From a cohort of 113 children, followed prospectively from birth during the first three years of life regarding different aspects of acute otitis media (AOM), two study groups were selected for the present investigation: 13 children with recurrent AOM (rAOM, i.e. at least six episodes of AOM during a 12–month period), and 29 children without any AOM episode. The purpose of this study was to analys

We document the impact of blood parasite infections caused by Hepatozoon sp. on water python (Liasis fuscus) life history traits such as growth rates, condition, reproductive output and survival. Individual snakes maintained similar among-year parasite loads. Hepatozoon infections affected python growth rate, i.e. snakes suffering from high infection levels exhibited significantly slower growth co

This chapter presents a case study from a global company developing a new generation of programmable controllers to replace several existing products. The system needs to incorporate support for a large number of I/O systems, network types, and communication protocols. To leverage its global development resources and the competency of different development centers, the company decided to adopt a c

We present a new implementation of the time-resolved fluorescence anisotropy technique for the analysis of carbon nanoparticles directly in a Bunsen-type propane flame. By exploiting femtosecond laser excitation, UV-visible laser-induced fluorescence and time resolution of the experimental set-up, small soot nanoparticles have been identified within the flame. From the measurement of the decay tim

Objective: Cigarette smoking has been reported as "probable" risk factor for Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), a poorly understood disease in terms of aetiology. The extensive longitudinal data of the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC) were used to evaluate age-specific mortality rates from ALS and the role of cigarette smoking on the risk of dying from ALS. Met

We report on a theoretical study of the electronic structure of silicon nanocrystals with a shape of the regular rhombic dodecahedron, based on a tight-binding method. The energies of the lowest unoccupied state and the highest occupied state have been calculated. We have shown that the six-fold degenerate conduction band minima of the bulk silicon crystal are split into a non-degenerate A(1) stat

A molecular phylogeny of the Lecanora rupicola group is presented, based on ITS sequence analyses. The study includes saxicolous and corticolous members of the Lecanora rupicola group as well as other Lecanora species with pruinose apothecia. A phylogenetic hypothesis for species in Lecanora s. lat. and various other genera in Lecanoraceae, based on an alignment-free distance estimation technique,

Patients with knee osteoarthritis (OA) often present with symptoms that warrant bilateral TKAs. There are potential benefits to operating on both knees on the same day, but the safety of simultaneous bilateral TKAs has been questioned. To evaluate whether there were any differences in 30-day mortality between patients having simultaneous bilateral TKAs and those having staged bilateral TKAs, we an

Structural equilibrium properties of transient networks formed by microemulsion droplets and ABA triblock copolymers in solution have been studied by Monte Carlo simulation. The droplets were represented by soft spheres, and the polymers were represented by junctions connected by harmonic bonds with an angular potential regulating the intrinsic chain stiffness. The interaction parameters were sele

Aim Climate is an important determinant of species distributions. We assess different aspects of risk arising from future climate change by quantifying changes in the spatial distribution of future climatic conditions compared with the recent past. Location Europe. Methods A 10' x 10' resolution gridded data set of five climate variables was used to calculate expected changes to the area, distance

Abstract We investigated the female-produced sex pheromone of the solitary bee Andrena nigroaenea and compared it with floral scent of the sexually deceptive orchid Ophrys sphegodes which is pollinated by Andrena nigroaenea males. We identified physiologically and behaviorally active compounds by gas chromatography with electroantennographic detection, gas chromatography-mass spectrometry, and beh

Laser Doppler velocimetry (LDV) measurement and large eddy simulation (LES) were used to study confined isothermal turbulent swirling flows in a model dump combustor. The aim was to gain deeper understanding of the flow and turbulence structures in dump combustors and to examine the capability of LES for prediction of turbulent swirling flows. A refractive index matching technique is used in the L

In this paper results are presented from a range of experiments to explore the feasibility of inserting a ceramic material PZT (lead zirconium titanate) into different kinds of high-aspect-ratio resist moulds. Polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA) and SU-8 on silicon substrates and free-standing SU-8 membranes with microcavities or through-holes (defined by X-ray lithography) have been used as moulding me

The decay of core-excited electronic states in free 1,3 trans butadiene molecules has been studied using high-resolution synchrotron radiation and electron spectrometry. The core-level energy shift between the terminal and central carbon atoms is 0.64 eV making selective excitation of core electrons from these atoms possible. Resonant excitation to the au(*) valence state leads to autoionizing dec

The compatibilizing effect of poly(styrene-graft-ethylene oxide) in polystyrene (PS) blends with poly(n-butyl acrylate) (PBA) and poly(n-butyl acrylate-co-acrylic acid) (PBAAA) was investigated. No significant effects of the graft copolymer on the domain size were found in the PBA blends. By functionalizing PBA with acrylic acid, the average size of the polyacrylate domains was reduced considerabl

In memory retrieval, search can be guided by mental sets towards different subsets of the available evidence. Such retrieval orientations have been suggested to leave an imprint on event-related potentials (ERPs). The present study aimed at characterizing orientations towards perceptual and conceptual evidence in a recognition task, where pictures and words were studied. In the recognition test, i

The relative importance of prior occupancy and of asymmetries in both value of winning and in resource-holding potential for the outcome of animal contests was tested. Bluethroats, Luscinia s. svecica, were offered food ad libitum in the field. Prior to migration, at a moulting site, their weight increased rapidly and peaked after a few days. Lean birds won significantly more interactions than fat

Pulmonary hypertension is frequently seen after lung transplantation. To study how the release of the endothelium-dependent relaxing factor is affected by lung preservation and transplantation, porcine pulmonary arteries were investigated in organ baths. The arteries (1 mm in diameter) were taken from fresh nonperfused lungs (group I), lungs immediately after flush-perfusion with a low-potassium-d