Actors, Institutions and Innovation Processes in New Path Creation : The Regional Emergence and Evolution of Wind Energy Technology in Germany

The recent literature of evolutionary economic geography points out that new technologies do not emerge randomly across space. The evolution of the economic landscape is associated with processes of path creation, regional branching and regional path dependence. However, the underlying processes and the role of the actors are under-investigated and poorly understood. This research gap is the starting point of this dissertation. The thesis focuses on the actors, mechanisms and processes of path creation and the co-evolution of technology and institutions. The overall aim of the dissertation is to provide theoretical foundation and empirical evidence to understand and explain the regional emergence and evolution of new technologies. The key question of the thesis is: Where, how, by whom and under which conditions do new technologies emerge. Based on research in evolutionary economic geography, institutional economic geography, and social and organizational science, a revised theoretical and conceptual framework is developed for analyzing and explaining the regional emergence and evolution of new technologies. The framework provides an actor-centered, dynamic perspective and goes beyond technological diversification and regional branching processes. Hence, the dissertation contributes to the current theoretical debate on path creation and the role of institutions and institutional change for the evolution of new technologies. The empirical analysis is based on an explanatory case study on the emergence and evolution of the onshore wind energy technology in Germany. A qualitative content analysis was employed. Data were collected by a document analysis and 40 in-depth interviews with relevant stakeholders. The findings show that besides energy and environmental policies at the national level, path creation was strongly influenced by the regional institutional environment. The findings also give qualitative insights into different types of actors and their motives and activities in an emerging technology. Concerning the mechanisms, the thesis identifies entrepreneurial activities and regional industry diversification as the key mechanisms in new regional path creation. These were later strengthened by various exogenous impulses. The relevance of the processes differs between regions. The thesis also reveals interrelations and feedback mechanisms between technological development and the institutional environment and finds that the co-evolution of supporting institutions like technical standards, the Electricity Feed-in Act and the Renewable Energy Sources Act was a key success factor for the evolution of wind energy technology. It was found that co-evolution was driven by actors who shaped and changed their institutional environment

Low motivation and unawareness in small farmers as an obstacle for implementation of the EU pig welfare rules

Using semi-structured interviews, Croatian pig farmers and institutional stakeholders were asked about their intentions to improve pig welfare, future perspectives, opinions and communication efforts on the EU pig welfare directives. While full-time family farmers (FFF) and employees at farm enterprises (EFE) expressed interest in improving pig welfare on their farms as a prerequisite for increasing competitiveness in the future, part-time family farmers (PFF) were not interested in pig welfare because they did not want to increase productivity and feared for their existence. Communication between institutional stakeholders and FFF with more than ten sows is best stablished, whereas communication with EFE is more via private consultants and communication with PFF is lacking. As Croatia is today counting over 85% farms as production units with up to 10 sows covering 75% of whole pig production, these results represent considerably important indicators of necessity to approach this population of farmers

Harmonization of welfare standards for the protection of pigs with the EU-rules: the case of Croatia

Three quarters of Croatian pigs are produced in small production units (1-5 sows) and on family farms with mixed farming activities. Only few farms have specialized production units with up-to-date technologies and comply with EU standards. The future competitiveness of Croatian pig production is therefore questionable unless production systems are changing. Modernisation will most probably result in the expansion and intensification of larger farms and the termination of a great number of small farms. The aim of this study was to investigate how the welfare of pigs on Croatian farms would be affected by modernisation. Seventeen Croatian pig farmers were interviewed to describe the different pig production systems, while the welfare of pigs was assessed using resource-based and animal-based welfare indicators. Three production systems were distinguished: part-time family farms (PFF), full-time family farms (FFF) and farm enterprises (FE). Resources-based welfare indicators were investigated in 17 pens located on seven PFF, 25 pens distributed across six FFF and seven pens were visited at two FE. Animal-based welfare indicators were assessed on 21 pigs at PFF, 90 pigs at FFF and 18 pigs at FE. The study demonstrated that different production systems have different welfare problems. Based on resource-based indicators pig welfare was better ensured on FE, but based on animal-based indicators there was no clear difference in welfare between the three production systems. Based on these findings is it unlikely that the modernisation of current production systems in Croatia will significantly improve pig welfare. From a welfare point of view, neither the enlargement nor the termination of pig farms can be supported. However, the number of farms involved in this study was too small to allow for generalisation. The case-study does, however, point at the importance of further studies into the specific welfare problems of each of the production-systems and their different solutions. These studies should be of larger scale in order to get a representative picture of pig welfare in Croatia, and its assurance within the process of modernisation

Linkages between Phosphorus and Plant Diversity in Central European Forest Ecosystems—Complementarity or Competition?

The phosphorus nutrition status of European forests has decreased significantly in recent decades. For a deeper understanding of complementarity and competition in terms of P acquisition in temperate forests, we have analyzed α-diversity, organic layer and mineral soil P, P nutrition status, and different concepts of P use efficiency (PUE) in Fagus sylvatica L. (European beech) and Picea abies (L.) H. Karst. (Norway spruce). Using a subset of the Second National Soil Survey in Germany, we correlated available data on P in the organic layer and soil with α-diversity indices for beech and spruce forests overall and for individual vegetation layers (tree, shrub, herb, and moss layers). Moreover, we investigated α-diversity feedbacks on P nutrition status and PUE of both tree species. The overall diversity of both forest ecosystems was largely positively related to P content in the organic layer and soil, but there were differences among the vegetation layers. Diversity in the tree layer of both forest ecosystems was negatively related to the organic layer and soil P. By contrast, shrub diversity showed no correlation to P, while herb layer diversity was negatively related to P in the organic layer but positively to P in soil. A higher tree layer diversity was slightly related to increased P recycling efficiency (PPlant/Porganic layer) in European beech and P uptake efficiency (PPlant/Psoil) in Norway spruce. The diversity in the herb layer was negatively related to P recycling and uptake efficiency in European beech and slightly related to P uptake efficiency in Norway spruce. In spruce forests, overall and herb species richness led to significantly improved tree nutrition status. Our results confirm significant, non-universal relationships between P and diversity in temperate forests with variations among forest ecosystems, vegetation layers, and P in the organic layer or soil. In particular, tree species diversity may enhance complementarity and hence also P nutrition of dominant forest trees through higher PUE, whereas moss and herb layers seemed to show competitive relationships among each other in nutrient cycling.DFG, 241127382, PhosForDiv - Phosphatverfügbarkeit als Einflussgröße der Pflanzen-Biodiversität in Waldökosysteme

Differential chemosensitivity to antifolate drugs between RAS and BRAF melanoma cells.

BACKGROUND: The importance of the genetic background of cancer cells for the individual susceptibility to cancer treatments is increasingly apparent. In melanoma, the existence of a BRAF mutation is a main predictor for successful BRAF-targeted therapy. However, despite initial successes with these therapies, patients relapse within a year and have to move on to other therapies. Moreover, patients harbouring a wild type BRAF gene (including 25% with NRAS mutations) still require alternative treatment such as chemotherapy. Multiple genetic parameters have been associated with response to chemotherapy, but despite their high frequency in melanoma nothing is known about the impact of BRAF or NRAS mutations on the response to chemotherapeutic agents. METHODS: Using cell proliferation and DNA methylation assays, FACS analysis and quantitative-RT-PCR we have characterised the response of a panel of NRAS and BRAF mutant melanoma cell lines to various chemotherapy drugs, amongst them dacarbazine (DTIC) and temozolomide (TMZ) and DNA synthesis inhibitors. RESULTS: Although both, DTIC and TMZ act as alkylating agents through the same intermediate, NRAS and BRAF mutant cells responded differentially only to DTIC. Further analysis revealed that the growth-inhibitory effects mediated by DTIC were rather due to interference with nucleotide salvaging, and that NRAS mutant melanoma cells exhibit higher activity of the nucleotide synthesis enzymes IMPDH and TK1. Importantly, the enhanced ability of RAS mutant cells to use nucleotide salvaging resulted in resistance to DHFR inhibitors. CONCLUSION: In summary, our data suggest that the genetic background in melanoma cells influences the response to inhibitors blocking de novo DNA synthesis, and that defining the RAS mutation status could be used to stratify patients for the use of antifolate drugs

Money for nothing and content for free? Willingness to pay for digital journalism

True to the motto “Money for nothing and content for free”, both up-to-date information and thoroughly researched reporting are principally used free of charge in their digital forms. Considering this, how can journalism be funded sustainably? This study focuses on users and investigates the reasons for their lack of willingness to pay for content, as well as what they do pay for, and why