Media coverage, fake news, and the diffusion of xenophobic violence: A fine-grained county-level analysis of the geographic and temporal patterns of arson attacks during the German refugee crisis 2015-2017.

Over the year of 2015, about 800.000 refugees arrived in Germany, a number which equals around one percent of the total population. This migration process was labelled the refugee crisis and was accompanied by a contested debate. On the one hand, there was a widespread willingness to voluntarily help arriving refugees, on the other hand, the number of xenophobic attacks against refugees drastically increased. Our paper will focus on a specific form of xenophobic violence with a strong symbolic meaning: We analyze how arson attacks against collective accommodation facilities spread. Using a comprehensive web chronicle, we collected temporal and spatial data about arson attacks perpetrated on accommodations or facilities for refugees in Germany between 2015 and 2017. We counted 251 attacks, assigned each incident location to its county, merged county characteristics such as population size, proportion of foreigners, right-wing party support, and-going beyond previous research-added geographically coded media data from two digital archives. Besides newspaper contents of a popular nation-wide tabloid, we use a data base that covers local fake news on refugees. Based on these data, we constructed a balanced panel data set with the counties as geographical units and periods of 14 days as the time dimension. Results indicate that social contagion drives the diffusion process of arson attacks. Spatial proximity of previous attacks increased the propensity of attacks in the neighboring counties. Attacks were more likely to occur in counties with larger populations and fewer foreigners. While local newspaper coverage did not impact the diffusion of xenophobic attacks, fake news were relevant-but only in East Germany. We also considered two particularly salient threatening events that received nation-wide media attention, namely Merkel's "border opening" on the 5th of September 2015 and the sexual assaults occurring during New Year's 2015/16 in Cologne. Both were followed by temporary increases in violence.

Intergenerational wealth transmission and homeownership in Europe-a comparative perspective.

The literature on social and wealth inequality has long acknowledged the importance of intergenerational wealth transmission (IWT) to inequality in homeownership tenure. However, it has paid insufficient attention to the institutional structures that moderate these inequalities. Therefore, in this study, we ask how institutional factors via differential housing finance systems and governmental housing policies, moderate the association between IWT and homeownership tenure. This is done by using the framework of housing regime configurations and mortgage market financialization. To do so, we pooled data for 20 European countries from the European Central Bank's Household Finance and Consumption Survey (HFCS) for 2010-2017, for household heads aged 25-40. Our main findings show consistent contradiction to the welfare state-homeownership "trade-off" hypothesis: that is, when the rental market is more heavily regulated, it is actually young adults who benefited from IWT or who received higher value of IWT have a higher probability of mortgaged homeownership. Paradoxically, when housing finance institutions are more active and generous, the wealthiest young adults hold an advantage in mortgaged homeownership. Therefore, liberal mortgage markets actually serve to enable wealthier young adults to reproduce and preserve their parental wealth status. Further, when housing prices are less affordable (median mortgage-to-income ratio), those who have received a higher amount of IWT hold an advantage in mortgaged homeownership. We discuss the implications of our findings, which cut across the socioeconomic, spatial, and demographical arenas.

Changes of Self-Rated Health Status, Overweight and Physical Activity During Childhood and Adolescence-The Ratchet Effect of High Parental Socioeconomic Status.

Childhood and adolescence are important life periods for the development of health status and physical activity (PA) behaviours. This study analyses the stability and potential changes of self-rated health status, overweight and PA behaviour over time, specifically focusing on the age and the socioeconomic status of children and adolescents. We employ representative longitudinal data for German children and adolescents from the Motorik-Modul Study and the German Health Interview and Examination Survey. Using four different dichotomous health status and PA indicators (self-rated health status [SRHS]; overweight; moderate-to-vigorous PA; and leisure sports engagement), we report within-person transition rates across the panel waves when the survey was taken (2003-2006, 2009-2012, and 2014-2017). Additionally, we report results of logistic regressions estimating the impact of children's age, gender, migration background, and their parents' socioeconomic status on these transition rates. The transition rates show mixed results. While children and adolescents from highly problematic states reporting bad SRHS and no leisure sports engagement at an early stage tend to improve later on, overweight children mostly stay overweight. Age and social inequality indicators correlate with some of the chances of improving or worsening the health and PA states. Most clearly, high parental status prevents the health status and PA from worsening over all transitions, particularly becoming overweight, representing a ratchet effect. The results of the present study underline that health policy needs to target specific groups to reduce social inequality in the health status and PA of children and adolescents.

Sports participation of children and adolescents in Germany: disentangling the influence of parental socioeconomic status.

BACKGROUND: Participation in sports and physical activity (PA) is a critical resource for children's health and social development. This study analyzes how the parental socioeconomic status (SES) of children and adolescents affects their PA in sports clubs (organized sports) and outside of sports clubs (unorganized sports) and tests whether the potential impact of parental SES is mediated by the opportunity structure of their residential area (walkability, infrastructure, etc.) and by family and peer support for PA. Furthermore, PA is analyzed respecting differences by gender and migration background. METHODS: Using representative data from the MoMo/KiGGS study (2009-2012 and 2014-2017), we take into account about 8000 measurements from about 7000 subjects. We estimate hurdle regression models to analyze the minutes per week spent on sports activities. RESULTS: Results show that children with a higher parental SES, children living in areas with many opportunities for PA, and children receiving family and peer support are more physically active than children without these features. Controlled for opportunities and support, status effects are small but visible. The differences regarding parental SES are much more apparent for organized sports than for unorganized sports, indicating the relevance of economic resources. Boys are more active than girls, whereas there is no clear effect of migration background. CONCLUSIONS: The coefficient of parental SES on organized sports most probably relates to the resources needed to participate in sports clubs, including fees and equipment. Lower membership fees might potentially help to integrate children with low parental SES into sports clubs and thereby make organized sports more accessible to all social classes.

[Therapeutic vaccination for tumors and neurodegenerative diseases]. / Therapeutische Immunisierungen gegen Tumore und neurodegenerative Erkrankungen.

Therapeutic vaccines are intended for the treatment of established diseases by harnessing the patient's own immune system. In this article we discuss therapeutic areas that are of relevance for therapeutic vaccination, i.e., oncology and neurodegenerative diseases. Clinical and regulatory aspects related to the manufacture and clinical use of actively personalized cancer vaccines are thoroughly reviewed. This applies to the regulatory classification of genomic sequencing approaches to identify tumor-specific mutations, combination therapies with checkpoint inhibitors, clinical study designs, and the use of suitable adjuvants and drug substances. Huge amounts of data (big data) are increasingly being generated in the area of personalized therapies; we briefly address the impact and usability of big data in regulatory procedures.

RNA-Based Adjuvants: Immunoenhancing Effect on Antiviral Vaccines and Regulatory Considerations.

During the last decade, a wide variety of cellular RNA sensors and structural characteristics of their agonists have been identified. On the basis of this knowledge, RNA formulations were developed as innovative adjuvant candidates. In contrast to DNA, RNA does not have genotoxic potential and is rapidly degraded. In many aspects, RNA mimics viral infections and induces considerably strong immune responses. Additionally, RNA-based adjuvants can be designed so that distinct RNA sensors can be triggered according to requirements of individual vaccines. Furthermore, RNA can be synthesized in vitro in a cell-free system, and recent developments in formulation technology have led to reduced RNA degradation within the body. These features qualify RNA as a promising adjuvant candidate. Here, we discuss latest developments in the field of RNA-based adjuvants and highlight differences between human and mouse nucleic acid sensors, which constitute a challenge in the development of RNA-based adjuvants. Finally, we discuss how RNA-based adjuvants are currently handled with regard to regulatory requirements.

The European Regulatory Environment of RNA-Based Vaccines.

A variety of different mRNA-based drugs are currently in development. This became possible, since major breakthroughs in RNA research during the last decades allowed impressive improvements of translation, stability and delivery of mRNA. This article focuses on antigen-encoding RNA-based vaccines that are either directed against tumors or pathogens. mRNA-encoded vaccines are developed both for preventive or therapeutic purposes. Most mRNA-based vaccines are directly administered to patients. Alternatively, primary autologous cells from cancer patients are modified ex vivo by the use of mRNA and then are adoptively transferred to patients. In the EU no regulatory guidelines presently exist that specifically address mRNA-based vaccines. The existing regulatory framework, however, clearly defines that mRNA-based vaccines in most cases have to be centrally approved. Interestingly, depending on whether RNA-based vaccines are directed against tumors or infectious disease, they are formally considered gene therapy products or not, respectively. Besides an overview on the current clinical use of mRNA vaccines in various therapeutic areas a detailed discussion of the current regulatory situation is provided and regulatory perspectives are discussed.

[Tumor vaccines and peptide-loaded dendritic cells (DCs)]. / Tumorimpfstoffe und peptidbeladene dendritische Zellen (DCs).

Vaccines are usually intended to prevent the spread of infectious diseases. Due to increasing knowledge about the immune system and its role in malignant disease, the development of therapeutic vaccines, which are intended to treat established tumors, has begun. For the induction of therapeutic immunity towards tumors, either tumor-specific or overexpressed antigens can be used. Tumor-specific antigens are mainly or exclusively expressed in tumors. It is assumed that they can thus be more easily recognized by the immune system than overexpressed antigens. Overexpressed antigens are expressed in both tumors and healthy tissues and therefore bear the risk of autoimmunity. In this review article, we discuss different approaches of therapeutic cancer vaccinations based on cells and on other drug substances. Moreover, we address the possibilities of authorizing cancer vaccines in the EU and in Germany.

Manufacturing and quality control of cell-based tumor vaccines: a scientific and a regulatory perspective.

Tumor vaccines play an increasingly important role in the therapy of various malignant diseases. The efficacy of these new products is currently being explored in many clinical trials all over the world. Cell-based tumor vaccines can be classified as somatic cell therapy, or, depending on whether genetic modifications have been applied, as gene-transfer medicinal products. Few specific guidance documents are available to standardize the development and production of cell-based tumor vaccines. Here, we review the different types of cell-based cancer vaccines that are currently being used in clinical trials. Furthermore, we discuss regulatory guidance documents available in the European Union and describe methods that have been applied so far to ensure that the cell-based vaccines meet acceptable standards, including potency assays.

A CpG-rich bidirectional promoter induces the T-cell death-associated gene 51 and downregulates an inversely oriented transcript during early T-cell activation.

The human T-cell death-associated gene 51 (TDAG51) is upregulated upon lymphocyte stimulation and in the context of ER stress. Moreover, TDAG51 plays a role in programmed cell death and tumorigenesis. We performed an extensive TDAG51 promoter analysis and found a strong CpG-rich bidirectional promoter within the first 582 nucleotides of the TDAG51 reference DNA complementary to RNA (cDNA). Upon stimulation of primary human T cells, this promoter modulated the downregulation of a newly detected head-to-head oriented transcript. Mapping of the transcription start points revealed that the 5' regions of the TDAG51 mRNA and of the newly identified transcript did not overlap in T cells. Thus, the TDAG51 locus shows an operon-like organization of two head-to-head oriented transcripts that are inversely regulated in T lymphocytes by a CpG-rich bidirectional promoter.