Prokaryotic and eukaryotic microorganisms make a vital contribution to biogeochemical cycles by decomposing virtually all natural compounds and thereby exert a lasting effect on biosphere and climate. The rapidly growing number of metagenomic sequences together with revolutionary advances in bioinformatics and protein analyses have opened completely new horizons to investigate the molecular bas...

Because of its oxidative modification during the acute-phase response to an aggression, low density lipoprotein (LDL) can be regarded as a source of lipid mediators that can act both to promote and inhibit inflammation. This can be exemplified by the production of anti-inflammatory oxidized fatty acids and proinflammatory lysophosphatidylcholine (LPC) during LDL oxidation. We have shown previou...

Recent studies have demonstrated that many galaxy clusters have luminosity functions (LFs) which are steep at the faint end. However, it is equally clear that not all clusters have identical LFs. In this paper we explore whether the variation in LF shape correlates with other cluster or environmental properties.

The relationship between environmental variability and niche overlap is studied for a class of model biological communities in which several species compete on a one-dimensional continuum of resources, e.g., food size. In a strictly unvarying (deterministic) environment, there is in general no limit to the degree of overlap, short of complete congruence. However, in a fluctuating (stochastic) e...

With an average concentration of 35 nM, vanadium (essentially present in the form of ion pairs NaH2VO4 -) is the second-to-most abundant transition metal in sea water, outclassed only by molybdenum (present as molybdate MoO4 2−, ca. 100 nM). Vanadate-dependent haloperoxidases (VHPOs) can be present in marine brown, green and red algae, in (symbiotic) marine cyanobacteria, in Streptomyces bacter...

Data on respiratory symptoms and pulmonary function were obtained for 2736 Portland cement plant workers and 755 controls. Personal dust samples contained a geometric mean concentration of 0.57 mg/m3 for respirable dust and 2.90 mg/m3 for total dust. Cement workers and controls had similar prevalences of symptoms, except that 5.4% of the cement workers had dyspnoea compared with 2.7% of the con...

Limited awareness of environmental remote sensing’s potential ability to support environmental policy development constrains the technology’s utilization. This paper reviews the potential of earth observation from the perspective of environmental policy. A literature review of “remote sensing and policy” revealed that while the number of publications in this field increased almost twice as rapi...

OBJECTIVE To review the epidemiological literature relevant to evaluating the risk of adverse effects on thyroid function associated with environmental perchlorate exposure. METHODS All studies investigating possible adverse effects of environmental perchlorate exposure on thyroid function in adults or in pregnant women and their newborns were critically evaluated. RESULTS There is no credi...

The formation of a fibrin clot is one of the key events in atherothrombotic vascular disease. The structure of the fibrin clot and the genetic and environmental factors that modify it have effects on its biological function. Alterations in fibrin structure and function have implications for the clinical presentation of vascular disease. This review briefly describes the key features involved in...