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Talk:Biochemistry

Index Reorganization
I'm new here but I'm studying this subject at the moment (on a fairly simple A-Level.. level) and I'm taking an exam on it within the next few months. I thought I might be able to make a contribution. Since this book is fairly skeltal at the moment I'd like to suggest an alternative structure, especially since most of the stuff in the introduction section at the moment doesn't seem very introductory:

 * Introduction
 * Macromolecular Structure
 * Proteins
 * Structure
 * Primary Structure
 * ..etc
 * Denaturation
 * Examples
 * Hemoglobin (since it's a protein, and all)
 * Myoglobin
 * Carboyhydrates
 * Monosaccharides
 * Disaccharides
 * Polysaccharides
 * Lipids
 * DNA/RNA structure
 * Differences between the two
 * Enzymes (following on from the protein thing)
 * Catalysis
 * Factors effecting enzyme activity
 * Temperature, concentration, all that stuff
 * Inhibition
 * Metabolism
 * Human
 * sugar metabolism - glycolysis
 * krebs cycle
 * lipid metabolism
 * mitochondrial metabolism
 * alcohol metabolism
 * Plant
 * Yeast / Bacterial
 * Membranes
 * Genetics - use the Genetics book?
 * DNA
 * Replication
 * RNA
 * Protein Synthesis
 * transcription
 * RNA Processing
 * translation
 * Biochemical Methods
 * Spectroscopy
 * X-ray diffraction
 * NMR
 * Genetics
 * Western/Northern/Southern blotting
 * PCR
 * Molecular Biology / Cellular Biochemisry
 * dna damage and repair
 * development
 * cell cycle
 * cell signalling
 * Signal transduction
 * immunology
 * Biochemistry Dictionary ?? just a thought

However, it's most likely others know more than me, so I haven't made any changes yet. Richard 15:33, 6 Apr 2004 (UTC)

 * I think it's time to reorganize the index dramatically. A good index with a good hierarchy would be an optimal startpoint to write articles. I'm beginning to add structure and materials in the Proteins section (since it's "my field"), but I'm not convinced of the actual structure of this WikiBook, both in the abstract and the practical sense. I'm still not so familiar with Wiki and I'm still new here,so I don't feel to redirect and rebuild indexes at my will. Anyway, the Richard catched the point. It's time to work on an index.

Cyclop 12.50, 13 Apr 2004 (UTC)
 * Looking at the index it seems to be more focused on exploring each topic in depth, instead of covering a range as a lecture series might (a series of three lecture classes covering successive levels of content). My lecture series went through
 * General macromolecular overview (the amino acids, proteins made from aa's, (deoxy)nucleotides, DNA/RNA structure, Lipids, carbohydrates), then onto enzymes, different metabolic functions (how enzymes do things faster), then going more in depth with carbs and into metabolism
 * In depth class on DNA, RNA, and the full processes in the central dogma (replication, transcription regulation, transcription, post transcriptional modification, nuclear export in eukaryotes, translational regulation, mRNA turnover, translation, post translational modification),biochemical techniques (both current and historical), and coverage of small non-coding RNA species (rRNA, tRNA, gRNA, snoRNA, siRNA, micro RNA, silencing, etc).
 * In depth class on proteins. Review of previous classes including amino acids, and primary through quaternary structure with added depth. Still in this course so I can't speak for all of the material yet.
 * There's two use cases I think will be most common. A multiple course, in-depth coverage of what amounts to the entire book, or secondly an overview course that just takes bits and pieces out, mostly from the more introductory information. Btharper1221 (discuss • contribs) 23:24, 10 February 2014 (UTC)

Biochem Bookshelf?
Biochemistry is a much bigger topic than I think wikibooks gives it credit for at the moment, can I suggest creating a whole bookshelf for Biochemistry. This would then be able to take advantage of the other books already (being) written such as genetics and immunology. this would then allow us to create books containing logical sections and peripheral subjects of biochemistry. we do seem to be lacking a metabolism, experimental methods, biophysics & energetics, and macromolecular structure & function sections which can be whole books in their own right. This would also stop any unnecessary repetition of the same info again and again, how many of the books in the biology category have genetics sections? Instead of writing a whole book from scratch, why don't we consolidate all the information on biochemistry (or rather the Molecular and Cellular Biology WikiProject) in wikipedia into a single consistent book. Drew

Pymol
I noticed the apparent lack of pictures (or content for that matter) and well I thought it might help to get a few pictures. PyMOL is a molecular imaging program. It can be used to draw protein, DNA, and even water structure. Best of all it's open source and takes images in PNG format. Hope this helps.--Alsocal 06:01, 4 Oct 2004 (UTC)

 * Thanks for mentioning this! I've spent the summer getting to grips with it and it's amazing. :) --81.178.101.159 21:10, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

Hi I would like to work on this book as well
I think this is a really cool idea and I'm excited to work on this book! I am a third year biochemistry student at the University of Vermont, and I think this will be a great way for me to both at once learn and teach biochemistry. Since no one has started on the lipids section, I will start there if no one else is currently working on it. I have never used Wiki Books before, so if you notice any mistakes I may be making, feel free to tell me!

--Brandon 13:12, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Combine Lipids and Membranes
I am going to combine the lipids and membranes chapters, since one naturaly leads into to the other.

I'd like to help too
Like Brandon, I'd like to help out on this book and hoefully when I get some time (after my exams) i'll be able to get some stuff up. Does anyone else think the name of the book 'Biology Biochemistry' sounds a bit strange. Why not simply 'Biochemisty'?

--Donkey 23:51, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)
 * I agree, "Biology Biochemistry" is redundant and should be changed to "Biochemistry". Any objections? Mike 07:22, August 9, 2005 (UTC)

"energy metabolism" in detail
The chemistry of the main metabolic pathways (Glycolysis, TCA Cycle, NADH dehydrogenase and Electron Transport Chain) should be added. I can volunteer to do this, but I would want to do it one chemical step at a time, which is A LOT of reactions to draw.. I haven't used the program mentioned above but will try it, if anyone has any other suggestions program-wise that would be great. Mike Kascel 07:27, August 9, 2005 (UTC)

 * Hey Mike, if you're talking about PyMOL (as mentioned by Alsocal) then that's a great program for viewing 3D structures of molecules but wont be useful for drawing chemical reactions. For that you'd be better off using a program like ChemDraw or, i think, ISIS draw. I have access to those but don't really know the reactions that would be required. Could someone tell me what sort of things would be required? --81.178.101.159 21:10, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

 * ChemDraw or ISIS draw should be ok for drawing the 2D structures. Luciano

Enzyme/Kinetics
Please be sure to include a section related to Enzyme Kinetics/Kinetics, Michaelis Menton, Vmax, double reciprocal plots, etc.

I see this now, under the the Catalysis section, however it would be prudent to insert information (namely, equations/derivations) and how you get the respective Vmax and Km values. It is an integral part of biochemistry/enzyme catalysis and kinetics. Please include this as you edit your book.

I am involed with a current project in Wikipedia Chemistry, however some time during my studies and outside project I will find time to drop by and read and review your hard work :D Jawz 06:01, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

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UK Constitution and Government/Sovereign

Presentation
The Sovereign

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The Sovereign
The role of head of state in the United Kingdom is held by the Sovereign; the present Sovereign is King Charles III.

Succession to the throne
As a hereditary monarchy, the rules for succession to the throne are established by common law, as modified by statute.

In accordance with the Act of Settlement (1701), on the death of the Sovereign he or she used to be succeeded by his or her "heir of the body"; this operated in accordance with the principle of male-preference primogeniture. If the Sovereign had only one child, that child succeeds. If there are more than one children, then the order of succession was determined first by sex, and then by age. This was repealed by the Succession to the Crown Act 2013.

If the Sovereign dies childless ("without issue") then the order of succession is applied to their siblings: the oldest surviving sibling then succeeds. If the Sovereign's siblings have died before he or she died, then the order of succession works through the children of the next oldest deceased brother, and so on.

Only legitimate children are able to succeed. The Royal Marriages Act 1772 operates to restrict the capacity for a potential heir to marry without the Sovereign's approval: all descendants of King George II, other than women who have married into foreign families, are required to obtain the Sovereign's consent before marrying, unless they can otherwise obtain approval from both Houses of Parliament.

The Bill of Rights (1689) and Act of Settlement require all heirs to be descendants of Sophia, Electress of Hanover (d. 1714), and impose further requirements that an heir be a Protestant, that they may never have married a Roman Catholic, and that they be in full communion with the Church of England. Heirs not meeting these conditions are skipped over as if "naturally dead".

The role of the Sovereign beyond the United Kingdom
As Sovereign in right of the United Kingdom, the Sovereign is also head of state in the "Crown dependencies" of Jersey, Guernsey (and its dependencies), and the Isle of Man. While the external relations of these islands is dealt with by the United Kingdom, however, they do not form part of the United Kingdom itself, and have their own constitutional arrangements.

Similarly, the United Kingdom has sovereignty over various territories around the world, known as the British overseas territories. As such, the Sovereign is also head of state in these territories, although again these do not form part of the United Kingdom itself, and have their own constitutional arrangements.

The British Sovereign is also the Sovereign of certain other Commonwealth Realms: Antigua and Barbuda, Australia, the Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Canada, Grenada, Jamaica, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, the Solomon Islands and Tuvalu. Each of these nations is a separate monarchy; the Sovereign therefore holds sixteen different crowns. In each nation, the Sovereign is represented by a Governor-General, who generally stands in relation to the local government in the same relation as the Sovereign does to the British government.

Finally, the Sovereign has the title Head of the Commonwealth. The Commonwealth is a body of nations mostly made up of former colonial dependencies of the United Kingdom. The role of Head of the Commonwealth is a personal role of the present King, Charles III, and is not formally attached to the monarchy itself (although the present King's mother, Queen Elizabeth II, also held the title). The role is purely a ceremonial one.

Royal Family
While the members of the Sovereign's family do not have any role in government, they do exercise ceremonial functions on his or her behalf.

A male Sovereign has the title "King", while a female Sovereign is the "Queen". The wife of a King is also known as a Queen; however, the husband of a female Sovereign has no specific title.

By convention, the Sovereign's eldest son is created "Prince of Wales" and "Earl of Chester" while still a boy; he also automatically gains the title of "Duke of Cornwall". Also by convention, the Sovereign's sons receive a peerage either upon reaching the age of twenty-one, or upon marrying.

The style of Prince or Princess extends to the children of the Sovereign, the children of the sons of the Sovereign, and the eldest son of the eldest son of the Prince of Wales. Furthermore, wives of Princes are styled Princesses, though husbands of Princesses do not automatically become Princes.


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UK Constitution and Government/Houses of Lancaster and York

Presentation
The Houses of Lancaster and York (1399-1485)

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Henry IV
Henry of Bolingbroke deposed his weak cousin, Richard II, in 1399. Henry IV's reign was marked by widespread rebellion. These were put down thanks to the great military skill of the Henry IV's son, the future King Henry V. Henry IV died in 1413 while plagued by a severe skin disease (possibly leprosy).

Henry V
Henry V's reign was markedly different from his father's in that it involved little domestic turmoil. Overseas, Henry V's armies won several important victories in France. In 1415, the English defeated the French King Charles VI decisively at the Battle of Agincourt. About 100 English soldiers were killed, along with about 5000 Frenchmen.

For the next two years, Henry V conducted delicate diplomacy to improve England's chances of conquering France. He negotiated with the Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund, who agreed to end the German alliance with France. In 1417, the war was renewed; by 1419, English troops were about to take Paris. The parties agreed to a treaty whereby Henry V was named heir of France. Henry V, however, died before he could succeed to the French throne, which therefore remained in the hands of the Frenchmen.

Henry VI and Edward IV
Henry VI succeeded to the throne while still an infant. His uncles, the Dukes of Bedford and Gloucester, both functioned as Regents. During his reign, many French territories won during the Hundred Years War were lost.

Henry VI's reign was interrupted by Edward IV's due to the War of the Roses. Henry VI was a member of the House of Lancaster, while Edward IV was from the House of York. The former House descended from Henry of Bolingbroke, the fourth son of King Edward III; the latter House descended from Edmund of Langley, Edward III's fifth son.

In 1461, the Lancastrians lost to the Yorkists at the Battle of Towton. The Yorkist claimant, Edward IV, ascended to the throne, with the support of the powerful nobleman Richard Neville, 16th Earl of Warwick, known by the nickname Warwick the Kingmaker. In 1464, Lancastrian revolts were put down. In 1469, however, Warwick the Kingmaker switched his allegiance, and in 1470, Henry VI was restored to the throne. The exiled Edward, however, soon returned and defeated Henry's forces. At the Battle of Tewkesbury, the remaining Lancastrians were defeated; Henry VI was also murdered.

Edward V and Richard III
Edward IV was succeeded by his twelve year-old son in 1483. Edward IV's brother, Richard, was made guardian of Edward V and his brother, also named Richard. The young King's uncle usurped the throne and had Parliament declare the two brothers illegitimate. The two princes were then imprisoned in the Tower of London, where they might have been killed (their fate, however, is not certain).

In 1485, Richard III faced Henry Tudor, the Lancastrian claimant, at the Battle of Bosworth Field, during which Richard became the last English monarch to be killed during battle. Henry came to power as Henry VII, establishing the Tudor Dynasty.

ms:Perlembagaan dan Kerajaan United Kingdom: Dewan Lancaster dan York


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UK Constitution and Government/House of Tudor

Presentation
The House of Tudor (1485-1603)

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Henry VII
Henry VII was one of the most successful monarchs in British history. He was the Lancastrian claimant to the throne and lived in France so as to remain safe from the designs of the Yorkist Kings. At the Battle of Bosworth Field in 1485, he defeated and killed the Yorkist Richard III. His claim was weak due to questions relating to the legitimacy of certain births, but he was nonetheless awarded the throne.

Henry reformed the nation's taxation system and refilled the nation's treasury, which had been bankrupted by the fiscal irresponsibility of his predecessors. He also made peace with France so that the resources of the nation would not be spent trying to regain territories won during the Hundred Years' War. Henry also created marital alliances with Spain and Scotland. Henry's son, Arthur, married Catherine of Aragon, daughter of Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella I of Castile. Furthermore, Henry's daughter Margaret married James IV, King of Scots.

When Henry's son Arthur died, he wished to protect the Anglo-Spanish alliance. Therefore, he obtained a dispensation from Pope Julius II allowing Henry's son, also named Henry, to marry Catherine. (Papal permission was necessary since Henry was marrying his brother's widow.) Upon Henry VII's death, Henry took the throne as Henry VIII.

Henry VIII
King Henry VIII is often remembered for his multiple marriages. In his quest to obtain a male heir to the throne, Henry married six different times. His first marriage, as noted above, was to his brother's widow, Catherine of Aragon. That marriage occurred in 1509 and was scarred by several tragedies involving their children. The couple's first child was stillborn, their second lived for just 52 days, the third pregnancy ended as a miscarriage and the product of the fourth pregnancy died soon after birth. In 1516, the couple had a daughter, named Mary, followed by another miscarriage. Henry was growing impatient with his wife and eagerly sought a male heir.

Henry sought to annul his marriage to Catherine. Ecclesiastic law permitted a man to marry his brother's widow only if the previous marriage had not been consummated. Catherine had informed the Pope that her marriage was non-consummate, so the Pope agreed to grant a dispensation allowing her to marry Henry. Now, however, Henry alleged that Catherine had lied, thereby rendering her marriage to him invalid. In 1533, an Act of Parliament annulled his marriage to Catherine, enabling him to marry Anne Boleyn. It was felt by many, however, that the Church, and not Parliament, could govern marriages. Henry had asked Pope Clement VII to issue a divorce several times. Under pressure from Catherine's nephew, Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, the Pope refused. Parliament therefore passed an Act denying appeals to Rome from certain decisions of English Archbishops. The Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Cranmer, annulled Henry's marriage to Catherine. In response, the Pope excommunicated Henry. Soon, the Church of England separated from the Roman Catholic Church. In 1534, all appeals to Rome from the decisions of the English clergy were stopped. An Act of Parliament passed in 1536 confirmed the King's position as Supreme Head of the Church of England, thereby ending any ceremonial influence that the Pope still had.

Anne Boleyn, meanwhile, was Henry's Queen, and the only surviving child from the marriage to Catherine, Mary, was declared illegitimate. Anne's first child, Elizabeth, was born in 1533. The next three pregnancies, however, all resulted in stillbirth or miscarriage. A dissatisfied Henry accused Anne of using witchcraft to entice him to marry her and to have five men enter into adulterous affairs with her. Furthermore, Anne was accused of treason because she had supposedly committed adultery while she was Queen. Anne's marriage to Henry VIII was annulled and she was executed at the Tower of London in 1536.

Within two weeks of Anne's death, Henry married Jane Seymour. In 1537, Jane produced the male heir that Henry had long desired. The boy was named Edward and would later succeed Henry to the throne. Meanwhile, his half-sister Elizabeth was declared illegitimate. Shortly after the birth of the child, Jane died. Jane was followed as Queen by Anne of Cleeves, whom Henry married in 1540. Anne was the daughter of John III, Duke of Cleeves. Henry did not actually see Anne until shortly before their marriage; the relationship was contracted to establish an alliance between Henry and the Duke of Cleeves, a major Protestant leader. After Anne married him, Henry found her physically displeasing and unattractive. Shortly thereafter, the marriage was annulled on the grounds that Anne had previously been engaged to the Duke of Lorraine. After her divorce, Anne was treated well. She was given the title of Princess and allowed to live in Hever Castle, the former home of Anne Boleyn's family.

Henry VIII's next marriage was to Catherine Howard, an Englishwoman of noble birth. In 1542, she was charged and convicted of high treason after having admitted to being engaged in an adulterous affair. In 1543, Henry contracted his final marriage, wedding Catherine Parr. The marriage lasted for the remainder of Henry's life, which ended in 1547.

Edward VI and Lady Jane Grey
When Edward VI, son of Henry VIII and Jane Seymour, came to the throne, he was just ten years old. His uncle, Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset served as Lord Protector while the King was a minor. Several nobles attempted to take over Somerset's role. John Dudley, 1st Earl of Warwick was successful; he was later created Duke of Northumberland.

Edward VI was the first Protestant King of England. His father had broken away from the Roman Catholic Church but had not yet embraced Protestantism. Edward, however, was brought up Protestant. He sought to exclude his Catholic half-sister Mary from the line of succession. As he was dying at the age of fifteen, he made a document barring his half-sisters Mary and Elizabeth from the throne. He named the Lady Jane Grey, daughter-in-law of the Duke of Northumberland, his successor. Her claim to the throne was through her mother, who was a granddaughter of King Henry VII. Jane was proclaimed Queen upon Edward's death in 1553, but she served for only nine days before being deposed by Mary. Mary enjoyed far more popular support; the public also sympathised with the way her mother, Catherine of Aragon, had been treated. Jane was soon executed. She was seventeen years old at the time.

Mary I
Mary was deeply opposed to her father's break from the Church in Rome. She sought to reverse reforms instituted by her Protestant half-brother. Mary even resorted to violence in her attempt to restore Catholicism, earning her the nickname Bloody Mary. She executed several Protestants, including the former Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Cranmer, on charges of heresy.

In 1554, Mary married the Catholic King of Spain, Philip II. The marriage was unpopular in England, even with Catholic subjects. The couple were unable to produce a child before Mary's death from cancer in 1558.

Elizabeth I
Mary's successor, her half-sister Elizabeth, was one of the most successful and popular British monarchs. The Elizabethan era was associated with cultural development and the expansion of English territory through colonialism.

After coming to power, Elizabeth quickly reversed many of Mary's policies. Elizabeth reinstated the Church of England and had Parliament pass the Act of Supremacy, which confirmed the Sovereign's position as Supreme Governor of the Church of England. The Act also forced public and clerical officers to take the Oath of Supremacy recognising the Sovereign's position. Elizabeth, however, did practice limited toleration towards Catholics.

After Pope Pius V excommunicated Elizabeth in 1570, Elizabeth ended her policy of religious toleration. One of Elizabeth's chief Catholic enemies was the Queen of Scotland, Mary. Since Elizabeth neither married nor bore any children, her cousin Mary was a possible heir to the English throne. Another possible heir was Lady Jane Grey's sister, Catherine. However, when Lady Catherine Grey died in 1568, Elizabeth was forced to consider that Catholic Mary was the most likely heir. Mary, however, had earlier been deposed by Scottish nobles, putting her infant son James on the throne. Mary had fled to England, hoping Elizabeth would aid her efforts to regain the Scottish throne, but Elizabeth reconsidered after learning of the "Ridolfi Plot", a scheme to assassinate Elizabeth and put the Roman Catholic Mary on the English throne. In 1572, Parliament passed a bill to exclude Mary from the line of succession, but Elizabeth refused to grant Royal Assent to it. Eventually, however, Mary proved to be too much of a liability due to her constant involvement in plots to murder Elizabeth. In 1587, she was executed after having been convicted of being involved in one such plot.

Following Mary's execution, Philip II (widower of Mary I of England) sent a fleet of Spanish ships known as the Armada to invade England. England had supported a Protestant rebellion in the Netherlands and was seen as a threat to Catholicism. Furthermore, England had interfered with Spanish shipping and trade. Using Mary's execution as an excuse, Philip II obtained the Pope's authority to depose Elizabeth. In 1588, the Spanish Armada set sail for England. Harmed by bad weather, the Armada was defeated by Elizabeth's naval leaders, including Sir Francis Drake and the Lord Howard of Effingham.

Towards the end of her life, Elizabeth still failed to name an heir. When she died, she was ironically succeeded by the son of Mary, Queen of Scots, James. James was already James VI, King of Scots; he became James I of England in 1603 and established the rule of the Stuart dynasty.


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UK Constitution and Government/House of Stuart and the Commonwealth

Presentation
The House of Stuart and the Commonwealth (1603-1714)

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James I
With the death of Elizabeth in 1603, the Crowns of England and Scotland united under James I. In 1567, when he was just a year old, James' mother Mary was forced to abdicate, and James became King James VI. Despite his mother's Catholicism, James was brought up as a Protestant.

One of James' first acts as King was to conclude English involvement in the Eighty Years' War, also called the Dutch Revolt. Elizabeth had supported the Protestant Dutch rebels, providing one cause for Philip II's attack. In 1604, James signed the Treaty of London, thereby making peace with Spain.

James had significant difficulty with the English Parliamentary structure. As King of Scots, he had not been accustomed to criticism from the Parliament. James firmly believed in the Divine Right of Kings—the right of Kings to rule that supposedly came from God—so he did not easily react to critics in Parliament. Under English law, however, it was impossible for the King to levy taxes without Parliament's consent, so he had to tolerate Parliament for some time.

King James died in 1625 and was succeeded by his son Charles.

Charles I
King Charles ruled at a time when Europe was moving toward domination by absolute monarchs. The French ruler, Louis XIV, epitomised this absolutism. Charles, sharing his father's belief in the Divine Right of Kings, also moved toward absolutist policies.

Charles conflicted with Parliament over the issue of the Huguenots, French Protestants. Louis XIV had begun a persecution of the Huguenots; Charles sent an expedition to La Rochelle to provide aid to the Protestant residents. The effort, however, was disastrous, prompting Parliament to further criticise him. In 1628, the House of Commons issued the Petition of Right, which demanded that Charles cease his use of arbitrary power. Charles had persecuted individuals using the Court of the Star Chamber, a secret court that could impose any penalty, even torture, except for death. Charles had also imprisoned individuals without a trial and denied them the right to the writ of habeas corpus. The Petition of Right, however, was not successful; in 1629, Charles dissolved Parliament. He ruled alone for the next eleven years, which is sometimes referred to as the eleven years of tyranny or personal rule. Since Parliamentary approval was required to impose taxes, Charles had grave difficulty in keeping the government functional. Charles imposed several taxes himself; these were widely seen as unlawful.

During these eleven years, Charles began instituting religious reforms in Scotland, moving it towards the English model. He attempted to impose the Anglican Prayer Book on Scottish churches, leading to riots and violence. In 1638, the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland abolished the office of bishop and established Presbyterianism (an ecclesiastic system without clerical officers such as bishops and archbishops). Charles sent his armies to Scotland, but was quickly forced to end the conflict, known as the First Bishops' War, because of a lack of funding. Charles granted Scotland certain parliamentary and ecclesiastic freedoms in 1639.

In 1640, Charles finally called a Parliament to authorise additional taxation. Since the Parliament was dissolved within weeks of its summoning, it was known as the Short Parliament. Charles then sent a new military expedition to Scotland to fight the Second Bishops' War. Again, the Royal forces were defeated. Charles then summoned Parliament again, this Parliament becoming known as the Long Parliament, in order to raise funds for making reparations to the Scots.

Tension between Charles and Parliament increased dramatically. Charles agreed to abolish the hated Star Chamber, but he refused to give up control of the army. In 1641, Charles entered the House of Commons with armed guards in order to arrest his Parliamentary enemies. They had already fled, however, and Parliament took the breach of their premises very seriously. (Since Charles, no English monarch has sought to set foot in the House of Commons.)

The unsafe monarch moved the Royal court to Oxford. Royal forces controlled north and west England, while Parliament controlled south and east England. A Civil War broke out, but was indecisive until 1644, when Parliamentary forces clearly gained the upper hand. In 1646, Charles was forced to escape to Scotland, but the Scottish army delivered him to Parliament in 1647. Charles was then imprisoned. Charles negotiated with the Scottish army, declaring that if it restored him to power, he would implement the Scottish Presbyterian ecclesiastic model in England. In 1648, the Scots invaded England, but were defeated.

The House of Commons began to pass laws without the consent of either the Sovereign or the House of Lords, but many MPs still wished to come to terms with the king. Members of the army, however, felt that Charles had gone too far by siding with the Scots against England and were determined to have him brought to trial. In December 1648 an army regiment, Colonel Pride's, used force to bar entry into the House of Commons, only allowing MPs who would support the army to remain. These MPs, the Rump Parliament, established a commission of 135 to try Charles for treason. Charles, an ardent believer in the Divine Right of Kings, refused to accept the jurisdiction of any court over him. Therefore, he was by default considered guilty of high treason and was executed on January 30, 1649.

Oliver and Richard Cromwell
At first, Oliver Cromwell ruled along with the republican Parliament, the state being known as the Commonwealth of England. After Charles' execution, however, Parliament became disunited. In 1653, he suspended Parliament, and as Charles had done earlier, began several years of rule as a dictator. Later, Parliament was recalled, and in 1657 offered to make Cromwell the King. Since he faced opposition from his own senior military officers, Cromwell declined. Instead, he was made a Lord Protector, even being installed on the former King's throne. He was a King in all but name.

Cromwell died in 1658 and was succeeded by his son Richard, an extremely poor politician. Richard Cromwell was not interested in his position and abdicated quickly. The Protectorate was ended and the Commonwealth restored. Anarchy was the result. Quickly, Parliament chose to reestablish the monarchy by inviting Charles I's son to take the throne as Charles II.

Charles II
During the rule of Oliver Cromwell, Charles II remained King in Scotland. After an unsuccessful challenge to Cromwell's rule, Charles escaped to Europe. In 1660, when England was in anarchy, Charles issued the Declaration of Breda, outlining his conditions for returning to the Throne. The Long Parliament, which had been convened in 1640, finally dissolved itself. A new Parliament, called the Convention Parliament, was elected; it was far more favourable to the Royalty than the Long Parliament. In May 1660, the Convention Parliament that Charles had been the lawful King of England since the death of his father in 1649. Charles soon arrived in London and was restored to actual power. Charles granted a general pardon to most of Cromwell's supporters. Those who had directly participated in his father's execution, however, were either executed or imprisoned for life. Cromwell himself suffered a posthumous execution: his body was exhumed, hung, drawn and quartered, his head cut off and displayed from a pole and the remainder of his body thrown into a common pit. The posthumous execution took place on the anniversary of Charles I's death.

Charles also dissolved the Convention Parliament. The next Parliament, called the Cavalier Parliament was soon elected. The Cavalier Parliament lasted for seventeen years without an election before being dissolved. During its long tenure, the Cavalier Parliament enacted several important laws, including many that suppressed religious dissent. The Act of Uniformity required the use of the Church of England's Book of Common Prayer in all Church services. The Conventicle Act prohibited religious assemblies of more than five members except under the Church of England. The Five Mile Act banned non-members of the Church of England from living in towns with a Royal Charter, instead forcing them into the country. In 1672, Charles mitigated these laws with the Royal Declaration of Indulgence, which provided for religious toleration. Parliament, however, suspected him of Catholicism and forced him to withdraw the Declaration. In 1673, Parliament passed the Test Act, which required civil servants to swear an oath against Catholicism.

Parliament's suspicions did turn out to be accurate. As Charles II lay dying in 1685, he converted to Catholicism. Charles did not have a single legitimate child, though he did have, while living in Europe, several illegitimate ones (over 300 by some estimates). He was succeeded, therefore, by his younger brother James, an open Catholic.

James II
James II (James VII in Scotland) was an extremely controversial monarch due to his Catholicism. Soon after he took power, a Protestant illegitimate son of Charles II, James Scott, Duke of Monmouth, proclaimed himself King. James II defeated him within a few days and had him executed.

James made himself highly unpopular by appointing Catholic officials, especially in Ireland. Later, he established a standing army in peacetime, alarming many Protestants. Rebellion, however, did not occur because people trusted James' daughter Mary, a Protestant. In 1688, however, James produced a son, who was brought up Catholic. Since Mary's place in the line of succession was lowered, and a Catholic Dynasty in England seemed ineveitable, the "Immortal Seven"—the Duke of Devonshire, the Earl of Danby, the Earl of Shrewsbury, the Viscount Lumley, the Bishop of London, Edward Russell and Henry Sidney—conspired to replace James and his son with Mary and her Dutch husband William of Orange. In 1688, William and Mary invaded England and James fled the country. The revolution was hailed as the Glorious Revolution or the Bloodless Revolution. Though the latter term was inaccurate, the revolution was not as violent as the War of the Roses or the English Civil War.

William and Mary
Parliament wished then to make Mary the sole Queen. She, however, refused and demanded that she be made co-Sovereign with her husband. In 1689, the Parliament of England declared in the English Bill of Rights, one of the most significant constitutional documents in British history, that James' flight constituted an abdication of the throne and that the throne should go jointly to William (William III) and Mary (Mary II). The Bill of Rights also required that the Sovereign cannot deny certain rights, such as freedom of speech in Parliament, freedom from taxation without Parliament's consent and freedom from cruel and unusual punishment. In Scotland, the Estates General passed a similar Act, called the Claim of Right, which also made William and Mary joint rulers. In Ireland, power had to be won in battle. In 1690, the English won the Battle of the Boyne, thereby establishing William and Mary's rule over the entire British Isles.

For the early part of the reign, Mary administered the Government while William controlled the military. Unpopularly, William appointed people from his native Holland as officers in the English army and Royal Navy. Furthermore, he used English military resources to protect the Netherlands. In 1694, after the death of Queen Mary from smallpox, William continued to rule as the sole Sovereign.

Since William and Mary did not have children, William's heir was Anne, who had seventeen pregnancies, most of which ended in stillbirth. In 1700, Anne's last surviving child, William, died at the age of eleven. Parliament was faced with a succession crisis, because after Anne, many in the line of succession were Catholic. Therefore, in 1701, the Act of Settlement was passed, allowing Sophia, Electress and Duchess Dowager of Hanover (a German state), and her Protestant heirs, to succeed if Anne had no further children. Sophia's claim stemmed from her great-grandfather, James I. Several lines that were more senior to Sophia's were bypassed under the act. Some of these had questionable legitimacy, while others were Catholic. The Act of Settlement also banned non-Protestants and those who married Catholics from the throne.

In 1702, William died, and his sister-in-law Anne became Queen.

Anne
Even following the passage of the Act of Settlement, Protestant succession to the throne was insecure in Scotland. In 1703, the Scottish Parliament, the Estates, passed a bill that required that, if Anne died without children, the Estates could appoint any Protestant descendant of Scottish monarchs as the King. The individual appointed could not be the same person who would, under the Act of Settlement, succeed to the English crown unless several economic conditions were met. The Queen's Commissioner refused Royal Assent on her behalf. The Scottish Estates then threatened to withdraw Scottish troops from the Queen's armies, which were then engaged in the War of the Spanish Succession in Europe and Queen Anne's War in North America. The Estates also threatened to refuse to levy taxes, so Anne relented and agreed to grant Royal Assent to the bill, which became the Act of Security.

The English Parliament feared the separation of the Crowns which had been united since the death of Elizabeth I. They therefore attempted to coerce Scotland, passing the Alien Act in 1705. The Alien Act provided for cutting off trade between England and Scotland. Scotland was already suffering from the failure of the Darién Scheme, a disastrous and expensive attempt to establish Scottish colonies in America. Scotland quickly began to negotiate union with England. In 1707, the Act of Union was passed, despite mass protest in Scotland, by Parliament and the Scottish Estates. The Act combined England and Scotland into one Kingdom of Great Britain, terminated the Parliament and Estates, and replaced them with one Parliament of Great Britain. Scotland was entitled to elect a certain number of members of the House of Commons. Furthermore, it was permitted to send sixteen of its peers to sit along with all English peers in the House of Lords. The Act guaranteed Scotland the right to retain its distinct legal system. The Church of Scotland was also guaranteed independence from political interference. Ireland remained a separate country, though still governed by the British Sovereign.

Anne is often remembered as the last British monarch to deny Royal Assent to a bill, which she did in 1707 to a militia bill. Due to her poor health, made worse by her failed pregnancies, her government was run through her ministers. She died in 1714, to be succeeded by George, Elector of Hanover, whose mother Sophia had died a few weeks earlier.


text:
User:Shekko/Latein

Ich beschäftige mich derzeit sehr mit dem Gedanken, ein Lateinisches Lehrbuch zu gestalten.

Mein Konzept dafür:

Grundsätzliches
Ich würde ein Lateinisches Lehrbuch zum Selbststudium vorschlagen - das aber auch die Möglichkeit zum Lernen in Gruppen oder Kursen (z. B. Volkshochschule) bietet. Und zwar mit der perfiden Zielrichtung, den Lerner zur Anwendung seiner Kenntnisse zu bringen.

Anwendungsgebiete
Wie kann man Latein heute anwenden - bzw. zu was kann das Erlernen der Lateinischen Sprache befähigen?
 * Lesen antiker und mittelalterlicher (und weniger neuerer) Texte, darunter
 * wissenschaftliche Texte aus allen Richtungen
 * besonders interessant: philosophische und religiöse Texte
 * Lesen kirchlicher Texte
 * erheblich vereinfachtes Lernen moderner romanischer Sprachen
 * Internationaler Austausch mit (leider nicht mehr allzuvielen) Gleichgesinnten über herkömmliche Sprachbarrieren hinweg auf einer gemeinsamen kulturhistorischen Grundlage
 * Verständnis für zahlreiche aus dem Lateinischen stammende Fremdwörter und Wendungen

(Ich habe die sog. weichen Faktoren wie Förderung des logischen Denkvermögens und des Verständnisses der eigenen Sprache jetzt mal bewußt außer Acht gelassen)

Das Publikum
Dieses Buch ist in erster Linie für Idealisten. Es ist für Menschen, die Latein interessehalber lernen (oder wieder lernen), weil sie es für eine schöne Sprache halten, weil sie endlich Cicero oder Augustinus im Original lesen möchten, oder ein Verständnis für die römischen Grundlagen unserer Kultur erwerben möchten. Manch einer will womöglich seine schulischen Lateinkenntnisse so auszubauen, wie es einer jahrelang erlernten Fremdsprache zusteht. Vielleicht haben sie auch ganz andere Gründe. In den allermeisten Fällen aber werden es keine Studenten sein, die ihr Latinum nachholen müssen und auch keine Lehrer oder Schüler, die es als Schulbuch verwenden.

Die Methoden
Um das Lateinische aber fernab von reglementierten Abschlüssen zu erleben und zu erlernen gibt es weitaus schönere Modelle als die von den heutigen Schulbüchern und Latinumskursen gepflegten, die lediglich auf die passive Beherrschung des Lateinischen abzielen. So kann man Latein wie jede andere moderne Sprache auch unterrichten: Anhand von kleinen Dialogen, Übersetzungsübungen in beide Richtungen, Aufsätze in der Fremdsprache, Beantwortung von Fragen in der Fremdsprache, usw. Die Themen müssen entsprechend der gewaltigen Zeitspanne, die die Geschichte der lateinischen Sprache umfaßt, vom alltäglichen zum philosophischen über das wirtschaftliche und politische bis hin zum künstlerischen und geschichtlichen reichen. Der erlernte Wortschatz soll dabei zum einen die Lektüre des klassischen Lateins und zum anderen die aktive Beherrschung des Lateinischen mit der Fähigkeit sich mit aktuellen Themen auseinanderzusetzen ermöglichen.

Der Bedarf
Es gibt für mich zwei Hauptgründe, warum ich diese Art eines Lateinischen Lehrbuches vorschlage:
 * 1) Ein solches Buch gibt es (meines Wissens) nicht. Es ist eine Marktlücke. Ich sähe keinen Sinn darin, die Xte Version eines Lehrbuches für den Latinumsstudenten anzubieten. Seit etwa einem Jahrhundert bereitet der Lateinunterricht auf die passive Beherrschung einer Sprache vor, die sich seit Jahrtausenden kaum mehr verändert hat. Da gibt es schon alles, wesentliche neue Ansätze lassen sich hier nicht mehr entwickeln. Außerdem ist die Konkurrenz gut positioniert und der Markt schrumpft.
 * 2) Ein solches Buch gibt es (meines Wissens) noch nicht. Es fehlt einfach. Wer sich aus Idealismus mit der Lateinischen Sprache beschäftigt, der will sie auch sprechen lernen - mir geht es zumindest so und ich teile mit all denen die mit mir das Abitur gemacht haben, das Bedauern darüber, 6, 7 oder 9 Jahre eine Sprache gelernt zu haben und sie nicht einmal sprechen zu können. Latein könnte eine sehr sehr ernsthafte Alternative für Esperanto oder auch für Englisch sein, sieht man sich mal an wieviele Schüler es heute noch in der Schule lernen, oder gar wieviele Erwachsene es mal gelernt haben - hätten sie es nur richtig gelernt. Das läßt sich ändern, und dazu braucht es einen Anstoß.

Was heißt das für unser Buch?
Es wird nicht einfach sein, ausreichend kompetente Autoren für eine derart ausgefallene Anwendung der lateinischen Sprache zu finden - wer lernt denn schon Latein so, daß er es aktiv beherrscht - noch dazu in modernem Kontext? Ich schlage deshalb vor, daß wir zuerst das Grundgerüst konzipieren, Übungen und Beispieltexte erstmal auf Deutsch formulieren und dann unter Zuhilfenahme aller uns zur Verfügung stehenden Quellen diese in ein angemessenes Latein übertragen. Nun hätte ich aber erstmal gern ein paar Rückmeldungen von Euch, wie Ihr dieses Konzept seht.

--Shekko 21:26, 6 Apr 2004 (UTC)

title: User:Shekko/Latein


text:
UK Constitution and Government/House of Hanover

Presentation
The House of Hanover (1714-1901)

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George I
George, Duke and Elector of Hanover became King George I in 1714. His claim was opposed by the Jacobites, supporters of the deposed King James II. Since James II had died, his claim was taken over by his son, James Francis Edward Stewart, the "Old Pretender." In 1715, there was a Jacobite rebellion, but an ill James could not lead it. By the time he recovered, it was too late, and the rebellion was suppressed.

King George was not deeply involved in British politics; instead, he concentrated on matters in his home, Germany. The King could not even speak English, earning the ridicule of many of his subjects. George, furthermore, spent much time in his native land of Hanover. Meanwhile, a ministerial system developed in Great Britain. George appointed Sir Robert Walpole as First Lord of the Treasury. Walpole was George's most powerful minister, but he was not termed "Prime Minister"; that term came into use in later years. Walpole's tenure began in 1721; other ministers held office at his, rather than the King's, pleasure. George's lack of involvement in politics contributed greatly to the development of the modern British political system.

George died in 1727 from a stroke while in Germany. He was succeeded by his son, who ruled as George II.

George II
George II was naturalised as a British citizen in 1705; his reign began in 1727. Like his father, George transferred political power to Sir Robert Walpole, who served until 1742. Walpole was succeeded by Spencer Compton, 1st Earl of Wilmington, who served until 1743, and then by Henry Pelham, who served until his death in 1754. During Pelham's service, the nation experienced a second Jacobite Rebellion, which was almost successful in putting Bonnie Prince Charlie—son of the Old Pretender, himself called the Young Pretender—on the throne. The rebellion began in 1745 and was ended in 1746 when the King's forces defeated the Jacobites at the Battle of Culloden, the last battle ever to be fought on British soil.

Before George II's death in 1760, he was served by two other Prime Ministers: Henry Pelham's elder brother the Duke of Newcastle, and the Duke of Devonshire. George II's eldest son, Frederick, had predeceased him, so George was succeeded by his grandson, also named George.

George III
George III attempted to reverse the trend that his Hanoverian predecessors had set by reducing the influence of the Prime Minister. He appointed a variety of different people as his Prime Minister, on the basis of favouritism rather than ability. The Whig Party of Robert Walpole declared George an autocrat and compared him to Charles I.

George III's reign is notable for many important international events. In 1763, Great Britain defeated France in the Seven Years' War, a global war that also involved Spain, Portugal and the Netherlands and was fought in Europe, America and India. As a result of the Treaty of Paris, New France (the French territory in North America, including Quebec and land east of the Mississippi) was ceded to Britain, as was Spanish Florida. Spain, however, took New Orleans and Louisiana, the vast French territory on the west of the Mississippi. Great Britain came to be recognised as the world's pre-eminent colonial power, displacing France. The nation, however, was left deeply in debt. To overcome it, British colonies in America were taxed, much to their distaste. Eventually, Britain lost its American colonies during the American War of Independence, which lasted from 1776 to 1783. Elsewhere, however, the British Empire continued to expand. In India, the British East India Company took control of many small nation-states nominally headed by their own princes. The island of Australia was also occupied, and Canada's population increased with the number of British Loyalists who left the newly formed United States of America.

In 1801, Parliament passed the Act of Union, uniting Great Britain and Ireland into the United Kingdom. Ireland was allowed to elect 100 Members of Parliament to the House of Commons and 22 representative peers to the House of Lords. The Act originally provided for the removal of restrictions from Roman Catholics, but George III refused to agree to the proposal, arguing that doing so would violate his oath to maintain Protestantism.

George was the last British monarch to claim the Kingdom of France. He was persuaded to abandon the meaningless claim dating to the Plantagenet days in 1801 by the French ruler Napoleon.

In 1811, George III, who had previously suffered bouts of madness, went permanantly insane. His son George ruled the country as Prince Regent, and became George IV when the King died in 1820.

George IV
George IV is often remembered as an unwise and extravagant monarch. During his Regency, London was redesigned, and funding for the arts was increased. As King, George was unable to govern effectively; he was overweight, possibly addicted to a form of opium and showing signs of his father's mental disease. While he ruled, George's ministers were once again able to regain the power that they had lost during his father's reign.

George opposed several popular social reforms. As his father, he refused to lift several restrictions on Roman Catholics. Upon his death in 1830, his younger brother began to reign as William IV.

William IV
Early in William's reign, British politics was reformed by the Reform Act of 1832. At the time, the House of Commons was a disorganised and undemocratic body, unlike the modern House. The nation included several rotten boroughs, which historically had the right to elect members of Parliament, but actually had very few residents. The rotten borough of Old Sarum, for instance, had seven voters, but could elect two MPs. An even more extreme example is of Dunwich, which could also elect two MPs despite having no residents, the entire borough having been eroded away into the North Sea. Other boroughs were called pocket boroughs because they were "in the pocket" of a wealthy landowner, whose son was normally elected to the seat. At the same time, entire cities such as Westminster (with about 20,000 voters) still had just two MPs.

The House of Commons agreed to the Reform Bill, but it was rejected by the House of Lords, whose members controlled several pocket boroughs. The Tory Party, furthermore, opposed the bill actively. William IV agreed with his Prime Minister, the Earl Grey, to flood the House of Lords with pro-reform members by creating fifty new peerages; when the time came, he backed down. The Earl Grey and his Whig Party government then resigned, but returned to power when William finally agreed to co-operate. The Reform Act of 1832 gave urban areas increased political power, but allowed aristocrats to retain effective control of the rural areas. Over fifty rotten boroughs were abolished, while the representation of some other boroughs was reduced from two MPs to one. Though members of the middle class were granted the right to vote, the Reform Act did not do much to expand the electorate, which amounted after passage to just three percent of the population.

In 1834, William became the last British monarch to appoint a Prime Minister who did not have the confidence of Parliament. He replaced the Whig Prime Minister, the Viscount Melbourne, with a Tory, Sir Robert Peel. Peel, however, had a minority in the House of Commons, so he resigned in 1835, and Melbourne returned to power.

In 1837, William died and was succeeded on the British throne by his niece Victoria, who was just eighteen years old at the time. The union of the Crowns of Britain and Hanover was then dissolved, since Salic Law, which applied in Hanover, only allowed males to rule. Therefore, Hanover passed to William's brother Ernest.

Victoria
A few years after taking power, Victoria married a German Prince, Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, who was given the title of Prince Consort. Albert originally wished to actively govern the United Kingdom, but he acquiesced to his wife's requests to the contrary. The extremely happy marriage ended with Albert's death in 1861, following which Victoria entered a period of semi-mourning that would last for the rest of her reign. She was often called the Widow of Windsor, after Windsor Castle, a Royal home.

In 1867, Parliament passed another Reform Act. Like its predecessor, the Reform Act of 1832, true electoral reform was not achieved; the property qualifications limited the electorate to about eight percent of the population. Therafter, power was held by two Prime Ministers—Benjamin Disraeli (a Tory and a favourite of Victoria) and William Ewart Gladstone (a Liberal whom Victoria disliked)—from 1868 to 1885. In 1876, Disraeli convinced Victoria to take the title of Empress of India.

Many of Victoria's daughters married into European Royal Houses, giving her the nickname Grandmother of Europe. All of the current European monarchs descend from Victoria.

Victoria died in 1901, holding the record for longest serving British Sovereign. She was succeeded by her son Edward, who became King Edward VII. Edward was deemed to belong not to his mother's House of Hanover, but instead to his father's dynasty, Saxe-Coburg-Gotha.


text:
UK Constitution and Government/Houses of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha and Windsor

Presentation
The Houses of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha and Windsor (1901—)

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Edward VII
Edward VII was the oldest person in British history to become King, beginning his reign at the age of fifty-nine. He participated actively in foreign affairs, visiting France in 1903. The visit led to the Entente Cordiale (Friendly Understanding), an informal agreement between France and the United Kingdom marking the end of centuries of Anglo-French rivalry. In the case of Germany, however, Edward VII exacerbated rivalry through his bad relations with his nephew, Kaiser Wilhelm II.

Towards the end of his life, Edward was faced with a constitutional crisis when the Liberal Government, led by Herbert Henry Asquith, proposed the People's Budget. The Budget reformed the tax system by creating a land tax, which would adversely affect the aristocratic class. The Conservative landowning majority in the House of Lords broke convention by rejecting the budget. They argued that the Commons themselves had broken a convention by attacking the wealth of the Lords. Before the problem could be resolved, Edward VII died in 1910, allowing his son, George, to ascend to the throne.

George V
After George became King, the constitutional crisis was resolved after the Liberal Government resigned and Parliament was dissolved. The Liberals were reelected, in part due to the unpopularity of the House of Lords, and used the election as a mandate to force their Budget through, almost too late to save the nation's financial system from ruin.

The Lords paid a price for their opposition to the Liberals, who in the commons passed the Parliament Bill, which provided that a bill could be submitted for the King's Assent if the Commons passed it in three consecutive sessions, even if the Lords rejected it. The time would later be reduced to two sessions in 1949. When the House of Lords refused to pass the Parliament Bill, Prime Minister Asquith asked George V to create 250 new Liberal peers to erase the Conservative majority. George agreed, but the Lords acquiesced and passed the bill quickly.

World War I occurred during George's reign. Due to the family's German connections, the Royalty began to become unpopular; George's cousin, Wilhelm II, was especially despised. In 1917, to appease the public, George changed the Royal House's name from the German-sounding Saxe-Coburg-Gotha to the more English Windsor.

In 1922, most of Ireland left the United Kingdom to form the Irish Free State following the Irish Civil War. The Irish Free State retained the British monarch as a Sovereign, but functioned as a Dominion of the Crown, with its own Government and Legislature. Six counties in the Irish province of Ulster remained in the United Kingdom as Northern Ireland. In 1927, the name of the country was changed from the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

George V died in 1936 and was succeeded by his son, who ruled as Edward VIII.

Edward VIII
Edward VIII became King in January of 1936 and abdicated in December. His reign was controversial because of his desire to marry the American Wallis Simpson. Simpson was already divorced once; she divorced her second husband so she could marry King Edward. A problem, however, existed because Edward was the Supreme Governor of the Church of England, which prohibited remarriage after divorce. The Government advised him that he could not marry while he was King, so he indicated a desire to abdicate and marry Simpson. The abdication was not unilateral, as the Act of Settlement provided that the Crown go to the heir of Sophia, Electress of Hanover, regardless of that person's willingness to rule. Therefore, Parliament had to pass a special Act in order to permit Edward to abdicate, which he did.

Edward's brother, Albert Frederick Arthur George, became King. He chose to rule as George VI to create a link in the public's mind between him and the previous Kings of the same name during a time of crisis. Edward, meanwhile, was made Duke of Windsor and the issue of his marriage to Simpson were excluded from the line of succession.

George VI
When George took power in 1936, the popularity of the Royal Family had been damaged by the abdication crisis. It was, however, restored when George and his wife, Queen Elizabeth, led the nation and boosted morale during World War II. During the war, Britain was led by one of its most famous Prime Ministers, Sir Winston Churchill.

Following the War, the United Kingdom began to lose several of its overseas possessions. In 1947, India became independent and George lost the title of Emperor of India. Until 1950, however, he remained King of India while a constitution was being written. George was also the last King of Ireland; the Irish established a republic in 1949.

George died in 1952 from lung cancer. His daughter Elizabeth succeeded him.

Elizabeth II
During Elizabeth's reign, there have been several important constitutional developments. A notable one occurred in 1963, when Conservative Prime Minister Harold Macmillan resigned. There was no clear leader of the Conservative Party, but many favoured Richard Austen Butler, the Deputy Prime Minister. Harold Macmillan advised the Queen, however, that senior politicians in the party preferred Alec Douglas-Home, 14th Earl of Home. Elizabeth accepted the advice and appointed the Earl of Home to the office of Prime Minister, marking the last time a member of the House of Lords would be so appointed. Home, taking advantage of the Peerage Act passed in 1963, "disclaimed" his peerage. A Conservative member of the House of Commons vacated his seat, allowing Home to contest the by-election for that constituency and become a member of the House of Commons.

There have also been many recent constitutional developments in the nation. The office of Prime Minister increased greatly in power under the Conservative Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher (the "Iron Lady") and the Labour Prime Minister Tony Blair. Under Blair, many of Parliament's lawmaking functions were devolved to local administrations in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. In 1999, the House of Lords Act was passed, removing the automatic right of hereditary peers to sit in the House.

Charles III
Charles III acceeded to the throne, aged 74, on the death of his mother, Elizabeth II in 2022 and was crowned in 2023.


text:
UK Constitution and Government/Government

Presentation
His Majesty's Government

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Structure
His Majesty's Government is the executive political authority for the United Kingdom as a whole. At its heart is the Cabinet, a grouping of senior Ministers of the Crown, headed by the Prime Minister. Members of the Government are political appointees, and are usually drawn from one of the two Houses of Parliament. In addition to the heads of the Departments of State (most of whom carry the title of Secretary of State), the Government also includes junior ministers (who bear the title of Under Secretary of State, Minister of State, or Parliamentary Secretary), whips (responsible for enforcing party discipline within the two Houses), and Parliamentary Private Secretaries (political assistants to ministers).

When the Sovereign is the Queen, the Government is referred to as Her Majesty's Government; likewise, when there are joint Sovereigns, the Government is known as Their Majesties' Government.

Prime Minister
The Prime Minister (or "PM") is the head of the Government. Since the early twentieth century the Prime Minister has held the office of First Lord of the Treasury, and in recent decades has also held the office of Minister for the Civil Service.

The Prime Minister is asked to form a Government by the Sovereign. Usually this occurs after a general election has altered the balance of party political power within the House of Commons. The Prime Minister is expected to have the confidence of the House of Commons; this usually means that he or she is the leader of the political party holding the majority of the seats in the Commons. Since at least the 1920s the Prime Minister himself is also expected to be a Member of Parliament (i.e. member of the House of Commons). The Prime Minister retains office until he or she dies or resigns, or until someone else is appointed; this means that even when expecting to be defeated at a general election, the Prime Minister remains formally in power until his or her rival is returned as an MP and asked in turn to form a Government.

By law, if defeated by an actual Commons vote of "no confidence", there is a period of 14 days during which an alternative Government may be formed, if a "vote of confidence" can be won by a prospective Prime Minister. If no Government can be formed within the 14 days an election is automatically triggered, in effect allowing the electorate itself to approve or disapprove of the Prime Minister's policy. The polling day for the election is to be the day appointed by Her Majesty by proclamation on the recommendation of the Prime Minister. The Parliament then in existence dissolves at the beginning of the 17th working day before the polling day.

The existence and basis of appointment of the office is a matter of constitutional convention rather than of law. Because of this, there are no formal qualifications for the office. However, a small number of Acts of Parliament do make reference to the Prime Minister, and since the 1930s office has carried a salary in its own right.

The Prime Minister is often an extremely powerful figure within the political system; the office has been said by some to be an "elected dictatorship", and some Prime Ministers have been accused of being "presidential". A weak Prime Minister may be forced out of office (i.e. forced to resign) by his or her own party, particularly if there is an alternative figure within the party seen as a better choice.

Cabinet and other ministers
Membership of the Cabinet is not defined by law, and is only loosely bound by convention. The Prime Minister and (if there is one) the Deputy Prime Minister are always members, as are the three most senior ministerial heads of Departments of State: the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (commonly known as the Foreign Secretary), the Chancellor of the Exchequer (i.e. the minister responsible for finance), and the Secretary of State for the Home Department (commonly known as the Home Secretary). Most of the other heads of departments are usually members of the Cabinet, as well as a small number of junior ministers.

Ministers of the Crown are formally appointed by the Sovereign upon the "advice" of the Prime Minister. Ministers are bound by the convention of collective responsibility, by which they are expected to publicly support or defend the policy of the Government, or else resign. They are also bound by the less clearly defined convention of individual responsibility, by which they are responsible to Parliament for the acts of their department. Ministers are often called upon to resign who either by their own actions, or by those of their department, are perceived in some manner to have failed in their duty; however, it usually takes sustained criticism over a period of time for both a minister to feel compelled to resign, and for the Prime Minister to accept that resignation. Occasionally a minister offers his or her resignation, but the Prime Minister retains them in office.

Parliamentary Private Secretaries are also bound by the principle of collective responsibility, even though they hold no ministerial responsibility and take no part in the formation of policy; the position is seen as an initial stepping-stone towards being offered ministerial office.

Privy Council
His Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council is a ceremonial body of advisors to the Sovereign. The Privy Council is used as a mechanism for maintaining ministerial responsibility for the actions of the Crown; for example, royal proclamations are approved by the Privy Council before they are issued. All senior members of the Government are appointed to be Privy Counsellors, as well as certain senior members of the Royal Family, leaders of the main political parties, the archbishops and senior bishops of the Church of England, and certain senior judges.

The Privy Council is headed by the Lord President of the Council, a ministerial office usually held by a member of the Cabinet. By convention the Lord President is also either the Leader of the House of Commons, or the Leader of the House of Lords, with responsibility for directing and negotiating the course of business in the respective House.

Meetings of the Privy Council are usually extremely short, and are rarely attended by more than a bare minimum of Privy Counsellors.


text:
UK Constitution and Government/Judiciary

Presentation
The Judiciary

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Structure
The United Kingdom is made up of three separate legal jurisdictions, each with a separate laws and hierarchy of courts: England and Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland.

England and Wales
England and Wales is a common law jurisdiction.

Lower courts
The lowest court in England and Wales is the Magistrates' Court. Magistrates, also known as Justices of the Peace, are laypersons appointed by the Sovereign. The court hears "summary" offences (punishable by six months or less in prison). When hearing such cases, three magistrates sit together as a panel without a jury. In some metropolitan areas, such as London, there are no magistrates; instead, summary cases are tried by a single District Judge who is trained in law.

Serious criminal cases are tried before a Crown Court with a judge and a jury of twelve. The accused may also choose to have certain summary offences referred from the magistrates' court to the Crown Court, in order for their case to be tried before a jury; the Crown Court also hears appeals from magistrates' courts. Though the Crown Court is constituted as a single body for the whole of England and Wales, it sits permanently at multiple places throughout its area of jurisdiction.

The counterpart to the Crown and Magistrates' Courts in the civil justice system is the County Court. There are over 200 County Courts throughout England and Wales.

High Court
The High Court of England and Wales takes appeals from the County Court, and also has an original jurisdiction in certain matters.

The High Court is constituted into three divisions: the Family Division, the Chancery Division, and the Queen's Bench Division.

The Family Division is presided over by the President of the Family Division, and hears cases involving family matters such as matrimonial breakdown, child custody and welfare, and adoption.

The Chancery Division is presided over by the Chancellor of the High Court (formerly known as the Vice-Chancellor), and hears cases involving land, companies, bankruptcy, and probate.

The Queen's Bench Division is presided over by the President of the Queen's Bench Division, and hears cases involving torts (civil wrongs). The Queen's Bench Division also includes four subordinate courts: the Admiralty Court (dealing with shipping), the Commercial Court (dealing with insurance, banking, and commerce), the Technology and Construction Court (dealing with complex technological matters), and the Administrative Court (exercising judicial review over the actions of local government). The Queen's Bench Division also has oversight of the lower courts.

Court of Appeal
Above the High Court in civil cases, and the Crown Court in criminal cases, is the Court of Appeal, headed by the Master of the Rolls, and including 35 Lords Justices of Appeal as well as other judges.

The Court of Appeal is divided into a Civil Division (presided over by the Master of the Rolls) and a Criminal Division (presided over by the Lord Chief Justice). Generally speaking, appeals may only be heard "by leave"; that is, with the permission of the either the Court of Appeal or the judge whose decision is being contested. In some cases, it is possible to "leapfrog" the High Court and bring a case directly from a County Court.

Together, the Crown Court, the High Court, and Court of Appeal constitute the Senior Courts (formerly known as the Supreme Court of Judicature). Thus, since they are theoretically one body, it is possible for judges of one court to sit in other courts. Appeals from the Senior Courts go to the Supreme Court; it is also possible to leapfrog from the High Court, but not from the Crown Court. Normally, leave to appeal to the Supreme Court is not granted unless the case is of great legal or constitutional importance.

Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland's system is based on that used in England and Wales, with a similar hierarchy of magistrates' court, the Crown Court (for criminal trials), county courts (for civil trials), the High Court, and the Court of Appeal.

Appeals from Northern Ireland lie to the Supreme Court.

Scotland
In contrast with the rest of the United Kingdom, Scotland uses a mixture of common law and civil law. Its court system was developed independently of that in England. The Act of Union (1707) guarantees the continuance of Scotland's different legal system.

Lower courts
Summary jurisdiction is exercised by Justice of the Peace Courts, held either by three Justices of the Peace (lay magistrates) sitting together, or by a Justice of the Peace sitting with a legally qualified clerk. As in England and Wales, professional judges may sit in certain metropolitan areas.

Above the Justice of the Peace Courts are the Sheriff Courts, of which there are around 50. Sheriff Courts hear both criminal and civil cases, and are held before a judge known as a Sheriff, and have a jury of fifteen people. Sheriff Courts are grouped into six different Sheriffdoms, headed by a Sheriff Principal who hears appeals from cases not decided by a jury.

High Court of Justiciary
The highest criminal court in Scotland is the High Court of Justiciary. The judges of the court are also the judges of the Court of Session (see below); as High Court judges they are known as Lords Commissioners of Justiciary. The head of the court is the Lord Justice-General (also the Lord President of the Court of Session), with a deputy known as the Lord Justice Clerk (who holds the same office in the Court of Session). Altogether the High Court has up to 32 individual judges.

The High Court has exclusive jurisdiction in serious crimes, such as murder or drug trafficking, in which case a single judge sits with a jury of fifteen. The High Court also hears appeals from Justice of the Peace Courts, and hears appeals in criminal cases from Sheriff Courts.

Appeals against decisions by a High Court judge in criminal cases are heard by either two (in appeals against sentences) or three (in appeals against conviction) High Court judges. No appeal lies beyond the High Court.

Court of Session
The highest civil court in Scotland is the Court of Session. Its judges also sit as judges of the High Court of Justiciary (see above); as Court of Session judges they are known as Lords and Ladies of Council and Session, or Senators of the College of Justice. The Court is headed by the Lord President, with a Lord Justice Clerk as deputy. Altogether the Court of Session has up to 32 individual judges.

The Court of Session is divided into the Outer House (made up of nineteen judges), and the Inner House (made up of the remaining judges). The Outer House has original jurisdiction, while the Inner House has appellate jurisdiction. The Inner House is further divided into the First and Second Divisions, headed by the Lord President and Lord Justice Clerk respectively. Sometimes, when many cases are before the court, an Extra Division may be appointed. Each Division may sit as a panel hearing an appeal from the Sheriff Court or from the Outer House.

Appeals from the Court of Session lie to the Supreme Court.

Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of the United Kingdom is the ultimate court of appeal in all civil matters, as well as in criminal cases (other than from Scotland), and also has original jurisdiction in devolution cases.

The Supreme Court has replaced the jurisdiction previously exercised by the House of Lords in the latter's now-abolished judicial capacity. The Supreme Court of the United Kingdom is not to be confused with the Supreme Court of Judicature, the name formerly held by (a) the Senior Courts, in England and Wales, and (b) the Court of Judicature, in Northern Ireland.

The Supreme Court is headed by a President, who has a Deputy President. There are a further ten puisne judges.

Judicial Committee of the Privy Council
The Judicial Committee of the Privy Council formerly held original jurisdiction in the United Kingdom in devolution cases, and continues to hold appellate jurisdiction over the ecclesiastical courts of the Church of England. Appeals to the Privy Council as a court of last resort also lie from the Crown dependencies, the British overseas territories, and from certain Commonwealth countries.

Membership of the Judicial Committee is made up of Justices of the Supreme Court, Privy Counsellors who are or were Lord Justices of Appeal in either England and Wales or Northern Ireland, members of the Inner House of Scotland's Court of Session, and selected senior judges from certain other Commonwealth countries. Members retire at the age of 75.

Appeals to Her Majesty in Council are referred to the Judicial Committee, which formally reports to the Queen in Council, who in turn formally confirms the report. By agreement, appeals from certain Commonwealth countries lie directly to the Judicial Committee itself.

The Queen-in-Council also considers appeals from the disciplinary committees of certain medical bodies such as the Royal College of Surgeons. Also, cases against the Church Commissioners (who administer the Church of England's property estates) may be considered. Appeals may be heard from certain ecclesiastic courts (the Court of Arches in Canterbury, and the Chancery Court in York) in cases that do not involve Church doctrine. Appeals may also be heard from certain dormant courts, including Prize Courts (which hear cases relating to the capture of enemy ships at sea, and the ownership of property seized from captured ships) and the Court of Admiralty of the Cinque Ports. Finally, the Queen-in-Council determines if an individual is qualified to be elected to the House of Commons under the House of Commons Disqualification Act.

ECHR and ECJ
In addition to the above domestic courts, there are two further courts which can be said to exercise a jurisdiction over the United Kingdom.

The European Court of Human Rights deals with cases concerning alleged infringements of the European Convention on Human Rights.

The European Court of Justice deals with cases concerning alleged infringements of European Union law.


text:
UK Constitution and Government/Constitution

Presentation
The Constitution

Previous Chapter | Next Chapter -- Unlike most other sovereign states, the United Kingdom does not possess a document expressing itself to be the nation's fundamental or highest law. Instead, the British constitution is found in a number of sources. Because of this, the British constitution is often said to be an unwritten constitution; however, many parts of the constitution are indeed in written form, so it would be more accurate to refer to the body of the British constitution as an uncodified constitution.

The British constitution is spread across a number of sources:

1. Statute law

2. Royal prerogative (executive powers usually exercised by Ministers of the Crown)

3. Constitutional conventions (accepted norms of political behaviour)

4. Common law (decisions by senior courts that are binding on lower courts)

5. EU Treaties

6. Statements made in books considered to have particular authority

Note that not all of these sources form part of the law of the land, and so the British constitution encompasses a wider variety of rules, etc. than that of (say) the United States.

1. Statute law
Many important elements of the British constitution are to be found in Acts of Parliament. In contrast with many other countries, legislation affecting the constitution is not subject to any special procedure, and is passed using the same procedures as for ordinary legislation.

The most important statute law still in force and affecting the constitution includes the following:
 * The Habeas Corpus Act 1679
 * The Bill of Rights (1689)
 * The Claim of Right (1689)
 * The Act of Settlement (1701)
 * The Acts of Union (1707)
 * The Septennial Act 1715
 * The Acts of Union (1800)
 * The Parliament Acts (1911 and 1949)
 * The Regency Act 1953
 * The Life Peerages Act 1958
 * The Peerage Act 1963
 * The European Communities Act 1972
 * The British Nationality Act 1981
 * The Representation of the People Act 1983
 * The Parliamentary Constituencies Act 1986
 * The Human Rights Act 1998
 * The Scotland Act 1998
 * The Northern Ireland Act 1998
 * The House of Lords Act 1999
 * The Civil Contingencies Act 2004
 * The Constitutional Reform Act 2005
 * The Government of Wales Act 2006

2. Royal prerogative
Certain powers pre-dating the establishment of the present parliamentary system are still formally retained by the Queen. In practice almost all of these powers are exercised only on the decision of Ministers of the Crown (the Cabinet). These powers, known as the royal prerogative, include the following:

 * The appointment and dismissal of government ministers
 * The summoning, opening, prorogation, and dissolution of Parliament
 * The assenting to legislation
 * The power to declare war, and to deploy the armed forces
 * The power to conduct relations with foreign states, including the recognition of states or governments, and the making of treaties
 * The issuing of passports

3. Constitutional conventions
Conventions are customs that operate as rules considered to bind the actions of the Queen or the Government. Conventions are not part of the law, but nevertheless are often considered to be just as fundamental to the structure and working of the constitution as the contents of any statute. Indeed, statute law affecting the constitution is often written in such a way that the existence of certain conventions is taken for granted, and some conventions are so fundamental that many people are unaware that they are in fact "unwritten" rules.

Examples of the more important constitutional conventions include:

 * The Queen does not direct government policy, and leaves all decision-making to her Cabinet
 * Cabinet members are bound by the principle of collective responsibility; ministers who feel themselves unable to publicly support or defend the policy of the Government are expected to resign
 * The Government is headed by a Prime Minister, appointed by the Queen from the House of Commons
 * The Prime Minister is usually expected to be the leader of the political party with the most MPs (members of the House of Commons)
 * When a Prime Minister's political party loses a general election (i.e. obtains less seats in the House of Commons than a rival party), he or she is expected to resign
 * Government ministers are usually expected to be drawn entirely from the two Houses of Parliament, and most important office-holders are expected to be MPs
 * A government that is unable to obtain the passage through Parliament of important legislation, including the annual Appropriation and Finance Acts, is expected to resign
 * The (unelected) House of Lords does not obstruct the passage of legislation stated in the government party's election manifesto to be fundamental policy
 * The Speaker of the House of Commons is expected to be impartial, even though originally elected as the representative of a political party

4. Common law
The common law is that part of the law which does not rest on statute. Instead, it is the accumulation of specific judicial decisions set by senior courts as precedents binding on lesser courts.

Certain parts of the common law are also what is known as trite law: examples of this include the fact that the United Kingdom is a monarchy, and the fact that brothers used to take precedence over sisters in the succession to the throne; this was repealed by the Succession to the Crown Act 2013.

5. EU Treaties
As a member state of the European Union, the United Kingdom is bound by EU law. However, the majority of votes cast favoured the referendum to exit the EU. The UK invoked Article 50 of the Treaty on European Union on 29 March 2017, which started what is often referred to as the "Brexit". The United Kingdom left the European Union on 30 January 2020.

6. Authoritative statements
Certain published works are usually considered to have particular authority. In the first half of the twentieth century this was the case with A V Dicey's Law of the Constitution, being cited with approval in judicial decisions. A particularly important work is Erskine May, which sets out the procedures and customs of the House of Commons. Other important sources include certain ministerial statements.

However, none of these works have legal authority; at best, they are merely persuasive.


text:
UK Constitution and Government/Devolved Administrations

Presentation
Devolved Administrations

Previous Chapter | Next Chapter

Devolution
Devolution refers to the transfer of administrative, executive, or legislative authority to new institutions operating only within a defined part of the United Kingdom. Devolved institutions have been created for Scotland, Northern Ireland, and Wales.

Devolution differs from federalism in formally being a unilateral process that can be reversed at will; formal sovereignty is still retained at the centre. Thus, while the US Congress cannot reduce the powers of a state legislature, Parliament has the legal capacity to even go so far as to abolish the devolved legislatures.

Devolution in Wales was originally restricted to the executive/administrative sphere, whereas in Scotland and Northern Ireland devolution extended to wide powers to pass laws.

Scotland
The Scottish legislative authority is the Scottish Parliament. The Scottish Parliament is a unicameral body composed of 129 members (called Members of Scottish Parliament, or MSPs) elected for fixed four-year terms. Each of 73 members is elected by a constituency. The remaining are elected by eight regions, with each region electing seven members. Each voter has one constituency vote—cast for a single individual—and one regional vote—cast either for a party or for an independent candidate. Regional members are allocated in such a way as to permit a party's share of the regional vote to be proportional to its share of seats in the Scottish Parliament.

The Scottish Government is the executive authority of Scotland; it is led by the First Minister. Other members of the Scottish Cabinet are generally given the title of Minister. The First Minister must retain the confidence of the Scottish Parliament to remain in power.

Scotland has responsibility over several major areas, including taxation, criminal justice, health, education, transport, the environment, sport, culture and local government. The Parliament at Westminster, however, retains authority over a certain number of reserved matters. Reserved matters include foreign affairs, defence, immigration, social security and welfare, employment, and general economic and fiscal policy.

Wales
The National Assembly for Wales is the Welsh legislative authority. It is, like the Scottish Parliament, a unicameral body; it also uses a similar electoral system. Forty of its sixty members are chosen from single-member constituencies, while the remaining twenty are regional members. (There are five regions.) The Welsh Government is led by the First Minister and includes other Ministers, who must retain the confidence of the Assembly.

The third Welsh Assembly can legislate using a system called "Assembly Measures". This system is a lower form of Primary Legislation similar to Acts of Parliament. They can be used to repeal laws, create provision and amend laws. The difference with "Assembly Measures" and "Acts of the Assembly" is that Measures do not have a bulk of powers with them, each Measure will come with a LCO, or Legislative Competency Order, which transfers powers from the UK Parliament to the Welsh Assembly Government. Devolution in Wales has changed a lot since 1999.

In order for the National Assembly to have full legislative powers, they will need to trigger a referendum through both the Assembly and both houses of the United Kingdom parliament. Once done, Wales will for the first time ever, will be able to legislate and make their own Acts. (To be known as Acts of the Assembly, or Acts of the National Assembly for Wales). In early 2011, a referendum held in Wales approved the transfer of full legislative competence to the National Assembly in all devolved matters.

Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland was the first part of the United Kingdom to gain devolution, in 1921. However, it has had a troubled history since then, caused by conflict between the main Unionist and Nationalist communities. Because of this historical background, the present system of devolution requires power to be shared between political parties representing the different communities, and there are complex procedural checks in place to ensure cross-community support for legislation and executive action.

The Northern Ireland Assembly comprises 108 members elected to represent 18 six-member constituencies.

The Executive (government) is made up of members from the largest parties in the Assembly, with ministerial portfolios allocated in proportion to party strengths. The Executive is headed jointly by a First Minister and Deputy First Minister, who are jointly elected by the Assembly.

The Assembly's legislative powers are broad, and are similar to those of the Scottish Parliament (with the notable exception of taxation). The transfer from the United Kingdom's central government of responsibility for the criminal justice system has been highly contentious, and has only recently been carried out.


text:
Electronics/Microwave

Microwave
Microwaves are defined to be waves having frequency greater than 1 GHz. While some books put the upper limit of 30 GHz to microwaves, some literature consider the upper limit to be up to 300 GHz. At such high frequencies, the behaviour of the devices used commonly is no longer predictable by general rules and new design issues need to be considered. Even short leads of devices act as inductances and may possess capacitances.

A magnetron emits microwaves at 2450 MHz λ = 12.24 cm A microwave is a Faraday cage, so waves can't escape openings smaller than 6.12 cm. Microwaves work by bombarding atoms from all sides with an electric field. This causes the dipole to keep realigning itself and the food heats up. Most effective on water, metal deflects microwaves. Containers survive because they do not absorb many microwaves relative to the food.

title: Electronics/Microwave


text:
Electronics/Photocopier

The Photocopier
One example of the practical use of static electricity is a photocopier. A photocopier is a fairly complicated piece of equipment, but the basic principle of how it works is fairly simple. The best way to understand what is going on is to consider it as a stage by stage process.

Stage one
Positive charge is sprayed onto a plate from a high voltage power supply. The plate is connected to the earth but the charge does not have quite enough energy to flow away. (The plate is not a good conductor of electricity)

Stage two
Paper is placed over the plate and a light shone onto the paper. Where the paper is white the light is reflected onto the plate, where the paper is dark a shadow falls onto the plate. The light falling on the plate gives it just the extra energy needed to allow the charge to escape to earth. The plate becomes neutral where the paper was white but keeps its charge where the paper is black. The plate is now a copy of the paper with charges taking the place of ink.

Stage three
Toner particles are spayed through a negatively charged nozzle onto the plate. As the toner passes through the nozzle it picks up the charge so that each particle of toner becomes negatively charged. The now charged toner is attracted to the areas of positive charge because unlike charges attract. More light then allows the positive charge to escape (however, the negative charge on the toner remains).

Stage four
A piece of paper is given a very strong positive charge, and then placed in contact with the plate. The paper attracts the toner. The paper is then removed from the plate and passed through a heating unit. The heat melts the toner and bonds it to the paper.

In a real photocopier, there is no plate, just a large drum. As the drum rotates its surface goes through stages one to four. At the end of the sequence a scraper removes any toner left on the drum and the whole process is repeated with a new image. A good photocopier can process a page in less than a second.

Questions on Photocopiers
'Q1)'If the black areas of the image leave a positive charge on the plate what charge do the white areas of the image leave? (Be very careful, the answer may not be what you think!)

Q2) How does the light shining onto the charged plate allow it to lose its charge ?

Q3) Why is the toner given a negative charge ?

Q4) Why does the paper attract the toner ?

Spray painting car parts
When paint is sprayed from a paint gun, the painter normally needs to use a fair amount of skill to ensure the paint goes on evenly. By connecting the spray nozzle to a negative electrode, it is possible to charge each droplet of paint. If the car part is then given the opposite charge, the paint droplets will be attracted to the car body part. This has several advantages.
 * Less mess- The paint goes to the body part and not to the electrically neutral floor.
 * Less wastage - All the paint ends up on the body part, very little is wasted.
 * Less skill needed - The paint wraps around the part, because the charges all over the part attract the paint. The paint even ends up on the back!

Questions
Q5) If the paint droplets are given a positive charge, what charge should the car part be given?

Q6) Why does less paint fall on the floor?

title: Electronics/Photocopier


text:
Electronics/Devices

< Electronics/Expanded Edition

Specific devices made through applying knowledge found in this book.

Consumer: Basic

 * 1) Blender
 * 2) Dishwasher
 * 3) Food Processor
 * 4) Microphone
 * 5) Microwave
 * 6) Power Supply
 * 7) Radio
 * 8) Electronics/Refrigerator
 * 9) Speakers
 * 10) TV

Consumer: Other

 * 1) Christmas Lights

Industrial

 * 1) Electrolysis
 * 2) Strain Gage

Office

 * 1) Photocopier

Other

 * 1) Atomic Clock
 * 2) Fuel Cell

Medical

 * 1) Dialysis Machine
 * 2) EEG
 * 3) EKG

title: Electronics/Devices


text:
Talk:First Aid

Alternate TOC's for different Application domains..
Would it be possible to have a alternate TOC arrangment for different contexts? Like for example 'First Aid in the Workplace' ?

I also note some topics are semmingly not covered in this book.

I am NOT First Aid Trained, but my general layout of a book on First Aid in the work place would be something like the following

 * Introduction
 * What is First Aid?
 * Training Organisations

 * Ethical and Legal Issues
 * Conduct
 * Consent
 * Liability
 * Children and vulnerable groups.
 * Suspicion of Abuse

 * Risk Assessment
 * Risk assessment
 * Protective Equipment
 * 'Safe' working
 * Incident 'Stress'.

 * Casualty Assessment
 * How to asses a 'casulty'/patient
 * A,B,C..
 * A - irway
 * B - reathing
 * C - Circulation/Compressions
 * D - Deadly Bleeding
 * Head to toe
 * History
 * Vitals.

 * Cuts and Punctures (NB This is how to asses, the treatment would come in respect of handling bleeding)
 * Falls

 * Airway/Breathing
 * Choking
 * Airway Collapse
 * Anaphylaxis
 * Asmatha/ Hyperventelation
 * Oxygen starvation

 * Circulation and Bleeding
 * Internal Bleeding
 * External Bleeding
 * Cuts
 * Punctures
 * Cardiac issues (Heart Attack/Angina)
 * Stroke

 * Systemic injuries -
 * Shock
 * Electrocution (aka Electrical Shock)
 * Fatigue / RSI.

 * Tissue Injuries-
 * Chest/Abdominal Injury
 * Organs
 * Eyes
 * Mouth
 * Burns

 * Bones, Joint and Muscles -
 * Breaks and Fractures
 * Injuries to the Skull
 * 'Back Pain'
 * Spinal injuries
 * Tears and Sprains

 * Poisoning -
 * Chemical
 * 'Noxious' fumes (inc. Monoxide)
 * Intoxication
 * Overdose.
 * Food

 * Medical Conditions -
 * Diabeties
 * Seizures (inc Epilepsy)
 * 'Crisis' - (aka Mental Health Emergency)
 * Spotting Fatigue

 * Environmental Injury
 * Caused by Heat
 * Caused by Cold
 * Caused by Depth

Any comments? Sfan00 IMG (talk) 10:55, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Foot Blisters
A page on foot blisters would be nice, the only information I can find is about burn blisters and it doesn't run into too much detail about dealing with them Gsp8181 (talk) 18:50, 29 September 2010 (UTC)

New CPR guidelines
Hello,

You may have noticed that new CPR guidelines have been issued just a few days ago. However, the full implications of those changes are not yet understood, and training agencies have not updated their materials or courses. I propose to update the textbook in January - by then, that sort of thing should be resolved, and we should have a more concrete basis to work from.

–  03:10, 23 October 2010 (UTC)

I'm working on an update to 2010 Guidelines. Also, there are a few first aid topics that I streamlining a bit, and trying to make sure the topics are covered at a level that is no higher than advanced first aid.

I teach first aid and CPR on a regular basis, used to be an Emergency Medical Technical, and am currently a nurse. I have a pretty good working knowledge of the procedures. Feel free to let me know if there are any suggestions. In particular, I'm trying to maintain the international applicability of the book, while including the relevant information for first aid in the US.

Brandon - GauzeGuy

Non-survivable injuries
Should there be a section on non-survivable injuries (i.e. decapitation, being cut in half, etc.) so people know when they can't help someone? --Whoop whoop pull up Bitching Betty 19:54, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

 * I don't think a new section would be necessary, but perhaps incorporating it into the initial action steps (or somewhere in the ABCs) would be appropriate. Mike6271 (discuss • contribs) 05:26, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

Overdose...
I appreciate this might be controvesial but, I was wondering if there should be some specfifc advise on drug overdoses in the Poisioning section. ShakespeareFan00 (discuss • contribs) 13:20, 10 April 2016 (UTC)

First_Aid/Epilepsy
The concern here is about the 'pattern' trigger noted, based on the pending edits (as yet unreviewed) the term 'fixation' may refer to a different context from that outlined. I'll try and clarify this with a contributor to medical articles on English Wikipedia I trust. ShakespeareFan00 (discuss • contribs) 19:27, 13 May 2018 (UTC)

title: Talk:First Aid


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