Severna Koreja in uganka preživetja

This paper sets out to balance the problematic “objective” status of North Korea on one hand as a “democratic” state (a democratic people’s republic), with its framing in liberal political discourse as a monstrous dictatorship on the other. The case of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea is as complex and misleading as its name, and here I argue that in order to grasp the enigma of its survival as a political regime or dynasty, one must come to terms with the ongoing drive of Stalinist (pseudo-)socialist modernization that gripped the country after World War II, and which dovetails with North Korea’s Juche ideology of self-reliance.Namen članka je soočenje problematičnega »objektivnega« statusa Severne Koreje kot »demokratične« države (demokratična ljudska republika) na eni strani z monstruozno diktaturo, preoblečeno v liberalni politični diskurz, na drugi. Primer Demokratične ljudske republike Koreje je tako kompleksen in zavajajoč kot njeno ime, zato trdim, da moramo, če naj dojamemo uganko njenega preživetja kot političnega režima ali dinastije, pojasniti še dandanes aktiven gon stalinistične (kvazi-)socialistične modernizacije, ki obvladuje državo po II. svetovni vojni in se opira na Juche, severnokorejsko ideologijo samozadostnosti

An aesthetic between utopia and reality : the idea of realism in Western Marxism.

The aim of this thesis is to examine the idea of realism in Western Marxism through the comparative approaches of Georg Lukacs, Walter Benjamin, Theodor W. Adorno, Bertolt Brecht, Jean-Paul Sartre and Fredric Jameson in relation to non-Marxist theorists such as Roland Barthes and Michel Foucault. The issue of realism suffers from the controversial terminology of realism and reality. This is the reason why realism can be better viewed by Marxist perspectives that are firmly based on the category of the subject-object dialectic. This Marxian principle, thereby pertaining to the reality existing outside of subjectivity, substantiates the issue of realism as a continuing social and aesthetic project. By focusing on the category of reality in relation to the idea of realism in Western Marxist debates, this study explores the way in which the Marxist theorists understand the relationship between culture and society, and respond to the change of socio-economic conditions in each historical moment. These various discourses revolving around the issue of realism produce a similar agenda to explain the place of the artwork in the realm of culture. Such a similarity arises from their attempt to retain the idea of realism, even when they argue for an aesthetic of anti-realism. In this respect, my thesis questions the distinction between realism and modernism in Western Marxist discourses, and argues that such differentiation had been articulated by a political intention to sever Western Marxism from Stalinism. Their idea of realism is paradoxical in the sense that their formulations of realism aspire to a utopian project. This is the very way in which their idea of realism can be grasped as another facet of their political programme

Molecular modeling of the reductase domain to elucidate the reaction mechanism of reduction of peptidyl thioester into its corresponding alcohol in non-ribosomal peptide synthetases

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Nonribosomal peptide synthetases (NRPSs) are multienzymatic, multidomain megasynthases involved in the biosynthesis of pharmaceutically important nonribosomal peptides. The peptaibol synthetase from <it>Trichoderma virens </it>(TPS) is an important member of the NRPS family that exhibits antifungal properties. The majority of the NRPSs terminate peptide synthesis with the thioesterase (TE) domain, which either hydrolyzes the thioester linkage, releasing the free peptic acid, or catalyzes the intramolecular macrocyclization to produce a macrolactone product. TPS is an important NRPS that does not encompass a TE domain, but rather a reductase domain (R domain) to release the mature peptide product reductively with the aid of a NADPH cofactor. However, the catalytic mechanism of the reductase domain has not yet been elucidated.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We present here a three-dimensional (3D) model of the reductase domain based on the crystal structure of vestitone reductase (VR). VR belongs to the short-chain dehydrogenase/reductase (SDR) superfamily and is responsible for the nicotinamide dinucleotide phosphate (NADPH)-dependent reduction of the substrate into its corresponding secondary alcohol product. The binding sites of the probable linear substrates, alamethicin, trichotoxin, antiamoebin I, chrysopermin C and gramicidin, were identified within the modeled R domain using multiple docking approaches. The docking results of the ligand in the active site of the R domain showed that reductase side chains have a high affinity towards ligand binding, while the thioester oxygen of each substrate forms a hydrogen bond with the OH group of Tyr176 and the thiol group of the substrate is closer to the Glu220. The modeling and docking studies revealed the reaction mechanism of reduction of thioester into a primary alcohol.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Peptaibol biosynthesis incorporates a single R domain, which appears to catalyze the four-electron reduction reaction of a peptidyl carrier protein (PCP)-bound peptide to its corresponding primary alcohol. Analysis of R domains present in the non-redundant (nr) database of the NCBI showed that the R domain always resides in the last NRPS module and is involved in either a two or four-electron reduction reaction.</p