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Purpose Rectal cancer and its treatment have a negative impact on health-related quality of life (HRQoL). If risk factors for sustained low HRQoL could be identified early, ideally before the start of treatment, individualised interventions could be identified and implemented to maintain or improve HRQoL. The study aimed to develop a multivariable prediction model for global HRQoL 12 months after rectal cancer treatment. Methods Within COLOR II, a randomised, multicentre, international trial of laparoscopic and open surgery for rectal cancer, a sub-study on HRQoL included 385 patients in 12 hospitals and five countries. The HRQoL study was optional for hospitals in the COLOR II trial. EORTC QLQ-C30 and EORTC QLQ-CR38 were analysed preoperatively and at 1 and 12 months postoperatively. In exploratory analyses, correlations between age, sex, fatigue, pain, ASA classification, complications, and symptoms after surgery to HRQoL were studied. Bivariate initial analyses were followed by multivariate regression models. Results Patient characteristics and clinical factors explained 4–10% of the variation in global HRQoL. The patient-reported outcomes from EORTC QLQ-C30 explained 55–65% of the variation in global HRQoL. The predominant predictors were fatigue and pain, which significantly impacted global HRQoL at all time points measured. Conclusion We found that fatigue and pain were two significant factors associated with posttreatment global HRQoL in patients treated for rectal cancer T1-T3 Nx. Interventions to reduce fatigue and pain could enhance global HRQoL after rectal cancer treatment., CC BY 4.0 DEEDEva Haglind eva.haglind@vgregion.seThis trial is registered with ClinicalTrials.gov No. NCT00297791Open access funding provided by University of Gothenburg. The study received financial support from the Swedish state under the agreement between the Swedish government and the county councils, the ALF-agreement (ALFGBG-138751; ALFGBG-4307771; ALFGBG-718221; ALFGBG-965245), the Swedish Cancer Society (CAN 2010/593CAN 2013/497; CAN 2016/362; Pj19 0303), the Alice Swenson Foundation, Anna-Lisa and Bror Björnsson Foundation, Axel Linders Foundation, Assar Gabrielsson Foundation, and the Gothenburg Medical Society.

Date: 2024-05-29 Level: Bachelor thesis in Business Administration, 15 cr Institution: School of Business, Society and Engineering, Mälardalen University Authors: John Andersson Philip Brander Rasmus Olsson (84/01/19) (02/01/13) (97/04/03) Title: Grow or wither, the impact of green reporting on profitability Supervisor: Angelina Sundström Keywords: Sustainability reporting, profitability, legitimacy theory, signaling theory, stakeholder theory Research questions Does more frequent mention of sustainability keywords in companies' sustainability report increase their profitability? Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to examine if there is a relationship between sustainability reporting and profitability in Swedish companies listed on the stock exchange. Method: The thesis applies a quantitative method where 120 companies listed on Large- and Small Cap constituted the population. The study performed a regression analysis that examined the relationship between sustainability reporting and profitability. Conclusion: The regression analysis was based on 113 companies and the findings show that there is a positive significant relationship between sustainability reporting and the operating margin. The study also found that there is a negative significant relationship between sustainability reporting and return on equity.

In Sweden, the number of rechargeable cars increases for every year. It is common to charge at home, for example because there is no need to wait for the vehicle to be fully charged.Charging at home takes place with low effects for longer time periods. The installation of micro production with photovoltaic systems is also increasing. Lidköping Elnät sees that the number of installations of chargers for electric vehicles and installation of micro production are increasing in the concession area and are expected to increase even more in the upcoming years. This study investigates the voltage variations that occur in an older and a newly constructed area with villas within the Lidköping urban area under normal load, as well as two future scenarios for micro production and chargers for electric vehicles. The work addresses which actions must be implemented in each area and what the actions cost.The voltage variations have been generated through calculations of the mentioned scenarios in the existing low voltage grid connected to the substation and the associated transformer in each area. Calculations on the low voltage grid at normal loads are based on consumption data take from Lidköping Elnäts’ system for debit measurement. In case of high production, a value is set for the photovoltaic systems that Lidköping Elnät considers as a normal size when a pre-registration of micro production is received. When charging electric vehicles, high consumption in the grid is assumed in the calculations. The voltage variations in the grid are added to the voltage variations occurring over the transformer to calculate the total voltage variations for the grid.Calculations of the total voltage variations in the grid for each scenario demonstrates that none of the points in the grid falls outside the limits allowed by the Swedish Energy Markets Inspectorate or European standard for voltage variations. At high production or high consumption the voltage increases or decreases for the wea

Nuclear pore complexes (NPCs) regulate all molecular transport between the nucleus and the cytoplasm in eukaryotic cells. Intrinsically disordered Phe-Gly nucleoporins (FG-Nups) line the central conduit of NPCs to impart a selective barrier where large proteins are excluded unless bound to a transport receptor (karyopherin; Kap). Here, we assess “Kap-centric” NPC models, which postulate that Kaps participate in establishing the selective barrier. We combine biomimetic nanopores, formed by tethering Nsp1 to the inner wall of a solid-state nanopore, with coarse-grained modeling to show that yeast Kap95 exhibits two populations in Nsp1-coated pores: one population that is transported across the pore in milliseconds, and a second population that is stably assembled within the FG mesh of the pore. Ionic current measurements show a conductance decrease for increasing Kap concentrations and noise data indicate an increase in rigidity of the FG-mesh. Modeling reveals an accumulation of Kap95 near the pore wall, yielding a conductance decrease. We find that Kaps only mildly affect the conformation of the Nsp1 mesh and that, even at high concentrations, Kaps only bind at most 8% of the FG-motifs in the nanopore, indicating that Kap95 occupancy is limited by steric constraints rather than by depletion of available FG-motifs. Our data provide an alternative explanation of the origin of bimodal NPC binding of Kaps, where a stable population of Kaps binds avidly to the NPC periphery, while fast transport proceeds via a central FG-rich channel through lower affinity interactions between Kaps and the cohesive domains of Nsp1. [Figure not available: see fulltext.], BN/Cees Dekker Lab, BN/Marileen Dogterom Lab

How do care and authority relate to each other, and why is the relation between them important to understand for architects and designers? By experimental modelling and experimental thinking this project tries to understand how the caring for different matters in the design process affect the results and consequences of care. The text draws parallells to early aviation pioneers and how a shifted focus from sheer power to manoeuvrability served them their success. Through the development of a curious wood treatment technique, and through it’s imagined applications to homes, mainly in large scale housing projects, this project searches eagerly for answers on matters related to care, authority, responsibility, a reasonable degree of rationality, standardisation, the role of the architect and the role of the designer.

Growing evidence indicates that air pollution can negatively impact cognitive functions. The olfactory system is interesting in this context as it is directly exposed to pollutants and also associated with cognitive functions. The aim of this study was to investigate long- and short-term PM2.5 exposure in association with olfactory functions. Scores from odor tests were obtained from the Betula project - a longitudinal cohort study. Estimates of annual mean PM2.5 concentrations at the participants' residential address were obtained from a dispersion-model. Daily mean PM2.5 concentrations were obtained from a measuring station close to the test location. We found a positive association between long-term PM2.5 exposure and odor identification, i.e. exposure was associated with a better ability to identify odors. We also found an interaction effect between PM2.5 and age on odor identification. We found no associations between any PM2.5 exposure and odor detection or between short-term PM2.5 exposure and olfactory functions.

The present study aims to research whether a development may be seen in the use of the passécomposé of L1 Swedish secondary school students and L1 Swedish university beginners learningFrench, the prevalence of the passé composé in their and a control group’s productions and whetherthe results confirm the aspectual hypothesis of Andersen (1991), which predicts that the perfective willdevelop first with telic verbs and then with atelic verbs. The hypotheses included that a developmentwould be seen, that the control group would have the highest frequency followed by the secondaryschool students and the beginners and that the latter groups would have a higher frequency of telicverbs in the passé composé than atelic verbs. The study confirmed the first and second hypotheses anddid not find the third hypothesis confirmed. The study had difficulty confirming the aspectualhypothesis of Andersen (1991). It was suggested that the dynamic trait may be a better predictor of thechoice of the passé composé than the telic trait, in accordance with Bergström’s (1997) findings.

It is widely known that the apolipoprotein E (APOE) ε4 allele imposes a higher risk for Alzheimer's disease (AD). Recent evidence suggests that exposure to air pollution is also a risk factor for AD, and results from a few studies indicate that the effect of air pollution on cognitive function and dementia is stronger in APOE ε4 carriers than in non-carriers. Air pollution and interaction with APOE ε4 on AD risk thus merits further attention. We studied dementia incidence over a 15-year period from the longitudinal Betula study in Northern Sweden. As a marker for long-term exposure to traffic-related air pollution, we used modelled annual mean nitrogen oxide levels at the residential address of the participants at start of follow-up. Nitrogen oxide correlate well with fine particulate air pollution levels in the study area. We had full data on air pollution, incidence of AD and vascular dementia (VaD), APOE ε4 carrier status, and relevant confounding factors for 1,567 participants. As expected, air pollution was rather clearly associated with dementia incidence. However, there was no evidence for a modifying effect by APOE ε4 on the association (p-value for interaction > 0.30 for both total dementia (AD+VaD) and AD). The results from this study do not imply that adverse effects of air pollution on dementia incidence is limited to, or stronger in, APOE ε4 carriers than in the total population.

Nuclear Pore Complexes (NPCs) regulate bidirectional transport between the nucleus and the cytoplasm. Intrinsically disordered FG-Nups line the NPC lumen and form a selective barrier, where transport of most proteins is inhibited whereas specific transporter proteins freely pass. The mechanism underlying selective transport through the NPC is still debated. Here, we reconstitute the selective behaviour of the NPC bottom-up by introducing a rationally designed artificial FG-Nup that mimics natural Nups. Using QCM-D, we measure selective binding of the artificial FG-Nup brushes to the transport receptor Kap95 over cytosolic proteins such as BSA. Solid-state nanopores with the artificial FG-Nups lining their inner walls support fast translocation of Kap95 while blocking BSA, thus demonstrating selectivity. Coarse-grained molecular dynamics simulations highlight the formation of a selective meshwork with densities comparable to native NPCs. Our findings show that simple design rules can recapitulate the selective behaviour of native FG-Nups and demonstrate that no specific spacer sequence nor a spatial segregation of different FG-motif types are needed to create selective NPCs., BN/Cees Dekker Lab, BN/Technici en Analisten

Let u be a solution to the normalized p-harmonic obstacle problem with p > 2. That is, u is an element of W-1,W-p(B-1(0)), 2 < p < infinity, u >= 0 and div(vertical bar del u vertical bar(p-2) del u) = chi({u>0}) in B-1(0) where u(x) >= 0 and chi(A) is the characteristic function of the set A. The main result is that for almost every free boundary point with respect to the (n - 1)-Hausdorff measure, there is a neighborhood where the free boundary is a C-1,C-beta-graph. That is, for Hn-1- a.e. point x(0) is an element of partial derivative{u > 0}boolean AND B-1(0) there is an r > 0 such that B-r(x(0))boolean AND partial derivative{u > 0} is an element of C-1,C-beta., QC 20210622

Objective: To assess the associations of 43 autoimmune diseases with the subsequent risk of ALS and further evaluate the contribution of familial confounding to these associations. Methods: We conducted a nationwide register-based nested case-control study including 3561 ALS patients diagnosed during 1990-2013 in Sweden and 35,610 controls that were randomly selected from the general population and individually matched to the cases on age, sex, and county of birth. To evaluate the contribution of familial factors on the studied association, we additionally studied the first-degree relatives (siblings and children) of ALS patients and their controls. Results: Patients with ALS had a 47% higher risk of being previously diagnosed with autoimmune disease (OR 1.47, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.31-1.64), compared with controls. A positive association was noted for several autoimmune diseases, including myasthenia gravis, polymyositis or dermatomyositis, Guillain-Barre syndrome, type 1 diabetes diagnosed younger than 30 years, multiple sclerosis, and hypothyreosis. The increased risk of any autoimmune disease was greatest during the year before ALS diagnosis, likely due to misdiagnosis. A statistically significantly increased risk was also noted during 2-5 years, but not earlier, before ALS diagnosis. First-degree relatives of ALS patients had however no increased risk of autoimmune diseases compared with first-degree relatives of controls. Conclusions: Although it is difficult to completely remove the potential effects of misdiagnosis, there is likely a positive association between autoimmune disease (such as type 1 diabetes and multiple sclerosis) and ALS, which is not fully explained by shared familial confounding factors., Funding Agencies:Karolinska Institutet (Senior Researcher Award) Karolinska Institutet (Strategic Research Area in Epidemiology) China Scholarship Council