text:
Mutual exclusion

In computer science, mutual exclusion is a property of concurrency control, which is instituted for the purpose of preventing race conditions. It is the requirement that one thread of execution never enters a critical section while a concurrent thread of execution is already accessing said critical section, which refers to an interval of time during which a thread of execution accesses a shared resource or shared memory.

The shared resource is a data object, which two or more concurrent threads are trying to modify (where two concurrent read operations are permitted but, no two concurrent write operations or one read and one write are permitted, since it leads to data inconsistency). Mutual exclusion algorithms ensure that if a process is already performing write operation on a data object [critical section] no other process/thread is allowed to access/modify the same object until the first process has finished writing upon the data object [critical section] and released the object for other processes to read and write upon.

The requirement of mutual exclusion was first identified and solved by Edsger W. Dijkstra in his seminal 1965 paper "Solution of a problem in concurrent programming control", which is credited as the first topic in the study of concurrent algorithms.

A simple example of why mutual exclusion is important in practice can be visualized using a singly linked list of four items, where the second and third are to be removed. The removal of a node that sits between two other nodes is performed by changing the next pointer of the previous node to point to the next node (in other words, if node $i$ is being removed, then the next pointer of node $i + 1$ is changed to point to node $i + 1$, thereby removing from the linked list any reference to node $i$). When such a linked list is being shared between multiple threads of execution, two threads of execution may attempt to remove two different nodes simultaneously, one thread of execution changing the next pointer of node $i – 1$ to point to node $i + 1$, while another thread of execution changes the next pointer of node $i$ to point to node $i – 1$. Although both removal operations complete successfully, the desired state of the linked list is not achieved: node $i + 1$ remains in the list, because the next pointer of node $i + 2$ points to node $i + 1$.

This problem (called a race condition) can be avoided by using the requirement of mutual exclusion to ensure that simultaneous updates to the same part of the list cannot occur.

The term mutual exclusion is also used in reference to the simultaneous writing of a memory address by one thread while the aforementioned memory address is being manipulated or read by one or more other threads.

Problem description
The problem which mutual exclusion addresses is a problem of resource sharing: how can a software system control multiple processes' access to a shared resource, when each process needs exclusive control of that resource while doing its work? The mutual-exclusion solution to this makes the shared resource available only while the process is in a specific code segment called the critical section. It controls access to the shared resource by controlling each mutual execution of that part of its program where the resource would be used.

A successful solution to this problem must have at least these two properties:
 * It must implement mutual exclusion: only one process can be in the critical section at a time.
 * It must be free of deadlocks: if processes are trying to enter the critical section, one of them must eventually be able to do so successfully, provided no process stays in the critical section permanently.

Deadlock freedom can be expanded to implement one or both of these properties:
 * Lockout-freedom guarantees that any process wishing to enter the critical section will be able to do so eventually. This is distinct from deadlock avoidance, which requires that some waiting process be able to get access to the critical section, but does not require that every process gets a turn. If two processes continually trade a resource between them, a third process could be locked out and experience resource starvation, even though the system is not in deadlock. If a system is free of lockouts, it ensures that every process can get a turn at some point in the future.
 * A k-bounded waiting property gives a more precise commitment than lockout-freedom. Lockout-freedom ensures every process can access the critical section eventually: it gives no guarantee about how long the wait will be. In practice, a process could be overtaken an arbitrary or unbounded number of times by other higher-priority processes before it gets its turn. Under a k-bounded waiting property, each process has a finite maximum wait time. This works by setting a limit to the number of times other processes can cut in line, so that no process can enter the critical section more than k times while another is waiting.

Every process's program can be partitioned into four sections, resulting in four states. Program execution cycles through these four states in order:

 * Non-Critical Section: Operation is outside the critical section; the process is not using or requesting the shared resource.

 * Trying: The process attempts to enter the critical section.

 * Critical Section: The process is allowed to access the shared resource in this section.

 * Exit: The process leaves the critical section and makes the shared resource available to other processes.

If a process wishes to enter the critical section, it must first execute the trying section and wait until it acquires access to the critical section. After the process has executed its critical section and is finished with the shared resources, it needs to execute the exit section to release them for other processes' use. The process then returns to its non-critical section.

Hardware solutions
On uni-processor systems, the simplest solution to achieve mutual exclusion is to disable interrupts during a process's critical section. This will prevent any interrupt service routines from running (effectively preventing a process from being preempted). Although this solution is effective, it leads to many problems. If a critical section is long, then the system clock will drift every time a critical section is executed because the timer interrupt is no longer serviced, so tracking time is impossible during the critical section. Also, if a process halts during its critical section, control will never be returned to another process, effectively halting the entire system. A more elegant method for achieving mutual exclusion is the busy-wait.

Busy-waiting is effective for both uniprocessor and multiprocessor systems. The use of shared memory and an atomic test-and-set instruction provide the mutual exclusion. A process can test-and-set on a location in shared memory, and since the operation is atomic, only one process can set the flag at a time. Any process that is unsuccessful in setting the flag can either go on to do other tasks and try again later, release the processor to another process and try again later, or continue to loop while checking the flag until it is successful in acquiring it. Preemption is still possible, so this method allows the system to continue to function—even if a process halts while holding the lock.

Several other atomic operations can be used to provide mutual exclusion of data structures; most notable of these is compare-and-swap (CAS). CAS can be used to achieve wait-free mutual exclusion for any shared data structure by creating a linked list where each node represents the desired operation to be performed. CAS is then used to change the pointers in the linked list during the insertion of a new node. Only one process can be successful in its CAS; all other processes attempting to add a node at the same time will have to try again. Each process can then keep a local copy of the data structure, and upon traversing the linked list, can perform each operation from the list on its local copy.

Software solutions
In addition to hardware-supported solutions, some software solutions exist that use busy waiting to achieve mutual exclusion. Examples include:
 * Dekker's algorithm
 * Peterson's algorithm
 * Lamport's bakery algorithm
 * Szymański's algorithm
 * Taubenfeld's black-white bakery algorithm
 * Maekawa's algorithm

These algorithms do not work if out-of-order execution is used on the platform that executes them. Programmers have to specify strict ordering on the memory operations within a thread.

It is often preferable to use synchronization facilities provided by an operating system's multithreading library, which will take advantage of hardware solutions if possible but will use software solutions if no hardware solutions exist. For example, when the operating system's lock library is used and a thread tries to acquire an already acquired lock, the operating system could suspend the thread using a context switch and swap it out with another thread that is ready to be run, or could put that processor into a low power state if there is no other thread that can be run. Therefore, most modern mutual exclusion methods attempt to reduce latency and busy-waits by using queuing and context switches. However, if the time that is spent suspending a thread and then restoring it can be proven to be always more than the time that must be waited for a thread to become ready to run after being blocked in a particular situation, then spinlocks are an acceptable solution (for that situation only).

Bound on the mutual exclusion problem
One binary test&set register is sufficient to provide the deadlock-free solution to the mutual exclusion problem. But a solution built with a test&set register can possibly lead to the starvation of some processes which become caught in the trying section. In fact, $$\Omega(\sqrt{n})$$ distinct memory states are required to avoid lockout. To avoid unbounded waiting, n distinct memory states are required.

Recoverable mutual exclusion
Most algorithms for mutual exclusion are designed with the assumption that no failure occurs while a process is running inside the critical section. However, in reality such failures may be commonplace. For example, a sudden loss of power or faulty interconnect might cause a process in a critical section to experience an unrecoverable error or otherwise be unable to continue. If such a failure occurs, conventional, non-failure-tolerant mutual exclusion algorithms may deadlock or otherwise fail key liveness properties. To deal with this problem, several solutions using crash-recovery mechanisms have been proposed.

Types of mutual exclusion devices
The solutions explained above can be used to build the synchronization primitives below:
 * Locks (mutexes)
 * Readers–writer locks
 * Recursive locks
 * Semaphores
 * Monitors
 * Message passing
 * Tuple space

Many forms of mutual exclusion have side-effects. For example, classic semaphores permit deadlocks, in which one process gets a semaphore, another process gets a second semaphore, and then both wait till the other semaphore to be released. Other common side-effects include starvation, in which a process never gets sufficient resources to run to completion; priority inversion, in which a higher-priority thread waits for a lower-priority thread; and high latency, in which response to interrupts is not prompt.

Much research is aimed at eliminating the above effects, often with the goal of guaranteeing non-blocking progress. No perfect scheme is known. Blocking system calls used to sleep an entire process. Until such calls became threadsafe, there was no proper mechanism for sleeping a single thread within a process (see polling).

title: Mutual exclusion


text:
User:Malcolm Farmer

About myself:

Did a chemistry degree long enough ago that I've forgotten almost all of it. Read far too much science fiction and fantasy. Have an ever growing collection of obsolete home computers filling a back bedroom.

Web page: http://med441.bham.ac.uk/index.html

 * How many Wikipedia pages are there?
 * Perl script to find new topics

Welcome, Malcolm!

Interesting work on the utopia/dystopia/H.G. Wells stuff!

--User:Larry Sanger

Yes, I've got stacks of these sort of books lying around, now I have to go and reread them (and read for the first time the Edward Bellamy book that's been on my shelf for some years, too!)

Hi Malcolm,

Very nifty program you've got there. Perhaps you could just completely replace new topics with the results of your program? Take charge, please! :-)

Larry

- Malcolm- I have come up with a little Unix shell script using lynx -post_data to post articles. I'm using it for posting the 1911 encyclopedia articles. You could adapt it to autopost the new topics stuff. e-mail me if you are interested. --Alan Millar

Thanks for the 10,000 article announcement, Malcolm. Woo-hoo! --User:LMS - You keep typing (or scanning, or whatever!) and I'll keep editing, Malcolm. Popes, antipopes and related articles alone ought to count for a thousand fairly soon! --MichaelTinkler

Unfortunately I was rewriting Telstar at the same time as you and I placed my version over yours. Please take a look.

-- It's fine: much more detail than I had!

Hi Malcolm! I'd like to solicit a current article count. Seems pretty likely we're over 20,000 articles, and that's something I'd like to put in the press release if it's true. --User:LMS

That's a nice photo of a field of snowdrops; how about a little text? (Not something I know much about, and I suspect you know more than I could find quickly.)

Sorry stepped on your toes. I think Cuthulu Mythos was the right place for the details of the Mythos but I'll let you sort it. Alex

A thousand thanks for the help on saturation! -- April

--\

Thanks for the help on the Binyon verse, Malcolm.

Arno

--\

Regarding Po& (or Pozegnania), I know there are lots of problems displaying Polish-language characters in Wiki... I don't know anything about the technical side of things, really. All I know is that I'd love to have both the Po& (or Pozegnania) link on the Polish Film School and Farewells pages redirect to Farewells... Hope that makes sense!

If you start looking through the Polish-language related entries on Wiki, you'll find LOTS of issues like this. I don't know how to solve them... It's a problem, however... Benzamin 2:41 EST, 14/6/05

Greetings there friend,

In regards to the deletion of my contribution of the title of 'Churchie Dance Off', it relates to something that is much greater. It is a social event that many have attended and has a proud history of hosting thousands of girls in the Brisbane area (a city in Australia). The population of the city might not be as much compared to other cities around the place, but this event is quite well known as is regarded as one of the best social events for students (in high school) in Brisbane. Can you please not delete future posts relating to it?

Aeryck89

Re: enriched text RFC 1896:

Doh i didn't get the abbreviation RFC and thought 1896 was supposed to be the YEAR the format was defined sorry for stupidity thanks for quick corrections.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: User:Malcolm Farmer


text:
Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons

The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) is an intergovernmental organisation and the implementing body for the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), which entered into force on 29 April 1997. The OPCW, with its 193 member states, has its seat in The Hague, Netherlands; it oversees the global endeavour for the permanent and verifiable elimination of chemical weapons.

The organisation promotes and verifies the adherence to the Chemical Weapons Convention, which prohibits the use of chemical weapons and requires their destruction. Verification consists both of evaluation of declarations by member states and onsite inspections.

The organisation was awarded the 2013 Nobel Peace Prize "for its extensive efforts to eliminate chemical weapons". Nobel Committee chairman Thorbjørn Jagland said, "The conventions and the work of the OPCW have defined the use of chemical weapons as a taboo under international law".

History

The Hague was chosen as the location for the seat of the organisation after a successful lobby of the Dutch government, competing against Vienna and Geneva. The organisation has its headquarters next to the World Forum Convention Centre (where it holds its yearly Conference of States Parties) and an equipment store and laboratory facility in Rijswijk. The headquarters were officially opened by Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands on 20 May 1998. and consist of an eight-story building built in a semi-circle. A permanent memorial to all victims is present at the back of the building and is open to the public.

The OPCW headquarters building was designed by American architect Gerhard Kallmann of Kallmann McKinnell & Wood.

The first Director-General only served about one year of his second term, after which, in April 2002, he was removed from office on grounds of lack of confidence by the member states. It was argued by The Guardian's columnist George Monbiot that Director-General José Bustani was being forced out by the U.S. government, despite the convention insisting the OPCW "shall not seek or receive instructions from any government"; the US had tried to persuade Brazil to recall Bustani. Monbiot wrote that the U.S. had tried other measures, although the convention also indicates that states should "not seek to influence" staff. In line with his mandate, Bustani wanted Iraq to sign the convention thus allowing international chemical weapons monitors into Iraq and thus potentially impeding the U.S. push for war against Iraq. The U.S. gave three main arguments for the removal of Bustani's from his position: "polarising and confrontational conduct", "mismanagement issues" and "advocacy of inappropriate roles for the OPCW". The removal was subsequently determined to be improper by an Administrative Tribunal of the International Labour Organization and consequently Bustani was awarded €50,000 in moral damages, his pay for the remainder of his second term, and his legal costs.

On 11 October 2013, the Norwegian Nobel Committee announced that the OPCW had been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for "extensive work to eliminate chemical weapons". The committee further indicated how "Recent events in Syria, where chemical weapons have again been put to use, have underlined the need to enhance the efforts to do away with such weapons." In the year ending September 2014, the OPCW had overseen the destruction of some 97 per cent of Syria's declared chemical weapons.

In 2014, The OPCW–The Hague Award was established to honour select individuals and institutions by highlighting their exceptional contributions towards the goal of a world permanently free of chemical weapons. The award was created as a legacy of the OPCW winning the 2013 Nobel Peace Prize. The OPCW—The Hague Award fund was created using the approximately €900,000 monetary prize which accompanied the Nobel Peace Prize, and is also supported financially by the City of The Hague, where the OPCW is based.

In June 2018, the OPCW voted to expand its own powers, allowing itself to assign blame for a contravention of its regulations.

In November 2019, a unanimous agreement of OPCW member states allowed the addition of the Novichok agents to "list of controlled substances" of the CWC "in one of the first major changes to the treaty since it was agreed in the 1990s" in response to the 2018 poisonings in the UK.

Organisational structure

The activities of the OPCW and its core organisational structure are described in the Chemical Weapons Convention (whose members are all in OPCW). The principal body is the Conference of the States Parties (CSP), which normally is convened yearly, and in which all countries can participate, with equal voting rights. Countries are generally represented in the conference by a permanent representative to the organisation, which in most cases is also the ambassador to the Netherlands. The conference decides on all main topics regarding the organisation (for example, taking retaliation measures) and the convention (approving guidelines, imposing retaliating measures against members).

The Executive Council (EC) is the executive organ of the organisation and consists of 41 states parties, which are appointed by the conference on a two-year term. The council amongst others oversees the budget and cooperates with the General Secretariat on all matters related to the convention.

The Technical Secretariat (TS) applies most of the activities mandated by the council and is the body where most of the employees of the organisation work. The main activities of the OPCW are performed by the inspection and the verification divisions.

All states parties make contributions to the OPCW budget, based on a modified UN scale of assessments. The OPCW budget for 2020 is €70,958,760

Powers
The OPCW has the power to report on whether chemical weapons were used in an attack it has investigated.

"The OPCW has the power to send inspectors to any signatory country to search for evidence of production of banned chemicals. It also can send experts to help countries to investigate crime scenes where chemical agents may have been used."

In June 2018 following the Skripal poisoning the UK convinced other members despite the Russian opposition that the OPCW needed to grant itself new powers to assign blame for attacks. The vote was won by a margin of 82 to 24, which exceeded the two-thirds majority needed for the motion to pass.

Chemical weapons destruction facilities
At all operational chemical weapons destruction facilities, 24/7 inspections by the OPCW take place on site to verify the success of the destruction as well as the amounts of weapons being destroyed. In light of the hazardous environment in which the inspections take place, they are generally performed by evaluation via CCTV-systems.

Industry inspections
Inspections are designed to verify compliance of States Parties with the requirements imposed on production and use of scheduled chemicals and to verify that industrial activities of member states have been correctly declared according to the obligation set by the CWC. The intensity and frequency of the inspections is dependent on the type of chemical produced (in descending order: Schedule 1, Schedule 2, Schedule 3 or DOC, see Scheduled Chemicals), but is regardless of the standing of the member state. For Schedule 1 and 2 facilities, a mass balance is prepared to identify whether all produced chemicals can be accounted for and whether the amounts are consistent with the declarations made by member states. Furthermore, at Schedule 2 and 3 facilities clues are investigated whether, contrary to the declaration and to the rules in the convention, Schedule 1 chemicals are produced. At Schedule 3 and DOC, the main aim is to check the declaration and to verify the absence of Schedule 2 and Schedule 1 production units. The time limit Schedule 2 inspections is 96 hours while Schedule 3 and DOC inspections can take a maximum of 24 hours. There is no time limit on Schedule 1 inspections.

Challenge inspections and investigations of alleged use
In case of allegation of use of chemical weapons or the prohibited production, a fact-finding inspection can be employed according to the convention. None of those activities have taken place, although the OPCW contributed to investigations of alleged use of chemical weapons in Syria as part of a United Nations mission. The OPCW only undertakes these inspections on request of another member state, after verification of the presented proof. To avoid misuse, a majority of three-quarters can block a challenge inspection request.

Relations with the United Nations
While the OPCW is not a specialised agency of the United Nations, it cooperates both on policy and practical issues as a related organisation. On 7 September 2000, the OPCW and the United Nations signed a cooperation agreement outlining how they were to coordinate their activities. The inspectors furthermore travel on the United Nations Laissez-Passer in which a sticker is placed explaining their position, and privileges and immunities. The United Nations Regional Groups also operate at the OPCW to govern the rotations on the Executive Council and provide informal discussion platform.

Membership
All 193 parties to the Chemical Weapons Convention are automatically members of the OPCW. Other states which are eligible to become members are UN member states: Israel is a signatory state that has not ratified the Convention; and Egypt, North Korea and South Sudan, which have neither signed nor acceded to the Convention. Palestine was the most recent state to submit its instrument of accession to the Convention. On 21 April 2021, Syria was stripped of its voting rights at the OPCW after Syrian forces were found to have repeatedly used poison gas during the Syrian civil war. A two-thirds majority of members voted to immediately revoke Syria's privileges at the agency.

Leadership
The Organisation is currently led by Director-General Ambassador Fernando Arias of Spain.

The Director-General is directly appointed by the Conference for a maximum of two four-year terms. A historical list of Directors-General is shown below. The appointment of Ambassador Arias followed a consensus recommendation by the OPCW Executive Council in October 2017.

Ambassador Arias is a career diplomat with extensive experience in multilateral diplomacy. Previously, he served as Ambassador of Spain to the Netherlands and the Permanent Representative of Spain to the OPCW. He also has served as Permanent Representative of Spain to the United Nations in New York and Ambassador of Spain to Mali, Mauritania, former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, and Bulgaria.

Findings by the Administrative Tribunal of the International Labour Organization
In 2002, the United States convened an extraordinary session of the Conference of the States Parties of the OPCW to request the dismissal of José Bustani, then Director General of the OPCW. Bustani was dismissed following the vote, held on 22 April 2002, with 48 states voting in favor, 7 against and 43 abstaining. Subsequently, Bustani accused the United States of having provoked his impeachment because he had succeeded in convincing Saddam Hussein to ratify the Chemical Weapons Convention, which implied inspection of the Iraqi arsenal by OPCW investigators and would have thwarted the American plan of an invasion of Iraq. He also lodged a complaint before the Administrative Tribunal of the International Labour Organization, which, by a judgment of 16 July 2003, quashed the dismissal and condemned the OPCW to compensation for material and moral damage. Bustani did not seek to be reinstated in office.


text:
International Fund for Agricultural Development

The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD; Fonds international de développement agricole (FIDA)) is an international financial institution and a specialised agency of the United Nations that works to address poverty and hunger in rural areas of developing countries. It is the only multilateral development organization that focuses solely on rural economies and food security.

Headquartered in Rome, IFAD is involved in over 200 projects across nearly 100 countries. It funds and sponsors initiatives that improve land and water management, develop rural infrastructure, train and educate farmers in more efficient technologies, build up resilience against climate change, enhancing market accessibility, and more.

IFAD has 177 member states and works in partnership with the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and members of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). As of 2021, since its foundation, IFAD has provided US$23.2 billion in loans and grants and coordinated an addition US$31 billion in international and domestic co-financing.

History
IFAD was established as an international financial institution in 1977 through United Nations General Assembly Resolution 32/107 (30 December 1977) as one of the major outcomes of the 1974 World Food Conference. Its headquarters are in Rome, Italy, and it is a member of the United Nations Development Group. The current President of the IFAD is Alvaro Lario from Spain, who took over from Gilbert Houngbo in late 2022.


text:
Auger electron spectroscopy

Auger electron spectroscopy (AES; pronounced in French) is a common analytical technique used specifically in the study of surfaces and, more generally, in the area of materials science. It is a form of electron spectroscopy that relies on the Auger effect, based on the analysis of energetic electrons emitted from an excited atom after a series of internal relaxation events. The Auger effect was discovered independently by both Lise Meitner and Pierre Auger in the 1920s. Though the discovery was made by Meitner and initially reported in the journal Zeitschrift für Physik in 1922, Auger is credited with the discovery in most of the scientific community. Until the early 1950s Auger transitions were considered nuisance effects by spectroscopists, not containing much relevant material information, but studied so as to explain anomalies in X-ray spectroscopy data. Since 1953 however, AES has become a practical and straightforward characterization technique for probing chemical and compositional surface environments and has found applications in metallurgy, gas-phase chemistry, and throughout the microelectronics industry.

Electron transitions and the Auger effect
The Auger effect is an electronic process at the heart of AES resulting from the inter- and intrastate transitions of electrons in an excited atom. When an atom is probed by an external mechanism, such as a photon or a beam of electrons with energies in the range of several eV to 50 keV, a core state electron can be removed leaving behind a hole. As this is an unstable state, the core hole can be filled by an outer shell electron, whereby the electron moving to the lower energy level loses an amount of energy equal to the difference in orbital energies. The transition energy can be coupled to a second outer shell electron, which will be emitted from the atom if the transferred energy is greater than the orbital binding energy. An emitted electron will have a kinetic energy of:

 * $$E_{\text{kin}}=E_{\text{Core State}}-E_B-E_{C}'$$

where $$E_{\text{Core State}}$$, $$E_B$$, $$E_C'$$ are respectively the core level, first outer shell, and second outer shell electron binding energies (measured from the vacuum level) which are taken to be positive. The apostrophe (tic) denotes a slight modification to the binding energy of the outer shell electrons due to the ionized nature of the atom; often however, this energy modification is ignored in order to ease calculations. Since orbital energies are unique to an atom of a specific element, analysis of the ejected electrons can yield information about the chemical composition of a surface. Figure 1 illustrates two schematic views of the Auger process.

The types of state-to-state transitions available to electrons during an Auger event are dependent on several factors, ranging from initial excitation energy to relative interaction rates, yet are often dominated by a few characteristic transitions. Because of the interaction between an electron's spin and orbital angular momentum (spin-orbit coupling) and the concomitant energy level splitting for various shells in an atom, there are a variety of transition pathways for filling a core hole. Energy levels are labeled using a number of different schemes such as the j-j coupling method for heavy elements (Z ≥ 75), the Russell-Saunders L-S method for lighter elements (Z < 20), and a combination of both for intermediate elements. The j-j coupling method, which is historically linked to X-ray notation, is almost always used to denote Auger transitions. Thus for a $$KL_1L_{2,3}$$ transition, $$K$$ represents the core level hole, $$L_1$$ the relaxing electron's initial state, and $$L_{2,3}$$ the emitted electron's initial energy state. Figure 1(b) illustrates this transition with the corresponding spectroscopic notation. The energy level of the core hole will often determine which transition types will be favored. For single energy levels, i.e. K, transitions can occur from the L levels, giving rise to strong KLL type peaks in an Auger spectrum. Higher level transitions can also occur, but are less probable. For multi-level shells, transitions are available from higher energy orbitals (different n, ℓ quantum numbers) or energy levels within the same shell (same n, different ℓ number). The result are transitions of the type LMM and KLL along with faster Coster–Kronig transitions such as LLM. While Coster–Kronig transitions are faster, they are also less energetic and thus harder to locate on an Auger spectrum. As the atomic number Z increases, so too does the number of potential Auger transitions. Fortunately, the strongest electron-electron interactions are between levels that are close together, giving rise to characteristic peaks in an Auger spectrum. KLL and LMM peaks are some of the most commonly identified transitions during surface analysis. Finally, valence band electrons can also fill core holes or be emitted during KVV-type transitions.

Several models, both phenomenological and analytical, have been developed to describe the energetics of Auger transitions. One of the most tractable descriptions, put forth by Jenkins and Chung, estimates the energy of Auger transition ABC as:

 * $$E_{ABC}=E_A(Z)-0.5[E_B(Z)+E_B(Z+1)]-0.5[E_C(Z)+E_C(Z+1)]$$

$$E_i(Z)$$ are the binding energies of the $$i$$th level in element of atomic number Z and $$E_i(Z+1)$$ are the energies of the same levels in the next element up in the periodic table. While useful in practice, a more rigorous model accounting for effects such as screening and relaxation probabilities between energy levels gives the Auger energy as:

 * $$E_{ABC}=E_A-E_B-E_C-F(BC:x)+R_{xin}+R_{xex}$$

where $$F(BC:x)$$ is the energy of interaction between the B and C level holes in a final atomic state x and the R's represent intra- and extra-atomic transition energies accounting for electronic screening. Auger electron energies can be calculated based on measured values of the various $$E_i$$ and compared to peaks in the secondary electron spectrum in order to identify chemical species. This technique has been used to compile several reference databases used for analysis in current AES setups.

Instrumentation

Surface sensitivity in AES arises from the fact that emitted electrons usually have energies ranging from 50 eV to 3 keV and at these values, electrons have a short mean free path in a solid. The escape depth of electrons is therefore localized to within a few nanometers of the target surface, giving AES an extreme sensitivity to surface species. Because of the low energy of Auger electrons, most AES setups are run under ultra-high vacuum (UHV) conditions. Such measures prevent electron scattering off of residual gas atoms as well as the formation of a thin "gas (adsorbate) layer" on the surface of the specimen, which degrades analytical performance. A typical AES setup is shown schematically in figure 2. In this configuration, focused electrons are incident on a sample and emitted electrons are deflected into a cylindrical mirror analyzer (CMA). In the detection unit, Auger electrons are multiplied and the signal sent to data processing electronics. Collected Auger electrons are plotted as a function of energy against the broad secondary electron background spectrum. The detection unit and data processing electronics are collectively referred to as the electron energy analyzer.

Since the intensity of the Auger peaks may be small compared to the noise level of the background, AES is often run in a derivative mode that serves to highlight the peaks by modulating the electron collection current via a small applied AC voltage. Since this $$\Delta V=k\sin(\omega t)$$, the collection current becomes $$I(V+k\sin(\omega t))$$. Taylor expanding gives:

 * $$I(V+k\sin(\omega t))\approx I_0+I'(V+k\sin(\omega t))+O(I'')$$

Using the setup in figure 2, detecting the signal at frequency ω will give a value for $$I'$$ or $$\frac{dN}{dE}$$. Plotting in derivative mode also emphasizes Auger fine structure, which appear as small secondary peaks surrounding the primary Auger peak. These secondary peaks, not to be confused with high energy satellites, which are discussed later, arise from the presence of the same element in multiple different chemical states on a surface (i.e. Adsorbate layers) or from relaxation transitions involving valence band electrons of the substrate. Figure 3 illustrates a derivative spectrum from a copper nitride film clearly showing the Auger peaks. The peak in derivative mode is not the true Auger peak, but rather the point of maximum slope of N(E), but this concern is usually ignored.

Quantitative analysis
Semi-quantitative compositional and element analysis of a sample using AES is dependent on measuring the yield of Auger electrons during a probing event. Electron yield, in turn, depends on several critical parameters such as electron-impact cross-section and fluorescence yield. Since the Auger effect is not the only mechanism available for atomic relaxation, there is a competition between radiative and non-radiative decay processes to be the primary de-excitation pathway. The total transition rate, ω, is a sum of the non-radiative (Auger) and radiative (photon emission) processes. The Auger yield, $$\omega_A$$, is thus related to the fluorescence (x-ray) yield, $$\omega_X$$, by the relation,

 * $$\omega_A=1-\omega_X=1-\frac{W_X}{W_X+W_A}$$

where $$W_X$$ is the X-ray transition probability and $$W_A$$ is the Auger transition probability. Attempts to relate the fluorescence and Auger yields to atomic number have resulted in plots similar to figure 4. A clear transition from electron to photon emission is evident in this chart for increasing atomic number. For heavier elements, x-ray yield becomes greater than Auger yield, indicating an increased difficulty in measuring the Auger peaks for large Z-values. Conversely, AES is sensitive to the lighter elements, and unlike X-ray fluorescence, Auger peaks can be detected for elements as light as lithium (Z = 3). Lithium represents the lower limit for AES sensitivity since the Auger effect is a "three state" event necessitating at least three electrons. Neither H nor He can be detected with this technique. For K-level based transitions, Auger effects are dominant for Z < 15 while for L- and M-level transitions, AES data can be measured for Z ≤ 50. The yield limits effectively prescribe a cutoff for AES sensitivity, but complex techniques can be utilized to identify heavier elements, such as uranium and americium, using the Auger effect.

Another critical quantity that determines yield of Auger electrons at a detector is the electron impact cross-section. Early approximations (in cm2) of the cross-section were based on the work of Worthington and Tomlin,

 * $$\sigma_{ax}(E)=1.3\times10^{13}b\frac{C}{E_p}$$

with b acting as a scaling factor between 0.25 and 0.35, and C a function of the primary electron beam energy, $$E_p$$. While this value of $$\sigma_{ax}$$ is calculated for an isolated atom, a simple modification can be made to account for matrix effects:

 * $$\sigma (E)=\sigma_{ax}[1+r_m(E_p,\alpha)]$$

where α is the angle to the surface normal of the incident electron beam; rm can be established empirically and encompasses electron interactions with the matrix such as ionization due to backscattered electrons. Thus the total yield can be written as:
 * $$Y(t)=N_x \times \delta t \times \sigma (E,t )[1-\omega_X] \exp\left(-t\cos \frac{\theta}{\lambda}\right) \times I(t)\times T\times\frac{d(\Omega)}{4\pi}$$

Here Nx is the number of x atoms per volume, λ the electron escape depth, θ the analyzer angle, T the transmission of the analyzer, I(t) the electron excitation flux at depth t, dΩ the solid angle, and δt is the thickness of the layer being probed. Encompassed in these terms, especially the Auger yield, which is related to the transition probability, is the quantum mechanical overlap of the initial and final state wave functions. Precise expressions for the transition probability, based on first-order perturbation Hamiltonians, can be found in Thompson and Baker. Often, all of these terms are not known, so most analyses compare measured yields with external standards of known composition. Ratios of the acquired data to standards can eliminate common terms, especially experimental setup characteristics and material parameters, and can be used to determine element composition. Comparison techniques work best for samples of homogeneous binary materials or uniform surface layers, while elemental identification is best obtained from comparison of pure samples.

Uses
There are a number of electron microscopes that have been specifically designed for use in Auger spectroscopy; these are termed scanning Auger microscopes (SAMs) and can produce high resolution, spatially resolved chemical images. SAM images are obtained by stepping a focused electron beam across a sample surface and measuring the intensity of the Auger peak above the background of scattered electrons. The intensity map is correlated to a gray scale on a monitor with whiter areas corresponding to higher element concentration. In addition, sputtering is sometimes used with Auger spectroscopy to perform depth profiling experiments. Sputtering removes thin outer layers of a surface so that AES can be used to determine the underlying composition. Depth profiles are shown as either Auger peak height vs. sputter time or atomic concentration vs. depth. Precise depth milling through sputtering has made profiling an invaluable technique for chemical analysis of nanostructured materials and thin films. AES is also used extensively as an evaluation tool on and off fab lines in the microelectronics industry, while the versatility and sensitivity of the Auger process makes it a standard analytical tool in research labs. Theoretically, Auger spectra can also be utilized to distinguish between protonation states. When a molecule is protonated or deprotonated, the geometry and electronic structure is changed, and AES spectra reflect this. In general, as a molecule becomes more protonated, the ionization potentials increase and the kinetic energy of the emitted outer shell electrons decreases.

Despite the advantages of high spatial resolution and precise chemical sensitivity attributed to AES, there are several factors that can limit the applicability of this technique, especially when evaluating solid specimens. One of the most common limitations encountered with Auger spectroscopy are charging effects in non-conducting samples. Charging results when the number of secondary electrons leaving the sample is different from the number of incident electrons, giving rise to a net positive or negative electric charge at the surface. Both positive and negative surface charges severely alter the yield of electrons emitted from the sample and hence distort the measured Auger peaks. To complicate matters, neutralization methods employed in other surface analysis techniques, such as secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS), are not applicable to AES, as these methods usually involve surface bombardment with either electrons or ions (i.e. flood gun). Several processes have been developed to combat the issue of charging, though none of them is ideal and still make quantification of AES data difficult. One such technique involves depositing conductive pads near the analysis area to minimize regional charging. However, this type of approach limits SAM applications as well as the amount of sample material available for probing. A related technique involves thinning or "dimpling" a non-conductive layer with Ar+ ions and then mounting the sample to a conductive backing prior to AES. This method has been debated, with claims that the thinning process leaves elemental artifacts on a surface and/or creates damaged layers that distort bonding and promote chemical mixing in the sample. As a result, the compositional AES data is considered suspect. The most common setup to minimize charging effects includes use of a glancing angle (~10°) electron beam and a carefully tuned bombarding energy (between 1.5 keV and 3 keV). Control of both the angle and energy can subtly alter the number of emitted electrons vis-à-vis the incident electrons and thereby reduce or altogether eliminate sample charging.

In addition to charging effects, AES data can be obscured by the presence of characteristic energy losses in a sample and higher order atomic ionization events. Electrons ejected from a solid will generally undergo multiple scattering events and lose energy in the form of collective electron density oscillations called plasmons. If plasmon losses have energies near that of an Auger peak, the less intense Auger process may become dwarfed by the plasmon peak. As Auger spectra are normally weak and spread over many eV of energy, they are difficult to extract from the background and in the presence of plasmon losses; deconvolution of the two peaks becomes extremely difficult. For such spectra, additional analysis through chemical sensitive surface techniques like x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) is often required to disentangle the peaks. Sometimes an Auger spectrum can also exhibit "satellite" peaks at well-defined off-set energies from the parent peak. Origin of the satellites is usually attributed to multiple ionization events in an atom or ionization cascades in which a series of electrons is emitted as relaxation occurs for core holes of multiple levels. The presence of satellites can distort the true Auger peak and/or small peak shift information due to chemical bonding at the surface. Several studies have been undertaken to further quantify satellite peaks.

Despite these sometimes substantial drawbacks, Auger electron spectroscopy is a widely used surface analysis technique that has been successfully applied to many diverse fields ranging from gas phase chemistry to nanostructure characterization. A new class of high-resolving electrostatic energy analyzers, face-field analyzers (FFA) can be used for remote electron spectroscopy of distant surfaces or surfaces with large roughness or even with deep dimples. These instruments are designed as if to be specifically used in combined scanning electron microscopes (SEMs). "FFA" in principle have no perceptible end-fields, which usually distort focusing in most of analysers known, for example, well known CMA.

title: Auger electron spectroscopy


text:
User:Jan Hidders

Jan Hidders got his PhD at Eindhoven University of Technology and, after a period as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Antwerp, took a teaching position at Delft University of Technology.

He very much likes the idea of a public domain encyclopedia but found that Everything2 had some minor points:
 * 1) too many features
 * 2) more than one write-up per node
 * 3) the contents are not public.

Jan plans to contribute something in the future although he hasn't really found anything yet to contribute. :-} His main interests are Computer science, Mathematics and Philosophy. Rumors have it that he is even prepared to do some research in order to be able to add something to Wikipedia.

 * Home Page: http://www.win.ua.ac.be/~hidders/
 * My own little Sandbox
 * My Todo list
 * Wikipedia Syntax
 * A proposal for HTML-free mark-up.

Welcome, Jan! Very nice work on the logic articles! --User:LMS
 * Thank you. Very nice to hear. Maybe even a little too nice, because such appreciation may tempt me to spend more time on Wikipedia than I had planned. :-) --User:Jan Hidders
 * Aha, you have discovered my evil plot! ;-) --User:LMS

Hey Jan, congratulations. Get yourself a nice t-shirt with "Trust me. I'm a doctor." on it. It works. Trust me. --AxelBoldt
 * *Big grin* Thank you. But to be honest, although I'm already hired, the Ph.D. ceremony (a big thing in the Netherlands) will take place in December. But then I will get the t-shirt. :-) In the meantime I'm going to see if I can write something in Wikipedia on database theory, which is my real area of expertise. -- Jan Hidders

I disagree with you regarding removing HTML markup from Wikipedia. There are 2 main reasons:

 * 1) HTML is a World standard, even if no browser that I am aware of completely supports it. However, this does give users (e.g. me) a chance to develop articles off-line, previewing them in their browsers, before uploading them later (copy+paste!).
 * 2) HTML syntax, with syntactical elements all delimited by < > is probably easier to parse than the multiple character markup you propose.

I am considering expending effort on (n/t/g)roff macros to enable the same source file to be used to generate PostScript or HTML... Rcingham

 * First, let me reassure you, the issue is as dead as a Dodo if only because far too much HTML has now been allowed already and it will be nearly impossible to come up with a reasonable Wiki-markup to replace it. However, I still feel that allowing HTML tags is probably one of the biggest mistakes in the history of Wikipedia. Let me give you a short summary of the arguments. (1) HTML tags make Wikipedia less accessible. The whole reason that the WikiWiki concept and its mark-up was introduced when HTML was already around was because HTML can actually get quite complicated and is not trivial to understand for people who aren't used to programming and/or creating web pages. If you're interested read the excellent book written by the originator of the WikiWiki idea: Ward Cunningham on what makes WikiWiki tick. The key word is simplicity. (2) HTML tags make parsing harder. The original wiki mark-up could be parsed with some simple regular expression matching but since HTML tags can be nested you need more complex code for this because you now need something closer to a parser for a context-free grammar. If we had no HTML tags we also wouldn't have to bother about filtering out unwanted tags or checking if the present HTML is well-formed. It would have kept the parsing code simpeler, less buggier, and more efficient. Your assumption that HTML tags are easier to parse may be true, but parsing a HTML document is another matter. If you don't believe me, try coming up with a context-free grammar for the syntax and semantics of the pages of Wikipedia. That's still something that needs to be done. (3) There are some other small things such as that having two mark-ups for the same thing can be confusing (it makes people wonder what the difference is between === and <h3> ) but the first two points are really the most important ones. -- Jan Hidders 13:44 Jul 23, 2002 (PDT)

Thanks for your comments, two years late... -- Leandro Dutra.

Main namespace cleanup
Heya, I've moved Jan Hidders/todo to User:Jan Hidders/old-todo. There's some edit history, so perhaps you want to keep it. Otherwise just delete it (or ask an admin to do so). --fvw *  20:02, 2004 Dec 14 (UTC)

title: User:Jan Hidders


text:
P. J. O'Rourke

Patrick Jake O'Rourke (November 14, 1947 – February 15, 2022) was an American author, journalist, and political satirist who wrote twenty-two books on subjects as diverse as politics, cars, etiquette, and economics. Parliament of Whores and Give War a Chance both reached No. 1 on The New York Times bestseller list.

After beginning his career writing for the National Lampoon, O'Rourke went on to serve as foreign affairs desk chief for Rolling Stone where he reported from far-flung places. Later he wrote for a number of publications, including The Atlantic, the Daily Beast, the Wall Street Journal, and the Weekly Standard, and was a longtime panelist on NPR's Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me!.

The Forbes Media Guide Five Hundred, 1994 states, "O'Rourke's original reporting, irreverent humor, and crackerjack writing makes for delectable reading. He never minces words or pulls his punches, whatever the subject."

Life and career
O'Rourke was born in Toledo, Ohio, the son of Delphine (née Loy), a housewife, and Clifford Bronson O'Rourke, a car salesman. O'Rourke had Irish ancestry that traces back to County Roscommon. He graduated from Toledo's DeVilbiss High School in 1965, received his undergraduate degree from Miami University in 1969 and earned a Master of Arts in English at Johns Hopkins University. Many of O'Rourke's essays recount that during his student days he was a leftist, anti-war hippie, but that in the 1970s his political views underwent a volte-face. He emerged as a political observer and humorist rooted in libertarian conservatism.

O'Rourke wrote articles for several publications, including "A.J. at N.Y.U." for The Rip Off Review of Western Culture, an underground magazine/comic book, in 1972, as well as pieces for the Baltimore underground newspaper Harry and the New York Ace, before joining National Lampoon in 1973, where he served as editor-in-chief, among other roles, and authored articles such as "Foreigners Around the World" and "How to Drive Fast on Drugs While Getting Your Wing-Wang Squeezed and Not Spill Your Drink".

O'Rourke received a writing credit for National Lampoon's Lemmings which helped launch the careers of Chevy Chase and Christopher Guest. He also co-wrote National Lampoon's 1964 High School Yearbook with Douglas Kenney. This inspired the cult comedy, Animal House, which launched the career of John Belushi.

Going freelance in 1981, O'Rourke had his work published in Playboy, Vanity Fair, Car and Driver, and Rolling Stone. He became foreign-affairs desk chief at Rolling Stone, where he remained until 2001. In 1996, he served as the conservative commentator in the point-counterpoint segment of 60 Minutes. During the Bosnian genocide, O'Rourke referred to the American public's lack of interest in Bosnia as a way to joke about "the unspellables killing the unpronounceables".

O'Rourke published over 20 books, including three New York Times bestsellers. Parliament of Whores and Give War a Chance reached No. 1 on The New York Times Best Seller list. He also wrote Modern Manners and Holidays in Hell. O'Rourke was a "Real Time Real Reporter" for Real Time with Bill Maher covering the 2008 presidential election. In the UK, he was known as the face of a long-running series of television advertisements for British Airways in the 1990s.

O'Rourke also worked on screenplays in Hollywood, including Rodney Dangerfield's Easy Money.

In 2009, O'Rourke described the nascent presidency of Barack Obama as "the Carter administration in better sweaters". However, in 2016, he endorsed presidential candidate Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump. O'Rourke stated that his endorsement included her "lies and empty promises" and added "She's wrong about absolutely everything, but she's wrong within normal parameters".

Personal life
From 1990 to 1993, O'Rourke was married to Amy Lumet, a daughter of movie director Sidney Lumet and a granddaughter of Lena Horne. In 1995, he married Tina Mallon; they had three children: daughters Elizabeth and Olivia and son Clifford. In an interview with the New Statesman published in January 2012, O'Rourke said, "Despite my name, I wasn't raised a Catholic. My mother was a Protestant, of a traditional American, vague kind: she belonged to the church that the nice people in the neighbourhood went to. My wife is a Catholic, the kids are Catholic, so I'm a Catholic fellow-traveller."

In September 2008, O'Rourke announced that he had been diagnosed with treatable rectal cancer, from which he expected "a 95% chance of survival". O'Rourke died from lung cancer at his home in Sharon, New Hampshire, on February 15, 2022, at the age of 74.

Writing
O'Rourke was a proponent of gonzo journalism; one of his earliest and best-regarded pieces was "How to Drive Fast on Drugs While Getting Your Wing-Wang Squeezed and Not Spill Your Drink", a National Lampoon article in March 1979. The article was republished in two of his books, Republican Party Reptile (1987) and Driving Like Crazy (2009).

O'Rourke's best-received book is Parliament of Whores, subtitled A Lone Humorist Attempts to Explain the Entire U.S. Government, whose main argument, according to the author, "is that politics are boring". He described himself as a libertarian.

O'Rourke typed his manuscripts on an IBM Selectric typewriter, though he denied being a Luddite, asserting that his short attention span would have made focusing on writing on a computer difficult.

title: P. J. O'Rourke


text:
Talk:P. J. O'Rourke

code error
date of death isn't showing in introduction. uses "is" instead of "was". 2600:1007:B023:7F89:606D:F755:3C04:5940 (talk) 17:26, 16 February 2022 (UTC)

title: Talk:P. J. O'Rourke


text:
Gossypium

Gossypium is a genus of flowering plants in the tribe Gossypieae of the mallow family, Malvaceae, from which cotton is harvested. It is native to tropical and subtropical regions of the Old and New Worlds. There are about 50 Gossypium species, making it the largest genus in the tribe Gossypieae, and new species continue to be discovered. The name of the genus is derived from the Arabic word goz, which refers to a soft substance.

Cotton is the primary natural fibre used by humans today, amounting to about 80% of world natural fibre production. Where cotton is cultivated, it is a major oilseed crop and a main protein source for animal feed. Cotton is thus of great importance for agriculture, industry and trade, especially for tropical and subtropical countries in Africa, South America and Asia. Consequently, the genus Gossypium has long attracted the attention of scientists.

The origin of the genus Gossypium is dated to around 5–10 million years ago. Gossypium species are distributed in arid to semiarid regions of the tropics and subtropics. Generally shrubs or shrub-like plants, the species of this genus are extraordinarily diverse in morphology and adaptation, ranging from fire-adapted, herbaceous perennials in Australia to trees in Mexico. Most wild cottons are diploid, but a group of five species from America and Pacific islands are tetraploid, apparently due to a single hybridization event around 1.5 to 2 million years ago. The tetraploid species are G. hirsutum, G. tomentosum, G. mustelinum, G. barbadense, and G. darwinii.

Cultivated cottons are perennial shrubs, most often grown as annuals. Plants are 1–2 m high in modern cropping systems, sometimes higher in traditional, multiannual cropping systems, now largely disappearing. The leaves are broad and lobed, with three to five (or rarely seven) lobes. The seeds are contained in a capsule called a "boll", each seed surrounded by fibres of two types. These fibres are the more commercially interesting part of the plant and they are separated from the seed by a process called ginning. At the first ginning, the longer fibres, called staples, are removed and these are twisted together to form yarn for making thread and weaving into high quality textiles. At the second ginning, the shorter fibres, called "linters", are removed, and these are woven into lower quality textiles (which include the eponymous lint). Commercial species of cotton plant are G. hirsutum (97% of world production), G. barbadense (1–2%), G. arboreum and G. herbaceum (together, ~1%). Many varieties of cotton have been developed by selective breeding and hybridization of these species. Experiments are ongoing to cross-breed various desirable traits of wild cotton species into the principal commercial species, such as resistance to insects and diseases, and drought tolerance. Cotton fibres occur naturally in colours of white, brown, green, and some mixing of these.

Subgenus Gossypium

 * Gossypium anomalum Wawra & Peyr.
 * Gossypium arboreum L. – tree cotton (India and Pakistan)
 * Gossypium herbaceum L. – Levant cotton (southern Africa and the Arabian Peninsula)

Subgenus Houzingenia

 * Gossypium raimondii Ulbr. – one of the putative progenitor species of tetraploid cotton, alongside G. arboreum
 * Gossypium thurberi Tod. – Arizona wild cotton (Arizona and northern Mexico)

Subgenus Karpas

 * Gossypium barbadense L. – Creole cotton/Sea Island Cotton (tropical South America)
 * Gossypium darwinii G.Watt – Darwin's cotton (Galápagos Islands)
 * Gossypium hirsutum L. – upland cotton (Central America, Mexico, the Caribbean and southern Florida)
 * Gossypium mustelinum Miers ex G.Watt
 * Gossypium tomentosum Nutt. ex Seem – Maʻo or Hawaiian cotton (Hawaii)

Subgenus Sturtia

 * Gossypium australe F.Muell (northwestern Australia)
 * Gossypium sturtianum J.H. Willis – Sturt's desert rose (Australia)

Formerly placed in genus Gossypium

 * Gossypioides brevilanatum (Hochr.) J.B.Hutch. (as G. brevilanatum Hochr. )
 * Gossypioides kirkii (Mast.) J.B.Hutch. (as Gossypium kirkii Mast. )
 * Kokia drynarioides (Seem.) Lewton (as G. drynarioides Seem. )

Gossypium genome
A public genome sequencing effort of cotton was initiated in 2007 by a consortium of public researchers. They agreed on a strategy to sequence the genome of cultivated, allotetraploid cotton. "Allotetraploid" means that the genomes of these cotton species comprise two distinct subgenomes, referred to as the At and Dt (the 't' for tetraploid, to distinguish them from the A and D genomes of the related diploid species). The strategy is to sequence first the D-genome relative of allotetraploid cottons, G. raimondii, a wild South American (Peru, Ecuador) cotton species, because of its smaller size due essentially to less repetitive DNA (retrotransposons mainly). It has nearly one-third the number of bases of tetraploid cotton (AD), and each chromosome is only present once. The A genome of G. arboreum, the 'Old-World' cotton species (grown in India in particular), would be sequenced next. Its genome is roughly twice the size of G. raimondii's. Once both A and D genome sequences are assembled, then research could begin to sequence the actual genomes of tetraploid cultivated cotton varieties. This strategy is out of necessity; if one were to sequence the tetraploid genome without model diploid genomes, the euchromatic DNA sequences of the AD genomes would co-assemble and the repetitive elements of AD genomes would assemble independently into A and D sequences, respectively. Then there would be no way to untangle the mess of AD sequences without comparing them to their diploid counterparts.

The public sector effort continues with the goal to create a high-quality, draft genome sequence from reads generated by all sources. The public-sector effort has generated Sanger reads of BACs, fosmids, and plasmids, as well as 454 reads. These later types of reads will be instrumental in assembling an initial draft of the D genome. In 2010, two companies (Monsanto and Illumina), completed enough Illumina sequencing to cover the D genome of G. raimondii about 50x. They announced they would donate their raw reads to the public. This public relations effort gave them some recognition for sequencing the cotton genome. Once the D genome is assembled from all of this raw material, it will undoubtedly assist in the assembly of the AD genomes of cultivated varieties of cotton, but a lot of hard work remains.

Pests

 * Boll weevil, Anthonomus grandis
 * Cotton aphid, Aphis gossypii
 * Cotton stainer, Dysdercus koenigii
 * Cotton bollworm, Helicoverpa zea, and native budworm, Helicoverpa punctigera, are caterpillars that damage cotton crops.
 * Some other Lepidoptera (butterfly and moth) larvae also feed on cotton – see list of Lepidoptera that feed on cotton plants.
 * Green mirid (Creontiades dilutus), a sucking insect
 * Spider mites, Tetranychus urticae, T. ludeni and T. lambi
 * Thrips, Thrips tabaci and Frankliniella schultzei

Diseases

 * Alternaria leaf spot, caused by Alternaria macrospora and Alternaria alternata
 * Anthracnose boll rot, caused by Colletotrichum gossypii
 * Black root rot, caused by the fungus Thielaviopsis basicola
 * Blight caused by Xanthomonas campestris pv. malvacearum
 * Fusarium boll rot caused by Fusarium spp.
 * Phytophthora boll rot, caused by Phytophthora nicotianae var. parasitica''
 * Sclerotinia boll rot, caused by the fungus Sclerotinia sclerotiorum
 * Stigmatomycosis, caused by the fungi Ashbya gossypii, Eremothecium coryli, (Nematospora coryli) and Aureobasidium pullulans

title: Gossypium


text:
ICRM

ICRM may refer to:

 * International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement, an international humanitarian movement
 * International Cliff Richard Movement, a fan club for English musician Cliff Richard
 * Institute of Certified Records Managers, a certifying body in the Records Management and Information Governance industry

title: ICRM


text:
Henry Dunant

Henry Dunant (born Jean-Henri Dunant; 8 May 1828 –30 October 1910), also known as Henri Dunant, was a Swiss Christian, humanitarian, businessman, social activist, and co-founder of the Red Cross. His humanitarian efforts won him the first Nobel Peace Prize in 1901.

Dunant was born in Geneva to a devout Calvinist family and had business interests in French Algeria and Tunisia. In 1859, while on his way to petition Napoleon III, he witnessed the aftermath of the Battle of Solferino in northern Italy. Horrified by the suffering of the wounded and the lack of care they received, Dunant took the initiative to organize the local population in providing aid for the soldiers. After returning to Geneva, he recorded his experiences in the book A Memory of Solferino, in which he advocated the formation of an organization that would provide relief for the wounded without discrimination in times of war. In February 1863, Dunant was a member of a five-person committee that sought to put his plan into action, which in effect founded the organization that would become the International Committee of the Red Cross. A year later, he took part in a diplomatic conference organized by the Swiss government that led to the signing of the First Geneva Convention.

Dunant became embroiled in a business scandal in 1867 which resulted in his bankruptcy and expulsion from the International Committee. He spent the next decades in poverty and obscurity, living in various places across Europe before settling in the Swiss village of Heiden. In 1895, Dunant was rediscovered by a journalist, which brought him renewed attention and support, and in 1901 he was awarded the first Nobel Peace Prize alongside French pacifist Frédéric Passy. He died in Heiden in 1910.

Early life and education
Dunant was born in Geneva, Switzerland, in 1828 as the first son of businessman Jean-Jacques Dunant and Antoinette Dunant-Colladon. His family was devoutly Calvinist and had significant influence in Geneva society. His parents stressed the value of social work, and his father was active helping orphans and parolees, while his mother worked with the sick and the poor.

Dunant grew up during the period of religious awakening known as the Réveil, and at age 18 he joined the Geneva Society for Alms giving. In the following year, together with friends, he founded the so-called "Thursday Association", a loose band of young men that met to study the Bible and help the poor, and he spent much of his free time engaged in prison visits and social work. On 30 November 1852, he founded the Geneva chapter of the YMCA and three years later he took part in the Paris meeting devoted to the founding of its international organization.

In 1849, at age 21, Dunant left the Collège de Genève due to poor grades and began an apprenticeship with the money-changing firm Lullin et Sautter. After its successful conclusion, he stayed as an employee of the bank.

Algeria
In 1853, Dunant visited Algeria, Tunisia, and Sicily, on assignment with a company devoted to the "colonies of Setif" (Compagnie genevoise des Colonies de Sétif). Despite little experience, he successfully fulfilled the assignment. Inspired by the trip, he wrote his first book with the title An Account of the Regency in Tunis (Notice sur la Régence de Tunis), published in 1858.

In 1856, he created a business to operate in foreign colonies, and, after being granted a land concession by French-occupied Algeria, a corn-growing and trading company called the Financial and Industrial Company of Mons-Djémila Mills (Société financière et industrielle des Moulins des Mons-Djémila). However, the land and water rights were not clearly assigned, and the colonial authorities were not especially cooperative. As a result, in 1859 Dunant decided to appeal directly to French emperor Napoléon III, who was with his army in Lombardy at the time. France was fighting on the side of Piedmont-Sardinia against Austria in the Austro-Sardinian War. Napoleon's headquarters were located in the small city of Solferino. Dunant wrote a flattering book full of praise for Napoleon III with the intention to present it to the emperor, and then traveled to Solferino to meet with him personally.

Battle of Solferino
Dunant arrived in Solferino on the evening of 24 June 1859, on the same day a battle between the two sides had occurred nearby. Forty thousand wounded, dying and dead remained on the battlefield, and there appeared to be little attempt to provide care. Shocked, Dunant himself took the initiative to organize the civilian population, especially the women and girls, to provide assistance to the injured and sick soldiers. They lacked sufficient materials and supplies, and Dunant himself organized the purchase of needed materials and helped erect makeshift hospitals. He convinced the population to service the wounded without regard to their side in the conflict as per the slogan "Tutti fratelli" (All are brothers) coined by the women of nearby city Castiglione delle Stiviere. He also succeeded in gaining the release of Austrian doctors captured by the French and British.

Red Cross founding history
After returning to Geneva early in July, Dunant decided to write a book about his experiences, which he titled Un Souvenir de Solferino (A Memory of Solferino). It was published in 1862 in an edition of 1,600 copies and was printed at Dunant's own expense. In the book, he described the battle, its costs, and the chaotic circumstances afterwards. He also developed the idea that in the future a neutral organization should exist to provide care to wounded soldiers. He distributed the book to many leading political and military figures in Europe.

Dunant also began to travel through Europe to promote his ideas. His book was largely positively received, and the President of the Geneva Society for Public Welfare, jurist Gustave Moynier, made the book and its suggestions the topic of the 9 February 1863 meeting of the organization. Dunant's recommendations were examined and positively assessed by the members. They created a five-person Committee to further pursue the possibility of their implementation and made Dunant one of the members. The others were Moynier, the Swiss army general Henri Dufour, and doctors Louis Appia and Théodore Maunoir. Their first meeting on 17 February 1863 is now considered the founding date of the International Committee of the Red Cross.

From early on, Moynier and Dunant had increasing disagreements and conflicts regarding their respective visions and plans. Moynier considered Dunant's idea to establish neutrality protections for care providers unfeasible and advised Dunant not to insist upon this concept. However, Dunant continued to advocate this position in his travels and conversations with high-ranking political and military figures. This intensified the personal conflict between Moynier, who took a rather pragmatic approach to the project, and Dunant, who was the idealist among the five.

In October 1863, 14 states took part in a meeting in Geneva organized by the committee to discuss the improvement of care for wounded soldiers. Dunant was a protocol leader during the meeting. A year later on 22 August 1864, a diplomatic conference organized by the Swiss government led to the signing of the First Geneva Convention by 12 states. Dunant was in charge of organizing accommodation for the attendees.

Forgotten period
Dunant's businesses in Algeria had suffered. In April 1867, the bankruptcy of the financial firm Crédit Genevois led to a scandal involving Dunant. He declared bankruptcy. The social outcry in Geneva, a city deeply rooted in Calvinist traditions, also led to calls for him to separate himself from the International Committee. Already on 25 August 1867, he resigned as Secretary and, on 8 September 1867, he was fully removed from the committee. Dunant was condemned by the Geneva Trade Court on 17 August 1868 for deceptive practices in the bankruptcies. Due to their investments in the firm, his family and many of his friends were also heavily affected by the downfall of the company.

In February 1868, Dunant's mother died. Later that year he was expelled from the YMCA because he was the Geneva founder of it and they felt his business failure tainted the group. In March 1867, he left his home city Geneva and would not return for the rest of his life. In the following years, Moynier likely used his influence to attempt to ensure that Dunant would not receive assistance and support from his friends. For example, the gold medal prize of Sciences Morales at the Paris World's Fair did not go to Dunant as originally planned but to Moynier, Dufour, and Dunant together so that the prize money would only go to the committee as a whole. Napoléon III's offer to take over half of Dunant's debts if Dunant's friends would secure the other half was also thwarted by Moynier's efforts.

Dunant moved to Paris, where he lived in meagre conditions. However, he continued to pursue his humanitarian ideas and plans. During the Franco-Prussian War (1870–1871), he founded the Common Relief Society (Allgemeine Fürsorgegesellschaft) and soon after the Common Alliance for Order and Civilisation (Allgemeine Allianz für Ordnung und Zivilisation). He argued for disarmament negotiations and for the erection of an international court to mediate international conflicts. Later he worked for the creation of a world library, an idea which had echoes in future projects such as UNESCO.

In his continued pursuit and advocacy of his ideas, he further neglected his personal situation and income, falling further in debt and being shunned by his acquaintances. Despite being appointed an honorary member of the national Red Cross societies of Austria, the Netherlands, Sweden, Prussia and Spain, he was nearly forgotten in the official discourse of the Red Cross Movement, even as it was rapidly expanding to new countries. He lived in poverty, moving to various places between 1874 and 1886, including Stuttgart, Rome, Corfu, Basel, and Karlsruhe. In Stuttgart he met the Tübingen University student Rudolf Müller with whom he would have a close friendship. In 1881, together with friends from Stuttgart, he went to the small Swiss resort village Heiden for the first time. In 1887 while living in London, he began to receive some monthly financial support from some distant family members. This enabled him to live a somewhat more secure existence, and he moved to Heiden in July. He spent the rest of his life there, and after 30 April 1892 he lived in a hospital and nursing home led by Dr. Hermann Altherr.

In Heiden, he met the young teacher Wilhelm Sonderegger and his wife Susanna; they encouraged him to record his life experiences. Sonderegger's wife founded a branch of the Red Cross in Heiden and in 1890 Dunant became its honorary president. With Sonderegger, Dunant hoped to further promote his ideas, including publishing a new edition of his book. However, their friendship later was strained by Dunant's unjustified accusations that Sonderegger, with Moynier in Geneva, was somehow conspiring against Dunant. Sonderegger died in 1904 at age 42. Despite their strained relationship, Dunant was deeply moved by the unexpected death. Wilhelm and Susanna Sonderegger's admiration for Dunant, felt by both even after Dunant's allegations, was passed on to their children. In 1935, their son René published a compilation of letters from Dunant to his father.

Return to public memory
In September 1895, Georg Baumberger, the chief editor of the St. Gall newspaper Die Ostschweiz, wrote an article about the Red Cross founder, whom he had met and conversed with during a walk in Heiden a month earlier. The article entitled "Henri Dunant, the founder of the Red Cross", appeared in the German Illustrated Magazine Über Land und Meer, and the article was soon reprinted in other publications throughout Europe. The article struck a chord, and he received renewed attention and support. He received the Swiss Binet-Fendt Prize and a note from Pope Leo XIII. Because of support from Russian tsarist widow Maria Feodorovna and other donations, his financial situation improved remarkably.

In 1897, Rudolf Müller, who was now working as a teacher in Stuttgart, wrote a book about the origins of the Red Cross, altering the official history to stress Dunant's role. The book also contained the text of A Memory of Solferino. Dunant began an exchange of correspondence with Bertha von Suttner and wrote numerous articles and writings. He was especially active in writing about women's rights, and in 1897 facilitated the founding of a "Green Cross" women's organization whose only section was briefly active in Brussels.

Nobel Peace Prize
In 1901, Dunant was awarded the first-ever Nobel Peace Prize for his role in founding the International Red Cross Movement and initiating the Geneva Convention. By public and private means, Müller, and later Norwegian military physician Hans Daae (who had received a copy of Müller's book), advocated Dunant's case to the Nobel committee over the course of 4 years. The award was jointly given to French pacifist Frédéric Passy, founder of the Peace League and active with Dunant in the Alliance for Order and Civilization. The official congratulations which he received from the International Committee finally represented the rehabilitation of Dunant's reputation:

"'There is no man who more deserves this honour, for it was you, forty years ago, who set on foot the international organization for the relief of the wounded on the battlefield. Without you, the Red Cross, the supreme humanitarian achievement of the nineteenth century would probably have never been undertaken.'"

Moynier and the International Committee as a whole had also been nominated for the prize. Although Dunant was supported by a broad spectrum in the selection process, he was still a controversial candidate. Some argued that the Red Cross and the Geneva Convention had made war more attractive and imaginable by eliminating some of its suffering. Therefore, Müller, in a letter to the committee, argued that the prize should be divided between Dunant and Passy, who for some time in the debate had been the leading candidate to be the sole recipient of the prize. Müller also suggested that if a prize were to be warranted for Dunant, it should be given immediately because of his advanced age and ill health.

By dividing the prize between Passy, a pacifist, and Dunant, a humanitarian, the Nobel Committee set a precedent for the conditions of the Nobel Peace Prize selection which would have significant consequences in later years. A section of Nobel's will had indicated that the prize should go to an individual who had worked to reduce or eliminate standing armies, or directly to promote peace conferences, which made Passy a natural choice for his peace work. On the other hand, the arguably distinct bestowal for humanitarian effort alone was seen by some as a wide interpretation of Nobel's will. However, another part of Nobel's testament marked the prize for the individual who had best enhanced the "brotherhood of people," which could be interpreted more generally as seeing humanitarian work like Dunant's as connected to peacemaking as well. Many recipients of the Nobel Peace Prize in later years can be assigned to either of these two categories first roughly established by the Nobel committee's decision in 1901.

Hans Daae succeeded in placing Dunant's part of the prize money, 104,000 Swiss Francs, in a Norwegian Bank and preventing access by his creditors. Dunant himself never spent any of the money during his lifetime, continuing to live simply and reserving it for bequests in his will to those who cared for him and charitable causes.

Death and legacy
Among several other awards in the following years, in 1903 Dunant was given an honorary doctorate by the medical faculty of the University of Heidelberg. He lived in the nursing home in Heiden until his death. In the final years of his life, he suffered from depression and paranoia about pursuit by his creditors and Moynier. There were even days when Dunant insisted that the cook of the nursing home first taste his food before his eyes to protect him against possible poisoning. In his final years, he spurned and attacked Calvinism and organized religion generally. He was said to be agnostic.

According to his nurses, the final act of his life was to send a copy of Müller's book to the Italian queen with a personal dedication. He died on 30 October 1910, and his final words were "Where has humanity gone?"

According to his wishes, he was buried without ceremony in the Sihlfeld Cemetery in Zürich. In his will, he donated funds to secure a "free bed" in the Heiden nursing home always to be available for a poor citizen of the region and deeded some money to friends and charitable organizations in Norway and Switzerland. The remaining funds went to his creditors partially relieving his debt; his inability to fully erase his debts was a major burden to him until his death.

His birthday, 8 May, is celebrated as the World Red Cross and Red Crescent Day. The former nursing home in Heiden now houses the Henry Dunant Museum. In Geneva and other places there are numerous streets, squares, and schools named after him. The Henry Dunant Medal, awarded every two years by the standing commission of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement is its highest decoration.

His life is represented, with some fictional elements, in the film D'homme à hommes (1948), starring Jean-Louis Barrault, and the period of his life when the Red Cross was founded in the international film coproduction Henry Dunant: Red on the Cross (2006). In 2010 the Takarazuka Revue staged a musical based on his time in Solferino and the founding of the Red Cross entitled Dawn at Solferino, or Where has Humanity Gone?.
 * In honor of Henry Dunant, the second highest peak in Switzerland was renamed from Ostspitze to Dunantspitze (Peak Dunant ) by Swiss Federal President Didier Burkhalter on 6 October 2014.
 * Henry Dunant Hospital is a general hospital in Athens, Greece.
 * The road where the headquarters of the Thai Red Cross Society is located is named Henri Dunant Road.
 * In 2020 a submarine internet cable named Dunant was laid between Virginia Beach, (United States) and Saint-Hilaire-de-Riez, (France) financed by two private firms

Cultural depictions

 * Henry Dunant: Red on the Cross (fr. Henry Dunant: Rouge sur la Croix), 2006. French/Swiss/Austria co-production starring Thomas Jouannet written by Claude-Michel Rome directed by Dominique Othenin-Girard.
 * Man to Men (fr. D'homme à hommes) a 1948 French-Swiss historical drama film directed by Christian-Jaque and starring Jean-Louis Barrault, Bernard Blier and Hélène Perdrière.

English books

 * online review
 * online
 * online review
 * online

title: Henry Dunant


text:
Sports governing body

A sports governing body is a sports organization that has a regulatory or sanctioning function.

Sports governing bodies come in various forms and have a variety of regulatory functions, including disciplinary action for rule infractions and deciding on rule changes in the sport that they govern. Governing bodies have different scopes. They may cover a range of sport at an internationally acceptable level, such as the International Olympic Committee and the International Paralympic Committee, or only a single sport at a national level, such as the Rugby Football League. National bodies will largely have to be affiliated with international bodies for the same sport. The first international federations were formed at the end of the 20th century.

Types of sports governing bodies
Every sport has a different governing body that can define the way that the sport operates through its affiliated clubs and societies. This is because sports have different levels of difficulty and skill, so they can try to organize the people playing their sport by ability and by age. The different types of sport governing bodies are all shown below:

International sports federations
International sports federations are non-governmental non-profit organizations for a given sport (or a group of similar sport disciplines, such as aquatics or skiing) and administers its sport at the highest level. These federations work to create a common set of rules, promote their sport, and organize international competitions. International sports federations represent their sport at the Olympic level where applicable.

About 30 international sport federations are located in Switzerland, with about 20 or so in the Lausanne area, where the International Olympic Committee is located.

International federations for sports that do not participate in the Olympic Games are managed by equivalent organisations to the International Olympic Committee, such as the Global Association of International Sports Federations.

International federations are typically organized with legislative and executive branches at the top. The legislative body is usually referred to as a congress or general assembly of the international federation and is responsible for defining its sports policies. It consists of all of the national federations, each of which receives one vote. On the other hand, the executive branch, which is often referred to as the council or executive committee, consists of elected members by the legislative branch and is responsible for directing, managing, and representing their federation.

Trusts
Trusts are organizations or groups that have control over the money that will be used to help someone else, such as the Youth Sport Trust.

National governing bodies
National governing bodies have the same objectives as those of an international federation, but within the scope of one country, or even part of a country, as the name implies. They support local clubs and are often responsible for national teams. National Olympic Committees and National Paralympic Committees are both a type of national federation, as they are responsible for a country's participation in the Olympic Games and in the Paralympic Games respectively. However, a national governing body (NGB) can be different from a national federation due to government recognition requirements. Also, national governing bodies can be a supraorganization representing a range of unrelated organizations operating in a particular sport, as evident in the example of the Northern Ireland Federation of Sub-Aqua Clubs.

Event organizers
Multi-sport event organizers are responsible for the organization of an event that includes more than one sport. The best-known example is the International Olympic Committee (IOC), the organizer of the modern Olympic Games. General sports organizations are responsible for sports-related topics, usually for a certain group, such as the Catholic or Jewish sports groups. General sports organizations and multi-sport events also exist for other groups such as the Invictus Games for military veterans.

Professional leagues
Professional sports leagues are usually the highest level of play in sport, specifically if they consist of the best players around the world in a certain sport. Because of this, they usually work with national or international federations, but there is usually a separation between the different federations. Most North American professional leagues usually do not have amateur divisions, as the amateur divisions are mostly run in separate leagues. Also, most professional leagues are related to other leagues, as players usually attempt to play in the league with the highest level of play. Because of this, promotion and relegation can occur; or, in league systems without promotion and relegation, clubs in professional leagues can have a team in the minor leagues. This enables them to shuffle players who are not doing well to the minor leagues, which will inspire them to contribute more to the team by playing better.

Criticisms
A 2014 study by the Institute for Human Rights and Business (IHRB) criticized major international sports governing bodies including the International Olympic Committee and FIFA for not having sufficient provisions for human and labor rights.

title: Sports governing body