Many pregnant women experience fear, worry or anxiety relating to the upcoming childbirth. The aim of this cross-sectional study was to investigate possible subgroups in a sample of 206 pregnant women (mean age 29.4 years), reporting fear of birth in mid-pregnancy. Comparisons were made between nulliparous and parous women. In a series of cluster analyses, validated psychological instruments were

Scholars of teaching and learning have increasingly acknowledged the significance of attending to the experiences and development of undergraduate and graduate student teaching assistants (TAs). The present study aims to contribute to this growing body of research by exploring the ways in which TAs at one Canadian university make decisions during and about their teaching. Drawing on data from semi

Background: Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the most prevalent cause of dementia with vascular dementia (VaD) being second alongside with mixed AD and VaD, according to some. For some time, it has been proposed that cardiovascular disease (CaVD), hypertension, and diabetes mellitus (DM), which are known risk factors for VaD, also are associated with and contribute to the development of AD. Objective:

This paper investigates the determinants of the propensity of firms to export new products, and focuses on the role of new imported inputs. Importing offers access to new technologies and better combination of inputs that can lead to new or improved products for the export markets. Based on a sample of more than 14,000 Swedish manufacturing firms over the period 2001–2012, we show that importing n

Searchable symmetric encryption (SSE) schemes are commonly proposed to enable search in a protected unstructured documents such as email archives or any set of sensitive text files. However, some SSE schemes have been recently proposed in order to protect relational databases. Most of the previous attacks on SSE schemes have only targeted its common use case, protecting unstructured data. In this

We analyze new Swedish data on the portfolio holdings of large blockholders and find that firm value increases with the weight of a stock in a large blockholder's portfolio. In our sample, this weight may be greater than 50%. We are the first to show that this value premium is correlated with portfolio weights for any large blockholders, not just institutions. We find some evidence that indicates

Background/objectives: Hypothalamic obesity (HO) occurs in 50% of patients with the pituitary tumor craniopharyngioma (CP). Attempts have been made to predict the risk of HO based on hypothalamic (HT) damage on magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), but none have included volumetry. We performed qualitative and quantitative volumetric analyses of HT damage. The results were explored in relation to feed

Objectives: The first aim, was to compare participant compliance with postoperative voice rest advice in two groups. The second aim was to compare vocal function and recovery in the short-term, seven days post-surgery and in the long-term, 3–6 months post-surgery. Design: Preliminary randomized prospective blind clinical trial. Methods: Twenty patients scheduled for surgery for benign vocal fold l

DLE (Dry Low Emission) techniques are widely used today to reduce the harmful NOx emissions associated with high combustion temperatures. In many DLE systems the fuel and air are premixed which effectively keep the flame temperature as low as possible, ideally equal to the turbine inlet temperature. By using premixing stability issues such as flash back and combustion driven dynamics may occur. Op

Background/Aims: The incidence of lectin allergic disease is increasing in recent decades, and definitive treatment is still lacking. Identification of B and T-cell epitopes of allergen will be useful in understanding the allergen antibody responses as well as aiding in the development of new diagnostics and therapy regimens for lectin poisoning. In the current study, we mainly addressed these que

This work visualized water-silicone oil two-phase flow patterns both at the inlet cross-junction and in the main square microchannel with a channel width of 400 µm. Tubing/threading, dripping and jetting were identified at the inlet junction while annular, slug and droplet flows were categorized in the main microchannel at 50 mm downstream of the junction. Flow patterns were represented in terms o

Acid-base equilibria of carboxylic acids and alkyl amines in the aqueous surface region were studied using surface-sensitive X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and molecular dynamics simulations. Solutions of these organic compounds were examined as a function of pH, concentration and chain length to investigate the distribution of acid and base form in the surface region as compared to the aqueous

The aim of this study is to develop a model capable of predicting the behavior of a district heating substation, including being able to distinguish datasets from well performing substations from datasets containing faults. The model developed in the study is based on machine learning algorithms and the model is trained on data from a Swedish district heating substation. A number of different mode

The major histocompatibility complex (MHC) has long served as a model for the evolution of adaptive genetic diversity in wild populations. Pathogen-mediated selection is thought to be a main driver of MHC diversity, but it remains elusive to what degree selection shapes MHC diversity in complex biogeographical scenarios where other evolutionary processes (e.g. genetic drift and introgression) may

We present a method for complex frequency estimation in several variables, extending the classical one-dimensional ESPRIT algorithm, and consider how to work with data sampled on nonstandard domains, i.e., going beyond multirectangles.

Context: Several drugs are approved and available for the treatment of lower urinary tract symptoms (LUTS) in men and women. However, the vast majority of available data, upon which the approval and recommendation in guidelines are based, considered only the role of the monotherapies and did not evaluate possible combination therapies. Objective: This systematic review analyzes the efficacy and ad

This work aims to explore possible ways of improving the precision of ignition measurements in the cone calorimeter. Both inherent repeatability of parts of the testing equipment and operator-dependent variations are considered. Inherent repeatability is indicated to be slightly improved if the test samples used are circular rather than square. Operator-dependent variation is discussed in terms of

The climate sensitivity of carbon (C) cycling in Arctic terrestrial ecosystems is a major unknown in the Earth system. There is a lack of knowledge about the mechanisms that drive the interactions between photosynthesis, respiration, and changes in C stocks across full annual cycles in Arctic tundra. We use a calibrated and validated model (soil-plant-atmosphere; SPA) to estimate net ecosystem exc