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This paper provides descriptions of Calcigorgia gorgonians collected from the Sea of Okhotsk and shores of the Kurile Islands between 3 Aug. 1984 and 20 Aug. 1987. New species described are the deep-water gorgonians Calcigorgia matua sp. nov. and C. simushiri sp. nov., belonging to the temperate fauna of the North Pacific hemisphere. Specimens belonging to all species of the genus were examined and the distinctive characters for each one are provided and summarized in a table. A modified diagnosis of the genus is proposed. The finding of a previously undescribed species emphasizes the need of further surveys, particularly in shelf and deeper waters, in order to improve our knowledge of this neglected fauna in Far East seas.
Synchroidae Lacordaire, 1859 is a taxonomically and biologically poorly known group. In the present paper, diagnostic characters used to separate genera are analysed and the phylogenetic relationships within this family are preliminarily investigated. Results suggest that the characteristic Synchroa pangu Hsiao, Li, Liu & Pang, 2016 can be removed to establish a new genus, Thescelosynchroa gen. nov. The new combination, T. pangu (Hsiao, Li, Liu & Pang) gen. et comb. nov., is proposed. The definitions of Synchroa Newman, 1838 and Synchroina Fairmaire, 1898 are revised. Moreover, morphological analysis and character comparison also suggest that the familial placement of Mallodrya subaenea Horn, 1888 is questionable. Six species are re-examined and rediagnosed: Synchroa chinensis Nikitsky, 1999, S. elongatula Nikitsky, 1999, S. formosana Hsiao, 2015, S. melanotoides Lewis, 1895, S. punctata Newman, 1838 and Synchroina tenuipennis Fairmaire, 1898. The male of S. chinensis and the female of S. formosana are described for the first time. Synchroa elongatula and Synchroina tenuipennis are newly recorded from Laos and Indonesia, respectively. We also hypothesize that the Eastern Asian-North American disjunction of Synchroa could be connected to a Mid-Late Tertiary migration of plants via the Bering Land Bridge.
New species of Neanura MacGillivray, 1893 and Deutonura Cassagnau, 1979 are described from northern Iran. Both taxa are characterized by unusual features that place them in isolated positions within the genera. Neanura deharvengi sp. nov. differs from congeners by the extreme reduction of head chaetotaxy and fused lateral tubercles on the head. These characteristics of the new species broaden the existing diagnosis of the genus Neanura. An updated diagnosis is provided herein. Deutonura persica sp. nov. is most similar to D. plena (Stach, 1951), known from the Carpathians. The new species can be distinguished by the strong reduction of its head, labial, and labral chaetotaxy as well as the relative length of chaetae De2 and De3 on abdominal segments I–III. The Iranian records of D. decolorata (Gama & Gisin, 1964) are questioned. Brief remarks on the importance of the newly described species for the knowledge of both genera are also provided.
Two new species of the family Selachinematidae Cobb, 1915 from an intertidal sandy flat in the East China Sea are described. Both species are distinct rapacious nematodes, preying on other nematodes. Gammanema magnum sp. nov. is characterized by its leaf-like labial setae, large loop-shaped amphideal fovea in the male and small spiral ones in the female, an anterior buccal cavity reinforced by 12 rhabdia, each rhabdion with about six denticles, and two unequally long spicules. Gammanema magnum sp. nov. is a striking species, exhibiting extreme sexual dimorphism in the amphideal fovea, but lacking a gubernaculum or precloacal supplements, all features by which it can be differentiated from congeneric species. Synonchium caudatubatum sp. nov. is characterized by a posterior buccal cavity, with three mandibles each with a large tooth flanked by three smaller teeth on both sides, a transverse oval-shaped multispiral amphideal fovea, and a bluntly rounded tail with a protuberant caudal duct. Synonchium caudatubatum sp. nov. is unique in the genus in having a protuberant caudal duct in the tail end. Furthermore, it differs from its congeners by its mandibles, which have seven teeth each. Synonchium caudatubatum sp. nov. lacks a gubernaculum and a precloacal supplement, both features present in congeners except S. depressum Gerlach, 1954.
The vividly coloured Neotropical genus Callipia Guenée (1858) (Lepidoptera Linnaeus, 1758, Geometridae (Leach, 1815), Larentiinae (Leach, 1815), Stamnodini Forbes, 1948) is revised and separated into four species groups, according to a provisional phylogeny based on Cytochrome Oxidase I (COI) gene data and morphology. Fourteen new species are described using COI data and morphology: a) in the balteata group: C. fiedleri sp. nov., C. jakobi sp. nov., C. lamasi sp. nov.; b) in the vicinaria group: C. hausmanni sp. nov., C. walterfriedlii sp. nov.; c) in the parrhasiata group: C. augustae sp. nov., C. jonai sp. nov., C. karsholti sp. nov., C. levequei sp. nov., C. milleri sp. nov., C. sihvoneni sp. nov., C. wojtusiaki sp. nov. and d) in the constantinaria group: C. hiltae sp. nov., C. rougeriei sp. nov. One new subspecies is described: C. wojtusiaki septentrionalis subsp. nov. Two species are revived from synonymy: C. intermedia Dognin, 1914 stat. rev. and C. occulta Warren, 1904 stat. rev. The taxon hamaria Sperry, 1951 is transferred from being a junior synonym of C. constantinaria Oberthür, 1881 to being a junior synonym of C. occulta stat. rev. The taxon admirabilis Warren, 1904 is confirmed as being a junior synonym of C. paradisea Thierry-Mieg, 1904. The taxon languescens Warren, 1904 is confirmed as being a junior synonym of C. rosetta, Thierry-Mieg, 1904 and the taxon confluens Warren, 1905 is confirmed as being a junior synonym of C. balteata Warren, 1905. The status of the remaining species is not changed: C. aurata Warren, 1904, C. brenemanae Sperry, 1951, C. parrhasiata Guenée, 1858, C. flagrans Warren, 1904, C. fulvida Warren, 1907 and C. vicinaria Dognin. All here recognised 26 species are illustrated and the available molecular genetic information of 25 species, including Barcode Index Numbers (BINs) for most of the taxa is provided. The almost threefold increase from 10 to 26 valid species shows that species richness of tropical moths is strongly underestimated even in relatively conspicuous taxa. Callipia occurs from medium to high elevations in wet parts of the tropical and subtropical Andes from Colombia to northern Argentina. The early stages and host plants are still unknown.
A new species complex, the eparmata complex, is established within the subgenus Phortica s. str., based on eight known and five new species, all of which are endemic to the Oriental Region: P. bipartita (Toda & Peng, 1992), P. eparmata (Okada, 1977), P. lanuginosa Chen & Toda, 2007, P. latipenis Chen & Gao, 2005, P. pangi Chen & Wen, 2005, P. setitabula Chen & Gao, 2005, P. unipetala Chen & Wen, 2005 and P. zeta Chen & Toda, 2007; P. jadete sp. nov., P. kava sp. nov., P. mengda sp. nov., P. wongding sp. nov. and P. yena sp. nov. A key to all species of this complex is provided. Barcoding sequences (mitochondrial COI gene) were obtained for 22 specimens of five known and the five abovementioned new species. The intra- and inter-specific pairwise K-2P (Kimura’s two-parameter) distances of COI were determined. Phylogenetic analysis was performed using Bayesian inference based on COI sequences, confirming the monophyletic status of the eparmata complex, which is distinct from the species complexes of magna, omega, variegata and another two ungrouped species.
The Astyanax orthodus species-group includes nine species: Astyanax boliviensis sp. nov., A. bopiensis nom. nov., A. embera sp. nov., A. gandhiae sp. nov., A. moorii comb. nov., A. orthodus, A. superbus, A. villwocki and A. yariguies comb. nov. The group is diagnosed by the presence of a series of pinnate-shaped marks (chevrons) located along the lateral midline, which extends from the humeral region to the caudal peduncle. Astyanax bopiensis nom. nov. is proposed as a substitute name for Astyanacinus multidens, which, along with Astyanax yariguies comb. nov., we reassign to Astyanax. We also propose the synonymy of Astyanacinus with Astyanax. The members of the A. orthodus speciesgroup are distributed in northwestern South America, occurring in the Patia River drainage (A. embera sp. nov.) of the Pacific coast of Colombia, the Atrato River Basin (A. orthodus), the Magdalena River Basin (A. yariguies comb. nov.) of Caribbean Colombia, streams of the southern flank of the Andes of the Orinoco Basin in Venezuela (A. superbus), in the upper Amazon River Basin of Colombia, Ecuador and Peru (A. villwocki, A. gandhiae sp. nov.), from the upper Paraguay River (A. moorii comb. nov.), the Madidi and Mamore Rivers, Bolivia (A. boliviensis sp. nov. and A. bopiensis nom. nov.). All species currently included in Astyanacinus are reassigned to the Astyanax orthodus species-group.
The Quedius mutilatus group, a very poorly known presumably monophyletic complex of wingless, possibly hypogean species confined to the Tien-Shan Mountains, is characterized as such for the first time. Newly available material clarified the identity of Q. mutilatus Eppelsheim, 1888 and Q. kalabi Smetana, 1995, each hitherto known from a handful of non-conspecific and vaguely georeferenced specimens only. Additional material is reported for Q. equus Smetana, 2014 and bionomics for all these four species of the group are summarized.
Bees of the genus Lasioglossum (Hymenoptera: Halictidae) from Greater Puerto Rico, West Indies
(2018)
The species of Lasioglossum from Greater Puerto Rico are reviewed. Nine species are recognized, including five new species described herein: asioglossum (Dialictus) genaroi sp. nov., L. (D.) dispersum sp. nov., L. (D.) enatum sp. nov., L. (D.) monense sp. nov. and L. (D.) amona sp. nov. The latter two are known only from Mona Island. Keys and images are provided to assist in identification. Details of nesting biology, floral hosts and distribution are provided where available. Three species, L. (D.) parvum (Cresson, 1865), L. (D.) busckiellum (Cockerell, 1915), and L. (D.) mestrei (Baker, 1906) are removed from the list of species for Puerto Rico. Details on their revised distribution are provided. Three new records for Haiti, L. (D.) gundlachii (Baker, 1906), L. (D.) ferrerii (Baker, 1906) and L. (D.) busckiellum are documented. Notes on other species in the Greater Antilles are provided, including the synonymy of Lasioglossum bruesi (Cockerell, 1912) and L. jamaicae (Ellis, 1914) under L. gemmatum (Smith, 1853).
The genus Raveniola Zonstein, 1987 is found to be represented in Western Asia by 16 species: ♂♀ R. adjarica sp. nov. (Georgia), ♂ R. anadolu sp. nov. (Turkey), ♂ R. arthuri Kunt & Yağmur, 2010 (Turkey), ♂ R. birecikensis sp. nov. (Turkey), ♂♀ R. dunini sp. nov. (Armenia, Azerbaijan, Iran), ♂♀ R. hyrcanica Dunin, 1988 (Azerbaijan), ♂ R. marusiki sp. nov. (Iran), ♂ R. mazandaranica Marusik, Zamani & Mirshamsi, 2014 (Iran), ♂♀ R. micropa (Ausserer, 1871) (Turkey), ♀ R. nana sp. nov. (Turkey), ♂♀ R. niedermeyeri (Brignoli, 1972) (Iran), ♂♀ R. pontica (Spassky, 1937) (Russia, Georgia), ♀ R. sinani sp. nov. (Turkey), ♂♀ R. turcica sp. nov. (Turkey), ♂♀ R. vonwicki Zonstein, 2000 (Iran) and ♂♀ R. zaitzevi (Charitonov, 1948) (Azerbaijan, Georgia) = ♀ Brachythele recki Mcheidze, 1983, syn. nov. Eight species are described as new; others are redescribed from types and/or conspecific material. Males of R. micropa and R. zaitzevi, hitherto unknown, are described for the first time. Data on the variability, relationships, distribution and ecology of all considered species are also provided.
Two new species of marine Platyhelminthes, Microstomum laurae sp. nov. and Microstomum edmondi sp. nov. (Macrostomida: Microstomidae) are described from the west coast of Sweden. Microstomum laurae sp. nov. is distinguished by the following combination of characters: rounded anterior and posterior ends; presence of approximately 20 adhesive papillae on the posterior rim; paired lateral red eyespots located level with the brain; preoral gut extending anterior to brain and and very small sensory pits. Microstomum edmondi sp. nov. is a protandrous hermaphrodite with a single ovary, single testis and male copulatory organ with stylet. It is characterized by a conical pointed anterior end, a blunt posterior end with numerous adhesive papillae along the rim, and large ciliary pits. The stylet is shaped as a narrow funnel with a short, arched tip. In addition, the first records of fully mature specimens of Microstomum rubromaculatum von Graff, 1882 from Fiskebäckskil and a phylogenetic analysis of Microstomum Schmidt, 1848 based on the mitochondrial cytochrome oxidase I (COI) gene are presented.
The frog Pristimantis marmoratus was originally described als Hylodes marmoratus by George A. Boulenger in 1900 based on a single specimen reported to have been collected at the foot of Mount Roraima in Guyana in 1898. We herein discuss the exact location of the type locality of P. marmoratus and provide a redescription of the species based on new material from Kaieteur National Park and from the slopes of Maringma-tepui in Guyana. We also describe the previously unknown vocalization and breeding ecology of the species, and conducted an exploratory molecular analysis of the phylogenetic relationships within the genus Pristimantis represented by the members of the "unistrigatus species group" in the Guiana Shield. Pristimantis marmoratus is a small-sized species mainly distinguished from its known Guiana Shield congeners by the combination of F I < II, SVL ≤ 20.4 in males, presence of vocal slits in males, granular/pustulate dorsal skin with well-developed scapular ridges, basal webbing between fingers, fringes in fingers and toes, crossed iris, diffuse yellow or pale green wash on groin, and absence of flashy colour on axillary/pre-axillary region. The advertisement call consists of a single note repeated at a rate of ca 11 calls/min with a dominant frequency ranging from 2756 to 3101 Hz. Pristimantis marmoratus is primarily arboreal, exclusively active at dusk, and propably restricted to the pristine rainforests of the Pantepui uplands and highlands, east of the Gran Sabana between ca 600 and 1800 m above sea level. Preliminary molecular analyses recovered Pristimantis marmoratus as sister to an unnamed species from the Eastern Guiana Shield. On grounds of the newly established distributional extent we suggest maintaining the IUCN conservation status as Least Concern.
Following a taxonomic revision of Begonia L. (Begoniaceae, Cucurbitales) from Northeast India based on 332 herbarium specimens, 38 species are confirmed to occur in the region, of which ten are endemic. One new species is described, Begonia koelzii R.Camfield sp. nov., in B. sect. Platycentrum (Klotzsch) A.DC. One species is reduced into synonymy; B. barbata Wall. is now a synonym of B. thomsonii A.DC. Three species, B. difformis (Irmsch.) W.C.Leong, C.I Peng & K.F.Chung, B. labordei H.Lév. and B. handelii Irmsch., are reported new for India, and B. lushaiensis C.E.C.Fisch. is reinstated as an accepted species, having previously been synonymised under B. modestiflora Kurz. A key to the species in the region and preliminary conservation assessments are presented.
Chigger mites of the African continent are reviewed using data acquired from the literature and examination of the collections deposited at the Royal Museum for Central Africa (Tervuren, Belgium) and the Natural History Museum (London, UK). All findings for 443 valid chigger species belonging to 61 genera are reported, along with details on their collection locality and host species. Three new synonyms are proposed: Straelensia Vercammen-Grandjean & Kolebinova, 1968 (= Anasuscuta Brown, 2009 syn. nov.); Herpetacarus (Herpetacarus) Vercammen-Grandjean, 1960 (= Herpetacarus (Lukoschuskaaia) Kolebinova & Vercammen-Grandjean, 1980 syn. nov.); Gahrliepia brennani (Jadin & Vercammen-Grandjean, 1952) (= Gahrliepia traubi Audy, Lawrence & Vercammen-Grandjean, 1961 syn. nov.). A new replacement name is proposed: Microtrombicula squirreli Stekolnikov, 2017 nom. nov. pro Eltonella myonacis heliosciuri Vercammen-Grandjean, 1965 (praeocc. Vercammen-Grandjean, 1965). Ninety new combinations are proposed. Keys to subfamilies, genera and subgenera of African trombiculid larvae and diagnoses of these taxa are given.
Damacornu gen. nov. (type species: D. transversum gen. et sp. nov.), Geotypodon papei sp. nov. and Spinotarsus fortehamatus sp. nov. are described, and Helicochetus dimidiatus (Peters, 1855), H. mutaba Kraus, 1960 and Hoffmanides dissutus (Hoffman, 1963) are recorded from the Udzungwa Mts, Tanzania. A complete overview of the 39 odontopygid species now known from the Udzungwa Mts is given, including notes on endemism, biogeographical relationships and altitudinal distribution patterns.
A group of Amazonian harvestmen is recognized and described as Amazochroma gen. nov. This taxon includes Discocyrtus carvalhoi Mello-Leitão, 1941 (type species), the only species of Discocyrtus previously thought to occur in Amazonia, and Amazochroma pedroi gen. et sp. nov., described here from the Brazilian states of Acre and Rondônia. New records are added for Amazochroma carvalhoi gen. et comb. nov, expanding its distribution from the Brazilian state of Mato Grosso northwards also to Pará and Amazonas in Brazil and additionally French Guiana and Suriname. Diagnostic features of Amazochroma gen. nov. include: trichromatic pattern of legs, dry marks on the dorsal scutum and base of legs and diastema in the row of macrosetae C of the penis ventral plate. A morphological maximum parsimony analysis (1022 scorings; 16 taxa; 64 characters) is performed to test whether Amazochroma gen. nov. is a member of Discocyrtus and if the traditional allocation of Discocyrtus in Pachylinae is defendable. A clade is retrieved containing three groups: Amazochroma carvalhoi gen. et comb. nov, here described as a new subfamily of Gonyleptidae - Roeweriinae subfam. nov. Discocyrtanus Roewer, 1929 and Roeweria Mello-Leitão, 1923 are accordingly here transferred from Pachylinae to Roeweriinae subfam. nov.
The species of the subgenus Conocetus Desbrochers des Loges, 1875 are reviewed and Polydrusus (Conocetus) transjordanus sp. nov. is described. Upon examination of the holotype of Polydrusus bardus Gyllenhal, 1834, it was observed that the species hitherto determined sensu auctorum as P. bardus was a misidentification. The specimen in question was therefore unnamed and is thus newly described as Polydrusus (Conocetus) crinipes sp. nov. Polydrusus femoratus (Stierlin, 1888) is a junior synonym of P. angustus (Lucas, 1854). Polydrusus gracilicornis Kiesenwetter, 1864, P. cylindrithorax (Desbrochers des Loges, 1900) and P. quadraticollis (Desbrochers des Loges, 1902) are proposed as junior synonyms of P. bardus. Polydrusus zurcheri (Schilsky, 1912) is proposed as a junior synonym of P. grandiceps (Desbrochers des Loges, 1875). Polydrusus kahri Kirsch, 1865 is transferred from subgenus Conocetus to Denticonocetus subgen. nov., with P. siculus Desbrochers des Loges, 1872 and P. vodozi Desbrochers des Loges, 1903 both recognized as new junior synonyms of P. kahri. The lectotypes of P. gracilicornis, P. zurcheri, P. marcidus Kiesenwetter, 1864, P. gracilis (Stierlin, 1888), P. rhodiacus (Schilsky, 1912) and P. grandiceps are designated. A key, figures, label data and distribution maps are provided for all species, except for P. longus (Stierlin, 1884), for which no specimens were available for examination, and whose placement in the subgenus Conocetus remains uncertain (thus categorized as incertae sedis). Polydrusus angustus is recorded for the first time for Italy, P. rhodiacus for mainland Turkey and P. festae (Solari, 1925) for Greece.
Regulation of the antiapoptotic protein cFLIP by the glucocorticoid Dexamethasone in ALL cells
(2018)
We recently reported that the Smac mimetic BV6 and glucocorticoids, e.g. Dexamethasone (Dexa), synergize to induce cell death in acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) in vitro and in vivo. Here, we discover that this synergism involves Dexa-stimulated downregulation of cellular FLICE-like inhibitory protein (cFLIP) in ALL cells. Dexa rapidly decreases cFLIPL protein levels, which is further enhanced by addition of BV6. While attenuating the activation of non-canonical nuclear factor-kappaB (NF-κB) signaling by BV6, Dexa suppresses cFLIPL protein but not mRNA levels pointing to a transcription-independent downregulation of cFLIPL by Dexa. Analysis of protein degradation pathways indicates that Dexa causes cFLIPL depletion independently of proteasomal, lysosomal or caspase pathways, as inhibitors of the proteasome, lysosomal enzymes or caspases all failed to protect from Dexa-mediated loss of cFLIPL protein. Also, Dexa alone or in combination with BV6 does not affect overall activity of the proteasome. Importantly, overexpression of cFLIPL to an extent that is no longer subject to Dexa-imposed downregulation rescues Dexa/BV6-mediated cell death. Vice versa, knockdown of cFLIP increases BV6-mediated cell death, thus mimicking the effect of Dexa. Altogether, these data demonstrate that Dexa-mediated downregulation of cFLIPL protein promotes Dexa/BV6-mediated cell death, thereby providing novel insights into the synergistic antitumor activity of this combination treatment.
Although effective antibody-based vaccines have been developed against multiple viruses, such approaches have so far failed for the human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1). Despite the success of anti-retroviral therapy (ART) that has turned HIV-1 infection into a chronic disease and has reduced the number of new infections worldwide, a vaccine against HIV-1 is still urgently needed. We discuss here the major reasons for the failure of “classical” vaccine approaches, which are mostly due to the biological properties of the virus itself. HIV-1 has developed multiple mechanisms of immune escape, which also account for vaccine failure. So far, no vaccine candidate has been able to induce broadly neutralizing antibodies (bnAbs) against primary patient viruses from different clades. However, such antibodies were identified in a subset of patients during chronic infection and were shown to protect from infection in animal models and to reduce viremia in first clinical trials. Their detailed characterization has guided structure-based reverse vaccinology approaches to design better HIV-1 envelope (Env) immunogens. Furthermore, conserved Env epitopes have been identified, which are promising candidates in view of clinical applications. Together with new vector-based technologies, considerable progress has been achieved in recent years towards the development of an effective antibody-based HIV-1 vaccine.
The mechanisms involved in malignant transformation of mature B and T lymphocytes are still poorly understood. In a previous study, we compared gene expression profiles of the tumor cells of Hodgkin lymphoma (HL) and anaplastic large cell lymphoma (ALCL) to their normal cellular counterparts and found the basic leucine zipper protein ATF-like 3 (BATF3) to be significantly upregulated in the tumor cells of both entities. To assess the oncogenic potential of BATF3 in lymphomagenesis and to dissect the molecular interactions of BATF3 in lymphoma cells, we retrovirally transduced murine mature T and B cells with a BATF3-encoding viral vector and transplanted each population into Rag1-deficient recipients. Intriguingly, BATF3-expressing B lymphocytes readily induced B-cell lymphomas after characteristic latencies, whereas T-cell transplanted animals remained healthy throughout the observation time. Further analyses revealed a germinal center B-cell-like phenotype of most BATF3-initiated lymphomas. In a multiple myeloma cell line, BATF3 inhibited BLIMP1 expression, potentially illuminating an oncogenic action of BATF3 in B-cell lymphomagenesis. In conclusion, BATF3 overexpression induces malignant transformation of mature B cells and might serve as a potential target in B-cell lymphoma treatment.
Titanium is a biocompatible material that is frequently used for making implantable medical devices. Nanoengineering of the surface is the common method for increasing material biocompatibility, and while the nanostructured materials are well-known to represent attractive substrata for eukaryotic cells, very little information has been documented about the interaction between mammalian cells and bactericidal nanostructured surfaces. In this study, we investigated the effect of bactericidal titanium nanostructures on PC12 cell attachment and differentiation—a cell line which has become a widely used in vitro model to study neuronal differentiation. The effects of the nanostructures on the cells were then compared to effects observed when the cells were placed in contact with non-structured titanium. It was found that bactericidal nanostructured surfaces enhanced the attachment of neuron-like cells. In addition, the PC12 cells were able to differentiate on nanostructured surfaces, while the cells on non-structured surfaces were not able to do so. These promising results demonstrate the potential application of bactericidal nanostructured surfaces in biomedical applications such as cochlear and neuronal implants.
A large body of evidence suggests that the 11+ warm-up programme is effective in preventing football-related musculoskeletal injuries. However, despite considerable efforts to promote and disseminate the programme, it is unclear as to whether team head coaches are familiar with the 11+ and how they rate its feasibility. The present study aimed to gather information on awareness and usage among German amateur level football coaches. A questionnaire was administered to 7893 individuals who were in charge of youth and adult non-professional teams. Descriptive and inferential statistics were used to analyse the obtained data. A total of 1223 coaches (16%) returned the questionnaire. There was no risk of a non-response bias (p>.05). At the time of the survey, nearly half of the participants (42.6%) knew the 11+. Among the coaches who were familiar with the programme, three of four reported applying it regularly (at least once per week). Holding a license (φ = .28, p < .0001), high competitive level (Cramer-V = .13, p = .007), and coaching a youth team (φ = .1, p = .001) were associated with usage of 11+. Feasibility and suitability of the 11+ were rated similarly by aware and unaware coaches. Although a substantial share of German amateur level coaches is familiar with the 11+, more than half of the surveyed participants did not know the programme. As the non-usage does not appear to stem from a lack of rated feasibility and suitability, existing communication strategies might need to be revised.
The structural diversity of terpenoids is limited by the isoprene rule which states that all primary terpene synthase products derive from methyl-branched building blocks with five carbon atoms. With this study we discover a broad spectrum of novel terpenoids with eleven carbon atoms as byproducts of bacterial 2-methylisoborneol or 2-methylenebornane synthases. Both enzymes use 2-methyl-GPP as substrate, which is synthesized from GPP by the action of a methyltransferase. We used E. coli strains that heterologously produce different C11-terpene synthases together with the GPP methyltransferase and the mevalonate pathway enzymes. With this de novo approach, 35 different C11-terpenes could be produced. In addition to eleven known compounds, it was possible to detect 24 novel C11-terpenes which have not yet been described as terpene synthase products. Four of them, 3,4-dimethylcumene, 2-methylborneol and the two diastereomers of 2-methylcitronellol could be identified. Furthermore, we showed that an E. coli strain expressing the GPP-methyltransferase can produce the C16-terpene 6-methylfarnesol which indicates the condensation of 2-methyl-GPP and IPP to 6-methyl-FPP by the E. coli FPP-synthase. Our study demonstrates the broad range of unusual terpenes accessible by expression of GPP-methyltransferases and C11-terpene synthases in E. coli and provides an extended mechanism for C11-terpene synthases.
Aims: Carotid intima media thickness (CIMT) predicts cardiovascular (CVD) events, but the predictive value of CIMT change is debated. We assessed the relation between CIMT change and events in individuals at high cardiovascular risk.
Methods and results: From 31 cohorts with two CIMT scans (total n = 89070) on average 3.6 years apart and clinical follow-up, subcohorts were drawn: (A) individuals with at least 3 cardiovascular risk factors without previous CVD events, (B) individuals with carotid plaques without previous CVD events, and (C) individuals with previous CVD events. Cox regression models were fit to estimate the hazard ratio (HR) of the combined endpoint (myocardial infarction, stroke or vascular death) per standard deviation (SD) of CIMT change, adjusted for CVD risk factors. These HRs were pooled across studies.
In groups A, B and C we observed 3483, 2845 and 1165 endpoint events, respectively. Average common CIMT was 0.79mm (SD 0.16mm), and annual common CIMT change was 0.01mm (SD 0.07mm), both in group A. The pooled HR per SD of annual common CIMT change (0.02 to 0.43mm) was 0.99 (95% confidence interval: 0.95–1.02) in group A, 0.98 (0.93–1.04) in group B, and 0.95 (0.89–1.04) in group C. The HR per SD of common CIMT (average of the first and the second CIMT scan, 0.09 to 0.75mm) was 1.15 (1.07–1.23) in group A, 1.13 (1.05–1.22) in group B, and 1.12 (1.05–1.20) in group C.
Conclusions: We confirm that common CIMT is associated with future CVD events in individuals at high risk. CIMT change does not relate to future event risk in high-risk individuals.
Empiric antibiotics are often used in combination with mechanical debridement to treat patients suffering from periodontitis and to eliminate disease-associated pathogens. Until now, only a few next generation sequencing 16S rDNA amplicon based publications with rather small sample sizes studied the effect of those interventions on the subgingival microbiome. Therefore, we studied subgingival samples of 89 patients with chronic periodontitis (solely non-smokers) before and two months after therapy. Forty-seven patients received mechanical periodontal therapy only, whereas 42 patients additionally received oral administered amoxicillin plus metronidazole (500 and 400 mg, respectively; 3x/day for 7 days). Samples were sequenced with Illumina MiSeq 300 base pairs paired end technology (V3 and V4 hypervariable regions of the 16S rDNA). Inter-group differences before and after therapy of clinical variables (percentage of sites with pocket depth ≥ 5mm, percentage of sites with bleeding on probing) and microbiome variables (diversity, richness, evenness, and dissimilarity) were calculated, a principal coordinate analysis (PCoA) was conducted, and differential abundance of agglomerated ribosomal sequence variants (aRSVs) classified on genus level was calculated using a negative binomial regression model. We found statistically noticeable decreased richness, and increased dissimilarity in the antibiotic, but not in the placebo group after therapy. The PCoA revealed a clear compositional separation of microbiomes after therapy in the antibiotic group, which could not be seen in the group receiving mechanical therapy only. This difference was even more pronounced on aRSV level. Here, adjunctive antibiotics were able to induce a microbiome shift by statistically noticeably reducing aRSVs belonging to genera containing disease-associated species, e.g., Porphyromonas, Tannerella, Treponema, and Aggregatibacter, and by noticeably increasing genera containing health-associated species. Mechanical therapy alone did not statistically noticeably affect any disease-associated taxa. Despite the difference in microbiome modulation both therapies improved the tested clinical parameters after two months. These results cast doubt on the relevance of the elimination and/or reduction of disease-associated taxa as a main goal of periodontal therapy.
After entorhinal deafferentiation of the hippocampal dentate gyrus a reinnervation of the denervated neurons by axon collaterals can be observed. This process takes place in a matter of weeks. However, the overall functional effect on the hippocampal network is still unclear.
In an effort to investigate this effect of axonal sprouting on the neuronal network of the dentate gyrus we compared the electrophysiological response of the dentate gyrus after electric stimulation in wild-type mice (WT mice) with a normal post-lesion sprouting, with genetically modified mice with an overexpression of the growth-protein CAP23 (cytoskeleton-associated protein 23). CAP23 overexpressing mice (CAP23tg mice) are known to have an enhanced axonal growth and sprouting after lesion.
The mice (both the WT as well as the CAP23tg mice) were deeply anesthetized and a lesion of the perforant path was induced stereotactically with a wire knife. After that the mice were permitted to survive for 4-6 weeks for partial reinnervation of the dentate gyrus before they were again operated and evoked potentials were measured (extracellular recordings of evoked potentials in the dentate gyrus). Non-lesioned litter-mate mice were taken as reference. The sprouting and the correct position of the electrodes was confirmed histologically.
For electrophysiological investigation we assessed laminar profiles and calculated a current-source density (CSD). In lesioned CAP23tg mice compared to lesioned WT mice this CSD-analysis revealed a significant enhancement of the current sink in the area of deafferentiation (outer molecular layer) and a significant excitation in the granule-cell layer.
Our results show that axonal sprouting seems to enhance the excitability of granule-cells. Thus, even if an enhanced axonal sprouting might accelerate the reinnervation of denervated dendrites after lesion, but it also leads to posttraumatic hyperexcitability of the neuronal network. In a therapeutic approach of fascilitating axonal sprouting this hyperexcitability has to be taken into consideration.
Objective: The present study aims to elucidate the state of gender equality in high-quality dermatological research by analysing the representation of female authorships from January 2008 to May 2017.
Design: Retrospective, descriptive study.
Setting: 113 189 male and female authorships from 23 373 research articles published in 23 dermatological Q1 journals were analysed with the aid of the Gendermetrics Platform.
Results: 43.0% of all authorships and 50.2% of the firstauthorships, 43.7% of the coauthorships and 33.1% of the last authorships are held by women. The corresponding female-to-male ORs are 1.41 (95% CI 1.37 to 1.45) for first authorships, 1.07 (95% CI 1.04 to 1.10) for coauthorships and 0.60 (95% CI 0.58 to 0.62) for last authorships. The annual growth rates are 1.74% overall and 1.45% for first authorships, 1.53% for coauthorships and 2.97% for last authorships. Women are slightly under-represented at prestigious authorships compared with men (Prestige Index=−0.11). The under-representation remains stable in highly competitive articles attracting the highest citation rates, namely, articles with many authors and articles that were published in highest-impact journals. Multiauthor articles with male key authors are only slightly more frequently cited than those with female key authors. Women publish slightly fewer papers compared with men (47.2% women hold 43.0% of the authorships). At the level of individual journals, there is a high degree of uniformity in gender-specific authorship odds. By contrast, distinct differences at country level were revealed. The prognosis for the next decades forecasts a consecutive harmonisation of authorship odds between the two genders.
Conclusions: In high-quality dermatological research, the integration of female scholars is advanced as compared with other medical disciplines. A gender gap consists mainly in the form of a career dichotomy, with many female early career researchers and few women in academic leadership positions. However, this gender gap has been narrowed in the last decade and will likely be further reduced in the future.
In the context of limited donor pool in cardiothoracic transplantation, utilization of organs from high risk donors, such as suicidal hanging donors, while ensuring safety, is under consideration. We sought to evaluate the outcomes of lung transplantations (LTx) that use organs from this group.
Between January 2011 and December 2015, 265 LTx were performed at our center. Twenty-two recipients received lungs from donors after suicidal hanging (group 1). The remaining 243 transplantations were used as a control (group 2). Analysis of recipient and donor characteristics as well as outcomes was performed.
No statistically significant difference was found in the donor characteristics between analyzed groups, except for higher incidence of cardiac arrest, younger age and smoking history of hanging donors (P < .001, P = .022 and P = .0042, respectively). Recipient preoperative and perioperative characteristics were comparable. Postoperatively in group 1 there was a higher incidence of extracorporeal life support (27.3 vs 9.1%, P = .019). There were no significant differences in chronic lung allograft dysfunction-free survival between group 1 and 2: 92.3 vs 94% at 1 year and 65.9 vs 75.5% at 3 years (P = .99). The estimated cumulative survival rate was also similar between groups: 68.2 vs 83.2% at 1 year and 68.2% versus 72% at 3 years (P = .3758).
Hanging as a donor cause of death is not associated with poor mid-term survival or chronic lung allograft dysfunction following transplantation. These results encourage assessment of lungs from hanging donors, and their consideration for transplantation.
Das menschliche Leben erscheint heute als in vielfältiger Weise mit seiner Umwelt verbunden. Bio- und neurowissenschaftliche Forschungen über die Interaktionsweisen mit der Umwelt verändern dabei das Bild des Körpers von einem hierarchisch aufgebauten Organismus zu einem organisch-kognitiv-verteilten Netzwerk. Nicht zuletzt Forschungen zur künstlichen Intelligenz haben gezeigt, dass das menschliche Gehirn nicht isoliert betrachtet werden kann, sondern verkörpert, vernetzt und damit in einer wechselwirkenden Abhängigkeit zu Körpern steht (embedded und extended mind). Epigenetische Forschungen haben ebenfalls auf die Umweltabhängigkeit auch genetischer Prozesse verwiesen (Postgenomik) und damit auf komplexe Wechselwirkungen zwischen Biotischem und Abiotischem aufmerksam gemacht. Diese komplexen Wechselwirkungen und Umweltabhängigkeiten zwischen Lebendigem und Nicht-Lebendigem werden inzwischen zusehends zum Gegenstand menschlicher Selbstorganisation. Sie tauchen in veränderter Form in den Plänen zu den sogenannten Industrien 4.0 auf, wenn es darum geht, intelligente Umgebungen mit dem Menschen interaktiv zu vernetzen. Die hierfür notwendigen digitalen Datenmengen stehen aber nur zur Verfügung, wenn Menschen sich aktiv vernetzen. Die Entstehung digitaler Daten- körper wird dadurch zu einem essentiellen Bestandteil sozialer Teilhabe, wodurch Soziales zum entwicklungsoffenen und unbestimmten Prozess wird. Wie sich Menschen wann und wo vernetzen, ist nicht vorherbestimmt. Digitalisierung ist dabei, so die These der Arbeit, sich zur grundlegenden Praxis menschlicher Vernetzung zu entwickeln.
Die Arbeit geht Digitalisierung aus einer Perspektive koevolutionärer Entstehungs- und Entwicklungszusammenhänge nach und zeigt, dass digitale Praxen zu einer neuen Form menschlicher Selbstorganisation weltweit geworden sind. Angesprochen wird damit, dass Digitalisierung nicht als etwas dem Menschen Äußerliches betrachtet werden kann, sondern in einen größeren kulturellen Entstehungszusammenhang eingebettet werden muss, der bis zu den Anfängen der Menschheit zurückreicht. Um dies zu veranschaulichen, werden in der Arbeit drei verschiedene Wissensformationen benannt, die sich jeweils in unterschiedlicher Art und Weise mit den aktuellen Veränderungen digitalisierter Lebenswelten auseinandersetzen.
Die erste Wissensformation (Kapitel 2) benennt den Humanismus, der im Aufkommen neuer Medientechnologien eine Bedrohung für den Menschen sieht. Eine zweite Wissensformation (Kapitel 3) widmet sich dem „Ende des Humanismus“, indem Ansätze der Science and Technology Studies (STS), der Akteur-Network-Theory (ANT) und des Agentiellen Realismus von Karan Barad diskutiert werden. Mit einer „neuen Ökonomie für eine neue Menschheit“ wird eine dritte Wissensformation (Kapitel 4) benannt, die, von postoperaistischen Ansätzen ausgehend, die These eines „dritten“ oder „kognitiven Kapitalismus“ diskutiert. Hier geht es um die These des Zusammenfallens von Ökonomischem und Sozialem, aus dem neue offene Sozialformationen entstehen. Schließlich wird eine vierte Wissensformation (Kapitel 5) formuliert, die, ausgehend vom Ansatz einer Anthropologie des Medialen (AdM) und dem Modell der Erweiterung kultureller Kapazitäten (EECC) versucht, die als digitalen Wandel bezeichneten Veränderungen in einen größeren Zusammenhang zu stellen.
Mit beiden Ansätzen kann schließlich gezeigt werden, dass sich Veränderungen menschlicher Selbstorganisation immer in der biologischen, individuellen, kulturellen und historisch-sozialen Entwicklungsdimension zugleich vollziehen. Dies lässt sich auch für die Prozesse der Digitalisierung zeigen. Nämlich, dass sich der Mensch als Teil der Natur in einem fortwährenden koevolutionären Prozess befindet. Weder Kultur, noch Soziales, noch Technologien sind unnatürlich. Sie können als „indirekte Biologie“, als „Künstliches“ oder als „Kultur der Biologie“ bezeichnet werden, die der Natur aber nie entkommen. Die Erweiterung kultureller Kapazitäten ist deshalb nicht als eine Ausdehnung des Menschen in die Natur hinaus zu verstehen, sondern bezeichnet die im Laufe der Menschheitsgeschichte komplexer werdenden Reichweiten und Zeittiefen menschlicher Selbstorganisation, die immer auf den drei Ebenen von Phylogenese, Ontogenese, Technogenese und der damit verbundenen Soziogenese basieren.
This study aimed to appraise two quantitative magnetic resonance imaging techniques, T2* imaging and diffusion-weighted imaging (DWI), for the diagnosis of the intervertebral disc degeneration of the cervico-thoracic junction. Influence of specific factors and diagnostic accuracy of both techniques were particularly explored. Sixty-one volunteers with neck and upper back pain were recruited and evaluated with both T2* imaging and DWI. The Pfirrmann grade, T2* relaxation time and apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) value of each disc between C7 and T3 were recorded. Stratified analyses were performed for different anatomic levels, genders, age ranges and Pfirrmann grades. The diagnostic accuracy of both techniques was investigated using the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves. No statistically significant difference of either T2* relaxation time or ADC value was detected between males and females. Both parameters decreased with the increasing age and Pfirrmann grade. The ROC curves showed the higher sensitivity and specificity for T2* imaging than DWI to quantitatively identify the disc degeneration. Particularly, T2* imaging allowed for a quantitative distinguishing the normal, mild and moderate disc degeneration from the severe degeneration, which was unable to accomplish with DWI. In conclusion, we demonstrated that T2* imaging possess a better accuracy than DWI to quantitatively diagnose the intervertebral disc degeneration at the cervico-thoracic junction.
Perception, particularly in the visual domain, is drastically influenced by rhythmic changes in ambient lighting conditions. Anticipation of daylight changes by the circadian system is critical for survival. However, the neural bases of time-of-day-dependent modulation in human perception are not yet understood. We used fMRI to study brain dynamics during resting-state and close-to-threshold visual perception repeatedly at six times of the day. Here we report that resting-state signal variance drops endogenously at times coinciding with dawn and dusk, notably in sensory cortices only. In parallel, perception-related signal variance in visual cortices decreases and correlates negatively with detection performance, identifying an anticipatory mechanism that compensates for the deteriorated visual signal quality at dawn and dusk. Generally, our findings imply that decreases in spontaneous neural activity improve close-to-threshold perception.
Ideally located in the writer's position of the voice "contractus (& quasi contractus)" of the Dictionary, the author of this paper tries to discover the difficulties that his drafting could imply. The difficulties encountered come mainly from the chronology and the diversity of profiles between the members of the Salamanca School that deal with contracts, from the unusual historical and material extension of the elements they work with and from the need to understand their methods, their initial assumptions and the aims they pursue. At the end, some practical considerations are offered to the voice's drafting.
Reconstructing the evolution of baleen whales (Mysticeti) has been problematic because morphological and genetic analyses have produced different scenarios. This might be caused by genomic admixture that may have taken place among some rorquals. We present the genomes of six whales, including the blue whale (Balaenoptera musculus), to reconstruct a species tree of baleen whales and to identify phylogenetic conflicts. Evolutionary multilocus analyses of 34,192 genome fragments reveal a fast radiation of rorquals at 10.5 to 7.5 million years ago coinciding with oceanic circulation shifts. The evolutionarily enigmatic gray whale (Eschrichtius robustus) is placed among rorquals, and the blue whale genome shows a high degree of heterozygosity. The nearly equal frequency of conflicting gene trees suggests that speciation of rorqual evolution occurred under gene flow, which is best depicted by evolutionary networks. Especially in marine environments, sympatric speciation might be common; our results raise questions about how genetic divergence can be established.
Diagnostic approaches for invasive aspergillosis—specific considerations in the pediatric population
(2018)
Invasive aspergillosis (IA) is a major cause of morbidity and mortality in children with hematological malignancies and those undergoing hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. Similar to immunocompromised adults, clinical signs, and symptoms of IA are unspecific in the pediatric patient population. As early diagnosis and prompt treatment of IA is associated with better outcome, imaging and non-invasive antigen-based such as galactomannan or ß-D-glucan and molecular biomarkers in peripheral blood may facilitate institution and choice of antifungal compounds and guide duration of therapy. In patients in whom imaging studies suggest IA or another mold infection, invasive diagnostics such as bronchoalveolar lavage and/or bioptic procedures should be considered. Here we review the current data of diagnostic approaches for IA in the pediatric setting and highlight the major differences of performance and clinical utility of the tests between children and adults.
Background: Anger and aggression belong to the core symptoms of borderline personality disorder. Although an early and specific treatment of BPD is highly relevant to prevent chronification, still little is known about anger and aggression and their neural underpinnings in adolescents with BPD.
Method: Twenty female adolescents with BPD (age 15–17 years) and 20 female healthy adolescents (age 15–17 years) took part in this functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study. A script-driven imagery paradigm was used to induce rejection-based feelings of anger, which was followed by descriptions of self-directed and other-directed aggressive reactions. To investigate the specificity of the neural activation patterns for adolescent patients, results were compared with data from 34 female adults with BPD (age 18–50 years) and 32 female healthy adults (age 18–50 years).
Results: Adolescents with BPD showed increased activations in the left posterior insula and left dorsal striatum as well as in the left inferior frontal cortex and parts of the mentalizing network during the rejection-based anger induction and the imagination of aggressive reactions compared to healthy adolescents. For the other-directed aggression phase, a significant diagnosis by age interaction confirmed that these results were specific for adolescents.
Discussion: The results of this very first fMRI study on anger and aggression in adolescents with BPD suggest an enhanced emotional reactivity to and higher effort in controlling anger and aggression evoked by social rejection at an early developmental stage of the disorder. Since emotion dysregulation is a known mediator for aggression in BPD, the results point to the need of appropriate early interventions for adolescents with BPD.
Die vorliegende Arbeit befasst sich damit, wie die spezifische Durchführung eines besonderen psychologischen Laborexperiments in eine allgemeine, kausale Form übersetzt wird. Anstatt dazu formale Kriterien der Validität heranzuziehen, wird ein experimenteller Forschungsprozess ethnographisch begleitet.
Forschungsgegenstand ist ein Verhaltensexperiment aus der allgemeinen Psychologie zur Trainierbarkeit des Arbeitsgedächtnisses. Im Rahmen der Ethnographie werden teilnehmende Beobachtungen, Interviews und Dokumentensammlung kombiniert eingesetzt. Die Auswertung der Materialien erfolgt mithilfe der Situationsanalyse nach Clarke (2012), einer qualitativen Auswertungsmethode im Anschluss an die Grounded Theory.
In dieser Arbeit wird das Verhalten der Versuchsperson ins Zentrum gerückt, das die Messung in Gang setzt und hält und die Entstehung von zahlenförmigen Daten ermöglicht. Dazu wird in Orientierung an neueren Science & Technology Studies eine begriffliche Systematisierung der Experimentalpraxis aus dem empirischen Material herausgearbeitet, mit dem die Konstruktion und Transformation des Verhaltens der Versuchsperson im Verlauf des Datenerhebungs- Auswertungs- und Interpretationsprozesses beschrieben werden kann.
Die Ergebnisse der Ethnographie legen nahe, dass dieses Verhalten der Versuchsperson - korrespondierend zum kausal verfassten Endprodukt des Experiments - von der komplexen Erhebungssituation abhängig und paradoxerweise gleichzeitig unabhängig ist. Damit wird in Anlehnung an Latour (2002) zwischen konstruktivistischen und objektivistischen Positionen vermittelt. Zudem weisen die erforschten Praktiken die epistemische Stellung der Versuchsperson aus. Diese wird im Anschluss an die Terminologie von Rheinberger (2001/ 2006) als Mischform von epistemischem Ding (Neues) und technischem Ding (Bekanntes) bestimmt.
G-protein coupled receptors (GPCRs) are a predominant class of cell-surface receptors in eukaryotic life. They are responsible for the perception of a broad range of ligands and involved in a multitude of physiological functions. GPCRs are therefore of crucial interest for biological and pharmaceutical research. Molecular analysis and functional characterisation of GPCRs is frequently hampered by challenges in efficient large-scale production, non-destructive purification and long-term stability. Cell-free protein synthesis (CFPS) provides new production platforms for GPCRs by extracting the protein synthesis machinery of the cell in an open system that allows target-oriented modulations of the synthesis process and direct access to the nascent polypeptide chain. CFPS is fast, reliable and highly adaptable. Unfortunately, highly productive cell-free synthesis of GPCRs is often opposed by low product quality. This thesis was aimed to adapt and improve some of the new possibilities for the cell-free production of GPCRs in high yield and quality for structural and pharmaceutical analysis. An E. coli based CFPS system was applied to synthesise various turkey and human Beta-adrenergic receptor (Beta1AR) derivatives as well as human Endothelin receptors type A and B (ETA and ETB) constructs. Both receptor families are important drug targets and pharmacologically addressed in the treatment of several cardiovascular diseases. CF-synthesis was mainly performed in presence of nanodiscs (ND), which are reconstituted high density lipoprotein particles forming discoidal bilayer patches with a diameter varyring from 6 to approx. 15 nm. The supplementation of ND in the CF-synthesis reaction caused the co-translational solubilisation of the freshly synthesised GPCRs. The fraction of the solubilised GPCR that was correctly folded was analysed by the competence to bind its ligand alprenolol or Endothelin-1, respectively. Both the solubilisation efficiency and the ability to fold in a ligand binding competent state was strongly affected by the lipid composition of the supplied ND. Best results were generally achieved with lipids having phosphoglycerol headgroups and unsaturated fatty acid chains with 18 carbon atoms. Furthermore, thermostabilisation by introduction of point mutations had a large positive impact on the folding efficiency of both Beta1AR and ETB receptor. Formation of a conserved disulphide bridge in the extracellular region was additionally found to be crucial for the function of the ETB receptor. Disulphide bridge formation could be enhanced by applying a glutathione-based redox system in the CFPS. Further improvements in the quality of ETB receptor could be made by the enrichment of heat-shock chaperones in the CF-reaction. Depending on the receptor type and DNA-template, roughly 10 – 30 nmol (350 – 1500 µg) of protein could be synthesised in 1 ml of CF-reaction mixture. After the applied optimisation steps, the fractions of correctly folded receptor could be improved by several orders of magnitude and were finally in between 35% for the thermostabilised turkey Beta1AR, 9% for the thermostabilised ETB receptor, 6.5% for the non-stabilised ETB receptor, 1 - 5% for non-stabilised turkey Beta1AR and for human Beta1AR isoforms and 0.1% for ETA receptor. Therefore, between 2 and 120 µg of GPCR could be synthesised in a ligand binding competent form, depending on the receptor and its modifications. Correctly folded turkey Beta1AR and ETB receptors were thermostable at 30°C and could be stored at 4°C for several weeks after purification. Yields of the thermostabilised turkey Beta1AR were sufficient to purify the receptor in a two-step process by ligand-binding chromatography to obtain pure and correctly folded receptor in the lipid bilayer of a ND. Furthermore, a lipid dependent ligand screen could be demonstrated with the turkey Beta1AR and significant alterations in binding affinities to currently in-use pharmaceuticals were found. The established protocols are therefore suitable and highly competetive for a variety of applications such as screening of GPCR ligands, analysis of lipid effects on GPCR function or for the systematical biochemical characterisation of GPCRs. Most promising for future approaches appears to address the suspected bottlenecks of intial insertion of the GPCR-polypeptide chain in the ND bilayer and the thermal stability of the receptors. Nevertheless, the estabilised protocols for the analysed targets in this thesis are already highly competitive to previously published production protocols either in cell-based or cell-free systems with regard to yield of functional protein, speediness and costs. Moreover, the direct accessibility and other general characteristics of cell-free synthesis open a large variety of possible applications and this work can therefore contribute to the molecular characterisation of this important receptor type and to the development of new pharmaceuticals.
An die Soziologie werden zunehmend Fragen des ökonomischen Nutzens und der gesellschaftlichen Relevanz herangetragen. Ein Wissen um den gesellschaftlichen Impact soziologischen Wissens und die Artikulation eines Nutzens für die Praxis sind wertvolle Werkzeuge im Kampf um die Alimentation soziologischer Forschung. Aber wie wird soziologisches Wissen überhaupt angewendet? Um diese Frage zu beantworten, wird soziologisches Wissen definiert und dessen Anwendung expliziert. Unter Zuhilfenahme von Wissenschaftstheorie und Wissenssoziologie wird zunächst eine Definition erarbeitet. Anschließend werden Forschungsgebiete, die sich mit der Anwendung von (soziologischen) Wissen beschäftigen, vorgestellt – allen voran die soziologische Verwendungsforschung. Darauf aufbauend wird eine Explikation der Anwendung soziologischen Wissens erarbeitet, vor dessen Hintergrund aktuelle Bemühungen, soziologisches Wissen stärker anzuwenden, betrachtet werden. Die abschließende Diskussion beschäftigt sich mit den Möglichkeiten und Restriktionen der Anwendung soziologischen Wissens und betont die Rolle der Soziologie als kritische gesellschaftliche Aufklärungsinstanz.
Trotz aller Unsicherheit und kritischer Infragestellung sind Kunstlandschaftsbezeichnungen – und damit auch der „Mittelrhein“ – als Hilfsbegriffe für die Lokalisierung der Kunstwerke noch immer gebräuchlich. Aber es ist ganz besonders problematisch, vom Mittelrhein um 1500 als „Kunstlandschaft“ zu sprechen. Schon die Umgrenzung der Region fällt unterschiedlich aus, und noch mehr sind die Kriterien schwankend, die im Vergleich zu anderen Regionen den Mittelrhein definieren sollen. Vorherrschend sind bei solchen Vergleichen nach wie vor Stilbegriffe, welche Vorbehalte gegenüber dem Begriff des Stils auch geäußert werden. So ist die Frage, ob die für den Mittelrhein vorgeschlagene Kennzeichnung „Stilheterogenität“ als Kriterium der Abgrenzung tauglich ist oder mehr eine methodische Verlegenheitslösung darstellt.
Die Untersuchung konzentriert sich auf das Schnitzretabel, das als Leitmedium der spätgotischen Kunst im deutschsprachigen Raum zu betrachten ist. Die analysierten Schnitzretabel sind als Fallstudien anzusehen, wobei hier vor allem jene analysiert worden sind, die einen guten Erhaltungszustand aufweisen. Zwar haben die wenigsten ihr ursprüngliches Aussehen bewahrt, aber entweder sind die Veränderungen nur minimal oder der originale Zustand ist gut rekonstruierbar, sodass die Werkgruppe trotz der Eingriffe als repräsentativ gelten kann. Neben den traditionellen Untersuchungsmethoden konnte die Infrarotreflektographie mit beweglicher Kamera (Osiris) eingesetzt werden. Es soll mit der Vorstellung einer Gattung ein Ausschnitt der in der Region präsenten Kunst ohne „mittelrheinische Vorentscheidungen“ gezeigt werden.
Die meisten analysierten Retabel entstammen der Rhein-Main-Region mit Frankfurt und Mainz als Oberzentren des Mittelrheins; Oberwesel, Speyer und Gelnhausen markieren die Grenze für die Auswahl. Die 27 Einzeluntersuchungen finden sich im Katalogteil der Arbeit, während deren zusammenfassende Darstellung – im Hinblick auf Methode, Standort, Auftraggeber, Künstler, Retabeltyp, Bildprogramm sowie Einflüsse – sowie Ergebnisse im Hauptteil besprochen werden.
The article is designed to introduce and analyze authoritarian constitutionalism as an important phenomenon in its own right, not merely a deficient or deviant version of liberal constitutionalism. Therefore it is not adequate to dismiss it as sham or window-dressing. Instead, its crucial features – participation as complicity, power as property and the cult of immediacy – are related to the basic assumption that authoritarian constitutions are texts with a purpose that warrant careful analysis of the domestic and transnational audience.
This dissertation discusses the mutual influence between leaders and followers on perception, emotion and behavior, using an attachment theory perspective. Some individuals are more likely to be seen as leaders than others. On the one hand this is determined by the characteristics or attributes as well as skills of the person in question. However, on the other hand, followers’ perception and expectations play a big role as well, in particular which expectations of an ideal leader can be fulfilled by followers’ current leader. Although attachment theory and – styles have only recently entered the organizational psychology literature, this dissertation advances that literature by looking at the role of attachment orientations between leaders and followers. In doing so, this dissertation answers several recent research calls on this topic. The three main subsequent chapters discuss the predictive role of attachment orientations with regard to leader preferences, the transference of behavioural expectations from one leader to another, and the perception of leader prototypicality in groups. The first chapter discusses the connection between implicit leader preferences and attachment orientations as predictors. Results show that avoidant attached individuals prefer a more autonomous and independent leadership style, whereas anxious attached individuals prefer a supportive and team-oriented leadership style. In the second chapter I study the transference of behavioural expectations from one leader to another. Results show that avoidant attached individuals are more likely to engage in this transference process. In addition, I discuss and empirically test the influence of culture with regard to leader transference. In the final chapter, I examine the behavioural influence of attachment orientations on how likely someone is perceived to be a leader in groups. Based on 57 project groups, I find that team members actually perceive avoidant attached individuals to be the most leader-like. Put differently, given certain environmental conditions, insecure attachment orientations can be perceived as leaders. These results show that it is even more important that leaders somewhat adapt to their followers’ preferences and not commit to merely one particular leadership style.
Cells within a tissue form highly complex, cellular interactions. This architecture is lost in two-dimensional (2D) cell cultures. To close the gap between 2D cell cultures and in vivo tissues, three-dimensional (3D) cell cultures such as spheroids or embryoid bodies were developed. To fully take advantage of the third dimension, imaging techniques are essential. The emerging field of "image-based systems biology" exploits the information in images and builds a connection between experimental and theoretical investigation of biological processes. Such interdisciplinary approaches strongly depend on the development of protocols to establish 3D cell cultures, innovations in sample preparation, well-suited imaging techniques and quantitative segmentation methods.
Although 3D cell cultures and image-based systems biology provide a great potential, 2D methods are still not completely replaced by 3D methods. This is mainly due to methodical and technical hurdles. Therefore, this thesis provides a significant contribution to overcome these hurdles and to further develop 3D cell cultures. I established computational and experimental methods related to 3D aggregates and investigated fundamental, cellular processes such as adhesion, growth and differentiation.
The automatic segmentation method "PAS" and "LoS" were developed in the context of this thesis. They extract essential biological properties such as the projected area or features of cell nuclei from 2D or 3D images of 3D aggregates. Both algorithms show their accuracy robustly over image data from different samples and different microscopes. In addition, the superior performance of PAS and LoS was proven in a comparison with state-of-the-art methods.
The PAS approach served as an essential basis for investigating cellular processes such as adhesion and growth which are tightly regulated to contribute to tissue integrity. These processes are involved in the formation of spheroids. The temporally resolved data of spheroid formation of three mammary epithelial cell lines revealed differences in their formation dynamics as well as in the onset of spheroid formation phases (aggregation, compaction and growth). Despite these differences, adhesion- and growth-associated proteins such as E-cadherin, actin, microtubules, and the focal adhesion kinase show similar importance in a particular phase. Notably, certain proteins (e.g. E-Cadherin) contribute differently to spheroid formation of cells from different cell types in terms of cell adhesion and growth. Overall, analyses of the individual phases of spheroid formation revealed the temporal coordination of fundamental tissue-specific processes. The results contribute to a better understanding of the maintenance and disruption of tissue integrity.
An important but yet unknown process is how cells accomplish to arrange themselves against the gravitational force to form a spheroid. Live imaging with light sheet-based microscopy provides the best solution for a temporally and in particular spatially resolved investigation of spheroid formation. Although the imaging possibilities increase with this particular microscopy technique, available sample preparation methods are rare. Therefore, I have significantly optimized "agarose beaker" as preparation method for 3D long-term imaging of spheroid formation. The data show that upward movement of the cells takes place early. This movement is initiated in the centre of the initially flat cell layer. Subsequently, the cells move from the periphery of the cell layer toward the centre. Cells rearrange within the spheroid which is followed by growth. It is very likely that 3D aggregates form by adopting an energetically favoured, spherical shape by increasing cell-cell or cell-matrix contacts.
Besides the knowledge gained from the examination of the self-assembly process in different contexts, fully formed cellular aggregates can serve as basis to investigate differentiation processes. Differentiation guide cell fate specification during early embryonic development (i.e. preimplantation) and is not fully understood yet. Due to the lack of an in vitro system for preimplantation, I have developed "blastoids". These are 3D multicellular aggregates of mouse embryonic stem cells which represent important phases of preimplantation and beyond. In qualitative and quantitative analyses, a strong similarity was proven between blastoids and the inner cell mass of in vivo mouse embryos. Further results strongly suggest that both, the cell number and the trophectoderm play a subordinate role for cell fate decision during preimplantation. Furthermore, 3D neighbourhood analyses have shown that both, blastoids and mouse embryos, do not show a random "salt-and-pepper" pattern during differentiation. Instead, they show a yet unknown local clustering of cells with identical fates, suggesting local cell interactions that influence cell fate decision. Furthermore, the data indicate that the maturation of the epiblast in the later stages of preimplantation is initiated by an interaction between cells of the epiblast and the primitive endoderm.
Using image-based systems biology, I have investigated fundamental cellular processes such as adhesion, growth and differentiation in the context of tissue integrity and early embryonic development using 3D cellular aggregates. This highly interdisciplinary work is a major contribution to 3D cell biology and demonstrates how cells bind and interact within a complex system. The main methods developed in this thesis as well as the biological findings can be used not only in further biological but also in medical and pharmacological studies. They have the potential to advance our understanding of complex biological systems and to provide new opportunities for practical applications.
Acute myeloid leukemia (AML) is a clonal malignancy of hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs) characterized by expansion of myeloid blasts in the bone marrow. It has been shown that autophagy is a degradative process, which delivers cytoplasmic components to lysosomes to prevent malignant transformation by maintaining HSC integrity. Besides its function as a bulk degradation machinery to recycle cytoplasmic components during limited energy supply, autophagy also serves as an intracellular quality control mechanism. Selective autophagy requires autophagy receptors such as p62 to specifically bridge the targeted cargos into autophagosomes. p62 is known as a central signaling hub involved in pro-oncogenic signaling pathways and autophagic degradation pathways. However, little is known about the role of p62 as a selective autophagy receptor in AML. This study aims to elucidate the precise function of p62 as an autophagy receptor in leukemia development and maintenance.
In silico analysis revealed that high p62 expression was significantly associated with poor overall survival of adult patients with de novo AML, suggesting that p62 may promote leukemia maintenance. To address the functional role of p62 in leukemia, genome editing by CRISPR/Cas9 was used to knockout p62 in four human AML cell lines. Importantly, p62 loss reduced cell proliferation in all four cell lines. This observation could be transferred to a murine leukemia cell model in which leukemic transformation of lineage-depleted bone marrow (ldMBM) cells was induced by overexpression of the human transcriptional coactivator MN1. Knockdown of p62 by shRNA in MN1-driven leukemia cells impaired proliferation and decreased colony forming ability without altering apoptosis. This indicates that p62 is crucial for leukemia proliferation in vitro. To further characterize the role of p62 in leukemia development and maintenance a murine AML transplantation model was established. Therefore, ldMBM cells isolated from WT and p62-/- mice were transduced with MN1 and transplanted into lethally irradiated mice. As expected, all mice developed fatal myeloid proliferation. Notably, p62 loss in MN1-driven leukemia significantly prolonged survival in mice and caused a more immature phenotype. Consistent with the in vitro results, ex vivo analysis of p62-/- leukemic cells displayed decreased colony-forming ability, although p62 loss did not affect composition and function of HSCs. Moreover, re-transplantation of primary MN1-driven leukemia cells attenuated leukemia progression upon p62 loss. These findings support a decisive role of p62 in leukemia development and maintenance.
To gain molecular insight into the function of p62 during myeloid transformation an interactome analysis of murine MN1-driven leukemia cells was performed. This revealed first that p62 predominantly interacts with mitochondrial proteins and second that inhibition of autophagic degradation causes accumulation of p62-bound mitochondria. This leads to the first assumption that loss of p62 may provoke mitochondrial accumulation with increasing mitochondrial damage and second that p62 may mediate degradation of mitochondria by mitophagy. Indeed, in the absence of p62, accumulation of dysfunctional mitochondria was detected by morphological changes of the mitochondria, increased mitochondrial ROS and impaired mitochondrial respiration capacity. Furthermore, induction of PINK1/Parkin-independent mitophagy revealed that loss of p62 caused impaired degradation of mitochondrial proteins and reduced translocation of damaged mitochondria into autophagosomes. Taken together, p62 is required for effective degradation of dysfunctional mitochondria by mitophagy in AML.
Due to the fact that p62 is a multifunctional protein, rescue experiments with different mutants of p62 were performed to clarify if p62-mediated mitophagy contributes to leukemia proliferation. Notably, the autophagy-deficient mutant (disabled to bind autophagosomes) reduced cell growth and colony-forming ability to the same extent as knockdown of p62, as the clustering-deficient mutant (disabled to form aggregates) displayed an intermediate phenotype. Strikingly, only the autophagy-deficient mutant failed to rescue mitophagy.
In conclusion, this study demonstrates the prominent role of p62 as a selective autophagy receptor for mitochondrial quality control which contributes to leukemia development and maintenance. Therefore, targeting selective autophagy opens new venues in the treatment of AML.
The pyrrolobenzodiazepine tilivalline (1) was originally identified in the human gut pathobiont Klebsiella oxytoca, the causative agent of antibiotic-associated hemorrhagic colitis. Here we show the identification of tilivalline and analogs thereof in the entomopathogenic bacterium Xenorhabdus eapokensis as well as the identification of its biosynthesis gene cluster encoding a bimodular non-ribosomal peptide synthetase. Heterologous expression of both genes in E. coli resulted in the production of 1 and from mutasynthesis and precursor directed biosynthesis 11 new tilivalline analogs were identified in X. eapokensis. These results allowed the prediction of the tilivalline biosynthesis being similar to that in K. oxytoca.
Im Kindes- und Jugendalter gehoert das Rhabdomyosarkom zu den haeufigsten Weichteilsarkomen. Bisher belaeuft sich das Therapieverfahren auf chirurgische Entfernung, gefolgt von Chemotherapie, bzw. bei nicht-operablen Faellen auf Radiotherapie und Chemotherapie, jedoch haben sich die Ueberlebenschancen fuer Patienten mit einer Erkrankung in metastasiertem oder rezidiviertem Stadium trotz intensiver Forschung ueber mehrere Jahrzehnte hinweg kaum gebessert und bleiben bei unter 30%. Neue therapeutische Strategien versuchen das Immunsystem des Patienten zu modulieren und dieses gezielter oder aggressiver gegen Tumorzellen zu machen. Nebst direkter Injektion von Zytokinen oder Antikoerpern bietet die adoptive Immunzelltherapie einen vielversprechenden Ansatz. In der vorliegenden Arbeit lag der Fokus auf Natuerlichen Killer- (NK) Zellen, da diese ein hohes zytotoxisches Potential gegenueber Tumorzellen aufweisen. Eine der groessten Herausforderungen der NK-Zellforschung ist die Breitstellung ausreichender Mengen an NK-Zellen mit optimaler antitumoraler Funktion fuer den klinischen Einsatz. Viele aktuell erprobte NK-Zellexpansionsstrategien basieren auf der Verwendung von Hilfs- oder Feeder-Zellen (Versorgerzellen), die jedoch vor der Applikation in Patienten aus dem finalen Produkt entfernt werden muessen. In der vorliegenden Arbeit sollten Feeder-zellfreie NK-Zellexpansionsprotokolle unter Verwendung von Gammakettenzytokinen getestet werden.
Interleukin (IL-) 15 erwies sich dabei vor allem fuer die Vermehrung der NK-Zellen als besonders foerderlich. Im Vergleich dazu fielen die Expansionsraten mit IL-2 oder IL-21 geringer aus. Interessanterweise wurde der expansionsfoerdernde Effekt von IL-15 durch dauerhafte Anwesenheit von IL-21 im Kulturmedium gehemmt. Ein kurzer, dreitaegiger IL-21-Boost am Ende der Expansionsphase wirkte sich wiederum positiv auf die NK-Zellexpansionsraten aus. Zudem zeigte sich durch IL-21 ein vermehrtes Auftreten von NK-Zellen des reiferen CD16posCD56dim Phaenotyps, der die zytotoxische Funktion vermittelt. Bei Degranulationsuntersuchungen wurden eine IL-21-induzierte Exozytoseaktivitaet und die vermehrte Ausschuettung von Perforin und Granzym B, welche Apoptose in den Zielzellen ausloesen, beobachtet. Vor allem der dreitaegige Boost mit IL-21 bewirkte eine gesteigerte Zytotoxizitaet gegenueber Tumorzellen, insbesondere gegenueber Rhabdomyosarkomzellen.
Auf dieser Grundlage bot es sich an fuer die NK-Zellexpansion ein Zwei-Phasen-Protokoll anzuwenden, bestehend aus einer initialen Proliferationsphase mit IL-15 und einem anschliessendem IL-21-Boost, durch den die antitumorale Funktionalitaet der NK-Zellen gesteigert wurde. Dieses IL-15+21boost-Protokoll wurde mit anderen Kombinationen aus den Gammakettenzytokinen IL-2, IL-15 und IL-21 verglichen und stellte sich hinsichtlich der NK-Zellexpansionsraten, der Degranulationskapazitaet und der damit verbundenen Zytotoxizitaet als den anderen Protokollen ueberlegen heraus.
Zytokinexpandierte NK-Zellen zeigten eine hoehere Rezeptorexpression an ihren Oberflaechen als unstimulierte Zellen. Die Expansion mit dem IL-15+21boost-Protokoll bewirkte die hoechste Dichte des Todesrezeptors TRAIL, jedoch auch der inhibitorischen KIR2D-Rezeptorfamilie. Fuer andere Oberflaechenmarker ergab sich jeweils eine mittlere Expressionsdichte verglichen mit dem IL-15- bzw. dem IL-15+21-Expansionsprotokoll. Die Sekretion von proinflammatorischen Zytokinen wie Interferon-gamma (IFN-g) und Tumor-Nekrose-Faktor-alpha (TNF-a) wurde zudem verstaerkt durch IL-21 angeregt, aber ebenso die Sekretion des immunsupprimierenden IL-10.
Weiter wurden die zytoinexpandierten NK-Zellen zur UEberpruefung ihrer in vivo Funktionalitaet anhand eines praeklinischen Xenograftmodells unter Verwendung von NOD SCID IL-2-Rgamma-/- (NSG) Maeusen und der Technologie der in-vivo-Biolumineszenzbildgebung getestet. Dabei konnte beobachtet werden, dass die NK-Zellen das Wachstum luciferaseexprimierender humaner Rhabdomyosarkome verlangsamten. Die Wirksamkeit der IL-15+21boost-expandierten NK-Zellen zeigte sich vor allem in einem kombinierten Ansatz, bei dem die Tumore zunaechst mit ionisierender Strahlung behandelt wurden und residuale Rhabdomyosarkomzellen anschliessend durch den adoptiven Transfer von humanen NK-Zellen in ihrem Wachstum gehemmt waren, solange die NK-Zelltherapie andauerte. Somit stellte sich die Kombination aus Bestrahlung und NK-Zelltransfer als wirksamer im Einsatz gegen Rhabdomyosarkome heraus als die alleinige Behandlung der Tumore durch Radiotherapie.
Zusammengefasst konnte in dieser Arbeit ein NK-Zellexpansionsprotokoll entwickelt werden, dass durch den ausschliesslichen Einsatz von Gammakettenzytokinen zu einem funktionalen NK-Zellprodukt fuehrte, welches auch in vivo lytische Aktivitaet gegenueber Rhabdomyosarkomzellen aufwies.
Die am Wochenende beschlossene Verfassungsänderung gibt Chinas Präsident Xi Jinping die Möglichkeit auf Lebenszeit im Amt zu bleiben. Das wird als Zeichen des wachsenden Autoritarismus und Xis zunehmender Macht gewertet. Doch ein genauerer Blick lässt zweifeln: Die Entscheidung ist eher Ausdruck von Zukunftssorgen und Selbstzweifeln der Regierenden in Peking.
Die vorliegende Arbeit befasst sich damit, wie die spezifische Durchführung eines besonderen psychologischen Laborexperiments in eine allgemeine, kausale Form übersetzt wird. Anstatt dazu formale Kriterien der Validität heranzuziehen, wird ein experimenteller Forschungsprozess ethnographisch begleitet.
Forschungsgegenstand ist ein Verhaltensexperiment aus der allgemeinen Psychologie zur Trainierbarkeit des Arbeitsgedächtnisses. Im Rahmen der Ethnographie werden teilnehmende Beobachtungen, Interviews und Dokumentensammlung kombiniert eingesetzt. Die Auswertung der Materialien erfolgt mithilfe der Situationsanalyse nach Clarke (2012), einer qualitativen Auswertungsmethode im Anschluss an die Grounded Theory.
In dieser Arbeit wird das Verhalten der Versuchsperson ins Zentrum gerückt, das die Messung in Gang setzt und hält und die Entstehung von zahlenförmigen Daten ermöglicht. Dazu wird in Orientierung an neueren Science & Technology Studies eine begriffliche Systematisierung der Experimentalpraxis aus dem empirischen Material herausgearbeitet, mit dem die Konstruktion und Transformation des Verhaltens der Versuchsperson im Verlauf des Datenerhebungs- Auswertungs- und Interpretationsprozesses beschrieben werden kann.
Die Ergebnisse der Ethnographie legen nahe, dass dieses Verhalten der Versuchsperson - korrespondierend zum kausal verfassten Endprodukt des Experiments - von der komplexen Erhebungssituation abhängig und paradoxerweise gleichzeitig unabhängig ist. Damit wird in Anlehnung an Latour (2002) zwischen konstruktivistischen und objektivistischen Positionen vermittelt. Zudem weisen die erforschten Praktiken die epistemische Stellung der Versuchsperson aus. Diese wird im Anschluss an die Terminologie von Rheinberger (2001/ 2006) als Mischform von epistemischem Ding (Neues) und technischem Ding (Bekanntes) bestimmt.
Due to immigration influxes, Germany’s ethnic diversity is on steady rise. Although citizens of immigrant origin make up a high percentage of the population in all Western European countries, they are descriptively underrepresented in most legislative bodies. As widely acknowledged, political parties form the key channels through which societal developments are fed into parliament. By selecting parliamentary candidates, they constitute the most crucial nexus of the population to be represented and legislative bodies. Despite the pivotal role of the intra-party candidate selection in shaping who runs for election, the question of how candidates of immigrant background fare in the candidate selection and whether the criteria political parties use for selecting candidates of immigrant background are the same as for native-born candidates remained a blind spot of the research on minority representation. Therefore, the dissertation scrutinizes the thresholds candidates of immigrant background need to overcome to run for legislative office. It thus tackles the questions of how political parties go about selecting candidates of immigrant background in comparison to native-born candidates and which contextual factors drive their choice of selection behavior. For this purpose, the dissertation develops three ideal-typical selection strategies political parties can adopt towards candidates of immigrant background, which are referred to as neutrality, opening or closure, and empirically tests which selection strategy is in use. To explore parties’ selection behavior towards candidates of immigrant background, the dissertation combines the advantages of quantitative analysis by employing candidate surveys at the state and national level, with advantages of qualitative analysis by conducting interviews with candidates of immigrant background. As the analysis reveals, neutrality is the predominant selection strategy that political parties use towards candidates of immigrant background, the reason being that neutral selection practices involve the fewest intra-party conflicts.
Determining the age of juvenile blow flies is one of the key tasks of forensic entomology when providing evidence for the minimum post mortem interval. While the age determination of blow fly larvae is well established using morphological parameters, the current study focuses on molecular methods for estimating the age of blow flies during the metamorphosis in the pupal stage, which lasts about half the total juvenile development. It has already been demonstrated in several studies that the intraspecific variance in expression of so far used genes in blow flies is often too high to assign a certain expression level to a distinct age, leading to an inaccurate prediction. To overcome this problem, we previously identified new markers, which show a very sharp age dependent expression course during pupal development of the forensically-important blow fly Calliphora vicina Robineau–Desvoidy 1830 (Diptera: Calliphoridae) by analyzing massive parallel sequencing (MPS) generated transcriptome data. We initially designed and validated two quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) assays for each of 15 defined pupal ages representing a daily progress during the total pupal development if grown at 17 °C. We also investigated whether the performance of these assays is affected by the ambient temperature, when rearing pupae of C. vicina at three different constant temperatures—namely 17 °C, 20 °C and 25 °C. A temperature dependency of the performance could not be observed, except for one marker. Hence, for each of the defined development landmarks, we can present gene expression profiles of one to two markers defining the mentioned progress in development.
We used electron cryo-tomography and subtomogram averaging to investigate the structure of complex I and its supramolecular assemblies in the inner mitochondrial membrane of mammals, fungi, and plants. Tomographic volumes containing complex I were averaged at ∼4 nm resolution. Principal component analysis indicated that ∼60% of complex I formed a supercomplex with dimeric complex III, while ∼40% were not associated with other respiratory chain complexes. The mutual arrangement of complex I and III2 was essentially conserved in all supercomplexes investigated. In addition, up to two copies of monomeric complex IV were associated with the complex I1III2 assembly in bovine heart and the yeast Yarrowia lipolytica, but their positions varied. No complex IV was detected in the respiratory supercomplex of the plant Asparagus officinalis. Instead, an ∼4.5-nm globular protein density was observed on the matrix side of the complex I membrane arm, which we assign to γ-carbonic anhydrase. Our results demonstrate that respiratory chain supercomplexes in situ have a conserved core of complex I and III2, but otherwise their stoichiometry and structure varies. The conserved features of supercomplex assemblies indicate an important role in respiratory electron transfer.
The major obstacle in the clinical use of the antitumor drug cisplatin is inherent and acquired resistance. Typically, cisplatin resistance is not restricted to a single mechanism demanding for a systems pharmacology approach to understand a whole cell’s reaction to the drug. In this study, the cellular transcriptome of untreated and cisplatin-treated A549 non-small cell lung cancer cells and their cisplatin-resistant sub-line A549rCDDP2000 was screened with a whole genome array for relevant gene candidates. By combining statistical methods with available gene annotations and without a previously defined hypothesis HRas, MAPK14 (p38), CCL2, DOK1 and PTK2B were identified as genes possibly relevant for cisplatin resistance. These and related genes were further validated on transcriptome (qRT-PCR) and proteome (Western blot) level to select candidates contributing to resistance. HRas, p38, CCL2, DOK1, PTK2B and JNK3 were integrated into a model of resistance-associated signalling alterations describing differential gene and protein expression between cisplatin-sensitive and -resistant cells in reaction to cisplatin exposure.
Natural Killer T cells (NKT cells) are emerging as critical regulators of pro- and anti-tumor immunity, both at baseline and in therapeutic settings. While type I NKT cells can promote anti-tumor immunity, their activity in the tumor microenvironment may be limited by negative regulators such as inhibitory immune checkpoints. We observed dominant expression of B- and T-lymphocyte attenuator (BTLA) on type I NKT cells in polyoma middle T oncogene-driven (PyMT) murine autochthonous mammary tumors. Other immune checkpoint receptors, such as programmed cell death 1 (PD-1) were equally distributed among T cell populations. Interference with BTLA using neutralizing antibodies limited tumor growth and pulmonary metastasis in the PyMT model in a therapeutic setting, correlating with an increase in type I NKT cells and expression of cytotoxic marker genes. While therapeutic application of an anti-PD-1 antibody increased the number of CD8+ cytotoxic T cells and elevated IL-12 expression, tumor control was not established. Expression of ZBTB16, the lineage-determining transcription factor of type I NKT cells, was correlated with a favorable patient prognosis in the METABRIC dataset, and BTLA levels were instrumental to further distinguish prognosis in patents with high ZBTB16 expression. Taken together, these data support a role of BTLA on type I NKT cells in limiting anti-tumor immunity.
kurz und kn@pp news : Nr. 42
(2018)
Even if the importance of micro data transparency is a well-established fact, European institutions are still lacking behind the US when it comes to the provision of financial market data to academics. In this Policy Letter we discuss five different types of micro data that are crucial for monitoring (systemic) risk in the financial system, identifying and understanding inter-linkages in financial markets and thus have important implications for policymakers and regulatory authorities. We come to the conclusion that for all five areas of micro data, outlined in this Policy Letter (bank balance sheet data, asset portfolio data, market transaction data, market high frequency data and central bank data), the benefits of increased transparency greatly offset potential downsides. Hence, European policymakers would do well to follow the US example and close the sizeable gap in micro data transparency. For most cases, relevant data is already collected (at least on national level), but just not made available to academics for partly incomprehensible reasons. Overcoming these obstacles could foster financial stability in Europe and assure level playing fields with US regulators and policymakers.
Does economic policy uncertainty affect household stockholding? To answer this question we create a novel measure of household exposure to economic policy uncertainty news by combining survey information on the hours a household spends in reading newspapers and the frequency of such news in the popular press during a household’s pre-interview period. After controlling for household fixed effects, month-year fixed effects and time-varying cognitive skills, we find that households with a higher exposure to economic policy uncertainty news are less likely to invest in stocks held directly or through mutual funds. This effect is independent from the market volatility index and household (first-moment) expectations about the stock market index.
Objectives: Within a randomized controlled trial contrasting the outcome of manualized cognitive-behavioral (CBT) and short term psychodynamic therapy (PDT) compared to a waiting list condition (the SOPHO-Net trial), we set out to test whether self-reported attachment characteristics change during the treatments and if these changes differ between treatments.
Research design and methods: 495 patients from the SOPHO-Net trial (54.5% female, mean age 35.2 years) who were randomized to either CBT, PDT or waiting list (WL) completed the partner-related revised Experiences in Close Relationships Questionnaire (ECR-R) before and after treatment and at 6 and 12 months follow-up. The Liebowitz Social Anxiety Scale (LSAS) was administered at pre-treatment, post-treatment, and at 6-month and 1-year follow-up. ECR-R scores were first compared to a representative healthy sample (n = 2508) in order to demonstrate that the clinical sample differed significantly from the non-clinical sample with respect to attachment anxiety and avoidance.
Results: LSAS scores correlated significantly with both ECR-R subscales. Post-therapy, patients treated with CBT revealed significant changes in attachment anxiety and avoidance whereas patients treated with PDT showed no significant changes. Changes between post-treatment and the two follow-ups were significant in both conditions, with minimal (insignificant) differences between treatments at the 12- month follow-up.
Conclusions: The current study supports recent reviews of mostly naturalistic studies indicating changes in attachment as a result of psychotherapy. Although there were differences between conditions at the end of treatment, these largely disappeared during the follow-up period which is line with the other results of the SOPHO-NET trial.
Trial registration: Controlled-trials.com ISRCTN53517394
The spirochete Borrelia burgdorferi is the causative agent of Lyme disease, the most common tick-borne disease in the US and Europe. No potent human vaccine is currently available. The innate immune complement system is vital to host defense against pathogens, as complement activation on the surface of spirochetes results in bacterial killing. Complement system is inhibited by the complement regulator factor H (FH). To escape killing, B. burgdorferi produces an outer surface protein CspZ that binds FH to inhibit complement activation on the cell surface. Immunization with CspZ alone does not protect mice from infection, which we speculate is because FH-binding cloaks potentially protective epitopes. We modified CspZ by conjugating to virus-like particles (VLP-CspZ) and eliminating FH binding (modified VLP-CspZ) to increase immunogenicity. We observed greater bactericidal antibody titers in mice vaccinated with modified VLP-CspZ: A serum dilution of 1:395 (modified VLP-CspZ) vs 1:143 (VLP-CspZ) yielded 50% borreliacidal activity. Immunizing mice with modified VLP-CspZ cleared spirochete infection, as did passive transfer of elicited antibodies. This work developed a novel Lyme disease vaccine candidate by conjugating CspZ to VLP and eliminating FH-binding ability. Such a strategy of conjugating an antigen to a VLP and eliminating binding to the target ligand can serve as a general model for developing vaccines against other bacterial infectious agents.
Acetaminophen [paracetamol, N-acetyl-p-aminophenol (APAP)]-induced acute liver injury (ALI) not only remains a persistent clinical challenge but likewise stands out as well-characterized paradigmatic model of drug-induced liver damage. APAP intoxication associates with robust hepatic necroinflammation the role of which remains elusive with pathogenic but also pro-regenerative/-resolving functions being ascribed to leukocyte activation. Here, we shine a light on and put forward a unique role of the interleukin (IL)-1 family member IL-18 in experimental APAP-induced ALI. Indeed, amelioration of disease as previously observed in IL-18-deficient mice was further substantiated herein by application of the IL-18 opponent IL-18-binding protein (IL-18BPd:Fc) to wild-type mice. Data altogether emphasize crucial pathological action of this cytokine in APAP toxicity. Adding recombinant IL-22 to IL-18BPd:Fc further enhanced protection from liver injury. In contrast to IL-18, the role of prototypic pro-inflammatory IL-1 and tumor necrosis factor-α is controversially discussed with lack of effects or even protective action being repeatedly reported. A prominent detrimental function for IL-18 in APAP-induced ALI as proposed herein should relate to its pivotal role for hepatic expression of interferon-γ and Fas ligand, both of which aggravate APAP toxicity. As IL-18 serum levels increase in patients after APAP overdosing, targeting IL-18 may evolve as novel therapeutic option in those hard-to-treat patients where standard therapy with N-acetylcysteine is unsuccessful. Being a paradigmatic experimental model of ALI, current knowledge on ill-fated properties of IL-18 in APAP intoxication likewise emphasizes the potential of this cytokine to serve as therapeutic target in other entities of inflammatory liver diseases.
A cGMP signaling cascade composed of C-type natriuretic peptide, the guanylyl cyclase receptor Npr2 and cGMP-dependent protein kinase I (cGKI) controls the bifurcation of sensory axons upon entering the spinal cord during embryonic development. However, the impact of axon bifurcation on sensory processing in adulthood remains poorly understood. To investigate the functional consequences of impaired axon bifurcation during adult stages we generated conditional mouse mutants of Npr2 and cGKI (Npr2fl/fl;Wnt1Cre and cGKIKO/fl;Wnt1Cre) that lack sensory axon bifurcation in the absence of additional phenotypes observed in the global knockout mice. Cholera toxin labeling in digits of the hind paw demonstrated an altered shape of sensory neuron termination fields in the spinal cord of conditional Npr2 mouse mutants. Behavioral testing of both sexes indicated that noxious heat sensation and nociception induced by chemical irritants are impaired in the mutants, whereas responses to cold sensation, mechanical stimulation, and motor coordination are not affected. Recordings from C-fiber nociceptors in the hind limb skin showed that Npr2 function was not required to maintain normal heat sensitivity of peripheral nociceptors. Thus, the altered behavioral responses to noxious heat found in Npr2fl/fl;Wnt1Cre mice is not due to an impaired C-fiber function. Overall, these data point to a critical role of axonal bifurcation for the processing of pain induced by heat or chemical stimuli.
Juvenile neuronal ceroid lipofuscinosis (JNCL) is caused by mutations in the CLN3 gene. Most JNCL patients exhibit a 1.02 kb genomic deletion removing exons 7 and 8 of this gene, which results in a truncated CLN3 protein carrying an aberrant C-terminus. A genetically accurate mouse model (Cln3Δex7/8 mice) for this deletion has been generated. Using cerebellar precursor cell lines generated from wildtype and Cln3Δex7/8 mice, we have here analyzed the consequences of the CLN3 deletion on levels of cellular gangliosides, particularly GM3, GM2, GM1a and GD1a. The levels of GM1a and GD1a were found to be significantly reduced by both biochemical and cytochemical methods. However, quantitative high-performance liquid chromatography analysis revealed a highly significant increase in GM3, suggesting a metabolic blockade in the conversion of GM3 to more complex gangliosides. Quantitative real-time PCR analysis revealed a significant reduction in the transcripts of the interconverting enzymes, especially of β-1,4-N-acetyl-galactosaminyl transferase 1 (GM2 synthase), which is the enzyme converting GM3 to GM2. Thus, our data suggest that the complex a-series gangliosides are reduced in Cln3Δex7/8 mouse cerebellar precursor cells due to impaired transcription of the genes responsible for their synthesis.
Hypoxia-induced long non-coding RNA Malat1 is dispensable for renal ischemia/reperfusion-injury
(2018)
Renal ischemia-reperfusion (I/R) injury is a major cause of acute kidney injury (AKI). Non-coding RNAs are crucially involved in its pathophysiology. We identified hypoxia-induced long non-coding RNA Malat1 (Metastasis Associated Lung Adenocarcinoma Transcript 1) to be upregulated in renal I/R injury. We here elucidated the functional role of Malat1 in vitro and its potential contribution to kidney injury in vivo. Malat1 was upregulated in kidney biopsies and plasma of patients with AKI, in murine hypoxic kidney tissue as well as in cultured and ex vivo sorted hypoxic endothelial cells and tubular epithelial cells. Malat1 was transcriptionally activated by hypoxia-inducible factor 1-α. In vitro, Malat1 inhibition reduced proliferation and the number of endothelial cells in the S-phase of the cell cycle. In vivo, Malat1 knockout and wildtype mice showed similar degrees of outer medullary tubular epithelial injury, proliferation, capillary rarefaction, inflammation and fibrosis, survival and kidney function. Small-RNA sequencing and whole genome expression analysis revealed only minor changes between ischemic Malat1 knockout and wildtype mice. Contrary to previous studies, which suggested a prominent role of Malat1 in the induction of disease, we did not confirm an in vivo role of Malat1 concerning renal I/R-injury.
Objectives: Investigate the effectiveness of a complex intervention aimed at improving the appropriateness of medication in older patients with multimorbidity in general practice.
Design: Pragmatic, cluster randomised controlled trial with general practice as unit of randomisation.
Setting: 72 general practices in Hesse, Germany.
Participants: 505 randomly sampled, cognitively intact patients (≥60 years, ≥3 chronic conditions under pharmacological treatment, ≥5 long-term drug prescriptions with systemic effects); 465 patients and 71 practices completed the study.
Interventions: Intervention group (IG): The healthcare assistant conducted a checklist-based interview with patients on medication-related problems and reconciled their medications. Assisted by a computerised decision support system, the general practitioner optimised medication, discussed it with patients and adjusted it accordingly. The control group (CG) continued with usual care.
Outcome measures: The primary outcome was a modified Medication Appropriateness Index (MAI, excluding item 10 on cost-effectiveness), assessed in blinded medication reviews and calculated as the difference between baseline and after 6 months; secondary outcomes after 6 and 9 months’ follow-up: quality of life, functioning, medication adherence, and so on.
Results: At baseline, a high proportion of patients had appropriate to mildly inappropriate prescriptions (MAI 0–5 points: n=350 patients). Randomisation revealed balanced groups (IG: 36 practices/252 patients; CG: 36/253). Intervention had no significant effect on primary outcome: mean MAI sum scores decreased by 0.3 points in IG and 0.8 points in CG, resulting in a non-significant adjusted mean difference of 0.7 (95% CI −0.2 to 1.6) points in favour of CG. Secondary outcomes showed non-significant changes (quality of life slightly improved in IG but continued to decline in CG) or remained stable (functioning, medication adherence).
Conclusions: The intervention had no significant effects. Many patients already received appropriate prescriptions and enjoyed good quality of life and functional status. We can therefore conclude that in our study, there was not enough scope for improvement.
Trial registration number: ISRCTN99526053. NCT01171339; Results.
We explore a combinatorial framework which efficiently quantifies the asymmetries between minima and maxima in local fluctuations of time series. We first showcase its performance by applying it to a battery of synthetic cases. We find rigorous results on some canonical dynamical models (stochastic processes with and without correlations, chaotic processes) complemented by extensive numerical simulations for a range of processes which indicate that the methodology correctly distinguishes different complex dynamics and outperforms state of the art metrics in several cases. Subsequently, we apply this methodology to real-world problems emerging across several disciplines including cases in neurobiology, finance and climate science. We conclude that differences between the statistics of local maxima and local minima in time series are highly informative of the complex underlying dynamics and a graph-theoretic extraction procedure allows to use these features for statistical learning purposes.
The long-chain fatty acid receptor FFAR1 is highly expressed in pancreatic β-cells. Synthetic FFAR1 agonists can be used as antidiabetic drugs to promote glucose-stimulated insulin secretion (GSIS). However, the physiological role of FFAR1 in β-cells remains poorly understood. Here we show that 20-HETE activates FFAR1 and promotes GSIS via FFAR1 with higher potency and efficacy than dietary fatty acids such as palmitic, linoleic, and α-linolenic acid. Murine and human β-cells produce 20-HETE, and the ω-hydroxylase-mediated formation and release of 20-HETE is strongly stimulated by glucose. Pharmacological inhibition of 20-HETE formation and blockade of FFAR1 in islets inhibits GSIS. In islets from type-2 diabetic humans and mice, glucose-stimulated 20-HETE formation and 20-HETE-dependent stimulation of GSIS are strongly reduced. We show that 20-HETE is an FFAR1 agonist, which functions as an autocrine positive feed-forward regulator of GSIS, and that a reduced glucose-induced 20-HETE formation contributes to inefficient GSIS in type-2 diabetes.
Der Beitrag bietet eine Übersicht zu den Zusammenhängen zwischen Immaterialgüterrechten (IP [intellectual property]-Rechte), Privatautonomie und Innovation. Demnach beruht das IP-Recht auf der Annahme, dass erst die Kombination aus fungiblen Ausschließlichkeitsrechten und Privatautonomie – also die juristische Form der Marktwirtschaft – einen innovationsförderlichen Effekt verspricht. Dementsprechend kombiniert das geltende Recht ein hohes materielles IP-Schutzniveau mit einer weitreichenden Anerkennung der Privatautonomie der Berechtigten. Dieser Regulierungsansatz hat den Vorteil, dass sehr anpassungsfähige Rahmenbedingungen für Innovationen geschaffen werden. Wer für seine Innovation eine umfassende Exklusivität benötigt, kann unter Geltung der beiden genannten Prinzipien ebenso operieren wie Akteure, die auf IP-Schutz teilweise oder ganz verzichten möchten, weil ihnen dies unter den gegebenen Wettbewerbsbedingungen vorzugswürdig erscheint. Und doch erläutert der Beitrag, dass die naheliegende Folgerung zu kurz greift, der Gesetzgeber könne sich darauf beschränken, möglichst umfassende und zugleich fungible IP-Rechte zu kodifizieren, da der Markt stets für eine effiziente und auch sonst sozial wünschenswerte Ressourcenallokation sorge. Denn die mit ausschließlichen IP-Rechten verbundenen Transaktionskosten stehen diesem Ziel nicht selten im Wege. Damit zeigt sich, dass keine noch so elaborierte Vertragsrechtstheorie die Frage nach dem Sinn des logisch vorrangigen Eigentums erübrigt.
Das Immaterialgüterrecht bildet eine der ältesten und inzwischen umfangreichsten Materien des Einheitsprivatrechts. Fast alle Staaten der Erde sind Mitglieder der World Intellectual Property Organization und bekennen sich als solche zur Förderung des „geistigen Eigentums“. Allerdings ist der Rechtsschutz nach dem seinerseits universell anerkannten Territorialitätsprinzip auf das Territorium des jeweiligen Gesetzgebers beschränkt. Zu dieser geografischen Fragmentierung treten fremdenrechtliche Beschränkungen des Zugangs zum lokalen Rechtsschutz hinzu. Der Beitrag erläutert, welche Akteure die Spannung zwischen globaler Kommunikation und fragmentiertem Immaterialgüterrechtsschutz auf welche Weisen regulativ bearbeiten. Dabei wird unterschieden zwischen der Rechtsangleichung bei fortdauernder Fragmentierung, der Schaffung supranational einheitlicher Verfahren, Immaterialgüterrechte und Gerichte sowie informellen Kooperationen zwischen Privaten und Patentämtern. Die Leitfrage der Bestandsaufnahme lautet, ob all diese Phänomene im Sinne von Kropholler und David als funktionales Einheitsrecht begriffen werden können, ob es sich also um Rechtssätze handelt, bei denen die Einheitlichkeit ihrer Geltung im Interesse des unverfälschten internationalen Handels zu einem besonderen Rechtszweck erhoben wurde, oder ob man lediglich objektiv-formal eine rechtlich bindende Einheitlichkeit konstatieren kann, die primär ein anderes Ziel verfolgt, nämlich: die weltweite Stärkung des Immaterialgüterrechtsschutzes. Den Abschluss bildet eine kritische Stellungnahme zur verbreiteten Annahme, die weit fortgeschrittene Vereinheitlichung des Immaterialgüterrechts sei ein großartiger Erfolg.
Target-specific treatment modalities are currently not available for triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC), and acquired chemotherapy resistance is a primary obstacle for the treatment of these tumors. Here we employed derivatives of BT-549 and MDA-MB-468 TNBC cell lines that were adapted to grow in the presence of either 5-Fluorouracil, Doxorubicin or Docetaxel in an aim to identify molecular pathways involved in the adaptation to drug-induced cell killing. All six drug-adapted BT-549 and MDA-MB-468 cell lines displayed cross resistance to chemotherapy and decreased apoptosis sensitivity. Expression of the anti-apoptotic co-chaperone BAG3 was notably enhanced in two thirds (4/6) of the six resistant lines simultaneously with higher expression of HSP70 in comparison to parental controls. Doxorubicin-resistant BT-549 (BT-549rDOX20) and 5-Fluorouracil-resistant MDA-MB-468 (MDA-MB-468r5-FU2000) cells were chosen for further analysis with the autophagy inhibitor Bafilomycin A1 and lentiviral depletion of ATG5, indicating that enhanced cytoprotective autophagy partially contributes to increased drug resistance and cell survival. Stable lentiviral BAG3 depletion was associated with a robust down-regulation of Mcl-1, Bcl-2 and Bcl-xL, restoration of drug-induced apoptosis and reduced cell adhesion in these cells, and these death-sensitizing effects could be mimicked with the BAG3/Hsp70 interaction inhibitor YM-1 and by KRIBB11, a selective transcriptional inhibitor of HSF-1. Furthermore, BAG3 depletion was able to revert the EMT-like transcriptional changes observed in BT-549rDOX20 and MDA-MB-468r5-FU2000 cells. In summary, genetic and pharmacological interference with BAG3 is capable to resensitize TNBC cells to treatment, underscoring its relevance for cell death resistance and as a target to overcome therapy resistance of breast cancer.
Germany Inc. was an idiosyncratic form of industrial organization that put financial institutions at the center. This paper argues that the consumption of private benefits in related party transactions by these key agents can be understood as a compensation for their coordinating and monitoring function in Germany Inc. As a consequence, legal tools apt to curb tunneling remained weak in Germany from the perspective of outside shareholders. While banks were in a position to use their firm-level knowledge and influence to limit rent-seeking by other related parties, their own behavior was not subject to meaningful controls. With the dismantling of Germany Inc. banks seized their monitoring function and left an unprecedented void with regard to related party transactions. Hence, a “traditionalist” stance which opposes law reform for related party transactions in Germany negatively affects capital market development, growth opportunities and ultimately social welfare.
We characterize the optimal linear tax on capital in an Overlapping Generations model with two period lived households facing uninsurable idiosyncratic labor income risk. The Ramsey government internalizes the general equilibrium feedback of private precautionary saving. For logarithmic utility our full analytical solution of the Ramsey problem shows that the optimal aggregate saving rate is independent of income risk. The optimal time-invariant tax on capital is increasing in income risk. Its sign depends on the extent of risk and on the Pareto weight of future generations. If the Ramsey tax rate that maximizes steady state utility is positive, then implementing this tax rate permanently generates a Pareto-improving transition even if the initial equilibrium is dynamically efficient. We generalize our results to Epstein-Zin-Weil utility and show that the optimal steady state saving rate is increasing in income risk if and only if the intertemporal elasticity of substitution is smaller than 1.
This paper investigates the roles psychological biases play in empirically estimated deviations between subjective survival beliefs (SSBs) and objective survival probabilities (OSPs). We model deviations between SSBs and OSPs through age-dependent inverse S-shaped probability weighting functions (PWFs), as documented in experimental prospect theory. Our estimates suggest that the implied measures for cognitive weakness, likelihood insensitivity, and those for motivational biases, relative pessimism, increase with age. We document that direct measures of cognitive weakness and motivational attitudes share these trends. Our regression analyses confirm that these factors play strong quantitative roles in the formation of subjective survival beliefs. In particular, cognitive weakness is an increasingly important contributor to the overestimation of survival chances in old age.
This paper is the national report for Germany prepared for the to the 20th General Congress of the International Academy of Comparative Law 2018 and gives an overview of the regulation of crowdfunding in Germany and the typical design of crowdfunding campaigns under this legal framework. After a brief survey of market data, it delineates the classification of crowdfunding transactions in German contract law and their treatment under the applicable conflict of laws regime. It then turns to the relevant rules in prudential banking regulation and capital market law. It highlights disclosure requirements that flow from both contractual obligations of the initiators of campaigns vis-à-vis contributors and securities regulation (prospectus regime). After sketching the most important duties of the parties involved in crowdfunding, the report also looks at the key features of the respective transactions’ tax treatment.
This paper revisits the macroeconomic effects of the large-scale asset purchase programmes launched by the Federal Reserve and the Bank of England from 2008. Using a Bayesian VAR, we investigate the macroeconomic impact of shocks to asset purchase announcements and assess changes in their effectiveness based on subsample analysis. The results suggest that the early asset purchase programmes had significant positive macroeconomic effects, while those of the subsequent ones were weaker and in part not significantly different from zero. The reduced effectiveness seems to reflect in part better anticipation of asset purchase programmes over time, since we find significant positive macroeconomic effects when we consider shocks to survey expectations of the Federal Reserve’s last asset purchase programme. Finally, in all estimations we find a significant and persistent positive impact of asset purchase shocks on stock prices.
Objective: The influence of the jaw position on postural control, body posture, walking and running pattern has been reported in the literature. All these movements have in common that a relatively small, but well controlled muscle activation is required. The induced effects on motor output through changed jaw positions have been small. Therefore, it has been questioned if it could still be observed in maximal muscle activation.
Method: Twenty-three healthy, mid age recreational runners (mean age = 34.0 ± 10.3 years) participated in this study. Three different jump tests (squat jump, counter movement jump, and drop jumps from four different heights) and three maximal strength tests (trunk flexion and extension, leg press of the right and left leg) were conducted. Four different dental occlusion conditions and an additional familiarization condition were tested. Subjects performed the tests on different days for which the four occlusion conditions were randomly changed.
Results: No familiarization effect was found. Occlusion conditions with a relaxation position and with a myocentric condylar position showed significantly higher values for several tests compared to the neutral condition and the maximal occlusion position. Significance was found in the squat jump, countermovement jump, the drop jump from 32cm and 40cm, trunk extension, leg press force and rate of force development. The effect due to the splint conditions is an improvement between 3% and 12% (min and max). No influence of the jaw position on symmetry or balance between extension and flexion muscle was found.
Conclusion: An influence of occlusion splints on rate of force development (RFD) and maximal strength tests could be confirmed. A small, but consistent increase in the performance parameters could be measured. The influence of the occlusion condition is most likely small compared to other influences as for example training status, age, gender and circadian rhythm.
A new Mexican species of Ochraethes Chevrolat, 1860 (Coleoptera, Cerambycidae, Cerambycinae, Clytini) is described: Ochraethes skillmani Wappes, Santos-Silva and Botero. Plocaederus mirim Martins and Monné, 2002 (Cerambycini) is redescribed and its female is figured for the first time. New geographical records in Plocaederus Dejean, 1835 are also provided.
A taxonomic revision of Panamanian species of the genus Dasymutilla Ashmead (Hymenoptera, Mutillidae) is presented and a key for the six species is given, all recognized from both sexes. Dasymutilla colorado Cambra, Williams and Quintero sp. nov., from central and eastern Panama, is described and illustrated. Sex associations permitted us to make the following five synonymies: D. sleipniri Manley and Pitts, 2007 (male) under D. phya (Cameron, 1895) (female); D. deyrollesi Mickel, 1937 (male) and Sphaerophthama [sic.] temaxensis Cameron, 1895 under Dasymutilla araneoides (Smith, 1862) (female); D. ionothorax Manley and Pitts, 2007 (male) under Dasymutilla spilota Manley and Pitts, 2007 (female); and D. guanacaste Manley and Pitts, 2007 (male) under D. paradoxa (Gerstaecker, 1874) (female). Seasonal flight activity for Dasymutilla from six years of continuous malaise trappings in Barro Colorado Island is presented.
A full understanding of the origin, formation and degradation of volatile compounds that contribute to wine aroma is required before wine style can be effectively managed. Fractionation of grapes represents a convenient and robust method to simplify the grape matrix to enhance our understanding of the grape contribution to volatile compound production during yeast fermentation. In this study, acetone extracts of both Riesling and Cabernet Sauvignon grape berries were fractionated and model wines produced by spiking aliquots of these grape fractions into model grape juice must and fermented. Non-targeted SPME-GCMS analyses of the wines showed that several medium chain fatty acid ethyl esters were more abundant in wines made by fermenting model musts spiked with certain fractions. Further fractionation of the non-polar fractions and fermentation of model must after addition of these fractions led to the identification of a mixture of polyunsaturated triacylglycerides that, when added to fermenting model must, increase the concentration of medium chain fatty acid ethyl esters in wines. Dosage-response fermentation studies with commercially-available trilinolein revealed that the concentration of medium chain fatty acid ethyl esters can be increased by the addition of this triacylglyceride to model musts. This work suggests that grape triacylglycerides can enhance the production of fermentation-derived ethyl esters and show that this fractionation method is effective in segregating precursors or factors involved in altering the concentration of fermentation volatiles.
Drugs may cause liver injury in a few susceptible individuals, but the molecular events that lead to this idiosyncratic, largely dose-independent and non-predictable drug-induced liver injury (DILI) are mostly unknown, since animal models to explore the pathogenetic mechanisms of human idiosyncratic DILI are not yet reliable.
Brachiopod shells are the most widely used geological archive for the reconstruction of the temperature and the oxygen isotope composition of Phanerozoic seawater. However, it is not conclusive whether brachiopods precipitate their shells in thermodynamic equilibrium. In this study, we investigated the potential impact of kinetic controls on the isotope composition of modern brachiopods by measuring the oxygen and clumped isotope compositions of their shells. Our results show that clumped and oxygen isotope compositions depart from thermodynamic equilibrium due to growth rate-induced kinetic effects. These departures are in line with incomplete hydration and hydroxylation of dissolved CO2. These findings imply that the determination of taxon-specific growth rates alongside clumped and bulk oxygen isotope analyses is essential to ensure accurate estimates of past ocean temperatures and seawater oxygen isotope compositions from brachiopods.
In dieser Arbeit soll identifiziert werden, welcher der zahlreichen Vertreter einer Arzneistoffklasse sich letztlich auf dem Markt durchsetzen kann und ob bestimmte pharmakokinetische, pharmakodynamische, klinische oder praktische Substanzeigenschaften retrospektiv für den Markterfolg einer Substanz verantwortlich gemacht werden können. Zudem stellt sich die Frage, ob und in wie fern Analogpräparate einen Nutzen in der Arzneimitteltherapie mit sich bringen, obwohl ihnen zum Zeitpunkt ihrer Markteinführung nur ein geringer Innovationsgrad zugebilligt wurde. Um derartige Rückschlüsse ziehen zu können wurden exemplarisch folgende fünf Arzneistoffklassen untersucht, die sich durch eine Vielzahl an Vertretern auszeichnen: Arsphenamine, Sulfonamide, Benzodiazepine, Glucocorticoide sowie Betablocker. Der Untersuchungszeitraum bemisst sich folglich vom Anfang des 20. Jahrhunderts, als industriell gefertigte, chemisch definierte hochpotente Wirkstoffe die Therapie zu bestimmen begannen, bis etwa zum letzten Drittel des 20. Jahrhunderts als Preise und Kostenerstattungsfragen zusätzlich zu Substanzeigenschaften für den Markterfolg mitbestimmend wurden.
Exploring biophysical properties of virus-encoded components and their requirement for virus replication is an exciting new area of interdisciplinary virological research. To date, spatial resolution has only rarely been analyzed in computational/biophysical descriptions of virus replication dynamics. However, it is widely acknowledged that intracellular spatial dependence is a crucial component of virus life cycles. The hepatitis C virus-encoded NS5A protein is an endoplasmatic reticulum (ER)-anchored viral protein and an essential component of the virus replication machinery. Therefore, we simulate NS5A dynamics on realistic reconstructed, curved ER surfaces by means of surface partial differential equations (sPDE) upon unstructured grids. We match the in silico NS5A diffusion constant such that the NS5A sPDE simulation data reproduce experimental NS5A fluorescence recovery after photobleaching (FRAP) time series data. This parameter estimation yields the NS5A diffusion constant. Such parameters are needed for spatial models of HCV dynamics, which we are developing in parallel but remain qualitative at this stage. Thus, our present study likely provides the first quantitative biophysical description of the movement of a viral component. Our spatio-temporal resolved ansatz paves new ways for understanding intricate spatial-defined processes central to specfic aspects of virus life cycles.
The behavioral sciences, including most of psychology, seek to explain and predict behavior with the help of theories and models that involve concepts (e.g., attitudes) that are subsequently translated into measures. Currently, some subdisciplines such as social psychology focus almost exclusively on measures that demand reflection or even introspection when administered to persons. We argue that such a focus hinders progress in explaining behavior. One major reason is that such an exclusive focus on reflections results in common method bias, which then produces spurious relations, or in other words, low discriminant validity. Without the valid measurement of theoretical concepts, theoretical assumptions cannot be tested, and hence, theory development will be hampered. We argue that the use of a greater variety of methods would reduce these problems and would in turn foster theory building. Using a representative sample of N = 472 participants (age: M = 51.0, SD = 17.7; 54% female), we compared the validity of a classical introspective attitude measure (i.e., the New Ecological Paradigm) with that of an alternative attitude measure (i.e., the General Ecological Behavior scale). The latter measure, which was based on self-reported behavior, showed substantially better validity that we argue could aid theory development.
Tumor progression largely depends on the presence of alternatively polarized (M2) tumor-associated macrophages (TAMs), whereas the classical M1-polarized macrophages can promote anti-tumorigenic immune responses. Thus, selective inhibition of M2-TAMs is a desirable anti-cancer approach in highly resistant tumor entities such as hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) or breast cancer. We here examined whether a peptide that selectively binds to and is internalized by in vitro-differentiated murine M2 macrophages as compared to M1 macrophages, termed M2pep, could be used to selectively target TAMs in HCC and breast carcinoma. We confirmed selectivity of M2pep for in vitro M2 polarized macrophages. Upon incubation of suspended mixed 4T1 tumor cells with M2pep, high amounts of the TAMs were found to be associated with M2pep, whereas in mixed tumor cell suspensions from two HCC mouse models, M2pep showed only low-degree binding to TAMs. M2pep also showed low-degree targeting of liver macrophages. This indicates that the TAMs in different tumor entities show different targeting of M2pep and that M2pep is a very promising approach to develop selective M2-TAM-targeting in tumor entities containing M2-TAMs with significant amounts of the so far elusive M2pep receptor(s).
Knowledge about the biogeographic affinities of the world’s tropical forests helps to better understand regional differences in forest structure, diversity, composition, and dynamics. Such understanding will enable anticipation of region-specific responses to global environmental change. Modern phylogenies, in combination with broad coverage of species inventory data, now allow for global biogeographic analyses that take species evolutionary distance into account. Here we present a classification of the world’s tropical forests based on their phylogenetic similarity. We identify five principal floristic regions and their floristic relationships: (i) Indo-Pacific, (ii) Subtropical, (iii) African, (iv) American, and (v) Dry forests. Our results do not support the traditional neo- versus paleotropical forest division but instead separate the combined American and African forests from their Indo-Pacific counterparts. We also find indications for the existence of a global dry forest region, with representatives in America, Africa, Madagascar, and India. Additionally, a northern-hemisphere Subtropical forest region was identified with representatives in Asia and America, providing support for a link between Asian and American northern-hemisphere forests.
Background: Current approved drugs for Alzheimer’s disease (AD) only attenuate symptoms, but do not cure the disease. The pirinixic acid derivate MH84 has been characterized as a dual gamma-secretase/proliferator activated receptor gamma (PPARγ) modulator in vitro. Pharmacokinetic studies in mice showed that MH84 is bioavailable after oral administration and reaches the brain. We recently demonstrated that MH84 improved mitochondrial dysfunction in a cellular model of AD. In the present study, we extended the pharmacological characterization of MH84 to 3-month-old Thy-1 AβPPSL mice (harboring the Swedish and London mutation in human amyloid precursor protein (APP)) which are characterized by enhanced AβPP processing and cerebral mitochondrial dysfunction, representing a mouse model of early AD.
Methods: Three-month-old Thy-1 AβPPSL mice received 12 mg/kg b.w. MH84 by oral gavage once a day for 21 days. Mitochondrial respiration was analyzed in isolated brain mitochondria, and mitochondrial membrane potential and ATP levels were determined in dissociated brain cells. Citrate synthase (CS) activity was determined in brain tissues and MitoTracker Green fluorescence was measured in HEK293-AβPPwt and HEK293-AβPPsw cells. Soluble Aβ1–40 and Aβ1–42 levels were determined using ELISA. Western blot analysis and qRT-PCR were used to measure protein and mRNA levels, respectively.
Results: MH84 reduced cerebral levels of the β-secretase-related C99 peptide and of Aβ40 levels. Mitochondrial dysfunction was ameliorated by restoring complex IV (cytochrome-c oxidase) respiration, mitochondrial membrane potential, and levels of ATP. Induction of PPARγ coactivator-1α (PGC-1α) mRNA and protein expression was identified as a possible mode of action that leads to increased mitochondrial mass as indicated by enhanced CS activity, OXPHOS levels, and MitoTracker Green fluorescence.
Conclusions: MH84 modulates β-secretase processing of APP and improves mitochondrial dysfunction by a PGC-1α-dependent mechanism. Thus, MH84 seems to be a new promising therapeutic agent with approved in-vivo activity for the treatment of AD.
Damage control resuscitation may lead to postoperative intra-abdominal hypertension or abdominal compartment syndrome. These conditions may result in a vicious, self-perpetuating cycle leading to severe physiologic derangements and multiorgan failure unless interrupted by abdominal (surgical or other) decompression. Further, in some clinical situations, the abdomen cannot be closed due to the visceral edema, the inability to control the compelling source of infection or the necessity to re-explore (as a “planned second-look” laparotomy) or complete previously initiated damage control procedures or in cases of abdominal wall disruption. The open abdomen in trauma and non-trauma patients has been proposed to be effective in preventing or treating deranged physiology in patients with severe injuries or critical illness when no other perceived options exist. Its use, however, remains controversial as it is resource consuming and represents a non-anatomic situation with the potential for severe adverse effects. Its use, therefore, should only be considered in patients who would most benefit from it. Abdominal fascia-to-fascia closure should be done as soon as the patient can physiologically tolerate it. All precautions to minimize complications should be implemented.
The contribution of upper body movements to dynamic balance regulation during challenged locomotion
(2018)
Recent studies suggest that in addition to movements between ankle and hip joints, movements of the upper body, in particular of the arms, also significantly contribute to postural control. In line with these suggestions, we analyzed regulatory movements of upper and lower body joints supporting dynamic balance regulation during challenged locomotion. The participants walked over three beams of varying width and under three different verbally conveyed restrictions of arm posture, to control the potential influence of arm movements on the performance: The participants walked with their arms stretched out perpendicularly in the frontal plane, spontaneously, i.e., without restrictions to the arm movements, and with their hands on their thighs. After applying an inverse-dynamics analysis to the measured joint kinematics, we investigated the contribution of upper and lower body joints to balance regulation in terms of torque amplitude and variation. On the condition with the hands on the thighs, the contribution of the upper body remains significantly lower than the contribution of the lower body irrespective of beam widths. For spontaneous arm movements and for outstretched arms we find that the upper body (including the arms) contributes to the balancing to a similar extent as the lower body. Moreover, when the task becomes more difficult, i.e., for narrower beam widths, the contribution of the upper body increases, while the contribution of the lower body remains nearly constant. These findings lend further support to the hypothetical existence of an "upper body strategy" complementing the ankle and hip strategies especially during challenging dynamic balance tasks.
The new edition of the 2016 World Health Organization (WHO) classification system for tumors of the hematopoietic and lymphoid tissues was published in September 2017. Under the category of myeloproliferative neoplasms (MPNs), the revised document includes seven subcategories: chronic myeloid leukemia, chronic neutrophilic leukemia, polycythemia vera (PV), primary myelofibrosis (PMF), essential thrombocythemia (ET), chronic eosinophilic leukemia-not otherwise specified and MPN, unclassifiable (MPN-U); of note, mastocytosis is no longer classified under the MPN category. In the current review, we focus on the diagnostic criteria for JAK2/CALR/MPL mutation-related MPNs: PV, ET, and PMF. In this regard, the 2016 changes were aimed at facilitating the distinction between masked PV and JAK2-mutated ET and between prefibrotic/early and overtly fibrotic PMF. In the current communication, we (i) provide practically useful resource tables and graphs on the new diagnostic criteria including outcome, (ii) elaborate on the rationale for the 2016 changes, (iii) discuss the complementary role of mutation screening, (iv) address ongoing controversies and propose solutions, (v) attend to the challenges of applying WHO criteria in routine clinical practice, and (vi) outline future directions from the perspectives of the clinical pathologist.
Background: Rare diseases are, by definition, very serious and chronic diseases with a high negative impact on quality of life. Approximately 350 million people worldwide live with rare diseases. The resulting high disease burden triggers health information search, but helpful, high-quality, and up-to-date information is often hard to find. Therefore, the improvement of health information provision has been integrated in many national plans for rare diseases, discussing the telephone as one access option. In this context, this study examines the need for a telephone service offering information for people affected by rare diseases, their relatives, and physicians.
Methods: In total, 107 individuals participated in a qualitative interview study conducted in Germany. Sixty-eight individuals suffering from a rare disease or related to somebody with rare diseases and 39 health care professionals took part. Individual interviews were conducted using a standardized semi-structured questionnaire. Interviews were analysed using the qualitative content analysis, triangulating patients, relatives, and health care professionals. The fulfilment of qualitative data processing standards has been controlled for.
Results: Out of 68 patients and relatives and 39 physicians, 52 and 18, respectively, advocated for the establishment of a rare diseases telephone service. Interviewees expected a helpline to include expert staffing, personal contact, good availability, low technical barriers, medical and psychosocial topics of counselling, guidance in reducing information chaos, and referrals. Health care professionals highlighted the importance of medical topics of counselling—in particular, differential diagnostics—and referrals.
Conclusions: Therefore, the need for a national rare diseases helpline was confirmed in this study. Due to limited financial resources, existing offers should be adapted in a stepwise procedure in accordance with the identified attributes.
Background: The Catechol-O-methyltransferase (COMT) represents the key enzyme in catecholamine degradation. Recent studies suggest that the COMT rs4680 polymorphism is associated with the response to endogenous and exogenous catecholamines. There are, however, conflicting data regarding the COMT Met/Met phenotype being associated with an increased risk of acute kidney injury (AKI) after cardiac surgery. The aim of the current study is to prospectively investigate the impact of the COMT rs4680 polymorphism on the incidence of AKI in patients undergoing cardiac surgery.
Methods: In this prospective single center cohort study consecutive patients hospitalized for elective cardiac surgery including cardiopulmonary-bypass (CPB) were screened for participation. Demographic clinical data, blood, urine and tissue samples were collected at predefined time points throughout the clinical stay. AKI was defined according to recent recommendations of the Kidney Disease Improving Global Outcome (KDIGO) group. Genetic analysis was performed after patient enrolment was completed.
Results: Between April and December 2014, 150 patients were recruited. The COMT genotypes were distributed as follows: Val/Met 48.7%, Met/Met 29.3%, Val/Val 21.3%. No significant differences were found for demography, comorbidities, or operative strategy according to the underlying COMT genotype. AKI occurred in 35 patients (23.5%) of the total cohort, and no differences were evident between the COMT genotypes (20.5% Met/Met, 24.7% Val/Met, 25.0% Val/Val, p = 0.66). There were also no differences in the post-operative period, including ICU or in-hospital stay.
Conclusions: We did not find statistically significant variations in the risk for postoperative AKI, length of ICU or in-hospital stay according to the underlying COMT genotype.