Developing LCA-based benchmarks for sustainable consumption - for and with users

This article presents the development process of a consumer-oriented, illustrative benchmarking tool enabling consumers to use the results of environmental life cycle assessment (LCA) to make informed decisions. Active and environmentally conscious consumers and environmental communicators were identified as key target groups for this type of information. A brochure presenting the benchmarking tool was developed as an participatory, iterative process involving consumer focus groups, stakeholder workshops and questionnaire-based feedback. In addition to learning what works and what does not, detailed suggestions on improved wording and figures were obtained, as well as a wealth of ideas for future applications

Gender- and age-stratified analyses of gambling disorder in Finland between 2011 and 2020 based on administrative registers

Aim: Prevalence studies on gambling have largely relied on survey samples. Little is known about the diagnosed prevalence of gambling disorder (GD) based on register data. This study examines the annual prevalence rate of GD between 2011 and 2020 among Finns by gender and age. Methods: Aggregated data on the diagnosis of GD (corresponding to pathological gambling, code F63.0 in the ICD-10) were retrieved from the following national registers: Register of Primary Health Care Visits, and Care Register for Health Care, including specialised outpatient and inpatient health care, and inpatient Care Register for Social Welfare. Primary and secondary diagnoses of adults were included. Average population during a calendar year (4,282,714-4,460,177 individuals) was utilised to calculate annual prevalence. Results: The annual prevalence of diagnosed GD in the population increased from 0.005% (n = 196) to 0.018% (n = 804) within nine years. In 2011, the annual prevalence rate was 0.006% for men and 0.003% for women, compared to rates in 2020 of 0.025% and 0.011%. Gender discrepancy was relatively stable across years: 27.2-33.8% of the diagnoses were for women. The prevalence of GD varied between age groups within genders. GD was most prevalent among 18-44-year-olds. The prevalence rates increased the most among 30-44-year-old women. Conclusion: The extremely low prevalence rate of GD implies that the problem remains under-diagnosed, yet, it has increased among all age groups across genders, except for women aged 60 years or older. Active efforts are needed to increase awareness of GD among both primary and specialised healthcare professionals and the public for better recognition and early detection.Peer reviewe

Latest Development in the FoTran Project – Scaling Up Language Coverage in Neural Machine Translation Using Distributed Training with Language-Specific Components

We give an update on the Found in Translation (FoTran) project, focusing on the study of emerging language-agnostic representations from neural machine translation (NMT). We describe our attention-bridge model, a modular NMT model which connects language-specific components through a shared network layer. Our latest implementation supports distributed training over many nodes and GPUs in order to substantially scale up the number of languages that can be included in a modern neural translation architecture.Peer reviewe

Clinical Value of 18F-fluorodeoxyglucose Positron Emission Tomography/Computed Tomography in Response Evaluation after Primary Treatment of Advanced Epithelial Ovarian Cancer

Aims: To prospectively evaluate the use of F-18-fluorodeoxyglucose positron emission tomography/computed tomography (F-18-FDG-PET/CT) in the definition of the treatment response after primary treatment of advanced epithelial ovarian cancer (EOC). Materials and methods: Forty-nine patients with advanced EOC had an F-18-FDG PET/CT scan before and after primary treatment. The treatment response was defined with the currently used radiological and serological Response Criteria in Solid Tumors (RECIST1.1/GCIC) criteria and the modified PET Response Criteria in Solid Tumors (PERCIST). The concordance of the two methods was analysed. If the patient had a complete response to primary treatment by conventional criteria, the end of treatment F-18-FDG PET/CT scan (etPET/CT) was not opened until retrospectively at the time of disease progression. The ability of etPET/CT to predict the time to disease recurrence was analysed. The recurrence patterns were observed with an F-18-FDG PET/CT at the first relapse. Results: The agreement of the RECIST1.1/GCIC and modified PERCIST criteria in defining the primary treatment response in the whole patient cohort was good (weighted kappa coefficient = 0.78 ). Of the complete responders (n = 28), 34% had metabolically active lesions present in the etPET/CT, most typically in the lymph nodes. The same anatomical sites tended to activate at disease relapse, but were seldom the only site of relapse. In patients with widespread intra-abdominal carsinosis at diagnosis, the definition of metabolic response was challenging due to problems in distinguishing the physiological FDG accumulation in the bowel loops from the residual tumour in the same area. The presence of metabolically active lesions in the etPET/CT did not predict earlier disease relapse in the complete responders. Conclusions: In the present study, etPET/CT revealed metabolically active lesions in complete responders after EOC primary therapy, but they were insignificant for the patient's prognosis. The current study does not favour routine use of F-18-FDG PET/CT after EOC primary treatment for complete responders. (C) 2018 The Royal College of Radiologists. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.Peer reviewe

An exploratory study looking at the relationship marketing techniques used in the music festival industry

There are current issues and trends in the music festival market, which may affect the success of an event, and market saturation is at the forefront of these issues. Previous literature, maintaining the need for a marketing approach to festivals, identifi es the need for maintaining strong stakeholder relationships in order to succeed in a business environment; attention has been focused to the theory of relationship marketing (RM) because of the recognition that this practice is complementary to the marketing of festivals. The very nature of the music festival as an annual, usually, 4-day event means that effective marketing is needed to keep connections with the consumer throughout the year. This article focuses on the RM techniques utilised within the music festival industry from the viewpoint of the festival organiser in an attempt to establish how festival organisations value and monitor organisational relationships. This article explores the extent to which these relationships are valued and managed; furthermore, the variations between these intricate relationships are considered by focusing on those held with the organisation ’ s consumers and sponsors, the results of which have provided the ability to establish the importance and relevance of RM to the industry and further identify the marketing communication methods employed to establish and maintain such relationships. In-depth, convergent interviews have been conducted with a segment of music festival organisers from a range of events. The results have been integrated with the study of current literature to best exemplify these issues. It has been established that RM has a strong role in today ’ s commercial and independent music festival industry; technological advances are enabling the organiser to support online relationships further and increase consumer loyalty. There is a need to expand the research further because of the complexity of organisational relationships and the varying categories of festivals

An Interdisciplinary Perspective on Education Service Systems

Part 3: Finance and Service ScienceInternational audienceThe increased complexity in education systems has given rise to a number of intersecting trends and calling for a discipline to integrate across academic silos. As the concept of service innovation advances more rapidly into education services; industry, government, and academy are awakened to the concept of embedding services innovation. This theoretical paper offers an integrated framework for education systems (IFES) covering two intersecting dimensions where service innovation and service science can take place. As an effort to contribute in the area of service innovation and service sciences, an interdisciplinary approach is applied, interconnecting an array of competences across the different stakeholders. It is hypothesized that to increase productivity in education industries, interconnecting knowledge and resources from diverse areas and across different stakeholders through the co-lineation of four dimensions: (1) information, communications and technology; (2) skills and tools; (3) people and attitudes; (4) systems, processes and management; are essential to creating service innovation. This paper contributes a perspective of interconnectivity balanced with harmony that are crucial for effective productivity and service innovation by adopting a service science approach

Extralevator versus standard abdominoperineal excision in locally advanced rectal cancer: a retrospective study with long-term follow-up

To analyze the results of abdominoperineal excisions (APE) for locally advanced rectal cancer at our institution before and after the adoption of extralevator abdominoperineal excision (ELAPE) with a special reference to long-term survival.A retrospective cohort study conducted in a tertiary referral center. All consecutive patients operated for locally advanced (TNM classification T3-4) rectal cancer with APE in 2004-2009 were compared to patients with similar tumors operated with ELAPE in 2009-2016.Forty-two ELAPE and 27 APE patients were included. Circumferential resection margin (CRM) was less than 1 mm (R1-resection) in 10 (24%) of ELAPE patients and 11 (41%) of APE patients (p = 0.1358). Intraoperative perforation (IOP) occurred in 4 (10%) patients and 6 (22%) patients in ELAPE and APE groups, respectively (p = 0.1336). There were 3 (7%) local recurrences (LRs) in ELAPE group and 5 (19%) in APE (p = 0.2473). There were no statistical differences in adverse events, overall survival, or disease-free survival between ELAPE and APE groups.We found a non-significant tendency to lower rates of IOP and positive CRM as well as lower rate of LR in the ELAPE group. Long-term survival and adverse events did not differ between the groups. ELAPE is beneficial for the surgeon in offering better vicinity to the perineal area and better work ergonomics. These technical aspects and the clinically very important tendency to lower rate of LR support the use of ELAPE technique in spite of the lack of survival benefit

Cyclin D mediates tolerance of genome-doubling in cancers with functional p53

BACKGROUND: Aneuploidy and chromosomal instability (CIN) are common features of human malignancy that fuel genetic heterogeneity. Although tolerance to tetraploidization, an intermediate state that further exacerbates CIN, is frequently mediated by TP53 dysfunction, we find that some genome-doubled tumours retain wild-type TP53. We sought to understand how tetraploid cells with a functional p53/p21-axis tolerate genome-doubling events. METHOD: We performed quantitative proteomics in a diploid/tetraploid pair within a system of multiple independently derived TP53 wild-type tetraploid clones arising spontaneously from a diploid progenitor. We characterized adapted and acute tetraploidization in a variety of flow cytometry and biochemical assays and tested our findings against human tumours through bioinformatics analysis of the TCGA dataset. RESULTS: Cyclin D1 was found to be specifically overexpressed in early but not late passage tetraploid clones, and this overexpression was sufficient to promote tolerance to spontaneous and pharmacologically induced tetraploidy. We provide evidence that this role extends to D-type cyclins and their overexpression confers specific proliferative advantage to tetraploid cells. We demonstrate that tetraploid clones exhibit elevated levels of functional p53 and p21 but override the p53/p21 checkpoint by elevated expression of cyclin D1, via a stoichiometry-dependent and CDK activity-independent mechanism. Tetraploid cells do not exhibit increased sensitivity to abemaciclib, suggesting that cyclin D-overexpressing tumours might not be specifically amenable to treatment with CDK4/6 inhibitors. CONCLUSION: Our study suggests that D-type cyclin overexpression is an acute event, permissive for rapid adaptation to a genome-doubled state in TP53 wild-type tumours and that its overexpression is dispensable in later stages of tumour progression

Treatment of municipal wastewater in full-scale on-site sand filter reduces BOD efficiently but does not reach requirements for nitrogen and phosphorus removal

© 2017, The Author(s).A traditional sand filter for treatment of household wastewater was constructed in the fall of 2012 at Biolinja 12, Turku, Finland. Construction work was led and monitored by an authorized wastewater treatment consultant. The filter was placed on a field bordered by open ditches from all sides in order to collect excess rain and snowmelt waters. The filter was constructed and insulated from the environment so that all outflowing water was accounted for. Untreated, mainly municipal, wastewater from Varissuo suburb was pumped from a sewer separately via three septic tanks (volume = 1 m3 each) into the filters. Normally, wastewater was distributed to ground filters automatically according to pre-programmed schedule. Initially, the daily flow was 1200 L day−1 to reflect the average organic load of a household of five persons (load: ca 237 g day−1 BOD; 73 g day−1 total N; and 10.4 g day−1 total P). Later in the test, the flow rate was decreased first to 900 and then to 600 L day−1 to better reflect the average volume produced by five persons. Volumes of inlet wastewater as well as treated water were monitored by magnetic flow meters. Samples were withdrawn from the inlet water, from the water entering the filters after the third septic tank, and from the outflowing water. After an initial adaption time, the reductions in BOD and chemical oxygen demand were constantly between 92 and 98%, showing that the biological degradation process in the filters functioned optimally and clearly comply with the national and EU standards. The reduction in total nitrogen and total phosphorus, however, reached required levels only during the first months of testing, apparently when buildup of microbial biomass was still ongoing. After this initial period of 3 months showing satisfactory reduction levels, the reduction of total nitrogen varied between 5 and 25% and total phosphorus mostly between 50 and 65%. Nitrification was efficient in the filter, but as indicated by high nitrate levels and poor nitrogen reductions, denitrification was inefficient or absent. During the winter period, the temperature in the filter dropped to near freezing, but at all time points, the flow of water was unaffected by freezing. During snowmelt and heavy rain, occasional flooding was observed. Such situations may lead to dilution rather than purification of the wastewater. In conclusion, the sand filter tested worked well for reduction of the organic load in municipal wastewater but failed to sufficiently reduce nitrogen and phosphorus levels

A cross validation of Consumer-Based Brand Equity (CBBE) with Private Labels in Spain

Molinillo,S., Ekinci, Y., Japutra, A. (2014)'A cross validation of Consumer-Based Brand Equity (CBBE) with Private Labels in Spain'. in Martínez-López, Gázquez-Abad, J.C. and Sethuraman, R. J.A. (eds.) Advances in National Brand and Private Label Marketing. Second International Conference, 2015. Springer Proceedings in Business and Economics, pp. 113-125In recent years a number of Consumer-Based Brand Equity (CBBE) models and measurement scales have been introduced in the branding literature. However, examinations of brand equity in Private Labels (PL) are rather limited. This study aims to compare the validity of the two prominent CBBE models those introduced by Yoo and Donthu (2001) and Nam et al. (2011). In order to test the models and make this comparison, the study collected data from 236 respondents who rated private labels in Spain. A list of 30 different fashion and sportswear PL was introduced to respondents. These brands do not make any reference to the retail store in which they are sold. Research findings suggest that the extended CBBE model introduced by Nam et al. (2011) and Ciftci et al. (2014) is more reliable and valid than Yoo and Donthu’s model for assessing PL. Theoretical contributions and managerial implications are discussed.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech