Stress, life history and dental development: a histological study of mandrills (Mandrillus sphinx)

Dental development is frequently used to reconstruct life history in primates for which little other information exists. In addition to the regular growth increments visible in histological tooth sections, accentuated lines are thought to form at the time of stressful events in the lives of individual animals. However, our understanding of when, how and why such accentuated lines form in relation to stressful events is limited. In this thesis, I tested the hypothesis that accentuated lines in the enamel and dentine are associated with stressful events in the lives of semi-free-ranging mandrills (Mandrillus sphinx, Cercopithecidae) from the Centre International de Recherches Médicales de Franceville, Gabon. I used dates of birth and death to calibrate dental histology to calendar time and individual age. I then reconstructed dental development sequences for individual mandrills, providing a detailed overview of mandrill dental development. I report sex-specific dental development chronologies, crown extension rates and stages of dental development, and compare these to mandrill life history. Based on this dental development data, I matched the observed accentuated lines in the mandrill teeth with the dates of events in the mandrills’ lives. My results suggest that accentuated lines can correspond to potentially stressful events, including resumption of reproductive cycling in the mother and menstrual cycles, and in some occasions with parturitions. My results show that male mandrills might form accentuated lines at the time of potentially stressful events too, but most potentially stressful life history events for males take place after dental development is complete. Furthermore, my findings suggest that the number of accentuated lines recorded in teeth varies between individuals in a population, reflecting differences that may influence reproductive success

Prophylaxis and therapy of viral infections in pediatric patients treated for malignancy

Infections are still an important cause of mortality and morbidity in pediatric cancer patients. Most of the febrile episodes in immunocompromised patients are classified as a fever of unknown origin (FUO) while bacteria are the more frequent causes of documented infections. Viral infections are also feared during chemotherapy but less data are available on their incidence and morbidity. We reviewed the literature on incidence, morbidity, and mortality of viral infections in children undergoing chemotherapy and discussed the evidence concerning the prophylaxis and the therapy

Bürgerschaftliche Finanzierungsmodelle – Eine Alternative zur klassischen Kreditfinanzierung für Unternehmen der Land- und Lebensmittelwirtschaft?

In den vergangenen Jahren sind sowohl das Interesse an Geldanlagemöglichkeiten, die sich nicht ausschließlich an finanziellen Motiven orientieren als auch das persönliche Engagement von Bürger*innen für ein nachhaltiges Lebensmittelsystem gestiegen. Diese Entwicklung machen sich insbesondere Unternehmen der Öko-Branche zu Nutze und entscheiden sich zunehmend für bürgerschaftliche Finanzierungsmodelle als Alternative oder Ergänzung zur klassischen Kreditfinanzierung. In der Forschung blieb die mögliche Rolle von Bürger*innen als Kapitalgeber*innen für Unternehmen der Land- und Lebensmittelwirtschaft bisher weitestgehend unberücksichtigt. Vor diesem Hintergrund beschäftigt sich dieser Beitrag mit bürgerschaftlicher Finanzierung aus Unternehmensperspektive und zeigt, aus welchen Gründen sich Unternehmen für diese Finanzierungsmodelle entscheiden und welche Bedeutung sie für die betriebliche Gesamtfinanzierung haben

Bürgerschaftliche Finanzierungsmodelle in der Land- und Lebensmittelwirtschaft – Anwendungsbereiche, Ausgestaltung, Motive (Arbeitspapier 1 des Forschungsprojektes BioFinanz)

Das vorliegende Arbeitspapier fasst erste, ausgewählte Ergebnisse des Forschungsprojektes BioFinanz zu bürgerschaftlichen Finanzierungsmodellen in der Land- und Lebensmittelwirtschaft zusammen. Es basiert auf einer Literatur- und Projektrecherche, Expert*innen-Interviews sowie einer Online-Befragung von Unternehmen der Land- und Lebensmittelwirtschaft. Neben der Vorstellung des konzeptionellen Rahmens und des methodischen Vorgehens werden die berücksichtigten Finanzierungsmodelle kategorisiert, vorgestellt und ihre Bedeutung für die Praxis anhand erster Ergebnisse aufgezeigt. Auf Basis der verschiedenen Untersuchungsschritte werden Unterscheidungsmerkmale der Finanzierungsmodelle beleuchtet, darunter Art und Umfang der Finanzierung, rechtlicher Rahmen, Governance und soziale Einbettung sowie soziodemographische Merkmale, Motive und Ziele der Beteiligten

Peaked and low action solutions of NLS equations on graphs with terminal edges

We consider the nonlinear Schr\"odinger equation with focusing power-type nonlinearity on compact graphs with at least one terminal edge, i.e. an edge ending with a vertex of degree 1. On the one hand, we introduce the associated action functional and we provide a profile description of positive low action solutions at large frequencies, showing that they concentrate on one terminal edge, where they coincide with suitable rescaling of the unique solution to the corresponding problem on the real line. On the other hand, a Ljapunov-Schmidt reduction procedure is performed to construct one-peaked and multipeaked positive solutions with sufficiently large frequency, exploiting the presence of one or more terminal edges.Comment: 25 pages, 1 figur

Summer Universities for Women in Computer Science

A cross-university approach will be discussed that reflects moneducation, networking, and gender oriented organizational reforms in university programs. The concept was developed in Germany in 1997 as a national approach. Each year “Informatica Feminale” (www. Informatica-feminale.de) attracts more than 70 female lectures from universities, research, or industry to give courses on all topics of computer science oriented to the existing university curricula. Participants are female students as well as women interested in further education. The approach has won an European award for best practice. Since 2003 Austria provides a similar project called the “ditact-women’s IT summer studies” (www.ditact.ac.at). Another project will be located in New Zealand in 2005 as the “Computing Women Conference” (www/ cwc.org.nz)

Searching for novel carbonic anhydrase inhibitors: from virtual screening to the lab bench

Carbonic Anhydrases (CAs) are zinc metalloenzymes that catalyze the reversible hydration of carbon dioxide to bicarbonate both in prokaryotes and eukaryotes. In this context, Computer Aided Drug Design strategies have emerged as powerful tools in the modern drug discovery paradigm. In particular, using ligand- and pharmacophore-based virtual screening approaches, we identified novel chemical entities with original chemotypes, that showed an interesting and selective inhibitory activity in nanomolar/low micromolar range toward CA I and CAII, isoforms. Herein, we present the hit-to-lead optimization process for these prototypes

Not only a problem of fatigue and sleepiness: Changes in psychomotor performance in Italian nurses across 8-h rapidly rotating shifts

Although many studies have detailed the consequences of shift work in nurses concerning health, fatigue, sleepiness, or medical errors, no study has been carried out trying to disentangle the contribution of sleepiness and fatigue associated to shift work from the attentional performance. The aim of this pilot study is (A) to investigate the effects of an 8-h rapidly rotating shift on fatigue and sleepiness among staff nurses and (B) how these factors affect their psychomotor performance. Fourteen nurses were selected for a within-subject cross-sectional study according to this sequence of shifts: morning–afternoon–night, which were compared as function of tiredness, sleepiness, and performance at the Psychomotor Vigilance Task (PVT). Subsequently, a within-subject Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA) evaluated if the observed differences between shifts persist when the contribution of sleepiness is controlled. Our results clearly indicate that night shifts are associated with significant greater sleepiness and tiredness, and worsened performance at the PVT. As hypothesized, ANCOVA showed that these differences disappear when the contribution of sleepiness is controlled. Results point to a lower psychomotor performance in night compared to day shifts that depends on sleepiness. Hence, interventions to minimize the consequences of the night shift should consider a reduction of sleepiness