On the effect of variable identification on the essential arity of functions

We show that every function of several variables on a finite set of k elements with n>k essential variables has a variable identification minor with at least n-k essential variables. This is a generalization of a theorem of Salomaa on the essential variables of Boolean functions. We also strengthen Salomaa's theorem by characterizing all the Boolean functions f having a variable identification minor that has just one essential variable less than f.Comment: 10 page

Co-development of the CMAP Book: a tool to enhance children's participation in pediatric rehabilitation

Purpose The purpose of the co-development project was to create a tool that enhances children's active participation and agency in rehabilitation and in everyday life. Materials and methods Action research was the methodological approach. Participants in the different phases of the process (2015-2017) were children with disabilities, parents and rehabilitation professionals. The co-development process included: (1) designing the tool's first version, (2) piloting the tool, (3) evaluating the tool by collecting feedback and reflection, (4) generating the tool's final version. Results Through the co-development process, an accommodating and digital tool called the CMAP Book-a description of the child's meaningful activities and participation-was developed. The CMAP Book is used with an electronic app enabling the identification and description of what is meaningful in daily life from the child's perspective with videos, photos, pictures, recording and writing. The tool enables the child, family and professionals to prepare and build collaboration in rehabilitation with flexibility according to child and family needs. Conclusions Use of the CMAP Book promotes the active involvement of the child and parents in designing the rehabilitation process in daily life in partnership with professionals. The stakeholder involvement in the co-development facilitated meaningful results and a concrete tool for rehabilitation.Peer reviewe

Idiopathic giant cell myocarditis or cardiac sarcoidosis? A retrospective audit of a nationwide case series

Aims Cardiac sarcoidosis (CS) and giant cell myocarditis (GCM) are inflammatory cardiomyopathies sharing histopathological and clinical features. Their differentiation is difficult and susceptible of confusion and apparent mistakes. The possibility that they represent different phenotypes of a single disease has been debated. Methods and results We made a retrospective audit of 73 cases of GCM diagnosed in Finland since the late 1980s. All available histological material was reanalyzed as were other examinations pertinent to the distinction between GCM and CS. Finding granulomas in or outside the heart was considered diagnostic of CS and exclusive of GCM. Altogether 45 of the 73 cases of GCM (62%) were reclassified as CS. In all except one case, this was based on finding sarcoid granulomas that either had been originally missed (n = 29) or misinterpreted (n = 11) or were found in additional posttransplant myocardial specimens (n = 3) or samples of extracardiac tissue (n = 1) accrued over the disease course. Supporting the reclassification, patients relocated to the CS group had less heart failure at presentation (prevalence 20% vs. 46%, P = 0.017) and better 1 year transplant-free survival (82% vs. 45%, P = 0.011) than patients considered to represent true GCM. Conclusions Recognizing granulomas in or outside the heart remains a challenge for the pathologist. Given that CS and GCM are considered distinct diseases and granulomas exclusive of GCM, many cases of GCM, if thoroughly scrutinized, may need reclassification as CS. However, whether CS and GCM are truly different entities or parts of a one-disease continuum has not yet been conclusively settled.Peer reviewe

Cardiac sarcoidosis and giant cell myocarditis after COVID-19 infection

Patients infected with SARS-CoV-2 have varying manifestations of cardiac involvement. We report four patients presenting with symptomatic cardiac sarcoidosis (CS) or giant cell myocarditis (GCM) 1-8 months after mild COVID-19. All patients received immunosuppressive therapy and improved gradually within the following months. The possible temporal association between the CS/GCM and COVID-19 infection might suggest that COVID-19 could be a trigger for granulomatous myocarditis.Peer reviewe

Thermal seasons in northern Europe in projected future climate

Global warming acts to prolong thermal summers and shorten winters. In this work, future changes in the lengths and timing of four thermal seasons in northern Europe, with threshold temperatures 0 and 10 degrees C, are derived from bias-adjusted output data from 23 CMIP5 global climate models. Three future periods and two Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) scenarios are discussed. The focus is on the period 2040-2069 under RCP4.5, which approximately corresponds to a 2 degrees C global warming relative to the preindustrial era. By the period 2040-2069, the average length of the thermal summer increases by nearly 30 days relative to 1971-2000, and the thermal winter shortens by 30-60 days. The timing of the thermal springs advances while autumns delay. Within the model ensemble, there is a high linear correlation between the modelled annual-mean temperature increase and shifts in the thermal seasons. Thermal summers lengthen by about 10 days and winters shorten by 10-24 days per 1 degrees C of local warming. In the mid-21st century, about two-thirds of all summers (winters) are projected to be very long (very short) according to the baseline-period standards, with an anomaly greater than 20 days relative to the late-20th century temporal mean. The proportion of years without a thermal winter increases remarkably in the Baltic countries and southern Scandinavian peninsula. Implications of the changing thermal seasons on nature and human society are discussed in a literature review.Peer reviewe

Functionality of spruce galactoglucomannans in oil-in-water emulsions

For a sustainable food chain, the demand for plant-based, functional, and cost-effective food hydrocolloids is on a high-rise. Hemicelluloses from the renewable lignocellulosic biomass are available in abundance from side-streams of the forestry industry to fulfill this demand. Their effective valorization requires a safe, economic extraction method that can be up-scaled to an industrial scale and, simultaneously, understanding of their functionality to develop applications. In this study, an aqueous-based extraction method, pressurized hot water extraction (PHWE) of spruce saw meal was used to obtain galactoglucomannans (GGM), "spruce gum". Ethanol precipitation was performed to remove non-polysaccharide extractives such as free phenolic compounds, and the emulsion component ratio-dependent interfacial saturation capacity of the remaining purified fraction was studied to understand its functionality. GGM resulted in good to excellent emulsification and stabilization of oil-in-water emulsions and exhibited adsorption at the oil droplet interface, which depended on the amount of oil and droplet size of emulsions. The adsorbed GGM content was determined by gas chromatography after acid methanolysis, and their macromolecular characteristics were studied by size-exclusion chromatography. At GGM to oil ratios 2, 1, and 0.4, stable emulsions with predicted several months of shelf life at room temperature were achieved. The results indicated mechanisms affecting the physical stabilization and breakdown of emulsions containing spruce gum, a novel sustainable hydrocolloid. (C) 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.Peer reviewe

PENGARUH HARD FACTOR DAN SOFT FACTOR TERHADAP DISTRIBUSI SPASIAL EKONOMI KREATIF DI INDONESIA TAHUN 2016

Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk menganalisis tingkat konsentrasi distribusi spasial ekonomi kreatif dan pengaruh hard factor dan soft factor terhadap jumlah perusahaan atau usaha di sektor ekonomi kreatif di Indonesia. Variabel dependen pada penelitian ini adalah jumlah perusahaan atau usaha di subsektor industri kreatif sedangkan variabel independen yang digunakan terbagi ke dalam dua faktor yaitu hard factor dan soft factor. Hard factor terdiri dari jumlah penduduk dan Indeks Pembangunan Manusia (IPM) sedangkan soft factor terdiri dari Indeks Kota Toleran (IKT). Data yang digunakan adalah data sekunder yang didapat dari beberapa sumber. Berbeda dengan penelitian sebelumnya yang menggunakan data industri dari BPS pada tahun 2006, penelitian ini menggunakan data kolaborasi Bekraf-BPS dan data lain pada tahun 2016. Hasil analisis memberikan kesimpulan bahwa tingkat konsentrasi distribusi spasial industri kreatif di Indonesia cukup rendah atau dengan kata lain, tingkat kompetisi pasar industri kreatif cukup kompetitif. Sedangkan hasil regresi menunjukkan bahwa hard factor dan soft factor signifikan terhadap perubahan jumlah perusahaan maupun usaha di industri kreatif. Hard factor yang terdiri dari jumlah penduduk dan IPM memberikan hasil dengan pengaruh positif sedangkan soft factor yaitu IKT memberikan hasil dengan pengaruh negatif. Terdapat tujuh subsektor yang tidak signifikan pada variabel IKT. Penelitian ini menggunakan program STATA 13 untuk melakukan olah data. Hasil analisis menunjukkan bahwa persebaran ekonomi kreatif di Indonesia makin merata serta variabel jumlah penduduk, IPM dan IKT berpengaruh signifikan terhadap jumlah perusahaan atau usaha di sektor ekonomi kreatif di Indonesi

Data integration to prioritize drugs using genomics and curated data

Background: Genomic alterations affecting drug target proteins occur in several tumor types and are prime candidates for patient-specific tailored treatments. Increasingly, patients likely to benefit from targeted cancer therapy are selected based on molecular alterations. The selection of a precision therapy benefiting most patients is challenging but can be enhanced with integration of multiple types of molecular data. Data integration approaches for drug prioritization have successfully integrated diverse molecular data but do not take full advantage of existing data and literature. Results: We have built a knowledge-base which connects data from public databases with molecular results from over 2200 tumors, signaling pathways and drug-target databases. Moreover, we have developed a data mining algorithm to effectively utilize this heterogeneous knowledge-base. Our algorithm is designed to facilitate retargeting of existing drugs by stratifying samples and prioritizing drug targets. We analyzed 797 primary tumors from The Cancer Genome Atlas breast and ovarian cancer cohorts using our framework. FGFR, CDK and HER2 inhibitors were prioritized in breast and ovarian data sets. Estrogen receptor positive breast tumors showed potential sensitivity to targeted inhibitors of FGFR due to activation of FGFR3. Conclusions: Our results suggest that computational sample stratification selects potentially sensitive samples for targeted therapies and can aid in precision medicine drug repositioning. Source code is available from http://csblcanges.fimm.fi/GOPredict/.Peer reviewe

Communicating the amount of windstorm induced forest damage by the maximum wind gust speed in Finland

Windstorms are natural disturbance agents in forests playing a role in natural forest regeneration. In Finland, the most severe individual windstorms have commonly damaged 2–4 million&thinsp;m3 of timber. In addition to financial losses caused to forest owners, windthrown trees have in many cases seriously disrupted the functionality of the national power grid. Communicating windstorm risks in duty forecasting is difficult. In this study, we aimed at developing windstorm impact estimates for forest damage in Finland to help the forecaster to improve communication of the risks of windstorms. We have compared the volume of forest damage caused by the most intense windstorms in Finland during the recent decade to the observed maximum inland wind gust speeds associated with the same windstorms. It was found out that the volume of forest damage follows approximately a power relation as a function of wind gust speed with a power of ∼10. This is a tentative estimate because of a short time series and small number of inspected windstorms. Moreover, also wind direction, location of the affected area and soil properties among other factors have an impact to the amount of damage as illustrated in our inspection. Despite the shortness of the time series, we believe that our results demonstrating the steep increase in the impacts of windstorms with an increasing windstorm intensity are valuable. However, more detailed investigations with longer time series are needed in order to more specifically communicate the windstorm risks and their impacts in boreal forests.</p

Data integration to prioritize drugs using genomics and curated data

Background: Genomic alterations affecting drug target proteins occur in several tumor types and are prime candidates for patient-specific tailored treatments. Increasingly, patients likely to benefit from targeted cancer therapy are selected based on molecular alterations. The selection of a precision therapy benefiting most patients is challenging but can be enhanced with integration of multiple types of molecular data. Data integration approaches for drug prioritization have successfully integrated diverse molecular data but do not take full advantage of existing data and literature. Results: We have built a knowledge-base which connects data from public databases with molecular results from over 2200 tumors, signaling pathways and drug-target databases. Moreover, we have developed a data mining algorithm to effectively utilize this heterogeneous knowledge-base. Our algorithm is designed to facilitate retargeting of existing drugs by stratifying samples and prioritizing drug targets. We analyzed 797 primary tumors from The Cancer Genome Atlas breast and ovarian cancer cohorts using our framework. FGFR, CDK and HER2 inhibitors were prioritized in breast and ovarian data sets. Estrogen receptor positive breast tumors showed potential sensitivity to targeted inhibitors of FGFR due to activation of FGFR3. Conclusions: Our results suggest that computational sample stratification selects potentially sensitive samples for targeted therapies and can aid in precision medicine drug repositioning. Source code is available from http://csblcanges.fimm.fi/GOPredict/.Peer reviewe