| 1. |
- Asp, Michaela, et al.
(författare)
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Spatial detection of fetal marker genes expressed at low level in adult human heart tissue
- 2017
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Ingår i: Scientific Reports. - : NATURE PUBLISHING GROUP. - 2045-2322. ; 7
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Heart failure is a major health problem linked to poor quality of life and high mortality rates. Hence, novel biomarkers, such as fetal marker genes with low expression levels, could potentially differentiate disease states in order to improve therapy. In many studies on heart failure, cardiac biopsies have been analyzed as uniform pieces of tissue with bulk techniques, but this homogenization approach can mask medically relevant phenotypes occurring only in isolated parts of the tissue. This study examines such spatial variations within and between regions of cardiac biopsies. In contrast to standard RNA sequencing, this approach provides a spatially resolved transcriptome- and tissue-wide perspective of the adult human heart, and enables detection of fetal marker genes expressed by minor subpopulations of cells within the tissue. Analysis of patients with heart failure, with preserved ejection fraction, demonstrated spatially divergent expression of fetal genes in cardiac biopsies.
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| 2. |
- Enhörning, Sofia, et al.
(författare)
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Water Supplementation Reduces Copeptin and Plasma Glucose in Adults With High Copeptin : The H2O Metabolism Pilot Study
- 2019
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Ingår i: The Journal of clinical endocrinology and metabolism. - : The Endocrine Society. - 1945-7197 .- 0021-972X. ; 104:6, s. 1917-1925
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- OBJECTIVE: Because elevated copeptin, a marker of vasopressin, is linked to low water intake and high diabetes risk, we tested the effect of water supplementation on copeptin and fasting glucose.DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS: Thirty-one healthy adults with high copeptin (>10.7 pmol · L-1 in men and >6.1 pmol·L-1 in women) identified in a population-based survey from 2013 to 2015 and with a current 24-hour urine osmolality of >600 mOsm · kg-1 were included.INTERVENTION: Addition of 1.5 L water daily on top of habitual fluid intake for 6 weeks.MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE: Pre- and postintervention fasting plasma copeptin concentrations.RESULTS: Reported mean water intake increased from 0.43 to 1.35 L · d-1 (P < 0.001), with no other observed changes in diet. Median (interquartile range) urine osmolality was reduced from 879 (705, 996) to 384 (319, 502) mOsm · kg-1 (P < 0.001); urine volume increased from 1.06 (0.90, 1.20) to 2.27 (1.52, 2.67) L · d-1 (P < 0.001); and baseline copeptin decreased from 12.9 (7.4, 21.9) pmol · L-1 to 7.8 (4.6;11.3) pmol · L-1 (P < 0.001). Water supplementation reduced fasting plasma glucose from a mean (SD) of 5.94 (0.44) to 5.74 (0.51) (P = 0.04). The water-associated reduction of both fasting copeptin and glucose concentration in plasma was most pronounced in participants in the top tertile of baseline copeptin.CONCLUSIONS: Water supplementation in persons with habitually low water consumption and high copeptin levels is effective in lowering copeptin. It appears a safe and promising intervention with the potential of lowering fasting plasma glucose and thus reducing diabetes risk. Further investigations are warranted to support these findings.
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| 3. |
- Gebert Persson, Sabine, et al.
(författare)
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Public and private networks in tourism – : barriers to network identity construction and commitmen
- 2019
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- IntroductionDestinations all over the world encompass a broad range of stakeholders who all aspire to increase the tourism industry to accomplish regional development. At these destinations, there are many different stakeholders, who have mutual interest in a specific region, and there are different attempts to promote cooperation for joint efforts to attract visitors. Moreover, there is an increasing drive for municipalities to influence the tourism business as part of their regional development (Tillväxtverket, 2017).However, the aforementioned development of destinations has proven to involve competing interests between local, national and international stakeholders. Although private enterprises, the municipalities and on-governmental organizations, and residents have a common, or at least partly overlapping, interest in the development of a specific destination, competing interests will occasionally occur (c.f. Elbe et al., 2018). For instance, private businesses, like small local entrepreneurs, could be in direct competition with national or international corporations, despite the fact that they may have much to gain from joint marketing efforts (c.f. investment in a common brand). Similarly, public1organizations have a shared interest in the development of the tourism industry to increase tax revenues and job creation. However, municipalities have a greater responsibility for communities and its residents.As in many other sectors, public and private interactions are common within the tourism industry due to an overall reduction in public sector funding (Valente et al., 2015). Relationships between public and private actors are also set up to conjointly pool resources, share risks in the process of building, maintaining and developing public services (Keränen, 2017). Interactions between public-private actors have been acknowledged as important since these relationships enable firms to influence decisions within areas such as the public sector, rules and actions that can affect how the firm is perceived as legitimate or not (Hadjikhani, Lee, & Ghauri, 2008; Jansson, Saqib, & Sharma, 1995) but also as ways to develop new and existing resources. However, research has shown that uncertainty tends to be rather high in these relationships and the roles that the actors play are consequently dynamic and unclear. This in turn also affects how the actors perceive the cooperation between public and private actors (Keränen, 2017) and their commitment to these types of networks (Elbe et al., 2018). The sought after commitment would be enhanced if a mutual identity could be constituted; still the identity is established from how the stakeholders perceive their roles and relations to each other. So how could the identity of public actors merge with the identity of private actors to establish a mutual and common identity?Despite the apparent advantage to create a network to coordinate mutual, or at least overlapping, interests, it has proven to entail a number of difficult issues of which some will be addressed below. The combination of private and public stakeholders in one organization may have implications for its role and commitments (c.f. Elbe et al. 2009; 2018) i.e. it could influence the perceived identity construction of its constituents. The combination of public and private interests in the same organization could create tension; one perspective could have precedence over the other. For instance, if a publicly funded organization considers it to be its mission to only enhance businesses, there are stakeholder who could be overlooked, such as permanent residents, community services, and other lines of industry. Although the established networks are intended to work towards common goals, there may still be implicit and ambiguous goals, roles and identity formations.2The organizing of public and private interests in order to transform a place and its characteristics into a destination has proven to be a complex process. More research is needed in order to bring further clarity into factors affecting these types of relationships in terms of activities and resources (de Araujo and Bramwell, 2002) as well as how this affects the actors. Although there is a growing scholarly interest in public-private relationships, additional knowledge is needed on how the processes of these types of cooperation evolve (de Araujo and Bramwell, 2002). This is especially so in the context of created networks where the network is constructed rather than emerging and where the aim is to foster and manage activities, resource interactions and actor bonds.This paper sets out to further the understanding of interaction processes where public and private actors attempt to find ways to cooperate on a common issue. This is done by analyzing how the identity of a created network, consisting of public and private actors, develops over time. This paper focuses on explaining how a created network develops over time and why it evolves in the way it does. The purpose is to identify possible barriers to identity construction in a created network consisting of public and private actors. This is done through a case taking its point of departure in the decision of a major infrastructural investment in a destination in Sweden: the building of a new cruise quay on Gotland.Created public-private cooperation – previous research.Interactions between public-private actors have been acknowledged as important since these relationships enable firms to influence decisions within different areas such as the public sector, rules and actions (Keränen, 2017; Elbe et al., 2018) but also as ways to develop new and existing resources. These co-operations are encouraged by governments in many countries as interactions can facilitate the discussions and decisions related to how different activities evolve and are coordinated as well as how public resources are distributed. Moral responsibility and a way to recover citizens’ trust for politicians’ abilities to deliver on electoral pledge when resources are scarce has been emphasized as a reason for cooperation between public and private actors (Velotti, Botti & Vesci, 2012). In a tourism context, private-public cooperation can also increase the competitive advantage of destinations (Kotler et al., 1993).Over the last decades, a growing number of designated organizations for the coordination of tourist actors have been established using the concept of: Destination Management Organizations, DMO (c.f. Elbe et al. 2009). According to UNWTO (2018), the DMO’s3role should, “be to lead and coordinate activities under a coherent strategy in pursuit of this common goal.” The argument in research, and in practice, has been that these destination organizations can manage marketing and coordinate different actors from varying sectors in the society. Through this, it is assumed that the destination through facilitation of interactions among local actors and creation of networks can stimulate economic growth (Elbe et al., 2018). Hence, specific organizations are politically created to facilitate regional development. In addition, DMOs are proposed as a coalition of many organizations and interest although in practice, these organizations have proven to be composed in different ways, with varying performance (Tillväxtverket 2017). In order to understand the accomplishment the sought-after coordination of diverse stakeholder interests, a network approach has been suggested that encompasses inter-organizational relations (Elbe et al. 2018). The proposed network approach could take into account relations between organizations, not only limited to intra-organizational management models that do not encompass all stakeholders.Despite the numerous potential advantages of public-private interactions, they can be time- consuming and difficult as the participants come from different sectors and with deviating interests. Therefore, actors can perceive a risk that their power and influence may decrease. This can also lead to a lack of trust between the actors (de Araujo & Bramwell, 2002).Tensions and paradoxesInteraction between business actors are built around an economic rational. An assumption is that without economic incentives, interactions between business actors in networks will not come about (Håkansson, 1982; Finke et al., 2017). Different types of resources such as financial resources (capital), physical resources (time, technologies, people) and informational resources (knowledge) are exchanged and combined in new and unique ways through the interactions. Resources are through inherently dynamic and can always be used in new combinations within one relationship or in other relationships (Baraldi et al., 2012). An important condition and a factor influencing the interaction processes are the norms and perceptions of what constitutes the rules of the game. Through the interactions new norms for exchange can form and influence the continuation of the exchange. Whether to engage in the cooperation or not will be affected by previous experiences and expectations as expressed by Mousas and Ford (2009, p. 497): “Recurrent episodes are affected by the perceptions of the participants of their previous interactions and by their expectations of the future.” These exchange relationships, constitute the context in which interaction4processes between actors takes place (Easton & Håkansson, 1996; Håkansson & Ford, 2002; Håkansson & Waluszewski, 2002, 2007; Ritter, 2000).In tourist destinations, many of the resources used to attract tourists are public and common goods. The question of who owns these common goods is not always clear. Beaches, lakes, museums, culture heritage buildings are all resources that can attract tourists but that are public. Exchange relationships and agreement on how these public resources are exploited becomes essential for the survival of those organizations involved in developing act
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| 4. |
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| 5. |
- Alves Dias, Joana, et al.
(författare)
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Plasma variation and reproducibility of oxidized LDL-cholesterol and low-grade inflammation biomarkers among participants of the Malmö Diet and Cancer cohort
- 2016
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Ingår i: Biomarkers. - 1354-750X. ; 21:6, s. 562-571
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Context: Large epidemiological studies often collect non-fasting samples, although the reliability of biomarkers may be uncertain. Objective: To explore the reliability and reproducibility of a single measurement of selected biomarkers in a sub-sample of the Malmö Diet and Cancer cohort. Methods: We estimated single- and average-measures intraclass correlation coefficients (ICC) for oxidized (ox)-LDL, interleukin (IL)-1β, IL-6, IL-8 and TNF-α. Results: Single-measures ICC in non-fasting samples of ox-LDL, IL-1β, IL-6, IL-8 and TNF-α were the following: 0.85, 0.71, 0.61, 0.78 and 0.66 for men, and 0.67, 0.81, 0.87, 0.69 and 0.81 for women. Biomarkers at non-fasting and fasting samples were highly correlated (all r > 0.80). Conclusions: The observed ICC suggest that most of the examined biomarkers (non-fasting blood) would allow meaningful analysis in epidemiological studies.
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| 6. |
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| 7. |
- De Palma, Adriana, et al.
(författare)
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Predicting bee community responses to land-use changes : effects of geographic and taxonomic biases
- 2016
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Ingår i: Scientific Reports. - : Nature Publishing Group. - 2045-2322. ; 6, s. 1-14
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Land-use change and intensification threaten bee populations worldwide, imperilling pollination services. Global models are needed to better characterise, project, and mitigate bees' responses to these human impacts. The available data are, however, geographically and taxonomically unrepresentative; most data are from North America and Western Europe, overrepresenting bumblebees and raising concerns that model results may not be generalizable to other regions and taxa. To assess whether the geographic and taxonomic biases of data could undermine effectiveness of models for conservation policy, we have collated from the published literature a global dataset of bee diversity at sites facing land-use change and intensification, and assess whether bee responses to these pressures vary across 11 regions (Western, Northern, Eastern and Southern Europe; North, Central and South America; Australia and New Zealand; South East Asia; Middle and Southern Africa) and between bumblebees and other bees. Our analyses highlight strong regionally-based responses of total abundance, species richness and Simpson's diversity to land use, caused by variation in the sensitivity of species and potentially in the nature of threats. These results suggest that global extrapolation of models based on geographically and taxonomically restricted data may underestimate the true uncertainty, increasing the risk of ecological surprises.
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| 8. |
- Demirel, Isak, 1987-, et al.
(författare)
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Transcriptional Alterations of Virulence-Associated Genes in Extended Spectrum Beta-Lactamase (ESBL)-Producing Uropathogenic Escherichia coli during Morphologic Transitions Induced by Ineffective Antibiotics
- 2017
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Ingår i: Frontiers in Microbiology. - : Frontiers Media S.A.. - 1664-302X. ; 8
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- It is known that an ineffective antibiotic treatment can induce morphological shifts in uropathogenic Escherichia coli (UPEC) but the virulence properties during these shifts remain to be studied. The present study examines changes in global gene expression patterns and in virulence factor-associated genes in an extended spectrum beta-lactamase (ESBL)-producing UPEC (ESBL019) during the morphologic transitions induced by an ineffective antibiotic and in the presence of human primary bladder epithelial cells. Microarray results showed that the different morphological states of ESBL019 had significant transcriptional alterations of a large number of genes (Transition; 7%, Filamentation; 32%, and Reverted 19% of the entities on the array). All three morphological states of ESBL019 were associated with a decreased energy metabolism, altered iron acquisition systems and altered adhesion expression. In addition, genes associated with LPS synthesis and bacterial motility was also altered in all the morphological states. Furthermore, the transition state induced a significantly higher release of TNF-alpha from bladder epithelial cells compared to all other morphologies, while the reverted state was unable to induce INF-alpha release. Our findings show that the morphological shifts induced by ineffective antibiotics are associated with significant transcriptional virulence alterations in ESBL-producing UPEC, which may affect survival and persistence in the urinary tract.
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| 9. |
- Edström, Mats, et al.
(författare)
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Rötning av fjäderfägödsel med gödselförädling i tillämpad skala
- 2018
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Rapport (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Ett tjugotal lantbrukare i Mönsterås kommun planerar för att bygga en stor biogasanläggning som kommer att ha fastgödsel från höns som huvudsubstrat. Den gemensamma biogasanläggning kan bli den största i sitt slag i Sverige, med en biogasproduktion på ca 70 GWh biogas/år för produktion av drivmedel. Den genererade rötresten kan kväveförsörja ca 12 000 ha/år växtodling och fosforförsörja ca 20 000 ha/år. Den rötade gödseln bidrar i princip till all växtnäring i rötresten, där fjäderfägödseln kommer att bidra med ca 80 % av rötrestens innehåll av kväve och fosfor. Ett hinder för att realisera denna anläggning är att det idag saknas erfarenhet från praktisk drift av rötningsanläggningar med betydande inblandning av fjäderfägödsel. Fjäderfägödsel är både ett fosfor- och kväverikt substrat, och innehåller dessutom både tunga och lätta partiklar som riskerar att bilda sediment och svämtäcken i rötkammaren. Idag betraktas fjäderfägödsel framför allt som ett fosforgödselmedel eftersom huvuddelen av kvävet inte är direkt upptagbart av växter, men rötning av fjäderfägödsel ökar andelen direktverkanande kväve. För att optimera hantering, spridning och utnyttjande av kväve och fosfor i fjäderfägödsel är det önskvärt att processa denna gödsel för att generera fyra stycken gödselmedel med olika kväve- och fosforkvot. För att kunna studera dessa frågeställningar och bredda gödselbasen för rötning har Vinnova, under 2016-2018, finansierat denna tillämpade studie.Under ett tillämpat försök genomfördes rötning i pilotskala av kväverik hönsgödsel som huvudsubstrat. Rötningsprocessen gick att driva stabilt vid en ammoniumkvävehalt på närmare 6 g/l inom det mesofila temperaturområdet i en totalomblandad rötkammare med volymetrisk metanproduktion som uppgick till 1,1 m3 CH4/m3 slamvolym & dag. Järnklorid tillfördes rötkammaren för att hålla biogasens innehåll av svavelväte vid ca 100 ppm. För att hålla ammoniumhalten vid angiven nivå tillfördes vatten motsvarande halva inflödet in i rötkammaren, för att späda ner kvävet till denna nivå. Efter rötningen av substratblandningen ökade dess ammoniuminnehåll med 3,7 gånger.Under pilotförsöket producerades ca 13 m3 rötrest som sparades och lagrades 4–8 månader innan den förädlades i två steg till två olika gödselmedel. I första steget genomfördes fasseparation med en dekantercentrifug följt av indunstning av surgjord tunnfas. Baserat på dessa försök beräknas fassepareringen kunna generera ett fast gödselmedel vars vikt motsvarar 23 % av i rötningsprocessen producerad rötrest. Det fasta gödselmedlets innehåll av fosfor utgör dryga 70 % av rötrestens fosforinnehåll. Vidare beräknas indunstningen kunna generera ett uppkoncentrerat flytande gödselmedel vars vikt motsvarar 2o % av i rötningsprocessen producerad rötrest. Det flytande gödselmedlets innehåll av ammoniumkvävet utgör dryga 70 % av rötrestens ammoniuminnehåll. Det producerade koncentratgödselmedlet liksom tunnfasgödselmedlet hade en hög andel lättillgängligt kväve, vilket är en viktig delförutsättning för att uppnå höga skördar vid växtodling. Gödselmedel från Mönsterås Biogas planerade biogasanläggning kan i framtiden bidra till att jordbruket i Kalmar län med omnejd kan gå mot en hållbar intensifiering av livsmedelsproduktionen.
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