From Pato to Parlor.: Domesticity, Masculinity, Religious Space, and Alternative Archives in 20th-Century Ghana

Vom pato zur Wohnstube. Häuslichkeit, männlichkeit, religiöser Raum und alternative Archive im Ghana des 20. Jahrhunderts Die Missionare, die vor 150 Jahren im heutigen Südwest-Ghana ankamen, fanden eine Form häuslicher Architektur vor, die weitgehend von Gender-Prinzipien geprägt war. Jeder, der es sich leisten konnte, baute in seinem Gehöft einen auf drei Seiten geschlossenen Plattform (pato), wo er Besucher empfangen konnte. Ebenfalls wichtig war der Raum, in dem die sakralen Hocker der matrilinearen Ahnen aufbewahrt wurden. Mit der Ausbreitung des Christentums im frühen 20. Jahrhundert entstand eine neue Klasse gebildeter Männer, die zwar im Einklang mit den Forderungen der Missionare zusammen mit der Ehefrau und den Kindern in einem Haus wohnten, aber innerhalb davon eine Stube hatten, die einen männlichen Raum darstellte. Sie übernahm sowohl die Funktion des sakralen Hockerraums (sie war mit christlicher Ikonographie geschmückt und diente unter anderem als Gebetsraum) als auch die des Besucherraums. Dieser Wandel in der Architektur widerspiegelte den Übergang zu einem neuen Männertypu

Editorial: African women's struggles in a gender perspective

International audienc

Analysis and Functional Consequences of Increased Fab-Sialylation of Intravenous Immunoglobulin (IVIG) after Lectin Fractionation

It has been proposed that the anti-inflammatory effects of intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIG) might be due to the small fraction of Fc-sialylated IgG. In this study we biochemically and functionally characterized sialic acid-enriched IgG obtained by Sambucus nigra agglutinin (SNA) lectin fractionation. Two main IgG fractions isolated by elution with lactose (E1) or acidified lactose (E2) were analyzed for total IgG, F(ab’)2 and Fc-specific sialic acid content, their pattern of specific antibodies and anti-inflammatory potential in a human in vitro inflammation system based on LPS- or PHA-stimulated whole blood. HPLC and LC-MS testing revealed an increase of sialylated IgG in E1 and more substantially in the E2 fraction. Significantly, the increased amount of sialic acid residues was primarily found in the Fab region whereas only a minor increase was observed in the Fc region. This indicates preferential binding of the Fab sialic acid to SNA. ELISA analyses of a representative range of pathogen and auto-antigens indicated a skewed antibody pattern of the sialylated IVIG fractions. Finally, the E2 fraction exerted a more profound anti-inflammatory effect compared to E1 or IVIG, evidenced by reduced CD54 expression on monocytes and reduced secretion of MCP-1 (CCL2); again these effects were Fab- but not Fc-dependent. Our results show that SNA fractionation of IVIG yields a minor fraction (approx. 10%) of highly sialylated IgG, wherein the sialic acid is mainly found in the Fab region. The tested anti-inflammatory activity was associated with Fab not Fc sialylation

Engineered hexavalent Fc proteins with enhanced Fc-gamma receptor avidity provide insights into immune-complex interactions

Tania Rowley et al. present multivalent Fc molecules with enhanced avidity for Fc gamma receptors in order to improve the treatment of autoantibody-mediated human diseases. They found several key amino acids involved in Fc receptor binding interactions

Stochastic models and dynamic measures for the characterization of bistable circuits

During the last few years, a great deal of interest has risen concerning the applications of stochastic methods to several biochemical and biological phenomena. Phenomena like gene expression, cellular memory, bet-hedging strategy in bacterial growth and many others, cannot be described by continuous stochastic models due to their intrinsic discreteness and randomness. In this thesis I have used the Chemical Master Equation (CME) technique to modelize some feedback cycles and analyzing their properties, including experimental data. In the first part of this work, the effect of stochastic stability is discussed on a toy model of the genetic switch that triggers the cellular division, which malfunctioning is known to be one of the hallmarks of cancer. The second system I have worked on is the so-called futile cycle, a closed cycle of two enzymatic reactions that adds and removes a chemical compound, called phosphate group, to a specific substrate. I have thus investigated how adding noise to the enzyme (that is usually in the order of few hundred molecules) modifies the probability of observing a specific number of phosphorylated substrate molecules, and confirmed theoretical predictions with numerical simulations. In the third part the results of the study of a chain of multiple phosphorylation-dephosphorylation cycles will be presented. We will discuss an approximation method for the exact solution in the bidimensional case and the relationship that this method has with the thermodynamic properties of the system, which is an open system far from equilibrium.In the last section the agreement between the theoretical prediction of the total protein quantity in a mouse cells population and the observed quantity will be shown, measured via fluorescence microscopy

From discovering to understanding

Friedrich Miescher, the Swiss scientist who discovered DNA in 1869, already understood a surprising amount about its function. Sadly, as Ralf Dahm explains, he fell short of grasping the role of DNA in heredity because he was held back by established theories of the time