Målinger i Norge fra 1960 og frem til Tsjernobyl

I Norge var målekapasiteten svært dårlig i forhold til situasjonen i Sverige. Vi hadde nesten ingen målekapasitet, heller ikke ved Institutt for Strålehygiene. Imidlertid hadde vi opprettholdt en undersøkelse som startet i 1965, da nedfallssituasjonen var noe av den samme som i dag. Vi visste også da at spesielle befolkningsgrupper var mer utsatt for stråling enn andre. Det var spesielt reindriftssamene som var knyttet til næringskjeden lav-reinkjøtt-menneske. Undersøkelser i Sverige, Finland og i Nord-Amerika hadde vist at det var betydelige mengder radioaktivitet i visse befolkningsgrupper. Kautokeino ble valgt som målingssted

Promoting Pre-Feeding Skills: Development and Implementation of an Oral Motor Protocol and Clinical Guidelines in a Level IV NICU

Intro: Oral feeding is often the last discharge criterion for preterm infants in the NICU and a leading cause of extended hospital stay. Preterm infants lack motor practice they would receive in utero when swallowing amniotic fluid and have underdeveloped physiological systems and oral structures, delaying feeding skills. Standardized pre-feeding oral motor protocols that include stimulation of oral structures and sucking on pacifiers have been shown to improve feeding efficiency, decrease transition time to full oral feeding, and decrease length of stay. Purpose: The purpose of this doctoral capstone project was to update the clinical guidelines on oral motor interventions in the University of Minnesota Masonic Children’s Hospital (UMMCH) NICU to improve the neurodevelopmental outcomes of premature infants by targeting oral motor skills through a new protocol to enhance breastfeeding and bottle feeding. Approach: Following an extensive literature review on best oral motor practices, the occupational therapists participated in a survey and focus group, were trained to implement the new protocol, and completed a follow-up survey to assess the utility of the protocol and updated clinical guidelines. Infant oral motor outcomes were also analyzed. Outcomes: All therapists reported feeling satisfied with the guidelines and confident in implementing the protocol and modifying it with intubated infants. Therapists also reported improved patient outcomes, including secretion management and swallowing, arousal levels, tolerance to stimulation and oral interest, and bottling skills. Short-term infant outcomes during the protocol include high percentages of good secretion management, activated swallowing, and latching to a pacifier. Recommendations: UMMCH NICU should continue to implement the protocol with infants of appropriate gestational age, utilize the clinical guidelines to train new therapists, provide additional training on the protocol as needed, continue quality improve cycle and adjust guidelines appropriately based on new evidence, provide parent education on protocol, and distribute modified nursing guidelines to further promote positive oral input for premature infants in the NICU

Purification and characterization of UEF3, a novel factor involved in the regulation of the urokinase and other AP-1 controlled promoters.

Basal as well as induced transcription from the human urokinase-type plasminogen activator gene requires an enhancer containing two elements, a combined PEA3/AP-1 and a consensus AP-1 site. The integrity of each of these binding sites as well as their cooperation is required for activating transcription. The two elements are separated by a 74-base pair cooperation mediating (COM) region required for the cooperation between the transactivating sites. The COM region contains binding sites for four different unidentified urokinase-type plasminogen activator enhancer factors (UEF 1 to 4), all four required for correct COM activity. We have purified UEF3 from HeLa nuclear extracts by several chromatographic steps including DNA affinity purification. Purification and UV cross-linking data showed that UEF3 is a complex of three polypeptides (p40, p50, and p64). Amino acid sequence from one peptide of p64 was obtained, which showed no homology to other known proteins. Both crude and purified UEF3 specifically bound to the sequence TGACAG as shown by electrophoretic mobility shifts and methylation interference studies. DNA-binding specificity of purified UEF3 was identical to that of NIP, a non-characterized factor binding and regulating multiple AP-1-regulated promoters like stromelysin and interleukin-3. Thus UEF3 appears to be a general DNA-binding factor involved in modulating the transcriptional response of AP-1 containing promoters

The neighborhood matters: warming and novel competitors alter flower production of alpine plants

Sexual reproduction, and the genetic variation it entails, could prove vital for plants’ ability to persist under a changing climate. Climate warming is causing species to shift their ranges to higher elevations and latitudes. The assembly of novel species combinations after asynchronous migrations with climate may have implications for the flower production of alpine plants. Studying how novel competitors affect flowering performance under climate warming is important to understand potential impacts of climate change on alpine plant population persistence and range dynamics. To investigate this, I used an established field experiment along a natural precipitation gradient in the mountains of western Norway, where both temperature and competitive conditions in alpine vegetation were manipulated through open-top chambers and transplant experiments. Data on flower production of graminoids and forbs in alpine plant communities and demographic data on two focal alpine species, Veronica alpina and Sibbaldia procumbens, were collected in four alpine semi-natural grasslands. In this study, experimental warming and the presence of novel competitors triggered higher flower production for graminoids and forbs, respectively. Additionally, the graminoid flowering community shifted towards more flowering in Cyperaceae- and Juncaceae species and less in Poaceae species under warming. Furthermore, fecundity clearly contributed to changes in population growth rates (∆λ) of both V. alpina and S. procumbens with warming and novel competitors. The population models revealed trade-offs in resource allocation between fecundity and vegetative growth and compensatory increases in fecundity with reduced survival. Thus, fecundity is strategically used in the ontogeny of alpine plant individuals. These findings suggest that genetic variation in alpine species will be preserved and that alpine plants may persist in alpine regions when influenced by the projected climate warming and range-expansion of lowland competitors, but also that the character of alpine grasslands may change towards more graminoid-dominant.Masteroppgave i biologiBIO399MAMN-BIOMAMN-HAVS

Rapid neural processing of grammatical tone in second language learners

The present dissertation investigates how beginner learners process grammatical tone in a second language and whether their processing is influenced by phonological transfer. Paper I focuses on the acquisition of Swedish grammatical tone by beginner learners from a non-tonal language, German. Results show that non-tonal beginner learners do not process the grammatical regularities of the tones but rather treat them akin to piano tones. A rightwards-going spread of activity in response to pitch difference in Swedish tones possibly indicates a process of tone sensitisation. Papers II to IV investigate how artificial grammatical tone, taught in a word-picture association paradigm, is acquired by German and Swedish learners. The results of paper II show that interspersed mismatches between grammatical tone and picture referents evoke an N400 only for the Swedish learners. Both learner groups produce N400 responses to picture mismatches related to grammatically meaningful vowel changes. While mismatch detection quickly reaches high accuracy rates, tone mismatches are least accurately and most slowly detected in both learner groups. For processing of the grammatical L2 words outside of mismatch contexts, the results of paper III reveal early, preconscious and late, conscious processing in the Swedish learner group within 20 minutes of acquisition (word recognition component, ELAN, LAN, P600). German learners only produce late responses: a P600 within 20 minutes and a LAN after sleep consolidation. The surprisingly rapid emergence of early grammatical ERP components (ELAN, LAN) is attributed to less resource-heavy processing outside of violation contexts. Results of paper IV, finally, indicate that memory trace formation, as visible in the word recognition component at ~50 ms, is only possible at the highest level of formal and functional similarity, that is, for words with falling tone in Swedish participants. Together, the findings emphasise the importance of phonological transfer in the initial stages of second language acquisition and suggest that the earlier the processing, the more important the impact of phonological transfer

Davidson on Explicit Performatives and Mood-setters

 I det følgende giver jeg en kort præsentation af Donald Davidsons semantiske analyse af eksplicitte performativer og modus. Jeg diskuterer hans strategi for at løse de semantiske problemer, der knytter sig til modus og argumenterer for, at hans analyse lider under det faktum, at han accepterer illokutionær kraft som et semantisk primitiv. Dette medfører, at han i stedet for at løse et semantisk problem blot flytter problemet fra den semantiske analyse af eksplicitte performativer til den semantiske analyse af det, han kalder sætningens ‘mood-setter’