Blumeria graiminis f. sp. hordei (powdery mildew) is an obligate biotroph infecting hordeum vulgare (barley). It is one of the most devastating pathogens of barley, decreasing barley yield in great extent. In order to decrease barley loss, numerous studies are being conducted for overcoming the disease from the sides of both pathogen and host. However the pathogen is evolving very rapidly preventing the effective use of pesticides such as fungisides or development of resistant barley varieties by crossing race-specific resistance varieties, varieties having R genes, with susceptible but high yield producing varieties. In order to understand the mechanism of pathogen-host interactions, and producing enduring solutions for the problem of yield loss in barley molecular tools need to be used. In this thesis study, Amplified Fragment Length Polymorphism (AFLP) molecular marker method is used in order to reveal the molecular characterization of Turkish Blumeria graminis f. sp. hordei varieties collected from &Ccedil / ukurova region in Turkey. Thirty-nine samples were analyzed with eigth universal races, of which virulence genes are studied. AFLP studies were conducted on LI-COR 4300 DNA Analyzer system. Bioinformatics analysis was performed with NTSYS program. By the help of this Numerical Taxonomic System, similarity, dissimilarity, clustering, dendograms, two-dimensional scatter plots, and three-dimensional perspective plots were obtained. By the light of these analyses Turkish Blumeria graminis f. sp. hordei varieties together with universal races are grouped into three clusteres. In conclusion, studying Turkish Blumeria graminis f. sp. hordei isolates and comparing them with universal races is a unique study in terms of characterizing the Turkish Bgh isolates for the first time, and can be used as a frontier study for studying Resistance genes, by reverse genetic tools.

Immune systems are fundamentally based on the differentiation of self and non-self. Unlike mammals, plants have an innate immune system responding to the pathogen only at the site of attack. One of these pathogens is Blumeria graminis f. sp. hordei which is an obligate biotrophic pathogen causing powdery mildew disease and resulting in up to 30% yield loss for both cultivated and wild barley. In this study, Pallas-01 (P-01) and Pallas-03 (P-03) barley lines were inoculated with powdery mildew race Bgh103 (64/01) resulting incompatible and compatible interactions, respectively. 6, 12, 24, 48 and 72 hour-post-inoculation (hpi) samples were used in order to define the differential gene expression of NAD malic enzyme, chloroplast lipocalin, phosphoglyceromutase (PGM), Mg chelatase and 26S protease regulatory subunit 6B homolog. In the proteomics study previously conducted in the laboratory, except for the NAD-dependent malic enzyme, the other four proteins were shown to be involved in the incompatible interaction of P-01 and Bgh103 at protein level, whereas NAD-dependent malic enzyme was changing in the compatible interaction. The expression level for both proteomics and transcriptomics were assumed to be similar. However, the level of transcript would not always reflect its protein level or correlate with the level of proteins, due to complex cellular regulation processes. Post-transcriptional modifications such as synthesis, processing, degradation and post-translational modifications are changing the level of proteins expressed, thus a parallel correlation between the protein and mRNA levels can be lost. Other possible reasons for this variation can be changes in mRNA and protein stability, efficiency of translation and protein&rsquo / s turnover rate. The transcription level changes of the genes investigated in this study are found to be differentially expressed, supporting the proteomics data indicating that these genes are possibly involved in resistance. For further investigations, genetic tools such as gene silencing with RNAi and knockout experiments are required in order to elucidate the mechanism of these candidate genes in the plant-pathogen interaction.

A bulk of empirical literature has emerged that explores the role of various location factors as determinants of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in Central and Eastern European Countries (CEECs). A notable feature of these studies is that their empirical approaches abstract from third-country (spatial) effects in FDI across the home and host country dimensions. Neglecting these effects could bias results concerning the role of location factors for attracting FDI. This in turn may lead to misguided economic policy conclusions. The current paper adds to the literature by applying the recently proposed spatial "origin-destinationow model" of LeSage and Pace (2008) to FDI ows from 7 Western OECD home countries to 8 CEE host countries. Controlling for country-pair and time effects our results indicate that (a) spatial interactions across the host country dimension matter for FDI revealing that vertical complex FDI ows dominate total FDI ows to CEECs; (b) spatial autocorrelation in the home country dimension is absent; (c) results of previous studies remain valid as coefficient estimates on location factors change only slightly when spatial interdependencies are considered and (d) effective corporate income taxes and the endowment with production-related material infrastruc- ture are statistically and economically signifficant determinants of FDI in CEECs. (author's abstract) / Series: Discussion Papers SFB International Tax Coordination

Cytochrome P4502E1 (CYP2E1), the ethanol-inducible isoform of cytochrome P450 superfamily, catalyzes many low molecular weight endogenous and exogenous compounds, including ethanol, acetone, drugs like acetaminophen and chlorzoxazone, and industrial solvents like benzene and styrene, most of which are carcinogenic. Besides, it has a high capacity to produce reactive oxygen species. CYP2E1 is induced by ethanol and isoniazid, as well by some pathophysiological conditions like diabetes and starvation. CYP2E1 gene shows genetic polymorphisms which are thought to play a major role in interindividual variability in drug response and in susceptibility to chemical-induced diseases, like several types of cancers. It is well established that CYP2E1 polymorphisms vary markedly in frequency among different ethnic and racial groups. Therefore, in this study, the frequency of two important CYP2E1 polymorphisms / the single nucleotide polymorphisms C-1019T / G-1259C in 5&rsquo / -flanking region and T7678A poymorphism in intron 6, in Turkish population was investigated. For this purpose, whole blood samples were collected from 132 healthy volunteers representing Turkish population and genomic DNA for each subject was isolated in intact form. The genotypes were determined by PCR amplification of corresponding regions followed by restriction endonuclease RsaI, PstI (for C-1019T / G-1259C SNPs) and DraI (for T7678A SNP) digestions. The genotype frequencies, for C-1019T / G-1259C SNPs, which are in complete linkage disequilibrium, were investigated on 116 DNA samples, and determined as 97.4% for homozygous wild type (c1/c1), 2.6% for heterozygotes (c1/c2) and 0.0% for homozygous mutants (c2c2). The allele frequency of wild type allele (c1) was calculated as 98.7% and that of mutated allele (c2) as 1.3%. The genotype frequencies for T7678A SNP, investigated in 108 DNA samples were determined as 80.6% for homozygous wild type (DD), 19.4% for heterozygotes (CD) and 0.0% for homozygous mutants (CC). The corresponding allele frequencies were 90.3% for wild type allele (D), and 9.7% for mutated allele (C). Genotype frequencies of both polymorphisms fit Hardy-Weinberg equation and showed no significant difference with respect to gender. The genotype distributions of both polymorphisms showed similarity when compared to other Caucasian populations like French, Swedish, German, and Italian populations, while both polymorphisms studied differed significantly from Chilean, Japanese, Taiwanese and Chinese populations, as compared with Chi-Square test.

In this study, a strategy called gene splicing by overlap extension, &ldquo / Gene SOEing&rdquo / , was used for the construction of the fusion proteins with the purpose of increasing the thermostability of mesophilic enzymes by incorporation of stability domain from a thermostable enzyme. Gene SOEing is a PCR-based approach for recombining DNA molecules at precise junctions irrespective of nucleotide sequences at the recombination site and without the use of restriction endonucleases or ligase. In fusion constructs, as the stability determinant Thermoplasma volcanium citrate synthase (CS) large domain has been used. This gene has recently been cloned in our laboratory. In two different fusions, as fusion partners, dehalogenase II (dehCII) gene of Pseudomonas sp. CBS3 and aminoglycoside-3&#039 / -phosphotransferase-II (APH(3&#039 / )-II) gene of E. coli were employed. Following the Gene SOEing, two fusion products, 1722 bp long CS Large Domain-dehCII and 1750 bp long CS Large Domain-APH(3&#039 / )-II were constructed. Also a 1586 bp long dehCII-APH(3&#039 / )-II fusion was prepared. Three fusion constructs were cloned in E. coli. Cloning was confirmed in each case, by restriction analysis of the isolated plasmids from recombinant colonies. APH(3&#039 / )-II gene associated with CS Large Domain-APH(3&#039 / )-II and dehCII-APH(3&#039 / )-II fusion constructs were successfully expressed in E. coli as revealed by enzyme assay and antibiotic agar plate assay. CS Large Domain-APH(3&#039 / )-II fusion protein retained 9.4% of the original APH(3&#039 / )-II activity after 10 minutes at 60&ordm / C. However, CS Large Domain-dehCII and dehCII-APH(3&#039 / )-II fusions did not display any dehalogenase activity.

In many applications nonsmooth nonconvex energy functions, which are Lipschitz continuous, appear quite naturally. Contact mechanics with friction is a classic example. A second example is the 1-Laplace operator and its eigenfunctions. In this work we will give an algorithm such that for every locally Lipschitz continuous function f and every sequence produced by this algorithm it holds that every accumulation point of the sequence is a critical point of f in the sense of Clarke. Here f is defined on a reflexive Banach space X, such that X and its dual space X' are strictly convex and Clarkson's inequalities hold. (E.g. Sobolev spaces and every closed subspace equipped with the Sobolev norm satisfy these assumptions for p>1.) This algorithm is designed primarily to solve variational problems or their high dimensional discretizations, but can be applied to a variety of locally Lipschitz functions. In elastic contact mechanics the strain energy is often smooth and nonconvex on a suitable domain, while the contact and the friction energy are nonsmooth and have a support on a subspace which has a substantially smaller dimension than the strain energy, since all points in the interior of the bodies only have effect on the strain energy. For such elastic contact problems we suggest a specialization of our algorithm, which treats the smooth part with Newton like methods. In the case that the gradient of the entire energy function is semismooth close to the minimizer, we can even prove superlinear convergence of this specialization of our algorithm. We test the algorithm and its specialization with a couple of benchmark problems. Moreover, we apply the algorithm to the 1-Laplace minimization problem restricted to finitely dimensional subspaces of piecewise affine, continuous functions. The algorithm developed here uses ideas of the bundle trust region method by Schramm, and a new generalization of the concept of gradients on a set. The basic idea behind this gradients on sets is that we want to find a stable descent direction, which is a descent direction on an entire neighborhood of an iteration point. This way we avoid oscillations of the gradients and very small descent steps (in the smooth and in the nonsmooth case). It turns out, that the norm smallest element of the gradient on a set provides a stable descent direction. The algorithm we present here is the first algorithm which can treat locally Lipschitz continuous functions in this generality, up to our knowledge. In particular, large finitely dimensional Banach spaces haven't been studied for nonsmooth nonconvex functions so far. We will show that the algorithm is very robust and often faster than common algorithms. Furthermore, we will see that with this algorithm it is possible to compute reliably the first eigenfunctions of the 1-Laplace operator up to disretization errors, for the first time. / In vielen Anwendungen tauchen nichtglatte, nichtkonvexe, Lipschitz-stetige Energie Funktionen in natuerlicher Weise auf. Ein klassische Beispiel bildet die Kontaktmechanik mit Reibung. Ein weiteres Beispiel ist der $1$-Laplace Operator und seine Eigenfunktionen. In dieser Dissertation werden wir ein Abstiegsverfahren angeben, so dass fuer jede lokal Lipschitz-stetige Funktion f jeder Haeufungspunkt einer durch dieses Verfahren erzeugten Folge ein kritischer Punkt von f im Sinne von Clarke ist. Hier ist f auf einem einem reflexiver, strikt konvexem Banachraum definierert, fuer den der Dualraum ebenfalls strikt konvex ist und die Clarkeson Ungleichungen gelten. (Z.B. Sobolevraeume und jeder abgeschlossene Unterraum mit der Sobolevnorm versehen, erfuellt diese Bedingung fuer p>1.) Dieser Algorithmus ist primaer entwickelt worden um Variationsprobleme, bzw. deren hochdimensionalen Diskretisierungen zu loesen. Er kann aber auch fuer eine Vielzahl anderer lokal Lipschitz stetige Funktionen eingesetzt werden. In der elastischen Kontaktmechanik ist die Spannungsenergie oft glatt und nichtkonvex auf einem geeignetem Definitionsbereich, waehrend der Kontakt und die Reibung durch nicht glatte Funktionen modelliert werden, deren Traeger ein Unterraum mit wesentlich kleineren Dimension ist, da alle Punkte im Inneren des Koerpers nur die Spannungsenergie beeinflussen. Fuer solche elastischen Kontaktprobleme schlagen wir eine Spezialisierung unseres Algorithmuses vor, der den glatten Teil mit Newton aehnlichen Methoden behandelt. Falls der Gradient der gesamten Energiefunktion semiglatt in der Naehe der Minimalstelle ist, koennen wir sogar beweisen, dass der Algorithmus superlinear konvergiert. Wir testen den Algorithmus und seine Spezialisierung an mehreren Benchmark Problemen. Ausserdem wenden wir den Algorithmus auf 1-Laplace Minimierungsproblem eingeschraenkt auf eine endlich dimensionalen Unterraum der stueckweise affinen, stetigen Funktionen an. Der hier entwickelte Algorithmus verwendet Ideen des Bundle-Trust-Region-Verfahrens von Schramm, und einen neu entwickelten Verallgemeinerung von Gradienten auf Mengen. Die zentrale Idee hinter den Gradienten auf Mengen ist die, dass wir stabile Abstiegsrichtungen auf einer ganzen Umgebung der Iterationspunkte finden wollen. Auf diese Weise vermeiden wir das Oszillieren der Gradienten und sehr kleine Abstiegsschritte (im glatten, wie im nichtglatten Fall.) Es stellt sich heraus, dass das normkleinste Element dieses Gradienten auf der Umgebung eine stabil Abstiegsrichtung bestimmt. So weit es uns bekannt ist, koennen die hier entwickelten Algorithmen zum ersten Mal lokal Lipschitz-stetige Funktionen in dieser Allgemeinheit behandeln. Insbesondere wurden nichtglatte, nichtkonvexe Funktionen auf derart hochdimensionale Banachraeume bis jetzt nicht behandelt. Wir werden zeigen, dass unser Algorithmus sehr robust und oft schneller als uebliche Algorithmen ist. Des Weiteren, werden wir sehen, dass es mit diesem Algorithmus das erste mal moeglich ist, zuverlaessig die erste Eigenfunktion des 1-Laplace Operators bis auf Diskretisierungsfehler zu bestimmen.

This article investigates the interrelations between the initial members of the Euro area and five important Central and Eastern European economies. We set up a theoretical open economy model to derive the Purchasing Power Parity, the Interest Rate Parity, the Fisher Inflation Parity, and an output gap relation. After taking convergence into account, they are used as restrictions on the cointegration space of a structural vector error correction model. We then employ generalized impulse response analysis to assess the dynamic effects of shocks in output and interest rates on the respective other area as well as the implications of shocks in the exchange rate and in relative prices on both areas. The results show a high degree of interconnectedness between the two economies. There are strong positive spillovers in output to the respective other region with the magnitude of the impact being similarly strong in both areas. Furthermore, we find a multiplier effect being present in Eastern Europe and some evidence for the European Central Banks' desire towards price stability. (author's abstract) / Series: Department of Economics Working Paper Series

The history of western monasticism in the early middle ages has traditionally been viewed as a continuous process of development. Women religious have been excluded from this discourse, although early work which ‘rediscovered’ female communities has been built on to place them in the mainstream of thinking about monasticism. However, one way of approaching religious women has been largely overlooked. The production and circulation of normative works by and for female communities is of prime importance for evidence of interaction between male and female traditions of dedicated life. This thesis examines these issues through the works of Caesarius of Arles (470-542). Although his rule’s importance as the first western regula written specifically for women has long been recognised, the subsequent use of his monastic writings has never been adequately explored. In addition to being the inspiration for a number of later rules, his work was given a new purpose as part of the reforming activities of Benedict of Aniane in the opening decades of the ninth century. It is between these two vitally important figures that my thesis is framed. For the first time, this study shows that a core selection of Caesarian writings circulated between their composition in the early sixth century and the dates of the earliest existing manuscripts in the early ninth. This has unexplored implications for the understanding of the literary basis of dedicated life for both sexes. The thesis has significance for the study of female religious communities in two areas. Firstly, the relative popularity of Caesarius’ texts over time is of great interest as an indicator of values placed on different aspects of his work. The second area of investigation is the apparent fluidity of the texts’ gender, and how, in brief, texts written for women could be used equally effectively for men. This research opens up a new way of thinking about the relationship between female and male dedicated life. It is no longer possible to conceive of religious dedication along strictly gendered lines.

Le Liber contra collatorem est un traité composé par Prosper d’Aquitaine en 432-433, qui réfute les positions d’un certain « conférencier », c’est-à-dire l’auteur des Conférences, Jean Cassien. C’est dans cette œuvre que Prosper, défenseur de saint Augustin et de sa doctrine de la grâce, a pu fournir la critique la plus complète des théories propagées par les adversaires provençaux de l’évêque d’Hippone, en s’appuyant exclusivement sur des extraits tirés de la Conl. XIII « Sur la protection de Dieu ».En abordant, dans une première partie, les aspects les plus importants de l’œuvre (finalité du traité, modus operandi, genre littéraire, pratiques polémiques, enjeux théologiques), la présente thèse cherche à défendre l’hypothèse qu’en composant son Liber, Prosper a voulu constituer un dossier à charge suffisamment argumenté pour obtenir de l’évêque de Rome une condamnation officielle de ce que l’on a nommé le « semipélagianisme » et, par là, la reconnaissance de l’autorité de la doctrine augustinienne en matière de grâce. La seconde partie consiste en l’étude de l’ensemble de la tradition manuscrite du traité et des témoignages médiévaux le concernant, qui permet de mettre en évidence une histoire du texte aussi riche que complexe, qui justifie pleinement l’établissement d’une nouvelle édition – la première qui soit critique – de nature à corriger un textus receptus, datant de 1711, qui ne laisse pas d’être par endroits problématique. Cette édition est assortie d’une traduction française et d’une annotation destinée à éclairer les passages les plus importants ou les moins facilement compréhensibles du texte. / The Liber contra collatorem is a treatise written in 432-433 by Prosper of Aquitaine, who refutes the positions taken by a certain “lecturer”, by which John Cassian is meant, author of the Conferences. As an advocate of Augustine and of his doctrine of grace, Prosper has provided in this work most fully his criticism of the theories expressed by the bishop of Hippo’s Southern-French opponents. In order to do this, Prosper built only on excerpts from Conference nr. 13, “On the protection of God”. The first part of this thesis addresses the principal aspects of the work: the purpose of the treatise, the modus operandi, the literary genre, polemical practices, and theological issues. In doing so, this thesis defends the hypothesis that Prosper wrote his treatise in order to assemble a sufficiently argued file to obtain an official condemnation by the bishop of Rome of what has been called “Semipelagianism” and thus the recognition of the authority of the Augustinian doctrine of grace. The second part presents a study of the manuscript tradition of the treatise and of its medieval testimonies, which allows unraveling a rich and complex textual history. Hence, a new edition is justified, the first critical one, correcting and replacing the textus receptus dating from 1711, which is problematic at various points. The edition here presented is provided with a French translation and annotated in order to cast light on the most important or les easily comprehensible passages of the text.

Diese Arbeit hat zum Ziel, marktunterstützende institutionelle Reformen im Transformationsprozess zu analysieren. Als Einstieg in die Thematik wird die Aufnahme mittel- und osteuropäischer Länder in die Europäische Union mit der zurückliegenden Süderweiterung der Europäischen Gemeinschaft verglichen. Die folgenden Kapitel befassen sich mit der Bedeutung weicher Budgetbeschränkungen in Transformationsökonomien. Zunächst werden anhand von Daten bulgarischer und rumänischer Unternehmen theoretische Erklärungsansätze für weiche Budgetbeschränkungen getestet. Im anschließenden Teil wird analysiert, ob Handelskredite einen Teil der normalen Geschäftspraxis darstellen oder ob Handelskredite starke Handelsverflechtungen zwischen Unternehmen unterstützen und damit die Wahrscheinlichkeit von weichen Budgetbeschränkungen erhöhen können. Im empirischen Teil werden Daten aus Ungarn und Rumänien verwendet, die aus Unternehmensbefragungen stammen. Im letzten Kapitel wird die Unternehmensebene verlassen und mit makroökonomischen Daten gearbeitet. Ziel ist es hier, den Einfluss institutioneller Reformen auf das Wirtschaftswachstum zu testen. / Main objective of this work is to analyse market-supporting institutional reforms in the transition process. In the first part of the dissertation, the upcoming enlargement of the European Union towards the east is compared with the earlier southern enlargement. Research in the following chapters is devoted to the problem of soft budget constraints in transition countries. Firstly, theories on the causes of soft budget constraints are empirically tested. Therefore a panel data set consisting of company account data for Bulgarian and Romanian firms is used. Secondly, firm-level survey data from Hungary and Romania is used to test whether trade credits are just part of normal business practice or whether trade credits are representing a systematic phenomenon supporting soft budget constraints of firms in transition. Thirdly, macroeconomic data is utilised to illustrate the impact of implementing institutional change on economic performance.