Risk communication in clinical trials: A cognitive experiment and a survey

10.1186/1472-6947-10-55BMC Medical Informatics and Decision Making101

Tissue type and location within forest together regulate decay trajectories of Abies faxoniana logs at early and mid-decay stage

Deadwood decomposition plays a crucial role in global carbon and nutrient cycles. Factors controlling deadwood decomposition at local scales could also have strong effects at broader scales. We tested how trait variation within stems (i.e. tissue types) and forest habitat heterogeneity (i.e. location within forest) together influence the deadwood decay trajectory and decay rate. We conducted an in situ decomposition experiment of Abies faxoniana logs in an alpine forest on the eastern Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau, decomposing logs from a series of decay classes I-III (on a 5-class scale) for five years on the forest floor in canopy gap, gap edge and under closed canopy (each sized 25 ± 3 × 25 ± 3 m). We found strong differences in density and chemical composition between tissue types at least across decay classes I-III, which revealed the distinct contribution of each tissue type to carbon and nutrient cycling. There were remarkable interactions of tissue types and locations within forest. We found bark always decomposed faster than wood, while heartwood can decompose faster than sapwood in canopy edge and canopy gap. Locations within forest influenced the best fit decay model and decay rate of bark and sapwood in the same way, while it had no corresponding effects for heartwood decay dynamics. The largest difference in T0.25 and T0.4 (time to 25% and 40% mass loss) between locations were 1.52 and 3.21 (bark), 19.41 and 37.61 (wood overall), 31.82 and 60.15 (sapwood), and 12.86 and 22.84 (heartwood), respectively. We also found that pH was significantly negatively related with sapwood and heartwood mass loss, demonstrating that pH can potentially be applied to evaluate sapwood and heartwood mass loss when density correction is difficult to achieve at least at early to mid-decay stages. However, whether pH is a powerful predictor of decomposition trajectory across more species and biomes remains to be tested. We strongly recommend that further model predictions of coarse log decay include radial positions within stem and locations within forest as factors to increase the reliability of carbon budget estimates

A randomized phase II study comparing two schedules of the 21-day regimen of gemcitabine and carboplatin in advanced non-small cell lung cancer

Purpose: Carboplatin area under the curve (AUC) 5 ml/min on day 1 with gemcitabine 1,250 mg/m2on day 1 and day 8 is a widely used regimen in advanced non-small cell lung cancer. Grade 3-4 thrombocytopenia and neutropenia are frequent. The aim of this study is to investigate whether toxicity of gemcitabine/carboplatin could be reduced by administering carboplatin on day 8 instead of

POVIJEST ZLARINA 3

Singapore Medical Journal354420-42

Nutrigenomic and nutritional analyses reveal the effects of pelleted feeds on Asian Seabass (Lates calcarifer)

As nutrition-related expenses constitute the majority of the costs for aquaculture farms, it is essential for them to use feeds that provide an ideal combination of nutrients for the species of choice. In this study, the relative effect of consuming three different pelleted feeds (B, C and D) in comparison to frozen baitfish (A; control) were compared on juvenile Asian seabass (77.3 ± 22.4g) that were selected for increased growth rate over two generations. Our objectives were: 1) to evaluate the effects of different pelleted feeds based on overall physiological changes and nutritional quality of fillets; 2) improve our understanding of the underlying mechanisms with transcriptomic analysis; 3) if possible, identify the feed type that supports the growth of these fishes without substantially reducing the nutritional quality of fillet. The growth performance, fatty acid composition of fillet, hepatic histology and transcriptome of the fishes (Groups A-D) were analyzed. The majority of fatty acids of the fillets, except γ-linolenic acid (GLA, C18:3n6), correlated significantly with the respective diets. Asian seabass fed Feed C showed highest specific growth rate (SGR) and feed conversion efficiency (FCE) with closest histology and transcriptomic profile to control, but their fillet contained the highest n6/n3 ratio. When the liver-based transcriptomes were analyzed, a complex set of differentially expressed genes were detected between groups fed pelleted feeds and controls as well as among the pellet-fed groups themselves. Significant enrichment of genes with growth-related function tallied with the morphological data measured. When compared with control (Group A), ‘Biosynthesis of unsaturated fatty acids’ and ‘Steroid biosynthesis’ pathways were significantly enriched in pellet-fed groups. Reduced goblet cell numbers were observed in the gut of pellet-fed fish compared to controls and fads6 was found to be a suitable candidate gene to separate wild-caught Asian seabass, from pellet-fed ones. These results provide insights for researchers on the various effects of feeds on the biochemistry and global gene expression of the fish and potentially for seabass farms to make more informed feed choices

The relation between mood, activity, and interaction in long-term dementia care

YesObjective: The aim of the study is to identify the degree of association between mood, activity engagement, activity location, and social interaction during everyday life of people with dementia (PwD) living in long-term care facilities. Method: An observational study using momentary assessments was conducted. For all 115 participants, 84 momentary assessments of mood, engagement in activity, location during activity, and social interaction were carried out by a researcher using the tablet-based Maastricht Electronic Daily Life Observation-tool. Results: A total of 9660 momentary assessments were completed. The mean age of the 115 participants was 84 and most (75%) were women. A negative, neutral, or positive mood was recorded during 2%, 25%, and 73% of the observations, respectively. Positive mood was associated with engagement in activities, doing activities outside, and social interaction. The type of activity was less important for mood than the fact that PwD were engaged in an activity. Low mood was evident when PwD attempted to have social interaction but received no response

Search for a W' boson decaying to a bottom quark and a top quark in pp collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV

Results are presented from a search for a W' boson using a dataset corresponding to 5.0 inverse femtobarns of integrated luminosity collected during 2011 by the CMS experiment at the LHC in pp collisions at sqrt(s)=7 TeV. The W' boson is modeled as a heavy W boson, but different scenarios for the couplings to fermions are considered, involving both left-handed and right-handed chiral projections of the fermions, as well as an arbitrary mixture of the two. The search is performed in the decay channel W' to t b, leading to a final state signature with a single lepton (e, mu), missing transverse energy, and jets, at least one of which is tagged as a b-jet. A W' boson that couples to fermions with the same coupling constant as the W, but to the right-handed rather than left-handed chiral projections, is excluded for masses below 1.85 TeV at the 95% confidence level. For the first time using LHC data, constraints on the W' gauge coupling for a set of left- and right-handed coupling combinations have been placed. These results represent a significant improvement over previously published limits.Comment: Submitted to Physics Letters B. Replaced with version publishe