Mittels einer Untersuchung von standardisierten Praktiken (Stadtrundgängen und Stadtrundfahrten) und Dispositiven (Stadtkarten, Reiseführer) fürs „Touren“ von Städten zeigt diese Dissertation, (1) wie die Stadt Berlin in ein virtuelles Objekt, nämlich, einen touristischen Zielort, transformiert wird, ( 2) wie diese Transformation nicht nur durch die Bewegung von Touristen im Raum und das Unterwegssein ermöglicht wird, sondern durch touristische Kommunikation über die Stadt, und (3) wie diese emergente touristische Stadt in einer multiplen und polykontexturalen städtischen Öffentlichkeit eingebettet ist, wo sie in verschiedenen Typen von Beziehung mit naheliegenden Inszenierungen der Stadt eintritt, wie die der Stadt-Marketing und der kollektiven Erinnerungspolitik. Drei weitere Aspekte sind zu erwähnen, die den gesamten Text subtil anregen. Die Dissertation stellt eine neue Theorie des Tourismus als Kommunikationsform, und nicht als Form des Reisens, auf; sie integriert die Luhmannsche Kommunikationstheorie mit der Akteur-Netzwerk-Theorie, und sie ist durchaus empirisch, basierend auf einer jahrlangen ethnographischen Untersuchung (2005-2006) von Praktiken und Dispositiven des „Tourens“ im zeitgenössischen Berlin. / Through the study of standardized practices (walking tours, bus-tours) and devices (maps, guidebooks) for touring cities, this dissertation shows (1) how the city of Berlin is transformed into a virtual object, namely, an urban destination, (2) how such transformation is enabled not simply by tourist movement in space and being away from ‚home‘, but by tourist communication on the city, and (3) how this emergent tourist city is embedded in a multiple and polycontextural urban public sphere, in which it enters into different types of relationship with neighbouring enactments of the city, such as those of city-marketing and collective memory. Subtly informing the whole text there are three aspects to be mentioned: the dissertation proposes a new theory of tourism as a form of communication, not of travel; it integrates Luhmann’s communication theory with actor-network theory; and it is throughout empirical, based on a year-long ethnographic study (2005-2006) of touring practices and devices in contemporary Berlin.

Das Zytokin Interleukin-7 (IL-7) ist für die Entstehung und das Überleben reifer T Zellen von zentraler Bedeutung. Die Gabe von IL-7 führt sowohl in der Maus als auch im Menschen zu erhöhten T Zellzahlen und einem veränderten T Zellphänotyp. Folglich könnte sich die therapeutische Gabe von IL-7 bei Patienten mit geschwächtem Immunsystem positiv auswirken. Diese Hypothese wird derzeit in mehreren klinischen Studien untersucht. Bisher wurde allerdings nur die Wirkung von IL-7 auf T-Zellen studiert. Zu dessen Wirkung auf andere Immun- oder Stromazellen sowie deren IL-7-abhängigen Beitrag zur Regulation der T-Zellhomöostase ist nur wenig bekannt. Daher war es Ziel der Arbeit, den Einfluss einer therapeutischen Gabe von IL-7 auf adoptiv-transferierte T-Zellen in IL-7-Rezeptor (IL-7R)-kompetenten und defizienten lymphopenischen Mäusen zu studieren. Die Untersuchungen bestätigen, dass die Gabe von IL-7 T-Zellantworten unterstützt, zeigen jedoch auch, daß viele dieser Effekte von IL-7R-exprimierenden Wirtszellen abhängig sind. Dies weist darauf hin, dass IL-7R-vermittelte Signale in Wirtszellen indirekt T-Zellantworten beeinflussen. Zudem zeigte sich, dass effiziente anti-Tumor-T Zellantworten von IL 7R-vermittelten Signalen in Wirtszellen abhängen. Vor allem nicht-hämatopoetische Wirtszellen fungieren hier als Regulatoren der IL-7-Therapie-vermittelten T Zelldifferenzierung. Unsere Ergebnisse bestätigen außerdem, dass Stromazellen in verschiedenen Organen il-7 exprimieren und zeigen darüber hinaus, dass diese Zellen durch die Gabe von IL-7 beeinflusst werden. Wir folgern daraus, dass die Effekte der IL-7-Therapie auf T Zellhomöostase teilweise indirekt über il-7-exprimierende Stromazellen vermittelt werden. Um diese Zellen genauer identifizieren und untersuchen zu können, haben wir ein neues transgenes Mausmodell charakterisiert, was es erleichtern wird, die beteiligten molekularen Signalwege zu analysieren und den Erfolg der adoptiven T Zelltherapie zu verbessern. / Interleukin-7 (IL-7) is an essential cytokine required for the development and maintenance of mature T cell. Its availability is limited under normal conditions, but rises during lymphopenia, leading to increased T cell proliferation. The administration of recombinant IL-7 to normal or lymphopenic mice and humans results in increased T cell numbers and altered T cell phenotype. Hence, IL-7 administration could mediate therapeutic benefits in immunocompromised patients and is currently tested in several clinical trials. However, besides its well-studied effects on T cells little is known about the effect of IL-7 on other immune and non-immune cells and their influence on T cell homeostasis. Therefore, we evaluated the effect of IL-7 therapy on adoptively transferred T cells in IL-7 receptor (IL-7R)-competent and IL-7R-deficient lymphopenic mice. We confirm the benefits of IL-7 therapy on T cell responses but additionally show that many of these effects are dependent on IL-7R expression by host cells, indicating that IL-7R signaling in host cells modulates T cell responses. We show that efficient T cell responses against cancer are dependent on host IL-7R signaling. Based on studies in bone-marrow chimeric mice, we identify non-hematopoietic host cells as main regulators of IL-7 therapy-modulated T cell differentiation. We conclude from these data that IL-7 therapy affects non-hematopoietic stromal cells that modulate the success of adoptive T cell therapy. Our results confirm that stromal cells in various organs express il-7 and show that these cells are targeted by IL-7 therapy in vivo. Hence, we propose that il-7-expressing cells regulate IL-7 therapy-modulated T cell homeostasis. To identify and study these il-7 expressing stromal cells in more detail, we characterized a new transgenic mouse model that will facilitate determining the molecular pathways to improve the success of adoptive T cell therapy.

Mammals have two orthologs, Mll and Trx2, for the Drososphila protein Trithorax (TRX), which is the founding member of the trithorax group (TrxG) of epigenetic regulators. TrxG proteins are characterized by an evolutionary conserved SET domain. A major function of all SET domain- containing proteins is to modulate gene activity, but the underlying mechanisms are poorly understood. Apparently TRX, Mll and Trx2 are histone H3 lysine 4 specific methyltransferases. So far all evidence points to roles in expression of specific target genes. However, target genes and function of the epigenetic regulator Trx2 were still unknown. Homozygous trx2 mutant embryos arrest in development because of severe and widespread defects {Glaser, 2005 #296}. Thus mouse embryonic stem (ES) cells carrying a null mutation of trx2 were used as an alternative model system to address the implication of Trx2 in differentiation. This study showed that Trx2 is redundant for ES cell self-renewal. Homozygous trx2 knockout ES cells did not exhibit cell cycle defects. However, loss of Trx2 resulted in reduced proliferation and increased apoptosis rates in trx2-/- ES cells. Due to the fact that differentiation requires an appropriate rate of population growth, trx2-/- cells were affected adversely upon in vitro differentiation. Neurogeneic differentiation of trx2 mutant cells generated fewer mature neurons than wild type cells. Moreover a temporal delay in the developmental progression to differentiation became apparent. Cardiac differentiation of trx2-/- cells confirmed the developmental defect and temporal delay. Notably differentiation of trx2-/- cells was merely delayed or impaired but it was not absent, implying that Trx2 is not required for gene expression programs specific for neurons or cardiac myocytes. We propose that differentiation of trx2-/- ES cells is impaired because apoptosis is disturbing differentiation. Apart from analyzing the phenotype of trx2 mutant cells, this work was focused on the identification of Trx2 target genes. Oligonucleotide expression arrays were used to identify genes whose expression levels were affected by the absence of Trx2. In general, loss of Trx2 function resulted in more genes with decreased than increased expression levels. This is consistent with the hypothesis that Trx2 functions as a transcriptional activator. Comparison of gene expression profiles for constitutive and conditional trx2 mutant cells enabled a distinction between direct and indirect target genes for Trx2. As a result Magoh2 was identified as the key candidate target gene for Trx2. Interaction between Trx2 and Magoh2 suggested a potential regulatory role for Trx2 in alternative splicing. Furthermore this work provided evidence that Trx2 could be involved in the maintenance of CpG island promoter gene expression, thus providing a potent regulatory mechanism for ubiquitously expressed genes.

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Over the last decade a huge amount of experimental data on biological systems has been generated by modern high-throughput methods. Aided by bioinformatics, the '-omics' (genomics, transcriptomics, proteomics, metabolomics and interactomics) have listed, quantif ed and analyzed molecular components and interactions on all levels of cellular regulation. However, a comprehensive framework, that does not only list, but links all those components, is still largely missing. The biology-based but highly interdisciplinary field of systems biology aims at such a holistic understanding of complex biological systems covering the length scales from molecules to whole organisms. Spanning the length scales, it has to integrate the data from very different fields and to bring together scientists from those fields. For linking experiments and theory, hypothesis-driven research is an indispensable concept, formulating a cycle of experiment, modeling, model predictions for new experiments and, fi nally, their experimental validation as the start of the new iteration. On the hierarchy of length scales certain unique entities can be identi fied. At the nanometer scale such functional entities are molecules and at the micrometer level these are the cells. Cells can be studied in vitro as independent individuals isolated from an organism, but their interplay and communication in vivo is crucial for tissue function. Control over such regulation mechanisms is therefore a main goal of medical research. The requirements for understanding cellular interplay also illustrate the interdisciplinarity of systems biology, because chemical, physical and biological knowledge is needed simultaneously. Following the notion of cells as the basic units of life, the focus of this thesis are mathematical multi-scale models of multi-cellular systems employing the concept of individual (or agent) based modeling (IBM). This concept accounts for the entity cell and their individuality in function and space. Motivated by experimental observations, cells are represented as elastic and adhesive spheres. Their interaction is given by a model for elastic homogeneous spheres, which has been established for analysis of the elastic response of cells, plus an adhesion term. Cell movement is modeled by an equation of motion for each cell which is based on the balance of interaction, friction and active forces on the respective cell. As a fi rst step the model was carefully examined with regard to the model assumptions, namely, spherical shape, homogeneous isotropic elastic body and apriori undirected movement. The model examination included simulations of cell sorting and compression of multicellular spheroids. Cell sorting could not be achieved with only short range adhesion. However, it sorting completed with long range interactions for small cell numbers, but failed for larger aggregates. Compression dynamics of multi-cellular spheroids was apparently reproduced qualitatively by the model. But in a more detailed survey neither the time scales nor the rounding after compression could be reproduced. Based on these results, the applications consistent with the assumed simpli cations are discussed. One already established application is colony growth in two-dimensional cell cultures. In order to model cell growth and division, a two-phase model of the cell cycle was established. In a growth phase the cell doubles its volume by stochastic increments, and in a mitotic phase it divides into two daughter cells of equal volume. Additionally, control of the cell cycle by contact inhibition is included in the model. After examination of its applicability, the presented model is used for simulations of in vitro growth of mesenchymal stem cells (MSC) and subsequent cartilage formation in multi-cellular spheroids. A main factor for both processes is the oxygen concentration. Experimental results have shown, that i) MSC grow much better in vitro at low than at high oxygen concentrations and ii) the MSC progeny harvested from low oxygen culture produce higher amounts of the cartilage components aggrecan and collagen II in multicellular spheroids than the ones from high oxygen culture. In order to model these processes, IBM was extended by a stochastic model for cellular differentiation. In this model cellular differentiation is captured phenomenologically by two additional individual properties, the degree of differentiation and the lineage or cell type, which are subject to fl uctuations, that are state and environment dependent. After fitting the model parameters to the experimental results on MSC growth in monoclonal expansion cultures at low and high oxygen concentrations, the resulting simulated cell populations were used for initialization of the simulations of cartilage formation in multi-cellular spheroids. The model nicely reproduced the experimental results on growth dynamics and the observed number of functional cells in the spheroids and suggests the following explanation for the difference between the two expansion cultures: due to the stronger pre-differentiation found after expansion in high oxygen, the plasticity of these cells is smaller and less cell adopt the chondrogenic phenotype and start to produce cartilage. Moreover, the model predicts an optimal oxygen concentration for cartilage formation independent of expansion culture and a de-differentiating effect of low oxygen culture within 24h. Because all simulations comply with the concept of hypothesis-driven research and follow closely the experimental protocols, they can easily be tested and are currently used for optimization of a bioreactor for cartilage production. Cell populations are composed of individual cells and regulation of population properties is performed by individual cell, but knowledge about individual cell fates is largely missing due to the problem of single cell tracking. The IBM modeling approach used for modeling MSC growth and differentiation generically includes information of each individual cell and is therefore perfectly suited for tackling this question. Based on the validated parameter set, the model was used to generate predictions on plasticity of single cells and related population dynamics. Single cell plasticity was quantifi ed by calculating transition times into stem cell and differentiated cell states at high and low oxygen concentrations. At low oxygen the results predict a frequent exchange between all subpopulations, while at high oxygen a quasi-deterministic differentiation is found. After quantifying the plasticity of single cells at low and high oxygen concentration, the plasticity of a cell population is addressed in a simulation closely following a regeneration experiment of populations of hematopoietic progenitor cells. In the simulation the regeneration of the distribution of differentiation states in the population is monitored after selection of subpopulations of stem cells and differentiated cells. Simulated regeneration occurs on the time scales estimated from the single cell transition times except the unexpectedly fast regeneration from differentiated cells in the high oxygen environment, which favors differentiation. The latter case emphasizes the importance of single outlier cells in such system, which in this case repopulate less differentiated states with their progeny. In general, cell proliferation and regeneration behavior are in uenced by biomechanical and geometrical properties of the environment e.g. matrix stiffness or cell density. Because in the model cells are represented as physical objects, a variation of friction is linked to cell motility. The cultures of less motile cells become denser at the same size and the effects of contact inhibition of growth more pronounced. This variation of friction coe fficients allows the comparison of cultures with varying degrees of contact inhibition regarding their differentiation structure and the results suggest, that stalled proliferation is su fficient to explain the well-known differentiation effects in confl uent colonies. In addition, the composition of the simulated stem cell pool was analyzed regarding differentiation. In contrast to the established pedigree models, where stem cell can only be produced by asymmetric division, this model predicts that most of the cells in stem cell states descend from progenitor cells of intermediate differentiation states. A more detailed analysis of single cell derived clones revealed properties that could not be described by the model so far. First, a differentiation gradient was observed in larger colonies, that was the opposite of the one predicted by the model. Second, the proliferative activity turned out to depend not only on oxygen, but also to be a property of individual clones persisting over many generations. Because the relation slow growth/pre-differentiation also holds for single cell derived clones, the general model of differentiation is extended by another heritable individual property. Motivated by the decline of proliferation and differentiation in culture and the high metabolic and epigenetic activity during cell division, each division event is assumed to de-stabilize stem cell states. Consequently, in the model the cells age in terms of cell divisions determines the fl uctuations in stem cell states and the environment the mean fl uctuation strength. Including this novel concept, that links aging to growth and differentiation dynamics, into the model reproduces the experimental results regarding differentiation gradient and persistent clonal heterogeneity. The spatial differentiation pattern can largely be explained by the spatio-temporal growth pattern of the mono-clonal cell assembly: cells close to the border of the cell assembly have undergone more cell divisions than those in the interior and therefore their stem cell states are less stable. Heterogeneity of single-cell derived clones depends on the age of the first cell in the clone. When the stem cell fluctuations equal the mean fl uctuations strength, the proliferative activity passes a maximum at a certain age due to the destabilization of stem cell states. Thereafter the proliferative activity decreases, because more time is spent in non-proliferative differentiated states. Considering the number of divisions the cells have already undergone in vivo and after the initial expansion in vitro, it can be assumed that all cells have already passed this maximum. Interestingly, the model also predicts an optimal age for directed differentiation, when cells stably differentiate, but have not lost the required plasticity. According to the model, this clonal heterogeneity may be caused purely in vitro, but hypothetical simulation of in vivo aging yielded results consistent with experiments on MSC from rats of varying age. Finally, the detailed molecular regulation mechanisms in a multi-scale tissue model of liver zonation was studied, in which the key molecular components were explicitly modeled. Hence, this model resolved the intracellular regulation in higher resolution than the above considered differentiation models which had summarized the intracellular control and differentiation mechanisms by a few phenomenological, dynamical variables. The metabolic zonation of the liver is essential for many of the complex liver functions. One of the vitally important enzymes, glutamine synthetase, (GS) is only synthesized in a strictly defi ned pattern. Experimental evidence has shown that a particular pathway, the canonical wnt pathway, controls expression of the gene for GS. A model for transport, receptor dynamics and intracellular regulation mechanism has been set up for modeling the spatio-temporal formation of this pattern. It includes membrane-bound transport of the morphogen and an enzyme kinetics approach to fibeta-catenin-regulation in the interior of the cell. As an IBM this model reproduces the results of co-culture experiments in which two-dimensional arrangements of liver cells and an epithelial liver cell line give rise to different patterns of GS synthesis. The two main predictions of the model are: First, GS-synthesis requires a certain local cell number of wnt releasing cells. And second, a simple inversion of geometry explains the difference between the specifi c GS pattern found in the liver and in the co-culture experiments. Summarizing the results presented in this thesis, it can be concluded that properties such as the occurrence of memory effects and single cells pursuing fates far off the population average could be essential for biological function. Considering the role of single cells in many tissues, the use of individual based methods, that are able to take such effects into account, can be expected to be a very valuable tool for the problems of systems biology.

Die vorliegende Untersuchung widmet sich der Frage, welche Bedeutung die räumliche Differenzierung des Haushaltsbildungsverhaltens für die Ergebnisse von kleinräumigen Haushaltsprognosen hat. Die Haushaltsgrößenstruktur veränderte sich in Deutschland seit ihrer erstmaligen flächendeckenden Erhebung beträchtlich. Diese Strukturveränderungen sind von anhaltenden Haushaltsverkleinerungen geprägt und vollziehen sich auf der Makro-, Meso- und Mikro-ebene in unterschiedlicher Intensität. Eine möglichst exakte Abbildung räumlich differenzierter Trends ist für kleinräumige Haushaltsprognosen ergebnisrelevant. Die Trends ergeben sich zum einen aus der kleinräumigen Bevölkerungsentwicklung und zum anderen aus den Veränderungen des Haushaltsbildungsverhaltens. Um die oben gestellte Frage zu beantworten, wurden zunächst die Veränderungen von Anzahl und Größenstruktur der Haushalte in Deutschland nach dem 2. Weltkrieg nach ihren räumlichen Ausprägungen - zunächst anhand der Literatur und frei zugänglichen Datenquellen - untersucht. Der Fokus der eigenen empirischen Untersuchungen lag auf dem Zeit-raum 1998 bis 2011. Als Hauptdatenquelle wurden Einzeldaten des Mikrozensus im Rahmen von Scientific-Use-Files und der kontrollierten Datenfernverarbeitung genutzt. Um die Bedeutung des Haushaltsbildungsverhaltens beurteilen zu können, musste es operationalisiert werden. Als Grundgerüst diente das Haushaltsvorstandsquotenverfahren, welches jedoch an die Erfordernisse der Untersuchung angepasst werden musste. Aufbauend auf der Operationalisierung wurde mithilfe eines selbst weiterentwickelten Standardisierungsverfahrens der Einfluss des Haushaltsbildungsverhaltens auf die Haushaltsentwicklung bestimmt. Um Aussagen für kleinräumige Entwicklungen treffen zu können, wurden im nächsten Schritt die räumlich und nach Altersgruppen differenzierten Haushaltsvorstands-quoten auf Gemeinden in Sachsen übertragen. Diese Vorgehensweise wird auch in kleinräumigen makroanalytischen Haushaltsprognosen angewendet. Die Berechnungen erfolgten für alle Gemeinden in fünf Varianten und darüber hinaus für ausgewählte Gemeinden des Dresdener Umlandes mit einer Variante auf Basis von kommunalen Daten der Haushaltegenerierung (HHGen). Die Bedeutung der räumlichen Differenzierung ließ sich schließlich durch den Vergleich der Varianten mit der Referenzvariante ohne räumliche Differenzierung sowie dem Vergleich zwischen den vier Varianten der räumlichen Differenzierung messen. Als am besten für die demographisch ausgerichtete Untersuchung geeignet, stellte sich die Definition der Haushaltsbezugsperson nach dem ältesten Haushaltsmitglied heraus. Die anhand des Lebenszykluskonzeptes und altersjahrspezifischer Ausprägungen gewählten acht bzw. sieben Altersgruppen erwiesen sich für räumliche Betrachtungen als günstig und wiesen nur geringe Unterschiede zu altersjahrspezifischen Berechnungen auf. Das Haushaltswachstum in Deutschland betrug im Betrachtungszeitraum 7,7 %. 3,0 % Haushaltswachstum lassen sich auf die Veränderung des Haushaltsbildungsverhaltens zurückführen. Altersstruktureffekte tragen zu einem Wachstum von 5,3 % bei, während dagegen die Veränderung der Bevölkerungszahl bei Ausschluss der anderen Einflussgrößen, zu einem Rückgang von 0,5 % geführt hätte. Die Veränderung des Haushaltsbildungsverhaltens hatte im Betrachtungszeitraum für die Haushaltsentwicklung zweifelsfrei eine hohe Relevanz. Der Einfluss des Haushaltsbildungsverhaltens war im Betrachtungszeitraum für ostdeutsche Bundesländer besonders hoch und in Sachsen mit 8,0 % am höchsten. In Westdeutschland unterschied sich der Einfluss des Haushaltsbildungsverhaltens auf Bundesländerebene deutlich. Darüber hinaus sind insbesondere Stadt-Land-Unterschiede feststellbar. Der Einfluss von stadtregionalen Einflüssen ist aufgrund fehlender Raumkategorien dagegen nicht nachweisbar. Die Erhebungsumstellung des Mikrozensus im Jahr 2005 hat Auswirkungen auf die berechneten Ergebnisse der Haushaltsstruktur und des Haushaltsbildungsverhaltens. Sondereffekte durch die gehäufte Einführung von Zweitwohnsitzsteuern und die sog. Hartz-IV-Reform lassen im Vergleich zu HHGen-Daten Dresdens den Schluss zu, dass es im Zeitraum der Erhebungsumstellung zu einer erhöhten Haushaltsverkleinerung gekommen ist und es sich somit nicht ausschließlich um einen reinen methodischen Effekt handelt. Zu Verzerrungen der regionalen und nach Gemeindetypen differenzierten Ergebnisse können insbesondere Gebietsreformen, Statuswechsel durch dynamische Prozesse sowie Konzeptumstellungen der Typisierungen führen. Am stärksten wirkten sich diese Veränderungen auf den Bevölkerungsmengeneffekt, weniger auf den Verhaltenseffekt aus. Auf Gemeindeebene ergab sich ebenso eine hohe Relevanz des Haushaltsbildungsverhaltens für die Haushaltsentwicklung. Im Maximum führte die räumliche Differenzierung zu einer Abweichung von neun Prozentpunkten im Vergleich zur Referenzvariante. Die Spannweite (R) zwischen den Varianten der räumlichen Differenzierungen ist in Mittelstädten und suburbanen Gemeinden besonders hoch. Für die untersuchten Mittelstädte ist ein Regionaleffekt verantwortlich, d. h. die regionale Differenzierung von Gemeindegrößenklassen führte zu einer Erhöhung der rechnerischen Haushaltsentwicklung. Aus den Ergebnissen lässt sich schlussfolgern, dass von den räumlichen Differenzierungen im Mikrozensus als Ausgangsbasis zunächst Gemeindegrößenklassen am besten geeignet sind. Diese sollten mindestens nach West- und Ostdeutschland unterschieden werden. Die Regionalisierung nach (zusammengefassten) Bundesländern oder zusammengefassten Raumordnungsregionen ist anzustreben, jedoch nur unter großer Sorgfalt umsetzbar, da sonst die Fallzahlen zu gering und der Stichprobenfehler zu hoch werden. Für kleinräumige Haushaltsprognosen ist das Risiko von Fehlprognosen durch die Unterlassung von räumlichen Differenzierungen weitaus höher ist als durch deren Berücksichtigung. Das räumliche Auswertungspotenzial des Mikrozensus ist sehr hoch. Es kann jedoch gegenwärtig nicht voll ausgeschöpft werden. Notwendig wären nachträgliche Gebietsstandsbereinigungen sowie die künftige und rückwirkende Aufnahme geeigneter räumlicher Differenzierungen, die den stadtregionalen Kontext explizit berücksichtigen. / The present study addresses the question of the significance of spatial differentiation of household formation behaviour for the results of small-scale household projections. The structure of household sizes in Germany changed significantly since its first nationwide survey. These structural changes are marked by the permanent trend of household size diminishment and take place in varying degrees on macro, meso and micro level. Representing spatially differentiated trends as exactly as possible is of high relevance for the results of small-scale projections of households. These trends result in part from small-scale population development and, secondly, from the changes in household formation behaviour. To answer the question above, the changes in number and size structure of households in Germany after World War II were examined according to their spatial characteristics – as a start in literature and openly accessible data sources. The focus of this thesis’ empirical studies lies on period from 1998 to 2011. The main data source was micro data acquired in the micro-census. These data were used in the context of Scientific Use Files and controlled remote data processing. The assessment of the importance of household formation behaviour requires its operationalization. As backbone the head of household ratio method was used, which, however, had to be adapted to the requirements of the investigation. Based on the operationalization a standardization method developed further in the context of this study was used to determine the influence of household formation behaviour on house-hold development. To be able to draw conclusions for small-scale developments, in a next step head of household ratios differentiated spatially and by age group were applied on municipalities in Saxony – analogous to the approach used in small-scale macro-analytical household projections. The calculations were made for all municipalities for five variants. Furthermore, an additional variant based on local data of household generation (HHGen) was calculated for selected municipalities surrounding Dresden. The importance of spatial differentiation was measured by comparing the variants with a reference calculation without spatial differentiation as well as by comparing between the four variants with spatial differentiation. The definition of the eldest household member as household head proved to be most suitable for demographic studies. Seven respectively eight age groups based on life cycle concept were found to be suitable for spatial considerations and showed only minor differences to year-of-age specific calculations. The number of households increased by 7.7% in the analysis period. 3.0% can be attributed to the change in household formation behaviour. Age structure effects contribute to a growth of 5.3%, whereas the change in population - excluding other influences - would have led to a decline in household numbers of 0.5%. The change in household formation behaviour was doubtless of high relevance in the analysis period. The influence of household formation behaviour in the analysis period was particularly high for East Germany, with the maximum in Saxony (8.0%). In West Germany, the influence of household formation behaviour differed significantly for the different federal states (Länder). Moreover, especially urbanrural differences are noticeable. Urban-suburban interrelations are, however, undetectable due to lack of spatial categories. The change in survey methods for the micro-census in 2005 affects the results of household structure and the calculated household formation behaviour. Compared to HHGen data of Dresden, special effects by the frequent introduction of taxes on secondary residences and the socalled “Hartz IV reform” lead to the conclusion, that an increased household size reduction has taken place in the period of change in survey methods. Consequently, this is not merely a methodological effect. Reforms of regional structures, changes in status caused by dynamic processes as well as changes in concepts of typification may lead to biased regionally differentiated and municipal results. The highest impact of these changes was discovered on population quantity effect, less on the behaviour effect. At municipal level, household formation behaviour showed a high relevance for household development. Spatial differentiation led to a maximal deviation of nine percentage points compared to the reference calculation. The range between the variants of spatial differentiation is particularly high in medium-sized towns and suburban municipalities. For the medium-sized towns this is due to a regional effect: the regional differentiation of municipality size classes led to an increase in the determined household development. The results lead to the conclusion that, choosing from the spatial differentiation possibilities in the micro-census, differentiation on municipality level is most suited as a basis. These should be differentiated at least into West and East Germany. Regionalization to (combined) federal states (Länder) or combined spatial planning regions (Raumordnungsregionen) is desirable. However, it can be implemented only with great care, as there are only a limited number of cases and the sampling error would be too high. For small-scale household projections the risk of incorrect predictions by the omission of spatial differentiation is is much higher than by taking them into account. The potential of spatial analysis of the micro-census is very high, but cannot be exploited to the fullest at the time being. Subsequent territorial adjustments would be necessary, as well as future and retroactive inclusion of appropriate spatial differentiations which explicitly take into account the intraregional context.