Morphological Adaptation to Climate in Modern Homo sapiens Crania: The Importance of Basicranial Breadth

The aim of this study is to investigate whether the variation in breadth of the cranial base among modern human populations that inhabit different regions of the world is linked with climatic adaptation. This work provides an examination of two hypotheses. The first hypothesis is that the correlation between basicranial breadth and ambient temperature is stronger than the correlation between temperature and other neurocranial variables, such as maximum cranial breadth, maximum neurocranial length, and the endocranial volume. The second hypothesis is that the correlation between the breadth of the cranial base and the ambient temperature is significant even when other neurocranial features used in this study (including the size of the neurocranium) are constant. For the sake of this research, the necessary neurocranial variables for fourteen human populations living in diverse environments were obtained from Howells’ data (except for endocranial volume which was obtained by means of estimation). The ambient temperature (more precisely, the mean yearly temperature) of the environments inhabited by these populations was used as a major climatic factor. Data were analysed using Pearson correlation coefficients, linear regression and partial correlation analyses. The results supported the two hypotheses, thus suggesting that ambient temperature may contribute to the observed differences in the breadth of the cranial base in the studied modern humans

Spectral Metric and Einstein Functionals for Hodge-Dirac operator

We examine the metric and Einstein bilinear functionals of differential forms introduced in Adv.Math.,Vol.427,(2023)1091286, for Hodge-Dirac operator $d+\delta$ on an oriented even-dimensional Riemannian manifold. We show that they reproduce these functionals for the canonical Dirac operator on a spin manifold up to a numerical factor. Furthermore, we demonstrate that the associated spectral triple is spectrally closed, which implies that it is torsion-free.Comment: Final versio

Spectral Torsion

We introduce a trilinear functional of differential one-forms for a finitely summable regular spectral triple with a noncommutative residue. We demonstrate that for a canonical spectral triple over a spin manifold it recovers the torsion of the linear connection. We examine several spectral triples, including Hodge-de\,Rham, Einstein-Yang-Mills, almost-commutative two-sheeted space, conformally rescaled noncommutative tori, and quantum $SU(2)$ group, showing that the third one has a nonvanishing torsion if nontrivially coupled

LassoProt: server to analyze biopolymers with lassos

The LassoProt server, http://lassoprot.cent.uw.edu.pl/, enables analysis of biopolymers with entangled configurations called lassos. The server offers various ways of visualizing lasso configurations, as well as their time trajectories, with all the results and plots downloadable. Broad spectrum of applications makes LassoProt a useful tool for biologists, biophysicists, chemists, polymer physicists and mathematicians. The server and our methods have been validated on the whole PDB, and the results constitute the database of proteins with complex lassos, supported with basic biological data. This database can serve as a source of information about protein geometry and entanglement-function correlations, as a reference set in protein modeling, and for many other purposes

Diagnosis and treatment of mucosa Candida spp. infections – a review article

Candida albicans is the most common cause of fungal infections worldwide. Non-albicans Candida species play an important role in vulvovaginal candidiasis and invasive infections. Most cases of infections are endogenous. In case of patients with immune disorders this opportunistic pathogen causes both surface, systemic infections, and candidemia. Symptoms depend on the area affected. Candidiasis are treated with antimycotics; these include clotrimazole, nystatin, fluconazole, voriconazole, amphotericin B, and echinocandins. The emergence of drug resistance and the side effects of currently available antifungals are becoming a major problem in the management of Candida spp. infection

When dreams come true – urban land use and management trends desired by residents and participatory budgeting – a case study in Toruń

Social participation allows public authorities to learn about communities’ views and thus to jointly work out satisfying solutions. The pre-1989 law in Poland generally prevented the possibility of citizens taking part in the making of decisions about the use of public areas. Over the following years participatory decision-making was adopted, which evolved and expanded as new tools were introduced which encourage citizen involvement. The municipality of Toruń adopted a participatory approach to budgeting in 2014 so that the city’s residents could influence the use of public land in their neighbourhoods according to their needs. The total amount of funding spent on participatory budgets between 2014 and 2017 exceeded PLN 26 million. The aim of the study is to prepare a typology of desired changes in the city of Toruń and to identify the level of social participation on the basis of projects nominated for financing from the participatory budget. To this end, the types of projects and the turnout of the residents who voted were analysed by place of residence. The study showed that both the number of nominated projects and the number of voters increased in the years covered by the survey, thus pointing to the success of participatory budgeting, a form of schooling in local democracy, in Toruń

Diagnosis and treatment of invasive Candida infections – a review article

Candida albicans is the most common cause of fungal infections worldwide. Invasive candidiasis comprises candidemia and deep-seated candidiasis. Most yeast invasive infections are endogenous with a high mortality. Pathogenesis of candidiasis depends on avoiding host immune responses, as well as the virulence factors of the fungus enabling colonization and invasion of tissues. Adequate source control and antifungal therapy administered within a short time is critical to get a better prognosis. The emergence of drug resistance and the side effects of currently available antifungals are becoming the major problem in the management of Candida spp. infection

Long-term follow-up after pacemaker implantation via persistent left superior vena cava

Background: The persistent left superior vena cava (PLSVC) is a relatively common con­genital venous return anomaly. It may have serious clinical implications especially in case of pacemaker/cardioverter-defibrillator implantation, venous catheter insertion, radio-frequency ablation and cardiac surgery. There is also some evidence that PLSVC may be accompanied by arrhythmias. The aim of this report is to present the effectiveness and safety of cardiac pacing via PLSVC, clinical outcome and appearance of arrhythmias in a long-term follow-up. Methods and results: Four cases of pacing electrodes implanted via PLSVC in patients without any other cardiac congenital heart anomalies were observed for at least 6 years. There was 1 patient with AAI, 2 patients with VVI, and 1 with DDD pacemaker. Atrial electrodes were implanted on the free right atrial wall, 2 ventricular electrodes were implanted in right ventricular outflow tract, 1 in postero-lateral cardiac vein. During the mean 110 months of observation, pacing was efficient. One patient underwent an upgrade from AAI to biatrial pac­ing due to progressive interatrial conduction delay during the follow-up. No other intervention or pacemaker related events were noticed except for battery replacement. Conclusions: The presence of PSVC may complicate implantation, but it does not influence the long-term follow-up of pacing parameters.

Cudzoziemiec niepożądany jako kategoria prawna

Jacek Jagielski - Uniwersytet WarszawskiPaweł Dąbrowski - Ośrodek Badań nad Migracjami Uniwersytetu Warszawskieg

Innovative process management in the public sector

PURPOSE: Process management is part of the wider field of quality management. Since the 1990s, it has been effectively put into practice in commercial organizations. The article provides examples of applying process management, highlighting the challenges that emerge during the execution of this kind of alteration in an organization. It demonstrates the factors, implementation, and advantages of introducing an innovative approach for organizational processes in a public sector enterprise.DESIGN/METHODOLOGY/APPROACH: The article presents practical observations gathered by the authors during the implementation of several process management change projects. These included a higher education institution and an organization associated with managing pension entitlements.FINDINGS: New trends in the surroundings of public organizations, contacts and relationships with business organizations that are subject to market conditions, are forcing changes in the public sector. One example is an innovative approach to managing processes in public organizations. This approach can bring significant benefits to public authorities, collaborating commercial companies, and above all, to society as the "end user".PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS: The presented results can support the preparation of public sector organizations for effective planning and implementation of new organizational solutions. However, above all, public sector organizations should and can (as the article shows) see the opportunities for innovative, often radical increases in the efficiency of their operations.ORIGINALITY/VALUE: Dynamic changes in the organization's environment require adapting innovative management methods for more effective achievement of strategic goals. This issue seems to be insufficiently represented in the subject literature. This article aims to contribute to filling this gap.peer-reviewe