En omsorgskrise i den danske velfærdsstat?

Vi undersøger og afklarer hvordan vi kan forstå en omsorgskrise – og dens udbredelse - i en dansk kontekst, og hvordan vi skal forstå et paradoks mellem indikatorer på en omsorgskrise og høje, positive brugerevalueringer på hospitaler og i ældreomsorgen. Vi forklarer paradokset indenfor ældreomsorgen og hospitalerne ved en forventningsbias formet af mediernes dækning af skandaler og/eller en generationseffekt, da der er tydelige tegn på en omsorgskrise. Vi konkluderer, at omsorgskrisen vil påvirke velfærdsstatens bæredygtighed på længere sigt, og have stærkt kønnede effekter

How fast is a collective bacterial state established?

Bacteria in a biofilm colony have the capacity to monitor the size and growth conditions for the colony and modify their phenotypical behaviour to optimise attacks, defence, migration, etc. The quorum sensing systems controlling this involve production and sensing of diffusive signal molecules. Frequently, quorum sensing systems carry a positive feedback loop which produces a switch at a threshold size of the colony. This all-or-none switch can be beneficial to create a sudden attack, leaving a host little time to establish a defence. The reaction-diffusion system describing a basal quorum sensing loop involves production of signal molecules, diffusion of signal molecules, and detection of signal molecules. We study the ignition process in a numerical solution for a basal quorum sensor and demonstrate that even in a large colony the ignition travels through the whole colony in a less than a minute. The ignition of the positive feedback loop was examined in different approximations. As expected, in the exact calculation the ignition was found to be delayed compared to a calculation where the binding of signal molecules was quasistatic. The buffering of signal molecules is found to have little effect on the ignition process. Contrary to expectation, we find that the ignition does not start when the threshold is reached at the center-instead it allows for the threshold to be approached in the whole colony followed by an almost simultaneous ignition of the whole biofilm aggregate

Governance Struggles and Policy Processes in Disaster Risk Reduction: A Case Study from Nepal

In the neo-liberal climate of reduced responsibility for the state, alongside global platforms established to implement the Hyogo Framework for Action, a new arena opens for a multitude of stakeholders to engage in disaster risk reduction (DRR). The key role that the state can play in instituting effective DRR tends to receive little attention, yet in situations where the state apparatus is weak, such as in Nepal, it becomes evident that integrating DRR into development is a particularly challenging task. Due to the political situation in Nepal, progress has been stalled in providing a legislative context conducive to effective DRR. This paper traces the evolution of key DRR initiatives that have been developed in spite of the challenging governance context, such as the National Strategy for Disaster Risk Management and the Nepal Risk Reduction Consortium. Informed by in-depth interviews with key informants, the argument is made that the dedicated efforts of national and international non-governmental organisations, multilateral agencies and donors in mainstreaming DRR demonstrate that considerable progress can be made even where government departments are protective of their own interests and are slow to enact policies to support DRR. The paper suggests however, that without stronger engagement of key political actors the prospects for further progress in DRR may be limited. The findings have implications for other post-conflict countries or weak states engaging in DRR

Geometrical optimization of microstripe arrays for microbead magnetophoresis

Manipulation of magnetic beads plays an increasingly important role in molecular diagnostics. Magnetophoresis is a promising technique for selective transportation of magnetic beads in lab-on-a-chip systems. We investigate periodic arrays of exchange-biased permalloy microstripes fabricated using a single lithography step. Magnetic beads can be continuously moved across such arrays by combining the spatially periodic magnetic field from microstripes with a rotating external magnetic field. By measuring and modeling the magnetophoresis properties of thirteen different stripe designs, we study the effect of the stripe geometry on the magnetophoretic transport properties of the magnetic microbeads between the stripes. We show that a symmetric geometry with equal width of and spacing between the microstripes facilitates faster transportation and that the optimal period of the periodic stripe array is approximately three times the height of the bead center over the microstripes

Configurational Statistics of Magnetic Bead Detection with Magnetoresistive Sensors

Magnetic biosensors detect magnetic beads that, mediated by a target, have bound to a functionalized area. This area is often larger than the area of the sensor. Both the sign and magnitude of the average magnetic field experienced by the sensor from a magnetic bead depends on the location of the bead relative to the sensor. Consequently, the signal from multiple beads also depends on their locations. Thus, a given coverage of the functionalized area with magnetic beads does not result in a given detector response, except on the average, over many realizations of the same coverage. We present a systematic theoretical analysis of how this location-dependence affects the sensor response. The analysis is done for beads magnetized by a homogeneous in-plane magnetic field. We determine the expected value and standard deviation of the sensor response for a given coverage, as well as the accuracy and precision with which the coverage can be determined from a single sensor measurement. We show that statistical fluctuations between samples may reduce the sensitivity and dynamic range of a sensor significantly when the functionalized area is larger than the sensor area. Hence, the statistics of sampling is essential to sensor design. For illustration, we analyze three important published cases for which statistical fluctuations are dominant, significant, and insignificant, respectively