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- Kuschmierz, Paul, et al.
(författare)
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European first-year university students accept evolution but lack substantial knowledge about it : A standardized European cross-country assessment
- 2021
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Ingår i: Evolution. - : BioMed Central (BMC). - 1936-6426 .- 1936-6434. ; 14:1, s. 1-22
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Background: Investigations of evolution knowledge and acceptance and their relation are central to evolution education research. Ambiguous results in this field of study demonstrate a variety of measuring issues, for instance differently theorized constructs, or a lack of standardized methods, especially for cross-country comparisons. In particular, meaningful comparisons across European countries, with their varying cultural backgrounds and education systems, are rare, often include only few countries, and lack standardization. To address these deficits, we conducted a standardized European survey, on 9200 first-year university students in 26 European countries utilizing a validated, comprehensive questionnaire, the “Evolution Education Questionnaire”, to assess evolution acceptance and knowledge, as well as influencing factors on evolution acceptance. Results: We found that, despite European countries’ different cultural backgrounds and education systems, European first-year university students generally accept evolution. At the same time, they lack substantial knowledge about it, even if they are enrolled in a biology-related study program. Additionally, we developed a multilevel-model that determines religious faith as the main influencing factor in accepting evolution. According to our model, knowledge about evolution and interest in biological topics also increase acceptance of evolution, but to a much lesser extent than religious faith. The effect of age and sex, as well as the country’s affiliation, students’ denomination, and whether or not a student is enrolled in a biology-related university program, is negligible. Conclusions: Our findings indicate that, despite all their differences, most of the European education systems for upper secondary education lead to acceptance of evolution at least in university students. It appears that, at least in this sample, the differences in knowledge between countries reflect neither the extent to which school curricula cover evolutionary biology nor the percentage of biology-related students in the country samples. Future studies should investigate the role of different European school curricula, identify particularly problematic or underrepresented evolutionary concepts in biology education, and analyze the role of religious faith when teaching evolution.
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| 2. |
- Lee, Yunsung, et al.
(författare)
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Blood-based epigenetic estimators of chronological age in human adults using DNA methylation data from the Illumina MethylationEPIC array
- 2020
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Ingår i: BMC Genomics. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1471-2164. ; 21:1
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Background: Epigenetic clocks have been recognized for their precise prediction of chronological age, age-related diseases, and all-cause mortality. Existing epigenetic clocks are based on CpGs from the Illumina HumanMethylation450 BeadChip (450 K) which has now been replaced by the latest platform, Illumina MethylationEPIC BeadChip (EPIC). Thus, it remains unclear to what extent EPIC contributes to increased precision and accuracy in the prediction of chronological age. Results: We developed three blood-based epigenetic clocks for human adults using EPIC-based DNA methylation (DNAm) data from the Norwegian Mother, Father and Child Cohort Study (MoBa) and the Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) public repository: 1) an Adult Blood-based EPIC Clock (ABEC) trained on DNAm data from MoBa (n = 1592, age-span: 19 to 59 years), 2) an extended ABEC (eABEC) trained on DNAm data from MoBa and GEO (n = 2227, age-span: 18 to 88 years), and 3) a common ABEC (cABEC) trained on the same training set as eABEC but restricted to CpGs common to 450 K and EPIC. Our clocks showed high precision (Pearson correlation between chronological and epigenetic age (r) > 0.94) in independent cohorts, including GSE111165 (n = 15), GSE115278 (n = 108), GSE132203 (n = 795), and the Epigenetics in Pregnancy (EPIPREG) study of the STORK Groruddalen Cohort (n = 470). This high precision is unlikely due to the use of EPIC, but rather due to the large sample size of the training set. Conclusions: Our ABECs predicted adults’ chronological age precisely in independent cohorts. As EPIC is now the dominant platform for measuring DNAm, these clocks will be useful in further predictions of chronological age, age-related diseases, and mortality.
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| 5. |
- Feijoo, C., et al.
(författare)
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Harnessing artificial intelligence (AI) to increase wellbeing for all: The case for a new technology diplomacy
- 2020
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Ingår i: Telecommunications Policy. - : Elsevier BV. - 0308-5961. ; 44:6
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The field of artificial intelligence (AI) is experiencing a period of intense progress due to the consolidation of several key technological enablers. AI is already deployed widely and has a high impact on work and daily life activities. The continuation of this process will likely contribute to deep economic and social changes. To realise the tremendous benefits of AI while mitigating undesirable effects will require enlightened responses by many stakeholders. Varying national institutional, economic, political, and cultural conditions will influence how AI will affect convenience, efficiency, personalisation, privacy protection, and surveillance of citizens. Many expect that the winners of the AI development race will dominate the coming decades economically and geopolitically, potentially exacerbating tensions between countries. Moreover, nations are under pressure to protect their citizens and their interests—and even their own political stability—in the face of possible malicious or biased uses of AI. On the one hand, these different stressors and emphases in AI development and deployment among nations risk a fragmentation between world regions that threatens technology evolution and collaboration. On the other hand, some level of differentiation will likely enrich the global AI ecosystem in ways that stimulate innovation and introduce competitive checks and balances through the decentralisation of AI development. International cooperation, typically orchestrated by intergovernmental and non-governmental organisations, private sector initiatives, and by academic researchers, has improved common welfare and avoided undesirable outcomes in other technology areas. Because AI will most likely have more fundamental effects on our lives than other recent technologies, stronger forms of cooperation that address broader policy and governance challenges in addition to regulatory and technological issues may be needed. At a time of great challenges among nations, international policy coordination remains a necessary instrument to tackle the ethical, cultural, economic, and political repercussions of AI. We propose to advance the emerging concept of technology diplomacy to facilitate the global alignment of AI policy and governance and create a vibrant AI innovation system. We argue that the prevention of malicious uses of AI and the enhancement of human welfare create strong common interests across jurisdictions that require sustained efforts to develop better, mutually beneficial approaches. We hope that new technology diplomacy will facilitate the dialogues necessary to help all interested parties develop a shared understanding and coordinate efforts to utilise AI for the benefit of humanity, a task whose difficulty should not be underestimated.
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| 6. |
- Henckel, Ewa, et al.
(författare)
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A novel association between ykl-40, a marker of structural lung disease, and short telomere length in 10-year-old children with bronchopulmonary dysplasia
- 2021
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Ingår i: Children. - : MDPI. - 2227-9067. ; 8:2
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Extremely preterm infants are born with immature lungs and are exposed to an inflammatory environment as a result of oxidative stress. This may lead to airway remodeling, cellular aging and the development of bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD). Reliable markers that predict the long-term consequences of BPD in infancy are still lacking. We analyzed two biomarkers of cellular aging and lung function, telomere length and YKL-40, respectively, at 10 years of age in children born preterm with a history of BPD (n = 29). For comparison, these markers were also evaluated in sex-and-age-matched children born at term with childhood asthma (n = 28). Relative telomere length (RTL) was measured in whole blood with qPCR and serum YKL-40 with ELISA, and both were studied in relation to gas exchange and the regional ventilation/perfusion ratio using three-dimensional V/Q-scintigraphy (single photon emission computer tomography, SPECT) in children with BPD. Higher levels of YKL-40 were associated with shorter leukocyte RTL (Pearson’s correlation: −0.55, p = 0.002), but were not associated with a lower degree of matching between ventilation and perfusion within the lung. Serum YKL-40 levels were significantly higher in children with BPD compared to children with asthma (17.7 vs. 13.2 ng/mL, p < 0.01). High levels of YKL-40 and short RTLs were associated to the need for ventilatory support more than 1 month in the neonatal period (p < 0.01). The link between enhanced telomere shortening in childhood and structural remodeling of the lung, as observed in children with former BPD but not in children with asthma at the age of 10 years, suggests altered lung development related to prematurity and early life inflammatory exposure. In conclusion, relative telomere length and YKL-40 may serve as biomarkers of altered lung development as a result of early-life inflammation in children with a history of prematurity.
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| 8. |
- Jadersten, M., et al.
(författare)
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Targeting SAMHD1 with hydroxyurea in first-line cytarabine-based therapy of newly diagnosed acute myeloid leukaemia: Results from the HEAT-AML trial
- 2022
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Ingår i: Journal of Internal Medicine. - : Wiley. - 0954-6820 .- 1365-2796. ; 292:6, s. 925-940
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Background Treatment of newly diagnosed acute myeloid leukaemia (AML) is based on combination chemotherapy with cytarabine (ara-C) and anthracyclines. Five-year overall survival is below 30%, which has partly been attributed to cytarabine resistance. Preclinical data suggest that the addition of hydroxyurea potentiates cytarabine efficacy by increasing ara-C triphosphate (ara-CTP) levels through targeted inhibition of SAMHD1. Objectives In this phase 1 trial, we evaluated the feasibility, safety and efficacy of the addition of hydroxyurea to standard chemotherapy with cytarabine/daunorubicin in newly diagnosed AML patients. Methods Nine patients were enrolled and received at least two courses of ara-C (1 g/m(2)/2 h b.i.d. d1-5, i.e., a total of 10 g/m(2) per course), hydroxyurea (1-2 g d1-5) and daunorubicin (60 mg/m(2) d1-3). The primary endpoint was safety; secondary endpoints were complete remission rate and measurable residual disease (MRD). Additionally, pharmacokinetic studies of ara-CTP and ex vivo drug sensitivity assays were performed. Results The most common grade 3-4 toxicity was febrile neutropenia (100%). No unexpected toxicities were observed. Pharmacokinetic analyses showed a significant increase in median ara-CTP levels (1.5-fold; p = 0.04) in patients receiving doses of 1 g hydroxyurea. Ex vivo, diagnostic leukaemic bone marrow blasts from study patients were significantly sensitised to ara-C by a median factor of 2.1 (p = 0.0047). All nine patients (100%) achieved complete remission, and all eight (100%) with validated MRD measurements (flow cytometry or real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction [RT-qPCR]) had an MRD level <0.1% after two cycles of chemotherapy. Treatment was well-tolerated, and median time to neutrophil recovery >1.0 x 10(9)/L and to platelet recovery >50 x 10(9)/L after the start of cycle 1 was 19 days and 22 days, respectively. Six of nine patients underwent allogeneic haematopoietic stem-cell transplantation (allo-HSCT). With a median follow-up of 18.0 (range 14.9-20.5) months, one patient with adverse risk not fit for HSCT experienced a relapse after 11.9 months but is now in second complete remission. Conclusion Targeted inhibition of SAMHD1 by the addition of hydroxyurea to conventional AML therapy is safe and appears efficacious within the limitations of the small phase 1 patient cohort. These results need to be corroborated in a larger study.
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| 12. |
- Mayer, Ludovic, et al.
(författare)
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Widespread Pesticide Distribution in the European Atmosphere Questions their Degradability in Air
- 2024
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Ingår i: Environmental Science and Technology. - 0013-936X. ; 58:7, s. 3342-3352
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Risk assessment of pesticide impacts on remote ecosystems makes use of model-estimated degradation in air. Recent studies suggest these degradation rates to be overestimated, questioning current pesticide regulation. Here, we investigated the concentrations of 76 pesticides in Europe at 29 rural, coastal, mountain, and polar sites during the agricultural application season. Overall, 58 pesticides were observed in the European atmosphere. Low spatial variation of 7 pesticides suggests continental-scale atmospheric dispersal. Based on concentrations in free tropospheric air and at Arctic sites, 22 pesticides were identified to be prone to long-range atmospheric transport, which included 15 substances approved for agricultural use in Europe and 7 banned ones. Comparison between concentrations at remote sites and those found at pesticide source areas suggests long atmospheric lifetimes of atrazine, cyprodinil, spiroxamine, tebuconazole, terbuthylazine, and thiacloprid. In general, our findings suggest that atmospheric transport and persistence of pesticides have been underestimated and that their risk assessment needs to be improved.
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