Diurnal and nocturnal African dung beetles use celestial cues, such as the sun, the moon, and the polarization pattern, to roll dung balls along straight paths across the savanna. Although nocturnal beetles move in the same manner through the same environment as their diurnal relatives, they do so when light conditions are at least 1 million-fold dimmer. Here, we show, for the first time to our kn

ApoA-I, the main protein component of high-density lipoprotein (HDL), is suggested to be involved in metabolic homeostasis. We examined the effects of Milano, a naturally occurring ApoA-I variant, about which little mechanistic information is available. Remarkably, high fat-fed mice treated with Milano displayed a rapid weight loss greater than ApoA-I WT treated mice, and a significantly reduced a

When studying tunable electrostatic repulsions in aqueous suspensions of charged colloids, irreversible colloid aggregation or gelation may occur at high salt concentrations. For many commonly used synthetic colloids, such as polystyrene and silica particles, the reason for coagulation is the presence of unbalanced, strongly attractive, and short-ranged van der Waals (VDW) forces. Here, we present

Non-traumatic pain in the shoulder, arm and hand (brachialgia) is a common complaint in the field of musculoskeletal disorders, where nerve entrapment constitutes a possible cause. The effect of nerve compression is dose-dependent; hence a low-level compression will only result in decreased endoneurial circulation, neural edema and a Seddon's grade-IV weakness, but won't be revealed in nerve condu

The Danish national return-to-work (RTW) program aims to improve the management of municipal sickness benefit in Denmark. A study is currently ongoing to evaluate the RTW program. The purpose of this article is to describe the study protocol. The program includes 21 municipalities encompassing approximately 19 500 working-age adults on long-term sickness absence, regardless of reason for sickness

A high-resolution , X-ray and gamma-ray coincidence spectroscopy experiment was conducted at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung. Thirty correlated alpha-decay chains were detected following the fusion-evaporation reaction 48Ca + 243Am. The observations are consistent with previous assignments of similar decay chains to originate from element Z = 115. For the first time, precise spec

Context: Drug abuse (DA) strongly runs in families. Does this result solely from genetic factors or does the family environment contribute? Objective: To determine the familial environmental contribution to the risk for DA. Design: Follow-up in 9 public databases (1961-2009) in siblings and spouses. Setting: Sweden. Participants: A total of 137 199 sibling pairs and 7561 spousal pairs containing a

Background The incidence of hematologic cancers increases with age. These cancers are associated with recurrent somatic mutations in specific genes. We hypothesized that such mutations would be detectable in the blood of some persons who are not known to have hematologic disorders. Methods We analyzed whole-exome sequencing data from DNA in the peripheral-blood cells of 17,182 persons who were uns

The additional effect of anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) reconstruction on muscle strength and physical performance after a structured exercise programme is not well understood.

Fear conditioning is an important survival mechanism, as is the ability to generalize learned fear responses to stimuli that are similar to the original conditioned stimulus. Overgeneralization of fear learning, prominent in many anxiety disorders, is however highly maladaptive. Because sleep is involved in the consolidation of fear learning, and in active processing of information, the present st

Objective: Osteoarthritis (OA) is a chronic and slowly progressive disease for which biomarkers may be able to provide a more rapid indication of therapeutic responses to therapy than is currently available; this could accelerate and facilitate OA drug discovery and development programs. The goal of this document is to provide a summary and guide to the application of in vitro (biochemical and oth

Military sleeping bags are envisaged for intensive use during military actions. They have extra properties that provide protection for military staff. In cold climatic conditions when sleeping bags are used for rest soldiers’s combat ability and survival depends on the thermal insulation properties of material technical resources (gear) and clothing. Aim of the research is to establish the extreme

The authors investigated the role of known risk factors in educational differences in breast cancer incidence. Analyses were based on the European Prospective Investigation Into Cancer and Nutrition and included 242,095 women, 433 cases of in situ breast cancer, and 4,469 cases of invasive breast cancer. Reproductive history (age at first full-term pregnancy and parity), exposure to endogenous and

Non-steroid anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) are frequently occurring in sludge and waters from sewage treatment plants (STPs). Sludge obtained from sewage treatment is often applied as a fertilizer in agriculture and not many studies about the uptake of pharmaceuticals into crops can be found. In this paper, we present a greenhouse experiment to study the presence of four NSAIDs (naproxen, ketopr

Tree dehardening and budburst will occur earlier in a warmer climate, and this could lead to an increased risk of frost damage caused by temperature backlashes. By using a spring backlash index and a cold hardiness model, we assessed different aspects of risk for frost damage in Norway spruce forests during the present climate and for one future emission scenario. Uncertainties associated with cli

Two consecutive hemispherical electron energy analyzers have been used to measure the argon angular distribution of 2p photoelectron lines over two quadrants of the dipole plane. A significant anomaly in the intensity of the photolines is observed at several electron emission angles, suggesting asymmetry with respect to the electric field vector of synchrotron light. As a possible cause for the ob

Risk for drug abuse (DA) is strongly associated with neighborhood social deprivation (SD). However, the causal nature of this relationship is unclear.

Researchers in the scientific community actively discuss the fact that polymer hydrogels synthesized by crosslinking polly(allylamine hydrochloride) (PAH) with epichlorohydrin (EPI) in the presence of D-glucose-6-phosphate monobarium salt do not show or show imprinting on the molecular level. In the work reported here, a polymer hydrogel was synthesized in the presence of flumequine (FQ) by crossl