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Die Produktion von Polyrhythmen ist ein wichtiger experimenteller Zugang für die Untersuchung der menschlichen Motorik. Durch Variation des Tempos (externer Kontrollparameter) bei rhythmischen Bewegungsabläufen können qualitative Übergänge in der Koordinationsdynamik induziert werden. Diese Übergänge lassen sich mit der Methode der symbolischen Dynamik in experimentellen Zeitreihen nachweisen und sind ein wichtiger Hinweis darauf, dass die untersuchten Bewegungsabläufe nichtlinearen Kontrollprozessen unterliegen. Die theoretische Beschreibung bimanueller Rhythmusproduktion mit gekoppelten Differenzengleichungen führt auf ein Modell mit nichtlinearer Fehlerkontrolle. Es ist eine wichtige Eigenschaft der Kontrollprozesse, dass sie mit zeitverzögerter Rückkopplung arbeiten. Neben deterministischen Steuerungsmechanismen ist die Motorik des Menschen ausserdem von Fluktuationen auf zwei Ebenen gekennzeichnet, der kognitiven Kontrollebene und der Ebene der motorischen Systeme. Daher ist die Koordination von Bewegungen das Ergebnis von Wechselwirkungen zwischen nichtlinearen, zeitverzögerten Kontrollprozessen und stochastischen Fluktuationen.
Semantics
(2007)
We argue that there is a crucial difference between determiner and adverbial quantification. Following Herburger [2000] and von Fintel [1994], we assume that determiner quantifiers quantify over individuals and adverbial quantifiers over eventualities. While it is usually assumed that the semantics of sentences with determiner quantifiers and those with adverbial quantifiers basically come out the same, we will show by way of new data that quantification over events is more restricted than quantification over individuals. This is because eventualities in contrast to individuals have to be located in time which is done using contextual information according to a pragmatic resolution strategy. If the contextual information and the tense information given in the respective sentence contradict each other, the sentence is uninterpretable. We conclude that this is the reason why in these cases adverbial quantification, i.e. quantification over eventualities, is impossible whereas quantification over individuals is fine.
In this paper we compare the behaviour of adverbs of frequency (de Swart 1993) like usually with the behaviour of adverbs of quantity like for the most part in sentences that contain plural definites. We show that sentences containing the former type of Q-adverb evidence that Quantificational Variability Effects (Berman 1991) come about as an indirect effect of quantification over situations: in order for quantificational variability readings to arise, these sentences have to obey two newly observed constraints that clearly set them apart from sentences containing corresponding quantificational DPs, and that can plausibly be explained under the assumption that quantification over (the atomic parts of) complex situations is involved. Concerning sentences with the latter type of Q-adverb, on the other hand, such evidence is lacking: with respect to the constraints just mentioned, they behave like sentences that contain corresponding quantificational DPs. We take this as evidence that Q-adverbs like for the most part do not quantify over the atomic parts of sum eventualities in the cases under discussion (as claimed by Nakanishi and Romero (2004)), but rather over the atomic parts of the respective sum individuals.
We propose a definition of aboutness topicality that not only encompasses individual denoting DPs, but also indefinites. We concentrate on the interpretative effects of marking indefinites as topics: they either receive widest scope in their clause, or they are interpreted in the restrictor of an overt or covert Q-adverb. We show that in the first case they are direct aboutness topics insofar as they are the subject of a predication expressed by the comment, while in the second case they are indirect aboutness topics: they define the subject of a higher-order predication – namely the set of situations that the respective Q-adverb quantifies over.
Sequelae of prematurity triggered by oxidative stress and free radical-mediated tissue damage have coined the term "oxygen radical disease of prematurity". Caffeine, a potent free radical scavenger and adenosine receptor antagonist, reduces rates of brain damage in preterm infants. In the present study, we investigated the effects of caffeine on oxidative stress markers, anti-oxidative response, inflammation, redox-sensitive transcription factors, apoptosis, and extracellular matrix following the induction of hyperoxia in neonatal rats. The brain of a rat pups at postnatal Day 6 (P6) corresponds to that of a human fetal brain at 28-32 weeks gestation and the neonatal rat is an ideal model in which to investigate effects of oxidative stress and neuroprotection of caffeine on the developing brain. Six-day-old Wistar rats were pre-treated with caffeine and exposed to 80% oxygen for 24 and 48 h. Caffeine reduced oxidative stress marker (heme oxygenase-1, lipid peroxidation, hydrogen peroxide, and glutamate-cysteine ligase catalytic subunit (GCLC)), promoted anti-oxidative response (superoxide dismutase, peroxiredoxin 1, and sulfiredoxin 1), down-regulated pro-inflammatory cytokines, modulated redox-sensitive transcription factor expression (Nrf2/Keap1, and NF kappa B), reduced pro-apoptotic effectors (poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase-1 (PARP-1), apoptosis inducing factor (AIF), and caspase-3), and diminished extracellular matrix degeneration (matrix metalloproteinases (MMP) 2, and inhibitor of metalloproteinase (TIMP) 1/2). Our study affirms that caffeine is a pleiotropic neuroprotective drug in the developing brain due to its anti-oxidant, anti-inflammatory, and anti-apoptotic properties.
Als Folge der demografischen Entwicklungen und der finanziellen Engpässe vieler Bundesländer kommt es seit einigen Jahren in den meisten Flächenländern der Bundesrepublik Deutschland erneut zu tiefgreifenden Verwaltungsreformen auf kommunaler Ebene. Mit Hilfe von Verwaltungsstruktur-, Funktional- und Kreisgebietsreformen wird versucht, die Verwaltungseffektivität zu erhöhen sowie die kreislichen Aufgaben- und Territorialstrukturen an die veränderten Rahmenbedingungen anzupassen. Nach Auffassung vieler Reformer kann die angestrebte Effektivitätssteigerung, die insbesondere zu Kostenersparnissen und Synergieeffekten führen soll, v. a. durch eine deutliche Vergrößerung der Verwaltungsräume erreicht werden.
Neben dem Ziel, die Leistungsfähigkeit der lokalen Verwaltungsstrukturen zu erhöhen, das zumeist im Mittelpunkt der Reformvorhaben steht, gilt es jedoch gleichermaßen, die Legitimität lokalen Handelns durch Demokratie und bürgerschaftliche Teilhabe zu erhalten. Der Gesetzgeber steht daher vor der Aufgabe, beide Zielvorstellungen in einem Reformprozess zu berücksichtigen und die Größe der administrativen Einheiten so zu gestalten, dass in ihnen ein ausgewogenes Verhältnis zwischen Effizienz und Bürgernähe entsteht.
Ausgehend von dieser Problematik werden jene Thesen und Annahmen aufgegriffen, die im Zusammenhang mit dem Urteil des LVerfG M-V vom 26. Juli 2007 im Kontext von Effizienz und Partizipation stehen, und auf die Kreisgebietsreform im Freistaat Sachsen übertragen. Konkret werden die Auswirkungen des territorialen Neuzuschnitts der sächsischen Landkreise auf die Wahrnehmung des kommunalpolitischen Ehrenamts erstmals auch durch eine breite Empirie untersucht.
Universitäten erbringen wohlfahrtsfördernde Leistungen für die Gesellschaft, insbesondere indem sie Studierende ausbilden, über Forschung neues Wissen erzeugen sowie den Wissens- und Technologietransfer in Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft hinein betreiben. Die Erbringung dieser Leistungen wird ermöglicht durch eine größtenteils öffentliche Finanzierung, die nicht nur in Zeiten wirtschaftlicher Krisen und Spargebote gerne hinterfragt wird. Die Politik ist daher ebenso wie die Hochschulen gut beraten, die Mittelzuweisungen immer wieder neu zu legitimieren. Die vorliegende Studie untersucht die sozioökonomischen Effekte der Universität Potsdam und schließt so vorhandene Informationslücken. Die Autoren zeigen, dass auch indirekte und unerwartete Effekte eine große Rolle spielen können, was die Wirkung einer Universität auf Wirtschaft und Wohlstand angeht.
Recht auf Demokratie
(2012)
Inhalt: I. Problemstellung II. Demokratieprinzip im Völkerrecht III. Selbstbestimmungsrecht der Völker IV. Enthält das Recht auf „Selfdetermination“ ein Recht auf „Selfgovernment“? V. Umfang und Inhalt des Rechts auf Demokratie der Bürger und Völker VI. Durchsetzbarkeit der Rechte auf Demokratie VII. Ergebnisse
Das Ende der Ratlosigkeit
(2007)
Inhalt: - Fünf Ausgangsfaktoren 1. Der ursprüngliche Verfassungsvertrag ist gescheitert 2. Die Beibehaltung von Nizza ist keine Option 3. Zentrale Neuerungen des Verfassungsvertrags sollten gesichert werden 4. Inakzeptable Kompromisse gefährden Ratifizierung 5. Überwindung der Verfassungskrise erfordert komplexe Lösungsstrategie - Fünf Rettungsmodelle zur Zukunft des Verfassungsvertrags 1. Nizza Plus– Ausschöpfen des geltenden Primärrechts 2. Verfassung Minus und Verfassung Minus-Minus 3. Avantgarde- oder Kerneuropa-Modell 4. Verfassung Plus und Verfassung Plus-Plus 5. Änderung des geltenden Nizza-Vertrags – Mini-Vertrag, Core Treaty oder Vertrag zur Reform des Vertrags von Nizza - Die Wiederbelebung der EU – von der Notwendigkeit eines neuen Großprojekts - Fahrplan zum weiteren Vorgehen
Die kumulative Dissertation zur Projektdidaktik trägt den Titel „Von der Konzeption zur Praxis: Zur Entwicklung der Projektdidaktik am Oberstufen-Kolleg Bielefeld und ihre Impulsgebung und Modellbildung für das deutsche Regelschulwesen“. Die Dissertation versteht sich als beispielgebende Umsetzung und Implementierung der Projektdidaktik für das Regelschulsystem. Auf der Basis von 22 bereits erschienenen Publikationen und einer Monographie werden mit fünf methodischen Zugriffen (bildungshistorisch, dichte Beschreibung, Aktionsforschung, empirische Untersuchung an Regelschulen und Implementierungsforschung, s. Kapitel 1) in sieben Kapiteln (2- 8) des systematischen ersten Teils die Entwicklung der Unterrichtsform Projektunterricht in der BRD, Projektbegriff und Weiterentwicklung des Konzepts, Methodik, Bewertung sowie Organisation des Projektunterrichts am Oberstufen-Kolleg, der Versuchsschule des Landes NRW, in Auseinandersetzung mit der allgemeinen Projektdidaktik dargestellt sowie Formen und Verfahren der erprobten Implementierung in das Regelschulsystem präsentiert.
Ein Schlusskapitel (9) fasst die Ergebnisse zusammen. Im umfangreichen Anhang finden sich verschiedene Publikationen zu Aspekten der Projektdidaktik, auf die der systematische Teil jeweils Bezug nimmt.
Die bildungshistorische Analyse (Kapitel 2) untersucht das Verhältnis von pädagogischer Theorie und schulischer Praxis, die weder in Literatur und noch in Praxis genügend verbunden sind. Nach der Rezeption der gut erforschten Konzeptgeschichte pädagogischer Theorie in Anlehnung an Dewey und Kilpatrick wird durch eine erste Analyse der „Praxisgeschichte“ des Projektunterrichts auf ein Forschungsdesiderat hingewiesen, dies auch um die Projektpraxis am Oberstufen-Kolleg in Beziehung zu der in den Regelschulen setzen zu können. Dabei wurden seit 1975 sechs Entwicklungslinien herausgearbeitet: Start, Krise und ihre Überwindung durch Öffnung und Vernetzung (1975-1990), didaktisch-methodische Differenzierung und Notwendigkeit von Professionalisierung (ab 1990) sowie Schulentwicklung und Institutionalisierung (seit Ende der 1990er Jahre).
Projektunterricht besteht am Oberstufen-Kolleg seit der Gründung 1974 als fest eingerichtete Unterrichtsform (seit 2002 zweimal jährlich 2 Wochen) mit dem Ziel, für das Regelschulsystem die Projektdidaktik zu erproben und weiterzuentwickeln. Als wichtige praxisorientierte Ziele wurden ein praxistauglicher Begriff, Bildungswert und Kompetenzen im Unterschied zum Lehrgang herausgearbeitet (z.B. handlungs- und anwendungsorientierte Kompetenzen) und das Verhältnis zum Fachunterricht bestimmt (Kapitel 3). Letzteres wurde am Beispiel des Fachs Geschichte entwickelt und exemplarisch in Formen der Verzahnung dargestellt (Kapitel 6).
Auch für die methodische Dimension galt, die allgemeine Projektdidaktik weiterzuentwickeln durch ihre Abgrenzung zu anderen Methoden der Öffnung von Schule und Unterricht (Kapitel 4). Dabei wurde als zentrales methodisches Prinzip die Handlungsorientierung bestimmt sowie sieben Phasen und jeweilige Handlungsschritte festgelegt. Besonders Planung und Rollenwechsel bedürfen dabei besonderer Beachtung, um Selbsttätigkeit der ProjektteilnehmerInnen zu erreichen. Verschiedene methodische „Etüden“ ( z.B. Gruppenarbeit, recherchieren, sich öffentlich verhalten), handlungsorientierte Vorformen und projektorientiertes Arbeiten sollten die Vollform Projektunterricht vorbereiten helfen.
Die Bewertung von Projekten (Kapitel 5) stellt andere Anforderungen als der Lehrgang, weil sie unterschiedliche Bewertungsebenen (z.B. Prozessbedeutung, Produktbeurteilung, Gruppenbewertung) umfasst. Dazu sind am Oberstufen-Kolleg andere Bewertungsformen als die Ziffernnote entwickelt worden: z.B. ein „Reflexionsbericht“ als individuelle Rückmeldung von SchülerInnen und LehrerInnen und ein „Zertifikat“ für besondere Leistungen im Projekt.
Zentral für die Entwicklung von Projektunterricht ist jedoch die Organisationsfrage (Kapitel 7). Dazu bedarf es einer Organisationsgruppe Projekt, die die Unterrichtsform didaktisch betreut und in einem Hearing die angemeldeten Projekte berät. Das Oberstufen-Kolleg hat damit eine entwickelte „Projektkultur“ organisatorisch umgesetzt. Für eine empirische Untersuchung an sechs Regelschulen in Ostwestfalen ist dann eine idealtypische Merkmalsliste von schulischer „Projektkultur“ als Untersuchungsinstrument entstanden, das zugleich als Leitlinie für Schulentwicklung im Bereich Projektlernen in den Regelschulen dienen kann. Zu dieser Implementierung (Kapitel 8) wurden Konzepte und Erfahrungen vom Oberstufen-Kolleg für schulinterne und schulexterne Fortbildungsformen sowie eine exemplarische Fortbildungseinheit entwickelt. So konnten in zahlreichen Lehrerfortbildungen durch die Versuchsschule Impulse für das Regelschulsystem gegeben werden.
The use of preformed polymers for the preparation of Langmuir-Blodgett (LB) multilayers is reviewed. Principles for polymer self-organization are outlined and the appropriate molecular designs are discussed. Recent developments in the different classes of polymers for LB multilayers are presented, and their outstanding properties highlighted.
Linking together the processes of rapid physical erosion and the resultant chemical dissolution of rock is a crucial step in building an overall deterministic understanding of weathering in mountain belts. Landslides, which are the most volumetrically important geomorphic process at these high rates of erosion, can generate extremely high rates of very localised weathering. To elucidate how this process works we have taken advantage of uniquely intense landsliding, resulting from Typhoon Morakot, in the T'aimali River and surrounds in southern Taiwan. Combining detailed analysis of landslide seepage chemistry with estimates of catchment-by-catchment landslide volumes, we demonstrate that in this setting the primary role of landslides is to introduce fresh, highly labile mineral phases into the surface weathering environment. There, rapid weathering is driven by the oxidation of pyrite and the resultant sulfuric-acid-driven dissolution of primarily carbonate rock. The total dissolved load correlates well with dissolved sulfate - the chief product of this style of weathering - in both landslides and streams draining the area (R-2 = 0.841 and 0.929 respectively; p < 0.001 in both cases), with solute chemistry in seepage from landslides and catchments affected by significant landsliding governed by the same weathering reactions. The predominance of coupled carbonate-sulfuric-acid-driven weathering is the key difference between these sites and previously studied landslides in New Zealand (Emberson et al., 2016), but in both settings increasing volumes of landslides drive greater overall solute concentrations in streams.
Bedrock landslides, by excavating deep below saprolite-rock interfaces, create conditions for weathering in which all mineral phases in a lithology are initially unweathered within landslide deposits. As a result, the most labile phases dominate the weathering immediately after mobilisation and during a transient period of depletion. This mode of dissolution can strongly alter the overall output of solutes from catchments and their contribution to global chemical cycles if landslide-derived material is retained in catchments for extended periods after mass wasting.
Within the context of United Nations (UN) environmental institutions, it has become apparent that intergovernmental responses alone have been insufficient for dealing with pressing transboundary environmental problems. Diverging economic and political interests, as well as broader changes in power dynamics and norms within global (environmental) governance, have resulted in negotiation and implementation efforts by UN member states becoming stuck in institutional gridlock and inertia. These developments have sparked a renewed debate among scholars and practitioners about an imminent crisis of multilateralism, accompanied by calls for reforming UN environmental institutions. However, with the rise of transnational actors and institutions, states are not the only relevant actors in global environmental governance. In fact, the fragmented architectures of different policy domains are populated by a hybrid mix of state and non-state actors, as well as intergovernmental and transnational institutions. Therefore, coping with the complex challenges posed by severe and ecologically interdependent transboundary environmental problems requires global cooperation and careful management from actors beyond national governments.
This thesis investigates the interactions of three intergovernmental UN treaty secretariats in global environmental governance. These are the secretariats of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Convention on Biological Diversity, and the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification. While previous research has acknowledged the increasing autonomy and influence of treaty secretariats in global policy-making, little attention has been paid to their strategic interactions with non-state actors, such as non-governmental organizations, civil society actors, businesses, and transnational institutions and networks, or their coordination with other UN agencies. Through qualitative case-study research, this thesis explores the means and mechanisms of these interactions and investigates their consequences for enhancing the effectiveness and coherence of institutional responses to underlying and interdependent environmental issues.
Following a new institutionalist ontology, the conceptual and theoretical framework of this study draws on global governance research, regime theory, and scholarship on international bureaucracies. From an actor-centered perspective on institutional interplay, the thesis employs concepts such as orchestration and interplay management to assess the interactions of and among treaty secretariats. The research methodology involves structured, focused comparison, and process-tracing techniques to analyze empirical data from diverse sources, including official documents, various secondary materials, semi-structured interviews with secretariat staff and policymakers, and observations at intergovernmental conferences.
The main findings of this research demonstrate that secretariats employ tailored orchestration styles to manage or bypass national governments, thereby raising global ambition levels for addressing transboundary environmental problems. Additionally, they engage in joint interplay management to facilitate information sharing, strategize activities, and mobilize relevant actors, thereby improving coherence across UN environmental institutions. Treaty secretariats play a substantial role in influencing discourses and knowledge exchange with a wide range of actors. However, they face barriers, such as limited resources, mandates, varying leadership priorities, and degrees of politicization within institutional processes, which may hinder their impact. Nevertheless, the secretariats, together with non-state actors, have made progress in advancing norm-building processes, integrated policy-making, capacity building, and implementation efforts within and across framework conventions. Moreover, they utilize innovative means of coordination with actors beyond national governments, such as data-driven governance, to provide policy-relevant information for achieving overarching governance targets.
Importantly, this research highlights the growing interactions between treaty secretariats and non-state actors, which not only shape policy outcomes but also have broader implications for the polity and politics of international institutions. The findings offer opportunities for rethinking collective agency and actor dynamics within UN entities, addressing gaps in institutionalist theory concerning the interaction of actors in inter-institutional spaces. Furthermore, the study addresses emerging challenges and trends in global environmental governance that are pertinent to future policy-making. These include reflections for the debate on reforming international institutions, the role of emerging powers in a changing international world order, and the convergence of public and private authority through new alliance-building and a division of labor between international bureaucracies and non-state actors in global environmental governance.
The Rio Conventions stand at the centerpiece of international cooperation within the governance area of climate change, biodiversity, and desertification. Due to substantial environmental and political linkages, there are interrelations between the three regimes. This study seeks to examine the inter-institutional relationship between the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Convention on Biological Diversity and the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification by analyzing and assessing their horizontal interplay activities from the starting point of their genesis at Earth Summit in 1992 until today. In this research, I address the connections between the three conventions and identify the conflicting, cooperative, and synergetic aspects of inter-institutional relationship. While the overall empirical analysis suggests weak indications of a conflictive type, this research asserts that the interplay activities have thus far led to a cooperative relationship between the Rio Conventions. Moreover, increasing coordination and collaboration between the conventions’ treaty secretariats signals characteristics of a synergetic relationship, which could open up a potential window of opportunity for these actors to further engage and progress in institutional management in the future. In a conclusion, this study explores the possibility of the formation of an overarching environmental institution as a result of joint institutional management within the complex of climate change, biodiversity, and desertification.
Die vorliegende Arbeit beschäftigte sich mit zwei Themengebieten. Es ging zum einen um die mechanischen Eigenschaften von Polyelektrolythohlkapseln und zum anderen um die Adhäsion von Polyelektrolythohlkapseln. Die mechanischen Eigenschaften wurden mit der AFM „colloidal probe” Technik untersucht. Dabei zeigte sich, dass die Kraftdeformationskurven für kleine Deformationen den nach der Schalentheorie vorhergesagten linearen Verlauf haben. Ebenso wurde die quadratische Abhängigkeit der Federkonstanten von der Dicke bestätigt. Für PAH/PSS findet man einen E-Modul von 0.25 GPa. Zusammen mit der Tatsache, dass die Deformationskurven unabhängig von der Geschwindigkeit sind und praktisch keine Hysterese zeigen, sowie der Möglichkeit die Kapseln plastisch zu deformieren, kann man schließen, dass das System in einem glasartigen Zustand vorliegt. <pt>Erwartungsgemäß zeigte der pH einen starken Einfluss auf die PEM. Während in einem pH-Bereich zwischen 2 und 11.5 keine morphologischen Änderungen festgestellt werden konnten, vergrößerte sich der Radius bei pH = 12 um bis zu 50 %. Diese Radienänderung war reversibel und ging einher mit einem sichtbaren Weicherwerden der Kapseln. Eine Abnahme des E-Moduls um mindestens drei Größenordungen wurde durch Kraftdeformationsmessungen bestätigt. Die Kraftdeformationskurven zeigen eine starke Hysterese. Das System befindet sich nun nicht mehr in einem glasartigen Zustand, sondern ist viskos bis gummiartig geworden. Messungen an Kapseln, die mit Glutardialdehyd behandelt wurden, zeigten, dass die Behandlung das pH-abhängige Verhalten verändert. Dies kann darauf zurückgeführt werden, dass das PAH durch den Glutardialdehyd quervernetzt wird. Bei einem hohen Quervernetzungsgrad, zeigen die Kapseln keine Änderung des mechanischen Verhaltens bei pH = 12. Schwach quervernetzte Kapseln werden immer noch signifikant weicher bei pH = 12, jedoch ändert sich der Radius nicht. Außerdem wurden Multilagenkapseln untersucht, deren Stabilität nicht auf elektrostatischen Wechselwirkungen sondern auf Wasserstoffbrückenbindungen beruhte. Diese Kapseln zeigten eine deutlich höhere Steifigkeit mit E-Modulen bis zu 1 GPa. Es wurde gefunden, dass auch dieses System für kleine Deformationen ein lineares Kraft-Deformationsverhalten zeigt, und dass die Federkonstante quadratisch von der Dicke abhängt. Die Kapseln lösen sich praktisch sofort bei pH = 6.5 auf. In der Nähe dieses pHs konnte das Abnehmen der Federkonstanten verfolgt werden. Außerdem wurde das Adhäsionsverhalten von PAH/PSS Kapseln auf mit PEI-beschichtetem Glas untersucht. Die Adhäsionsflächen waren zu einem großen Teil rund und ließen sich quantitativ auswerten. Der Adhäsionsradius nimmt mit dem Kapselradius zu und mit der Dicke ab. Das Verhalten konnte mit zwei Modellen, einem für die große und einem für die kleine Deformation beschrieben werden. Das große Deformationsmodell liefert um eine Größenordung niedrigere Adhäsionsenergien als das kleine Deformationsmodell, welches mit Werten von ‑0.2 mJ/m<sup>2 Werte in einem plausiblen Bereich liefert. Es wurde gefunden, dass bei einem Verhältnis von Dicke zu Deformation von etwa eins "buckling" auftritt. Dieser Punkt markierte zugleich den Übergang von der großen zur kleinen Deformation.
Faunal remains from Palaeolithic sites are important genetic sources to study preglacial and postglacial populations and to investigate the effect of climate change and human impact. Post mortem decay, resulting in fragmented and chemically modified DNA, is a key obstacle in ancient DNA analyses. In the absence of reliable methods to determine the presence of endogenous DNA in sub-fossil samples, temporal and spatial surveys of DNA survival on a regional scale may help to estimate the potential of faunal remains from a given time period and region. We therefore investigated PCR amplification success, PCR performance and post mortem damage in c. 47,000 to c. 12,000-year-old horse remains from 14 Palaeolithic sites along the Swiss Jura Mountains in relation to depositional context, tissue type, storage time and age, potentially influencing DNA preservation. The targeted 75 base pair mitochondrial DNA fragment could be amplified solely from equid remains from caves and not from any of the open dry and (temporary) wetland sites. Whether teeth are better than bones cannot be ultimately decided; however, both storage time after excavation and age significantly affect PCR amplification and performance, albeit not in a linear way. This is best explained by the—inevitable—heterogeneity of the data set. The extent of post mortem damage is not related to any of the potential impact factors. The results encourage comprehensive investigations of Palaeolithic cave sites, even from temperate regions.
Looking times and gaze behavior indicate that infants can predict the goal state of an observed simple action event (e.g., object-directed grasping) already in the first year of life. The present paper mainly focuses on infants' predictive gaze-shifts toward the goal of an ongoing action. For this, infants need to generate a forward model of the to-be-obtained goal state and to disengage their gaze from the moving agent at a time when information about the action event is still incomplete. By about 6 months of age, infants show goal-predictive gaze-shifts, but mainly for familiar actions that they can perform themselves (e.g., grasping) and for familiar agents (e.g., a human hand). Therefore, some theoretical models have highlighted close relations between infants' ability for action-goal prediction and their motor development and/or emerging action experience. Recent research indicates that infants can also predict action goals of familiar simple actions performed by non-human agents (e.g., object-directed grasping by a mechanical claw) when these agents display agency cues, such as self-propelled movement, equifinality of goal approach, or production of a salient action effect. This paper provides a review on relevant findings and theoretical models, and proposes that the impacts of action experience and of agency cues can be explained from an action-event perspective. In particular, infants' goal-predictive gaze-shifts are seen as resulting from an interplay between bottom-up processing of perceptual information and top-down influences exerted by event schemata that store information about previously executed or observed actions.
Behandelte Themen sind: Staat und Wirtschaft als wesentliches Thema von TI; Staat und Wirtschaft früher stärker verbandelt; Distanz zwischen Staat und Wirtschaft als Korruptionsprävention; Geforderte Distanz gegenläufig zu New Public Management; New Public Management als Alternative zum Klüngel; Public Private Partnerships (PPP) – populär, wo formalisierte Lösungen versagen; „Privatisierung“ führt zu neuen Korruptionsrisiken; New Public Management – in Teilbereichen Alternative zu „Privatisierung“?; Das Potential von Transparenz; Neue Chancen für Ethik und Integrität
Mit der globalen Banken- und Finanzkrise ist die Debatte um den Kapitalismus neu entfacht. Doch wie kapitalistisch ist die Weltwirtschaft und welche Folgen entstehen für die internationale Politik? Bereits mit seinem 2007 erschienenen Werk zur „Geschichte und Ökonomie der europäischen Welteroberung – Vom Zeitalter der Entdeckungen zum 1. Weltkrieg“ legt Hartmut Elsenhans eine umfangreiche Analyse der Geschichte und Bedingungen kapitalistischer Expansion vor. Im vorliegenden Beitrag bleibt der Autor seinem interdisziplinären Ansatz treu. Als entscheidend für kapitalistisches Wachstum werden gesellschaftliche Kräfteverhältnisse zwischen dominanten und subalternen Klassen erachtet. Der Kapitalismus erweist sich hier als fragiles System, dessen Entstehung nicht auf in vorkapitalistischen Gesellschaften vorhandene Interessen herrschender Klassen zurückzuführen ist, sondern ein ungeplant umgesetztes „Projekt“ der Subalternen darstellt.
Underlying the importance of revenue the author discusses the future of the international order from the perspective of political economy. The international system will not be a capitalist one. Political conflicts will not be removed by nonviolent market regulations. Weakness of labour force and a dominant role of revenue will further more result in political interventions by nation states. The struggle for revenue to maintain comparative advantages in high-tech-development strengthens state intervention in order to protect domestic market. The failure of the "development state" in the third world and the rising of fundamentalistic tendencies supported by a market-oriented middle class will increase conflicts in those regions.
Hellmanns Warnung vor einer Resozialisierung der deutschen Außenpolitik in eine traditionelle Großmachtrolle erweckt bei mir viel Sympathie. Seine Alternative finde ich moralisch ehrenhaft, aber realistisch nur innerhalb des Prozesses der europäischen Integration. Ich glaube allerdings nicht, dass das Erbe der Geschichte Deutschlands ein besonderes außenpolitisches Vorgehen erzwingt. Ebenso wenig glaube ich, dass idealistische Positionen, gleich welcher Couleur, bei der Bewahrung von Frieden realistischen überlegen sind. Der Berliner Republik haftet ein gewisser Wilhelminismus in der Außenpolitik an. Man will durch Nachholen gleich werden wie die anderen. Die Warnung vor Rissen im Bündnis und vor der Möglichkeit einer Spirale des Niedergangs der europäischen Integration im Beitrag von Hellmann teile ich. Ich würde noch weiter gehen: Auch die humanitäre Intervention bleibt Intervention. Prinzipien der Menschenrechte sind wichtig, ihre Ausgestaltung, manchmal sogar Teile ihrer Prinzipien aber strittig. Welche Kriterien gibt uns der offensive Realismus bei der Stärkung der Interventionsmöglichkeiten draußen, wenn wir dabei keine machtpolitischen Interessen vertreten sollen? Wenn wir nicht alle Übel der Welt abschaffen wollen, dann muss eine Hierarchie verfolgt werden. Die rot-grüne Koalition hat mit der Ausnahme der Irak-Entscheidung im Wesentlichen das Ziel verfolgt, den eigenen Einfluss innerhalb der westlichen Staatengemeinschaft zu steigern. Hellmanns Empfehlung lautet wohl, dort mitzumachen, wo supranationale Institutionen geschaffen werden sollen. Welches sind die Kriterien zur Messung dieser Ziele?
Vor 50 Jahren löste sich Algerien nach langem Kampf endgültig aus dem französischen Kolonialreich. Die anschließend durchgeführten Wirtschaftsreformen konnten das Land aber nicht befrieden, weil sie keine effektive Nutzung der Rente verwirklichten. Bis heute ist die Wirtschaft des Landes wenig diversifiziert und stark von Erdöleinnahmen abhängig. Ist eine exportorientierte Industrialisierung als Lösung der Probleme denkbar?
Von einem destruktiven Keynesianismus wird angenommen, dass er das Beschäftigungsproblem aufwirft – allerdings nur in Deutschland und zulasten der Partner in der EU. Wer Wachstum von steigenden Exportüberschüssen erwartet – ohne Ausweitung des deutschen Binnenmarktes –, exportiert auch Arbeitslosigkeit und Wirtschaftskrisen.
Was uns Algerien lehrt
(2011)
Earlier investigations at South Creek in northeastern Queensland established the importance of overland flow as a hydrologic pathway in this tropical rainforest environment. Since this pathway is ‘fast’, transmitting presumably ‘new’ water, its importance should be reflected in the stormflow chemistry of South Creek: the greater the volumentric contribution to the stormflow hydrograph, the more similarity between the chemical composition of streamwater and of overland flow is to be expected. Water samples were taken during two storm events in an ephemeral gully (gully A), an intermittent gully (gully B) and at the South Creek catchment outlet; additional spot checks were made in several poorly defined rills. The chemical composition of ‘old’ water was determined from 45 baseflow samples collected throughout February. The two events differed considerably in their magnitudes, intensities and antecedent moisture conditions. In both events, the stormflow chemistry in South Creek was characterized by a sharp decrease in Ca, Mg, Na, Si, Cl, EC, ANC, alkalinity and total inorganic carbon. pH remained nearly constant with discharge, whereas K increased sharply, as did sulfate in an ill-defined manner. In event 1, this South Creek stormflow pattern was closely matched by the pattern in gully A, implying a dominant contribution of ‘new’ water. This match was confirmed by the spot samples from rills. Gully B behaved like South Creek itself, but with a dampened ‘new’ water signal, indicating less overland flow generation in its subcatchment. In event 2, which occurred five days later, the initial ‘new’ water signal in gully A was rapidly overwhelmed by a different signal which is attributed to rapid drainage from a perched water table. This study shows that stormflow in this rainforest catchment consists predominantly of ‘new’ water which reaches the stream channel via ‘fast’ pathways. Where the ephemeral gullies delivering overland flow are incised deeply enough to intersect a perched water table, a delayed, ‘old’ water-like signal may be transmitted.
Previous hydrometric studies demonstrated the prevalence of overland flow as a hydrological pathway in the tropical rain forest catchment of South Creek, northeast Queensland. The purpose of this study was to consider this information in a mixing analysis with the aim of identifying sources of, and of estimating their contribution to, storm flow during two events in February 1993. K and acid-neutralizing capacity (ANC) were used as tracers because they provided the best separation of the potential sources, saturation overland flow, soil water from depths of 0.3, 0.6, and 1.2 m, and hillslope groundwater in a two-dimensional mixing plot. It was necessary to distinguish between saturation overland flow, generated at the soil surface and following unchanneled pathways, and overland flow in incised pathways. This latter type of overland flow was a mixture of saturation overland flow (event water) with high concentrations of K and a low ANC, soil water (preevent water) with low concentrations of K and a low ANC, and groundwater (preevent water) with low concentrations of K and a high ANC. The same sources explained the streamwater chemistry during the two events with strongly differing rainfall and antecedent moisture conditions. The contribution of saturation overland flow dominated the storm flow during the first, high-intensity, 178-mm event, while the contribution of soil water reached 50% during peak flow of the second, low-intensity, 44-mm event 5 days later. This latter result is remarkably similar to soil water contributions to storm flow in mountainous forested catchments of the southeastern United States. In terms of event and preevent water the storm flow hydrograph of the high-intensity event is dominated by event water and that of the low-intensity event by preevent water. This study highlights the problems of applying mixing analyses to overland flow-dominated catchments and soil environments with a poorly developed vertical chemical zonation and emphasizes the need for independent hydrometric information for a complete characterization of watershed hydrology and chemistry.
Chemical fingerprints of hydrological compartments and flow paths at La Cuenca, western Amazonia
(1995)
A forested first-order catchment in western Amazonia was monitored for 2 years to determine the chemical fingerprints of precipitation, throughfall, overland flow, pipe flow, soil water, groundwater, and streamflow. We used five tracers (hydrogen, calcium, magnesium, potassium, and silica) to distinguish “fast” flow paths mainly influenced by the biological subsystem from “slow” flow paths in the geochemical subsystem. The former comprise throughfall, overland flow, and pipe flow and are characterized by a high potassium/silica ratio; the latter are represented by soil water and groundwater, which have a low potassium/silica ratio. Soil water and groundwater differ with respect to calcium and magnesium. The groundwater-controlled streamflow chemistry is strongly modified by contributions from fast flow paths during precipitation events. The high potassium/silica ratio of these flow paths suggests that the storm flow response at La Cuenca is dominated by event water.
Throughfall measurements were made under primary terra firme rainforest in the Rio Pichis valley, in the Upper Amazon Basin of Peru. Based on 214 precipitation events over nearly 18 months, throughfall was estimated to be 83.1±8.8% of gross precipitation. Regression analysis of all events revealed that gross precipitation is the only significant explanatory variable; the use of one-burst events does not significantly improve the regression relationship. Gross precipitation is, however, a poor predictor of throughfall for small rainfall events. The two forest structure parameters, canopy capacity, S, and free throughfall coefficient, p, were determined to be 1.3±0.2 mm and 0.32±0.18 mm. Rainfall intensity was found to influence these parameters. New methods which attempt to minimize the influence of meteorologic variables are used to estimate the potential values of these canopy parameters.
Rainfall erosivities as defined by the R factor from the universal soil loss equation were determined for all events during a two-year period at the station La Cuenca in western Amazonia. Three methods based on a power relationship between rainfall amount and erosivity were then applied to estimate event and daily rainfall erosivities from the respective rainfall amounts. A test of the resulting regression equations against an independent data set proved all three methods equally adequate in predicting rainfall erosivity from daily rainfall amount. We recommend the Richardson model for testing in the Amazon Basin, and its use with the coefficient from La Cuenca in western Amazonia.
The topography of first-order catchments in a region of western Amazonia was found to exhibit distinctive, recurrent features: a steep, straight lower side slope, a flat or nearly flat terrace at an intermediate elevation between valley floor and interfluve, and an upper side slope connecting interfluve and intermediate terrace. A detailed survey of soil-saturated hydraulic conductivity (K sat)-depth relationships, involving 740 undisturbed soil cores, was conducted in a 0.75-ha first-order catchment. The sampling approach was stratified with respect to the above slope units. Exploratory data analysis suggested fourth-root transformation of batches from the 0–0.1 m depth interval, log transformation of batches from the subsequent 0.1 m depth increments, and the use of robust estimators of location and scale. The K sat of the steep lower side slope decreased from 46 to 0.1 mm/h over the overall sampling depth of 0.4 m. The corresponding decrease was from 46 to 0.1 mm/h on the intermediate terrace, from 335 to 0.01 mm/h on the upper side slope, and from 550 to 0.015 mm/h on the interfluve. A depthwise comparison of these slope units led to the formulation of several hypotheses concerning the link between K sat and topography.
Dynamic resource management is an essential requirement for private and public cloud computing environments. With dynamic resource management, the physical resources assignment to the cloud virtual resources depends on the actual need of the applications or the running services, which enhances the cloud physical resources utilization and reduces the offered services cost. In addition, the virtual resources can be moved across different physical resources in the cloud environment without an obvious impact on the running applications or services production. This means that the availability of the running services and applications in the cloud is independent on the hardware resources including the servers, switches and storage failures. This increases the reliability of using cloud services compared to the classical data-centers environments.
In this thesis we briefly discuss the dynamic resource management topic and then deeply focus on live migration as the definition of the compute resource dynamic management. Live migration is a commonly used and an essential feature in cloud and virtual data-centers environments. Cloud computing load balance, power saving and fault tolerance features are all dependent on live migration to optimize the virtual and physical resources usage. As we will discuss in this thesis, live migration shows many benefits to cloud and virtual data-centers environments, however the cost of live migration can not be ignored. Live migration cost includes the migration time, downtime, network overhead, power consumption increases and CPU overhead.
IT admins run virtual machines live migrations without an idea about the migration cost. So, resources bottlenecks, higher migration cost and migration failures might happen. The first problem that we discuss in this thesis is how to model the cost of the virtual machines live migration. Secondly, we investigate how to make use of machine learning techniques to help the cloud admins getting an estimation of this cost before initiating the migration for one of multiple virtual machines. Also, we discuss the optimal timing for a specific virtual machine before live migration to another server. Finally, we propose practical solutions that can be used by the cloud admins to be integrated with the cloud administration portals to answer the raised research questions above.
Our research methodology to achieve the project objectives is to propose empirical models based on using VMware test-beds with different benchmarks tools. Then we make use of the machine learning techniques to propose a prediction approach for virtual machines live migration cost. Timing optimization for live migration is also proposed in this thesis based on using the cost prediction and data-centers network utilization prediction. Live migration with persistent memory clusters is also discussed at the end of the thesis. The cost prediction and timing optimization techniques proposed in this thesis could be practically integrated with VMware vSphere cluster portal such that the IT admins can now use the cost prediction feature and timing optimization option before proceeding with a virtual machine live migration.
Testing results show that our proposed approach for VMs live migration cost prediction shows acceptable results with less than 20% prediction error and can be easily implemented and integrated with VMware vSphere as an example of a commonly used resource management portal for virtual data-centers and private cloud environments. The results show that using our proposed VMs migration timing optimization technique also could save up to 51% of migration time of the VMs migration time for memory intensive workloads and up to 27% of the migration time for network intensive workloads. This timing optimization technique can be useful for network admins to save migration time with utilizing higher network rate and higher probability of success.
At the end of this thesis, we discuss the persistent memory technology as a new trend in servers memory technology. Persistent memory modes of operation and configurations are discussed in detail to explain how live migration works between servers with different memory configuration set up. Then, we build a VMware cluster with persistent memory inside server and also with DRAM only servers to show the live migration cost difference between the VMs with DRAM only versus the VMs with persistent memory inside.
Social networks are currently at the forefront of tools that
lend to Personal Learning Environments (PLEs). This study aimed to
observe how students perceived PLEs, what they believed were the
integral components of social presence when using Facebook as part
of a PLE, and to describe student’s preferences for types of interactions
when using Facebook as part of their PLE. This study used mixed
methods to analyze the perceptions of graduate and undergraduate
students on the use of social networks, more specifically Facebook as a
learning tool. Fifty surveys were returned representing a 65 % response
rate. Survey questions included both closed and open-ended questions.
Findings suggested that even though students rated themselves relatively
well in having requisite technology skills, and 94 % of students used
Facebook primarily for social use, they were hesitant to migrate these
skills to academic use because of concerns of privacy, believing that
other platforms could fulfil the same purpose, and by not seeing the
validity to use Facebook in establishing social presence. What lies
at odds with these beliefs is that when asked to identify strategies in
Facebook that enabled social presence to occur in academic work, the
majority of students identified strategies in five categories that lead to
social presence establishment on Facebook during their coursework.
Die Maßnahmen zur Eindämmung der COVID-19-Pandemie gingen mit Schulschließungen und variablen Unterrichtsformen einher, was laut Studienlage zum Thema viele Schüler:innen vor große Herausforderungen gestellt hat und noch immer stellt. Es werden Leistungsabfälle und negative Auswirkungen auf die psychische Gesundheit diskutiert. Da besonders die Lesekompetenz eine grundlegende Ressource für schulische Leistungssituationen ist, soll sie im Fokus dieser Studie stehen.
Die Daten der längsschnittlich angelegten BLab-Studie, die den Erwerbsverlauf von Lese- und Rechtschreibleistungen über die Klassenstufen 1 bis 10 untersucht, wurden dazu genutzt, Unterschiede zwischen den Leseleistungen (operationalisiert aus den normierten und standardisierten Untertests zur Lesekompetenz aus ELFE 1 – 6 und SLRT-II) und vier Skalen des Fragebogens zur Erfassung von schulrelevanten Einstellungen und Sichtweisen von Grundschüler:innen FEESS 3 – 4 (Schuleinstellung, Anstrengungsbereitschaft, Lernfreude und Selbstkonzept) statistisch zu analysieren. Dazu wurden die Testergebnisse von N = 174 Viertklässler:innen zweier Kohorten ausgewertet, von denen eine vom variablen Unterrichtsmodus während der COVID-19-Pandemie betroffen war.
Die Ergebnisse der Gruppenvergleiche stellen sich heterogen dar und müssen differenziert betrachtet werden. Insgesamt scheinen die hier einbezogenen Schüler:innen mit den schulbezogenen Maßnahmen zur Eindämmung der COVID-19-Pandemie gut zurechtgekommen zu sein.
Objective
To improve consumer decision making, the results of risk assessments on food, feed, consumer products or chemicals need to be communicated not only to experts but also to non-expert audiences. The present study draws on evidence from literature reviews and focus groups with diverse stakeholders to identify content to integrate into an existing risk assessment communication (Risk Profile).
Methods
A combination of rapid literature reviews and focus groups with experts (risk assessors (n = 15), risk managers (n = 8)), and non-experts (general public (n = 18)) were used to identify content and strategies for including information about risk assessment results in the “Risk Profile” from the German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment. Feedback from initial focus groups was used to develop communication prototypes that informed subsequent feedback rounds in an iterative process. A final prototype was validated in usability tests with experts.
Results
Focus group feedback and suggestions from risk assessors were largely in line with findings from the literature. Risk managers and lay persons offered similar suggestions on how to improve the existing communication of risk assessment results (e.g., including more explanatory detail, reporting probabilities for individual health impairments, and specifying risks for subgroups in additional sections). Risk managers found information about quality of evidence important to communicate, whereas people from the general public found this information less relevant. Participants from lower educational backgrounds had difficulties understanding the purpose of risk assessments. User tests found that the final prototype was appropriate and feasible to implement by risk assessors.
Conclusion
An iterative and evidence-based process was used to develop content to improve the communication of risk assessments to the general public while being feasible to use by risk assessors. Remaining challenges include how to communicate dose-response relationships and standardise quality of evidence ratings across disciplines.
Polizei im Orient
(2009)
Inhalt: Polizei in Kambodscha – Der Blick in die Vergangenheit - Folgen dieser Erfahrungen auf Bevölkerung und Gesellschaft - Zusammensetzung und Organisation der Polizei in Kambodscha - Betriebsförmigkeit - Standardisierung - Formalisierung Zur Sozialkultur und Außenwirkung der kambodschanischen Polizei Einordnung des kambodschanischen Polizeiapparats in das Herrschaftstypenmodell Max Webers
Oil and gas are the most important gains for the russian economy. So the improvement of these industries is very important and should be analyzed very well. In this paper we analyze the tendency in the development of these industries for the past ten years. We use a factor-analysis for the identification of determinants which have positive and negative effects on the development of the performance of these companies. Some of these determinants are the investment activities or the influence by the government. As result we get three types of firms related to their performances. There are the leaders, the middle and the outsiders.
Over the last decades mechanisms of recognition of morphologically complex words have been extensively examined in order to determine whether all word forms are stored and retrieved from the mental lexicon as wholes or whether they are decomposed into their morphological constituents such as stems and affixes. Most of the research in this domain focusses on English. Several factors have been argued to affect morphological processing including, for instance, morphological structure of a word (e.g., existence of allomorphic stem alternations) and its linguistic nature (e.g., whether it is a derived word or an inflected word form). It is not clear, however, whether processing accounts based on experimental evidence from English would hold for other languages. Furthermore, there is evidence that processing mechanisms may differ across various populations including children, adult native speakers and language learners. Recent studies claim that processing mechanisms could also differ between older and younger adults (Clahsen & Reifegerste, 2017; Reifegerste, Meyer, & Zwitserlood, 2017).
The present thesis examined how properties of the morphological structure, types of linguistic operations involved (i.e., the linguistic contrast between inflection and derivation) and characteristics of the particular population such as older adults (e.g., potential effects of ageing as a result of the cognitive decline or greater experience and exposure of older adults) affect initial, supposedly automatic stages of morphological processing in Russian and German. To this end, a series of masked priming experiments was conducted.
In experiments on Russian, the processing of derived -ost’ nouns (e.g., glupost’ ‘stupidity’) and of inflected forms with and without allomorphic stem alternations in 1P.Sg.Pr. (e.g., igraju – igrat’ ‘to play’ vs. košu – kosit’ ‘to mow’) was examined. The first experiment on German examined and directly compared processing of derived -ung nouns (e.g., Gründung ‘foundation’) and inflected -t past participles (e.g., gegründet ‘founded’), whereas the second one investigated the processing of regular and irregular plural forms (-s forms such as Autos ‘cars’ and -er forms such as Kinder ‘children’, respectively).
The experiments on both languages have shown robust and comparable facilitation effects for derived words and regularly inflected forms without stem changes (-t participles in German, forms of -aj verbs in Russian). Observed morphological priming effects could be clearly distinguished from purely semantic or orthographic relatedness between words. At the same time, we found a contrast between forms with and without allomorphic stem alternations in Russian and regular and irregular forms in German, with significantly more priming for unmarked stems (relative to alternated ones) and significantly more priming for regular (compared) word forms. These findings indicate the relevance of morphological properties of a word for initial stages of processing, contrary to claims made in the literature holding that priming effects are determined by surface form and meaning overlap only. Instead, our findings are more consistent with approaches positing a contrast between combinatorial, rule-based and lexically-stored forms (Clahsen, Sonnenstuhl, & Blevins, 2003).
The doctoral dissertation also addressed the role of ageing and age-related cognitive changes on morphological processing. The results obtained on this research issue are twofold. On the one hand, the data demonstrate effects of ageing on general measures of language performance, i.e., overall longer reaction times and/or higher accuracy rates in older than younger individuals. These findings replicate results from previous studies, which have been linked to the general slowing of processing speed at older age and to the larger vocabularies of older adults. One the other hand, we found that more specific aspects of language processing appear to be largely intact in older adults as revealed by largely similar morphological priming effects for older and younger adults. These latter results indicate that initial stages of morphological processing investigated here by means of the masked priming paradigm persist in older age. One caveat should, however, be noted. Achieving the same performance as a younger individual in a behavioral task may not necessarily mean that the same neural processes are involved. Older people may have to recruit a wider brain network than younger individuals, for example. To address this and related possibilities, future studies should examine older people’s neural representations and mechanisms involved in morphological processing.
Fruits exhibit a vast array of different 3D shapes, from simple spheres and cylinders to more complex curved forms; however, the mechanism by which growth is oriented and coordinated to generate this diversity of forms is unclear. Here, we compare the growth patterns and orientations for two very different fruit shapes in the Brassicaceae: the heart-shaped Capsella rubella silicle and the near-cylindrical Arabidopsis thaliana silique. We show, through a combination of clonal and morphological analyses, that the different shapes involve different patterns of anisotropic growth during three phases. These experimental data can be accounted for by a tissue level model in which specified growth rates vary in space and time and are oriented by a proximodistal polarity field. The resulting tissue conflicts lead to deformation of the tissue as it grows. The model allows us to identify tissue-specific and temporally specific activities required to obtain the individual shapes. One such activity may be provided by the valve-identity gene FRUITFULL, which we show through comparative mutant analysis to modulate fruit shape during post-fertilisation growth of both species. Simple modulations of the model presented here can also broadly account for the variety of shapes in other Brassicaceae species, thus providing a simplified framework for fruit development and shape diversity.
The Semantics of Ellipsis
(2005)
There are four phenomena that are particularly troublesome for theories of ellipsis: the existence of sloppy readings when the relevant pronouns cannot possibly be bound; an ellipsis being resolved in such a way that an ellipsis site in the antecedent is not understood in the way it was there; an ellipsis site drawing material from two or more separate antecedents; and ellipsis with no linguistic antecedent. These cases are accounted for by means of a new theory that involves copying syntactically incomplete antecedent material and an analysis of silent VPs and NPs that makes them into higher order definite descriptions that can be bound into.
Der vorliegende Artikel befasst sich mit Adventure-based Learning, einer digitalen, spielbasierten Lernmethode. Das Ziel derartiger Anwendungen ist es, Motivation und Begeisterung der Lernenden zu stimulieren und dadurch Lernprozesse zu unterstützen. Die Frage, inwiefern Adventure-based Learning tatsächlich lernförderliche Mehrwerte induziert, wird anhand einer Fallstudie im Kontext betrieblicher Weiterbildung untersucht. Hierzu wird ein Experiment mit 40 Probanden durchgeführt, in der eine Adventure-based Learning-Anwendung mit einer interaktiven Powerpoint-Präsentation verglichen wird. Die Ergebnisse der Untersuchung deuten darauf hin, dass viele Lernende sich Lernprogramme wünschen, die weniger textlastig sind und mit Adventure-based Learning eine vergleichbare Behaltensleistung erreicht wird.
A variety of polymerizable lipids containing a hydrophilic spacer group between the reactive group and the main amphiphilic structure have been synthesized. They were investigated in monolayers, liposomes, and multilayers. When the spacer concept was used, efficient decoupling of the motions of the polymeric chain and the amphiphilic side groups is achieved. Thus, the often found loss of the important fluid phases by polymerization is avoided. Polymeric monolayers of the spacer lipid, prepared either by polymerization in the monolayer or by spreading of prepolymerized lipid, exhibit nearly identical surface pressure-area diagrams. Most distinctly, the successful decoupling of the motions of the polymer main chain and the membrane forming amphiphilic side groups is demonstrated by the self-organization of bulk polymerized spacer lipids to polymeric liposomes. In addition, spacer lipids are able to build polymeric Langmuir-Blodgett multilayers. The decoupling of the polymer main chain and the membrane-forming amphiphilic side groups enables the deposition of already polymeric monolayers onto supports to form defined multilayers. If, alternatively, monomeric monolayers are deposited and polymerized on the support, defects in the layers due to structural changes during the polymerization are avoided by the flexible spacer group.