Civil society in Second Life

The original premise of Second Life was that people really could have a second life. They could be a postman or a shop clerk by day, but by night, they could be a DJ or a builder and earn a living. People took this seriously and did just that to the extent of even quitting their day jobs. The consequence of this is that the lives of the people in Second Life and the institutions they make are a type of civil society.     

Wikitopia: Balancing intellectual property rights within open source research databases

Wiki “communities” based on the open access ideology allow any visitor to easily add, remove or edit content. However, there are a slew of ethics and policy challenges inherent in their use. Open source software developers are faced with the dilemma of openly sharing their intellectual property and prevent others from claiming proprietary rights from the code they freely shared to the public? Intellectual Property rights licensing, ironically, is the route by which open software developers have chosen to regulate their free code in cyberspace. Open source code is generally free on the surface; but in reality, it comes with obligations which are enforceable by law. Aside from the potential liability for intellectual property infringement, the use of open software raises competition law and tort liability issues. The European Union has developed the European Public License which is written in conformity with the copyright, product liability and consumer protection laws of the 27 member states. The EU Commission has also proposed a new Directive which will extend the principles of consumer protection rules to cover licensing agreements of products like software. This paper will address the various legal issues that may arise in open source community sharing.     

Variability of the Entire Mitochondrial DNA Control Region in a Human Isolate from the Pas Valley (Northern Spain)

Abstract: In this study, we analyzed the entire mtDNA control region in 61 unrelated individuals from the Pas Valley (Cantabria), a human isolate from northern Spain, to evaluate the suitability of this analysis to increase the power of discrimination of this locus for forensic purposes in human isolates. Low values obtained for the diversity parameters confirmed the relative isolation of this human group. The main findings of this study indicated that even the analysis of the entire mtDNA control region may have important limitations for use in forensic casework when dealing with human isolates: none of the 44 individuals who exhibited identical HVI‐HVII haplotypes could be further differentiated by analysis of segment HVIII. Nevertheless, analysis of the entire mtDNA control region proved to be useful to determine the ancestry of the samples examined, by contributing to the confirmation, and, on occasion, even to the refinement of the haplogroup assignment.     

Do governments delay the implementation of parliamentary requests? Examining time variation in implementing legislative requests in Switzerland

Policy Sciences - This paper investigates time variations in the implementation of legislative requests by the Swiss government. Combining the literature on executive–legislative relations...     

Rethinking civil society: radical politics and the legitimization of unpaid activities

This article examines recent debates on the concept of civil society as a source of renewal for political economy and a contributing factor to the establishment of social inclusion. In terms of political economy it contends that the relationship between markets and civil society has been under-theorized and that the potentially deleterious impact of the hegemony of market discourses on civil society has been neglected. Thus there is a need to engage with more radical theories which suggest that, if we want to support and legitimize socially useful activities such as unpaid work, spaces within civil society should be protected from the penetration of economic rationality. To this end the article argues that, following contemporary radical democratic theory, it is important to think of civil society as a differentiated space in which a wide range of actors engage in a multiplicity of activities. However, where radical democrats have tended to focus on a differentiated space for political engagement, this article concludes that we should do the same for economic and non-economic activities and, in so doing, construct an alternative political economy to the hegemony of market discourses.     

A rapid test for heroin (3,6-diacetylmorphine) based on two chemiluminescence reactions

A rapid method for screening drug seizure samples for 3,6-diacetylmorphine (heroin), which consists of a simple hydrolysis procedure and flow-injection analysis with two chemiluminescence reagents, is described. Before hydrolysis, 3,6-diacetylmorphine evokes an intense response with a tris(2,2'-bipyridyl)ruthenium(III) reagent (prepared by dissolving the perchlorate salt in acetonitrile), and a relatively weak chemiluminescence response with a second reagent: potassium permanganate in an aqueous acidic polyphosphate solution. However, the permanganate reagent is extremely sensitive toward the hydrolysis products of 3,6-diacetylmorphine (i.e., 6-monoacetylmorphine and morphine). Some compounds commonly found in drug laboratories may cause false positives with tris(2,2'-bipyridyl)ruthenium(III), but do not produce the markedly increased response with the permanganate reagent after the hydrolysis procedure. The combination of these two tests therefore provides an effective presumptive test for the presence of 3,6-diacetylmorphine, which we have verified with 14 samples obtained from a forensic science laboratory.     

Species identification using sequences of the trnL intron and the trnL-trnF IGS of chloroplast genome among popular plants in Taiwan

Forensic botanical comparison can be hampered by the lack of appropriate DNA databases. While DNA sequence databases for many mitochondrial loci have been established for the identification of animal species, less is known regarding the genomes of plants. We report on the use of the trnL intron and the trnL-trnF intergenic spacer (IGS) in the chloroplast genome and establish a DNA sequence database for plant species identification. The DNA sequences at these two loci from commonly encountered plants, including monocots and dicots, were aligned to establish a DNA database of local plants. The database comprises 373 individual sequences representing 80 families, 206 genera and 269 species. These plant species can be grouped to species level using both sequence and length polymorphisms at these loci. To validate the database for future forensic purposes, we sequenced 20 blind samples and searched the local database and the databases of GenBank and EMBL. Fifteen of these 20 samples used in blind trial testing matched their respective species from our local DNA database but only 6 matched species registered in the GenBank and EMBL databases. The sequences of two species used in the blind trial did not match any sequence registered in any of these databases. Cluster analysis was performed to demonstrate the family and genus distribution of samples. Neighbor-joining trees of the two DNA regions from 70 samples of the local database and 10 of the species used in the blind trials were constructed and clustered to both family and genus. The bootstrap values of the trnL intron were higher than most of those of the trnL-trnF IGS. The sequence database described in this study can be used to identify plant species using DNA sequences of the trnL intron and trnL-trnF IGS of chloroplast genome and illustrates its value in plant species identification.     

Characterization of the polymorphic repeat sequence within the rDNA IGS of Cannabis sativa

The rDNA intergenic spacer (IGS) structure of Cannabis sativa contains six variable repeat motifs within a locus spanning 1387 base pairs. The degree of variation of the first three motifs was examined using 77 samples from cannabis samples. The samples originated from five seizures in Taiwan and seed stocks from six different countries. The results showed that there were four types of sequences producing PCR products at either 255, 260, 264 or 265 base pairs. The data obtained indicates that this region of rDNA IGS exhibits a degree of polymorphism that while insufficient by itself can be added to a multiplex with other cannabis STR loci.     

Sequence analysis of STR polymorphisms at locus ACTBP2 in the Taiwanese population

A highly polymorphic sequence structure is reported in the human beta-actin related pseudogene 2 (ACTBP2) (SE33) locus in members of the Taiwanese Han population. A total of 100 unrelated members of the Taiwanese Han population were used in the study. Alleles that shared the same size but differ in their sequence are described to allow for inter laboratory sharing of data. PCR products amplified from this locus were separated by single-strand conformation polymorphism electrophoresis, the single-stranded DNA bands were excised from the gels, a second amplification performed, and then the PCR products were sequenced. All the alleles differed by either 2 or 4 bp. Sequence variations were observed as deletions or insertions in the repeat units AG (or AA) and AAAG. Additionally, transitions in the flanking regions were recorded. A total of 27 alleles with 71 associated genotypes were recorded if the alleles were defined by size, but 68 alleles with 88 associated genotypes were noted with the alleles were scored on the basis of sequence variation. The power of discrimination (Pd) of this single locus was 0.9874 making the human ACTBP2 a good alternative marker for individual identification and paternity testing.