5,589 results match your criteria: "VU-University Amsterdam[Affiliation]"

Background: Xerostomia, often associated with decreased saliva quality, poses challenges due to limited treatment efficacy. This study aimed to investigate alternative approaches to enhance saliva secretion through olfactory volatile stimulation with mastic resin and its main compound α-pinene, known for inhibiting acetylcholinesterase in vitro.

Methods: The inhibitory effects of freshly prepared mastic resin extract oil and α-pinene oil on acetylcholinesterase (AChE) activity were measured in vitro.

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Background: Medical specialist workforces are not representative of the society they serve, partially due to loss of diversity in the path from student to specialist. We investigated which demographic characteristics of bachelor students of medicine (BSM) are associated with becoming a physician and (particular type of) medical specialist; and whether this suggests 'cloning' (reproduction of sameness) of the existing workforce.

Methods: We used a retrospective cohort design, based on Statistics Netherlands data of all first-year BSM in 2002-2004 in The Netherlands (N = 4503).

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Biomarkers can guide precision medicine in clinical trials and practice. They can increase clinical trials' efficiency through selection of study populations more likely to benefit from treatment, thus increasing statistical power and reducing sample size requirements or study duration. We performed a narrative synthesis to explore biomarker utilization for patient selection to guide precision medicine trials in marketing authorization dossiers of centrally approved medicines in Europe between 2018 and 2020 and analyzed in-depth those that eventually included biomarkers in the medicines' indications.

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Objectives: This study aims to assess the heterogeneity of psychosocial working conditions of young workers by identifying subgroups of work characteristic configurations within young workers and to assess these subgroups' associations with emotional exhaustion.

Design: Latent class analysis. Groups were formed based on 12 work characteristics (8 job demands and 4 job resources), educational level and sex.

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Article Synopsis
  • The study aimed to explore how beliefs about memory related to dissociation impact trauma-focused treatment in patients with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), particularly those with the dissociative subtype.
  • Researchers assessed PTSD symptoms and dissociative beliefs in a sample of 111 patients, finding that those with the dissociative subtype had higher levels of these beliefs before treatment, which decreased after trauma-focused therapy.
  • Contrary to initial expectations, the study concluded that higher levels of dissociation-related beliefs did not adversely affect treatment outcomes for PTSD patients.
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An amplitude analysis of B^{0}→J/ψϕK_{S}^{0} decays is performed using proton-proton collision data, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 9  fb^{-1}, collected with the LHCb detector at center-of-mass energies of 7, 8, and 13 TeV. Evidence with a significance of 4.0 standard deviations of a structure in the J/ψK_{S}^{0} system, named T_{ψs1}^{θ}(4000)^{0}, is seen, with its mass and width measured to be 3991_{-10}^{+12} _{-17}^{+9}  MeV/c^{2} and 105_{-25}^{+29} _{-23}^{+17}  MeV, respectively, where the first uncertainty is statistical and the second systematic.

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Two new excited states, Ω_{c}(3185)^{0} and Ω_{c}(3327)^{0}, are observed in the Ξ_{c}^{+}K^{-} invariant-mass spectrum using proton-proton collision data collected by the LHCb experiment, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 9  fb^{-1}. Five previously observed excited Ω_{c}^{0} states are confirmed, namely Ω_{c}(3000)^{0}, Ω_{c}(3050)^{0}, Ω_{c}(3065)^{0}, Ω_{c}(3090)^{0}, and Ω_{c}(3119)^{0}. The masses and widths of these seven states are measured with the highest precision to date.

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Active music making and leisure activities for people with intellectual disabilities: A cluster randomized pilot study.

Res Dev Disabil

November 2023

Research Institute of Child Development and Education, University of Amsterdam, Postbus 15776, 1001 NG Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

Aim: A pilot cluster randomized controlled trial was performed to evaluate the effects of a music group intervention and a leisure activities group intervention on well-being, self-esteem, social acceptance, challenging behaviour and three components of executive functions (inhibitory control, cognitive flexibility and visual working memory) of adults with intellectual disabilities (ID).

Method: Twenty-nine participants living in four residential facilities for people with ID were randomized into a music or a leisure activities group intervention. Sixteen weekly sessions of one hour were performed with six to eight participants per group.

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Background: Worldwide, non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) were implemented during the COVID-19 crisis, which heavily impacted the daily lives of citizens. This study considers public perspectives on whether and how public engagement (PE) can contribute to future decision-making about NPIs.

Methods: An online survey was conducted among a representative sample of the public in the Netherlands from 27 October to 9 November 2021.

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Background: The extent to which intensive trauma-focused treatment for individuals with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is also effective in treating comorbid major depressive disorder (MDD) remains unclear.

Objective: The purpose of the present study was to test the hypothesis that brief intensive trauma-focused therapy for PTSD is associated with significant reductions in depressive symptoms and loss of diagnostic status of MDD.

Methods: A total of 334 adult patients with PTSD (189 patients who were also diagnosed with MDD) underwent a brief intensive trauma-focused treatment programme consisting of EMDR therapy, prolonged exposure, physical activity, and psychoeducation.

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Thalamic regulation of ocular dominance plasticity in adult visual cortex.

Elife

October 2023

Molecular Visual Plasticity Group, Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience, Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, Amsterdam, Netherlands.

Experience-dependent plasticity in the adult visual system is generally thought of as a cortical process. However, several recent studies have shown that perceptual learning or monocular deprivation can also induce plasticity in the adult dorsolateral geniculate nucleus (dLGN) of the thalamus. How plasticity in the thalamus and cortex interact in the adult visual system is ill-understood.

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Background: Evidence-based practice (EBP) is being rapidly adopted by the Italian physiotherapy community, although a knowledge gap persists at clinical level with consequent lack of integration of EBP into ground roots practice. Teaching of EBP during the Bachelor of Science (BSc) undergraduate course in physiotherapy likely has a vital role to play in the spread of knowledge, providing a grounding in the fundamental concepts of EBP. The aim of the present study was to investigate the prevalence of EBP educational content in Italian BSc courses in physiotherapy.

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The ratios of branching fractions R(D^{*})≡B(B[over ¯]→D^{*}τ^{-}ν[over ¯]_{τ})/B(B[over ¯]→D^{*}μ^{-}ν[over ¯]_{μ}) and R(D^{0})≡B(B^{-}→D^{0}τ^{-}ν[over ¯]_{τ})/B(B^{-}→D^{0}μ^{-}ν[over ¯]_{μ}) are measured, assuming isospin symmetry, using a sample of proton-proton collision data corresponding to 3.0  fb^{-1} of integrated luminosity recorded by the LHCb experiment during 2011 and 2012. The tau lepton is identified in the decay mode τ^{-}→μ^{-}ν_{τ}ν[over ¯]_{μ}.

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Structural comparison of allophycocyanin variants reveals the molecular basis for their spectral differences.

Photosynth Res

December 2024

Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, 16802, USA.

Allophycocyanins are phycobiliproteins that absorb red light and transfer the energy to the reaction centers of oxygenic photosynthesis in cyanobacteria and red algae. Recently, it was shown that some allophycocyanins absorb far-red light and that one subset of these allophycocyanins, comprising subunits from the ApcD4 and ApcB3 subfamilies (FRL-AP), form helical nanotubes. The lowest energy absorbance maximum of the oligomeric ApcD4-ApcB3 complexes occurs at 709 nm, which is unlike allophycocyanin (AP; ApcA-ApcB) and allophycocyanin B (AP-B; ApcD-ApcB) trimers that absorb maximally at ~ 650 nm and ~ 670 nm, respectively.

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Article Synopsis
  • The study aimed to evaluate the tolerance of a new root canal irrigation fluid (RISA) by analyzing patient well-being, postoperative pain, and treatment success after root canal treatment (RCT) on patients with asymptomatic apical periodontitis.
  • Out of 16 subjects, most reported feeling 'good' shortly after treatment, though 82.4% experienced some level of postoperative pain and swelling.
  • The effectiveness of the RCT with RISA was promising, with a high resolution rate of apical periodontitis, but further research is suggested to optimize RISA application to minimize swelling.
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Background: Therapeutic drug monitoring (TDM) has the potential to improve efficacy and diminish side effects. Measuring methotrexate-polyglutamate (MTX-PG) in erythrocytes might enable TDM for methotrexate in patients with Crohn's disease (CD).

Aim: To investigate the relationship between MTX-PGs and methotrexate drug survival, efficacy and toxicity METHODS: In a multicentre prospective cohort study, patients with CD starting subcutaneous methotrexate without biologics were included and followed for 12 months.

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You don't know: knowledge as supportive alibi evidence.

Psychiatr Psychol Law

September 2022

Faculty of Law, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands.

Until now, supportive evidence for alibis has been conceptualised into two distinct types: witness and physical evidence. The present study examined whether knowledge, as a third type of supportive evidence, can contribute to the understanding of evidence for alibis. Three experiments were conducted in which police detectives, laypersons and undergraduate students were asked to evaluate four alibis with witness, physical or knowledge supportive evidence, or with no supportive evidence.

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Article Synopsis
  • The LHCb experiment measures prompt D^{0} meson production in proton-lead collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 8.16 TeV, focusing on both forward and backward rapidity regions.
  • Results reveal significant suppression of D^{0} meson production in the forward rapidity region compared to proton-proton collisions, offering valuable insights into nuclear parton distribution models.
  • In the backward rapidity region, a noteworthy suppression is also observed, particularly in high transverse momentum ranges, challenging existing parton distribution function predictions in a nuclear context.
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Early career researchers (ECRs) play a crucial role in European and nationally funded research projects. They are at the forefront of planning, conducting, analysing, and reporting research. As part of the SOPs4RI project funded by the European Commission, we, as ECRs and members of this project's consortium, were given the opportunity to reflect on our role, obstacles, and possible opportunities that we experienced.

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The time-integrated CP asymmetry in the Cabibbo-suppressed decay D^{0}→K^{-}K^{+} is measured using proton-proton collision data, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 5.7  fb^{-1} collected at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV with the LHCb detector. The D^{0} mesons are required to originate from promptly produced D^{*+}→D^{0}π^{+} decays, and the charge of the companion pion is used to determine the flavor of the charm meson at production.

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Searches for the rare hadronic decays B^{0}→pp[over ¯]pp[over ¯] and B_{s}^{0}→pp[over ¯]pp[over ¯] are performed using proton-proton collision data recorded by the LHCb experiment and corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 9  fb^{-1}. Significances of 9.3σ and 4.

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Introduction: Dissociative identity disorder (DID) is characterized by, among others, amnesic episodes and the recurrence of different dissociative identity states. While consistently observed in clinical settings, to our knowledge, no controlled research study has shown the degree to which different identity states report autobiographical knowledge over time. Hence, the current study investigates self-relevance and emotional intensity ratings of words longitudinally.

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Plant-based animal product alternatives are increasingly promoted to achieve more sustainable diets. Here, we use a global economic land use model to assess the food system-wide impacts of a global dietary shift towards these alternatives. We find a substantial reduction in the global environmental impacts by 2050 if globally 50% of the main animal products (pork, chicken, beef and milk) are substituted-net reduction of forest and natural land is almost fully halted and agriculture and land use GHG emissions decline by 31% in 2050 compared to 2020.

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