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Gastrointestinal motility disorders are common in childhood and in this thesis we look at two of them, i.e. Hirschsprung´s Disease (HD) and gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) in five different studies. HD is a congenital disease characterized by an abscence of ganglion cells in myenteric and submucous ganglia, most commonly in the distal part of the large bowel. In Paper I, we have studied th

IDDM is positively associated with HLA-DQA1*0301-DQB1*0302 (DQ8) and DQA1*0501-DQB1*0201 (DQ2) and negatively associated with DQA1*0102-DQB1*0602 (DQ6). The aim of the present study was to analyze the importance of several polymorphic residues and domains of DQalpha and DQbeta, in addition to residue 52 DQalpha and residue 57 DQbeta, with regard to susceptibility or resistance in new-onset 0- to 1

The metabolic syndrome is a clustering of several risk factors associated with diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Diabetes is a global problem with 90% of patients suffering from type 2 diabetes (T2D), which is attributable to various factors including genetic predispositions and lifestyle. In T2D, there is a reduction in β cell mass and function, and impaired glucose homeostasis. It is often as

Background: Excess body weight, physical activity, smoking, alcohol consumption and certain dietary factors are individually related to colorectal cancer (CRC) risk; however, little is known about their joint effects. The aim of this study was to develop a healthy lifestyle index (HLI) composed of five potentially modifiable lifestyle factors healthy weight, physical activity, non-smoking, limited

Diabetic patients suffer from macro- and microvascular complications causing increased morbidity and mortality. How hyperglycemia provokes vascular damage remains unclear, but glucose is believed to fuel a harmful low-grade chronic inflammation of the vessel wall. Previous work showed that glucose activates the transcription factor Nuclear Factor of Activated T cells (NFAT) in arteries ex vivo. NF

This thesis presents experimental results on the development and optimization of novel and highly compact sources of beams of fast ions, relativistic electrons and coherent x-rays, driven by intense laser-plasma interactions. The rapid development of high-power, short-pulse laser systems have made available peak powers reaching the petawatt regime and focused intensities reaching 10^21 W/cm2. Whe

Tissue kallikrein releases pharmacollogically highly active kinins from kininogen. Many other enzymes may also release kinins. The aim of the study was to clarify the pathophysiological role of tissue kallikrein in acute pancreatitis. Two sensitive and specific radioimmunoassays for porcine and human tissue kallikrein were developed. A large release of tissue kallikrein from the pancreatic gland

Wind has a profound influence on migrating birds since it inevitably will influence travel time and energy expenditure. In this thesis I investigate how migrating birds are affected by, and use winds. The studies cover the following main topics: i) the influence of wind on the decision to depart on a migratory flight, and possible energy savings by choosing to migrate in tailwinds, ii) the effect

It is the aim of this thesis to contribute to a research-based understanding of researchers’ use of blogs as a part of scholarly communication. The following research questions guide the investigation: (1) How are scholarly blogs constructed and used as sociotechnical systems in scholarly communication? (2) Which roles do scholarly blogs play in relation to other forms of scholarly communicati

Agricultural intensification has caused severe declines among biodiversity in European farmland over the last half century. The transformation of the agricultural landscape has led to reduced availability of key resources such as food, nesting habitat and shelter. In this thesis I have investigated a way of ameliorating the negative effects of agricultural intensification, through the creation of

Metabolomics is a rapidly growing research field. It aims for quantification of all the metabolites in a biological sample such as plasma, saliva, cerebrospinal fluid or cells. Because the metabolite levels in a biological sample are the end result of the regulatory processes in cells, metabolomics is a very powerful approach for characterisation of phenotypes. Metabolomics has been used to find d

Increasing food production is a key step towards attaining food security in Cameroon. For the last half century, increase in production has been achieved by bringing more land under cultivation. In consequence of competition for land between agriculture and other uses that particular route to increasing production to meet the country’s growing demand is now limited. The alternative is to increase

Introduction. Limited information is available concerning the general and sexual health status of European men. Aim. To investigate the age-related changes in general and sexual health in middle-aged and older men from different countries of the European Union. Methods. This is a cross-sectional multicenter survey performed on a sample of 3,369 community-dwelling men aged 40-79 years old (mean 60

Agricultural intensification has contributed substantially to the increase in food production, but has come at the expense of soil degradation and environmental problems. Management of soil based ecosystem services need to be considered in agricultural management since intensive management implies not only costs to the farmer but also to society. In this study we used data from four long-term (55

BACKGROUND: Optimal treatment of soft-tissue sarcoma requires multidisciplinary management at a sarcoma center. However, these rare tumors are often misinterpreted as benign and many are inadequately treated outside a sarcoma center, with an increased risk of local recurrence that often requires further extensive surgical treatment. To improve referral and centralization of soft-tissue sarcoma man

The overall aim of this thesis was to investigate formal care and services at home, regarding structure, process, and outcomes, for persons with dementia (aged 65+ years) at risk of nursing home admission. Availability and utilization of formal care and services at home for persons with dementia, from diagnosis to end-of-life stage, in eight European countries was described in study I. A mapping f