Erinnerungskultur und Erinnerungspflicht

Festakt : 10 Jahre Historisch Orientierte Kulturwissenschaften an der Universität des Saarlandes : 16. Mai 2009

Zur Geschichte der Fachzeitschriften: von der "Historischen Zeitschrift" zu den "zeitenblicken"

"The article spans a large spectrum between the "classical style" periodicals and the new e-journals. First our attention is drawn to the beginnings of scientific journals which in the late 19th century were developing from university-standard periodicals to differentiated specialist bodies with a very broad offer of information. Taking the "Historische Zeitung" as an example, the individual stations of passage of the print periodicals are traced. Do print periodicals belong to the past, are e-journals the promise of the future? The article closes with an ambivalent conclusion: Whereas the periodical crisis and technical possibilities would on the one hand seem to render e-journals as the most suitable and trendsetting medium for specialist information, traditional reception forms and scepticism towards the 'volatile' form of electronic publishing are still opposed to a broad use of such periodicals. It will take another few years before we can see to what extent this scepticism can be overcome." (author's abstract)"Der Beitrag spannt einen weiten Bogen von den Zeitschriften 'klassischen Stils' bis hin zu den neuen E-Journalen. Zunächst wird der Blick auf die Anfänge der wissenschaftlichen Zeitschriften gelenkt, die sich Ende des 19. Jahrhunderts von den jeweiligen Universitäts-Standard präsentierenden Periodika zu Zeitschriften der sich ausdifferenzierenden Fachinstitutionen mit einem sehr breiten Informationsspektrum entwickelten. Am Beispiel der 'Historischen Zeitschrift' werden die einzelnen Entwicklungsphasen einer Printzeitschrift nachgezeichnet. Gehören Printprodukte der Vergangenheit an? Sind E-Journals ein Versprechen für die Zukunft? Der Artikel schließt mit einem ambivalenten Fazit: Während die Krise der Periodika und die technischen Möglichkeiten einerseits die E-Journale zum geeignetsten und zukunftsweisenden Medium für Spezialisteninformationen machen, stehen traditionelle Lese- und Arbeitsgewohnheiten sowie ein gewisser Skeptizismus gegenüber der 'flüchtigen' Form elektronischen Publizierens einer breiten Verwendung solcher Periodika noch entgegen. Es wird wohl noch einige Jahre dauern, bis sich zeigt, inwieweit dieser Skeptizismus überwunden werden kann." (Autorenreferat

Novi izvori za povijest slavonske seljačke bune 1573.

Posljednjih se godina znatno povećao broj izvora z a povijest seljačkebune iz 1572/73 godine. U usporedbi s ranije objavljenim izvorima Kro-nesa, Račkog, von Zahna i Mella pojavila se tijekom priprema za proslavu 400-te godišnjice bune iznenađujuća količina izvora koja je naročitopovećala naša znanja o događajima što su prethodili ustanku, te o privrednim uvjetima na ustaničkom području. Tu, prije svega, treba upozoriti na istraživanja i izdavačku djelatnost Josipa Adamčeka koji je zaslužan i za predradnje oko ediranja i za ukupne sinteze

Induction of sustained remission in early inflammatory arthritis with the combination of infliximab plus methotrexate: the DINORA trial.

BACKGROUND: In the present study, we explored the effects of immediate induction therapy with the anti-tumour necrosis factor (TNF)α antibody infliximab (IFX) plus methotrexate (MTX) compared with MTX alone and with placebo (PL) in patients with very early inflammatory arthritis. METHODS: In an investigator-initiated, double-blind, randomised, placebo-controlled, multi-centre trial (ISRCTN21272423, http://www.isrctn.com/ISRCTN21272423 ), patients with synovitis of 12 weeks duration in at least two joints underwent 1 year of treatment with IFX in combination with MTX, MTX monotherapy, or PL randomised in a 2:2:1 ratio. The primary endpoint was clinical remission after 1 year (sustained for at least two consecutive visits 8 weeks apart) with remission defined as no swollen joints, 0-2 tender joints, and an acute-phase reactant within the normal range. RESULTS: Ninety patients participated in the present study. At week 54 (primary endpoint), 32% of the patients in the IFX + MTX group achieved sustained remission compared with 14% on MTX alone and 0% on PL. This difference (p < 0.05 over all three groups) was statistically significant for IFX + MTX vs PL (p < 0.05), but not for IFX + MTX vs MTX (p = 0.10), nor for MTX vs PL (p = 0.31). Remission was maintained during the second year on no therapy in 75% of the IFX + MTX patients compared with 20% of the MTX-only patients. CONCLUSIONS: These results indicate that patients with early arthritis can benefit from induction therapy with anti-TNF plus MTX compared with MTX alone, suggesting that intensive treatment can alter the disease evolution. TRIAL REGISTRATION: The trial was registered at http://www.isrctn.com/ISRCTN21272423 on 4 October 2007 (date applied)/12 December 2007 (date assigned). The first patient was included on 24 October 2007

The neural bases of tinnitus : Lessons from deafness and cochlear implants

Subjective tinnitus is the conscious perception of sound in the absence of any acoustic source. The literature suggests various tinnitus mechanisms, most of which invoke changes in spontaneous firing rates of central auditory neurons resulting from modification of neural gain. Here, we present an alternative model based on evidence that tinnitus is: (i) rare in people who are congenitally deaf, (ii) common in people with acquired deafness, and (iii) potentially suppressed by active cochlear implants used for hearing restoration. We propose that tinnitus can only develop after fast auditory fiber activity has stimulated the synapse formation between fast-spiking parvalbumin positive (PV+) interneurons and projecting neurons in the ascending auditory path and co-activated fronto-striatal networks after hearing onset. Thereafter, fast auditory fiber activity promotes feedforward and feedback inhibition mediated by PV+ interneuron activity in auditory-specific circuits. This inhibitory network enables enhanced stimulus resolution, attention-driven contrast improvement, and augmentation of auditory responses in central auditory pathways (neural gain) after damage of slow auditory fibers. When fast auditory fiber activity is lost, tonic PV+ interneuron activity is diminished, resulting in the prolonged response latencies, sudden hyperexcitability, enhanced cortical synchrony, elevated spontaneous gamma oscillations, and impaired attention/stress-control that have been described in previous tinnitus models. Moreover, because fast processing is gained through sensory experience, tinnitus would not exist in congenital deafness. Electrical cochlear stimulation may have the potential to re-establish tonic inhibitory networks and thus suppress tinnitus. The proposed framework unites many ideas of tinnitus pathophysiology and may catalyze cooperative efforts to develop tinnitus therapies

Tracking Virus-Specific CD4+ T Cells during and after Acute Hepatitis C Virus Infection

CD4+ T cell help is critical in maintaining antiviral immune responses and such help has been shown to be sustained in acute resolving hepatitis C. In contrast, in evolving chronic hepatitis C CD4+ T cell helper responses appear to be absent or short-lived, using functional assays. Here we used a novel HLA-DR1 tetramer containing a highly targeted CD4+ T cell epitope from the hepatitis C virus non-structural protein 4 to track number and phenotype of hepatitis C virus specific CD4+ T cells in a cohort of seven HLA-DR1 positive patients with acute hepatitis C in comparison to patients with chronic or resolved hepatitis C. We observed peptide-specific T cells in all seven patients with acute hepatitis C regardless of outcome at frequencies up to 0.65% of CD4+ T cells. Among patients who transiently controlled virus replication we observed loss of function, and/or physical deletion of tetramer+ CD4+ T cells before viral recrudescence. In some patients with chronic hepatitis C very low numbers of tetramer+ cells were detectable in peripheral blood, compared to robust responses detected in spontaneous resolvers. Importantly we did not observe escape mutations in this key CD4+ T cell epitope in patients with evolving chronic hepatitis C. During acute hepatitis C a CD4+ T cell response against this epitope is readily induced in most, if not all, HLA-DR1+ patients. This antiviral T cell population becomes functionally impaired or is deleted early in the course of disease in those where viremia persists

A comparison of the strength of biodiversity effects across multiple functions

In order to predict which ecosystem functions are most at risk from biodiversity loss, meta-analyses have generalised results from biodiversity experiments over different sites and ecosystem types. In contrast, comparing the strength of biodiversity effects across a large number of ecosystem processes measured in a single experiment permits more direct comparisons. Here, we present an analysis of 418 separate measures of 38 ecosystem processes. Overall, 45% of processes were significantly affected by plant species richness, suggesting that, while diversity affects a large number of processes not all respond to biodiversity. We therefore compared the strength of plant diversity effects between different categories of ecosystem processes, grouping processes according to the year of measurement, their biogeochemical cycle, trophic level and compartment (above- or belowground) and according to whether they were measures of biodiversity or other ecosystem processes, biotic or abiotic and static or dynamic. Overall, and for several individual processes, we found that biodiversity effects became stronger over time. Measures of the carbon cycle were also affected more strongly by plant species richness than were the measures associated with the nitrogen cycle. Further, we found greater plant species richness effects on measures of biodiversity than on other processes. The differential effects of plant diversity on the various types of ecosystem processes indicate that future research and political effort should shift from a general debate about whether biodiversity loss impairs ecosystem functions to focussing on the specific functions of interest and ways to preserve them individually or in combinatio