Aziatische hoornaardarren

De Aziatische hoornaar (Vespa velutina) komt van nature voor in Zuidoost-Azië. De afgelopen tien jaar heeft de soort zich ook verspreid in Europa, inclusief Nederland en Vlaanderen (Tan et al., 2007; Wen et al., 2017). De Aziatische hoornaar jaagt op bijen en honing en vormt op deze manier een bedreiging voor bijenvolken

Hoop in de strijd tegen de varroamijt? Zachtaardige killer bees

In 1957 ontsnapten volken van een Afrikaanse ondersoort (Apis mellifera scutellata) uit een experimenteel veredelingsprogramma in Brazilië. Het programma had als doel om een hybride te ontwikkelen met een goede ziekteresistentie en gewend aan een tropisch klimaat, zoals de Afrikaanse honingbij, maar met het zachtaardigere karakter van Europese honingbijen. De Afrikaanse bijen paarden met de locale Apis mellifera en vormden zo een de zeer agressieve en invasieve hybride: de geafrikaniseerde honingbij, ook wel bekend als ‘killer bee’

Steken als laatste redmiddel: het verdedigen van de bijenkast

Voor de hedendaagse imker is het heel normaal om een bijenkast te openen, er ramen uit te tillen en deze rustig te bekijken. Eigenlijk is het wonderbaarlijk dat bijen menselijke indringers tolereren – een bewijs dat mensen effect hebben gehad op de evolutie van honingbijen, aldus de Amerikaanse professor Delaplane (2017). Sinds mensen honing oogsten en geleidelijk overgingen van honingjagen naar bijenhouden, zijn honingbijen, zelfs onopzettelijk, geselecteerd op productiviteit en vriendelijkheid, zodat wij tegenwoordig in een kast vol rustige bijen kunnen werken

Creativity in Higher Education: Teaching Activities during Student Groups’ Idea Evaluation Process

Creativity should be cultivated in higher education to tackle the increasingly complex healthcare problems; however, despite this need for novelty, students collaborating in groups to solve a complex problem often seek consensus around low-novelty ideas. This study aims to explore the challenges higher education student groups face while evaluating and improving creative ideas, and to identify teaching activities that overcome these challenges. A qualitative study was conducted using semi-structured interviews with 14 teachers from the “innovation project” at Radboud university medical center in Netherlands. The results show that student groups face challenges in balancing thegoals of novelty and usefulness in their search for creative ideas, often selecting either novel ideas that are infeasible or ineffective, or useful ideas that already exist. Furthermore, teachers also identified problematic group dynamics as a challenge in the idea evaluation process. To overcome these challenges, teachers reported using cognitive, affective, metacognitive, and sociocommunicative teaching activities. In conclusion, higher education studentsmay not develop their most creative ideas even when creative solutions are required. This study highlights the importance of teaching higher education students to skilfully manage the twin goals of novelty and usefulness in theirsearch for creative solutions, while also dealing with group dynamics

Creativity in Higher Education: Teaching Activities during Student Groups’ Idea Evaluation Process

Creativity should be cultivated in higher education to tackle the increasingly complex healthcare problems; however, despite this need for novelty, students collaborating in groups to solve a complex problem often seek consensus around low-novelty ideas. This study aims to explore the challenges higher education student groups face while evaluating and improving creative ideas, and to identify teaching activities that overcome these challenges. A qualitative study was conducted using semi-structured interviews with 14 teachers from the “innovation project” at Radboud university medical center in Netherlands. The results show that student groups face challenges in balancing thegoals of novelty and usefulness in their search for creative ideas, often selecting either novel ideas that are infeasible or ineffective, or useful ideas that already exist. Furthermore, teachers also identified problematic group dynamics as a challenge in the idea evaluation process. To overcome these challenges, teachers reported using cognitive, affective, metacognitive, and sociocommunicative teaching activities. In conclusion, higher education studentsmay not develop their most creative ideas even when creative solutions are required. This study highlights the importance of teaching higher education students to skilfully manage the twin goals of novelty and usefulness in theirsearch for creative solutions, while also dealing with group dynamics

Modelling fish habitat preference with a genetic algorithm-optimized Takagi-Sugeno model based on pairwise comparisons

Species-environment relationships are used for evaluating the current status of target species and the potential impact of natural or anthropogenic changes of their habitat. Recent researches reported that the results are strongly affected by the quality of a data set used. The present study attempted to apply pairwise comparisons to modelling fish habitat preference with Takagi-Sugeno-type fuzzy habitat preference models (FHPMs) optimized by a genetic algorithm (GA). The model was compared with the result obtained from the FHPM optimized based on mean squared error (MSE). Three independent data sets were used for training and testing of these models. The FHPMs based on pairwise comparison produced variable habitat preference curves from 20 different initial conditions in the GA. This could be partially ascribed to the optimization process and the regulations assigned. This case study demonstrates applicability and limitations of pairwise comparison-based optimization in an FHPM. Future research should focus on a more flexible learning process to make a good use of the advantages of pairwise comparisons

Time Trends in the Incidence and Treatment of Extra-Abdominal and Abdominal Aggressive Fibromatosis: A Population-Based Study

BACKGROUND: Aggressive fibromatosis (AF) is a locally infiltrating soft-tissue tumor. In a population-based study in the Netherlands, we evaluated time trends for the incidence and treatment of AF. METHODS: In PALGA: Dutch Pathology Registry, all patients diagnosed between 1993 and 2013 as having extra-abdominal or abdominal wall aggressive fibromatosis were identified and available pathology data of the patients were evaluated. Epidemiological and treatment-related factors were analyzed with χ(2)and regression analysis. RESULTS: During the study period, 1134 patients were identified. The incidence increased from 2.10 to 5.36 per million people per year. Median age at the time of diagnosis increased annually by B 0.285 (P = 0.001). Female gender prevailed and increased over time [annual odds ratio (OR) 1.022; P = 0.058]. All anatomic localizations, but in particular truncal tumors, became more frequent. During the study period diagnostic histological biopsies were performed more often (annual OR 1.096; P < 0.001). The proportion of patients who underwent surgical treatment decreased (annual OR 0.928; P < 0.001). When resection was preceded by biopsy, 49.8 % of the patients had R0-resection versus 30.7 % in patients without biopsy (P < 0.001). CONCLUSIONS: In this population-based study, an increasing incidence of extra-abdominal and abdominal-wall aggressive fibromatosis was observed. The workup of patients improved and a trend towards a nonsurgical treatment policy was observed

De arbeidsmarkt naar opleiding en beroep tot 2020

In dit rapport van het Researchcentrum voor Onderwijs en Arbeidsmarkt (ROA) wordt een overzicht gepresenteerd en besproken van de huidige en toekomstige ontwikkelingen op de Nederlandse arbeidsmarkt tot 2020. Het overzicht heeft als doel inzicht te verschaffen in de actuele arbeidsmarktsituatie en de arbeidsmarktprognoses naar bedrijfssectoren, beroepen en opleidingen. De gegevens over de actuele arbeidsmarktsituatie worden jaarlijks geactualiseerd en opgenomen in het ROA ArbeidsmarktInformatieSysteem (AIS). De prognoses worden elke twee jaar opgesteld en hebben betrekking op een periode van zes jaar. De rapportage vindt plaats in het kader van het door het ROA uitgevoerde Project Onderwijs-Arbeidsmarkt (POA)

Real-life data on the impact of successful downstaging in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma: A Dutch Multicenter Study

Cellular mechanisms in basic and clinical gastroenterology and hepatolog