Gender-related traits as predictors of alcohol use in male German and Spanish university students

This study examined instrumental (masculine stereotyped) and expressive (feminine stereotyped) personality traits and alcohol use among men from Germany and Spain. Participants were 161 male university students (76 German, M-age=23 years; 77 Spanish, M-age=22 years), who completed either a daytime or a nighttime drinking questionnaire, each including a Short Form of the Bem Sex Role Inventory. Poisson regression analyses with latent predictors were conducted. The trait factors and their interactions with nationality predicted daytime and nighttime alcohol use. The results add support to the assumption that alcohol use is associated with the construction of masculinity and that internalization of traditionally female attributes protects against health-risk behaviors such as alcohol consumption

Characterization of site-specific vegetation activity in Alaskan wet and dry tundra as related to climate and soil state

We present discrete (2-h resolution) multi-year (2008–2017) in situ measurements of seasonal vegetation growth and soil biophysical properties from two sites on Alaska\u27s North Slope, USA, representing dry and wet sedge tundra. We examine measurements of vertical active soil layer temperature and soil moisture profiles (freeze/thaw status), woody shrub vegetation physiological activity, and meteorological site data to assess interrelationships within (and between) these two study sites. Vegetation phenophases (cold de-hardening start, physiological function start, stem growth start, stem growth end, physiological function end, cold hardening completion) were found to have greater interannual day of year (DOY) occurrence variability at the dry site compared with the wet site. At the dry site, vegetation activity begins on average ~7 days earlier and ends ~11 days earlier. The mean active stem growth window lasts ~54 days for the dry site and ~51 days for the wet site. Vegetation, in both tundra environments, began cold de-hardening functions (warm season prep) prior to atmospheric temperatures warming above 0°C. Similar results were found related to the critical soil freeze/thaw/transition dates; the dry site had a DOY phenophase occurrence range that was 8 days larger than that of the wet site. A longer continuous summer thaw period was captured at the wet site by ~26 days throughout the active layer. In addition, the dry site was measured to have longer spring and fall soil isothermal conditions than the wet site by ~9 and 5 days throughout the active layer. These results show that the dry site\u27s willow shrub vegetation physiology and soil condition phenology is more variable than the wet site. Alongside the in situ data, a remote sensing product from NASA\u27s MEaSUREs program was utilized; our research indicates that the AMSR-derived satellite product is more precise over the wet tundra site with critical date alignment between remote sensing observations and in situ measurements ranging from ~4 to 11 days. Furthermore, the AMSR product was shown to preemptively estimate land surface condition change during the spring transition for both tundra types while lagging during the fall transition and freeze-up periods

Gender Mainstreaming: ein neues Tätigkeitsfeld für Sozialwissenschaftler/innen?

Die Verfasserinnen geben einen Einblick in den Stand der Umsetzung von Gender Mainstreaming vor allem auf Bundes- und Kommunalebene. Es wird gezeigt, was Gender Mainstreaming ist, worin sich dieses Konzept von älteren Ansätzen der Frauenförderungs- und Gleichstellungspolitik unterscheidet und welche veränderten Anforderungen es an staatliches Handeln und Verwaltungshandeln stellt. Ob die Nachfrage nach Gender-Experten, die sich im Zuge der Implementation von Gender Mainstreaming entwickelt, ein neues berufliches Tätigkeitsfeld für SozialwissenschaftlerInnen erschließt, bleibt beim gegenwärtigen Stand der Umsetzung noch offen. Für die Entwicklung eines intermediären Beratungsmarktes ist der kontinuierliche Dialog zwischen Wissenschaft und Praxis eine wichtige Voraussetzung. (ICE2

Persönlichkeitsmodelle im Kontext der Kinder- und Jugendpsychiatrie – Entwicklung, Veränderung, Stabilität und Forschungsperspektiven

Persönlichkeitsmodelle spielen für das ätiologische Verständnis von abweichender Entwicklung im klinischen Alltag eine wichtige Rolle. In diesem Überblicksartikel werden relevante Persönlichkeitsmodelle vorgestellt und insbesondere hinsichtlich ihrer Entwicklungsdynamik und ihrer Bedeutung für die Adaptationsfähigkeit über die Lebensspanne, beginnend in der Kindheit näher beleuchtet. Im Fokus steht dabei die entwicklungspsychopathologische Bedeutung von Prozessen der Ich-Flexibilität und Selbstregulationsfähigkeit im Spannungsfeld zwischen Disposition und sozialen Umgebungsbedingungen. Dies zeigt sich gerade in der Diskussion von Entwicklungspfadmodellen zu Persönlichkeitsfehlentwicklungen mit Misshandlungserleben bzw. Bindungsdesorganisation in der kindlichen Vorgeschichte. Psychopathologisch ergeben sich aus einer persönlichkeitsimmanenten Beeinträchtigung der Selbststeuerungsfähigkeit häufig stabile Fehlanpassungsmuster, die bei rein symptomatischer Behandlung meist nur zu temporären Verhaltensmodifikationen führen. Hingegen spricht die Veränderbarkeit pathologischer Persönlichkeitszüge durch den Einsatz gezielter Interventionsansätze für eine positive Entwicklungsmöglichkeit und widerspricht einer deterministischen Merkmalsstabilität. Für künftige entwicklungspsychopathologische Forschungsperspektiven werden verschiedene theoretische Persönlichkeitskonstrukte mit klinischen Beobachtungen in Verbindung gebracht und diskutiert

In Vivo Identification of Novel Regulators and Conserved Pathways of Phagocytosis in A. gambiae

SummaryAnopheles gambiae uses effective immune responses, including phagocytosis, to fight microbial infection. We have developed a semiquantitative phagocytosis test and used it in conjunction with dsRNA gene silencing to test the in vivo roles of 71 candidate genes in phagocytosis of Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus. Here, we show that inactivation of 26 genes changes the phagocytic activity by more than 45% and that two pathways similar to those that mediate apoptotic cell removal in Caenorhabditis elegans are used in A. gambiae for phagocytosis of microorganisms. Simultaneous inactivation of the identified regulators of phagocytosis and conserved components defining each signaling pathway permitted provisional assignment of the novel regulators to one or the other pathway. Pathway inactivation enhances at least three times the ability of E. coli and S. aureus to proliferate in the mosquito. Interestingly, mosquito survival is not compromised even if both pathways are perturbed simultaneously

Clinical, biochemical, and genetic spectrum of seven patients with NFU1 deficiency

Disorders of the mitochondrial energy metabolism are clinically and genetically heterogeneous. An increasingly recognized subgroup is caused by defective mitochondrial iron-sulfur (Fe-S) cluster biosynthesis, with defects in 13 genes being linked to human disease to date. Mutations in three of them, NFU1, BOLA3, and IBA57, affect the assembly of mitochondrial [4Fe-4S] proteins leading to an impairment of diverse mitochondrial metabolic pathways and ATP production. Patients with defects in these three genes present with lactic acidosis, hyperglycinemia, and reduced activities of respiratory chain complexes I and II, the four lipoic acid-dependent 2-oxoacid dehydrogenases and the glycine cleavage system (GCS). To date, five different NFU1 pathogenic variants have been reported in 15 patients from 12 families. We report on seven new patients from five families carrying compound heterozygous or homozygous pathogenic NFU1 mutations identified by candidate gene screening and exome sequencing. Six out of eight different disease alleles were novel and functional studies were performed to support the pathogenicity of five of them. Characteristic clinical features included fatal infantile encephalopathy and pulmonary hypertension leading to death within the first 6 months of life in six out of seven patients. Laboratory investigations revealed combined defects of pyruvate dehydrogenase complex (five out of five) and respiratory chain complexes I and II+III (four out of five) in skeletal muscle and/or cultured skin fibroblasts as well as increased lactate (five out of six) and glycine concentration (seven out of seven). Our study contributes to a better definition of the phenotypic spectrum associated with NFU1 mutations and to the diagnostic workup of future patients