History and National Identity Construction: The Great Famine in Irish and Ukrainian History Textbooks

This paper compares the narratives on the Famine in Irish and Ukrainian history textbooks and examines to what extent these narratives are coloured by a nationalist discourse. It argues that the story of the Famine in Irish history textbooks has changed from nationalist propaganda to a more balanced narrative, and that this change was brought about by the social transformations in the 1960s. The paper further observes that the current Ukrainian textbooks display quite a variation in the selection and interpretation of events relating to the Famine. Whereas some show a considerable nationalist bias, others present more moderate views. The trajectory of Irish narratives lends support to a theory that relates politicized historiography to the age of a state and to the consolidation of democracy. The diverse pattern of Ukrainian narratives, however, is difficult to reconcile with theories linking historiography to the wider social and political context. This pattern suggests that young states and/or states emerging from authoritarian rule need not automatically entertain uniformly nationalist or otherwise ideologically coloured discourses in the immediate post-independence period

Civic Culture in Western and Eastern Europe

This paper examines the nature of civic culture and the strength of civic attitudes in postcommunist and western countries. In particular, it seeks to explore the internal consistency and durability of civic culture using World Values Survey and European Values Study data. It discusses three perspectives on the strength and durability of civic attitudes in East and West, (the historical roots, the legacy of communism, and the postcommunist transition perspectives) and explores to what extent the pattern of civic attitudes in the two regions matches the predicted outcomes of these perspectives. The paper finds that the attitudes associated with civic culture do not form a coherent syndrome, neither at the individual nor at the societal level. It further finds only marginal support for the historical perspective, which accords a great degree of persistence to civic culture. It therefore concludes that civic culture is not the monolithic and durable phenomenon that some cultural theorists claim it is. © Archives Europénes de Sociology 2006

From Drivers to Athletes -- Modeling and Simulating Cross-Country Sking Marathons

Traffic flow of athletes in classic-style cross-country ski marathons, with the Swedish Vasaloppet as prominent example, represents a non-vehicular system of driven particles with many properties of vehicular traffic flow such as unidirectional movement, the existence of lanes, and, moreover, severe traffic jams. We propose a microscopic acceleration and track-changing model taking into account different fitness levels, gradients, and interactions between the athletes in all traffic situations. The model is calibrated on microscopic data of the $\textit{Vasaloppet 2012}$ Using the multi-model open-source simulator MovSim.org, we simulate all 15 000 participants of the Vasaloppet during the first ten kilometers.Comment: 8 pages, contribution to the conference Traffic and Granular Flow '13 in Juelich. Will be included in the Conference proceedings (Springer

Migration of germline progenitor cells is directed by sphingosine-1-phosphate signalling in a basal chordate.

The colonial ascidian Botryllus schlosseri continuously regenerates entire bodies in an asexual budding process. The germ line of the newly developing bodies is derived from migrating germ cell precursors, but the signals governing this homing process are unknown. Here we show that germ cell precursors can be prospectively isolated based on expression of aldehyde dehydrogenase and integrin alpha-6, and that these cells express germ cell markers such as vasa, pumilio and piwi, as well as sphingosine-1-phosphate receptor. In vitro, sphingosine-1-phosphate (S1P) stimulates migration of germ cells, which depends on integrin alpha-6 activity. In vivo, S1P signalling is essential for homing of germ cells to newly developing bodies. S1P is generated by sphingosine kinase in the developing germ cell niche and degraded by lipid phosphate phosphatase in somatic tissues. These results demonstrate a previously unknown role of the S1P signalling pathway in germ cell migration in the ascidian Botryllus schlosseri