Adult Hirschsprung's disease diagnosed during forensic autopsy

We report a case of fatal Hirschsprung's disease (HD) discovered at autopsy. A 20-year-old man collapsed at home. Emergency medical personnel found him in cardiac arrest and all resuscitative efforts failed. He had a past history of chronic constipation since infancy. Forensic autopsy revealed a megacolon full of gas and stools. Microscopic examination showed absence of ganglion cells in a short segment of the rectum and enterocolitis in the left and transverse colon. HD is rarely described in adults. In many cases, patients complained of constipation since infancy but the affection remained misdiagnosed. The relative good tolerance of the disease is usually due to a short aganglionic bowel segment. Enterocolitis is a frequent and severe complication of HD in children but is rarely described in adults. This case suggests the importance of HD diagnosis in childhood in order to avoid fatal complications with forensic consequences.     

Racial Bias in Mock Juror Decision-Making: A Meta-Analytic Review of Defendant Treatment

Common wisdom seems to suggest that racial bias, defined as disparate treatment of minority defendants, exists in jury decision-making, with Black defendants being treated more harshly by jurors than White defendants. The empirical research, however, is inconsistent—some studies show racial bias while others do not. Two previous meta-analyses have found conflicting results regarding the existence of racial bias in juror decision-making (Mazzella & Feingold, 1994, Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 24, 1315–1344; Sweeney & Haney, 1992, Behavioral Sciences and the Law, 10, 179–195). This research takes a meta-analytic approach to further investigate the inconsistencies within the empirical literature on racial bias in juror decision-making by defining racial bias as disparate treatment of racial out-groups (rather than focusing upon the minority group alone). Our results suggest that a small, yet significant, effect of racial bias in decision-making is present across studies, but that the effect becomes more pronounced when certain moderators are considered. The state of the research will be discussed in light of these findings.     

Adipocere in postmortem imaging using multislice computed tomography (MSCT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)

A body was found in a local river almost completely converted into adipocere. The corpse was identified as a 78-year-old male who was missed for 13 months. It was assumed that he committed suicide by drowning. The postmortem imaging findings utilizing multislice computed tomography (MSCT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in this virtopsy case are presented with special focus on the radiologic appearance of adipocere. The loss of signal in MRI and hyperdensities in MSCT up to 1000 Hounsfield units, as well as the increased assessment of the intracranial structures compared with traditional autopsy, are presented.     

Inference of human geographic origins using Alu insertion polymorphisms

The inference of an individual's geographic ancestry or origin can be critical in narrowing the field of potential suspects in a criminal investigation. Most current technologies rely on single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) genotypes to accomplish this task. However, SNPs can introduce homoplasy into an analysis since they can be identical-by-state. We introduce the use of insertion polymorphisms based on short interspersed elements (SINEs) as a potential alternative to SNPs. SINE polymorphisms are identical-by-descent, essentially homoplasy-free, and inexpensive to genotype using a variety of approaches. Herein, we present results of a blind study using 100 Alu insertion polymorphisms to infer the geographic ancestry of 18 unknown individuals from a variety of geographic locations. Using a Structure analysis of the Alu insertion polymorphism-based genotypes, we were able to correctly infer the geographic affiliation of all 18 unknown human individuals with high levels of confidence. This technique to infer the geographic affiliation of unknown human DNA samples will be a useful tool in forensic genomics.     

Dynamics,Experimental Economics,and Entrepreneurship

Economic experiments are introduced and proposed as the methodology of choice for a subset of research questions in technological entrepreneurship, an approach that has not yet been used in this field. Moreover, we provide an entrepreneurship-specific framework that matches types of research questions and feasible empirical methods. For example, a very dynamic environment is seen as a threat to most field studies, whereas the need to have entrepreneurs or other practitioners as subjects is almost a criterion for preclusion in economic experiments. The design of a recent economic experiment dealing with the timing of exploitation of an R&D based opportunity is explained and analyzed. We finally discuss the applicability of economic experiments to entrepreneurship questions in technology transfer.     

'Deliberative Supranationalism'—Two Defences

This paper responds in its first sections to a series of articles in which Rainer Schmalz-Bruns developed a concept of legitimate governance beyond the constitutional state, which he called 'deliberative supranationalism' and contrasted with what Jürgen Neyer and the present author had suggested under the same title. The Epilogue of the paper first comments on more recent critiques brought forward especially by contributors to this Special Issue of the ELJ and then on the programmatic rejection of comitology by the European Commission's White Paper on Governance in the EU. Our querelles allemandes were not specifically Teutonic: while Schmalz-Bruns presented his approach as a systematic elaboration of the theories of deliberative democracy, based, in particular, on recent contributions by Joshua Cohen, Michael Dorf, and Charles Sabel, Jürgen Neyer and I had offered an interpretation of institutional innovations and decision-making practices as observed in the European market-building project. This discussion has had precursors and follow-ups in various contexts, among both lawyers and political scientists. This essay should hence be understood as a contribution to an ongoing debate.     

Social structure and voting in the Austrian party system

An analysis of electoral behaviour in the Austrian party system shows that the cleavages, social class and religion, are still playing a major role—their total impact seems higher than in most Western democracies. In the seventies a declining influence of both dimensions can be registered; but after closer inspection, most of it seems to be due to structural changes.Particularly the expansion of intermediate and higher education can be hypothesized to dissolve the traditional Lager-structure, which made for a very stable vote throughout the electoral history of the Second Austrian Republic. But the question remains, whether the increase in floating vote really supersedes the class and religious cleavages, or only produces more oscillating election outcomes.The analysis also makes clear why regional cleavages are of minor general impact in Austria: on the one hand, historical West-East differentiations prevail over urban-rural cleavages, on the other hand, Austria seems to be too small to give way to major cultural drifting between regions. None the less, the impact of social structure upon voting behaviour seems to be significantly higher than in most Western nations.     

Cognitive mapping in technology transfer

Frequent tensions continue to plague the operations of multinational corporations (MNCs) in less-developed countries (LDCs). Accusations of insensitivity and heed-lessness toward the needs and aspirations of LDCs are commonplace. In this writer's opinion, negative perceptions of the MNCs' operations result in part from differing “world views” between the two groups that are frequently overlooked in strategy formulation. This paper is an attempt to demonstrate that productive, culturally sensitive strategies can be formulated if MNCs use a multiple-perspective approach in their relationships with LDCs. To illustrate this, cognitive mapping is used to analyze the MNCs' decisionmaking behavior. Use of this process should provide MNCs with an opportunity to evaluate the consequences of their actions, the prospect of more effective strategies emerges.