With use of innovative proxies and new annual data, I demonstrate that relatively high legal capacity and regulatory activity of the early-modern Polish parliament, the Seym, was positively associated with deeper domestic commodity market integration. Conversely, the lack of effective law-making, caused by the right of a single delegate to discontinue the Seym's sessions, fostered market fragmenta

Scanning Laue microdiffraction was used to study the evolution of the microstructure and the stress field around two tin whiskers during ageing for up to 21 months. In the heterogeneous stress fields obtained, localised ridges of high compressive stress leading to the root of the whiskers were found. Due to the evolution of the intermetallic compound in the interface between the copper substrate a

CONTEXT: Early prediction of dysglycemia is crucial to prevent progression to type 2 diabetes. The 1-hour postload plasma glucose (PG) is reported to be a better predictor of dysglycemia than fasting plasma glucose (FPG), 2-hour PG, or glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c). OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the predictive performance of clinical markers, metabolites, HbA1c, and PG and serum insulin (INS) levels during

In order to significantly improve engine efficiency and reduce exhaust emissions at the same time, new radical combustion concepts have emerged. Gasoline partially premixed combustion (PPC) is one of them, with early results showing high gross indicated efficiency. To achieve that, PPC relies on high EGR (exhaust gas recirculation) use, with numbers that can reach up to 50%. Such a high amount of

Oruro city in the Bolivian highlands depends solely on groundwater to supply domestic consumption and irrigation. The top porous aquifer currently exploited is not fully understood in aspects like geometry, hydrogeological properties and interaction with other aquifers in the region. Recent studies detected traces of fractures in the bedrock beneath the porous aquifer; these geological structures

BACKGROUND: The optimal advanced heart failure (HF) therapy strategy for patients aged 60 or older with end-stage HF refractory to optimal medical therapy remains uncertain. This study compares outcomes of three advanced HF therapy strategies in this patient population. METHODS: A single-center retrospective study was conducted in 95 patients aged 60-73 years who had undergone isolated heart trans

Aim: To assess Ig20Gly tolerability in pediatric patients with primary immunodeficiencies. Patients & methods: Infusion parameters and tolerability were analyzed in pediatric patients (aged 2-5 years [n = 6], 6-11 years [n = 22] and 12-17 years [n = 22]) receiving Ig20Gly in two Phase II/III trials. Results: Of 2624 Ig20Gly infusions, >99% did not require any rate reduction, interruption or di

Objective: To assess all-cause mortality patients with dementia treated with typical and atypical antipsychotic drugs (APDs). Design: Registry-based cohort study. Setting and participants: A total of 58,412 patients diagnosed with dementia and registered in the Swedish Dementia Registry were included in the study. Of the study sample, 2526 of the patients were prescribed APDs. Of these, 602 patien

On Zn-polluted soils, populations of the ectomycorrhizal basidiomycete Suillus bovinus exhibit an elevated Zn tolerance when compared to populations on non-polluted sites. To elucidate the mechanism of Zn tolerance, the time-course of Zn uptake was studied in isolates with contrasting Zn tolerance. Unidirectional fluxes and subcellular compartmentation of Zn were investigated through radiotracer f

Current metabarcoding studies aiming to characterize microbial communities generally rely on the amplification and sequencing of relatively short DNA regions. For fungi, the internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region in the ribosomal RNA (rRNA) operon has been accepted as the formal fungal barcode. Despite an increasing number of fungal metabarcoding studies, the amplification efficiency of primers

The impact of metal pollution on plant communities has been studied extensively in the past, but little is known about the effects of metal pollution on fungal communities that occur in metal-polluted soils. Metal-tolerant ecotypes of the ectomycorrhizal fungus Suillus luteus are frequently found in pioneer pine forests in the Campine region in Belgium on metal-polluted soils. We hypothesized that

RATIONALE:Hypomotor seizures (characterized by diminished behavioral activity with indeterminate level of consciousness) have been identified as an important seizure type in infants. Our goal was to further investigate the clinical and EEG features of hypomotor seizures.METHODS:We retrospectively reviewed 110 hypomotor seizures from 34 patients recorded with video-EEG.RESULTS:Twenty-seven patients

This reflection, based on a keynote address to celebrate the fortieth anniversary of Disasters on 14 September 2017, begins by considering some of the prevailing assumptions that existed at the time of the journal's creation. Next is a summary of significant milestones during the past 40 years, covering major global trends, changing disaster impacts, and key developments in disaster risk managemen

We report on X-ray scattering measurements of helical poly[9,9-bis(2-ethylhexyl)-fluorene-2,7-diyl] by mapping the sample with 10 μm spatial resolution from 0.3 GPa to 36 GPa. We follow the strongest 00l reflection, which moves toward higher scattering angles with pressure indicating planarization of helical polyfluorene. Lateral inhomogeneity is increased for >10 GPa concomitant with the solidifi

Background: The risks of thromboembolic and hemorrhagic events in patients with atrial fibrillation both increase with age; therefore, net clinical benefit analyses of anticoagulant treatments in the elderly population are crucial to guide treatment. We evaluated the 1-year clinical outcomes with non-vitamin-K antagonist and vitamin K antagonist oral anticoagulants (NOACs vs VKAs) in elderly (≥75

Airborne dispersal of microorganisms influences their biogeography, gene flow, atmospheric processes, human health and transmission of pathogens that affect humans, plants and animals. The extent of their impact depends essentially on cell-survival rates during the process of aerosolization. A central factor for cell-survival is water availability prior to and upon aerosolization. Also, the abilit

This study investigates and challenges the capability of standard and hybrid soft computing models of fuzzy c-means clustering adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system (ANFIS), wavenet and artificial neural networks (MLPNN and RBFNN) to estimate the spillway aerator air demand in dams. For the learning process, four different meta-heuristic optimization methods (particle swarm optimization (PSO), ge