A cooperative Peru: Is centralisation of cooperatives better for local development?

Research shows that some agricultural cooperatives implement development projects in their local communities. What remains to be explained is why certain cooperatives pursue local development while others do not. Through a comparison of coffee cooperatives in two regions of Peru, this study examines the implications of a regional cooperative for local development. The creation of a regional cooperative leads to a concentration of resources and a decrease in the need and ability of local cooperatives to pursue independent development projects. At the same time, it allows for more equal access to those resources and to the benefits of cooperative-led development projects.     

Application of BioRobot M48 to forensic DNA extraction

The development of a nucleic acid extraction method based on magnetic separation has opened up possibilities forl automation of DNA extraction. The BioRobot M48 is one of robotic stations applicable to automated DNA extraction in forensics. However, each new method should be thoroughly validated before application to routine casework. Our aim was to compare the effectiveness of the currently utilized organic/Microcon 100 based extraction procedure and magnetic extraction with BioRobot M48. The DNA concentration of DNA extracts obtained from different kinds of typical forensic material was evaluated followed by amplification with the SGM Plus or Identifiler kit and capillary electrophoresis using ABI 3100 Avant. We can conclude that BioRobot M48 is a very effective instrument for DNA extraction from most specimens and can be successfully applied in forensic laboratories.     

Polymorphism of four X-chromosomal STR loci in Belarusians and Slovaks

We have investigated four X-chromosomal STR loci (a tetranucleotide repeat marker HPRTB, DXS7423 and trinucleotide repeat systems DXS101, DXS8377) in population samples of unrelated Belarusian and Slovak males (N = 180 and 116, respectively).Markers were amplified in a multiplex PCR reaction with primers labeled with fluorescent dyes 5-FAM and 5-JOE (dye set F). The separation and detection of PCR products were performed by capillary electrophoresis on a 3130 Genetic Analyzer (Applied Biosystems), using positive controls (K562 and NA9947A) and the GeneScan-500 ROX internal lane standard. Allele designation was based on comparison with the constructed allelic ladder. We performed statistical analysis estimating power of discrimination for males (PD_male). Our data was compared with European populations from Poland and Germany. The obtained data are useful in forensic practice and they contribute to creation of national X-STR databases in Belarus and Slovakia.     

Gendered perceptions: women in the labour market in Poland

Abstract

This paper considers the consequences of economic and political change in the early 1990s for women's situation in the Polish labour market. New types of employment emerged in various sectors of the Polish economy around the mid-1970s. Some, such as finance, insurance, education and health care became highly feminised. Under the Communist system, many regulations were introduced to allow women to combine paid labour with taking care of the household. In the new post-Communist economic situation, these gender-specific regulations work against women, making them less attractive to employers. In a situation of high unemployment, employers in the growing private sector can afford to make specific demands of their employees: that they be young, male, and mobile. Women are thus in a worse situation in the labour market even though they are often more educated than the men with whom they must compete for work. There is urgent need to introduce mechanisms to create a more equal labour market.     

Law,Love and Legality

The argument of this paper is that our lives have meaning because theyare structured by rules which are open to the outside, through which theoutside can reflexively fold back into the rules so that it canregenerate and transform them. It is this process that constitutes theunity and integrity of our lives and gives them coherence. Our lives donot have certainty in the sense that there is always a definite answeras to how we should live. It is in the reflexive unity of law and lovethat we have the confidence to respond to the outside and create andtransform our narratives, however dangerous that may seem. We might callthis ``legality' – the ability to go beyond the law at theappropriate time. In this sense then, it is a creative activity and isto be distinguished from legalism, which thinks that following the rulesis all that there is. But following the rules is important, for it isonly in following them and being faithful to them that we gain theunderstanding of when to break them. That creativity, which stems fromthe precarious linking of the arbitrary and the structured, might leadus to think of legality as a form of anarchy – not of thenihilistic variety but of the ability creatively to break the law andthus regenerate it.     

Ultrastructural changes in liver after the test exposition of laser irradiation

The aim of this research was to verify characteristic morphological changes in the liver with regard to survival time after laser irradiation. The duration of irradiation was constant. For the purpose of irradiation we used a helium-neon laser. The value of the energy absorbed during the exposition amounted to about 2.5 J. Segments from the irradiated liver field of rats were taken directly after decapitation following different times of survival, and the changes were estimated in an ultrastructural microscope. Our results showed dependence of certain morphological changes (perceptible only by ultrastructural examination) on the time of survival after irradiation.     

Ankle joint injuries as a reconstruction parameter in car-to-pedestrian accidents

The study has assessed the usefulness of ankle joint injuries for deducing about the presumable location of a pedestrian in relation to a motor vehicle at the moment of collision. A statistically significant correlation was found between the direction of impact and the mechanism of ankle joint injuries. Such injuries were found in 113 of 317 pedestrian, fatal victims of road traffic accidents (36%). In the cases of impacts on the medial surface of the lower limb, the injuries associated with the supination mechanism were six times more frequent than the injuries associated with the pronation mechanism, while in the group of impacts on the limbs from the lateral side those connected with the pronation mechanism were four times more frequent. In victims hit from the back, the injuries connected with the plantarflexion mechanism were found almost four times more frequent than the dorsiflexion mechanism and in victims hit from the front in three of the five damaged joints the dorsiflexion component was observed (without any plantarflexion case). Less frequent "pronation injuries" in the limbs hit from the medial side and "supination injuries" in the limbs hit from the lateral side as well as "dorsiflexion injuries" in victims hit from the back predominantly occurred in impacts to the pelvic area, i.e. resulting from collisions with a van or lorry. Injuries of upper ankle joints are, thus, useful for reconstructing the presumable location of the pedestrian in relation to the vehicle at the moment of collision, especially, when the vehicle involved in the accident is known.