Conserved androgenic differentiation pathways are repurposed during the evolution of adult sexual plasticity

Early exposure to androgens is necessary to organize male phenotype, and inhibition of androgen signaling adversely affects external genitalia development. Nonetheless, vertebrates that remain sexually plastic as adults require mechanisms that induce changes and prevent fixation of genital morphology. In Lythrypnus dalli, a highly social hermaphroditic fish, sex differences in genitalia morphology are maintained in the absence of dimorphic levels of potent fish androgen 11-ketotestosterone. Since a functional androgen receptor (AR) is critical to the masculinization of phenotype across all vertebrates, local differences in the AR may be one mechanism to maintain dimorphic genitalia in this species. We demonstrate that AR expression is high throughout the male genitalia, but low or absent in female genitalia. Animals with ambiguous genitalia exhibited higher AR expression than females within the body of the papilla. In addition, both male and female developing L. dalli exhibited high mesenchymal AR expression suggesting that elevated that levels of AR in this region of ambiguous animals may be characteristic of multipotentiality, allowing for genitalia morphogenesis in either direction. To examine the necessity of AR in maintaining male-typical genitalia, nesting males were intraperitoneally injected with 50µg/g/day of flutamide (AR antagonist) or a vehicle for five days. Compared to control animals, flutamide treated males had a significant percent decrease in papilla length to width ratio. In a species that must remain neutral to sexual canalization, regional differences in AR expression appear to mediate this phenotypic difference

Soundness and Completeness of a Model-Checking Proof System for CTL

We propose a local model-checking proof system for a fragment of CTL. The rules of the proof system are motivated by the well-known fixed-point characterisation of CTL based on unfolding of the temporal operators. To guarantee termination of proofs, we tag the sequents of our proof system with the set of states that have already been explored for the respective temporal formula. We define the semantics of tagged sequents, and then state and prove soundness and completeness of the proof system, as well as termination of proof search for finite-state models.Comment: 10 page

Temporal Variability of Urinary Phthalate Metabolite Levels in Men of Reproductive Age

Phthalates are a family of multifunctional chemicals widely used in personal care and other consumer products. The ubiquitous use of phthalates results in human exposure through multiple sources and routes, including dietary ingestion, dermal absorption, inhalation, and parenteral exposure from medical devices containing phthalates. We explored the temporal variability over 3 months in urinary phthalate metabolite levels among 11 men who collected up to nine urine samples each during this time period. Eight phthalate metabolites were measured by solid-phase extraction–high-performance liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry. Statistical analyses were performed to determine the between- and within-subject variance apportionment, and the sensitivity and specificity of a single urine sample to classify a subject’s 3-month average exposure. Five of the eight phthalates were frequently detected. Monoethyl phthalate (MEP) was detected in 100% of samples; monobutyl phthalate, monobenzyl phthalate, mono-2-ethylhexyl phthalate (MEHP), and monomethyl phthalate were detected in > 90% of samples. Although we found both substantial day-to-day and month-to-month variability in each individual’s urinary phthalate metabolite levels, a single urine sample was moderately predictive of each subject’s exposure over 3 months. The sensitivities ranged from 0.56 to 0.74. Both the degree of between- and within-subject variance and the predictive ability of a single urine sample differed among phthalate metabolites. In particular, a single urine sample was most predictive for MEP and least predictive for MEHP. These results suggest that the most efficient exposure assessment strategy for a particular study may depend on the phthalates of interest

Beschreibungstexte zu Crowdfunding-Kampagnen: Der Einfluss sprachlicher Merkmale auf die Erfolgsaussichten im Crowdfunding

Crowdfunding ist ein communitybasiertes Finanzierungsmodell, das in den letzten Jahren zunehmend an Bedeutung gewonnen hat. Indem eine Vielzahl an Unterstützer:innen gewonnen werden, können so Kreative und Kulturschaffende Produkte veröffentlichen, ohne einen klassischen Publikationsweg über Verlage oder ähnliche Institutionen zu wählen. Zentral für den Erfolg von Projekten ist dabei, eine Projektseite zu gestalten, die möglichst viele Menschen davon überzeugt, Geld in die Kampagne zu investieren. Ein Teil dieser Werbung geschieht mittels der Beschreibungstexte der Projekte. Diese stehen im Zentrum der vorliegenden Arbeit. Mittels einer korpuslinguistischen Analyse wird zunächst untersucht, welche sprachlichen Mittel in Beschreibungstexten die Erfolgschancen von Crowdfunding-Kampagnen erhöhen und welche diese verringern. Darauf folgt eine qualitative Auswertung der Ergebnisse auf Basis von Theorien aus der Linguistischen Vertrauensforschung, der kognitiven Linguistik und der Soziologie – wie etwa dem von Reckwitz eingeführten Kreativitätsdispositiv.:1. Einleitung 2. Crowdfunding 3. Theoretische Grundlagen 3.1. Linguistische Vertrauensforschung 3.2. Diskursanalyse 3.3. Aufmerksamkeitslenkung und Metaphern 3.4. Das Kreativitätsdispositiv 4. Methodik 5. Korpuszusammenstellung 6. Analyse 6.1. Lemmata 6.1.1. Unigramme 6.1.1.1. Eure und deine 6.1.1.2. Absprache 6.1.1.3. handsigniert 6.1.1.4. Echt, limitiert, aufwendig und atmosphärisch 6.1.1.5. Zwischenfazit - Reziprozität 6.1.1.6. Kompetenz 6.1.1.7. Meine 6.1.1.8. Enwickeln und Idee 6.1.1.9. Zwischenfazit - Adressat:innenbezug und Kompetenz 6.1.1.10. Zielperspektivierung 6.1.1.11. Gendern 6.1.1.12. Spaß 6.1.2. Trigramme 6.1.2.1. Zusätzlich erhalten sie und außerdem erhalten sie 6.1.2.2. In die letzt 6.2. Wortartem 6.2.1. Unigramme 6.2.1.1. Bestimmte und unbestimmte Artikel 6.2.1.2. Personalpronomen 6.2.1.3. Modalverben 6.2.1.4. Infinitive und Infinitivpartikel 6.2.2. Trigramme 6.2.2.1. Substantiv Artikel Substantiv und Artikel Substantiv Artikel 6.2.2.2. Artikel attributives Adjektiv Substantiv 7. Fazit 8. Anhänge 8.1. Zitierte Primärliteratur 8.2. Sekundärliteratu

Beiträge zur Chemie des Holzgewebes : Inaugural-Dissertation

http://tartu.ester.ee/record=b2287534~S1*es

Increased Androgenic Sensitivity in the Hind Limb Muscular System Marks the Evolution of a Derived Gestural Display

Physical gestures are prominent features of many species’ multi- modal displays, yet how evolution incorporates body and leg movements into animal signaling repertoires is unclear. Andro- genic hormones modulate the production of reproductive signals and sexual motor skills in many vertebrates; therefore, one possi- bility is that selection for physical signals drives the evolution of androgenic sensitivity in select neuromotor pathways. We exam- ined this issue in the Bornean rock frog (Staurois parvus, family: Ranidae). Males court females and compete with rivals by per- forming both vocalizations and hind limb gestural signals, called “foot flags.” Foot flagging is a derived display that emerged in the ranids after vocal signaling. Here, we show that administration of testosterone (T) increases foot flagging behavior under seminatural conditions. Moreover, using quantitative PCR, we also find that adult male S. parvus maintain a unique androgenic phenotype, in which androgen receptor (AR) in the hind limb musculature is expressed at levels ∼10× greater than in two other anuran species, which do not produce foot flags (Rana pipiens and Xenopus laevis). Finally, because males of all three of these species solicit mates with calls, we accordingly detect no differences in AR expression in the vocal apparatus (larynx) among taxa. The results show that foot flagging is an androgen-dependent gestural signal, and its emergence is associated with increased androgenic sensitivity within the hind limb musculature. Selection for this novel gestural signal may therefore drive the evolution of increased AR expres- sion in key muscles that control signal production to support adap- tive motor performance

AHAA- Agile, Hybrid Assessment Method for Automotive, Safety Critical SMEs

The need for software is increasingly growing in the automotive industry. Software development projects are, however, often troubled by time and budget overruns, resulting in systems that do not fulfill customer requirements. Both research and industry lack strategies to combine reducing the long software development lifecycles (as required by time-to-market demands) with increasing the quality of the software developed. Software process improvement (SPI) provides the first step in the move towards software quality, and assessments are a vital part of this process. Unfortunately, software process assessments are often expensive and time consuming. Additionally, they often provide companies with a long list of issues without providing realistic suggestions. The goal of this paper is to describe a new low-overhead assessment method that has been designed specifically for small-to-medium-sized (SMEs) organisations wishing to be automotive software suppliers. This assessment method integrates the structured-ness of the plan-driven SPI models of Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) and Automotive SPICETM with the flexibleness of agile practices