Promoting Renewable Energies in Tourism

In tourism, energy demands are particularly high. Tourism facilities such as hotels require large amounts of electric and heating / cooling energy while their supply is usually still based on fossil energies. This research approach analyses the potential of promoting renewable energies in tourism. It focuses on a combined and hence highly efficient production of both electric and thermal energy by biogas plants on the one hand and its provision to local tourism facilities via short distance networks on the other. Considering regional resource availability as well as socio-economic aspects, it thus examines strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats that can arise from such a micro-cooperation. The research aim is to provide an actor-based, spatially transferable feasibility analysis

Die Produktion von Wirkstoffen bei Roche; gestern, heute, morgen

During Roche's first 100 years, production of pharmaceutical active ingredients was a key component in the company's business. This article traces changes in manufacturing technology and methods and looks at the demands placed on pharmaceutical manufacturing today. Documents from the company archives illustrate the development of production techniques over the past 100 years. Finally, modern production facilities and design concepts are discussed

Induction of the lac promoter in the absence of DNA loops and the stoichiometry of induction

In vivo induction of the Escherichia coli lactose operon as a function of inducer concentration generates a sigmoidal curve, indicating a non-linear response. Suggested explanations for this dependence include a 2:1 inducer–repressor stoichiometry of induction, which is the currently accepted view. It is, however, known for decades that, in vitro, operator binding as a function of inducer concentration is not sigmoidal. This discrepancy between in vivo and in vitro data has so far not been resolved. We demonstrate that the in vivo non-linearity of induction is due to cooperative repression of the wild-type lac operon through DNA loop formation. In the absence of DNA loops, in vivo induction curves are hyperbolic. In the light of this result, we re-address the question of functional molecular inducer–repressor stoichiometry in induction of the lac operon

Counterexamples to local Lipschitz and local H\"older continuity with respect to the initial values for additive noise driven SDEs with smooth drift coefficient functions with at most polynomially growing derivatives

In the recent article [A. Jentzen, B. Kuckuck, T. M\"uller-Gronbach, and L. Yaroslavtseva, arXiv:1904.05963 (2019)] it has been proved that the solutions to every additive noise driven stochastic differential equation (SDE) which has a drift coefficient function with at most polynomially growing first order partial derivatives and which admits a Lyapunov-type condition (ensuring the the existence of a unique solution to the SDE) depend in a logarithmically H\"older continuous way on their initial values. One might then wonder whether this result can be sharpened and whether in fact, SDEs from this class necessarily have solutions which depend locally Lipschitz continuously on their initial value. The key contribution of this article is to establish that this is not the case. More precisely, we supply a family of examples of additive noise driven SDEs which have smooth drift coefficient functions with at most polynomially growing derivatives whose solutions do not depend on their initial value in a locally Lipschitz continuous, nor even in a locally H\"older continuous way.Comment: 27 page

Präventive Anbauplanung im Umgang mit der Schädlingsgilde in Ackerbohnen und Erbsen zur Schadensvermeidung und Ertragssicherung (WP1)

Für den Ackerbohnen- und Erbsenanabau wurden das räumlich-, zeitliche Befallsgeschehen vierer Zielschädlinge analysiert, um risikobehaftete Anbaukonstellationen zu identifizieren. Das Projekt war Teil des zeitgleich bestehenden BÖLN-Projektverbundes CYDNIGPRO mit den Projektpartnern Uni-Kassel-FÖP, Gäa e. V., ZEPP, und LLG Sachsen-Anhalt. Die Befallserhebungen fanden in drei Modellregionen von etwa 30 km Durchmesser in Hessen, Sachsen und Sachsen-Anhalt statt und umfassten Buchtenfraß an Ackerbohne & Erbse (Blattrandkäfer), Pheromonfallenfänge und Knospenschaden an Erbse (Erbsengallmücke) und Pflückproben von Ackerbohnen (Ackerbohnenkäfer) und Erbsen (Erbsenkäfer). Mit den georeferenzierten Flächeninformationen zur Lage, Geometrie, ihrer jeweiligen Entfernungen zueinander, Saatzeit/Feldaufgang und Wetterdaten wurden zwei räumliche Auswertungsmethoden als a) Entfernung zur nächstgelegenen Vorjahresfläche und b) prozentualer Vorjahres Flächenanteil innerhalb gestufter Radien um die aktuellen Flächen gerechnet. Im Projektverlauf stieg das Befallsniveau von Ackerbohnen- und Blattrandkäfer in allen Regionen an. Auch der Erbsenkäferbefall nahm sowohl in Sachsen, als auch in Hessen zu, während die Erbsengallmücke in Sachsen-Anhalt nur sehr niedrigen Befall aufwies. Beim Blattrandkäfer führten weite Flächenabstände zu tendenziell sinkendem Befall. Trotz witterungsbedingt sehr unterschiedlichen Aussaatzeitfenstern nach Jahr und Region, überwogen bei Spätsaaten signifikant geringere Buchtenfraßwerte. Beim Ackerbohnenkäfer wirkten sich weder Flächenabstand noch Saatzeit befallsmindernd aus, sodass diese keine nutzbare Option zur Befallsprävention darstellen. Für Hessen konnte belegt werden, dass Käferlebendbesatz im Saatgut eine bisher unterschätzte Befallsquelle darstellt. Der ebenfalls präventive Ansatz, waldumschlossene „Gesundlagen“ mit Vorjahresanbaupause zu nutzen, wurde mit moderatem Ergebnis bestätigt. Die vorgestellte Ergebnislage ist zunächst regions-spezifisch und ist im Kontext der regionalen Anbaumuster und der stark unterschiedlichen Pflanzenschutzregime zu betrachten. Prinzipiell und als Fernziel, scheinen Befallsprognosen insbesondere für Blattrandkäfererstbefall möglich. Die vorliegenden Daten belegen, dass Flächenabstände und Saattermine präventiv nutzbare Stellgrößen gegen Starkbefall darstellen können und bilden eine wertvolle Referenz für Beratung und Praxis

Staphylococcus aureus adapts to the immunometabolite itaconic acid by inducing acid and oxidative stress responses including S-bacillithiolations and S-itaconations

Staphylococcus aureus is a major pathogen, which has to defend against reactive oxygen and electrophilic species encountered during infections. Activated macrophages produce the immunometabolite itaconate as potent electrophile and antimicrobial upon pathogen infection. In this work, we used transcriptomics, metabolomics and shotgun redox proteomics to investigate the specific stress responses, metabolic changes and redox modifications caused by sublethal concentrations of itaconic acid in S. aureus. In the RNA-seq transcriptome, itaconic acid caused the induction of the GlnR, KdpDE, CidR, SigB, GraRS, PerR, CtsR and HrcA regulons and the urease-encoding operon, revealing an acid and oxidative stress response and impaired proteostasis. Neutralization using external urea as ammonium source improved the growth and decreased the expression of the glutamine synthetase-controlling GlnR regulon, indicating that S. aureus experienced ammonium starvation upon itaconic acid stress. In the extracellular metabolome, the amounts of acetate and formate were decreased, while secretion of pyruvate and the neutral product acetoin were strongly enhanced to avoid intracellular acidification. Exposure to itaconic acid affected the amino acid uptake and metabolism as revealed by the strong intracellular accumulation of lysine, threonine, histidine, aspartate, alanine, valine, leucine, isoleucine, cysteine and methionine. In the proteome, itaconic acid caused widespread S-bacillithiolation and S-itaconation of redox-sensitive antioxidant and metabolic enzymes, ribosomal proteins and translation factors in S. aureus, supporting its oxidative and electrophilic mode of action in S. aureus. In phenotype analyses, the catalase KatA, the low molecular weight thiol bacillithiol and the urease provided protection against itaconic acid-induced oxidative and acid stress in S. aureus. Altogether, our results revealed that under physiological infection conditions, such as in the acidic phagolysome, itaconic acid is a highly effective antimicrobial against multi-resistant S. aureus isolates, which acts as weak acid causing an acid, oxidative and electrophilic stress response, leading to S-bacillithiolation and itaconation