Environmental pollution by man-made Persistent Organic Chemicals (POCs) has been a serious global issue for over half a century. Exposure to POCs may result in health effects, including, endocrine disruption leading to birth defects, intellectual disability, low testosterone, childhood obesity, autism and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Therefore, POCs have been the subject of intensive regional, national, and international efforts to limit the production, use, and disposal of these chemicals. Since POCs are ubiquitous and recalcitrant, and cause long-term effects on wildlife and humans, trend monitoring studies are valuable in making clear the behavior and fate of these compounds and to protect our environment and living resources. The Pacific Basin is a unique geographical region representing tropical, temperate and polar zones. This region is home to two-thirds of the world's population and consists of rapidly growing economies (countries) and highly developed countries. Due to this diversity of climatic and socio-economic conditions, environment and biota in different countries in this basin have varying degrees of environmental contamination and effects on wildlife and humans. The Pacific Rim countries play a pivotal role in governing global POC contamination and resulting harmful health effects. Because articles on POCs and their effect on environment and health are published in a large number of different journals, it is useful to have a book that includes original papers and reviews on the latest advances by well-known scientists in the field, especially focusing on the countries in the Pacific Rim. The two volumes of this book satisfy this need. Topics covered in Volume 1 include an overview of POCs contamination status and trends in the Pacific Basin Countries; human exposure to brominated flame retardants; POCs in sediments, soil and atmosphere of South Korea; and new research on sequestration and redistribution of emerging and classical persistent organic pollutants by polystyrene. The collection of chapters in these volumes may serve as a reasonable representation of current and future trends of POCs in the Pacific Basin countries. It is hoped that the book can inspire students and researchers, as well as professionals, to facilitate the understanding of the environmental and biological behavior of these persistent chemicals and to help in the development of strategies and practices for protecting the global environment for future generations.

NGOs headquartered in the North have been, for some time, the most visible in attempts to address the poverty, lack of political representation, and labor exploitation that disproportionally affect women from the global South. Feminist NGOs and NGOs focusing on women's rights have been successful in attracting funding for their causes, but critics argue that the highly educated elites from the global North and South who run them fail to question or understand the power hierarchies in which they operate. In order to give depth to these criticisms, Sara de Jong interviewed women NGO workers in seven different European countries about their experiences and perspectives on working on gendered issues affecting women in the global South. Complicit Sisters untangles and analyzes the complex tensions women NGO workers face and explores the ways in which they negotiate potential complicities in their work. Weighing the women NGO workers' first-hand accounts against critiques arising from feminist theory, postcolonial theory, global civil society theory and critical development literature, de Jong brings to life the dilemmas of "doing good." She considers these workers' ideas about "sisterhood," privilege, gender stereotypes, feminism, and the private/public divide, and she suggests avenues for productive engagement between these and the inevitable tensions and complexities in NGO work.

This incisive Research Handbook addresses the growing recognition within the international law community that natural resource governance and environmental protection are crucial aspects of peace processes, both as a security imperative and as an opportunity for peacebuilding. Examining the impact of international normative and institutional frameworks on environmental peacebuilding, this Research Handbook features contributions from distinguished experts and global case studies on integrated legal approaches to the governance of natural resources. Chapters examine the role of international legal obligations on fair and equitable benefit-sharing in environmental protection, the contribution of the UN and other international institutions to environmental peacebuilding, and the nexus between access to environmental services and peacebuilding efforts. The compelling conclusion explores contemporary approaches for improving the inclusivity of environmental peacebuilding, considering the role of gender and indigenous peoples’ perspectives. The Research Handbook on International Law and Environmental Peacebuilding will be crucial reading for students and scholars in environmental law, environmental politics and policy, peace and security studies and public international law. Its comprehensive treatment will also be beneficial to policymakers in international environmental and peacebuilding organizations.

Unlike some other reproductions of classic texts (1) We have not used OCR(Optical Character Recognition), as this leads to bad quality books with introduced typos. (2) In books where there are images such as portraits, maps, sketches etc We have endeavoured to keep the quality of these images, so they represent accurately the original artefact. Although occasionally there may be certain imperfections with these old texts, we feel they deserve to be made available for future generations to enjoy.

Unlike some other reproductions of classic texts (1) We have not used OCR(Optical Character Recognition), as this leads to bad quality books with introduced typos. (2) In books where there are images such as portraits, maps, sketches etc We have endeavoured to keep the quality of these images, so they represent accurately the original artefact. Although occasionally there may be certain imperfections with these old texts, we feel they deserve to be made available for future generations to enjoy.

This monograph expounds on general Yang-Mills symmetry, a new symmetry based on arbitrary vector gauge functions and Hamilton's characteristic phase functions in the gauge transformations of Abelian and non-Abelian groups. General Yang-Mills symmetry includes the conventional gauge symmetries as special cases and is useful for describing phenomena at scales ranging from the super-macroscopic such as dark matter, to the ultra-microscopic such as the quantum 3-body problem of baryons. Moreover, this symmetry supports the Broader Particle-Cosmology framework based on particle physics and quantum Yang-Mills gravity in flat space-time, which can explain why the gravitational force is always attractive. This volume also discusses how CPT invariance in particle physics suggests a 'Big Jets' model for the birth of the universe, proposing one explanation for the dearth of anti-matter in our universe. Finally, we discuss a simplified quantum shell model for N baryons with a quark Hamiltonian and a Sonine-Laguerre equation that gives reasonable eigenvalues for the energies of the 29 N baryons.

From Peter de Jonge, who previously joined forces with the New York Times bestselling author James Patterson to write two No.1 bestsellers, comes a murder mystery set in the rotten core of the Big Apple. When a gifted student mysteriously disappears from a New York bar, Detective Darlene O'Hara unravels a chilling story of murder and deception. Running from a troubled past, Francesca Pena's come to New York to reinvent herself, earning a scholarship and the admiration of her more privileged friends. But none of them knows the real Francesca. Following a night of heavy drinking with three friends, she's reported missing. Detective Darlene O'Hara from New York's 7th Precinct and her partner Serge Krekorian set out to find her. A week later, Francesca's body is discovered severely mangled in a toilet by the East River. The case quickly becomes a high-profile hunt that the Homicide Unit are quick to snatch away. Covertly, O'Hara and Krekorian continue their own investigation into the city's seedy underbelly. But they have to move fast before Homicide make a devestating mistake that will leave the real killer free. From Peter de Jonge, who previously joined forces with the New York Times bestselling author James Patterson to write two No.1 bestsellers, comes a tense and electric thriller set in part of the city the tourist never see.