Shells of Arctica islandica collected between 1884 and 2004 from A-resund, Kattegat and Skagerrak (Swedish West Coast) were used to monitor local climate variations and the influence of human activities on the local environment. For this purpose, we analysed the growth, structure and chemical composition of these shells and compared them with shells collected from Kiel Bay, Norway and Iceland. The

Tanzania has come a long way in her market-oriented reforms of the past fifteen years, but the performance of agriculture has been less than satisfactory. This paper estimates supply elasticities for individual crops as well as for commodity aggregates (cash and food crops) in order to investigate whether this performance is due to a lack of response on the part of farmers or on other factors. The

BACKGROUND : Recruitment and activation of eosinophils have been studied intensely in asthma and other allergic diseases. Less is known about the infiltration and behaviour of eosinophils during gastric ulcer healing. AIM : To examine the tissue infiltration and activation of eosinophils in the ulcer margin at different time points after ulcer induction (days 1-15). METHODS : Eosinophil peroxidase

Background-To explore potential interrelationships between lipoprotein-associated phosholipase A2 (Lp-PLA(2)), the metabolic syndrome (MetS), and incident cardiovascular disease (CVD). Methods and Results-MetS was defined by the National Cholesterol Education Program Adult treatment Panel III criteria in 4480 nondiabetic Malmo Diet and Cancer Study subjects without history of CVD. Incidence of fir

Insulin resistance has been proposed to be the underlying disorder of the so-called metabolic or insulin resistance syndrome, which represents the clustering in the same individual of several cardiovascular risk factors, such as type 2 diabetes mellitus, hypertension, abdominal obesity, elevated triglycerides and low high-density lipoprotein-cholesterol. As far as the connection of insulin resista

According to a recently developed density functional theory, athermal polymer solutions, in which the solvent particles are smaller than the monomers, may undergo a bulk fluid-fluid phase separation, driven by excluded volume effects. In recent work, we showed that an inert surface immersed in the dilute polymer phase can, in principle, be wetted by the condensed phase. However, we show here that

Objective: Mismatch responses are elicited to changes in sound streams in healthy newborns. In the ideal case, these responses can predict cognitive problems later in life. We employed a multiple deviant paradigm for a fast assessment of the ability of the newborn brain to respond to various types of acoustic changes. Methods: In 12 healthy newborns, we recorded all electroencephalogram (EEG) and

The MYCN protooncogene is involved in the control of cell proliferation, differentiation, and survival of neuroblasts. Deregulation of MYCN by gene amplification contributes to neuroblastoma development and is strongly correlated to advanced disease and poor outcome, emphasizing the urge for new therapeutic strategies targeting MYCN function. The transcription factor N-Myc, encoded by MYCN, regula

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: Although smoking is associated with an increased incidence of cardiovascular disease and death, many smokers remain healthy after many years of smoking. Our objective was to assess whether this variation is related to rate of decline of respiratory function. DESIGN: This was a population-based cohort study, its subjects being men born in 1914 from Malmo, Sweden. METHODS:

Aim: To assess the diagnostic concordance of SCID-II and clinicians' estimation of DSM-III-R personality disorders of substance abusers. Method: Clinical diagnoses of substance abusers in inpatient treatment were compared with SCID-II diagnoses (N = 138). Findings: The overall prevalence of personality disorder was 79% for clinical diagnosis and 80% for SCID-H diagnosis. Substantial agreement was

By interviewing 22 psychiatric nurses, the present study aimed to reveal the meaning and significance of systematic clinical group supervision and supervised individually planned nursing care, using latent content analysis. The interpreted meaning was 'confronting the complexity of ongoing life in daily nursing care' and the interpreted significance was 'strengthening the foundation for nursing ca

Novel triblock copolymers based on central poly( ethylene glycol) ( PEG) or poly( ethylene glycol-co-propylene glycol) (PEGPG) blocks with poly( pentafluorostyrene) (PFS) outer blocks were prepared by Atom Transfer Radical Polymerization (ATRP) with polydispersities on the order of 1.2 - 1.3. The bromoisobutyrate functionalized polyether macroinitiators with molecular masses (M-n) of approx. 10 00

The aim of this article is to analyse and discuss the ethically problematic conflict raised by patients with stroke who refuse nutritional treatment. In analysing this conflict, the focus is on four different aspects: (1) Is nutritional treatment biologically necessary? (2) If necessary, is the reason for refusal a functional disability, lack of appetite or motivation, misunderstanding of the situ

Ferulic acid (FA) and para-coumaric acid (p-CA) may mediate the protective effects of whole-grain cereals against colon cancer. Therefore, the effects of FA and p-CA on the metabolic activity, proliferation, cell cycle phase distribution, and kinetics of the colonic endothelial tumor cell line Caco-2 was studied. Both compounds at 1500 M decreased the number of cells to 43-75% of control after 2-3

Using event-related potentials (ERPs), we examined the relative contributions of familiarity and recollection to recognition memory for items and their study contexts in school-aged children and adults. Whereas adults were able to selectively accept target items and to reject familiar nontarget items in ail exclusion task, this discrimination was more difficult for children, as was evident in the

The rise in the average temperature of earth has been described as global warming which is mainly attributed to the increasing phenomenon of the greenhouse effect. It is believed that global warming can have several harmful effects on human health, both directly and indirectly. Since malaria is greatly influenced by climatic conditions because of its direct relationship with the mosquito populatio

Fatigue crack growth experiments on Inconel 718 have been performed in a scanning electron microscope at room temperature. The investigated cracks were approximately 1-3 mm long and the samples used were thin 10 mm wide plates. The crack opening stress was found to vary significantly, even in the Paris region, for a constant stress ratio. Crack growth was predominantly found to be either growth on