Search results

Background: Allergic rhinitis is a systemic disorder, and it is clinically well recognized that it can be aggravated by infection. Activation of the innate immune system constitutes a critical element in the process. Toll-like receptors (TLRs) comprise a part of the innate immune system, and lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-induced activation of TLR4 represents bacterial-induced interactions in various mo

The prompt and non-prompt production cross-sections for psi(2S) mesons are measured using 2.1 fb(-1) of pp collision data at a centre-of-mass energy of 7TeV recorded by the ATLAS experiment at the LHC. The measurement exploits the psi(2S) --> J/psi(--> mu(+)mu(-)) pi(+)pi(-) decay mode, and probes psi(2S) mesons with transverse momenta in the range 10 <= p(T) < 100 GeV and rapidity |y| < 2.0. The

BK virus associated nephropathy occurs in approximately 5% of renal transplant recipients. Quantitation of BKV DNA in serum/plasma early in the course of disease has been suggested to be an important diagnostic tool for polymavirus-associated nephropathy (PVAN). The aim of this study was to develop a BKV real-time PCR (qPCR), which could be included in a diagnostic qPCR platform. Additionally, the

The compound semiconductor RuS2, known as mineral laurite, has been investigated as a potential (photo) electrochemically active anode material for the oxygen evolution in the process of (photo) electrolytic water splitting. The contribution describes for the first time the preparation of RuS2 thin films deposited on (100)- and (111)-oriented FeS2 (pyrite) substrates using reactive magnetron sputt

The genus Katatopygia gen. n. is proposed for the Boletina erythropyga/punctus-group that was first introduced by Garrett (1924, 1925) and currently comprises eight described species. Molecular studies have strongly indicated that this group forms a monophyletic sister-group to a clade consisting of all other Boletina, Coelosia and Gnoriste, and its monophyly is supported by morphological data as

Thermal-optical analysis is a conventional method for determining the carbonaceous aerosol fraction and for classifying it into organic carbon, OC, and elemental carbon, EC. Unfortunately, the different thermal evolution protocols in use can result in a wide elemental carbon-to-total carbon variation by up to a factor of five. In Europe, there is currently no standard procedure for determining the

We investigated possible hemispheric differences in the processing of four different lexical semantic categories: SPECIFIC (e.g. bird), GENERAL (e.g. animal), ABSTRACT (e.g. advice), and EMOTIONAL (e.g. love). These wordtypes were compared using a dichotic listening paradigm and a semantic category classification task. Response times (RTs) were measured when participants classified testwords as co

Two new Geissleria species from Siberian mountain lakes Baikal and Frolikha are described based on molecular and morphological data. The two new species are Geissleria baicalosimilis Kulikovskiy, Gusev, Andreeva & Annenkova sp. nov. and G. frolikhiensis Kulikovskiy, Gusev, Andreeva & Annenkova sp. nov. According to partial 18S rDNA and rbcL gene fragment analyses, Geissleria does not belon

Purpose: The authors' primary goal was to investigate the potential of past tense inflection as a clinical marker of Danish specific language impairment (SLI). They also wished to test the predictions of the extended optional infinitive (EOI) account and processing based accounts of SLI on Danish. Method: Using sentence completion and sentence repetition tasks, the authors investigated the use of

It is well established that subjects with moderately elevated plasma levels of C-reactive protein (CRP) have an increased risk of development of cardiovascular events. As atherosclerosis is a disease characterized by chronic arterial inflammation, it is possible that moderate increases in CRP level reflect the presence of plaque inflammation. To investigate this possibility we compared plasma leve

Intestinal alkaline sphingomyelinase (alk-SMase) generates ceramide and inactivates platelet-activating factor (PAF) and is previously suggested to have anticancer properties. The direct evidence is still lacking. We studied colonic tumorigenesis in alk-SMase knockout (KO) mice. Formation of aberrant crypt foci (ACF) was examined after azoxymethane (AOM) injection. Tumor was induced by AOM alone,

The adsorption of histatin 5 to hydrophilic silica surfaces is governed by electrostatic attractive forces between the positive protein and the negative surface. Hence pH and ionic strength control the adsorbed amount, which can be described by coarse-grained Monte Carlo simulations accounting for electrostatic forces and charge regulation of the protein.

A majority of us will at some point in our lives take care of family members, relatives and friends in need of assistance. How will this affect us? Strain related to life satisfaction (LS) and health related quality of life (HRQoL) among caregivers aged 60 years and older has not been previously studied.

In this Botanical Briefing we describe how the interactions between plants and their biotic environment can change during range-expansion within a continent and how this may influence plant invasiveness. We address how mechanisms explaining intercontinental plant invasions by exotics (such as release from enemies) may also apply to climate-warming-induced range-expanding exotics within the same co

The rural mountain communities have long faced challenges from a range of social, economic, political and environmental factors and the threat from these factors has only intensified due to the current climate change. This study was conducted in South Sikkim, a mountain region located in the Indian Eastern Himalaya, to get a deeper insight of the multitude of barriers and stresses that a poor rura

Reduced heart rate variability (HRV) is associated with poor outcome in patients with heart failure (HF). However, the data on predictive value of RR variability during atrial fibrillation (AF) are limited. Therefore, the aim of this study was to evaluate the association between ventricular response characteristics and long-term clinical outcome in the population of ambulatory patients with mild-t

AIM: To assess whether gemcitabine-based combination therapy improves the prognosis of unresectable pancreatic cancer compared with gemcitabine treatment alone. METHODS: A quantitative up-to-date meta-analysis was undertaken to investigate the efficacy of gemcitabine-based combination treatment compared with gemcitabine monotherapy in locally advanced or metastatic pancreatic cancer. Inclusion was