Splinter Haemorrhages,Pitting, and Other Findings in Fingernails of Healthy Adults

Splinter haemorrhages, pitting, transverse grooving, ridging, and flaking occur often in the fingernails of the healthy. While they may occur more often in certain diseases they have little diagnostic value in the absence of proper methods of measurement and examination and without a range of normal values for the sexes and age groups.     

Achieving consistency in life cycle assessment practice within the European construction sector: the role of the EeBGuide InfoHub

Purpose

The objective of the paper is to discuss the role of a new guidance document for life cycle assessment (LCA) in the construction sector available as an online InfoHub.

Methods

This InfoHub derives from the EeBGuide European project that aimed at developing a guidance document for energy-efficient building LCA studies. The InfoHub is built on reference documents such as the ISO 14040-44 standards, the EN 15804 and EN 15978 standards as well as the ILCD Handbook. The guidance document was filled with expertise and knowledge of several experts. The focus was put on providing scientifically sound, yet practical guidance.

Results

The EeBGuide InfoHub is an online guidance document, setting rules for conducting LCA studies and giving instructions on how to do this. The document has a section on buildings—new and existing—and a section on construction products. It is structured according to the life cycle stages of the European standards EN 15804 and EN 15978, covering all aspects of LCA studies by applying provisions from these standards and the ILCD handbook, wherever applicable. The guidance is presented for different scopes of studies by means of three study types. For the same system boundaries, default values are proposed in early or quick assessment (screening and simplified LCA) while detailed calculation rules correspond to a complete LCA. Such approach is intended to better match the user needs in the building sector.

Conclusions and recommendations

This paper can be viewed as a contribution to the ongoing efforts to improve the consistency and harmonisation in LCA studies for building products and buildings. Further contributions are now needed to improve building LCA guidance and to strengthen links between research, standardisation and implementation of LCA in the construction practice.     

A novel tetravalent bispecific TandAb (CD30/CD16A) efficiently recruits NK cells for the lysis of CD30+ tumor cells

To improve recruitment and activation of natural killer (NK) cells to lyse tumor cells, we isolated a human anti-CD16A antibody with similar affinity for the CD16A 158F/V allotypes, but no binding to the CD16B isoform. Using CD16A-targeting Fv domains, we constructed a tetravalent bispecific CD30/CD16A tandem diabody (TandAb®) consisting solely of Fv domains. This TandAb has two binding sites for CD16A and two for CD30, the antigen identifying Hodgkin lymphoma cells. The binding and cytotoxicity of the TandAb were compared with antibodies with identical anti-CD30 domains: (1) a native IgG, (2) an IgG optimized for binding to Fc receptors, and (3) a bivalent bispecific CD30/CD16A diabody. Due to its CD16A-bivalency and reduced k_off, the TandAb was retained longer on the surface of NK cells than the IgGs or the diabody. This contributed to the higher potency and efficacy of the TandAb relative to those of the other anti-CD30 antibodies. TandAb cytotoxicity was independent of the CD16A allotype, whereas the anti-CD30 IgGs were substantially less cytotoxic when NK cells with low affinity CD16A allotype were employed. TandAb activation of NK cells was strictly dependent on the presence of CD30⁺ target cells. Therefore, the CD30/CD16A TandAb may represent a promising therapeutic for the treatment of Hodgkin’s lymphoma; further, anti-CD16A TandAbs may function as potent immunotherapeutics that specifically recruit NK cells to destroy cancer cells.     

Responses of woody vegetation to exclusion of large herbivores in semi‐arid savannas

The Nkuhlu large‐scale long‐term exclusion experiment in Kruger National Park was designed to study the long‐term effects of large herbivores on vegetation. One treatment excludes elephants, another excludes all herbivores larger than hares and another one comprises an open, control area. Vegetation monitoring was implemented in 2002 when a baseline survey was conducted prior to exclusion. Monitoring was repeated 5 years after exclusion. Data from the surveys were analysed to establish how structure and composition of woody vegetation had changed 5 years after herbivore exclusion. The analysis showed that neither plant assemblage nor mean vegetation height had changed significantly since exclusion. However, both species richness and density of woody plants increased 5 years after exclusion of all large herbivores, but not after the exclusion of elephants alone. One already common species, Dichrostachys cinerea, became more common after excluding all large herbivores compared with either no exclusion or elephant exclusion, possibly leading to competitive suppression of other species. Species other than D. cinerea tended to either increase or decrease in density, but the changes were insufficient to induce significant shifts in the overall assemblage of woody plants. The results indicate that after 5 years of exclusion, the combined assemblage of large herbivores, and not elephants alone, could induce changes in species richness and abundances of woody plants, but the effect was so far insufficient to induce measureable shifts in the assemblages of woody plants. It is possible that assemblages will change with time and increasing elephant numbers may amplify future changes.     

Virtual reality 3D echocardiography in the assessment of tricuspid valve function after surgical closure of ventricular septal defect

Background

Chronic right ventricular apical pacing may have detrimental effect on left ventricular function and may promote to heart failure in adult patients with left ventricular dysfunction.

Methods

A group of 99 pediatric patients with previously implanted pacemaker was studied retrospectively. Forty-three patients (21 males) had isolated congenital complete or advanced atrioventricular block. The remaining 56 patients (34 males) had pacing indication in the presence of structural heart disease. Thirty-two of them (21 males) had isolated structural heart disease and the remaining 24 (13 males) had complex congenital heart disease. Patients were followed up for an average of 53 ± 41.4 months with 12-lead electrocardiogram and transthoracic echocardiography. Left ventricular shortening fraction was used as a marker of ventricular function. QRS duration was assessed using leads V₅ or II on standard 12-lead electrocardiogram.

Results

Left ventricular shortening fraction did not change significantly after pacemaker implantation compared to preimplant values overall and in subgroups. In patients with complex congenital heart malformations shortening fraction decreased significantly during the follow up period. (0.45 ± 0.07 vs 0.35 ± 0.06, p = 0.015). The correlation between the change in left ventricular shortening fraction and the mean increase of paced QRS duration was not significant. Six patients developed dilated cardiomyopathy, which was diagnosed 2 months to 9 years after pacemaker implantation.

Conclusion

Chronic right ventricular pacing in pediatric patients with or without structural heart disease does not necessarily result in decline of left ventricular function. In patients with complex congenital heart malformations left ventricular shortening fraction shows significant decrease.     

A phasing and imputation method for pedigreed populations that results in a single-stage genomic evaluation

Background

Efficient, robust, and accurate genotype imputation algorithms make large-scale application of genomic selection cost effective. An algorithm that imputes alleles or allele probabilities for all animals in the pedigree and for all genotyped single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP) provides a framework to combine all pedigree, genomic, and phenotypic information into a single-stage genomic evaluation.

Methods

An algorithm was developed for imputation of genotypes in pedigreed populations that allows imputation for completely ungenotyped animals and for low-density genotyped animals, accommodates a wide variety of pedigree structures for genotyped animals, imputes unmapped SNP, and works for large datasets. The method involves simple phasing rules, long-range phasing and haplotype library imputation and segregation analysis.

Results

Imputation accuracy was high and computational cost was feasible for datasets with pedigrees of up to 25 000 animals. The resulting single-stage genomic evaluation increased the accuracy of estimated genomic breeding values compared to a scenario in which phenotypes on relatives that were not genotyped were ignored.

Conclusions

The developed imputation algorithm and software and the resulting single-stage genomic evaluation method provide powerful new ways to exploit imputation and to obtain more accurate genetic evaluations.     

The importance of information on relatives for the prediction of genomic breeding values and the implications for the makeup of reference data sets in livestock breeding schemes

Background

The theory of genomic selection is based on the prediction of the effects of genetic markers in linkage disequilibrium with quantitative trait loci. However, genomic selection also relies on relationships between individuals to accurately predict genetic value. This study aimed to examine the importance of information on relatives versus that of unrelated or more distantly related individuals on the estimation of genomic breeding values.

Methods

Simulated and real data were used to examine the effects of various degrees of relationship on the accuracy of genomic selection. Genomic Best Linear Unbiased Prediction (gBLUP) was compared to two pedigree based BLUP methods, one with a shallow one generation pedigree and the other with a deep ten generation pedigree. The accuracy of estimated breeding values for different groups of selection candidates that had varying degrees of relationships to a reference data set of 1750 animals was investigated.

Results

The gBLUP method predicted breeding values more accurately than BLUP. The most accurate breeding values were estimated using gBLUP for closely related animals. Similarly, the pedigree based BLUP methods were also accurate for closely related animals, however when the pedigree based BLUP methods were used to predict unrelated animals, the accuracy was close to zero. In contrast, gBLUP breeding values, for animals that had no pedigree relationship with animals in the reference data set, allowed substantial accuracy.

Conclusions

An animal''s relationship to the reference data set is an important factor for the accuracy of genomic predictions. Animals that share a close relationship to the reference data set had the highest accuracy from genomic predictions. However a baseline accuracy that is driven by the reference data set size and the overall population effective population size enables gBLUP to estimate a breeding value for unrelated animals within a population (breed), using information previously ignored by pedigree based BLUP methods.