The fibrinolytic system (the plasminogen activating system) is involved in several physiological and pathological processes. Through the transformation of plasminogen to the aggressive broad spectrum protease plasmin, potent enzymatic activity is released. Plasmin acts directly on connective tissue components, and indirectly by activating proforms of the metalloproteinases. The destructive potenti

Background and Objectives: Hand eczema is a chronic disease with negative impact on quality of life (QoL). In this study, QoL in hand eczema patients is assessed and related to age, sex, severity, and diagnostic subgroups. Methods: A total of 416 patients with hand eczema from 10 European patch test clinics participated in the study. Data on QoL were obtained from a self-administered questionnaire

Patients with type 1 diabetes mellitus and with proliferative retinopathy often have a concomitant diabetic nephropathy. However, in cross-sectional studies it has been shown that 35% of patients with proliferative retinopathy do not show signs of diabetic nephropathy. The aim of the present study was to examine the incidence of diabetic nephropathy in type 1 diabetic patients with proliferative r

The two main sugars in the agricultural by-product corn stover are glucose and xylose. Co-fermentation of glucose and xylose at high content of water-insoluble solids (WIS) without detoxification is a prerequisite to obtain high ethanol concentration and to reduce production costs. A recombinant strain of Saccharomyces cerevisiae, TMB3400, was used in simultaneous saccharification and fermentation

Urban water balances differ from their rural counterparts due to extreme spatial heterogeneity, water imported from outside catchment boundaries and changed flow paths (e.g., drainage pipes and impervious surfaces). Urban catchments are characterized by increased peak discharges and fast response times, each contributing to specific environmental problems. The water balances of towns in the northe

Reproductive success of territorial female mammals depends partly on their capability to defend their young from conspecific intruders. However, how this is related to the characteristics of females and their litter sizes is largely unknown. The defence activity of 25 female bank voles (Clethrionomys glareolus) in relation to the number of offspring was studied in a behavioural arena by manipulati

Background/Aims: The liver is a major target organ of graft versus host disease (GvHD) with massive infiltration of alloreactive lymphocytes resulting in hepatitis and hepatocyte injury. Although adhesive mechanisms have been implicated in the biology of GvHD hepatitis, the identity of homing receptors involved in the initial recruitment of cells from the blood is not known. Methods: We have devel

A property of algebraic dependence between two commuting elements is shown to hold in a more general setting than that in which it has previously been established. Key conditions are identified and some methods for establishing them are given. Moreover the class of algebras with a generalised Weyl structure, generalising the so-called Generalised Weyl Algebras (GWAs) or hyperbolic rings, is introd

Process parameter optimization for the supercritical CO2 extraction of rye bran to obtain alkylresorcinols (AR) was studied by carrying out a two-level fractional design experiment. Four parameters, temperature, CO2 flow rate, cosolvent percentage, and extraction time, presumed to influence the extraction process, were analyzed. A tentative fractionation of the crude extract was also carried out a

We study how the dimension of the invariant set of an interval map with a hole depends on the size of the hole. Under some assumptions on the map, it is shown that the derivative of the dimension with respect to the size of the hole is bounded and that the dimension is bounded away from zero.

We construct the first known complex-valued harmonic morphisms from the non-compact Lie groups View the MathML source, SU*(2n) and View the MathML source equipped with their standard Riemannian metrics. We then introduce the notion of a bi-eigenfamily and employ this to construct the first known solutions on the non-compact Riemannian SO*(2n), SO(p,q), SU(p,q) and Sp(p,q). Applying a duality princ

Increasing pressure on innovativeness and collaboration is supposed to strengthen the importance of geographical proximity in innovation systems. But simultaneously there are;globalization forces' and information and communication technology (ICT) developments that stress wider contexts and different dependencies to place and distance. With case studies of innovative firms at IDEON Science Park in

This article examines men's use of physical punishment when interacting with their sons or grandsons in rural Vietnam. By drawing on two periods of anthropological fieldwork in a northern Vietnamese commune, the article analyses the ways in which violence is informed by, while also perpetually reinforcing, a masculine discourse. Vietnam has ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child and in

BACKGROUND: Cervico-isthmic pregnancy is a rare occurrence and until the use of current ultrasonographic techniques was associated with a disastrous outcome for women desiring to maintain their fertility. CASE REPORT: A 39-year-old woman was diagnosed at 12 weeks of amenorrhoea with an intra-uterine non-viable pregnancy and a low implantation of the gestational sac. Medical management of this situ

Benzoyl dextran with a degree of substitution of 0.18 was synthesized by reacting dextran T500 with benzoyl chloride. A new type of aqueous two-phase system composed of benzoyl dextran as bottom phase polymer and the random copolymer of ethylene oxide and propylene oxide (Ucon 50-HB-5100) as top phase polymer has been formed. The phase diagram for the system Ucon 50-HB-5100-benzoyl dextran with a