Refine
Has Fulltext
- no (24944) (remove)
Year of publication
Document Type
- Article (20602)
- Doctoral Thesis (1419)
- Monograph/Edited Volume (974)
- Other (654)
- Review (585)
- Conference Proceeding (288)
- Part of a Book (228)
- Preprint (106)
- Habilitation Thesis (37)
- Part of Periodical (19)
Language
- English (24944) (remove)
Is part of the Bibliography
- yes (24944) (remove)
Keywords
- climate change (103)
- Germany (78)
- stars: massive (58)
- Climate change (49)
- diffusion (48)
- stars: early-type (48)
- Arabidopsis thaliana (47)
- gamma rays: general (47)
- German (46)
- stars: winds, outflows (45)
Institute
- Institut für Physik und Astronomie (4349)
- Institut für Biochemie und Biologie (4168)
- Institut für Geowissenschaften (2859)
- Institut für Chemie (2485)
- Institut für Mathematik (1400)
- Department Psychologie (1283)
- Institut für Ernährungswissenschaft (905)
- Department Linguistik (774)
- Institut für Informatik und Computational Science (715)
- Wirtschaftswissenschaften (656)
This volume discusses the impact of human rights law on other fields of international law. Does international human rights law modify other fields of international law? Contributions focus on possible spillover effects of human rights on international economic or international criminal law. Does international human rights law have a streamlining effect on international law as a whole? This might be identified as a process of constitutionalisation. In this book, human rights can be understood as one of the core principles of international legal order and thus have an effect on the general law of treaties or on the settlement of disputes.
Although human rights law is a relatively young field of international law, its content and core values today are of major importance for the interpretation of international law as a whole. As we witness a redefinition of sovereignty as a responsibility of states towards the people and a shift to greater relevance of the individual in international law in general, it is a logical consequence that human rights have an impact on other areas of international law.
Purpose
This chapter is aimed at contributing to the question of how institutional reforms affect multi-level governance (MLG) capacities and thus the performance of public task fulfillment with a particular focus on the local level of government in England, France, and Germany.
Methodology/approach
Drawing on concepts of institutional evaluation, we analytically distinguish six dimensions of impact assessment: vertical coordination; horizontal coordination; efficiency/savings; effectiveness/quality; political accountability/democratic control; equity of service standards. Methodologically, we rely on document analysis and expert judgments that could be gleaned from case studies in the three countries and a comprehensive evaluation of the available secondary data in the respective national and local contexts.
Findings
Institutional reforms in the intergovernmental setting have exerted a significant influence on task fulfillment and the performance of service delivery. Irrespective of whether MLG practice corresponds to type I or type II, task devolution (decentralization/de-concentration) furthers the interlocal variation and makes the equity of service delivery shrink. There is a general tendency of improved horizontal/MLG type I coordination capacities, especially after political decentralization, less in the case of administrative decentralization. However, decentralization often entails considerable additional costs which sometimes overload local governments.
Research implications
The distinction between multi-purpose territorial organization/MLG I and single-purpose functional organization/MLG II provides a suitable analytical frame for institutional evaluation and impact assessment of reforms in the intergovernmental setting. Furthermore, comparative research into the relationship between MLG and institutional reforms is needed to reveal the explanatory power of intervening factors, such as the local budgetary and staff situation, local policy preferences, and political interests in conjunction with the salience of the transferred tasks.
Practical implications
The findings provide evidence on the causal relationship between specific types of (vertical) institutional reforms, performance, and task-related characteristics. Policy-makers and government actors may use this information when drafting institutional reform programs and determining the allocation of public tasks in the intergovernmental setting.
Social implications
In general, the euphoric expectations placed upon decentralization strategies in modern societies cannot straightforwardly be justified. Our findings show that any type of task transfer to lower levels of government exacerbates existing disparities or creates new ones. However, the integration of tasks within multi-functional, politically accountable local governments may help to improve MLG type I coordination in favor of local communities and territorially based societal actors, while the opposite may be said with regard to de-concentration and the strengthening of MLG type II coordination.
Originality/value
The chapter addresses a missing linkage in the existing MLG literature which has hitherto predominantly been focused on the political decision-making and on the implementation of reforms in the intergovernmental settings of European countries, whereas the impact of such reforms and of their consequences for MLG has remained largely ignored.
In the first part of my work I have investigated the ageing properties of the first passage time distributions in a one-dimensional subdiffusive continuous time random walk with power law distributed waiting times of the form $\psi(\tau) \sim \tau^{-1-\alpha}$ with $0<\alpha<1$ and $1<\alpha<2$. The age or ageing time $t_a$ is the time span from the start of the stochastic process to the start of the observation of this process (at $t=0$). I have calculated the results for a single target and two targets, also including the biased case, where the walker is driven towards the boundary by a constant force. I have furthermore refined the previously derived results for the non-ageing case and investigated the changes that occur when the walk is performed in a discrete quenched energy landscape, where the waiting times are fixed for every site. The results include the exact Laplace space densities and infinite (converging) series as exact results in the time space. The main results are the dominating long time power law behavior regimes, which depend on the ageing time. For the case of unbiased subdiffusion ($\alpha < 1$) in the presence of one target, I find three different dominant terms for ranges of $t$ separated by $t_a$ and another crossover time $t^{\star}$, which depends on $t_a$ as well as on the anomalous exponent $\alpha$ and the anomalous diffusion coefficient $K_{\alpha}$. In all three regimes ($t \ll t_a$, $t_a \ll t \ll t^{\star}$, $t \gg t^{\star}$) one finds power law decay with exponents depending on $\alpha$. The middle regime only exists for $t_a \ll t^{\star}$. The dominant terms in the first two regimes (ageing regimes) come from the probability distribution of the forward waiting time, the time one has to wait for the stochastic process to make the first step during the observation. When the observation time is larger than the second crossover time $t^{\star}$, the first passage time density does not show ageing and the non-ageing first passage time dominates. The power law exponents in the respective regimes are $-\alpha$ for strong ageing, $-1-\alpha$ in the intermediate regime, and $-1-\alpha/2$ in the final non-ageing regime. A similar split into three regimes can be found for $1<\alpha<2$, only with a different second crossover time $t^*$. In this regime the diffusion is normal but also age-dependent. For the diffusion in quenched energy landscapes one cannot detect ageing. The first passage time density shows a quenched power law $^\sim t^{-(1+2\alpha)/(1+\alpha)}$. For diffusion between two target sites and the biased diffusion towards a target only two scaling regimes emerge, separated by the ageing time. In the ageing case $t \ll t_a$ the forward waiting time is again dominant with power law exponent $-\alpha$, while the non-ageing power law $-1-\alpha$ is found for all times $t \gg t_a$. An intermediate regime does not exist. The bias and the confinement have similar effects on the first passage time density. For quenched diffusion, the biased case is interesting, as the bias reduces correlations due to revisiting of the same waiting time. As a result, CTRW like behavior is observed, including ageing. Extensive computer simulations support my findings.
The second part of my research was done on the subject of ageing Scher-Montroll transport, which is in parts closely related to the first passage densities. It explains the electrical current in an amorphous material. I have investigated the effect of the width of a given initial distribution of charge carriers on the transport coefficients as well as the ageing effect on the emerging power law regimes and a constant initial regime. While a spread out initial distribution has only little impact on the Scher-Montroll current, ageing alters the behavior drastically. Instead of the two classical power laws one finds four current regimes, up to three of which can appear in a single experiment. The dominant power laws differ for $t \ll t_a, t_c$, $t_a \ll t \ll t_c$, $t_c \ll t \ll t_a$, and $t \gg t_a,t_c$. Here, $t_c$ is the crossover time of the non-aged Scher-Montroll current. For strongly aged systems one can observe a constant current in the first regime while the others are dominated by decaying power laws with exponents $\alpha -1$, $-\alpha$, and $-1-\alpha$. The ageing regimes are the 1st and 3rd one, while the classical regimes are the 2nd and the 4th. I have verified the theory using numerical integration of the exact integrals and applied the new results to experimental data.
In the third part I considered a single file of subdiffusing particles in an energy landscape. Every occupied site of the landscape acts as a boundary, from which a particle is immediately reflected to its previous site, if it tries to jump there. I have analysed the effects single-file diffusion a quenched landscape compared to an annealed landscape and I have related these results to the number of steps and related quantities. The diffusion changes from ultraslow logarithmic diffusion in the annealed or CTRW case to subdiffusion with an anomalous exponent $\alpha/(1+\alpha)$ in the quenched landscape. The behavior is caused by the forward waiting time, which changes drastically from the quenched to the annealed case. Single-file effects in the quenched landscape are even more complicated to consider in the ensemble average, since the diffusion in individual landscapes shows extremely diverse behavior. Extensive simulations support my theoretical arguments, which consider mainly the long time evolution of the mean square displacement of a bulk particle.
In freshwater sciences, nitrogen gained increasing attention in the past as an important resource potentially influencing phytoplankton growth and thus eutrophication. Most studies and all management approaches, however, are still restricted to dissolved inorganic nitrogen (DIN = nitrate + nitrite + ammonium) since dissolved organic nitrogen (DON) was considered to be refractory for most of the photoautotrophs. In the meantime this assumption has been disproved for all aquatic systems. While research on DON in marine ecosystems substantially increased, in freshwater a surprisingly small number of investigations has been carried out on DON utilization by phytoplankton or even the occurrence and seasonal development of total DON or its compounds in lakes. Therefore, our present knowledge on DON utilization by phytoplankton is often based on single species experiments using a sole, usually low molecular weight DON component, often in unnaturally high amounts mainly carried out with marine phytoplankton species. Thus, we know that some phytoplankton species can take up different DON fractions if they are available in high concentrations and as sole nitrogen source. This does not necessarily imply that phytoplankton would perform likewise in natural environments. In addition, it will be difficult to draw conclusions on the behavior of freshwater phytoplankton from experiments with marine phytoplankton since the nutrient regime in marine environments differs from that of freshwater. In the light of the parallel availability of inorganic and organic nitrogen species in natural freshwater ecosystems, several questions must be raised: "If inorganic nitrogen is available, would phytoplankton really rely on an organic nitrogen source? Could a connection be detected between the seasonal development of DON and changes in the phytoplankton community composition as found for inorganic nitrogen? And if we reduce the input of inorganic nitrogen in lakes and rivers would the importance of DON as nitrogen source for phytoplankton increase, counteracting all management efforts or even leading to undesired effects due to changes in phytoplankton physiology and biodiversity?" I experimentally addressed the questions whether those DON compounds differentially influence growth, physiology and composition of phytoplankton both as sole available nitrogen source and in combination with other nitrogen compounds. I hypothesized that all offered DON - compounds (urea, natural organic matter (NOM), dissolved free and combined amino acids (DFAA, DCAA)) could be utilized by phytoplankton at natural concentrations. However, I assumed that the availability would decrease with increasing compound complexity. I furthermore hypothesized that the occurrence of low DIN concentrations would not affect the utilization of DON negatively. The nitrogen source, whatsoever, would have an impact on phytoplankton physiology as well as community composition. To investigate these questions and assumptions I conducted bioassays with algae monocultures as well as phytoplankton communities testing the utilization of various DON compounds by several freshwater phytoplankton species. Especially the potential utilization of NOM, a complex DON compound mainly consisting of humic substances is of interest, since it is usually regarded to be refractory. In order to be able to use natural concentrations of DON - compounds for my experiments the concentration of total DON and some DON - compounds (urea, humic substances, heigh molecular weight substances) was assessed in Lake Müggelsee. All compounds were able to support algae growth in the low natural concentrations supplied. However, I found that the offered DON compounds differ in their availability to various algae species, both, as sole nitrogen source or in combination with low DIN concentrations. As expected, the availability decreased with increasing complexity of the nitrogen compound. Furthermore, I could show that changes in algal physiology (nitrogen storage, metabolism) occur depending on the utilized nitrogen source. Especially the secondary photosynthetic pigment composition, heterocyst frequency and C:N - ratio of the algae were affected. The uptake and usage of certain nitrogen compounds might be more costly, potentially resulting in those physiology changes. Whereas laboratory experiments with single species revealed strong effects of DON, algal responses to DON in a multi-species situation remain unclear. Experiments with phytoplankton communities from Lake Müggelsee revealed that the nitrogen pool composition does influence the phytoplankton community structure. The findings furthermore show that several species combined might utilize the supplied nitrogen completely different than monocultures in the laboratory. Thus, besides the actual ability of algae to use the offered nitrogen sources other factors, such as interspecific competition, may be of importance. I further investigated, if the results of the laboratory experiments, can be verified in the field. Here, I surveyed the seasonal development of several dissolved organic matter (DOM) components (urea, high molecular weight substances (HMWS), humic substances (HS)) and associated parameters (Specific UV-absorption (SUVA), C:N - ratio) in Lake Müggelsee between 2011 and 2013. Furthermore, data from the long term measurements series of Lake Müggelsee such as physical (temperature, light, pH, O2) and chemical parameters (nitrogen, phosphorous, silica, inorganic carbon), zooplankton and phytoplankton data were used to investigate how much of the variability of the phytoplankton composition in Lake Müggelsee can be explained by DON/DOM concentration and composition, relative to the other groups of explanatory variables. The results show that DON mainly consists of rather complex compounds such as humic substances and biopolymers (80 %) and that only slight seasonal trends are detectable. Using variance partitioning I could show, that the usually investigated nutrients (DIN, silica, inorganic carbon, phosphorous) and abiotic factors together explain most of the algae composition as was to be expected (57.1 % of modeled variance). However, DOM and the associated parameters uniquely explain 10.3 % of the variance and thus slightly more than zooplankton with 9.3 %. I could therefore prove, that the composition of DOM (nitrogen and carbon) is connected to the algae composition in an eutrophic lake such as Lake Müggelsee. DON - compounds such as urea, however, could not be correlated with the occurrence of specific phytoplankton species. Overall, the results of this study imply that DON can be a valuable nitrogen source for freshwater phytoplankton. DON is used by various species even when DIN is available in low concentrations. Through the reduction of DIN in lakes and rivers, the DON:DIN ratio might be changed, resulting even in an increased importance of DON as phytoplankton nitrogen source. My work suggests that not only N2-fixation but also DON utilization might compensate for reduced N - input. Changes from DIN to DON as main nitrogen source might also promote certain, potentially undesired algae species and influence the biodiversity of a limnic ecosystem through changes in the phytoplankton community structure. Thus, DON, especially urea, should be included in calculations concerning total available nitrogen and when determining nitrogen threshold values. Furthermore, the input-reduction of DON, for example from waste-water treatment plants should also be evaluated and the results of my thesis should find consideration when planning to reduce the nitrogen input in freshwater.
The introduction of columnar in-memory databases, along with hardware evolution, has made the execution of transactional and analytical enterprise application workloads on a single system both feasible and viable. Yet, we argue that executing analytical aggregate queries directly on the transactional data can decrease the overall system performance. Despite the aggregation capabilities of columnar in-memory databases, the direct access to records of a materialized aggregate is always more efficient than aggregating on the fly. The traditional approach to materialized aggregates, however, introduces significant overhead in terms of materialized view selection, maintenance, and exploitation. When this overhead is handled by the application, it increases the application complexity, and can slow down the transactional throughput of inserts, updates, and deletes.
In this thesis, we motivate, propose, and evaluate the aggregate cache, a materialized aggregate engine in the main-delta architecture of a columnar in-memory database that provides efficient means to handle costly aggregate queries of enterprise applications. For our design, we leverage the specifics of the main-delta architecture that separates a table into a main and delta partition. The central concept is to only cache the partial aggregate query result as defined on the main partition of a table, because the main partition is relatively stable as records are only inserted into the delta partition. We contribute by proposing incremental aggregate maintenance and query compensation techniques for mixed workloads of enterprise applications. In addition, we introduce aggregate profit metrics that increase the likelihood of persisting the most profitable aggregates in the aggregate cache.
Query compensation and maintenance of materialized aggregates based on joins of multiple tables is expensive due to the partitioned tables in the main-delta architecture. Our analysis of enterprise applications has revealed several data schema and workload patterns. This includes the observation that transactional data is persisted in header and item tables, whereas in many cases, the insertion of related header and item records is executed in a single database transaction. We contribute by proposing an approach to transport these application object semantics to the database system and optimize the query processing using the aggregate cache by applying partition pruning and predicate pushdown techniques.
For the experimental evaluation, we propose the FICO benchmark that is based on data from a productive ERP system with extracted mixed workloads. Our evaluation reveals that the aggregate cache can accelerate the execution of aggregate queries up to a factor of 60 whereas the speedup highly depends on the number of aggregated records in the main and delta partitions. In mixed workloads, the proposed aggregate maintenance and query compensation techniques perform up to an order of magnitude better than traditional materialized aggregate maintenance approaches. The introduced aggregate profit metrics outperform existing costbased metrics by up to 20%. Lastly, the join pruning and predicate pushdown techniques can accelerate query execution in the aggregate cache in the presence of multiple partitioned tables by up to an order of magnitude.
Local Government in Germany
(2016)
Accountability is one of the most widely discussed concepts of public administration research and teaching in the last decade. But why is this case? Obviously accountability is, like its counterpart transparency, a “magic concept”, and an indispensable part of the prominent and omnipresent discourse on “good governance” as well as a significant element in debates about public sector reform. The same holds true for performance, which has been a magic and contested concept ever since New Public Management (NPM) entered the discourse about “modern” processes and structures of the public sector. But the third term in the title of this paper, legitimacy, even though it is one of the basic concepts of political science and democracy and is at the heart of Max Weber's theory of bureaucracy, has been surprisingly absent from current debates about the challenges of modern public administration, and for that sake also about the future of the welfare state. This chapter argues that different concepts of legitimacy lie at the heart of most debates about accountability and performance (input, output and throughput legitimacy), and that a better understanding of the relationships between accountability, performance and legitimacy can clarify some of the puzzles of contemporary research.
Introduction: Adequate cognitive function in patients is a prerequisite for successful implementation of patient education and lifestyle coping in comprehensive cardiac rehabilitation (CR) programs. Although the association between cardiovascular diseases and cognitive impairments (CIs) is well known, the prevalence particularly of mild CI in CR and the characteristics of affected patients have been insufficiently investigated so far.
Methods: In this prospective observational study, 496 patients (54.5 ± 6.2 years, 79.8% men) with coronary artery disease following an acute coronary event (ACE) were analyzed. Patients were enrolled within 14 days of discharge from the hospital in a 3-week inpatient CR program. Patients were tested for CI using the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) upon admission to and discharge from CR. Additionally, sociodemographic, clinical, and physiological variables were documented. The data were analyzed descriptively and in a multivariate stepwise backward elimination regression model with respect to CI.
Results: At admission to CR, the CI (MoCA score < 26) was determined in 182 patients (36.7%). Significant differences between CI and no CI groups were identified, and CI group was associated with high prevalence of smoking (65.9 vs 56.7%, P = 0.046), heavy (physically demanding) workloads (26.4 vs 17.8%, P < 0.001), sick leave longer than 1 month prior to CR (28.6 vs 18.5%, P = 0.026), reduced exercise capacity (102.5 vs 118.8 W, P = 0.006), and a shorter 6-min walking distance (401.7 vs 421.3 m, P = 0.021) compared to no CI group. The age- and education-adjusted model showed positive associations with CI only for sick leave more than 1 month prior to ACE (odds ratio [OR] 1.673, 95% confidence interval 1.07–2.79; P = 0.03) and heavy workloads (OR 2.18, 95% confidence interval 1.42–3.36; P < 0.01).
Conclusion: The prevalence of CI in CR was considerably high, affecting more than one-third of cardiac patients. Besides age and education level, CI was associated with heavy workloads and a longer sick leave before ACE.
In recent years, the category of evidentiality has also come into use for the description of Romance languages and of German. This has been contingent on a change in its interpretation from a typological category to a semantic-pragmatic category, which allows an application to languages lacking specialised morphemes for the expression of evidentiality. We consider evidentiality to be a structural dimension of grammar, the values of which are expressed by types of constructions that code the source of information which a speaker imparts. If we look at the situation in Romance languages and in German, drawing a boundary between epistemic modality and evidentiality presents problems that are difficult to solve. Adding markers of the source of the speaker’s knowledge often limits the degree of responsibility of the speaker for the content of the utterance. Evidential adverbs are a frequently used means of marking the source of the speaker’s knowledge. The evidential meaning is generalised to marking any source of knowledge, what can be regarded as a result of a process of pragmaticalisation. The use of certain means which also carry out evidential markings can even contribute to the blurring of the different kinds of evidentiality. German also has modal verbs which in conjunction with the perfect tense of the verb have a predominantly evidential use (sollen and wollen). But even here the evidential marking is not without influence on the modality of the utterance. The Romance languages, however, do not have such specialised verbs for expressing evidentiality in certain contexts. To do this, they mark evidentiality – often context bound – by verb forms such as the conditional and the imperfect tense. This article shall contrast the different architectures used in expressing evidentiality in German and in the Romance languages.
Background
Non-typhoid Salmonella Typhimurium (S. Typhimurium) accounts for a high number of registered salmonellosis cases, and O-serotyping is one important tool for monitoring epidemiology and spread of the disease. Moreover, variations in glucosylated O-antigens are related to immunogenicity and spread in the host. However, classical autoagglutination tests combined with the analysis of specific genetic markers cannot always reliably register phase variable glucose modifications expressed on Salmonella O-antigens and additional tools to monitor O-antigen glucosylation phenotypes of S. Typhimurium would be desirable.
Results
We developed a test for the phase variable O-antigen glucosylation state of S. Typhimurium using the tailspike proteins (TSP) of Salmonella phages 9NA and P22. We used this ELISA like tailspike adsorption (ELITA) assay to analyze a library of 44 Salmonella strains. ELITA was successful in discriminating strains that carried glucose 1-6 linked to the galactose of O-polysaccharide backbone (serotype O1) from non-glucosylated strains. This was shown by O-antigen compositional analyses of the respective strains with mass spectrometry and capillary electrophoresis. The ELITA test worked rapidly in a microtiter plate format and was highly O-antigen specific. Moreover, TSP as probes could also detect glucosylated strains in flow cytometry and distinguish multiphasic cultures differing in their glucosylation state.
Conclusions
Tailspike proteins contain large binding sites with precisely defined specificities and are therefore promising tools to be included in serotyping procedures as rapid serotyping agents in addition to antibodies. In this study, 9NA and P22TSP as probes could specifically distinguish glucosylation phenotypes of Salmonella on microtiter plate assays and in flow cytometry. This opens the possibility for flow sorting of cell populations for subsequent genetic analyses or for monitoring phase variations during large scale O-antigen preparations necessary for vaccine production.
The visceral protein transthyretin (TTR) is frequently affected by oxidative post-translational protein modifications (PTPMs) in various diseases. Thus, better insight into structure-function relationships due to oxidative PTPMs of TTR should contribute to the understanding of pathophysiologic mechanisms. While the in vivo analysis of TTR in mammalian models is complex, time- and resource-consuming, transgenic Caenorhabditis elegans expressing hTTR provide an optimal model for the in vivo identification and characterization of drug-mediated oxidative PTPMs of hTTR by means of matrix assisted laser desorption/ionization – time of flight – mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF-MS). Herein, we demonstrated that hTTR is expressed in all developmental stages of Caenorhabditis elegans, enabling the analysis of hTTR metabolism during the whole life-cycle. The suitability of the applied model was verified by exposing worms to D-penicillamine and menadione. Both drugs induced substantial changes in the oxidative PTPM pattern of hTTR. Additionally, for the first time a covalent binding of both drugs with hTTR was identified and verified by molecular modelling.
Mental arithmetic exhibits various biases. Among those is a tendency to overestimate addition and to underestimate subtraction outcomes. Does such “operational momentum” (OM) also affect multiplication and division? Twenty-six adults produced lines whose lengths corresponded to the correct outcomes of multiplication and division problems shown in symbolic format. We found a reliable tendency to over-estimate division outcomes, i.e., reverse OM. We suggest that anchoring on the first operand (a tendency to use this number as a reference for further quantitative reasoning) contributes to cognitive biases in mental arithmetic.
In the debate on how to govern sustainable development, a central question concerns the interaction between knowledge about sustainability and policy developments. The discourse on what constitutes sustainable development conflict on some of the most basic issues, including the proper definitions, instruments and indicators of what should be ‘developed’ or ‘sustained’. Whereas earlier research on the role of (scientific) knowledge in policy adopted a rationalist-positivist view of knowledge as the basis for ‘evidence-based policy making’, recent literature on knowledge creation and transfer processes has instead pointed towards aspects of knowledge-policy ‘co-production’ (Jasanoff 2004). It is highlighted that knowledge utilisation is not just a matter of the quality of the knowledge as such, but a question of which knowledge fits with the institutional context and dominant power structures. Just as knowledge supports and justifies certain policy, policy can produce and stabilise certain knowledge. Moreover, rather than viewing knowledge-policy interaction as a linear and uni-directional model, this conceptualization is based on an assumption of the policy process as being more anarchic and unpredictable, something Cohen, March and Olsen (1972) has famously termed the ‘garbage-can model’.
The present dissertation focuses on the interplay between knowledge and policy in sustainability governance. It takes stock with the practice of ‘Management by Objectives and Results’ (MBOR: Lundqvist 2004) whereby policy actors define sustainable development goals (based on certain knowledge) and are expected to let these definitions guide policy developments as well as evaluate whether sustainability improves or not. As such a knowledge-policy instrument, Sustainability Indicators (SI:s) help both (subjectively) construct ‘social meaning’ about sustainability and (objectively) influence policy and measure its success. The different articles in this cumulative dissertation analyse the development, implementation and policy support (personal and institutional) of Sustainability Indicators as an instrument for MBOR in a variety of settings. More specifically, the articles centre on the question of how sustainability definitions and measurement tools on the one hand (knowledge) and policy instruments and political power structures on the other, are co-produced.
A first article examines the normative foundations of popular international SI:s and country rankings. Combining theoretical (constructivist) analysis with factor analysis, it analyses how the input variable structure of SI:s are related to different sustainability paradigms, producing a different output in terms of which countries (developed versus developing) are most highly ranked. Such a theoretical input-output analysis points towards a potential problem of SI:s becoming a sort of ‘circular argumentation constructs’. The article thus, highlights on a quantitative basis what others have noted qualitatively – that different definitions and interpretations of sustainability influence indicator output to the point of contradiction. The normative aspects of SI:s does thereby not merely concern the question of which indicators to use for what purposes, but also the more fundamental question of how normative and political bias are intrinsically a part of the measurement instrument as such. The study argues that, although no indicator can be expected to tell the sustainability ‘truth-out-there’, a theoretical localization of indicators – and of the input variable structure – may help facilitate interpretation of SI output and the choice of which indicators to use for what (policy or academic) purpose.
A second article examines the co-production of knowledge and policy in German sustainability governance. It focuses on the German sustainability strategy ‘Perspektiven für Deutschland’ (2002), a strategy that stands out both in an international comparison of national sustainability strategies as well as among German government policy strategies because of its relative stability over five consecutive government constellations, its rather high status and increasingly coercive nature. The study analyses what impact the sustainability strategy has had on the policy process between 2002 and 2015, in terms of defining problems and shaping policy processes. Contrasting rationalist and constructivist perspectives on the role of knowledge in policy, two factors, namely the level of (scientific and political) consensus about policy goals and the ‘contextual fit’ of problem definitions, are found to be main factors explaining how different aspects of the strategy is used. Moreover, the study argues that SI:s are part of a continuous process of ‘structuring’ in which indicator, user and context factors together help structure the sustainability challenge in such a way that it becomes more manageable for government policy.
A third article examines how 31 European countries have built supportive institutions of MBOR between 1992 and 2012. In particular during the 1990s and early 2000s much hope was put into the institutionalisation of Environmental Policy Integration (EPI) as a way to overcome sectoral thinking in sustainability policy making and integrate issues of environmental sustainability into all government policy. However, despite high political backing (FN, EU, OECD), implementation of EPI seems to differ widely among countries. The study is a quantitative longitudinal cross-country comparison of how countries’ ‘EPI architectures’ have developed over time. Moreover, it asks which ‘EPI architectures’ seem to be more effective in producing more ‘stringent’ sustainability policy.
This edited volume provides insight into how digital badges may enhance formal and informal education by focusing on technical design issues including organizational requirements, instructional design, and deployment. It features current research exploring the theoretical foundation and empirical evidence of the utilization of digital badges as well as case studies that describe current practices and experiences in the use of digital badges for motivation, learning, and instruction in K-12, higher education, workplace learning, and further education settings.
In this Thesis, the properties of aqueous hemicellulose polysaccharides are investigated using computer simulations. The high swelling capacity of materials composed of these molecules allows the generation of directed motion in plant materials entirely controlled by water uptake.
To explore the molecular origin of this swelling capacity, a computational model with atomistic resolution for hemicellulose polysaccharides is build and validated in comparison with experiments. Using this model, simulations of small polysaccharides are employed to gain an understanding of the interactions of these molecules with water, the influence of water on their conformational freedom, and the swelling capacity quantified in terms of osmotic pressure. It is revealed that the branched hemicellulose polysaccharides show different hydration characteristics compared to linear polysaccharides.
To study swelling properties on length and time scales that exceed the limitations imposed by atomistic simulations, a procedure to obtain transferable coarse-grain models is developed. The transferability of the coarse-grain models over both different degrees of polymerization as well as different solute concentrations is demonstrated. Therefore, the procedure allows the construction of large coarse-grained systems based on small atomistic reference systems. Finally, the coarse-grain model is applied to demonstrate that linear and branched polysaccharides show a different swelling behavior when coupled to a water bath.
Ecosystems' exposure to climate change - Modeling as support for nature conservation management
(2016)
Background
Recently, the incidence rate of back pain (BP) in adolescents has been reported at 21%. However, the development of BP in adolescent athletes is unclear. Hence, the purpose of this study was to examine the incidence of BP in young elite athletes in relation to gender and type of sport practiced.
Methods
Subjective BP was assessed in 321 elite adolescent athletes (m/f 57%/43%; 13.2 ± 1.4 years; 163.4 ± 11.4 cm; 52.6 ± 12.6 kg; 5.0 ± 2.6 training yrs; 7.6 ± 5.3 training h/week). Initially, all athletes were free of pain. The main outcome criterion was the incidence of back pain [%] analyzed in terms of pain development from the first measurement day (M1) to the second measurement day (M2) after 2.0 ± 1.0 year. Participants were classified into athletes who developed back pain (BPD) and athletes who did not develop back pain (nBPD). BP (acute or within the last 7 days) was assessed with a 5-step face scale (face 1–2 = no pain; face 3–5 = pain). BPD included all athletes who reported faces 1 and 2 at M1 and faces 3 to 5 at M2. nBPD were all athletes who reported face 1 or 2 at both M1 and M2. Data was analyzed descriptively. Additionally, a Chi2 test was used to analyze gender- and sport-specific differences (p = 0.05).
Results
Thirty-two athletes were categorized as BPD (10%). The gender difference was 5% (m/f: 12%/7%) but did not show statistical significance (p = 0.15). The incidence of BP ranged between 6 and 15% for the different sport categories. Game sports (15%) showed the highest, and explosive strength sports (6%) the lowest incidence. Anthropometrics or training characteristics did not significantly influence BPD (p = 0.14 gender to p = 0.90 sports; r2 = 0.0825).
Conclusions
BP incidence was lower in adolescent athletes compared to young non-athletes and even to the general adult population. Consequently, it can be concluded that high-performance sports do not lead to an additional increase in back pain incidence during early adolescence. Nevertheless, back pain prevention programs should be implemented into daily training routines for sport categories identified as showing high incidence rates.
Behavioural Models
(2016)
This textbook introduces the basis for modelling and analysing discrete dynamic systems, such as computer programmes, soft- and hardware systems, and business processes. The underlying concepts are introduced and concrete modelling techniques are described, such as finite automata, state machines, and Petri nets. The concepts are related to concrete application scenarios, among which business processes play a prominent role.
The book consists of three parts, the first of which addresses the foundations of behavioural modelling. After a general introduction to modelling, it introduces transition systems as a basic formalism for representing the behaviour of discrete dynamic systems. This section also discusses causality, a fundamental concept for modelling and reasoning about behaviour. In turn, Part II forms the heart of the book and is devoted to models of behaviour. It details both sequential and concurrent systems and introduces finite automata, state machines and several different types of Petri nets. One chapter is especially devoted to business process models, workflow patterns and BPMN, the industry standard for modelling business processes. Lastly, Part III investigates how the behaviour of systems can be analysed. To this end, it introduces readers to the concept of state spaces. Further chapters cover the comparison of behaviour and the formal analysis and verification of behavioural models.
The book was written for students of computer science and software engineering, as well as for programmers and system analysts interested in the behaviour of the systems they work on. It takes readers on a journey from the fundamentals of behavioural modelling to advanced techniques for modelling and analysing sequential and concurrent systems, and thus provides them a deep understanding of the concepts and techniques introduced and how they can be applied to concrete application scenarios.
Implementation of a plasmodesmata gatekeeper system, and its effect on intercellular transport
(2016)
The title compounds, [(1R,3R,4R,5R,6S)-4,5-bis(acetyloxy)-7-oxo-2-oxabicyclo-
[4.2.0]octan-3-yl]methyl acetate, C14H18O8, (I), [(1S,4R,5S,6R)-5-acetyloxy-7-
hydroxyimino-2-oxobicyclo[4.2.0]octan-4-yl acetate, C11H15NO6, (II), and
[(3aR,5R,6R,7R,7aS)-6,7-bis(acetyloxy)-2-oxooctahydropyrano[3,2-b]pyrrol-5-
yl]methyl acetate, C14H19NO8, (III), are stable bicyclic carbohydrate derivatives.
They can easily be synthesized in a few steps from commercially available
glycals. As a result of the ring strain from the four-membered rings in (I) and
(II), the conformations of the carbohydrates deviate strongly from the ideal
chair form. Compound (II) occurs in the boat form. In the five-membered
lactam (III), on the other hand, the carbohydrate adopts an almost ideal chair
conformation. As a result of the distortion of the sugar rings, the configurations
of the three bicyclic carbohydrate derivatives could not be determined from
their NMR coupling constants. From our three crystal structure determinations,
we were able to establish for the first time the absolute configurations of all new
stereocenters of the carbohydrate rings.
The population structure of the highly mobile marine mammal, the harbor porpoise (Phocoena phocoena), in the Atlantic shelf waters follows a pattern of significant isolation-by-distance. The population structure of harbor porpoises from the Baltic Sea, which is connected with the North Sea through a series of basins separated by shallow underwater ridges, however, is more complex. Here, we investigated the population differentiation of harbor porpoises in European Seas with a special focus on the Baltic Sea and adjacent waters, using a population genomics approach. We used 2872 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), derived from double digest restriction-site associated DNA sequencing (ddRAD-seq), as well as 13 microsatellite loci and mitochondrial haplotypes for the same set of individuals. Spatial principal components analysis (sPCA), and Bayesian clustering on a subset of SNPs suggest three main groupings at the level of all studied regions: the Black Sea, the North Atlantic, and the Baltic Sea. Furthermore, we observed a distinct separation of the North Sea harbor porpoises from the Baltic Sea populations, and identified splits between porpoise populations within the Baltic Sea. We observed a notable distinction between the Belt Sea and the Inner Baltic Sea sub-regions. Improved delineation of harbor porpoise population assignments for the Baltic based on genomic evidence is important for conservation management of this endangered cetacean in threatened habitats, particularly in the Baltic Sea proper. In addition, we show that SNPs outperform microsatellite markers and demonstrate the utility of RAD-tags from a relatively small, opportunistically sampled cetacean sample set for population diversity and divergence analysis.
The horse is a fascinating animal symbolizing power, beauty, strength and grace. Among all the animal species domesticated the horse had the largest impact on the course of human history due to its importance for warfare and transportation. Studying the process of horse domestication contributes to the knowledge about the history of horses and even of our own species.
Research based on molecular methods has increasingly focused on the genetic basis of horse domestication. Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) analyses of modern and ancient horses detected immense maternal diversity, probably due to many mares that contributed to the domestic population. However, mtDNA does not provide an informative phylogeographic structure. In contrast, Y chromosome analyses displayed almost complete uniformity in modern stallions but relatively high diversity in a few ancient horses. Further molecular markers that seem to be well suited to infer the domestication history of horses or genetic and phenotypic changes during this process are loci associated with phenotypic traits.
This doctoral thesis consists of three different parts for which I analyzed various single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) associated with coat color, locomotion or Y chromosomal variation of horses. These SNPs were genotyped in 350 ancient horses from the Chalcolithic (5,000 BC) to the Middle Ages (11th century). The distribution of the samples ranges from China to the Iberian Peninsula and Iceland. By applying multiplexed next-generation sequencing (NGS) I sequenced short amplicons covering the relevant positions: i) eight coat-color-associated mutations in six genes to deduce the coat color phenotype; ii) the so-called ’Gait-keeper’ SNP in the DMRT3 gene to screen for the ability to amble; iii) 16 SNPs previously detected in ancient horses to infer the corresponding haplotype. Based on these data I investigated the occurrence and frequencies of alleles underlying the respective phenotypes as well as Y chromosome haplotypes at different times and regions. Also, selection coefficients for several Y chromosome lineages or phenotypes were estimated.
Concerning coat color differences in ancient horses my work constitutes the most comprehensive study to date. I detected an increase of chestnut horses in the Middle Ages as well as differential selection for spotted and solid phenotypes over time which reflects changing human preferences.
With regard to ambling horses, the corresponding allele was present in medieval English and Icelandic horses. Based on these results I argue that Norse settlers, who frequently invaded parts of Britain, brought ambling individuals to Iceland from the British Isles which can be regarded the origin of this trait. Moreover, these settlers appear to have selected for ambling in Icelandic horses.
Relating to the third trait, the paternal diversity, these findings represent the largest ancient dataset of Y chromosome variation in non-humans. I proved the existence of several Y chromosome haplotypes in early domestic horses. The decline of Y chromosome variation coincides with the movement of nomadic peoples from the Eurasian steppes and later with different breeding practices in the Roman period.
In conclusion, positive selection was estimated for several phenotypes/lineages
in different regions or times which indicates that these were preferred by humans. Furthermore, I could successfully infer the distribution and dispersal of horses in association with human movements and actions. Thereby, a better understanding of the influence of people on the changing appearance and genetic diversity of domestic horses could be gained. My results also emphasize the close relationship of ancient genetics and archeology or history and that only in combination well-founded conclusions can be reached.
Background
Doping presents a potential health risk for young athletes. Prevention programs are intended to prevent doping by educating athletes about banned substances. However, such programs have their limitations in practice. This led Germany to introduce the National Doping Prevention Plan (NDPP), in hopes of ameliorating the situation among young elite athletes. Two studies examined 1) the degree to which the NDPP led to improved prevention efforts in elite sport schools, and 2) the extent to which newly developed prevention activities of the national anti-doping agency (NADA) based on the NDPP have improved knowledge among young athletes within elite sports schools.
Methods
The first objective was investigated in a longitudinal study (Study I: t0 = baseline, t1 = follow-up 4 years after NDPP introduction) with N = 22 teachers engaged in doping prevention in elite sports schools. The second objective was evaluated in a cross-sectional comparison study (Study II) in N = 213 elite sports school students (54.5 % male, 45.5 % female, age M = 16.7 ± 1.3 years (all students had received the improved NDDP measure in school; one student group had received additionally NADA anti-doping activities and a control group did not). Descriptive statistics were calculated, followed by McNemar tests, Wilcoxon tests and Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA).
Results
Results indicate that 4 years after the introduction of the NDPP there have been limited structural changes with regard to the frequency, type, and scope of doping prevention in elite sport schools. On the other hand, in study II, elite sport school students who received further NADA anti-doping activities performed better on an anti-doping knowledge test than students who did not take part (F(1, 207) = 33.99, p <0.001), although this difference was small.
Conclusion
The integration of doping-prevention in elite sport schools as part of the NDPP was only partially successful. The results of the evaluation indicate that the introduction of the NDPP has contributed more to a change in the content of doping prevention activities than to a structural transformation in anti-doping education in elite sport schools. Moreover, while students who did receive additional education in the form of the NDPP“booster sessions” had significantly more knowledge about doping than students who did not receive such education, this difference was only small and may not translate to actual behavior.
Due to their multifunctionality, tablets offer tremendous advantages for research on handwriting dynamics or for interactive use of learning apps in schools. Further, the widespread use of tablet computers has had a great impact on handwriting in the current generation. But, is it advisable to teach how to write and to assess handwriting in pre- and primary schoolchildren on tablets rather than on paper? Since handwriting is not automatized before the age of 10 years, children's handwriting movements require graphomotor and visual feedback as well as permanent control of movement execution during handwriting. Modifications in writing conditions, for instance the smoother writing surface of a tablet, might influence handwriting performance in general and in particular those of non-automatized beginning writers. In order to investigate how handwriting performance is affected by a difference in friction of the writing surface, we recruited three groups with varying levels of handwriting automaticity: 25 preschoolers, 27 second graders, and 25 adults. We administered three tasks measuring graphomotor abilities, visuomotor abilities, and handwriting performance (only second graders and adults). We evaluated two aspects of handwriting performance: the handwriting quality with a visual score and the handwriting dynamics using online handwriting measures [e.g., writing duration, writing velocity, strokes and number of inversions in velocity (NIV)]. In particular, NIVs which describe the number of velocity peaks during handwriting are directly related to the level of handwriting automaticity. In general, we found differences between writing on paper compared to the tablet. These differences were partly task-dependent. The comparison between tablet and paper revealed a faster writing velocity for all groups and all tasks on the tablet which indicates that all participants—even the experienced writers—were influenced by the lower friction of the tablet surface. Our results for the group-comparison show advancing levels in handwriting automaticity from preschoolers to second graders to adults, which confirms that our method depicts handwriting performance in groups with varying degrees of handwriting automaticity. We conclude that the smoother tablet surface requires additional control of handwriting movements and therefore might present an additional challenge for learners of handwriting.
Loss to follow-up in a randomized controlled trial study for pediatric weight management (EPOC)
(2016)
Background
Attrition is a serious problem in intervention studies. The current study analyzed the attrition rate during follow-up in a randomized controlled pediatric weight management program (EPOC study) within a tertiary care setting.
Methods
Five hundred twenty-three parents and their 7–13-year-old children with obesity participated in the randomized controlled intervention trial. Follow-up data were assessed 6 and 12 months after the end of treatment. Attrition was defined as providing no objective weight data. Demographic and psychological baseline characteristics were used to predict attrition at 6- and 12-month follow-up using multivariate logistic regression analyses.
Results
Objective weight data were available for 49.6 (67.0) % of the children 6 (12) months after the end of treatment. Completers and non-completers at the 6- and 12-month follow-up differed in the amount of weight loss during their inpatient stay, their initial BMI-SDS, educational level of the parents, and child’s quality of life and well-being. Additionally, completers supported their child more than non-completers, and at the 12-month follow-up, families with a more structured eating environment were less likely to drop out. On a multivariate level, only educational background and structure of the eating environment remained significant.
Conclusions
The minor differences between the completers and the non-completers suggest that our retention strategies were successful. Further research should focus on prevention of attrition in families with a lower educational background.
The strong adhesion of sub-micron sized particles to surfaces is a nuisance, both for removing contaminating colloids from surfaces and for conscious manipulation of particles to create and test novel micro/nano-scale assemblies. The obvious idea of using detergents to ease these processes suffers from a lack of control: the action of any conventional surface-modifying agent is immediate and global. With photosensitive azobenzene containing surfactants we overcome these limitations. Such photo-soaps contain optical switches (azobenzene molecules), which upon illumination with light of appropriate wavelength undergo reversible trans-cis photo-isomerization resulting in a subsequent change of the physico-chemical molecular properties. In this work we show that when a spatial gradient in the composition of trans- and cis- isomers is created near a solid-liquid interface, a substantial hydrodynamic flow can be initiated, the spatial extent of which can be set, e.g., by the shape of a laser spot. We propose the concept of light induced diffusioosmosis driving the flow, which can remove, gather or pattern a particle assembly at a solid-liquid interface. In other words, in addition to providing a soap we implement selectivity: particles are mobilized and moved at the time of illumination, and only across the illuminated area.
Referential Choice
(2016)
We report a study of referential choice in discourse production, understood as the choice between various types of referential devices, such as pronouns and full noun phrases. Our goal is to predict referential choice, and to explore to what extent such prediction is possible. Our approach to referential choice includes a cognitively informed theoretical component, corpus analysis, machine learning methods and experimentation with human participants. Machine learning algorithms make use of 25 factors, including referent’s properties (such as animacy and protagonism), the distance between a referential expression and its antecedent, the antecedent’s syntactic role, and so on. Having found the predictions of our algorithm to coincide with the original almost 90% of the time, we hypothesized that fully accurate prediction is not possible because, in many situations, more than one referential option is available. This hypothesis was supported by an experimental study, in which participants answered questions about either the original text in the corpus, or about a text modified in accordance with the algorithm’s prediction. Proportions of correct answers to these questions, as well as participants’ rating of the questions’ difficulty, suggested that divergences between the algorithm’s prediction and the original referential device in the corpus occur overwhelmingly in situations where the referential choice is not categorical.
We study the adsorption–desorption transition of polyelectrolyte chains onto planar, cylindrical and spherical surfaces with arbitrarily high surface charge densities by massive Monte Carlo computer simulations. We examine in detail how the well known scaling relations for the threshold transition—demarcating the adsorbed and desorbed domains of a polyelectrolyte near weakly charged surfaces—are altered for highly charged interfaces. In virtue of high surface potentials and large surface charge densities, the Debye–Hückel approximation is often not feasible and the nonlinear Poisson–Boltzmann approach should be implemented. At low salt conditions, for instance, the electrostatic potential from the nonlinear Poisson–Boltzmann equation is smaller than the Debye–Hückel result, such that the required critical surface charge density for polyelectrolyte adsorption σc increases. The nonlinear relation between the surface charge density and electrostatic potential leads to a sharply increasing critical surface charge density with growing ionic strength, imposing an additional limit to the critical salt concentration above which no polyelectrolyte adsorption occurs at all. We contrast our simulations findings with the known scaling results for weak critical polyelectrolyte adsorption onto oppositely charged surfaces for the three standard geometries. Finally, we discuss some applications of our results for some physical–chemical and biophysical systems.
Intonation Units Revisited
(2016)
Intonation units have been notoriously difficult to identify in natural talk. Problems include fuzzy boundaries, lack of exhaustivity, and the potential circularity involved when studying their interface with other language-organizational dimensions. This volume advocates a way to resolve such problems: the cesura approach. Cesuras, or breaks in the flow of talk, are created by discontinuities in the prosodic-phonetic parameters of speech that cluster to various extents at certain points in time. Using conversation-analytic and interactional-linguistic methodology, the volume identifies the parameters creating cesuras in talk-in-interaction and proposes ways to notate them depending on the researcher s goal. It also offers a way to study the role of cesuras at the prosody-syntax interface non-circularly, which leads to new insights concerning language variation and change. The volume will thus be of major import to anyone working with natural spoken language, its chunks, its various dimensions, and its variation and change."
We present a temperature and fluence dependent Ultrafast X-Ray Diffraction study of a laser-heated antiferromagnetic dysprosium thin film. The loss of antiferromagnetic order is evidenced by a pronounced lattice contraction. We devise a method to determine the energy flow between the phonon and spin system from calibrated Bragg peak positions in thermal equilibrium. Reestablishing the magnetic order is much slower than the cooling of the lattice, especially around the Néel temperature. Despite the pronounced magnetostriction, the transfer of energy from the spin system to the phonons in Dy is slow after the spin-order is lost.
Investigation of the TCA cycle and glycolytic metabolons and their physiological impacts in plants
(2016)
Causes, Time, and Truth
(2016)
We need causation, time, and truth in order to know how things in the broadest sense of the term hang together in the broadest sense of the term. The essays try to say something clarifying about those three classical questions of traditional metaphysics. Not dogmatic answers are offered, but guiding perspectives and possible justifiable ways of dealing with such fundamental
Characterization of the Clp protease complex and identification of putative substrates in N. tabacum
(2016)
In June 2013, widespread flooding and consequent damage and losses occurred in Central Europe, especially in Germany. This paper explores what data are available to investigate the adverse impacts of the event, what kind of information can be retrieved from these data and how well data and information fulfil requirements that were recently proposed for disaster reporting on the European and international levels. In accordance with the European Floods Directive (2007/60/EC), impacts on human health, economic activities (and assets), cultural heritage and the environment are described on the national and sub-national scale. Information from governmental reports is complemented by communications on traffic disruptions and surveys of flood-affected residents and companies.
Overall, the impacts of the flood event in 2013 were manifold. The study reveals that flood-affected residents suffered from a large range of impacts, among which mental health and supply problems were perceived more seriously than financial losses. The most frequent damage type among affected companies was business interruption. This demonstrates that the current scientific focus on direct (financial) damage is insufficient to describe the overall impacts and severity of flood events.
The case further demonstrates that procedures and standards for impact data collection in Germany are widely missing. Present impact data in Germany are fragmentary, heterogeneous, incomplete and difficult to access. In order to fulfil, for example, the monitoring and reporting requirements of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030 that was adopted in March 2015 in Sendai, Japan, more efforts on impact data collection are needed.
It is quite generally assumed that the overdamped Langevin equation provides a quantitative description of the dynamics of a classical Brownian particle in the long time limit. We establish and investigate a paradigm anomalous diffusion process governed by an underdamped Langevin equation with an explicit time dependence of the system temperature and thus the diffusion and damping coefficients. We show that for this underdamped scaled Brownian motion (UDSBM) the overdamped limit fails to describe the long time behaviour of the system and may practically even not exist at all for a certain range of the parameter values. Thus persistent inertial effects play a non-negligible role even at significantly long times. From this study a general questions on the applicability of the overdamped limit to describe the long time motion of an anomalously diffusing particle arises, with profound consequences for the relevance of overdamped anomalous diffusion models. We elucidate our results in view of analytical and simulations results for the anomalous diffusion of particles in free cooling granular gases.
Himalayan water resources attract a rapidly growing number of hydroelectric power projects (HPP) to satisfy Asia's soaring energy demands. Yet HPP operating or planned in steep, glacier-fed mountain rivers face hazards of glacial lake outburst floods (GLOFs) that can damage hydropower infrastructure, alter water and sediment yields, and compromise livelihoods downstream. Detailed appraisals of such GLOF hazards are limited to case studies, however, and a more comprehensive, systematic analysis remains elusive. To this end we estimate the regional exposure of 257 Himalayan HPP to GLOFs, using a flood-wave propagation model fed by Monte Carlo-derived outburst volumes of >2300 glacial lakes. We interpret the spread of thus modeled peak discharges as a predictive uncertainty that arises mainly from outburst volumes and dam-breach rates that are difficult to assess before dams fail. With 66% of sampled HPP are on potential GLOF tracks, up to one third of these HPP could experience GLOF discharges well above local design floods, as hydropower development continues to seek higher sites closer to glacial lakes. We compute that this systematic push of HPP into headwaters effectively doubles the uncertainty about GLOF peak discharge in these locations. Peak discharges farther downstream, in contrast, are easier to predict because GLOF waves attenuate rapidly. Considering this systematic pattern of regional GLOF exposure might aid the site selection of future Himalayan HPP. Our method can augment, and help to regularly update, current hazard assessments, given that global warming is likely changing the number and size of Himalayan meltwater lakes.
The all-female Amazon molly (Poecilia formosa) originated from a single hybridization of two bisexual ancestors, Atlantic molly (Poecilia mexicana) and sailfin molly (Poecilia latipinna). As a gynogenetic species, the Amazon molly needs to copulate with a heterospecific male, but the genetic information of the sperm-donor does not contribute to the next generation, as the sperm only acts as the trigger for the diploid eggs’ embryogenesis. Here, we study the sequence evolution and gene expression of the duplicated genes coding for androgen receptors (ars) and other pathway-related genes, i.e., the estrogen receptors (ers) and cytochrome P450, family19, subfamily A, aromatase genes (cyp19as), in the Amazon molly, in comparison to its bisexual ancestors. Mollies possess–as most other teleost fish—two copies of the ar, er, and cyp19a genes, i.e., arα/arβ, erα/erβ1, and cyp19a1 (also referred as cyp19a1a)/cyp19a2 (also referred to as cyp19a1b), respectively. Non-synonymous single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) among the ancestral bisexual species were generally predicted not to alter protein function. Some derived substitutions in the P. mexicana and one in P. formosa are predicted to impact protein function. We also describe the gene expression pattern of the ars and pathway-related genes in various tissues (i.e., brain, gill, and ovary) and provide SNP markers for allele specific expression research. As a general tendency, the levels of gene expression were lowest in gill and highest in ovarian tissues, while expression levels in the brain were intermediate in most cases. Expression levels in P. formosa were conserved where expression did not differ between the two bisexual ancestors. In those cases where gene expression levels significantly differed between the bisexual species, P. formosa expression was always comparable to the higher expression level among the two ancestors. Interestingly, erβ1 was expressed neither in brain nor in gill in the analyzed three molly species, which implies a more important role of erα in the estradiol synthesis pathway in these tissues. Furthermore, our data suggest that interactions of steroid-signaling pathway genes differ across tissues, in particular the interactions of ars and cyp19as.
In this study, a new reliable, economic, and environmentally-friendly one-step synthesis is established to obtain carbon nanodots (CNDs) with well-defined and reproducible photoluminescence (PL) properties via the microwave-assisted hydrothermal treatment of starch and Tris-acetate-EDTA (TAE) buffer as carbon sources. Three kinds of CNDs are prepared using different sets of above mentioned starting materials. The as-synthesized CNDs: C-CND (starch only), N-CND 1 (starch in TAE) and N-CND 2 (TAE only) exhibit highly homogenous PL and are ready to use without need for further purification. The CNDs are stable over a long period of time (>1 year) either in solution or as freeze-dried powder. Depending on starting material, CNDs with PL quantum yield (PLQY) ranging from less than 1% up to 28% are obtained. The influence of the precursor concentration, reaction time and type of additives on the optical properties (UV-Vis absorption, PL emission spectrum and PLQY) is carefully investigated, providing insight into the chemical processes that occur during CND formation. Remarkably, upon freeze-drying the initially brown CND-solution turns into a non-fluorescent white/slightly brown powder which recovers PL in aqueous solution and can potentially be applied as fluorescent marker in bio-imaging, as a reduction agent or as a photocatalyst.
The paper aims at considering characteristics from one field of contemporary visual studies that has for a long time been neglected in academic research: Pictorial signs on Social Network Sites (SNS) are an outstanding class of semiotic resources that is greatly shaped by processes of technological and collective sign production and distribution. A brief examination of the scholarly research on the pragmatics and semiotics of pictorial signs on SNS shows that the heterogeneity of visual signs is often neglected and that it mostly concentrates on one aspect of these pictorial signs: their technological production or their purpose for individual self-disclosure. The paper therefore considers the semiosis of pictorial signs on SNS in a holistic perspective as one the one hand produced by individual and collective meaning making as well as on the other hand a product of technological framing. It therefore develops a techno-semiotic pragmatic account that takes into consideration both processes. Starting from a prominent class of pictorial signs on SNS during Tunisian Revolution, the Tunisian Flag graphics, the paper than shows that communicative and social interaction functions on the graphic interface of SNS (‘like’-function, sharing and commenting option) are not only directly inscribed into the pictorial frame, but also greatly influence the reading of a pictorial sign. The location of images on the SNS’ interface has an impact on its meaning and on the social functions of a pictorial sign, as profile pictures are directly linked to the online identity of the user. Through technological sign processing, the polysemy of the image is reduced. We therefore consider the images on the one hand as individual self-narratives and on the other as instances of SNS’ visual culture that brings out dominant visual codes but also allows social and political movements to spread.
Dropping Out or Keeping Up?
(2016)
The aim of this study was to examine how automatic evaluations of exercising (AEE) varied according to adherence to an exercise program. Eighty-eight participants (24.98 years ± 6.88; 51.1% female) completed a Brief-Implicit Association Task assessing their AEE, positive and negative associations to exercising at the beginning of a 3-month exercise program. Attendance data were collected for all participants and used in a cluster analysis of adherence patterns. Three different adherence patterns (52 maintainers, 16 early dropouts, 20 late dropouts; 40.91% overall dropouts) were detected using cluster analyses. Participants from these three clusters differed significantly with regard to their positive and negative associations to exercising before the first course meeting (η2p = 0.07). Discriminant function analyses revealed that positive associations to exercising was a particularly good discriminating factor. This is the first study to provide evidence of the differential impact of positive and negative associations on exercise behavior over the medium term. The findings contribute to theoretical understanding of evaluative processes from a dual-process perspective and may provide a basis for targeted interventions.
Widespread flooding in June 2013 caused damage costs of €6 to 8 billion in Germany, and awoke many memories of the floods in August 2002, which resulted in total damage of €11.6 billion and hence was the most expensive natural hazard event in Germany up to now. The event of 2002 does, however, also mark a reorientation toward an integrated flood risk management system in Germany. Therefore, the flood of 2013 offered the opportunity to review how the measures that politics, administration, and civil society have implemented since 2002 helped to cope with the flood and what still needs to be done to achieve effective and more integrated flood risk management. The review highlights considerable improvements on many levels, in particular (1) an increased consideration of flood hazards in spatial planning and urban development, (2) comprehensive property-level mitigation and preparedness measures, (3) more effective flood warnings and improved coordination of disaster response, and (4) a more targeted maintenance of flood defense systems. In 2013, this led to more effective flood management and to a reduction of damage. Nevertheless, important aspects remain unclear and need to be clarified. This particularly holds for balanced and coordinated strategies for reducing and overcoming the impacts of flooding in large catchments, cross-border and interdisciplinary cooperation, the role of the general public in the different phases of flood risk management, as well as a transparent risk transfer system. Recurring flood events reveal that flood risk management is a continuous task. Hence, risk drivers, such as climate change, land-use changes, economic developments, or demographic change and the resultant risks must be investigated at regular intervals, and risk reduction strategies and processes must be reassessed as well as adapted and implemented in a dialogue with all stakeholders.
Src1 is a Protein of the Inner Nuclear Membrane Interacting with the Dictyostelium Lamin NE81
(2016)
The nuclear envelope (NE) consists of the outer and inner nuclear membrane (INM), whereby the latter is bound to the nuclear lamina. Src1 is a Dictyostelium homologue of the helix-extension-helix family of proteins, which also includes the human lamin-binding protein MAN1. Both endogenous Src1 and GFP-Src1 are localized to the NE during the entire cell cycle. Immuno-electron microscopy and light microscopy after differential detergent treatment indicated that Src1 resides in the INM. FRAP experiments with GFP-Src1 cells suggested that at least a fraction of the protein could be stably engaged in forming the nuclear lamina together with the Dictyostelium lamin NE81. Both a BioID proximity assay and mis-localization of soluble, truncated mRFP-Src1 at cytosolic clusters consisting of an intentionally mis-localized mutant of GFP-NE81 confirmed an interaction of Src1 and NE81. Expression GFP-Src11–646, a fragment C-terminally truncated after the first transmembrane domain, disrupted interaction of nuclear membranes with the nuclear lamina, as cells formed protrusions of the NE that were dependent on cytoskeletal pulling forces. Protrusions were dependent on intact microtubules but not actin filaments. Our results indicate that Src1 is required for integrity of the NE and highlight Dictyostelium as a promising model for the evolution of nuclear architecture.
Postural control is important to cope with demands of everyday life. It has been shown that both attentional demand (i.e., cognitive processing) and fatigue affect postural control in young adults. However, their combined effect is still unresolved. Therefore, we investigated the effects of fatigue on single- (ST) and dual-task (DT) postural control. Twenty young subjects (age: 23.7 ± 2.7) performed an all-out incremental treadmill protocol. After each completed stage, one-legged-stance performance on a force platform under ST (i.e., one-legged-stance only) and DT conditions (i.e., one-legged-stance while subtracting serial 3s) was registered. On a second test day, subjects conducted the same balance tasks for the control condition (i.e., non-fatigued). Results showed that heart rate, lactate, and ventilation increased following fatigue (all p < 0.001; d = 4.2–21). Postural sway and sway velocity increased during DT compared to ST (all p < 0.001; d = 1.9–2.0) and fatigued compared to non-fatigued condition (all p < 0.001; d = 3.3–4.2). In addition, postural control deteriorated with each completed stage during the treadmill protocol (all p < 0.01; d = 1.9–3.3). The addition of an attention-demanding interference task did not further impede one-legged-stance performance. Although both additional attentional demand and physical fatigue affected postural control in healthy young adults, there was no evidence for an overadditive effect (i.e., fatigue-related performance decrements in postural control were similar under ST and DT conditions). Thus, attentional resources were sufficient to cope with the DT situations in the fatigue condition of this experiment.
In a recent BAMS article, it is argued that community-based Open Source Software (OSS) could foster scientific progress in weather radar research, and make weather radar software more affordable, flexible, transparent, sustainable, and interoperable.
Nevertheless, it can be challenging for potential developers and users to realize these benefits: tools are often cumbersome to install; different operating systems may have particular issues, or may not be supported at all; and many tools have steep learning curves.
To overcome some of these barriers, we present an open, community-based virtual machine (VM). This VM can be run on any operating system, and guarantees reproducibility of results across platforms. It contains a suite of independent OSS weather radar tools (BALTRAD, Py-ART, wradlib, RSL, and Radx), and a scientific Python stack. Furthermore, it features a suite of recipes that work out of the box and provide guidance on how to use the different OSS tools alone and together. The code to build the VM from source is hosted on GitHub, which allows the VM to grow with its community.
We argue that the VM presents another step toward Open (Weather Radar) Science. It can be used as a quick way to get started, for teaching, or for benchmarking and combining different tools. It can foster the idea of reproducible research in scientific publishing. Being scalable and extendable, it might even allow for real-time data processing.
We expect the VM to catalyze progress toward interoperability, and to lower the barrier for new users and developers, thus extending the weather radar community and user base.
The results of streamflow trend studies are often characterized by mostly insignificant trends and inexplicable spatial patterns. In our study region, Western Austria, this applies especially for trends of annually averaged runoff. However, analysing the altitudinal aspect, we found that there is a trend gradient from higher-altitude to lower-altitude stations, i.e. a pattern of mostly positive annual trends at higher stations and negative ones at lower stations. At midaltitudes, the trends are mostly insignificant. Here we hypothesize that the streamflow trends are caused by the following two main processes: on the one hand, melting glaciers produce excess runoff at higher-altitude watersheds. On the other hand, rising temperatures potentially alter hydrological conditions in terms of less snowfall, higher infiltration, enhanced evapotranspiration, etc., which in turn results in decreasing streamflow trends at lower-altitude watersheds. However, these patterns are masked at mid-altitudes because the resulting positive and negative trends balance each other. To support these hypotheses, we attempted to attribute the detected trends to specific causes. For this purpose, we analysed trends of filtered daily streamflow data, as the causes for these changes might be restricted to a smaller temporal scale than the annual one. This allowed for the explicit determination of the exact days of year (DOYs) when certain streamflow trends emerge, which were then linked with the corresponding DOYs of the trends and characteristic dates of other observed variables, e.g. the average DOY when temperature crosses the freezing point in spring. Based on these analyses, an empirical statistical model was derived that was able to simulate daily streamflow trends sufficiently well. Analyses of subdaily streamflow changes provided additional insights. Finally, the present study supports many modelling approaches in the literature which found out that the main drivers of alpine streamflow changes are increased glacial melt, earlier snowmelt and lower snow accumulation in wintertime.
Motivated by conflicting evidence in the literature, we re-assessed the role of facial feedback when detecting quantitative or qualitative changes in others’ emotional expressions. Fifty-three healthy adults observed self-paced morph sequences where the emotional facial expression either changed quantitatively (i.e., sad-to-neutral, neutral-to-sad, happy-to-neutral, neutral-to-happy) or qualitatively (i.e. from sad to happy, or from happy to sad). Observers held a pen in their own mouth to induce smiling or frowning during the detection task. When morph sequences started or ended with neutral expressions we replicated a congruency effect: Happiness was perceived longer and sooner while smiling; sadness was perceived longer and sooner while frowning. Interestingly, no such congruency effects occurred for transitions between emotional expressions. These results suggest that facial feedback is especially useful when evaluating the intensity of a facial expression, but less so when we have to recognize which emotion our counterpart is expressing.
The poly(A) tail at 3’ ends of eukaryotic mRNAs promotes their nuclear export, stability and translational efficiency, and changes in its length can strongly impact gene expression. The Arabidopsis thaliana genome encodes three canonical nuclear poly(A) polymerases, PAPS1, PAPS2 and PAPS4. As shown by their different mutant phenotypes, these three isoforms are functionally specialized, with PAPS1 modifying organ growth and suppressing a constitutive immune response. However, the molecular basis of this specialization is largely unknown. Here, we have estimated poly(A)-tail lengths on a transcriptome-wide scale in wild-type and paps1 mutants. This identified categories of genes as particularly strongly affected in paps1 mutants, including genes encoding ribosomal proteins, cell-division factors and major carbohydrate-metabolic proteins. We experimentally verified two novel functions of PAPS1 in ribosome biogenesis and redox homoeostasis that were predicted based on the analysis of poly(A)-tail length changes in paps1 mutants. When overlaying the PAPS1-dependent effects observed here with coexpression analysis based on independent microarray data, the two clusters of transcripts that are most closely coexpressed with PAPS1 show the strongest change in poly(A)-tail length and transcript abundance in paps1 mutants in our analysis. This suggests that their coexpression reflects at least partly the preferential polyadenylation of these transcripts by PAPS1 versus the other two poly(A)-polymerase isoforms. Thus, transcriptome-wide analysis of poly(A)-tail lengths identifies novel biological functions and likely target transcripts for polyadenylation by PAPS1. Data integration with large-scale co-expression data suggests that changes in the relative activities of the isoforms are used as an endogenous mechanism to co-ordinately modulate plant gene expression.
Manganese (Mn) is an essential micronutrient for development and function of the nervous system. Deficiencies in Mn transport have been implicated in the pathogenesis of Huntington's disease (HD), an autosomal dominant neurodegenerative disorder characterized by loss of medium spiny neurons of the striatum. Brain Mn levels are highest in striatum and other basal ganglia structures, the most sensitive brain regions to Mn neurotoxicity. Mouse models of HD exhibit decreased striatal Mn accumulation and HD striatal neuron models are resistant to Mn cytotoxicity. We hypothesized that the observed modulation of Mn cellular transport is associated with compensatory metabolic responses to HD pathology. Here we use an untargeted metabolomics approach by performing ultraperformance liquid chromatography-ion mobility-mass spectrometry (UPLC-IM-MS) on control and HD immortalized mouse striatal neurons to identify metabolic disruptions under three Mn exposure conditions, low (vehicle), moderate (non-cytotoxic) and high (cytotoxic). Our analysis revealed lower metabolite levels of pantothenic acid, and glutathione (GSH) in HD striatal cells relative to control cells. HD striatal cells also exhibited lower abundance and impaired induction of isobutyryl carnitine in response to increasing Mn exposure. In addition, we observed induction of metabolites in the pentose shunt pathway in HD striatal cells after high Mn exposure. These findings provide metabolic evidence of an interaction between the HD genotype and biologically relevant levels of Mn in a striatal cell model with known HD by Mn exposure interactions. The metabolic phenotypes detected support existing hypotheses that changes in energetic processes underlie the pathobiology of both HD and Mn neurotoxicity.
We investigate the ensemble and time averaged mean squared displacements for particle diffusion in a simple model for disordered media by assuming that the local diffusivity is both fluctuating in time and has a deterministic average growth or decay in time. In this study we compare computer simulations of the stochastic Langevin equation for this random diffusion process with analytical results. We explore the regimes of normal Brownian motion as well as anomalous diffusion in the sub- and superdiffusive regimes. We also consider effects of the inertial term on the particle motion. The investigation of the resulting diffusion is performed for unconfined and confined motion.