Populations that undergo a process of rapid evolution present excellent opportunities to investigate the mechanisms driving or restraining adaptive divergence. The genetic variance-covariance matrix (G) is often considered to constrain adaptation but little is known about its potential to evolve during phenotypic divergence. We compared the G-matrices of ancestral and recently established ecotype

The practices around genetic testing for hereditary breast and ovarian cancer in one major counselling centre in Austria are at the core of this article. Our study investigates how people undergoing genetic testing try to make sense of this experience that is perceived to be new and uncommon in Austria and that is thus taking place in a setting not validated through public insurance support and is

Old age is associated with an enhanced susceptibility to stroke and poor recovery from brain injury, but the cellular processes underlying these phenomena are only partly understood. Therefore, studying the basic mechanisms underlying structural and functional recovery after brain injury in aged subjects is of considerable clinical interest. Behavioral and cytological analyses of rodents that have

SufA, which belongs to the subtilisin-like serine protease family, contains a non-canonical Asp-His-Ser catalytic triad. Under in vitro conditions, SufA is capable of human fibrinogen hydrolysis leading to inhibition of fibrin network formation, thus suggesting its important role in the development and progression of Finegoldia magna infections. In addition, it has been demonstrated that SufA can

Heat transfer and pressure drop characteristics of Al2O3/water and MWCNT/water nanofluids flowing in a chevron-type plate heat exchanger were experimentally investigated and compared with those of water. Results showed that heat transfer seemed to be improved by using nanofluids at constant Reynolds number. However, little heat transfer enhancement was observed based on a constant flow velocity. T

Abstract Lymphoedema treatment outcome can be evaluated by calculating estimated limb volumes directly by water displacement (plethysmography; PG), or indirectly by circumference measurements (CM) and using the formula for a truncated cone. This study assessed the correlation between PG and circumference volume measurements to assess whether the correlation is acceptable, and if circumference meas

The harmful effects of cyanotoxins in surface waters have led to increasing demands for accurate early warning methods. This study proposes a capacitive immunosensor for broad-spectrum detection of the group of toxic cyclic peptides called microcystins (∼80 congeners) at very low concentration levels. The novel analytical platform offers significant advances compared to the existing methods. Monoc

Adeno-associated virus (AAV) vectors are used to deliver potentially therapeutic genes in clinical trials in Parkinson's disease (PD). Pre-existing immunity to AAV and a local neuroinflammatory response might negatively affect the efficacy of such AAV-mediated gene delivery.

Because music holds a strong power over people, and its impact on consumers is relatively direct, it is invariably an interesting medium for marketers. Although Sonic Branding – branding with music and sound – has been seen as ’the next big thing’ in branding toward consumers for about a decade, it is a scattered field still waiting for its breakthrough. Addressing this problem, the present consum

A concept that lies at the heart of political rhetoric is that of ‘workfare’. The issue, however, is what types of arguments have been invoked to assert the value of the concept. During the 1960s and 1970s, extensive criticism emerged towards a working life that was said to hinder women’s emancipation; a working life that wasted resources and had a negative impact on the environment; a working lif

The present response time study investigated how a hypothesized time-based working memory constraint of 2–3 s affects the resolution of grammatical and semantic dependencies. Congruent and incongruent object relative (OR) and subject relative sentences were read at different presentation rates so that the distance between dependent words was either shorter or longer than 2–3 s. Incongruent OR sent

Fibroblast growth factor 23 (FGF23) is a hormone with regulatory effects on mineral metabolism and arterial calcification. We aimed to study the association between FGF23 and risk of incident subarachnoid hemorrhage (SAH) in a nested case-control study.

This note provides a generalization of a recent result by Jarvenpaa, Jarvenpaa, Koivusalo, Li, and Suomala (to appear) on the dimension of limsup-sets of random coverings of tori. The result in this note is stronger in the sense that it provides also a large intersection property of the limsup-sets, the assumptions are weaker, and it implies the result of Jarvenpaa, Jarvenpaa, Koivusalo, Li, and S

Fungus-growing (attine) ants and their fungal symbionts passed through several evolutionary transitions during their 50 million year old evolutionary history. The basal attine lineages often shifted between two main cultivar clades, whereas the derived higher-attine lineages maintained an association with a monophyletic clade of specialized symbionts. In conjunction with the transition to speciali

The aims of this study were to investigate (1) perceived stress as felt by the nursing staff working in psychiatric inpatient care, (2) possible differences between nurses and nurse assistants, and (3) associations among individual characteristics, the ward atmosphere, the psychosocial work environment, and perceived stress. Ninety-three members of the nursing staff completed three instruments-one

Since 1967 annual pollen deposition has been monitored in the semi-natural mixed deciduous woodland Draved Forest by the Geological Survey of Denmark. In this paper, we analyse the variability in pollen accumulation rates for the eight most common deciduous trees, and their relationships to monthly temperature and precipitation. High summer temperatures in the year before flowering have a positive

We consider a random synaptic pruning in an initially highly interconnected network. It is proved that a random network can maintain a self-sustained activity level for some parameters. For such a set of parameters a pruning is constructed so that in the resulting network each neuron/node has almost equal numbers of in- and out-connections. It is also shown that the set of parameters which admits