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Purpose: To study dark adaptation in patients with symptomatic carotid artery disease or polycythemia before and after treatment. This necessitated determinations of pupillary changes as such may influence the findings. To determine whether changes in the retinal blood flow in light and darkness occur in healthy humans. Methods: Repeated automatic dark adaptometry was recorded monocularly in 21 c
Telomeres are specialized complexes of DNA and proteins that cap and confer stability to the ends of eukaryotic chromosomes. The telomeric DNA of most eukaryotes is composed of tandemly arranged short repeats. Within the budding yeasts these repeats are diverged in length as well as in nucleotide composition. However, they contain a sequence resembling the consensus binding sequence of the major t
In this thesis, I present both theoretical and empirical work where we have studied how humans and animals use information in situations where they need to continually update their information on the density of a resource. We have found that the amount of information, and the way the information is presented, are important factors for how well decisions are adapted to current circumstances. In an
The intention of this work was to establish alternative purification methods to obtain highly purified caveolae from various tissues. In order to isolate caveolae, sufficiently pure plasma membranes are needed. A method is presented for the isolation of plasma membranes from lung tissue using a combination of conventional polyethylene glycol/dextran two-phase partitioning and affinity partitioning
In this thesis, electron transport in mesoscopic semiconductor nanostructures, in particular so-called electron billiards or quantum dots, is studied. The thesis can be divided into two areas: the linear response regime of transport, and the nonlinear response regime of transport. The classical and quantum mechanical electron dynamics are studied for triangular and square-shaped electron billiard
Movement and dispersal are important determinants of the spatial distribution and persistence of animal populations in a heterogeneous environment. I studied the small-scale movement pattern of a soil-living insect, Protaphorura armata (Collembola) by using a video-equipment. I added chemical cues, food and conspecifics to their environment and evaluated the effects of external cues on the movemen
The purpose of this dissertation is to explore the role of visibility in the production and contestation of belonging to political communities. On the basis of an empirical enquiry of Russian media during the 2010s, a theoretical conceptualization of the relation between visibility and belonging is suggested, starting in the idea that what becomes visible to publics and how, and what is rendered i
During moisture uptake in polymers, the diffusion of the water molecules is believed to occur via unoccupied voids. These voids are called free volume cavities and their sizes are continuously altered when the moisture content in the polymer is enhanced. Not only the free volume cavity sizes, but also other polymer properties such as the degree of crystallinity, are changed as a consequence of moi
Understanding of the growth of fatigue cracks is of utmost importance since such growth often has a profound influence on the life of components subjected to cyclic loading. Thus, reliable fatigue life models enable a more efficient use of materials and improve the performance and efficiency in many applications. This thesis deals with the growth of fatigue cracks subjected to high load amplitude
The xanthophyll cycle involves the light-dependent and reversible conversion of violaxanthin to zeaxanthin. The enzyme, violaxanthin de-epoxidase (VDE) catalyses the conversion of violaxanthin to zeaxanthin, via the intermediate antheraxanthin. VDE is a membrane-hosted enzyme during its activity. Low lumenal pH, violaxanthin, ascorbate and monogalactosyldiacylglycerol are required for activity. Th
It is important to replace fossil resources such as oil, coal and natural gas with renewable raw materials for the production of materials and fuels in order to reduce environmental impact. Furthermore, these raw materials should preferably be residues, e.g. agricultural or forest residues, in order not to compete with the production of human food and animal feed. High molecular weight arabinoxyla
This thesis is based upon four original papers in which human dendritic cells (DCs) and B cells have been analyzed in terms of how they influence the character of adaptive immune responses. DCs isolated from human tonsils were found to possess a capacity to directly regulate proliferation, isotype switching, and antibody production in B cells. DC-produced cytokines, including IL-13, were identifie
A network of perivascular nerve fibres was demonstrated in coronary arteries and veins from guinea-pig and man. Nerve fibres displaying immunoreactivity to neuropeptide Y (NPY) had a distribution pattern similar to those containing immunoreactivity to tyrosine hydroxylase. Immunoreactivity to substance P and calcitonin gene-related peptide (CGRP) occurred in the same varicose nerve fibres, which w
The aim of this dissertation is to address a paradox: government control and social freedom on China's Internet are growing simultaneously. The study, which is based on fieldwork conducted between 2002 and 2006, and 48 interviews, seeks answers to the following two questions: 1. How can Internet use contribute to an unlocking of the public sphere, making it more independent from party-state contro
In order to produce fuel ethanol from lignocellulose, it is necessary to hydrolyse the sugar-containing constituents hemicellulose and cellulose. During acid hydrolysis, a number of compounds are formed or liberated in addition to the fermentable monomeric sugars. Several of these compounds might act as inhibitors during the fermentation of the sugars to ethanol. Thus, in order to obtain high etha
The fundamental question in this work concerns the ideal relation between asceticism and society in a 5th c. writing (C.E.), the Philotheos Historia (PH), written in elaborate Greek by the learned bishop of Cyrrhus, Theodoret. This collection of saints’ stories tells about the lives of a number of ascetics who lived in the Eastern part of the Roman Empire, many of them close to Antioch. As these n
Plasticity induced damage evolution is considered using a thermodynamical approach. Different postulates on how to include the effects of damage in the constitutive equations have been studied. The results reveal that a mapping, similar to that of the stress, of both the kinematic and isotropic hardening variables is to be preferred. The undesired property that, irrespectively of the postulate emp
New measurements of the elements Ba, Fe, Ga, In and Ru are reported. The analysis of barium contains new wavelengths, improved energy level values and new values of the ionization limit in both Ba I and Ba II. Oscillator strengths and radiative lifetimes in Fe II, as a part of the FERRUM project, are reported. The gallium analysis includes new wavelengths, ab initio calculated oscillator st
Three main themes are outlined in this thesis: Polyelectrolytes/DNA : In a living cell, DNA molecules have a compact conformation in order to fit in, while in a test tube they will take on an expanded cylindrical shape, due to the negative phosphate groups along the DNA molecule. With the help of computer simulations it has been shown that like-charged monomers of a poly- electrolyte can attract
Background: Restenosis is the most frequently occurring adverse event after percutaneous intravascular treatment of atherosclerotic lesions, which limits long-term patency of the intervention. Objective: The aim of the study was to evaluate if minimizing vascular injury during treatment by insertion of self-expanding stents or modifying the reparative mechanisms by local drug delivery can reduce r
