Die Studie untersucht das Spektrum populärwissenschaftlicher Darstellungsformen in der zweiten Hälfte des 19. Jahrhunderts und unternimmt erstmals den Versuch einer Systematisierung des Textfeldes ...zwischen Justus von Liebig und Ernst Haeckel.Die populäre Wissenschaftsprosa wird über ihre textuellen Verfahren, ihre gattungs- und medienspezifischen Darbietungsansprüche erschlossen. Leitend ist dabei die These, dass Popularität als eigenständiges Textmerkmal zu verstehen ist und maßgeblich vom rhetorischen Konzept der Evidenz und von Techniken der Veranschaulichung, des Sichtbarmachens und Vor-Augen-Stellens abhängt. Die Arbeit untersucht unter anderem populäre Briefe, Zeitschriften, Lexika, Hand- und Lehrbücher ebenso wie weltanschauliche Streitschriften. An all diesen Quellen lässt sich zeigen, wie sich die Entstehung und Professionalisierung und die Verbreitung und Popularisierung moderner Wissenschaftsdisziplinen wechselseitig bedingen.
Soil hydraulic properties of drained and cultivated fen soils vary considerably due to structural and physical alteration in the long-term. Although hydrological modelling is a key method to ...determine soil water conditions for a large number of aims, for instance the utilization of fen soils, general estimators of water retention that reflect the progressive nature of fen soil alteration are rare. Based on 405 horizons from 30 fen soil profiles at 12 different peatland sites in Germany soil hydraulic properties were estimated. Water retention and bulk density measurements were conducted fivefold per each horizon mapped after the German Soil Taxonomy. Considering the varying phases of moorsh-forming process, bulk densities and water retention data were clustered according to horizon category by applying the k-means method. This approach reduced the range of water contents measured at considered pressure heads (pF) and recommended their subdivision into three groups of graduated bulk density (high, moderate, low) per each horizon category. This subdivision resulted in 18 separated data sets for parameterisation of the selected van Genuchten model using the RETC software. Estimated water content at saturation ranged between 0.68 and 0.90cm3cm−3 and 0.10 and 0.35cm3cm−3 at a pF-value of 4.2. Shape parameter α varied stronger than n, especially for the strongly altered fen soil horizons. The continuing alteration of the moorshified, earthified, aggregated, and shrunken fen soil horizons classified by increasing bulk density levels was reflected by the estimated van Genuchten parameters. For horizons inventoried as unchanged peat substrates, less variability of bulk densities in combination with deviating van Genuchten parameters indicated the influence of additional factors on soil hydraulic properties.
•We estimated the water retention curves for specific fen soil horizons.•Per horizon we defined three subsets with increasing levels of bulk density.•By doing so, we account for the different phases of the moorsh-forming process.•The estimated parameters reflect a progressive alteration of fen soils.
Since unification, eastern Germany has witnessed a rapidly changing memorial landscape, as the fate of former socialist monuments has been hotly debated and new commemorative projects have met with ...fierce controversy.Memorializing the GDR provides the first in-depth study of this contested arena of public memory, investigating the individuals and groups devoted to the creation or destruction of memorials as well as their broader aesthetic, political, and historical contexts. Emphasizing the interrelationship of built environment, memory and identity, it brings to light the conflicting memories of recent German history, as well as the nuances of national and regional constructions of identity.
New knowledge, created in international cooperation, is essential for global sustainability. Set against this background, this study focuses on German science policy for research cooperation with ...developing countries and emerging economies in sustainability research. Based on interviews with policy makers and researchers, the book scrutinizes the actors, processes and contents of science policy in Germany. The author argues that science policy mainly aims at German economic benefits and technology development. This, however, negatively influences global sustainability. To counter existing path dependencies, the author provides recommendations for sustainability-oriented scientific practice and science policy.
From Crusade to Hazard: The Denazification of Bremen Germany relates how the American and British combat forces and military government officers occupied, administered, and denazified Bremen and its ...environs from 1945 to 1947. The three distinct phases in administering Bremen had a profound impact on the denazification of the city. Denazification legislation was first determined by the Americans, then by the British, and then again by the Americans. Throughout, denazification teams tried to find a middle way between the American dictum of a radical purge of the whole population and the less ambitious British goal of only cleansing the administration. This delicate balancing act led to an implementation of a purge that was unique to the Bremen enclave. While it succeeded in discovering and punishing many of the main functionaries of the Nazi regime, it also fell victim to its own ambition and collapsed underneath the weight of its administrative processes. As deadlines and waning governmental support forced a quick end to the program, the bloated denazification bureaucracy resorted to classifying most of the remaining cases as benign 'followers,' even when they hardly deserved that label. At a time when interest in de-politicizing old classes of administrators affiliated with dictatorial regimes is being increasingly fueled by contemporary world events, this book is a particularly valuable contribution.
•Ridge and furrows were studied by morphological and physicochemical analyses.•Study sites revealed a diversity in morphology, environmental setting and use.•Ridge and furrow cultivation was and is ...influencing the environment.•Elevated amounts of P and δ15N indicate the application of manure in the past.
Ridge and furrow cultivation is an example for a historic agriculture technique that has been very common in Germany, especially during medieval times. It seemed to be well-known how the ridge and furrows (RIFUs) were used and formed but previous studies came to contradictory conclusions which raised additional questions concerning their formation. Furthermore, the RIFUs’ morphological and physicochemical soil properties and their influence on current soils that developed after the RIFUs had been abandoned are not fully understood. In order to answer these questions, morphological and physicochemical analyses (pH, EC, TOC, TN, δ15N, C:N ratios, “Olsen P”, soil texture) were conducted on 11 preserved RIFUs in forested areas of Northern and Central Germany. The results showed that the studied RIFUs occur on sites with different properties (e.g. soil texture, inclination, vegetation) and presented various morphological shapes. They are also characterised by differences in the formation of soil horizons and general low TN (<1.5 g kg−1) and TOC (<10 g kg−1) contents. However, higher contents at some sites comparing to their references, indicated that the RIFU cultivation promoted a slight long-lasting soil improvement if not induced by secondary soil processes after RIFU use. Moreover, for some sites, high P and δ15N values may suggest the application of manure. Recent morphological changes also had a significant influence on some study sites. In summary, neither the formation and agricultural strategies of RIFU cultivation nor their function and any influences on the current soil and woodland characteristics can be regarded as identical for all RIFU sites.
In Rules and Rituals in Medieval Power Games Gerd Althoff highlights the great impact of unwritten rules (Spielregeln) and rituals in establishing order in prestate societies. He underpins this view ...with new examples and insights taken from the German perspective and thus offers a model suitable for comparison with other societies.
How do individuals, societies, and nations deal with their difficult pasts? "Getting History Right" examines this question in a comparative context by looking at an authoritarian East Germany and a ...pluralistic, democratic West Germany. Eschewing a narrow focus on elites, this work draws extensively on societal level discussions of the past in popular culture, such as film, television, radio, and newspapers. It examines how societal level discussions of the past shaped individual perceptions and interpretations of the past; and how individual perceptions and struggles over the meaning of the past shaped societal level discussions. These struggles over meaning and "getting history right" are not only shaped by political power, but are also a source of symbolic power. To understand political life, scholars must embrace not only material political power, but also the symbolic and cultural roots of power. The research presented here makes extensive use of public opinion data, cinema attendance, and television viewer data, as well as other sources, to look at the multiple meanings that East and West Germans assigned to the Holocaust and World War II across time. Rather than culture merely being an extension of political power, this work argues that culture and the boundaries of the cultural matrix shape the use of political power by different social actors. Getting history right is not only a reflection of political power; it is a source of power itself.
A common paradigm is that chernozem soils developed in the Holocene under grassland steppes, with their formation largely determined by three factors, parent material, climate and faunal mixing. For ...European chernozems, however, pollen records show that steppes were rare. Here, using high‐resolution transmission electron microscopy, electron energy loss spectroscopy, micro Raman spectroscopy and radiocarbon dating, we characterized the nanomorphology and chemical structure of soil organic carbon (SOC) from central European chernozems. We identified submicron remnants of burned biomass (15–45 percent of SOC), coexisting as amorphous char‐black carbon (BC) derived from pyrolized cellulose or soot‐BC. The BC was several millenia in age (1160–5040 carbon‐14 years) and up to 3990 radiocarbon years older than bulk SOC, indicating significant residence times for BC in soils. These results challenge common paradigms on chernozem formation and add fire as an important novel factor. It is also clear that the role of fire in soil formation has been underestimated outside classical fire prone biomes. Furthermore, our results demonstrate the importance of quantifying BC in soils because of its large contribution, longevity and potential role in the global biogeochemical carbon cycle.
This study investigates changes in erosion rates at high temporal and spatial resolution for three example catchments in West, North and East Saxony/Germany under climate change. The study is based ...on the A1B IPCC-scenario and model outputs of four models: ECHAM5-OPYC3 (general circulation model), WETTREG2010 (statistical downscaling climate model), METVER (agricultural model for calculation of daily initial soil moisture) and EROSION 3D as a process-based soil erosion model. Simulations were run for measured and projected single rainstorm events at a temporal resolution of 5min. Soil loss was simulated for two future periods from 2041 to 2050 and 2091 to 2100, respectively. Results were compared to simulated soil loss based on 10years of measured climate data from 1989 to 2007. Expected changes in land use, soil management due to changed crop rotation and shifted harvest date are taken into account as scenario studies.
Outputs of the regional climate model show that the total number of rainstorms with intensities≥0.1mm/min is decreasing in future while rainfall intensities are increasing. Periods of heavy rainstorms will mostly shift from summer to autumn. While the total amount of annual rainfall is decreasing and the duration of sunshine is strongly increasing, soils become drier. Dry periods will appear more often in late autumn.
Results of the simulations with EROSION 3D quantify the impacts of climate change on erosion rates. Climate change will lead to a significant increase of soil loss by 2050 and a partial decrease by 2100. Not adapting soil management and land use will aggravate erosion rates.
The impacts of land use, soil management and soil properties on soil erosion by water are higher than the effects of changed precipitation patterns. Current soil protection measures are suitable for soil conservation under conditions of a changed climate.
•The study investigates changes in erosion rates at high temporal resolution.•The number of heavy rainstorms will decrease while rain-intensities will increase.•Periods of heavy rainstorms will mostly shift from summer to autumn and spring.•Climate change will lead to a significant increase of soil loss by 2050.•Not adapting soil management and land use will aggravate erosion rates.
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