Ligand-gated ion channels mediate fast synaptic transmission in the central nervous s- tem (CNS) and at ganglionic and neuromuscular synapses. The nicotinic acetylcholine - ceptor (nAChR) is a member of the ligand-gated ion channel superfamily, which includes the 5-HT , glycine and GABA type A and C receptors. These receptors are known as Cys- 3 loop receptors, as all of them have a conserved sequence containing a pair of cysteines separated by 13 residues and linked by a disulfide bridge. nAChRs can be divided into two groups: muscle receptors, which are found at the skeletal neuromuscular junction where they mediate neuromuscular transmission, and neuronal receptors, which are found throughout the peripheral and central nervous system. Many of the early studies carried out on the subunit composition and structure of the nAChRs were performed on receptors isolated from the electric organ of Torpedo californica, as this tissue is very rich in nAChRs, and they were found to have a high degree of homology with the embryonic v- tebrate muscle type receptor. Muscle nAChRs are made up of five subunits arranged around a central pore (Fig. 1A, B). In Torpedo electric organ and vertebrate fetal muscle, the subunit composition is (a1) b1gd, and in adult muscle the g subunit is replaced by the e to give an (a1)b1ed 2 2 composition (Mishina et al. 1986).

Named a 2013 Doody's Core Title

Doody's Medical Reviews Score: 92, 4 Stars

" This book] is well written and achieves its aim of exploring the meaning of quality from a range of perspectives. It has a welcome focus on the views of residents, and the authors are to be congratulated for the efforts they have made to capture these views...This book will be of interest to a broad audience in relation to AL and other residential care settings, including managers, commissioners, care staff, researchers, students and also the wider public."--Ageing & Society

Considering that seventy-four million baby boomers will be the next generation of assisted living residents, there is a great need to create, sustain, and evaluate quality in these settings. Whereas most books focus on quality of care, this is the only volume to explicitly delve into the lives of those who inhabit assisted living facilities, seeking to understand and evaluate their perceived ideas of what constitutes quality of life.

"Quality Assisted Living" provides results from a National Institute on Aging-funded study that gathered information from not only residents, but also staff and family members, who are considered experts who can better help us to understand how quality should be conceived and evaluated. The volume addresses the complexities underlying seemingly clear cut issues and provides concrete suggestions for reframing problems in order to find better solutions. Plentiful stories and quotations are used to identity those elements of assisted living that are most conducive to a satisfying quality of life, and address how this research has led to a consideration of quality as a process rather than as a single condition. Key Features

• Employs the views and voices of research participants
• Provides down-to-earth and directly applicable results
• Written in a language that is accessible to a wide readership
• Describes complex social situation within the wall of AL
• Examines issues arising from collective living such as regulations, financing and diverse resident needs
• Uses real life stories to illustrate key points of the narrative

The present volume summarizes some of the important recent developments in the field of metallic glasses. A variety of new "amorphization" methods such as hydrogen absorption, thermal interdiffusion reactions, irradiation and mechanical alloying are presented and various thermodynamic and experimental aspects of these techniques are discussed in detail. A chapter is devoted to glassy metals used as catalyst precursors yielding metal catalysts with unusual chemical and structural properties. The interrelation between electronic and ionic structures in glassy and liquid metals gives fascinating insights in the basic properties of the non-crystalline state of matter.

For South Koreans, the twenty years from the early 1960s to late 1970s were the best and worst of times-a period of unprecedented economic growth and of political oppression that deepened as prosperity spread. In this masterly account, Carter J. Eckert finds the roots of South Korea's dramatic socioeconomic transformation in the country's long history of militarization-a history personified in South Korea's paramount leader, Park Chung Hee. The first volume of a comprehensive two-part history, Park Chung Hee and Modern Korea: The Roots of Militarism, 1866-1945 reveals how the foundations of the dynamic but strongly authoritarian Korean state that emerged under Park were laid during the period of Japanese occupation. As a cadet in the Manchurian Military Academy, Park and his fellow officers absorbed the Imperial Japanese Army's ethos of victory at all costs and absolute obedience to authority. Japanese military culture decisively shaped Korea's postwar generation of military leaders. When Park seized power in an army coup in 1961, he brought this training and mentality to bear on the project of Korean modernization. Korean society under Park exuded a distinctively martial character, Eckert shows. Its hallmarks included the belief that the army should intervene in politics in times of crisis; that a central authority should plan and monitor the country's economic system; that the Korean people's "can do" spirit would allow them to overcome any challenge; and that the state should maintain a strong disciplinary presence in society, reserving the right to use violence to maintain order.

Diese Sammlung beschaftigt sich mit den infolge zunehmender Globalisierung und Internationalisierung ablaufenden epochalen gesellschaftlichen Veranderungen. Neben empirischen Prozessanalysen werden Szenarien kunftiger gesellschaftlicher Entwicklungen einschliesslich neuer individueller Identitatsformen dargestellt. Deutschland ist infolge der Wiedervereinigung in besonderem Mass gesellschaftlichen Veranderungen unterworfen. Es werden noch bestehende Unterschiede in einigen psychologischen Parametern (z. B. in der Alltagskultur, in den Selbstangaben zur sozialen Integration) zwischen Ost- und Westdeutschen thematisiert und (die offenbar uberwiegenden) Gemeinsamkeiten referiert."

Untersucht werden in dieser Verlaufsstudie Patienten, die nach einer koronaren Bypassoperation am beruflichen Scheideweg stehen. Ziel der Erwerbstatigen ist es, nach der Operation eine sinnvolle Alltagsstrukturierung, ihre Respektabilitat als Gesellschaftsmitglied und ihren bisherigen Lebensstandard sicherzustellen bzw. zu optimieren, sei es - je nach Lebenslage - durch eine Ruckkehr zur Arbeit oder durch eine Fruhberentung. Die Studie zeigt, dass bei der Umsetzung der beruflichen Entscheidung jeweils spezifische, aber verallgemeinerbare berufliche, familiare, gesundheitliche und psychische Kontexte eine erleichternde oder erschwerende Rolle spielen.

Ausgehend von den psychosozialen Problemen hautkranker Personen werden medizinisch-psychologische Grundlagen in ihrer Wertigkeit fur die Betreuung dieser Patienten zur Anwendung gebracht. Zunachst wird bei Patienten mit chronisch rezidivierender Urtikaria, Alopezie, Psoriasis und Neurodermitis gezeigt, dass kritische Lebensereignisse in engem, aber unterschiedlichem Zusammenhang mit diesen Erkrankungen stehen. Des weiteren werden die Krankheitsmodelle bei Psoriasis- und Neurodermitispatienten analysiert. Nach der Reflexion uber psychodiagnostische Konsequenzen schliesst die Arbeit mit Untersuchungen zur Effektivitat psychotherapeutischer Interventionen bei Hautpatienten. Hypnose und Autogenes Training kamen bei Patienten mit progressiver Sklerodermie zur Anwendung, wahrend die Thematische Gruppentherapie zur Verbesserung der Lebensqualitat bei Neurodermitispatienten fuhrte."

Ein zentrales Element des Gesundheitsverhaltens ist das Konsultationsverhalten. Ob ein Kranker einen Arzt aufsucht oder nicht hangt nur zu einem kleinen Teil von den koerperlichen Beschwerden ab. Am Beispiel von Personen mit funktionellen Magen-Darm-Erkrankungen wird untersucht, welche Faktoren zu der Entscheidung beitragen, einen niedergelassenen Arzt aufzusuchen (reprasentative Stichprobe von rund 2200 Personen). Entscheidend sind nicht etwa die Starke der Beschwerden, sondern - neben der Dauer der Beschwerdephasen - vor allem psychologische Faktoren, die der Autor vorstellt.

Trotz ihrer grossen praktischen Bedeutung fand die Gruppenpsychotherapie in der Psychotherapieforschung bisher vergleichsweise wenig Beachtung. In diesem Handbuch werden Methoden der empirischen Gruppentherapieforschung zusammengestellt, die bislang schwer zuganglich waren. Die UEbersicht soll Wissenschaftlern ermoeglichen, Verfahren auszuwahlen, die sich zur Evaluation, zum Studium des Prozesses gruppentherapeutischer Behandlungen und zur Qualitatssicherung in diesem Feld bewahrt haben, Praktiker der Gruppenpsychotherapie finden hier Methoden dargestellt, mit denen sie ihr eigenes Tun begleitend untersuchen koennen. Das Buch fullt somit eine lange bestehende Lucke in der Literatur zur Psychotherapieforschung.

According to conventional interpretations, the Japanese annexation of Korea in 1910 destroyed a budding native capitalist economy on the peninsula and blocked the development of a Korean capitalist class until 1945. In this expansive and provocative study, now available in paperback, Carter J. Eckert challenges the standard view and argues that Japanese imperialism, while politically oppressive, was also the catalyst and cradle of modern Korean industrial development. Ancient ties to China were replaced by new ones to Japan - ties that have continued to shape the South Korean political economy down to the present day. Eckert explores a wide range of themes, including the roots of capitalist development in Korea, the origins of the modern business elite, the nature of Japanese colonial policy and the Japanese colonial state, the relationship between the colonial government and the Korean economic elite, and the nature of Korean collaboration. He conveys a clear sense of the human complexity, archival richness, and intellectual challenge of the historical period. His documentation is thorough; his arguments are compelling and often strikingly innovative.

According to conventional interpretations, the Japanese annexation of Korea in 1910 destroyed a budding native capitalist economy on the peninsula and blocked the development of a Korean capitalist class until 1945. In this expansive and provocative study, now available in paperback, Carter J. Eckert challenges the standard view and argues that Japanese imperialism, while politically oppressive, was also the catalyst and cradle of modern Korean industrial development. Ancient ties to China were replaced by new ones to Japan - ties that have continued to shape the South Korean political economy down to the present day.

Eckert explores a wide range of themes, including the roots of capitalist development in Korea, the origins of the modern business elite, the nature of Japanese colonial policy and the Japanese colonial state, the relationship between the colonial government and the Korean economic elite, and the nature of Korean collaboration. He conveys a clear sense of the human complexity, archival richness, and intellectual challenge of the historical period. His documentation is thorough; his arguments are compelling and often strikingly innovative.

Carter J. Eckert is Yoon Se Young Professor of Korean History at Harvard University.

"Should be ranked among the best in the field of Korean studies and should be required reading for those interested in Korea studies and/or serious about Japanese and Asian studies." " -Journal of Asian Studies"

"A superb case study in colonial industrialization."" - American Historical Review"

"Must become required reading for all students of East Asia in the twentieth century." " - Journal of the School of Oriental and African Studies"