In later life, the death of a family member occurs most often after a challenging time of family caring. It denotes a dramatic event in families’ lives, and involves intense feelings for all. To date, bereavement has mainly been investigated as an intrapersonal process from the perspective of family carers or widow/ers. Little is known about families’ experience when an adult member has died. A review of pertinent literature located only six adult family bereavement studies, which exposed the importance of family cohesion, communication and emotion, and found that family characteristics denote the background from which families make sense of the death. Despite these insights, a dearth of research exists about families’ lived relational world after a death late in life. Such knowledge is needed to better grasp bereaved families’ life-world and to discern their capacities and adversities, which shape their support needs. The purpose of this hermeneutic-phenomenological inquiry was to disclose meaning patterns and practices of families living with the loss of a close other. It included ten bereaved community-dwelling families, represented by widow/ers (mean age 80y), adult children, in-laws and grandchildren (n=30). Family was defined as a situated, relational involvement by those who feel close, and living with loss was seen as a process of changing relationships. A combination of in-depth family group (n=21) and solo interviews (n=16) were held six to 23 months after the death, and field-notes were written. The thematic and narrative analysis, embedded in a hermeneutic movement, involved reading, reflecting, and writing about gleaned data, fore-understandings, and emerging insights. Findings revealed that families’ life with loss is a world shared, and a world apart. Families collectively looked back to weave the death into their family narrative, and in so doing, constructed a story of a good death, compared-contrasted it with other deaths and events, and situated it within their multi-generational family context. Families lived with their loss by sharing-not sharing interpretations and daily lives. They connected via remembering, talking, spend-ing time, and enacting presence, but they disconnected for a variety of reasons. Families moved forward by continuing or reconstructing their family being and doing. While some families faced upheaval, others continued with little change. These findings need to be seen as situated, temporal constructs of prolonged researcher-participant engagements. They yield insights into families’ world based on the accounts of ten traditional families. Even so, this study adds a much needed empirical family perspective on bereavement. Family relations arose as interplay of different, contradicting forces at play, which moved members together and apart in their daily lives with loss. As such, it supports family models that emphasize the multivocal, relational, contextual, and continuously shifting nature of family health. It revealed that families hold an inherent capacity to make meaning of the death and enact family thereafter, and understand their relationships as resource. Thus, families may not need professional therapeutic interventions to redress their “functioning” or to avert “adverse” outcomes, but health promoting and relationship-strengthening care and services. Nurses can be helpful to families by facilitating meaning-making, strengthening family relations in a way that values multiple voices at play, and by supporting family transition and caring in light of present concerns.

eDNA microarray technology has generated a tremendous amount of interest among biologists because of its promise to monitor the entire genome on a single chip, thus enabling researchers to have a better picture of the interaction among thousands of genes simultaneously. In the current study, this technology was used to print over 3,000 unknown genes from various silk glands of the black widow spider to profile their expression patterns and to identify novel candidates. Spiders are remarkable creatures because of their ability to make different silks, each with a specific function. Some of these silks have amazing mechanical properties, comparable to those of the finest synthetic materials. Several silk genes have been cloned from various spiders over the last few years, and the contribution of each of those genes in silk production has been identified. However, the majority of cellular and biochemical processes involved in silk manufacture remain a mystery. In our research, we attempt to identify genes that might be involved in silk assembly, on a global scale and investigate more about those genes and their interplay with other key biological molecules involved in silk manufacture. Our study showed that silking spiders for a certain period of time resulted in down-regulation of two important silk genes, ECP-1 and ECP-2. Both these genes are key molecules implicated for their role in maintaining the egg case architecture in the black widow spider.,-and we believe that these genes are also directly or indirectly involved in the manufacture of dragline silk. Microarray analyses also enable the discovery of several other interesting molecules, two of which could be accessory proteins involved in silk formation. Furthermore, in a separate study we also characterized a novel silk glue protein with unique ensemble repeats. In conclusion, we believe that the findings of this study will indeed be significant to silk researchers and material scientists alike and it will enhance our knowledge in understanding the mystery behind silk production.

Araneoid spiders use specialized sets of abdominal silk glands to produce up to seven different types of silks, each with diverse functional properties. At the time of these studies, fibroin eDNA sequences that encode egg case silk had not been reported in the literature. This study used conventional nucleic acid-nucleic acid screening of a eDNA library to isolate a novel gene, named tubuliform spidroin 1 , from the black widow spider Latrodectus hesperus. TuSp 1 was demonstrated to be selectively expressed in the tubuliform gland (the gland suspected for egg case silk production), and examination of the amino acid sequence revealed highly homogeneous repeats (184 amino acid ensemble repeats), a characteristic feature of fibroin sequences. Analyses of the ensemble repeats within the amino acid sequence of TuSp 1 revealed the lack of long stretches of polyalanine and glycine-alanine sub-repeats, which are commonly found in minor ampullate and major ampullate silks. Polyserine blocks and short polyalanine stretches were highly represented in the TuSp 1 amino acid sequence. Our data support the assertion that TuSp 1 represents the main constituent within egg case silk. This supposition is supported by the observation that the amino acid composition of raw egg case silk was strikingly similar to the amino acid composition predicted from the translated TuSp1 eDNA. Two additional constituents identified in black widow egg case, egg case protein 1 (ECP-1) and egg case protein 2 (ECP-2), were also partially characterized in this study. Using immunohistochemical approaches, we demonstrate that ECPs predominantly localize to the exterior of the large diameter fibers of egg cases. Additionally, these studies revealed smaller amounts of ECPs localized to the interior portion of the fibers. Collectively, these results support TuSp1 as the predominant fibroin within egg sacs as well as reveal a structural role for the ECPs, providing clues regarding the supramolecular structure of egg case fibers.

Spider silk is one of the most remarkable materials produced in the natural world and its strength and extensibility are legendary. To date, the majority of studies have been performed on the following silks: dragline, capture spiral, and eggcase silk. The primary goal of this study was to characterize a lesser known silk type, called wrapping (swathing) silk, from Latrodectus hesperus. My research focused on elucidating the fibroins that make up the swathing silk. Perfonning MS/MS analyses on solubilized wrapping silk fibroins digested with trypsin, we demonstrate that a novel fibroin named AcSp !-like is present within wrapping silk. Consistent with this finding, SEM analyses reveal that wrapping silk is a composite material, containing at least three different diameter silk fibers. By using scanning electron micrographs, along with amino acid composition analyses and MS/MS analyses, we demonstrate wrapping material contains the fibroins AcSp1-like, MiSp1-like, MaSp1 and MaSp2. These are the first studies to reveal that minor, major and acinifonn silks are constituents of wrapping material.

Spider silk displays a unique balance of high tensile strength and extensibility, making it one of the toughest materials on the planet. Dragline silk, also known as the lifeline of the spider, represents one of the best studied fiber types and many labs are attempting to produce synthetic dragline silk fibers for commercial applications. In these studies, we develop a minifibroin for expression studies in bacteria. Using recombinant DNA methodology and protein expression studies, we develop a natural minifibroin that contains the highly conserved N- and C-terminal domains, along with several internal block repeats of MaSp1. We also characterize a family of small cysteine-rich proteins (CRPs) and demonstrate that these factors are present within the spinning dope of the major ampullate gland using MS analysis. Biochemical studies and characterization of one of the family members, CRP1, demonstrate that this factor can self-polymerize into higher molecular weight complexes under oxidizing conditions, but can be converted into a monomeric species under reducing conditions. Self-polymerization of CRP1 is also shown to be independent of pH and salt concentration, two important chemical cues that help fibroin aggregation. Overall, our data demonstrate that the polymerization state of CRP1 is dependent upon redox state, suggesting that the redox environment during fiber extrusion may help regulate the oligomerization of CRP molecules during dragline silk production.

No description available.

The purpose of this study is to present a critical analysis of how certain themes of the Norse pagan religion are portrayed in ten selected textbooks used for Religious Science education in grades one through nine. The themes included in the analysis are; the description of the transition from the Norse Pagan religion to Christianity; Adam of Bremen’s portrayal of human sacrifice, and lastly Ibn Fadhlan’s characterization of widow burning. By using a critical knowledge text analysis, and applying a theoretical starting point that pedagogical material analyses and interprets events from a specific perspective; in this case from a Christian perspective, I have from the study concluded that the chapters covering the Norse pagan religion in these textbooks have a distinguished Christian bias seen as the norm. The themes analysed in this study all describe different phenomena in a similar way and make use of the same sources, even though these are often questioned. The Christian religion is delegated a prominent role whereas the Norse pagan religion is portrayed as it’s opposite, undeveloped and barbaric.

No description available.

The presented diploma thesis is dealing with the life of Katerina Hradecká of Montfort, noble foreigner, married to Adam II. of Hradec. The author is using older as well as more recent literature, written, tangible and iconographic sources to analyze, based on historical-anthropological methods, transformation of the inner world of the noblewoman. She is firstly introduced as a maid of honor in the hofstadt of archduchess Maria of Bavaria in Graz. Author also looks into her marriage to Adam II. of Hradec, investigating it within political and religious context of that period, as it was associated with the connections of the lords of Hradec to the House of Habsburg. Author also pays attention to the noblewoman as a wife, a mother, a Jesuit confidant, a widow and a strict catholic, that had a substantial influence on the social life of Hradec and its surroundings due to her religious views. Author does not omit the tangible cultural aspects connected with the activities of Katerina Hradecka of Montfort and her impact on the ecclesiastical and secular architecture in Jindřichův Hradec.

L’étude d’environ 200 mémoires judiciaires, ou factums, principalement publiés entre 1770 et 1789, permet de fournir un éclairage sur la place des femmes dans la société française. Bien que soumises à la tutelle et à l’autorité masculine, les femmes sont montrées défendant leurs intérêts devant la justice. Si la norme de soumission à leur mari est rappelée, les épouses sont fréquemment mises en scène dans des situations où elles affirment leur indépendance. Les veuves peuvent défendre leurs intérêts seules, voire assumer des rôles de protectrices ou tenter de peser dans la répartition des biens dans la famille. La place des filles est très réduite, même si les récits des factums peuvent leur donner des rôles de premier plan. Quant à l'autorité maternelle, elle est reconnue. La fonction maternelle peut aussi être représentée par des mères de substitution (nourrices, marraines, grands-mères et tantes, soeurs). Les soeurs ne sont pas placées systématiquement sous le contrôle de leurs frères. Les mémoires judiciaires permettent ainsi de réfléchir sur la représentation de la nature féminine à la veille de la Révolution. À la différence des discours produits par les médecins et les philosophes, ils ne répandent pas l’idée d’une nature féminine spécifique. / This survey (PhD) sheds light on women’s status in the French society between 1770 and 1789, through the study of approximately 200 printed judicial briefs or factums. Although they were under men’s control, women could go to court. Wives had to obey their husbands. Nevertheless, they often showed their independence in judicial briefs. Widows could act by themselves, protect their families and influence the wealth distribution between the family members. “Girls” or “never-married women” are rare in judicial briefs, even though they could play important parts. The mother’s authority was recognized in judicial briefs. Other women also played the mother’s part instead of the real mother, e.g. godmothers, grand-mothers, aunts, sisters and wet-nurses. Sisters were not always under their brothers’ control. Judicial briefs interrogate the idea of women’s nature as it was portrayed before the French Revolution. Unlike physicians’ and philosophers’ discourses, they do not support the idea that there should be a specific nature of women.