Publications by authors named "S E Schweizer"

Methoxylated polybrominated diphenyl ethers (MeO-BDEs) are a class of environmentally relevant halogenated natural products. The two most relevant isomers, 2'-MeO-BDE 68 and 6-MeO-BDE 47, were repeatedly detected at levels comparable with persistent organic pollutants in marine environmental and food samples. MeO-BDEs were suspected to be biosynthesized by bromoperoxidases through the merging of two bromophenol units, three of which (2,4-dibromophenol, 2,6-dibromophenol and 2,4,6-tribromophenol) are abundant in marine environments, followed by O-methylation to give MeO-BDEs.

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As a social species, humans live in complexly bounded social groups. In order to navigate these networks, humans rely on a set of social-cognitive processes, including social working memory. Here, we designed a novel network memory task to study working memory for social versus non-social network information across 241 participants (18-65 years) in a tightly controlled, preregistered study.

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Introduction: The association between cognitive functioning and mental health symptoms across the lifespan remains poorly understood. Understanding the directionality of the association between mental health and cognition is important as most gold-standard psychological therapies, such as cognitive-behaviour therapy, are cognitively demanding. Here, we examined the directionality of the association between cognitive and affective control with symptoms of depression and anxiety across the lifespan.

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Persistent organic pollutants (POPs) are ubiquitously present in food and environmental samples. Accompanied by similar compounds like halogenated natural products (HNPs), their regular monitoring in fish and their predators is an important task. While different procedures have been developed, the removal of the lipid matrix, mainly carried out by treatment with sulfuric acid or by gel permeation chromatography (GPC), is an indispensable step during sample preparation.

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Article Synopsis
  • Bromochloro alkanes (BCAs) are newly identified flame retardants similar to other Persistent Organic Pollutants and have been found in environmental samples for the first time, yet no standard methods for their quantification exist.
  • This study involves the synthesis of 16 custom standards to explore quantification strategies for BCAs in indoor dust, achieving an average measurement accuracy of 81% and meeting EU accuracy criteria in 89% of cases during fortification trials.
  • Despite these advancements, applying the quantification method to actual dust samples showed a low correlation with the prototype standards, highlighting the need for more diverse mixture standards for reliable BCA quantification in environmental samples.
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