Havununnan (Lymantria monacha) levinneisyyshistoria ja seuranta Suomessa

Tiivistelmä. Havununna (Lymantria monacha) on merkittävä havupuumetsien neulastuholainen Keski-Euroopassa, ja sen kannankehitystä monitoroidaan säännöllisesti massaesiintymien syntymisen havaitsemiseksi. Havununna oli Suomessa harvinainen vierailija vielä 1950-luvulla, mutta siitä tehtyjen havaintojen määrä on jopa 80-kertaistunut 1990-luvulta viime vuosiin. Havununnahavainnot painottuvat Suomessa Vaasa-Kuopio-Joensuu- akselin eteläpuolelle. Tämän tutkimuksen tarkoituksena on selvittää havununnan levinneisyyshistoria Suomessa, tarkastella talvi- ja kesälämpötiloissa tapahtuneita muutoksia sekä luoda havununnapyynnin avulla kuva nykyisestä havununnakannasta. Lisäksi pyynnin avulla saadaan kartoitettua metsätuhojen kannalta riskialtteimmat alueet ja kerättyä referenssiaineistoa tulevia havununnapyyntejä varten. Levinneisyyshistoria luotiin Laji.fi-havaintoportaaliin kirjattujen havaintojen pohjalta 1950-luvulta alkaen. Lämpötila-aineistot poimittiin kuudelta Ilmatieteenlaitoksen mittauspisteeltä 1960-luvulta alkaen eri puolilta Suomea. Havununnapyynti tehtiin 137 feromonipyydyksen avulla, jotka sijoitettiin Etelä- ja Keski-Suomen havupuumetsiin Metsähallituksen maille. Havununnan levinneisyyshistoriassa on selvästi havaittavissa havaintojen yleistyminen erityisesti 1990-luvun jälkeen, ja havaintojen yleistyminen myös sisämaassa. Havainnoiduissa yksiömäärissä on tapahtunut jopa 100-kertainen kasvu verrattaessa 2010-luvun havaintoja vuosien 1990–1999 havaintomääriin. Sekä talvi- että kesälämpötiloissa näyttäisi tapahtuneen muutoksia, jotka voisivat parantaa havununnan talvehtimista ja lisääntymistä Suomessa. Erityisesti havununnalle tappavia pakkasöitä ei ole Etelä-Suomessa ollut enää vuosiin. Havununnapyynnissä saaliiksi saatiin lähes 17 000 havununnakoirasta, ja suurin yksittäinen saalismäärä (988 yksilöä) saatiin Kaakkois-Suomesta. Havununnakanta oli kuitenkin yleisesti suurempi Lounais-Suomessa, jossa usean pyydyksen saalismäärä ylitti 500 yksilön rajan. Pohjoisimmat havununnayksilöt saatiin läheltä 64°N- leveyspiiriä, mikä on pohjoisin varmistettu havununnahavainto Suomessa. Havununnakanta on vahvistunut Suomessa merkittävästi viime vuosikymmenien aikana, ja sen aiheuttamien metsätuhojen riski on todellinen ainakin Etelä-Suomessa. Havununnakannan monitoroinnin jatkaminen Suomessa on välttämätöntä, jotta voidaan varautua sen aiheuttamiin tuhoihin, mikäli havununnakanta jatkaa vahvistumistaan

Extracting dynamical equations from experimental data is NP-hard

The behavior of any physical system is governed by its underlying dynamical equations. Much of physics is concerned with discovering these dynamical equations and understanding their consequences. In this work, we show that, remarkably, identifying the underlying dynamical equation from any amount of experimental data, however precise, is a provably computationally hard problem (it is NP-hard), both for classical and quantum mechanical systems. As a by-product of this work, we give complexity-theoretic answers to both the quantum and classical embedding problems, two long-standing open problems in mathematics (the classical problem, in particular, dating back over 70 years).Comment: For mathematical details, see arXiv:0908.2128[math-ph]. v2: final version, accepted in Phys. Rev. Let

Preasymptotic Convergence of Randomized Kaczmarz Method

Kaczmarz method is one popular iterative method for solving inverse problems, especially in computed tomography. Recently, it was established that a randomized version of the method enjoys an exponential convergence for well-posed problems, and the convergence rate is determined by a variant of the condition number. In this work, we analyze the preasymptotic convergence behavior of the randomized Kaczmarz method, and show that the low-frequency error (with respect to the right singular vectors) decays faster during first iterations than the high-frequency error. Under the assumption that the inverse solution is smooth (e.g., sourcewise representation), the result explains the fast empirical convergence behavior, thereby shedding new insights into the excellent performance of the randomized Kaczmarz method in practice. Further, we propose a simple strategy to stabilize the asymptotic convergence of the iteration by means of variance reduction. We provide extensive numerical experiments to confirm the analysis and to elucidate the behavior of the algorithms.Comment: 20 page

From a rare inhabitant into a potential pest - status of the nun moth in Finland based on pheromone trapping

Forests are affected by climate change in various ways. This includes abiotic factors such as droughts, but also biotic damage by pest insects. There are numerous examples from cases where pest insects have benefitted from longer growing seasons or from warmer summers. Similarly, new pest insects have been able to expand their range due to climatic conditions that have changed from hostile to tolerable. Such seems to be the case with the nun moth (Lymantria monacha), an important defoliator of coniferous trees in Europe. For centuries, the species has had massive outbreaks across Central-Europe, while it has been a rare inhabitant in Northern Europe. Recently, the nun moth population in Finland has not only expanded in range, but also grown more abundant. This research note describes the results from the first years (2018-2019) of a monitoring program that is being conducted with pheromone traps across central and southern Finland. So far, the northernmost individuals were trapped near the 64 N degrees. However, there were more southern locations where no moths were trapped. The species was present in every trapping site below the latitude of 62 N degrees. More importantly, at some sites the abundance of the nun moth suggested that local forest damage may already occur. Given the current climatic scenarios for Fennoscandia, it is likely that the nun moth populations will continue to grow. which is why systematic surveys on their abundance and range expansions will be topical

The impact of an intervention to introduce malaria rapid diagnostic tests on fever case management in a high transmission setting in Uganda: A mixed-methods cluster-randomized trial (PRIME).

Rapid diagnostic tests for malaria (mRDTs) have been scaled-up widely across Africa. The PRIME study evaluated an intervention aiming to improve fever case management using mRDTs at public health centers in Uganda. A cluster-randomized trial was conducted from 2010-13 in Tororo, a high malaria transmission setting. Twenty public health centers were randomized in a 1:1 ratio to intervention or control. The intervention included training in health center management, fever case management with mRDTs, and patient-centered services; plus provision of mRDTs and artemether-lumefantrine (AL) when stocks ran low. Three rounds of Interviews were conducted with caregivers of children under five years of age as they exited health centers (N = 1400); reference mRDTs were done in children with fever (N = 1336). Health worker perspectives on mRDTs were elicited through semi-structured questionnaires (N = 49) and in-depth interviews (N = 10). The primary outcome was inappropriate treatment of malaria, defined as the proportion of febrile children who were not treated according to guidelines based on the reference mRDT. There was no difference in inappropriate treatment of malaria between the intervention and control arms (24.0% versus 29.7%, adjusted risk ratio 0.81 95\% CI: 0.56, 1.17 p = 0.24). Most children (76.0\%) tested positive by reference mRDT, but many were not prescribed AL (22.5\% intervention versus 25.9\% control, p = 0.53). Inappropriate treatment of children testing negative by reference mRDT with AL was also common (31.3\% invention vs 42.4\% control, p = 0.29). Health workers appreciated mRDTs but felt that integrating testing into practice was challenging given constraints on time and infrastructure. The PRIME intervention did not have the desired impact on inappropriate treatment of malaria for children under five. In this high transmission setting, use of mRDTs did not lead to the reductions in antimalarial prescribing seen elsewhere. Broader investment in health systems, including infrastructure and staffing, will be required to improve fever case management

The Schwarzian derivative and the Wiman-Valiron property

Consider a transcendental meromorphic function in the plane with finitely many critical values, such that the multiple points have bounded multiplicities and the inverse function has finitely many transcendental singularities. Using the Wiman-Valiron method it is shown that if the Schwarzian derivative is transcendental then the function has infinitely many multiple points, the inverse function does not have a direct transcendental singularity over infinity, and infinity is not a Borel exceptional value. The first of these conclusions was proved by Nevanlinna and Elfving via a fundamentally different method

Painleve I, Coverings of the Sphere and Belyi Functions

The theory of poles of solutions of Painleve-I is equivalent to the Nevanlinna problem of constructing a meromorphic function ramified over five points - counting multiplicities - and without critical points. We construct such meromorphic functions as limit of rational ones. In the case of the tritronquee solution these rational functions are Belyi functions.Comment: 33 pages, many figures. Version 2: minor corrections and minor changes in the bibliograph

A Nested Case-Control Study of Intrauterine Exposure to Persistent Organochlorine Pollutants in Relation to Risk of Type 1 Diabetes

BACKGROUND: The incidence of type 1 diabetes in Europe is increasing at a rate of about 3% per year and there is also an increasing incidence throughout the world. Type 1 diabetes is a complex disease caused by multiple genetic and environmental factors. Persistent organochlorine pollutants (POPs) have been suggested as a triggering factor for developing childhood type 1 diabetes. The aim of this case-control study was to assess possible impacts of in utero exposure to POPs on type 1 diabetes. METHODOLOGY/ PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: The study was performed as a case-control study within a biobank in Malmö, a city located in the Southern part of Sweden. The study included 150 cases (children who had their diagnosis mostly before 18 years of age) and 150 controls, matched for gender and day of birth. 2,2',4,4',5,5'-hexachlorobiphenyl (PCB-153) and the major DDT metabolite 1,1-dichloro-2,2-bis (p-chlorophenyl)-ethylene (p,p'-DDE) were used as a biomarkers for POP exposure. When comparing the quartile with the highest maternal serum concentrations of PCB-153 with the other quartiles, an odds ratio (OR) of 0.73 (95% confidence interval [CI] 0.42, 1.27) was obtained. Similar results was obtained for p,p'-DDE (OR 0.56, 95% CI 0.29, 1.08). CONCLUSIONS: The hypothesis that in utero exposure to POPs will trigger the risk for developing type 1 diabetes was not supported by the results. The risk estimates did, although not statistically significant, go in the opposite direction. However, it is not reasonable to believe that exposure to POPs should protect against type 1 diabetes

Immunogenicity of subcutaneous TNF inhibitors and its clinical significance in real-life setting in patients with spondyloarthritis

Key messages Considerable proportion of patients with SpA have been immunized to the subcutaneous anti-TNF drug they are using. Concomitant use of MTX protects from immunization, whereas SASP does not. Patients with SpA using subcutaneous anti-TNF drugs can benefit from monitoring of the drug trough levels. Immunization to biological drugs can lead to decreased efficacy and increased risk of adverse effects. The objective of this cross-sectional study was to assess the extent and significance of immunization to subcutaneous tumor necrosis factor (TNF) inhibitors in axial spondyloarthritis (axSpA) patients in real-life setting. A serum sample was taken 1-2 days before the next drug injection. Drug trough concentrations, anti-drug antibodies (ADAb) and TNF-blocking capacity were measured in 273 patients with axSpA using subcutaneous anti-TNF drugs. The clinical activity of SpA was assessed using the Bath AS Disease Activity Index (BASDAI) and the Maastricht AS Entheses Score (MASES). ADAb were found in 11% of the 273 patients: in 21/99 (21%) of patients who used adalimumab, in 0/83 (0%) of those who used etanercept, in 2/79 (3%) of those who used golimumab and in 6/12 (50%) of those who used certolizumab pegol. Use of methotrexate reduced the risk of formation of ADAb, whereas sulfasalazine did not. Presence of ADAb resulted in decreased drug concentration and reduced TNF-blocking capacity. However, low levels of ADAb had no effect on TNF-blocking capacity and did not correlate with disease activity. The drug trough levels were below the consensus target level in 36% of the patients. High BMI correlated with low drug trough concentration. Patients with low drug trough levels had higher disease activity. The presence of anti-drug antibodies was associated with reduced drug trough levels, and the patients with low drug trough levels had higher disease activity. The drug trough levels were below target level in significant proportion of patients and, thus, measuring the drug concentration and ADAb could help to optimize the treatment in SpA patients.Peer reviewe