Through the integrated framework of participation theory and political economy, this article analyzes participatory opportunities in the virtual world Habbo Hotel, and how participation is constrained and framed by the producer’s commercial strategies, which are based on advertising and sales of virtual goods. The study also looks into the ways in which the producer Sulake Corporation discursively

A new taxonomy of the Caloplaca citrina group in the Black Sea region is presented. It is based on the nrDNA ITS molecular data, chemistry (anthraquinone contents) and 20 morphological characters. Six species previously known in the region are accepted: Caloplaca arcis, C. calcitrapa, C. dichroa, C. flavocitrina, C. geleverjae, C. limonia. Five new species are described: Caloplaca arcisproxima, C.

Antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) are ancient effector molecules in the innate immune response of eukaryotes. These peptides are important for the antimicrobial efficacy of phagocytes and for the innate immune response mounted by epithelia of humans and other mammals. AMPs are generated either by de novo synthesis or by proteolytic cleavage from antimicrobially inactive proproteins. Studies of human d

We present the methods for phenotype evaluation, which give good chances to identify taxa larger according to the anatomical and morphological features. The basic idea is to evaluate characters having regard to completeness and reproducibility. We composed a list of about 100 basic characters and propose standardized ways of measuring them. We also present a list of morphological and anatomical te

Westergren R, Nilsson D, Heglind M, Arani Z, Grande M, Cederberg A, Ahren B, Enerback S. Overexpression of Foxf2 in adipose tissue is associated with lower levels of IRS1 and decreased glucose uptake in vivo. Am J Physiol Endocrinol Metab 298: E548-E554, 2010. First published December 15, 2009; doi:10.1152/ajpendo.00395.2009.-Many members of the forkhead genes family of transcription factors have

This article examines the way in which classification of financial instruments as debt or equity has developed in the Swedish income taxation system over the past 25 years. Although the structure of the tax system is based on the assumption that debt instruments are financial instruments with low risk, legal developments have not shared that assumption, resulting in several types of high-risk deri

Paleomagnetic data, although undeniably limited, have been used to constrain complex time-varying geomagnetic field models. Here we present four different versions of a time varying geocentric dipole model for the past approximately 9000 years based on a limited selection of sedimentary paleomagnetic data with good spatial coverage. The robustness of the modeling approach is evaluated using modern

Forward scattering of antennas is related to antenna performance via the forward scattering sum rule. The forward scattering sum rule is an integral identity that shows that a weighted integral of the extinction cross section over all spectrum is proportional to the static polarizabiliy of the antenna structure. Here, the forward scattering sum rule is experimentally verified for loaded, short cir

Background We evaluated the accuracy and repeatability of a 3D method for polyethylene acetabular cup wear measurements using computed tomography (CT). We propose that the method be used for clinical in vivo assessment of wear in acetabular cups. Material and methods Ultra-high molecular weight polyethylene cups with a titanium mesh molded on the outside were subjected to wear using a hip simulato

Background: An increasing number of neo-adjuvant breast cancer studies are being conducted and a novel model for tumor biological studies, the "window-of-opportunity" model, has revealed several advantages. Change in tumor cell proliferation, estimated by Ki67-expression in pre-therapeutic core biopsies versus post-therapeutic surgical samples is often the primary end-point. The aim of the present

The most commonly used 3'-splice site on the human papillomavirus type 16 (HPV-16) genome named SA3358 is used to produce HPV-16 early mRNAs encoding E4, E5, E6 and E7, and late mRNAs encoding L1 and L2. We have previously shown that SA3358 is suboptimal and is totally dependent on a downstream splicing enhancer containingmultiple potential ASF/SF2 binding sites. Here weshow that only one of the p

Purpose: We compared the rates of febrile urinary tract infection, kidney damage and reflux resolution in children with vesicoureteral reflux treated in 3 ways, including antibiotic prophylaxis, endoscopic therapy and surveillance with antibiotics only for symptomatic urinary tract infection. Materials and Methods: Children 1 to younger than 2 years with grade reflux were recruited into this prosp

Building owners are encouraged to reduce energy use in order to both contribute to national energy-saving goals and reduce the costs of heating and operation. It is important to choose the most optimal renovation measures available so as to achieve cost-effective energy use while maintaining excellent indoor environments, without sacrificing architectural quality or negatively affecting the enviro

The ability to design and tailor-make antibodies to meet the biophysical demands required by the vast range of current and future antibody-based applications within biotechnology and biomedicine will be essential. In this proof-of-concept study, we have for the first time tailored human recombinant scFv antibodies for site-specific photocoupling through the use of an unnatural amino acid (UAA) and

The diagnostics of endometrial pathology can be done by obtaining information at the molecular level, e. g. using the autofluorescence-based technique. Thus, for the first time an experimental study was performed on waste material of uterine cavity washing specimens to evaluate suitability of the technique for diagnostics. The specimens were obtained from 32 patients who had a conventional uterine

Enterprise resource planning (ERP) use and ERP value are of high interest among both academia's as well as practitioners. Despite different views of gained value from implemented ERP, there are some studies focusing in larger companies, however, few studies report on challenges experienced by Small and Medium sized Enterprises (SMEs). Based on diffusion of innovation (DOI) literature and resource-

This paper studies the possibility for improving the ductility of cement based materials by means of oligocationic additives. Actually, the setting of cement is due to ionic correlation forces between highly negatively charged C-S-H nanoparticles throughout a calcium rich solution. The main drawback of this strong attraction is its very short range that results in low elastic deformation of hydrat

High-performance embedded systems require the execution of many applications on multicore platforms and are subject to stringent restrictions and constraints. The actors project approach provides temporal isolation through resource reservation over a multicore platform, adapting the available resources on the basis of the overall quality requirements. The architecture is fully operational on both