Youth media repertoires: age ranges, context factors and privacy management

The overall aim of the study is to trace the interaction between the composition of the media repertoire and the everyday world of adolescents, also looking at privacy management in the course of acquiring digital communication media as part of the media repertoire. In order to do justice to this complexity, young people were not considered as a uniform demographic group, but were divided into three stages. Through this differentiation, a recursive process is to be worked out that makes it possible to also include contextual influencing factors such as peer group, family environment etc. and to expand previous findings on the media repertoire of young people. As a result of this approach, a multi-stage development process was elaborated as well as the privacy management of digital communication media of young people

Klinische Studie über die Veränderung der Hautelastizität und Hautperfusion nach Gesichtsverjüngung mittels Erbium-Yag Laser

Der Wunsch nach einem jugendlichen Aussehen wächst in der Bevölkerung aufgrund der stetig längeren Lebenserwartung. Ein jugendliches Aussehen wird sehr durch ein straffes und ebenmäßiges Hautbild bestimmt. Aufgrund der Hautalterung im Gesicht wächst die Nachfrage nach minimal-invasiven hautverjüngenden Verfahren. So gerieten in den letzten Jahren ästhetische Behandlungen wie, Laserverfahren zunehmend in den Fokus. Bisher war nur wenig über die objektiven Auswirkungen, in Bezug auf die Mikrozirkulation oder Elastizität der Haut bekannt. In dieser Studie wurde Facial Skin Rejuvenation bei 32 Probanden mittels Er:YAG Laser durchgeführt. Die Veränderungen der Mikrozirkulation und Hautelastizität wurden objektiv bestimmt. Die Mikrozirkulation (Strömung, SO2, Geschwindigkeit und rHB) wurde vor und direkt nach der Laserbehandlung anhand eines O2C bestimmt. Die Hautelastizität wurde mittels eines Cutometers (Uf, Ua, Ur und Ue) vor, direkt nach der Behandlung sowie eine Woche, einen, drei und sechs Monate nach Behandlung bestimmt. Des weiteren wurde die Probandenzufriedenheit sechs Monate nach der Behandlung bestimmt. 20 Probanden der anfänglichen 32 konnten die Nachsorgephase von sechs Monaten beenden. Die Mikrozirkulation zeigte bei allen Probanden statistisch signifikante Veränderungen nach Laserbehandlung in den oberflächlichen Gewebeschichten. Der biomechanische Hauptparameter für die Festigkeit der Haut zeigte einen statistisch signifikanten Anstieg im Bereich der oberflächlichen Gewebeschichten. Der signifikante Anstieg der Elastizitätsparameter nach einer Er:YAG Laserbehandlung zeigt einen objektiven Hautverjüngenden Effekt. Somit konnte die Tauglichkeit von Ablationslasern zur Hautverjüngung in einer Follow-up Studie über sechs Monate bestätigt werden

To be, or not to be ‘urban’? A multi-modal method for the differentiated measurement of the degree of urbanization

Today, 56.6% of the world’s population is urban and the trend is rising; in Germany, the urbanization process is almost complete at 80.3%. This is the ubiquitously used narrative. Surprisingly, the figures behind it are rarely questioned. The spatial statistics responsible for this meta-narrative are, however, prone to ambiguity. They suffer from a lack of systematic empirical justification, and from cross-national differences in cut-off values used to differentiate between urban and rural populations. In this study, we present an empirical approach that allows to systematically map urban and rural populations in a spatially and thematically differentiated manner using a multimodal method. On the one hand, we resort to the common approach of presenting the degree of urbanization in terms of population figures for administrative units. However, we do not only use the common national threshold value, but we project various national thresholds applied in different countries across the globe to classify multiple degrees of urbanization onto our study site Germany. On the other hand, we also calculate various degrees of urbanization at a higher spatial resolution using a regular grid. Beyond the common approach of calculating the degree of urbanization by population figures, we also apply at grid-level two additional variables: building density and the share of a certain building type. By systematically applying thresholds between minimum and maximum per variable, we trace the effects on the resulting degree of urbanization. These multiple perspectives lead us to propose that a range rather than a singular threshold allows us to estimate the degree of urbanization in a more differentiated way. To do so, we estimate the degree of urbanization for Germany on a probability-based basis. Therefore, we combine possible variants from the administrative approach using population figures and the grid-based approach using thresholds of population, building density and the share of a certain building type. Our results show that Germany can be considered urban by at least 50.0% up to possibly 68.1% of the population, which by no means comes near the reported 80.3%. We conclude that the results of the commonly used approach to quantify urban populations are not tenable in their clarity and should therefore be used only with caution. cacaution for political and societal decision-makin

Transposable element islands facilitate adaptation to novel environments in an invasive species

Peer reviewe

Renal allograft rejection, lymphocyte infiltration, and de novo donor-specific antibodies in a novel model of non-adherence to immunosuppressive therapy

Abstract Background Non-adherence has been associated with reduced graft survival. The aim of this study was to investigate the immunological mechanisms underlying chronic renal allograft rejection using a model of non-adherence to immunosuppressive therapy. We used a MHC (major histocompatibility complex) -mismatched rat model of renal transplantation (Brown Norway to Lewis), in which rats received daily oral cyclosporine A. In analogy to non-adherence to therapy, one group received cyclosporine A on alternating days only. Rejection was histologically graded according to the Banff classification. We quantified fibrosis by trichrome staining and intra-graft infiltration of T cells, B cells, and monocytes/macrophages by immunohistochemistry. The distribution of B lymphocytes was assessed using immunofluorescence microscopy. Intra-graft chemokine, chemokine receptor, BAFF (B cell activating factor belonging to the TNF family), and immunoglobulin G transcription levels were analysed by RT-PCR. Finally, we evaluated donor-specific antibodies (DSA) and complement-dependent cytotoxicity using flow cytometry. Results After 28 days, cellular rejection occurred during non-adherence in 5/6 animals, mixed with humoral rejection in 3/6 animals. After non-adherence, the number of T lymphocytes were elevated compared to daily immunosuppression. Monocyte numbers declined over time. Accordingly, lymphocyte chemokine transcription was significantly increased in the graft, as was the transcription of BAFF, BAFF receptor, and Immunoglobulin G. Donor specific antibodies were elevated in non-adherence, but did not induce complement-dependent cytotoxicity. Conclusion Cellular and humoral rejection, lymphocyte infiltration, and de novo DSA are induced in this model of non-adherence

Additional file 2: of Renal allograft rejection, lymphocyte infiltration, and de novo donor-specific antibodies in a novel model of non-adherence to immunosuppressive therapy

anti-CD20, anti-CD3, and anti-CD68 immunofluorescence costaining of rat spleen follicle. (A) shows anti-CD20-positive B cells in the B cell zone of a splenic follicle (green), anti-CD3-positive T cells in T cell zone of splenic follicle (red), and CD68-positive macrophages (yellow) in the splenic red pulp, also shown in (B) without costaining. (PDF 588 kb

Additional file 3: of Renal allograft rejection, lymphocyte infiltration, and de novo donor-specific antibodies in a novel model of non-adherence to immunosuppressive therapy

anti-CD11b/c and anti-CD68 FACS costain of rat splenocytes. (A) shows unstained cells, (B) shows anti-CD11b/c-PE antibody only, and (C) shows anti-anti-CD11b/c-PE antibody and anti-CD68-APC antibody co-stain of rat splenocytes. (PDF 82 kb