Sustainability Claims and Perceived Product Quality:The Moderating Role of Brand CSR

In this research, we focus on the presumed negative effect of a sustainability claim on product quality. We propose that a brands' corporate social responsibility (CSR) can reduce this negative effect. We conduct an experiment to test our hypotheses for a newly introduced detergent brand with an ecolabel vs. without one for high and low brand CSR levels. The experiment was conducted among 304 participants. Our results show that the ecolabel of the detergent can indeed trigger quality concerns. These quality concerns are reduced for brands high in CSR. This suggests that a brand's sustained commitment to sustainability is important in overcoming negative effects of sustainability claims on product quality

Intravenous immunoglobulin treatment in chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy

Patients with a chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy (CIDP) may respond to treatment with corticosteroids and to plasmapheresis, which was demonstrated in controlled clinical studies. In an uncontrolled study it was found that 13/17 CIDP patients had a rapid and clinical important improvement after infusion of Fresh Frozen Plasma (FFP). A beneficial response was also seen after-mtravenous rmmunoglobulin (Mg) treatment. The aims of this study were: - to evaluate the clinical effectiveness of Mg in CIDP patients, - to define clinical and inrmunological factors associated with improvement after Mg in CIDP patients and - to investigate immunological mechanisms involved in the response to Mg treatment

Tips in navigating the diagnostic complexities of chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyradiculoneuropathy

The 2021 guideline of the European Academy of Neurology/Peripheral Nerve Society on chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyradiculoneuropathy (CIDP) includes important revisions to the previous 2010 guideline. This article highlights the new criteria and recommendations for the differential diagnosis of CIDP. In the revised guideline, the CIDP spectrum has been modified to include typical CIDP and four well-characterized CIDP variants, namely distal, multifocal/focal, motor and sensory CIDP, replacing the term ‘atypical’ CIDP. To improve the diagnosis of CIDP, the revised guideline attempts to improve the specificity of the diagnostic criteria for typical CIDP and the four CIDP variants. Specific clinical and electrodiagnostic (including both motor and sensory conduction) criteria are provided for typical CIDP and each of the CIDP variants. The levels of diagnostic certainty have been changed to CIDP and possible CIDP, with the removal of probable CIDP (due to the lack of difference in the accuracy of the electrodiagnostic criteria for probable CIDP) and definite CIDP (due to the lack of a gold standard for diagnosis). If the clinical and electrodiagnostic criteria allow only for a diagnosis of possible CIDP, cerebrospinal fluid analysis, nerve ultrasound, nerve magnetic resonance imaging, objective treatment response, and nerve biopsy can be used as supportive criteria to upgrade the diagnosis to CIDP. Although the revised guideline needs to be validated and its strengths and weaknesses assessed, using the guideline will likely improve the accuracy of diagnosis of CIDP and variants of CIDP, and aid in distinguishing CIDP from conditions with similar features.</p

Signaling after the first bite: the role of insect elicitor and jasmonic acid metabolism in shaping plant-insect interactions

Plants and insects share a long evolutionary history, and in this time insects have specialized themselves on plant species, whereas plants have evolved many different ways of defense against these herbivores. An important part of plant defense is the recognition of insect herbivores, and plants have evolved mechanisms to perceive the oral secretions (OS) of feeding insects, allowing them to activate a tailored defense response. After the perception of these oral secretions, the plant hormone jasmonic acid (JA) is quickly biosynthesized. This JA accumulation will activate defense gene expression, leading to an accumulation of plant defense compounds and proteins throughout the plant. In this thesis, I have explored the metabolism of an insect elictor on the wounded plant surface, and investigated the metabolism of jasmonic acid after wounding alone, and simulated herbivory by wounding and applying oral secretions. These studies showed that in the interaction between Nicotiana attenuata and its herbivore Manduca sexta, the fatty-acid amino-acid conjugate 18:3-Glu is rapidly converted to at least three different compounds, one of which is also an active elicitor of JA and plant-produced volatiles. The role of JA metabolism was studies in the wild species Solanum nigrum, as tools for this study we created transgenic plants silenced for genes in JA biosynthesis , metabolism of JA to JA-Ile and the perception of jasmonates. Jasmonate profiling showed that COI1 and JAR4 played both important, but only partly overlapping roles in the metabolism of JA to JA-Ile and other jasmonates. Moreover, it was shown that in contrast to JA biosynthesis and JA perception, the conversion of JA to JA-Ile was not responsible for the activation of plant defenses in the systemic leaf. These results together suggest that both insect elicitor and jasmonic acid modification have been important in shaping the relationship between plants and their insect herbivores

Analysing the favourable effects of physical exercise:Relationships between physical fitness, fatigue and functioning in Guillain-Barre syndrome and chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy

Objective: To elucidate the effects of physical exercise in severely fatigued patients with Guillain-Barr syndrome and chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy, and to clarify the mutual relationships between 5 domains studied in these patients: physical fitness, fatigue, objectively measured actual mobility, perceived physical functioning, and perceived mental functioning.Design: Case series.Subjects/patients: Twenty patients with Guillain-Barre syndrome and chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy.Methods: The patients undertook a 12-week physical exercise program. Relationships between domains were studied in the change scores, and additionally in the baseline data of patients. The percentage of significant relationships between each pair of domains was determined.Results: In the change scores, a small percentage of significant relationships was found between the physical fitness domain and the other 4 domains (2/30, 7%). A higher percentage of significant relationships was found between the domains perceived mental functioning and actual mobility (44%), perceived mental functioning and perceived physical functioning (44%), and between fatigue and perceived physical functioning (33%). Generally, similar patterns were found in the baseline data.Conclusion: Changes in fatigue, actual mobility and perceived functioning seem not to be influenced by changes in physical fitness. This study stresses the presence and importance of additional effects of a physical training program, not directly related to increasing fitness