Historical “Truth,” Constructed Memory: Restaging Germany’s Reunification in Thomas Berger’s Television Melodrama Wir sind das Volk. Liebe kennt keine Grenzen (We are the people. Love without limits) (2008)

Film and television are popular media for the (re)presentation of history and the depiction of momentous past events. Germany’s reunification is no exception. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, Germany has witnessed a proliferation of media production that endeavors to historicize and aestheticize the past. This coincides with the need to forge a post-Wall identity of the new Germany. My discussion of Thomas Berger’s award winning television drama Wir sind das Volk. Liebe kennt keine Grenzen (2008) examines how reunification is presented in a mixture of fictitious elements and authentic historical reconstruction based on shared memories of this past. Following a melodramatic trajectory, the film aims at the reconciliation of German society as a people twenty years after reunification

Addressee-specific narratives in older age: A qualitative study of narratives from two different groups of older speakers

The ability to tell stories is considered central: it constitutes identity and is essential for adequate functioning in society (cf. McCabe 1996). By analysing narratives, we have to consider that every narrative is embedded in a specific communication situation, which includes a narrator, a narrative and an addressee. There are studies on narratives of older people that focus on the narrator and the narratives (cf. Gerstenberg 2011; Kemper et al. 1990). However, the role of the addressee and the accompanying necessary pragmatic skills of the narrator have not been considered so far. This talk focuses on the question of how people aged 70 to 80 shape narratives in an addressee-specific way. For this study, the MAIN-assessment was used, by which narratives of picture stories were collected and evaluated on their macrostructure in a structured way (cf. Gagarina et al. 2019). Each person was asked to tell two picture stories, one addressed to an adult and the other to a child. In parallel, cognitive tests were administered to assess cognitive performance. A total of eight German-speaking monolingual people were interviewed in 90-minute meetings. All subjects showed unremarkable scores in a screening for executive functions but differed in scores for the month ordering task and the Benton Test. These working memory scores led to a division of the subjects into two groups of four: a higher-performing group and a lower-performing group. The narratives of each person were evaluated on macrostructure following the MAIN-protocol, and the embedding of the story was analysed. This led to an intrapersonal comparison of the narratives to the different addressees, on the one hand, and a comparison between the two groups, on the other hand. The results demonstrate that the group of higher performers showed differences in their narratives to the two addressees – the narratives to children were more explicitly designed, scored higher in the macrostructure and had a differentiated embedding. These differences were not found in the group of lower performers – their narratives were not designed in an addressee-specific way and, overall, were similar to the narratives of the higher performers to adults: they showed no embeddings and had lower scores in the macrostructure. Hence, the ability to shape a story in an addressee-specific way was observable in the group of higher performers and not in the group of lower performers. It seems possible that this ability is lost in parallel with other cognitive abilities (working memory), which is an interesting and promising approach for larger follow-up studies

Everyday care in the context of multilingualism and dementia: Insights and perspectives

We live in an increasingly ageing world. Culturally and linguistically diverse. Thus, we can soon expect to have a higher number of multilingual people, with different linguistic and cultural backgrounds, who will eventually need assistance. Some of them will potentially suffer from dementia, a disease that in its course impairs linguistic and communicative abilities. The persons concerned may be particularly dependent on their familiar language. At the same time, it is not guaranteed that the required language is spoken by caregivers. This talk will focus on the specific challenges arising from this communication barrier. This will be illustrated using examples from different nursing homes in Germany. In the first part of the talk, I will cover the aspect of theoretical background. I will begin with a discussion of language and multilingualism in the elderly affected by dementia. Next, there will be a discussion on methodological challenges associated with researching on this vulnerable group and context. In the second part, I will cover the different linguistic constellations in Germany’s nursing homes. I will do this presenting some specific examples. I will continue with a discussion on long-term studies with bilingual people affected by dementia. From this we can gain knowledge of the multilingual developments in people suffering from dementia. I will conclude explaining to what extent the communicative abilities in different languages can and should be seen as a resource and used in the context of everyday assistance. The talk will end with an outlook on the existing approaches to integrate multilingualism in the context of care and to promote even more in the future

Some tree-level string amplitudes in the NSR formalism

We calculate tree level scattering amplitudes for open strings using the NSR formalism. We present a streamlined symmetry-based and pedagogical approach to the computations, which we first develop by checking two-, three-, and four-point functions involving bosons and fermions. We calculate the five-point amplitude for massless gluons and find agreement with an earlier result by Brandt, Machado and Medina. We then compute the five-point amplitudes involving two and four fermions respectively, the general form of which has not been previously obtained in the NSR formalism. The results nicely confirm expectations from the supersymmetric $F^4$ effective action. Finally we use the prescription of Kawai, Lewellen and Tye (KLT) to compute the amplitudes for the closed string sector.Comment: 40+8 pages; v2: references added; v3: additional field theory checks made; published version; v4: minor corrections; results unchange

Marktchancen für unternutzte Getreidearten in Bio-Bäckereien: Das Beispiel von Emmer, Einkorn und Dinkel

Weizen dominiert die Getreideanbauflächen in Europa. Roggen, Hafer, Dinkel, Emmer und Einkorn werden deutlich weniger angebaut. Diese Getreidesorten haben jedoch Eigenschaften, die sie heute für den ökologischen Anbau und den Konsum interessant machen: Sie sind gut verträglich, haben einen eigenen Geschmack, wachsen auch in extensiven Anbausystemen gut und sind an verschiedene Klimabedingungen angepasst. Im Rahmen einer Untersuchung von 11 Bäckereien mit Bio-Sortiment in Deutschland und der Schweiz konnte ein Marktpotenzial diese Getreidesorten in Bäckereien festgestellt werden. Ein Teil der Bäckereien sieht die Marktchancen eher positiv während andere Betriebe darauf hinwiesen, dass die Verarbeitung dieser alten Sorten schwierig und aufwändig sei und die Marktchancen daher gering. Die Bio-Bäcker gehen davon aus, dass die Getreide in einem Nischenmarkt bleiben und Weizen nicht ersetzen werden. Wichtig scheint auch die Einbindung von Mühlen und Landwirten sowie eine geeignete Kommunikation bei den Konsumenten. Die befragten Bäckereien bewerben ihre Produkte eher mit Geschmack und Gesundheit als mit Biodiversität, Nachhaltigkeit und Regionalität. Gerade für Bio-Bäckereien könnte die Verbindung von Umweltargumenten, regionaler Herkunft und traditioneller Verarbeitung jedoch eine Marktchance bedeuten. Um den Marktanteil der alten Getreidesorten zu erhöhen scheint es unverzichtbar, auch die Mühlen vom Mehrwert dieser Produkte zu überzeugen. Müssen die Getreide weite Strecken zu einer Mühle transportiert werden, ist die Argumentation hinsichtlich Regionalität in den Bäckereien nicht glaubwürdig. Bäckereien sind jedoch geeignete Orte, um den Mehrwert der Produkte zu kommunizieren. Die Arbeit konnte im Rahmen des EU Projekt HealthyMinorCereals durchgeführt werden

English-learning infants’ perception of word stress patterns

Adult speakers of different free stress languages (e.g., English, Spanish) differ both in their sensitivity to lexical stress and in their processing of suprasegmental and vowel quality cues to stress. In a head-turn preference experiment with a familiarization phase, both 8-month-old and 12-month-old English-learning infants discriminated between initial stress and final stress among lists of Spanish-spoken disyllabic nonwords that were segmentally varied (e.g. [ˈnila, ˈtuli] vs [luˈta, puˈki]). This is evidence that English-learning infants are sensitive to lexical stress patterns, instantiated primarily by suprasegmental cues, during the second half of the first year of life

The protein tyrosine kinases EpsB and PtkA differentially affect biofilm formation in <em>Bacillus subtilis</em>

The Gram-positive soil bacterium Bacillus subtilis is able to choose between motile and sessile lifestyles. The sessile way of life, also referred to as biofilm, depends on the formation of an extracellular polysaccharide matrix and some extracellular proteins. Moreover, a significant proportion of cells in a biofilm form spores. The first two genes of the 15-gene operon for extracellular polysaccharide synthesis, epsA and epsB, encode a putative transmembrane modulator protein and a putative protein tyrosine kinase, respectively, with similarity to the TkmA/PtkA modulator/kinase couple. Here we show that the putative kinase EpsB is required for the formation of structured biofilms. However, an epsB mutant is still able to form biofilms. As shown previously, a ptkA mutant is also partially defective in biofilm formation, but this defect is related to spore formation in the biofilm. The absence of both kinases resulted in a complete loss of biofilm formation. Thus, EpsB and PtkA fulfil complementary functions in biofilm formation. The activity of bacterial protein tyrosine kinases depends on their interaction with modulator proteins. Our results demonstrate the specific interaction between the putative kinase EpsB and its modulator protein EpsA and suggest that EpsB activity is stimulated by its modulator EpsA

A spontaneous tRNA suppressor of a mutation in the Chlamydomonas reinhardtii nuclear MCD1 gene required for stability of the chloroplast petD mRNA

Numerous nuclear gene products are required for the correct expression of organellar genes. One such gene in the green alga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii is MCD1, whose product is required for stability of the chloroplast-encoded petD mRNA. In mcd1 mutants, which are non-photosynthetic, petD mRNA is degraded by a 5′–3′ exonuclease activity, resulting in a failure to synthesize its product, subunit IV of the cytochrome b (6)/f complex. Here, we report the sequence of the wild-type MCD1 gene, which encodes a large and novel putative protein. Analysis of three mutant alleles showed that two harbored large deletions, but that one allele, mcd1-2, had a single base change resulting in a nonsense codon near the N-terminus. This same mutant allele can be suppressed by a second-site mutation in the nuclear MCD2 gene, whereas mcd2-1 cannot suppress the deletion in mcd1-1 (Esposito,D. Higgs,D.C. Drager,R.G. Stern, D.B. and Girard-Bascou,J. (2001) Curr. Genet., 39, 40–48). We report the cloning of mcd2-1, and show that the mutation lies in a tRNA(Ser)(CGA), which has been modified to translate the nonsense codon in mcd1-2. We discuss how the existence of a large tRNA(Ser) gene family may permit this suppression without pleiotropic consequences

Precision high voltage divider for the KATRIN experiment

The Karlsruhe Tritium Neutrino Experiment (KATRIN) aims to determine the absolute mass of the electron antineutrino from a precise measurement of the tritium beta-spectrum near its endpoint at 18.6 keV with a sensitivity of 0.2 eV. KATRIN uses an electrostatic retardation spectrometer of MAC-E filter type for which it is crucial to monitor high voltages of up to 35 kV with a precision and long-term stability at the ppm level. Since devices capable of this precision are not commercially available, a new high voltage divider for direct voltages of up to 35 kV has been designed, following the new concept of the standard divider for direct voltages of up to 100 kV developed at the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB). The electrical and mechanical design of the divider, the screening procedure for the selection of the precision resistors, and the results of the investigation and calibration at PTB are reported here. During the latter, uncertainties at the low ppm level have been deduced for the new divider, thus qualifying it for the precision measurements of the KATRIN experiment.Comment: 22 pages, 12 figure