capítulos 11, 12 y 13. Se hace un pequeño resumen acerca de los principios de la Climatología.

In the present work, urgent issues in the reliability qualification of semiconductor devices are addressed, which particularly affect value chains such as those in the automotive industry. These have particularly high requirements for long lifetime and low failure rates of their products, which are additionally exposed to more extreme operating and environmental conditions than in most other areas of application. In particular, the question arises on how to assess a product or semiconductor technology against the requirement of an application-specific mission profile with multiple non-constant stressors.For this purpose, the behavior of failure distributions under varying and progressive stress loads is investigated and described using cumulative damage models. For the first time, the industry-wide approach of transforming non-constant mission profiles into effective constant stress and test conditions for reliability assessment and qualification can be physically justified and substantiated with measurement data. This stress transformation is exemplified using the time-dependent dielectric breakdown (TDDB) failure mechanism with the two stressors voltage and temperature; and then extended to include the use of multi-dimensional mission profiles and interdependent stressors. These measurements are performed on university metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS) capacitors as well as on commercially available state-of-the-art transistors. Finally, it is demonstrated that the obtained findings in the field of cumulative damage can be applied to use reliability studies with ramp-stress for acceleration model verification and to determine model parameters with less time and experimental effort.

Die Dissertation beschreibt die Synthese und Charakterisierung verschiedener Münzmetallkomplexe an einem strukturgebenden tetradentaten monoanionischen PNNP Liganden. Von Interesse war die Frage nach einer möglichen Korrelation der lumineszenten Eigenschaften mit ausgewählten strukturellen Parametern. Es wurden daher selektiv Komplexe mit verschiedenen Kombinationen aus Art und Anzahl an Metallatomen innerhalb des Ligandensystems realisiert. Nach der Vorstellung von homometallischen zwei- und dreikernigen Komplexen, konnten, ausgehend von der zweikernigen Goldverbindung, verschiedene vierkernige und ein sechskerniger Goldkomplex synthetisiert werden. Die Verbindungen wurden intensiv bezüglich ihrer lumineszenten Eigenschaften, einige davon in verschiedenen Phasen, und zudem teilweise theoretisch untersucht.Aufbauend darauf gelang die Darstellung mehrerer Lanthanoid-Münzmetallkomplexe, die ebenfalls bezüglich ihrer lumineszenten Eigenschaften analysiert wurden.Außerdem wurden in einem kleinen Teil der Arbeit Münzmetallkomplexe mit einem Ferrocenylbisamidinatliganden vorgestellt, die teilweise eine kurze Fe M Distanz aufweisen