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Civil society has played an important role in meeting the challenges of refugee migration in recent years. This commentary documents the importance of civic engagement for the integration of refugees by linking individual survey data on refugees to a regional measure of civic engagement in Germany. Using the density of newly established civic associations at the county level as a measure of civic engagement, we exploit regional differences in civic engagement in order to estimate its association with refugee integration outcomes. We find that in regions with particularly high levels of civic engagement, refugees have significantly more frequent contact to Germans, higher life satisfaction, and better German language skills. This correlation is robust to regional contextual factors such as the local population structure, economic strength, and the state of the labor market. In terms of language acquisition, women and refugees with a low level of education benefit the most from high civic engagement. Moreover, refugees with university degrees find significantly better-paying jobs in areas with higher civic engagement. However, no direct correlation could be established between civic engagement and the likelihood that refugees are employed. Nonetheless, the results suggest that support from civil society translates into improved access to government benefits. Our findings highlight that local civic engagement is an important complement to public assistance services and policy makers should give a high priority to partnering with the civil society to improve refugees’ integration outcomes.

Environmental policies may have important consequences for firms' competitiveness or profitability. For the European Union Emissions Trading System (EU ETS) the empirical literature documents that significant emissions reductions have resulted from it. Surprisingly, however, the literature shows that there have been hardly any concurrent negative effects on firms' competitiveness during the first two phases of the scheme (2005-2012). We show that the main explanations for the absence of negative impacts on competitiveness are a large over-allocation of emissions allowances leading to a price drop and the ability of firms to pass costs onto consumers in some sectors. Cost pass-through combined with free allocation, in turn, partly generated windfall profits. In addition, the relatively low importance of energy costs indicated by their average share in the budgets of most manufacturing industries may have limited the impact of the EU ETS. Finally, small but significant stimulating effects on innovation have been found so far. Several factors suggest that over-allocation is likely to remain substantial in the upcoming periods of the scheme. Therefore, we expect to see no negative competitiveness effects from the EU ETS in Phases III and IV (2013-2030). Key policy insights Empirical literature on the EU ETS shows that there have been hardly any effects on firms' competitiveness or profitability. One main explanation is a large over-allocation of emissions allowances leading to a price drop. This reduced incentives for innovation. Moreover, firms were able to pass costs on to consumers in some sectors which partly generated windfall profits. Innovation effects have so far been small but positive. We expect to see no negative competitiveness effects on regulated firms in the near future suggesting that no further reliefs for regulated firms are required. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Petalomonas sphagnophila is a poorly studied plastid-lacking euglenid flagellate living in Sphagnum-dominated peatlands. Here we present a broad-ranging microscopic, molecular and microspectrophotometric analysis of uncultured P. sphagnophila collected from four field locations in Nova Scotia, Canada. Consistent with its morphological characteristics, 18S ribosomal DNA (rDNA) phylogenies indicate that P. sphagnophila is specifically related to Petalomonas cantuscygni, the only other Petalomonas species sequenced to date. One of the peculiar characteristics of P. sphagnophila is the presence of several green-pigmented particles ∼5 μm in diameter in its cytoplasm, which a previously published study suggested to be cyanobacterial endosymbionts. New data presented here, however, suggest that the green intracellular body may not be a cyanobacterium but rather an uncharacterized prokaryote yet to be identified by molecular sequencing. 16S rDNA library sequencing and fluorescence in situ hybridizations show that P. sphagnophila also harbors several other endobionts, including bacteria that represent five novel genus-level groups (one firmicute and four different proteobacteria). 16S rDNA phylogenies suggest that three of these endobionts are related to obligate intracellular bacteria such as Rickettsiales and Coxiella, while the others are related to the Daphnia pathogen Spirobacillus cienkowskii or belong to the Thermoactinomycetaceae. TEM, 16S rDNA library sequencing and a battery of PCR experiments show that the presence of the five P. sphagnophila endobionts varies markedly among the four geographic collections and even among individuals collected from the same location but at different time points. Our study adds significantly to the growing evidence for complex and dynamic protist–bacterial associations in nature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Microbial rhodopsins are membrane proteins that utilize a retinal chromophore to harvest sunlight for energetic and photosensory functions. Recently, a group of novel rhodopsin sequences named ‘actinorhodopsins’ (ActRs) was hypothesized to exist among uncultured planktonic Actinobacteria. ActRs were discovered by mining metagenomic data obtained during the Venter Institute's Global Ocean Sampling expedition, from a hypersaline lagoon, two estuaries and a freshwater lake. On the basis of these findings, and many studies that show Actinobacteria are common inhabitants of lakes, we predicted that ActR genes would likely be present in other freshwater habitats and among the genomes of cultivated Actinobacteria. Using degenerate polymerase chain reaction primers, we discovered an ActR gene present in an actinobacterial isolate of the family Microbacteriaceae. Isolate MWH-Uga1 was cultivated prior to this study from a freshwater pond in Uganda and belongs to a group of Actinobacteria previously identified in freshwater ecosystems. ActR genes were also discovered present in numerous mixed cultures containing freshwater Actinobacteria and among environmental DNA samples obtained from three freshwater sources; a small woodland pond and the Laurentian Great Lakes Superior and Erie. An analysis of small subunit ribosomal RNA genes from metagenomic DNA samples harboring ActR genes suggests that organisms belonging to the acI lineage, an uncultured group of Actinobacteria commonly present in fresh waters, may utilize rhodopsins. The co-occurrence of an acI organism with a specific ActR variant in a mixed culture supports our hypothesis.The ISME Journal (2009) 3, 726–737; doi:10.1038/ismej.2009.13; published online 26 February 2009 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Female labor market activity is dependent on the presence and the age of a child, but how do the determinants develop in magnitude and significance with the child's age? Using German SOEP data from 1991 to 2006 for mothers with young children, the change in maternal labor supply when the child is one, two, and three years old is explicitly addressed. According to the tobit regression results for precise working hours, maternal labor supply becomes increasingly responsive to economic incentives - mainly to imputed wages - as the child grows. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Petalomonas sphagnophila is a poorly studied plastid-lacking euglenid flagellate living in Sphagnum-dominated peatlands. Here we present a broad-ranging microscopic, molecular and microspectrophotometric analysis of uncultured P. sphagnophila collected from four field locations in Nova Scotia, Canada. Consistent with its morphological characteristics, 18S ribosomal DNA (rDNA) phylogenies indicate that P. sphagnophila is specifically related to Petalomonas cantuscygni, the only other Petalomonas species sequenced to date. One of the peculiar characteristics of P. sphagnophila is the presence of several green-pigmented particles approximately 5 mum in diameter in its cytoplasm, which a previously published study suggested to be cyanobacterial endosymbionts. New data presented here, however, suggest that the green intracellular body may not be a cyanobacterium but rather an uncharacterized prokaryote yet to be identified by molecular sequencing. 16S rDNA library sequencing and fluorescence in situ hybridizations show that P. sphagnophila also harbors several other endobionts, including bacteria that represent five novel genus-level groups (one firmicute and four different proteobacteria). 16S rDNA phylogenies suggest that three of these endobionts are related to obligate intracellular bacteria such as Rickettsiales and Coxiella, while the others are related to the Daphnia pathogen Spirobacillus cienkowskii or belong to the Thermoactinomycetaceae. TEM, 16S rDNA library sequencing and a battery of PCR experiments show that the presence of the five P. sphagnophila endobionts varies markedly among the four geographic collections and even among individuals collected from the same location but at different time points. Our study adds significantly to the growing evidence for complex and dynamic protist-bacterial associations in nature.

A leading hypothesis for the role of bacteria in inflammatory bowel diseases is that an imbalance in normal gut flora is a prerequisite for inflammation. Testing this hypothesis requires comparisons between the microbiota compositions of ulcerative colitis and Crohn's disease patients and those of healthy individuals. In this study, we obtained biopsy samples from patients with Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis and from healthy controls. Bacterial DNA was extracted from the tissue samples, amplified using universal bacterial 16S rRNA gene primers, and cloned into a plasmid vector. Insert-containing colonies were picked for high-throughput sequencing, and sequence data were analyzed, yielding species-level phylogenetic data. The clone libraries yielded 3,305 sequenced clones, representing 151 operational taxonomical units. There was no significant difference between floras from inflamed and healthy tissues from within the same individual. Proteobacteria were significantly (P = 0.0007) increased in Crohn's disease patients, as were Bacteroidetes (P < 0.0001), while Clostridia were decreased in that group (P < 0.0001) in comparison with the healthy and ulcerative colitis groups, which displayed no significant differences. Thus, the bacterial flora composition of Crohn's patients appears to be significantly altered from that of healthy controls, unlike that of ulcerative colitis patients. Imbalance in flora in Crohn's disease is probably not sufficient to cause inflammation, since microbiotas from inflamed and noninflamed tissues were of similar compositions within the same individual.