Jeder Mensch ist ein Sterbender Mensch. Der Tod und Seine Offenbarung in Walter Benjamins ‚Erzähler

In seinem Essay „Der Erzähler“ beschreibt Walter Benjamin eine Figur von der Gesellschaft, die jetzt verloren sei. Für Benjamin hat die Modernität und ihre Entwicklungen das Bedürfnis des Erzählers zerstört, und nur in gelegentlichen kreativen Ereignissen ist der Geist des Erzählers sichtbar. Was genau hat die Modernität gemacht, um den Erzähler zu töten? Welche Qualitäten sind durch den Verlauf der Zeit verschollen? Zu diesen Fragen hat Benjamin eine merkwürdige und provokative Antwort in seiner Beschreibung des Erzählers: „Der Tod ist die Sanktion von allem, was der Erzähler berichten kann. Vom Tod hat er seine Autorität geliehen.“ Das, was die Modernität vergessen hat, was die Erzählung möglich und notwendig macht, ist einfach „der Tod.“ Ich versuche in meinem Aufsatz diesen Rätsel zu lösen: wie funktioniert der Tod in der Erzählung und in dem Erzählungsprozess? Durch diese Untersuchung will ich die Beziehung zwischen den Tod und die Modernität aufdecken und den Stellenwert dieser Beziehung auch außer dem Essay entdecken. Obwohl die Behauptung Benjamins nur eine bloße Eigenschaft des Erzählers zu sein scheint, wenn man die Bedeutung der Behauptung befragt, demaskieren sich weitere Verwicklungen. Es ist vielleicht offensichtlich, dass Benjamin nicht meinte, dass der Mensch tot sein muss, um ein Erzähler zu werden; ich behaupte, dass er sondern eine Abbildung vom Erzähler erschafft, in der jeder Mensch immer ein Bewusstsein und eine Bekanntheit der Mortalität hat. Im Nachgang Martin Heideggers Sein und Zeit zeichnet Benjamin etwas, was ähnlich wie „Sein-zum-Tod“ aussieht, aber in Benjamins Essay wird es klar, dass dieser wesentliche Teil des Menschen von der Modernität unterdrückt worden ist. Benjamins Essay ist nicht nur eine Beschreibung des Erzählers, sondern auch eine Darstellung davon, wie ein moderner Mensch seinen Tod vergisst

Characterisation of the autoinmune antibody repertoire of Parkinson's disease patients by systematic screening of protein arrays

Comunicaciones a congreso

The Metallography of Aluminum Casting Alloys

The purpose of this thesis is to supply the Montana School of Mines with an up to date source of information concerning the metallography of aluminum casting alloys. This thesis is designed as a continuing project. Ultimately, it is hoped that a catalog containing all the typical structures of aluminum casting alloys will develop

Characteristics and efficacy of physical activity interventions to improve cardiometabolic and psychosocial outcomes in people living with HIV in sub-Saharan Africa: a protocol for a systematic review

BACKGROUND: Antiretroviral therapy (ART) has led to an increased lifespan for people living with HIV (PWH). This increased lifespan, coupled with the effects of HIV and adverse effects of ART have resulted in an increasing burden of cardiometabolic disease (CMD) among PWH. Physical activity (PA) has been proposed as an effective strategy to reduce the risk of developing cardiometabolic disease and other health complications in PWH. The aim of this paper is to review the characteristics and efficacy of PA interventions to improve cardiometabolic and psychosocial outcomes among PWH in sub-Saharan Africa. METHODS: The review will follow the preferred reporting items for systematic review and meta-analysis protocols (PRISMA-P). Literature searches will be conducted in PubMed, Web of Science (WoS), African Index Medicus, Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL), and Embase. Peer-reviewed publications will be included if they include adults (age 18 or older), PWH in sub-Saharan Africa, and a PA intervention to improve cardiometabolic outcomes and/or psychosocial outcomes. We will include randomized controlled trials and quasi-experimental study designs. Two independent reviewers will screen all abstracts and full-text articles. The study methodological quality (or bias) will be appraised using the Revised tool to assess risk of bias in randomized trials and the Downs and Black checklist. Certainty of evidence will be evaluated using the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation guidelines. Meta-analyses will be conducted if our results are adequate for meta-analysis. Outcomes will be analyzed as continuous or dichotomous and meta-analyses will be conducted using random effects models with Stata computer software. DISCUSSION: This review will identify and synthesize the current evidence regarding the characteristics and efficacy of PA interventions to improve cardiometabolic and psychosocial outcomes among PWH in sub-Saharan Africa. We also plan to identify the strengths and weaknesses of evaluated interventions. Based on the evidence, recommendations will be made to promote the design and further evaluate the most promising strategies to maximize the efficacy of PA interventions in improving cardiometabolic and psychosocial outcomes in PWH in sub-Saharan Africa. SYSTEMATIC REVIEW REGISTRATION: PROSPERO registration ID: CRD42021271937

Neural origins of human sickness in interoceptive responses to inflammation

BACKGROUND: Inflammation is associated with psychological, emotional, and behavioral disturbance, known as sickness behavior. Inflammatory cytokines are implicated in coordinating this central motivational reorientation accompanying peripheral immunologic responses to pathogens. Studies in rodents suggest an afferent interoceptive neural mechanism, although comparable data in humans are lacking. METHODS: In a double-blind, randomized crossover study, 16 healthy male volunteers received typhoid vaccination or saline (placebo) injection in two experimental sessions. Profile of Mood State questionnaires were completed at baseline and at 2 and 3 hours. Two hours after injection, participants performed a high-demand color word Stroop task during functional magnetic resonance imaging. Blood samples were performed at baseline and immediately after scanning. RESULTS: Typhoid but not placebo injection produced a robust inflammatory response indexed by increased circulating interleukin-6 accompanied by a significant increase in fatigue, confusion, and impaired concentration at 3 hours. Performance of the Stroop task under inflammation activated brain regions encoding representations of internal bodily state. Spatial and temporal characteristics of this response are consistent with interoceptive information flow via afferent autonomic fibers. During performance of this task, activity within interoceptive brain regions also predicted individual differences in inflammation-associated but not placebo-associated fatigue and confusion. Maintenance of cognitive performance, despite inflammation-associated fatigue, led to recruitment of additional prefrontal cortical regions. CONCLUSIONS: These findings suggest that peripheral infection selectively influences central nervous system function to generate core symptoms of sickness and reorient basic motivational states. PMID:19409533[PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE] PMCID: PMC2885492Free PMC Articl

FragIdent – Automatic identification and characterisation of cDNA-fragments

BACKGROUND: Many genetic studies and functional assays are based on cDNA fragments. After the generation of cDNA fragments from an mRNA sample, their content is at first unknown and must be assigned by sequencing reactions or hybridisation experiments. Even in characterised libraries, a considerable number of clones are wrongly annotated. Furthermore, mix-ups can happen in the laboratory. It is therefore essential to the relevance of experimental results to confirm or determine the identity of the employed cDNA fragments. However, the manual approach for the characterisation of these fragments using BLAST web interfaces is not suited for larger number of sequences and so far, no user-friendly software is publicly available. RESULTS: Here we present the development of FragIdent, an application for the automatic identification of open reading frames (ORFs) within cDNA-fragments. The software performs BLAST analyses to identify the genes represented by the sequences and suggests primers to complete the sequencing of the whole insert. Gene-specific information as well as the protein domains encoded by the cDNA fragment are retrieved from Internet-based databases and included in the output. The application features an intuitive graphical interface and is designed for researchers without any bioinformatics skills. It is suited for projects comprising up to several hundred different clones. CONCLUSION: We used FragIdent to identify 84 cDNA clones from a yeast two-hybrid experiment. Furthermore, we identified 131 protein domains within our analysed clones. The source code is freely available from our homepage at

BMI and All-Cause Mortality in a Population-Based Cohort in Rural South Africa

OBJECTIVE: This study evaluates the association between BMI and all-cause and cause-specific mortality in South Africa. METHODS: Prospective, population-based observational cohort data from rural South Africa were analyzed. BMI was measured in 2010. Demographic characteristics were recorded and deaths were verified with verbal autopsy interview. The InterVA-5 tool was used to assign causes of death. HIV testing was conducted annually. Cox proportional hazards models were fit to estimate the effect of BMI on all-cause and cause-specific mortality, accounting for the competing risk of death from other causes. Models were adjusted for sociodemographic characteristics and HIV status, and inverse probability weighting for survey nonparticipation was used. RESULTS: The cohort consisted of 9,728 individuals. In adjusted models, those with BMI of 25.0 to 29.9 kg/m2 or 30.0 to 34.9 kg/m2 had a lower hazard of death (adjusted hazard ratio: 0.80; 95% CI: 0.69-0.92 and adjusted hazard ratio: 0.75; 95% CI: 0.60-0.93, respectively) compared with those with BMI of 18.5 to 24.9 kg/m^{2}. CONCLUSIONS: Individuals in South Africa who meet clinically defined criteria for overweight or obesity had a lower risk of all-cause mortality than those with a normal BMI. These findings were stronger for women and communicable conditions