Mentales Training - Für und Wider bei ästhetisch-kompositorischen Sportarten

Mentales Training hat sich im Sport als Ergänzung zu herkömmlichen Methoden für das Erlernen und Stabilisieren von Bewegungsfertigkeiten etabliert. Da es sich vorwiegend bei kognitiven Aufgaben günstig auf die Leistung auswirkt, ist davon auszugehen, dass sportliche Disziplinen mit hohem technischen Anforderungsniveau besonders davon profitieren. Dies würde für die ästhetisch-kompositorischen Sportarten Kunstturnen und Eiskunstlauf zutreffen. Da jedoch der Großteil der motorischen Fertigkeiten in beiden Sportarten zwischen dem sechsten Lebensjahr und der Pubertät erlernt wird, stellt sich die Frage nach der Anwendbarkeit Mentalen Trainings im Kindes- und Jugendalter.Mental training has developed to become a complement to traditional methods for learning and stabilising movement skills in sports. Having positive effects on performance principally on cognitive tasks, it is expected that mental training will be particularly beneficial in sports disciplines with high technical requirements. This would apply to the aesthetic-compositional disciplines of artistic gymnastics and figure skating. However, most of the movement skills in both disciplines are acquired between the 6th year of age and puberty, which gives rise to the question for the applicability of mental training during infancy and adolescence. Subsequently on a presentation on the subject matter of the used terms (mental training, visualization, imagery, mental imagery, mental rehearsal …), especially theories explaining the effectiveness of mental training are addressed in detail, presenting some basic concepts of the most various aspects of mental training. This summary of the current state of research is followed by a descriptive individual case study of a 15 years old figure skater (mental training of the double Axel) and a 7 years old artistic gymnast (mental training of the forward bow). This study examines the applicability of mental training for learning movements through the five-steps Eberspächer concept. The aim is to ensure the applicability of mental training during infancy with focussed propaedeutic visualization, an increased practical imagery as well as a more intensive co-operation between the coach and the athlete during all coaching sessions. The presentation shows, which problems occurred during coaching, how they were reacted to and which differences appear in dealing with this training method as compared to adolescent athletes. The study is based on the assumption that a different approach towards mental training results from the latter rather than from cognitive gestation, due to the short coaching period. The pros and cons of mental training during infancy are highlighted by means of practical coaching and the implementation of the findings in scripts of movements already mastered and are compared with the results of adolescent athletes in order to see if a suitable approach to mental training can be found for children. In spite of improved movements by both athletes, significant variations appear between the athletes during infancy and adolescence, showing that mental training can only be used to a very limited extent for learning movements during infancy

Henry James's The Ambassadors: "The Nuance of the Novel"

The word "nuance" means a slight or delicate variation in expression, feeling, opmion, or meaning. The Ambassadors by Henry James is a novel which contains an extraordinary range of subtle gradation in the use of language which can in turn lead the reader to some understanding of the "nuances of personality" in each of the characters. Thus this paper will attempt a preliminary explication of language as a revelation of personality in The Ambassadors. For the purposes of this paper the first book (chapters one, two, and three) will be discussed. The reason for such a concentration of effort is not difficult to understand in light of our experience with Henry James. The author is himself a 'concentrate' or as critics have previously stated, his writing is comparable to that of a piece of complex and tightly woven fabric. The closer one looks at the material, the more threads and shades of colour, what is here called nuance, one is likely to see. Therefore the discussion of even one book becomes a monumental undertaking. Another reason, aside from the difficulty of the prose structure, for using the first book as a basis for this paper is that the arrangement of the three chapters provides the organization for the rest of the entire novel. The first chapter is about the meeting between Strether and Maria Gostrey. The second records the encounter between Strether and Waymarsh, while the third describes how these two forces (Gostrey-Waymarsh) work upon Strether. In miniature we have a setting; a range of ideas, sensibilities, and language that will play on Strether as he undertakes his mission as ambassador

WF10 Stimulates NK Cell Cytotoxicity by Increasing LFA-1-Mediated Adhesion to Tumor Cells

The redox-active chlorite-based drug WF10 (Immunokine) was shown to have modulatory effects on both the innate and adaptive immune system in vitro and in vivo. Animal studies suggest that WF10 enhances immunity against tumors. One possible explanation for such an effect is that WF10 stimulates natural killer cell cytotoxicity against malignant cells. Here, we show that WF10 regulates human NK cell cytotoxicity in a time-dependent manner, following an S-shaped kinetic with an initial stimulation of activity followed by a decrease in activity relative to the untreated controls. WF10 does not activate NK cells on its own but co-stimulates NK cell activation mediated by different activating receptors. This is mediated by enhancing NK cell adhesion to target cells through promoting the activation of the integrin LFA-1. These data demonstrate a direct effect of WF10 on the cytotoxicity of human NK cells

Ruptures, repairs, and reflections: contributions of Jeremy D. Safran

Jeremy D. Safran’s contributions to our understanding of the complexities of the therapeutic relationship, and its role in the process of patient change in psychotherapy, have been profound. In this paper, we briefly summarize the evolution of his thinking about the alliance and highlight how his ambivalence about this construct contributed to his seminal work delineating rupture resolution models, defined as negotiated intersubjective processes between patient and therapist that are the very essence of the therapeutic process for some patients. Responding to strains in the alliance throughout the rupture resolution process is critical and is an aspect of the treatment model that trainees find most challenging. A clinical example is included to illustrate how Jeremy’s attempts at metacommunicating about his experience with a frustrated patient initiated a productive shift in the process that also contributed to additional ruptures, requiring a simultaneous focus on the strained alliance

Metastasis of prostate cancer and melanoma cells in a preclinical in vivo mouse model is enhanced by L-plastin expression and phosphorylation

BACKGROUND: Tumor cell migration and metastasis require dynamic rearrangements of the actin cytoskeleton. Interestingly, the F-actin cross-linking and stabilizing protein L-plastin, originally described as a leukocyte specific protein, is aberrantly expressed in several non-hematopoietic malignant tumors. Therefore, it has been discussed as a tumor marker. However, systematic in vivo analyses of the functional relevance of L-plastin for tumor cell metastasis were so far lacking. METHODS: We investigated the relevance of L-plastin expression and phosphorylation by ectopical expression of L-plastin in human melanoma cells (MV3) and knock-down of endogenous L-plastin in prostate cancer (PC3M). The growth and metastatic potential of tumor cells expressing no L-plastin, phosphorylatable or non-phosphorylatable L-plastin was analyzed in a preclinical mouse model after subcutaneous and intracardial injection of the tumor cells. RESULTS: Knock-down of endogenous L-plastin in human prostate carcinoma cells led to reduced tumor cell growth and metastasis. Vice versa, and in line with these findings, ectopic expression of L-plastin in L-plastin negative melanoma cells significantly increased the number of metastases. Strikingly, the metastasis promoting effect of L-plastin was not observed if a non-phosphorylatable L-plastin mutant was expressed. CONCLUSIONS: Our data provide the first in vivo evidence that expression of L-plastin promotes tumor metastasis and, importantly, that this effect depends on an additionally required phosphorylation of L-plastin. In conclusion, these findings imply that for determining the importance of tumor-associated proteins like L-plastin a characterization of posttranslational modifications is indispensable

Mitochondrially-targeted APOBEC1 is a potent mtDNA mutator affecting mitochondrial function and organismal fitness in Drosophila

Abstract: Somatic mutations in the mitochondrial genome (mtDNA) have been linked to multiple disease conditions and to ageing itself. In Drosophila, knock-in of a proofreading deficient mtDNA polymerase (POLG) generates high levels of somatic point mutations and also small indels, but surprisingly limited impact on organismal longevity or fitness. Here we describe a new mtDNA mutator model based on a mitochondrially-targeted cytidine deaminase, APOBEC1. mito-APOBEC1 acts as a potent mutagen which exclusively induces C:G>T:A transitions with no indels or mtDNA depletion. In these flies, the presence of multiple non-synonymous substitutions, even at modest heteroplasmy, disrupts mitochondrial function and dramatically impacts organismal fitness. A detailed analysis of the mutation profile in the POLG and mito-APOBEC1 models reveals that mutation type (quality) rather than quantity is a critical factor in impacting organismal fitness. The specificity for transition mutations and the severe phenotypes make mito-APOBEC1 an excellent mtDNA mutator model for ageing research