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Purpose: Flattening filters (FFs) have been considered as an integral part of the treatment head of a medical accelerator for more than 50 years. The reasons for the longstanding use are, however, historical ones. Advanced treatment techniques, such as stereotactic radiotherapy or intensity modulated radiotherapy have stimulated the interest in operating linear accelerators in a flattening filter
Spectral hole burning and photon echoes are the techniques for frequency-selective optical memories, which have the potential to increase areal data storage density by a factor 10**7. They also have the capability to perform in-memory data processing. In this thesis, several materials and techniques for optical memories in the frequency- and time domain have been investigated. In the frequency do
BACKGROUND: Insulin-like growth factors (IGFs) and their binding proteins (BPs) regulate cell differentiation, proliferation and apoptosis, and may have a role in the aetiology of various cancers. Information on their role in pancreatic cancer is limited and was examined here in a case-control study nested within the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition. METHODS: Serum conc
Context: Blood hemoglobin (Hb) declines with age in healthy elderly men, in whom decreasing testosterone has been regarded as part of normal ageing. However, the association between Hb and serum estradiol is incompletely known. Objective: To determine whether estradiol is associated with anemia/Hb and established determinants of Hb in elderly men without prostate cancer. Design, Setting and Partic
PURPOSE To improve the poor prognosis of patients with primary disseminated multifocal Ewing sarcomas (PDMES) with a dose-intense treatment concept. PATIENTS AND METHODS From 1999 to 2005, 281 patients with PDMES were enrolled onto the Euro-EWING 99 R3 study. Median age was 16.2 years (range, 0.4 to 49 years). Recommended treatment consisted of six cycles of vincristine, ifosfamide, doxorubicin, a
CONTEXT: The well-known side-effect profile of androgen-deprivation therapy (ADT) has significant quality-of-life (QoL) implications. Intermittent androgen deprivation (IAD) alternates androgen blockade with treatment cessation to allow hormonal recovery between treatment cycles, thus potentially improving tolerability and QoL. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate available evidence regarding the efficacy and t
# 1. We investigated the potential drivers of Holocene vegetation changes recorded at four Scandinavian pollen sites, two in Sweden and two in Finland, at a time when they were largely free of anthropogenic influence. # 2. We used the generalized dynamic vegetation model LPJ-GUESS forced with climate anomaly output from an atmospheric general circulation model to simulate tree species dynamics
Background Long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acid (LCPUFA) especially the n-3-FA of skeletal muscle phospholipids may facilitate insulin action, whereas saturated and trans-FA act oppositely. Community studies show that non-diabetic weight matched obese men and women display similar insulin resistance, despite the fact that an android fat distribution is detrimental to insulin action. The increased
PURPOSE: In this population-based study, risk factors for primary intracerebral hemorrhage (PICH) and PICH subtypes were explored in a nested case-control design.METHOD: Risk factors were determined in 22,444 men and 10,902 women (mean age 47 years) who participated in a health-screening programme between 1974 and 1991. 147 subjects with CT or autopsy-verified first-ever PICH during the follow-up
Background Chitosans of high molecular weights have emerged as efficient. nonviral gene delivery systems, but the properties and efficiency of well-defined low molecular weight chitosans ((.) 5 kDa) have not been studied. We therefore characterized DNA complexes Of Such low molecular weight chitosans and related their physical shape and stability to their efficiency as gene delivery systems in vit
Background and Purpose: The 'capsular warning syndrome' (CWS) of recurrent stereotyped episodes of motor or sensory dysfunction is clinically well recognized, and is associated with a high risk of imminent lacunar infarction with permanent deficits resembling those of CWS. However, the pathophysiology of CWS has not been well characterized. We report a clinicoanatomic correlation with MR imaging s
Purpose To explore the effect of high-dose ifosfamide in first-line treatment for patients <= 40 years of age with nonmetastatic osteosarcoma of the extremity. Patients and Methods From March 1997 to September 2000, 182 patients were evaluated. Primary treatment consisted of two blocks of high-dose ifosfamide (15 g/m(2)), methotrexate (12 g/m(2)), cisplatin (120 mg/m(2)), and doxorubicin (75 mg/m(
Aims: Skeletal muscle is a major metabolic organ and plays important roles in glucose metabolism, insulin sensitivity and insulin action. Muscle telomere length reflects the myocyte's exposure to harmful environmental factors. Leukocyte telomere length is considered a marker of muscle telomere length and is used in epidemiologic studies to assess associations with ageing-related diseases where mus
Single-strand RNA-binding proteins (RBPs) are involved in many aspects of RNA metabolism and in the regulation of gene transcription. The RBP RBM3 was recently suggested to be a proto-oncogene in colorectal cancer; however, such a role has not been corroborated by previous studies in the colon or other tumor types, and the prognostic implications of tumor-specific RBM3 expression remain unclear. M
One hundred and forty four current and 26 former workers in a plant producing barrels for rocket guns from an epoxy resin containing methyltetrahydrophthalic anhydride (MTHPA; time weighted average air concentration up to 150 uglm') were studied. They showed higher frequencies of work related symptoms from the eyes (31 v 0%; p < 0-001), nose (53 v 9%; p < 0-001), pharynx (26 v 6%; p < 0-01), and a
Transport in and through biological membranes that consist of lipid bilayers has a crucial role in many applications in the food or pharmaceutical industries. How to deliver an enzyme through the membranes without damaging the enzymatic activity or the "shelf-life" of the enzyme has been of large interest since 1970 [29-30]. In this work, we have shown that a thin lipid sponge phase (L3)
Modern science, as we today know it has its roots in Europe during the renaissance, philosophers then begun to form knowledge on the rules for how nature science should work in its quest in understanding the universe. The seventeenth century was also when scientific journals came into circulation, this represents a great leap in how science was communicated in contrast to earlier private correspon
Background & Aims: Assess the prevalence of peri-transplant heart failure and its potential relation to post-transplant morbidity and mortality. Methods: A retrospective study was performed on 234 consecutive cirrhotic patients undergoing liver transplantation in a single European center from 1999 to 2007 (mean age 52, 30% women, 36% with alcoholic liver disease, 24% with viral hepatitis, 18%
The dic(9;20)(p13.2;q11.2) is reported to be present in similar to 2% of childhood B-cell precursor acute lymphoblastic leukemia (BCP ALL). However, it easily escapes detection by G-banding analysis and its true prevalence is hence unknown. We performed interphase fluorescence in situ hybridization analyses-in a three-step manner-using probes for: (i) CDKN2A at 9p21, (ii) 20p and 20q subtelomeres
Asteroids and Kuiper belt objects are remnant planetesimals from the epoch of planet formation. The first stage of planet formation is the accumulation of dust and ice grains into mm-cm-sized pebbles. These pebbles can clump together through the streaming instability and form gravitationally bound pebble `clouds'. Pebbles inside such a cloud will undergo mutual collisions, dissipating energy into
