Objective: To determine whether high DNA stainability (HDS), as assessed by the sperm chromatin structure assay (SCSA), predicts the risk of early miscarriage after in vitro fertilization with intracytoplasmic sperm injection (IVF-ICSI). Design: Retrospective cohort study of consecutive pregnancies after IVF and ICSI treatment. Setting: Reproductive medicine center. Patient(s): A total of 1,602 pr

Drawing on fieldwork in a multi-ethnic workplace (an industrial kitchen in Denmark), this article explores immigrants' self-directed ethnic humor in collegial relationships with Danes as it spontaneously develops and plays out in everyday work settings. Approaching ethnic humor from a symbolic interactionist perspective rather than adopting the dominant conflict approach, this article emphasizes t

Bacterial infection is one of the major problems for human health. To prevent outbreak of bacteria-caused diseases, early diagnosis of bacterial pathogen and effective destruction of pathogenic microorganisms are in urgent need. In this work, we developed a new multifunctional nanocomposite material that can effectively capture and destroy bacteria. Epoxide-modified nanoparticles were synthesized

In the light of the digital influence of literature and art, my paper focuses on a rather small topic that is traditionally strongly placed in the aesthetics of the interart and intermedia discourse, namely ekphrasis. Whereas the conventional discourse outlines ekphrasis as a “verbal representation of a visual representation” (Hefferan 1993, p. 3) to call attention to poems describing paintings, m

Control of electric fields over large areas is crucial for the accurate delivery and manipulation of biologically important molecules in microfluidic systems. In this paper we present a novel method for generating tunable uniform electric fields over large microfluidic arrays in two dimensions, and its application to a microfabricated device that separates genomic DNA. The device fractionates larg

We explore the connections between stellar age, chemistry, and kinematics across a Galactocentric distance of 7.5 < R(kpc) < 9.0, using a sample of ~12 000 intermediate-mass (FGK) turn-offstars observed with the RAdial Velocity Experiment (RAVE) survey. The kinematics of this sample are determined using radial velocity measurements from RAVE, and parallax and proper motion measurements from the T

Context. Baade's window (BW) is one of the most observed Galactic bulge fields in terms of chemical abundances. Owing to its low and homogeneous interstellar absorption it is considered the perfect calibration field for Galactic bulge studies. Aims. In the era of large spectroscopic surveys, calibration fields such as BW are necessary for cross calibrating the stellar parameters and individual abu

This paper is a reflection on market failure analysis in EU State aid law. Today, reliance upon market failure analysis is becoming more and more common in the practice of the Commission. Under Article 106(2) TFEU, it appears that market failure has increasingly been conceptualised as a part of the analysis of services of general economic interest (SGEI), which has been the subject to some researc

The geophysical characteristics of the carbonate-dominated Ordovician succession is described using wire-line logging data from exploration wells located within the Swedish part of the Baltic Basin, both offshore and from the island of Gotland. The petrophysical properties and log-motifs are compared and correlated with the lithology of cores from the Hamra-10, Skåls-1 and Grötlingbo-1 wells on s

The effect of napping versus wakefulness was studied on primed and repeated Remote Associate Tests (RATs) and on divergent creativity tests. The participants were 42 students from the USA, studying international courses at a Swedish university. The hypotheses for the RATs were (1), when the correct answers were primed before the nap, the RAT should be solved better for those who entered REM sleep,

Over the years, many jet clustering algorithms have been proposed for the analysis of hadronic final states in e+e- annihilations. These have somewhat different emphasis and are therefore more or less suited for various applications. We here review some of the most used and compare them from a theoretical and experimental point of view.

The tetanus neurotoxin (TeNT) is a highly potent toxin produced by Clostridium tetani that inhibits neurotransmission of inhibitory interneurons, causing spastic paralysis in the tetanus disease. TeNT differs from the other clostridial neurotoxins by its unique ability to target the central nervous system by retrograde axonal transport. The crystal structure of the tetanus toxin reveals a "closed"

Background: There are but a few studies of how persons with autism perceive and experience their bodies and movements. Having autism may mean difficulty with verbalizing these experiences. Difficulties in perceiving the surrounding world along with disturbed motor coordination and executive functions may affect physical and psychological development. Exploring possibilities to capture the experien

Among the irregular satellites orbiting Jupiter, the Himalia family is characterized by a high velocity dispersion dv of several hundred m s-1 among its members, inconsistent with a collisional origin. Efforts to account for this through internecine gravitational interactions do not readily reproduce this feature. Here, we revisit the problem in the context of recent cosmogonical models, where the

Context. The second release of Gaia data (Gaia DR2) contains the astrometric parameters for more than half a million quasars. This set defines a kinematically non-rotating reference frame in the optical domain. A subset of these quasars have accurate VLBI positions that allow the axes of the reference frame to be aligned with the International Celestial Reference System (ICRF) radio frame. Aims. W

A real photon has a complicated nature, whereby it may remain unresolved or fluctuate into a vector meson or a perturbative qq̄ pair. In γγ events, this gives three by three combinations of the nature of the two incoming photons, and thus six distinct event classes. The properties of these classes are partly constrained by the choices already made in our related γp model. It is therefore possible