Lichtgedanken 03

Rubrik 65 03 | LICHT GEDANKEN How does hypnosis work? Psychologists at the Department of Biological and Clinical Psychology have shown that even an imagined »obstruction« can disrupt a person’s vision. In the journal »Scientific Re- ports« they presented the results of a study that reveals what happens in the brain of a person under hypnosis when proces- sing visual stimuli (DOI:10.1038/s41598-017-05195-2). For her experiment, Dr Barbara Schmidt of the working group led by Prof. Wolfgang Miltner tested three groups of partici- pants: people who were very suggestible and easy to hypno- tize; people who were moderately suggestible; and a group of people who were more resistant to hypnosis. Under hypnosis, participants had to count symbols on a screen in front of them. At the same time, they were told to imagine that there was a wooden board in front of their eyes. The suggested visual blockade made the number of counting errors rise sharply. The participants’ brain activity, which was recorded via EEG during the task, showed that their basic visual perception was intact, even with the imagined obstruction. However, sec- ondary processing operations, such as counting the symbols, were impaired. sh Laser beams from the sky Laser beams are frequently used to study the chemical com- position of the atmosphere. Researchers send laser pulses into the sky and then analyse the light that is scattered back. Ho- wever, it would be better if the light could also return to earth as a laser beam, because its light sends a stronger signal and it is easier to read information from it. Dr Daniil Kartashov of the Institute of Optics and Quantum Electronics in Jena and Prof. M. Shneider of Princeton University (USA) have now established the theoretical principles for such sky lasers (DOI: 10.1063/1.4978745). For this, the researchers exploit the properties of the air. The use of ultrashort laser pulses creates a kind of »lens« in the air. This lens focuses more strongly the laser beam that is emitted and creates fine plasma channels. The light in these filaments, as they are called, supports a broad spectrum of radiation, which can provide information on the chemical composition of the environment. By selecting suitable parameters, such as plasma temperature and density, the laser can interact with the nitrogen in the atmosphere in such a way that a real sky laser is produced. sh Crossing borders Four-volume encyclopaedia provides first comprehen- sive overview of private international law In the 21st century, many people’s lives are very internatio- nal. They travel all over the world, buy goods from countless countries and marry people from other cultures. But what happens if the flight is cancelled, the car breaks down or a couple falls out of love? »Law has not managed to keep pace with the dramatic internationalisation of our lives. It is still to a great extent national and looks different in Germany from the way it looks in England, France or Italy,« says Prof. Giesela Rühl (photo on the right). Her area of expertise, private inter- national law, is concerned with the question of how to solve the problems of cross-border legal relationships. Rühl explains that with globalization the number of international disputes and legal proceedings has in- creased. National and international lawmakers, but especially the European Union, have responded to this si- tuation in recent decades and have adopted appropriate regulations. However, an overview of this confusing and rapidly growing area of law has been lacking – until now. The »Encyclopedia of Private International Law«, coordi- nated by Prof. Rühl’s department, has just been published. The four-volume English-language work contains 4,000 pa- ges that comprehensively describe the history, methods and content of private international law. As the central coordina- tion point, Giesela Rühl’s department brought together all the threads of the mammoth project funded by the Fritz Thyssen Foundation, which involved 181 authors from 57 countries. The first two volumes of the encyclopaedia contain contri- butions on private law topics. Volume three encompasses country reports on private international law from 80 states, including Thailand, Tunisia and Nigeria, which had hardly been described before. Finally, the fourth volume contains a collection of legal texts from all over the world, translated into English. »This volume is of central importance for further research, because it makes many laws available to an inter- national readership for the first time,« says Prof. Rühl. The entire work will soon be found on library shelves, mainly of universities and other educational institutions. jd Ticker