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Carotenoids are organic pigment molecules that play important roles in signalling, control of oxidative stress, and immunity. Fish allocate carotenoids to their eggs, which gives them the typical yellow to red colouration and supports their resistance against microbial infections. However, it is still unclear whether carotenoids act mainly as a shield against infection or are used up during the embryos' immune defence. We investigated this question with experimental families produced from wild-caught brown trout (Salmo trutta). Singly raised embryos were either exposed to the bacterial pathogen Pseudomonas fluorescens or sham-treated at one of two stages during their development. A previous study on these experimental families reported positive effects of egg carotenoids on embryo growth and resistance against the infection. Here, we quantified carotenoid consumption, i.e. the active metabolization of carotenoids into compounds that are not other carotenoid types, in these infected and sham-infected maternal sib groups. We found that carotenoid contents mostly decreased during embryogenesis. However, these decreases were neither linked to the virulence induced by the pathogen nor dependent on the time point of infection. We conclude that egg carotenoids are not significantly used up by the embryos' immune defence.

Life-history theory predicts that iteroparous females allocate their resources differently among different breeding seasons depending on their residual reproductive value. In iteroparous salmonids there is typically much variation in egg size, egg number, and in the compounds that females allocate to their clutch. These compounds include various carotenoids whose functions are not sufficiently understood yet. We sampled 37 female and 35 male brown trout from natural streams, collected their gametes for in vitro fertilizations, experimentally produced 185 families in 7 full-factorial breeding blocks, raised the developing embryos singly (n = 2960), and either shamtreated or infected them with Pseudomonas fluorescens. We used female redness (as a measure of carotenoids stored in the skin) and their allocation of carotenoids to clutches to infer maternal strategies. Astaxanthin contents largely determined egg colour. Neither egg weight nor female size was correlated with the content of this carotenoid. However, astaxanthin content was positively correlated with larval growth and with tolerance against P. fluorescens. There was a negative correlation between female skin redness and the carotenoid content of their eggs. Although higher astaxanthin contents in the eggs were associated with an improvement of early fitness-related traits, some females appeared not to maximally support their current offspring as revealed by the negative correlation between female red skin colouration and egg carotenoid content. This correlation was not explained by female size and supports the prediction of a maternal trade-off between current and future reproduction.

Is our sexuality a product of our genes, or of society, culture, and politics? How have views of sexual norms changed over time? And how have feminism, religion, and HIV/AIDS affected our attitudes to sex? This Very Short Introduction examines these questions and many more, exploring what shapes our sexuality, and how our sexuality shapes us. - ;What shapes our sexuality? Is it a product of our genes, or of society, culture, and politics? How have concepts of sexuality and sexual norms changed over time? How have feminist theories, religion, and HIV/AIDS affected our attitudes to sex?. Focusing on the social, political, and psychological aspects of sexuality, this Very Short Introduction examines these questions and many more, exploring what shapes our sexuality, and how our attitudes to sex have in turn shaped the wider world. Revealing how our assumptions about what is 'normal' in sexuality have, in reality, varied widely across time and place, this book tackles the major topics and controversies that still confront us when issues of sex and sexuality are. discussed: from sex education, HIV\\AIDS, and eugenics, to religious doctrine, gay rights, and feminism. -.

This book recognises sexuality as a mainstream concept in political analysis and explores issues in the politics of sexuality that are highly salient and controversial today. These include conceptions of citizenship and nationality linked to gender and sexuality, the legislation about the age of consent, prostitution and 'trafficing in women', the international politics of population control, abortion, sexual harrassment, and sexuality in the military. The international team of contributors provide a wide range of perspectives in a variety of contexts. On a national level they offer illustrative case studies from the UK, Ireland, the Netherlands, Spain and Israel among others, and on an international plane they cover the European Union, the UN Conference on Population and Development and the role of the Vatican as international arbiter. Moreover, the volume addresses the interaction between political discourse and the work of major theorists such as Weber, Freud, Foucault, Irigaray and Butler.

Eugenic discourses in the first half of the twentieth century comprised three central elements, namely ideas about selective breeding, the claim of the physical and mental decline of the population, and that of the hereditary character of mental illnesses, all of which directly affected ideas about gender, sexuality and notions of normalcy. [...]as a combination of science and social movement, eugenics provided an analysis of what was wrong with modern society, how this occurred and by what means it could be remedied. [...]he called for 'artificial sterilisation' by the state to 'decrease the numbers of inferior individuals'. [...]the construction of the Swiss nation was at least partly founded on what could be described as the Swiss 'dream of order'.27 The social and political order was seen to be 'troubled' by various categories of 'disorderly' ('unordentlich') citizens and non-citizens, such as Jews, Vagrants' (incorporating Yenish as well as other 'travellers'), the mentally ill, the physically disabled, unmarried mothers, and homosexuals. [...]eugenic ideas were influential in the formation of a number of preWar and post-War health and social policies. According to Keller 1999, Rufer 1991 and Wottreng 1999 Forel's first sterilisation was in 1886 on a 14 year old 'hysterical' girl, original source in Forel 1917; psychiatric castration was pioneered in 1891 by Forel in Burghölzli (Wolf in Rosenow, 1938); Charles Wolf, in S. Zurukzoglu (ed), Die Probleme der Eugenik unter Berücksichligung der Verhütung erbkranken Nachuruchses, Basel, Schwabe, 1938.

This article reviews the field of qualitative inquiry, identifying three conceptual breaks: the \"orthodox consensus\" of positivism which conceives the social world as a collection of external facts and attempts to eliminate bias and subjectivity; post-positivist philosophy of science, which concedes that objective observation of pure data is impossible but nevertheless tries to establish criteria of \"good\" research practice; and the interpretive turn, which rehabilitates subjectivity and views data collection as a mutual construction of meaning where the researcher is engaged in \"double hermeneutics\" (GIDDENS). The interpretive turn has implications for history, memory, and storage of data. However, while recognizing the interactionist and contextual nature of data collection, the article points out that it is counterproductive to overemphasize its implications, as some postmodern strands of interpretive research do. Drawing on the hermeneutic notions of objectivation and the hermeneutic circle, it is argued that interpretive research data consist of objectivations, and therefore lend themselves to storage and future revision, newly emerging questions, and (re-)interpretation. Furthermore, data storage allows for data access by non-specialists, including the subjects of the research. Archiving consequently potentially contributes to empowerment, feedback and dialogue. URN: urn:nbn:de:0114-fqs0502330

The 1960s and 1970s engendered an era of freedom of discussion and debate about sex which resulted in the politicization of sex in the West and a review of the prevalent ways of understanding and experiencing sexual practices and identities. Feminist and gay critiques of the normative status of heterosexuality triggered transformations of radical sexual meanings. ‘The future of sex’ looks at how ‘radical’ sexuality really is now. The increasing recognition of sexual diversity in politics, culture, the media, and the economy has led to a decline of the idea of ‘perversion’. Sexual needs, values, and emotions are the products of historical contexts and this will no doubt continue into the future.