Background. Based on the evidence that vitamin D is involved in the development of immune system and vitamin D receptor gene is associated with asthma, we supposed that vitamin D is related to the development of asthma. Methods. Asthma patients were identified from the Swedish Hospital Discharge Register and the hospitalization rate was examined by different seasons and regions. Standardized incid

BACKGROUND: Our objective was to examine the role of p38 mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) in ischemia-reperfusion (I/R)-induced recruitment or leukocytes in the colon. METHODS: C57/Bl6 mice were subjected to 30 minutes of ischemia by clamping the superior mesenteric artery followed by 2 hours of reperfusion. Animals were pretreated with the selective p38 MAPK inhibitors SB 239063 and SKF 86

It is generally believed that pregnancy is mediated by a Th2 response, which includes cytokines that promote placental growth and are involved in inducing tolerance to the foetus. If the balance between Th1/and Th2-mediated cytokines is disrupted, systemic and local changes could predispose the foetus to future disease. Therefore, a shift in the Th1/Th2 balance during pregnancy, possibly caused by

This article examines the pathophysiology of lesions caused by focal cerebral ischemia. Ischemia due to middle cerebral artery occlusion encompasses a densely ischemic focus and a less densely ischemic penumbral zone. Cells in the focus are usually doomed unless reperfusion is quickly instituted. In contrast, although the penumbra contains cells "at risk," these may remain viable for at least 4 to

A method for preparation of thylakoids from plant leaves on a large scale is described. The method involves: 1) disruption of the cells with a blender followed by filtration to remove large cell debris and non disrupted cells. 2) precipitation of the thylakoids by adjusting the pH to the isoelectric point, pH 4.7. 3) a washing step by dilution of the precipitate in water followed by precipitation

Multiple sequence alignment is the foundation of many important applications in bioinformatics that aim at detecting functionally important regions, predicting protein structures, building phylogenetic trees etc. Although the automatic construction of a multiple sequence alignment for a set of remotely related sequences cause a very challenging and error-prone task, many downstream analyses still

Popular Abstract in Swedish Prosodi och intonation är viktiga delar i det mänskliga talet. I system för text-till-talomvandling och automatisk taligenkänning måste prosodiska modeller inkluderas för att uppnå acceptabla resultat. Denna avhandling bidrar till modelleringen av svensk prosodi ur lexikalt och akustiskt perspektiv. Tre aspekter av lexikal modellering av prosodi studeras. Vi skisserar Prosody and intonation are very important ingredients of human speech. In speech technology, text-to-speech (TTS) and automatic speech recognition (ASR) systems must incorporate prosodic models in order to reach acceptable performances. We contribute to the modelling of Swedish prosody in a speech technology context from lexical and acoustic angles. Three aspects of lexical prosodic modelling are

OBJECTIVE: Aortic aneurysm size is a critical determinant of the need for intervention, yet the maximal diameter will often vary depending on the modality and method of measurement. We aimed to define the relationship between commonly used computed tomography (CT) measurement techniques and those based on current reporting standards and to compare the values obtained with diameter measured using u