The Flip Side of Distractibility-Executive Dysfunction in Functional Movement Disorders.

Attention plays a crucial role in functional neurological disorders. Attention to the symptoms leads to their exacerbation and distraction to their improvement or even transitory disappearance. Objective: The aim was to test if the alerting, orienting and particularly the executive aspect of attention are affected in functional movement disorders. Methods: Thirty patients with a functional movement disorder, 30 patients with an organic movement disorder and 30 healthy controls performed the attention network test. Results: The alerting and orienting effects were normal, but executive control of attention under conflict was abnormal in patients with functional movement disorders, compared to patients with an organic movement disorder and healthy controls. Conclusion: Executive dysfunction seems to be an important secondary feature of functional movement disorders, due to the overutilization of attentional resources for explicit movement control. Furthermore, it provides an explanation for seemingly unrelated symptoms commonly associated with functional movement disorders, such as concentration difficulties and fatigue

Perspectives on Norway’s supercharged electric vehicle policy

AbstractNorway has achieved an unprecedented breakthrough for battery electric vehicles. The market share reached 17.1% in 2015, and the total fleet passed 2.7%, some 70000 vehicles. The multilevel perspective framework demonstrate how Norwegian incentives and policies gradually developed over a 25 year period through interactions between the international landscape, national governance networks, regimes and niches. Actors have been able to utilize windows of opportunities leading to the potential establishment of a BEV regime assimilated into the ICE regime from 2016. BEV incentives, some of which have been in place since 1990, did not yield results until the traditional vehicle manufacturers manufactured BEVs based on Li-Ion batteries from 2010. Norwegian purchase incentives are large enough to make electric vehicles a competitively priced alternative for vehicle buyers. Increased selection of models, improved technology, reduced vehicle prices, and extensive marketing have spurred further sales

The associations of sodium-glucose cotransporter-2 inhibitors versus dipeptidyl peptidase-4 inhibitors as add-on to metformin with fracture risk in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus

AIM: To investigate whether sodium-glucose cotransporter-2 (SGLT2) inhibitor use as compared to dipeptidyl peptidase-4 (DPP-4) inhibitor use as add-on to metformin is associated with the risk of any fracture or major osteoporotic fractures (MOFs). METHODS: A cohort study using the Clinical Practice Research Datalink (CPRD) Aurum database was conducted. All patients aged 18 years and older with a first-ever prescription for a DPP-4 inhibitor or an SGLT2 inhibitor as add-on to metformin between January 1, 2013 and June 30, 2020 were selected. Patients starting with SGLT2 inhibitors were matched (up to 1:3) on propensity scores to patients starting with DPP-4 inhibitors. Propensity scores were calculated based on sex, age, body mass index, comorbidities, comedication and lifestyle factors. Cox proportional hazard models were used to estimate the risk of fracture with SGLT2 inhibitor use as compared to DPP-4 inhibitor use. RESULTS: A total of 13 807 SGLT2 inhibitor users (age 55.4 ± 10.6 years, 36.7% female) were included in this study, matched with 28 524 DPP-4 inhibitor users (age 55.4 ± 8.0 years, 36.4% female). The risk of any fracture with current SGLT2 inhibitor use was similar compared with current DPP-4 inhibitor use (adjusted hazard ratio [aHR] 1.09, 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.91-1.31), as was the risk of MOFs (aHR 0.89, 95% CI 0.64-1.22) and the risk of fractures at any of the individual MOF sites. Additionally, no association was found with duration of SGLT2 inhibitor use (longest duration >811 days) for any of the individual SGLT2 inhibitor agents, or after stratification by sex and age. CONCLUSION: Use of SGLT2 inhibitors was not associated with the risk of any fracture, MOFs or fracture at the individual MOF sites when compared to DPP-4 inhibitor use

Stress degradation studies and development of stability-indicating TLC-densitometry method for determination of prednisolone acetate and chloramphenicol in their individual and combined pharmaceutical formulations

A rapid and reproducible stability indicating TLC method was developed for the determination of prednisolone acetate and chloramphenicol in presence of their degraded products. Uniform degradation conditions were maintained by refluxing sixteen reaction mixtures for two hours at 80°C using parallel synthesizer including acidic, alkaline and neutral hydrolysis, oxidation and wet heating degradation. Oxidation at room temperature, photochemical and dry heating degradation studies were also carried out. Separation was done on TLC glass plates, pre-coated with silica gel 60F-254 using chloroform: methanol (14:1 v/v). Spots at Rf 0.21 ± 0.02 and Rf 0.41 ± 0.03 were recognized as chloramphenicol and prednisolone acetate, respectively. Quantitative analysis was done through densitometric measurements at multiwavelength (243 nm, λmax of prednisolone acetate and 278 nm, λmax of chloramphenicol), simultaneously. The developed method was optimized and validated as per ICH guidelines. Method was found linear over the concentration range of 200-6000 ng/spot with the correlation coefficient (r2 ± S.D.) of 0.9976 ± 3.5 and 0.9920 ± 2.5 for prednisolone acetate and chloramphenicol, respectively. The developed TLC method can be applied for routine analysis of prednisolone acetate and chloramphenicol in presence of their degraded products in their individual and combined pharmaceutical formulations

Combining machine learning and metaheuristics algorithms for classification method PROAFTN

© Crown 2019. The supervised learning classification algorithms are one of the most well known successful techniques for ambient assisted living environments. However the usual supervised learning classification approaches face issues that limit their application especially in dealing with the knowledge interpretation and with very large unbalanced labeled data set. To address these issues fuzzy classification method PROAFTN was proposed. PROAFTN is part of learning algorithms and enables to determine the fuzzy resemblance measures by generalizing the concordance and discordance indexes used in outranking methods. The main goal of this chapter is to show how the combined meta-heuristics with inductive learning techniques can improve performances of the PROAFTN classifier. The improved PROAFTN classifier is described and compared to well known classifiers, in terms of their learning methodology and classification accuracy. Through this chapter we have shown the ability of the metaheuristics when embedded to PROAFTN method to solve efficiency the classification problems

Nonthermal Emission from Star-Forming Galaxies

The detections of high-energy gamma-ray emission from the nearby starburst galaxies M82 & NGC253, and other local group galaxies, broaden our knowledge of star-driven nonthermal processes and phenomena in non-AGN star-forming galaxies. We review basic aspects of the related processes and their modeling in starburst galaxies. Since these processes involve both energetic electrons and protons accelerated by SN shocks, their respective radiative yields can be used to explore the SN-particle-radiation connection. Specifically, the relation between SN activity, energetic particles, and their radiative yields, is assessed through respective measures of the particle energy density in several star-forming galaxies. The deduced energy densities range from O(0.1) eV/cm^3 in very quiet environments to O(100) eV/cm^3 in regions with very high star-formation rates.Comment: 17 pages, 5 figures, to be published in Astrophysics and Space Science Proceeding

Puberty disorders among ART-conceived singletons: a Nordic register study from the CoNARTaS group

STUDY QUESTIONDo ART-conceived children have an increased risk for puberty disorders?SUMMARY ANSWERBoth ART-conceived boys and girls had a higher risk of puberty disorders; early puberty was more common among girls and late puberty among boys.WHAT IS KNOWN ALREADYSome physiological differences in growth and metabolism have been reported for ART-conceived children compared to non-ART-conceived children. Knowledge on pubertal development and disorders in ART-conceived children is limited.STUDY DESIGN, SIZE, DURATIONA register-based cohort study was carried out including data from 1985 to 2015. The Committee of Nordic Assisted Reproductive Technology and Safety (CoNARTaS) study population consists of all live and stillborn children, as well as their mothers, registered in the Medical Birth Registers during the study period in Denmark, Sweden, Finland and Norway.PARTICIPANTS/MATERIALS, SETTING, METHODSA total of 122 321 ART-conceived singletons and 6 576 410 non-ART singletons born in Denmark (1994–2014), Finland (1990–2014), Norway (2002–2015) and Sweden (1985–2015) were included. Puberty disorders were defined using International Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems (ICD)-9/ICD-10 codes and classified in the following groups: late puberty (6268/E30.0), early puberty (2591 and 2958/E30.1 and E30.8) and unspecified disorders (V212 and V579/E30.9 and Z00.3 as well as Z51.80 for Finland). The results in Cox regression were adjusted for maternal age, parity, smoking, gestational diabetes, chronic hypertension, hypertensive disorders during pregnancy and country, and further for either gestational age, birthweight, small for gestational age or large for gestational age.MAIN RESULTS AND THE ROLE OF CHANCEThere were 37 869 children with diagnoses related to puberty disorders, and 603 of them were born after ART. ART-conceived children had higher risks for early (adjusted hazard ratio (aHR) 1.45, 95% CI: 1.29–1.64) and late puberty (aHR 1.47, 95% CI: 1.21–1.77). Girls had more diagnoses related to early puberty (aHR 1.46, 95% CI: 1.29–1.66) and boys with late puberty (aHR 1.55, 95% CI: 1.24–1.95).LIMITATIONS, REASONS FOR CAUTIONUsing reported puberty disorders with ICD codes in health care registers might vary, which may affect the numbers of cases found in the registers. Register data may give an underestimation both among ART and non-ART-conceived children, especially among non-ART children, who may not be as carefully followed as ART-conceived children. Adjustment for causes and duration of infertility, mothers’ own puberty characteristics and BMI, as well as children’s BMI, was not possible because data were not available or data were missing for the early years. It was also not possible to compare ART to non-ART siblings or to study the pubertal disorders by cause of subfertility owing to a small number of discordant sibling pairs and a large proportion of missing data on cause of subfertility.WIDER IMPLICATIONS OF THE FINDINGSThis large, register-based study suggests that ART-conceived children have a higher risk for puberty disorders. However, the mechanisms of infertility and pubertal onset are complex, and ART is a rapidly advancing field with various treatment options. Studying the pubertal disorders of ART-conceived offspring is a continuing challenge.STUDY FUNDING/COMPETING INTEREST(S)This work was supported by the Nordic Trial Alliance: a pilot project jointly funded by the Nordic Council of Ministers and NordForsk (71450), the Central Norway Regional Health Authorities (46045000), the Nordic Federation of Obstetrics and Gynaecology (NF13041, NF15058, NF16026 and NF17043), the Interreg Öresund-Kattegat-Skagerrak European Regional Development Fund (ReproUnion project), the Research Council of Norway’s Centre of Excellence funding scheme (262700), the Swedish state under the agreement between the Swedish government and the county councils, the ALF-agreement (ALFGBG-70940) and FLUX Consortium ‘Family Formation in Flux—Causes, Consequences and Possible Futures’, funded by the Strategic Research Council, Academy of Finland (DEMOGRAPHY 345130). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish or preparation of the manuscript. The authors have no conflicts of interest to disclose.</p

The Na-O anticorrelation in horizontal branch stars. II. NGC1851

We studied the Na-O anti-correlation from moderately high resolution spectra for 35 stars on the blue HB (BHB), one RR Lyrae, and 55 stars are on the red HB (RHB) of NGC1851. We also derived abundances for He and N in BHB stars, and Ba and upper limits for N in RHB stars. The RHB stars clearly separate into two groups: the vast majority are O-rich and Na-poor, while about 10-15% are Na-rich and moderately O-poor. Most Na-rich RHB stars are also Ba-rich and there is an overall correlation between Na and Ba abundances within the RHB. The group of Ba-rich RHB stars resides on the warmer edge and includes ~10% of the RHB stars. We propose that they are the descendant of the stars on the RGB sequence with very red v-y colour. This sequence is known also to consist of Ba and perhaps CNO-rich stars. However, the upper limit we obtain for N ([N/Fe]<1.55) for one of the Ba-rich stars coupled with the low C-abundances for RGB Ba-rich stars from the literature suggests that the total CNO might not be particularly high ([(C+N+O)/Fe]<=0.15). The other Na-rich RHB stars are also at the warm edge of the RHB and the only RR Lyrae is Na-rich and moderately O-poor. We also find a Na-O anticorrelation among BHB stars, partially overlapping that found among RHB stars, though generally BHB stars are more Na-rich and O-poor. However, there is no clear correlation between temperature and Na and O abundances within the BHB. The average He abundance in BHB stars is Y=0.29+/-0.05. N abundances are quite uniform at [N/Fe]=1.16+/-0.14 among BHB stars, with a small trend with temperature. This value is consistent with normal CNO abundance and excludes that BHB stars are very CNO-rich: this leaves an age spread of ~1.5 Gyr as the only viable explanation for the split of the SGB. [Abridged]Comment: In press on Astronomy and Astrophysics. 19 pages, 12 figure