| 1. |
- Thompson, Paul M., et al.
(författare)
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The ENIGMA Consortium : large-scale collaborative analyses of neuroimaging and genetic data
- 2014
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Ingår i: BRAIN IMAGING BEHAV. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1931-7557 .- 1931-7565. ; 8:2, s. 153-182
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The Enhancing NeuroImaging Genetics through Meta-Analysis (ENIGMA) Consortium is a collaborative network of researchers working together on a range of large-scale studies that integrate data from 70 institutions worldwide. Organized into Working Groups that tackle questions in neuroscience, genetics, and medicine, ENIGMA studies have analyzed neuroimaging data from over 12,826 subjects. In addition, data from 12,171 individuals were provided by the CHARGE consortium for replication of findings, in a total of 24,997 subjects. By meta-analyzing results from many sites, ENIGMA has detected factors that affect the brain that no individual site could detect on its own, and that require larger numbers of subjects than any individual neuroimaging study has currently collected. ENIGMA's first project was a genome-wide association study identifying common variants in the genome associated with hippocampal volume or intracranial volume. Continuing work is exploring genetic associations with subcortical volumes (ENIGMA2) and white matter microstructure (ENIGMA-DTI). Working groups also focus on understanding how schizophrenia, bipolar illness, major depression and attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) affect the brain. We review the current progress of the ENIGMA Consortium, along with challenges and unexpected discoveries made on the way.
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| 2. |
- Blunden, Jessica, et al.
(författare)
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State of the Climate in 2012
- 2013
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Ingår i: Bulletin of The American Meteorological Society - (BAMS). - 0003-0007 .- 1520-0477. ; 94:8, s. S1-S258
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- For the first time in serveral years, the El Nino-Southern Oscillation did not dominate regional climate conditions around the globe. A weak La Ni a dissipated to ENSOneutral conditions by spring, and while El Nino appeared to be emerging during summer, this phase never fully developed as sea surface temperatures in the eastern conditions. Nevertheless, other large-scale climate patterns and extreme weather events impacted various regions during the year. A negative phase of the Arctic Oscillation from mid-January to early February contributed to frigid conditions in parts of northern Africa, eastern Europe, and western Asia. A lack of rain during the 2012 wet season led to the worst drought in at least the past three decades for northeastern Brazil. Central North America also experienced one of its most severe droughts on record. The Caribbean observed a very wet dry season and it was the Sahel's wettest rainy season in 50 years. Overall, the 2012 average temperature across global land and ocean surfaces ranked among the 10 warmest years on record. The global land surface temperature alone was also among the 10 warmest on record. In the upper atmosphere, the average stratospheric temperature was record or near-record cold, depending on the dataset. After a 30-year warming trend from 1970 to 1999 for global sea surface temperatures, the period 2000-12 had little further trend. This may be linked to the prevalence of La Ni a-like conditions during the 21st century. Heat content in the upper 700 m of the ocean remained near record high levels in 2012. Net increases from 2011 to 2012 were observed at 700-m to 2000-m depth and even in the abyssal ocean below. Following sharp decreases in to the effects of La Ni a, sea levels rebounded to reach records highs in 2012. The increased hydrological cycle seen in recent years continued, with more evaporation in drier locations and more precipitation in rainy areas. In a pattern that has held since 2004, salty areas of the ocean surfaces and subsurfaces were anomalously salty on average, while fresher areas were anomalously fresh. Global tropical cyclone activity during 2012 was near average, with a total of 84 storms compared with the 1981-2010 average of 89. Similar to 2010 and 2011, the North Atlantic was the only hurricane basin that experienced above-normal activity. In this basin, Sandy brought devastation to Cuba and parts of the eastern North American seaboard. All other basins experienced either near-or below-normal tropical cyclone activity. Only three tropical cyclones reached Category 5 intensity-all in Bopha became the only storm in the historical record to produce winds greater than 130 kt south of 7 N. It was also the costliest storm to affect the Philippines and killed more than 1000 residents. Minimum Arctic sea ice extent in September and Northern Hemisphere snow cover extent in June both reached new record lows. June snow cover extent is now declining at a faster rate (-17.6% per decade) than September sea ice extent (-13.0% per decade). Permafrost temperatures reached record high values in northernmost Alaska. A new melt extent record occurred on 11-12 July on the Greenland ice sheet; 97% of the ice sheet showed some form of melt, four times greater than the average melt for this time of year. The climate in Antarctica was relatively stable overall. The largest maximum sea ice extent since records begain in 1978 was observed in September 2012. In the stratosphere, warm air led to the second smallest ozone hole in the past two decades. Even so, the springtime ozone layer above Antarctica likely will not return to its early 1980s state until about 2060. Following a slight decline associated with the global 2 emissions from fossil fuel combustion and cement production reached a record 9.5 +/- 0.5 Pg C in 2011 and a new record of 9.7 +/- 0.5 Pg C is estimated for 2012. Atmospheric CO2 concentrations increased by 2.1 ppm in 2012, to 392.6 ppm. In spring 2012, 2 concentration exceeded 400 ppm at 7 of the 13 Arctic observation sites. Globally, other greenhouse gases including methane and nitrous oxide also continued to rise in concentration and the combined effect now represents a 32% increase in radiative forcing over a 1990 baseline. Concentrations of most ozone depleting substances continued to fall.
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| 3. |
- Dilday, Benjamin, et al.
(författare)
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A Measurement of the Rate of Type Ia Supernovae in Galaxy Clusters from the SDSS-II Supernova Survey
- 2010
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Ingår i: Astrophysical Journal. - 0004-637X .- 1538-4357. ; 715, s. 1021-1035
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- We present measurements of the Type Ia supernova (SN) rate in galaxy clusters based on data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey-II (SDSS-II) Supernova Survey. The cluster SN Ia rate is determined from 9 SN events in a set of 71 C4 clusters at z <= 0.17 and 27 SN events in 492 maxBCG clusters at 0.1 <= z <= 0.3. We find values for the cluster SN Ia rate of (0.37+0.17+0.01 -0.12-0.01) SNur h 2 and (0.55+0.13+0.02 -0.11-0.01) SNur h 2 (SNux = 10-12 L -1 xsun yr-1) in C4 and maxBCG clusters, respectively, where the quoted errors are statistical and systematic, respectively. The SN rate for early-type galaxies is found to be (0.31+0.18+0.01 -0.12-0.01) SNur h 2 and (0.49+0.15+0.02 -0.11-0.01) SNur h 2 in C4 and maxBCG clusters, respectively. The SN rate for the brightest cluster galaxies (BCG) is found to be (2.04+1.99+0.07 -1.11-0.04) SNur h 2 and (0.36+0.84+0.01 -0.30-0.01) SNur h 2 in C4 and maxBCG clusters, respectively. The ratio of the SN Ia rate in cluster early-type galaxies to that of the SN Ia rate in field early-type galaxies is 1.94+1.31+0.043 -0.91-0.015 and 3.02+1.31+0.062 -1.03-0.048, for C4 and maxBCG clusters, respectively. The SN rate in galaxy clusters as a function of redshift, which probes the late time SN Ia delay distribution, shows only weak dependence on redshift. Combining our current measurements with previous measurements, we fit the cluster SN Ia rate data to a linear function of redshift, and find rL = [(0.49+0.15 -0.14)+(0.91+0.85 -0.81) × z] SNuB h 2. A comparison of the radial distribution of SNe in cluster to field early-type galaxies shows possible evidence for an enhancement of the SN rate in the cores of cluster early-type galaxies. With an observation of at most three hostless, intra-cluster SNe Ia, we estimate the fraction of cluster SNe that are hostless to be (9.4+8.3 -5.1)%.
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| 4. |
- Dilday, Benjamin, et al.
(författare)
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Measurements of the Rate of Type Ia Supernovae at Redshift lsim0.3 from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey II Supernova Survey
- 2010
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Ingår i: Astrophysical Journal. - 0004-637X .- 1538-4357. ; 713, s. 1026-1036
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- We present a measurement of the volumetric Type Ia supernova (SN Ia) rate based on data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey II (SDSS-II) Supernova Survey. The adopted sample of supernovae (SNe) includes 516 SNe Ia at redshift z <~ 0.3, of which 270(52%) are spectroscopically identified as SNe Ia. The remaining 246 SNe Ia were identified through their light curves; 113 of these objects have spectroscopic redshifts from spectra of their host galaxy, and 133 have photometric redshifts estimated from the SN light curves. Based on consideration of 87 spectroscopically confirmed non-Ia SNe discovered by the SDSS-II SN Survey, we estimate that 2.04+1.61 -0.95% of the photometric SNe Ia may be misidentified. The sample of SNe Ia used in this measurement represents an order of magnitude increase in the statistics for SN Ia rate measurements in the redshift range covered by the SDSS-II Supernova Survey. If we assume an SN Ia rate that is constant at low redshift (z < 0.15), then the SN observations can be used to infer a value of the SN rate of rV = (2.69+0.34+0.21 -0.30-0.01)×10-5 SNe yr-1 Mpc-3 (H 0/(70 km s-1 Mpc-1))3 at a mean redshift of ~0.12, based on 79 SNe Ia of which 72 are spectroscopically confirmed. However, the large sample of SNe Ia included in this study allows us to place constraints on the redshift dependence of the SN Ia rate based on the SDSS-II Supernova Survey data alone. Fitting a power-law model of the SN rate evolution, rV (z) = Ap × ((1 + z)/(1 + z 0))ν, over the redshift range 0.0 < z < 0.3 with z 0 = 0.21, results in Ap = (3.43+0.15 -0.15) × 10-5 SNe yr-1 Mpc-3 (H 0/(70 km s-1 Mpc-1))3 and ν = 2.04+0.90 -0.89.
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| 5. |
- Ferreira, Daniel, et al.
(författare)
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The interactive effect of demographic and clinical factors on hippocampal volume : A multicohort study on 1958 cognitively normal individuals
- 2017
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Ingår i: Hippocampus. - : Wiley. - 1050-9631 .- 1098-1063. ; 27:6, s. 653-667
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Alzheimer's disease is characterized by hippocampal atrophy. Other factors also influence the hippocampal volume, but their interactive effect has not been investigated before in cognitively healthy individuals. The aim of this study is to evaluate the interactive effect of key demographic and clinical factors on hippocampal volume, in contrast to previous studies frequently investigating these factors in a separate manner. Also, to investigate how comparable the control groups from ADNI, AIBL, and AddNeuroMed are with five population-based cohorts. In this study, 1958 participants were included (100 AddNeuroMed, 226 ADNI, 155 AIBL, 59 BRC, 295 GENIC, 279 BioFiNDER, 398 PIVUS, and 446 SNAC-K). ANOVA and random forest were used for testing between-cohort differences in demographic-clinical variables. Multiple regression was used to study the influence of demographic-clinical variables on hippocampal volume. ANCOVA was used to analyze whether between-cohort differences in demographic-clinical variables explained between-cohort differences in hippocampal volume. Age and global brain atrophy were the most important variables in explaining variability in hippocampal volume. These variables were not only important themselves but also in interaction with gender, education, MMSE, and total intracranial volume. AddNeuroMed, ADNI, and AIBL differed from the population-based cohorts in several demographic-clinical variables that had a significant effect on hippocampal volume. Variability in hippocampal volume in individuals with normal cognition is high. Differences that previously tended to be related to disease mechanisms could also be partly explained by demographic and clinical factors independent from the disease. Furthermore, cognitively normal individuals especially from ADNI and AIBL are not representative of the general population. These findings may have important implications for future research and clinical trials, translating imaging biomarkers to the general population, and validating current diagnostic criteria for Alzheimer's disease and predementia stages.
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| 6. |
- Hudson, Lawrence N, et al.
(författare)
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The database of the PREDICTS (Projecting Responses of Ecological Diversity In Changing Terrestrial Systems) project
- 2017
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Ingår i: Ecology and Evolution. - : John Wiley & Sons. - 2045-7758. ; 7:1, s. 145-188
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The PREDICTS project-Projecting Responses of Ecological Diversity In Changing Terrestrial Systems (www.predicts.org.uk)-has collated from published studies a large, reasonably representative database of comparable samples of biodiversity from multiple sites that differ in the nature or intensity of human impacts relating to land use. We have used this evidence base to develop global and regional statistical models of how local biodiversity responds to these measures. We describe and make freely available this 2016 release of the database, containing more than 3.2 million records sampled at over 26,000 locations and representing over 47,000 species. We outline how the database can help in answering a range of questions in ecology and conservation biology. To our knowledge, this is the largest and most geographically and taxonomically representative database of spatial comparisons of biodiversity that has been collated to date; it will be useful to researchers and international efforts wishing to model and understand the global status of biodiversity.
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| 7. |
- Jacobs, Alan M., et al.
(författare)
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The Qualitative Transparency Deliberations : Insights and Implications
- 2021
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Ingår i: Perspectives on Politics. - 1537-5927 .- 1541-0986. ; 19:1, s. 171-208
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- In recent years, a variety of efforts have been made in political science to enable, encourage, or require scholars to be more open and explicit about the bases of their empirical claims and, in turn, make those claims more readily evaluable by others. While qualitative scholars have long taken an interest in making their research open, reflexive, and systematic, the recent push for overarching transparency norms and requirements has provoked serious concern within qualitative research communities and raised fundamental questions about the meaning, value, costs, and intellectual relevance of transparency for qualitative inquiry. In this Perspectives Reflection, we crystallize the central findings of a three-year deliberative process-the Qualitative Transparency Deliberations (QTD)-involving hundreds of political scientists in a broad discussion of these issues. Following an overview of the process and the key insights that emerged, we present summaries of the QTD Working Groups' final reports. Drawing on a series of public, online conversations that unfolded at www.qualtd.net, the reports unpack transparency's promise, practicalities, risks, and limitations in relation to different qualitative methodologies, forms of evidence, and research contexts. Taken as a whole, these reports-the full versions of which can be found in the Supplementary Materials-offer practical guidance to scholars designing and implementing qualitative research, and to editors, reviewers, and funders seeking to develop criteria of evaluation that are appropriate-as understood by relevant research communities-to the forms of inquiry being assessed. We dedicate this Reflection to the memory of our coauthor and QTD working group leader Kendra Koivu.(1)
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| 8. |
- Khan, Wasim, et al.
(författare)
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A Multi-Cohort Study of ApoE epsilon 4 and Amyloid-beta Effects on the Hippocampus in Alzheimer's Disease
- 2017
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Ingår i: Journal of Alzheimer's Disease. - 1387-2877 .- 1875-8908. ; 56:3, s. 1159-1174
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The apolipoprotein E (APOE) gene has been consistently shown to modulate the risk of Alzheimer's disease (AD). Here, using an AD and normal aging dataset primarily consisting of three AD multi-center studies (n = 1,781), we compared the effect of APOE and amyloid-beta (A beta) on baseline hippocampal volumes in AD patients, mild cognitive impairment (MCI) subjects, and healthy controls. A large sample of healthy adolescents (n = 1,387) was also used to compare hippocampal volumes between APOE groups. Subjects had undergone a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scan and APOE genotyping. Hippocampal volumes were processed using FreeSurfer. In the AD and normal aging dataset, hippocampal comparisons were performed in each APOE group and in epsilon 4 carriers with positron emission tomography (PET) A beta who were dichotomized (A beta+/A beta-) using previous cut-offs. We found a linear reduction in hippocampal volumes with epsilon 4 carriers possessing the smallest volumes, epsilon 3 carriers possessing intermediate volumes, and epsilon 2 carriers possessing the largest volumes. Moreover, AD and MCI epsilon 4 carriers possessed the smallest hippocampal volumes and control epsilon 2 carriers possessed the largest hippocampal volumes. Subjects with both APOE epsilon 4 and A beta positivity had the lowest hippocampal volumes when compared to A beta-epsilon 4 carriers, suggesting a synergistic relationship between APOE epsilon 4 and A beta. However, we found no hippocampal volume differences between APOE groups in healthy 14-year-old adolescents. Our findings suggest that the strongest neuroanatomic effect of APOE epsilon 4 on the hippocampus is observed in AD and groups most at risk of developing the disease, whereas hippocampi of old and young healthy individuals remain unaffected.
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| 9. |
- Mangialasche, Francesca, et al.
(författare)
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Tocopherols and tocotrienols plasma levels are associated with cognitive impairment
- 2012
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Ingår i: Neurobiology of Aging. - : Elsevier BV. - 0197-4580 .- 1558-1497. ; 33:10, s. 2282-2290
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Vitamin E includes 8 natural compounds (4 tocopherols, 4 tocotrienols) with potential neuroprotective activity. alpha-Tocopherol has mainly been investigated in relation to cognitive impairment. We examined the relation of all plasma vitamin E forms and markers of vitamin E damage (alpha-tocopherylquinone, 5-nitro-gamma-tocopherol) to mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and Alzheimer's disease (AD). Within the AddNeuroMed-Project, plasma tocopherols, tocotrienols, alpha-tocopherylquinone, and 5-nitro-gamma-tocopherol were assessed in 168 AD cases, 166 MCI, and 187 cognitively normal (CN) people. Compared with cognitively normal subjects, AD and MCI had lower levels of total tocopherols, total tocotrienols, and total vitamin E. In multivariable-polytomous-logistic regression analysis, both MCI and AD cases had 85% lower odds to be in the highest tertile of total tocopherols and total vitamin E, and they were, respectively, 92% and 94% less likely to be in the highest tertile of total tocotrienols than the lowest tertile. Further, both disorders were associated with increased vitamin E damage. Low plasma tocopherols and tocotrienols levels are associated with increased odds of MCI and AD.
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