The interface between Alzheimer's disease, normal aging, and related disorders

Since the earliest descriptions of Alzheimer's disease (AD), the presence of senile plaques (SP) and neurofibrillary tangles (NFT) have been regarded as the typical pathological hallmarks of the disease. Studies over the last twenty years, however, have reported a considerable degree of heterogeneity within the AD phenotype and as a consequence, an overlap between the pathological features of AD not only with normal aging, but also with disorders related to AD. This review discusses: 1) the degree of heterogeneity within AD, 2) the concept of an 'interface' between disorders, 3) the nature and degree of the interface between AD and normal aging, vascular dementia (VD), the tauopathies, synucleinopathies, and prion disease, and 4) whether the original status of AD should be retained or whether AD, normal aging, and the related disorders should be regarded as representing a 'continuum' of neuropathological change.

Development of an enantiomer selective microsampling assay for the quantification of ketorolac suitable for paediatric pharmacokinetic studies

Background: Ketorolac, a potent nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug used for pain control in children, exists as a racemate of inactive R (+) and active S (-) enantiomers. Aim: To develop a microsampling assay for the enantioselective analysis of ketorolac in children. Methods: Ketorolac enantiomers were extracted from 50 µl of plasma by liquid–liquid extraction and separated on a ChiralPak AD-RH. Detection was by a TSQ quantum triple quadrupole mass spectrometer with an electrospray ionisation source operating in a positive ion mode. Five children (age 13.8 (1.6) years, weight 52.7 (7.2) kg), were administered intravenous ketorolac 0.5 mg/kg (maximum 10 mg) and blood samples were taken at 0, 0.25, 0.5, 1, 2, 4, 6, 8 and 12 h post administration. CL, VD and t1/2 were calculated based on non-compartmental methods. Results: The standard curves for R (+) and S (-) ketorolac were linear in the range 0–2000 ng/ml. The LLOQs of the method were 0.15 ng on column and 0.31 ng on column for R (+) and S (-) ketorolac, respectively. The median (range) VD and CL of R (+) and S (-) ketorolac were 0.12 l/kg (0.07–0.17), 0.017 l/h/kg (0.12–0.29) and 0.17 (0.09–0.31) l/kg, 0.049 (0.02–0.1) l/h/kg, p = 0.043), respectively. The median (range) elimination half-life (t1/2) of the R (+) and S (-) ketorolac was 5.0 h (2.5–5.8) and 3.1 h (1.8–4.4), p = 0.043), respectively. Conclusion: The development of a simple, rapid and reliable ketorolac assay suitable for paediatric PK studies is reported. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Linked knowledge sources for topic classification of microposts:a semantic graph-based approach

Short text messages a.k.a Microposts (e.g. Tweets) have proven to be an effective channel for revealing information about trends and events, ranging from those related to Disaster (e.g. hurricane Sandy) to those related to Violence (e.g. Egyptian revolution). Being informed about such events as they occur could be extremely important to authorities and emergency professionals by allowing such parties to immediately respond. In this work we study the problem of topic classification (TC) of Microposts, which aims to automatically classify short messages based on the subject(s) discussed in them. The accurate TC of Microposts however is a challenging task since the limited number of tokens in a post often implies a lack of sufficient contextual information. In order to provide contextual information to Microposts, we present and evaluate several graph structures surrounding concepts present in linked knowledge sources (KSs). Traditional TC techniques enrich the content of Microposts with features extracted only from the Microposts content. In contrast our approach relies on the generation of different weighted semantic meta-graphs extracted from linked KSs. We introduce a new semantic graph, called category meta-graph. This novel meta-graph provides a more fine grained categorisation of concepts providing a set of novel semantic features. Our findings show that such category meta-graph features effectively improve the performance of a topic classifier of Microposts. Furthermore our goal is also to understand which semantic feature contributes to the performance of a topic classifier. For this reason we propose an approach for automatic estimation of accuracy loss of a topic classifier on new, unseen Microposts. We introduce and evaluate novel topic similarity measures, which capture the similarity between the KS documents and Microposts at a conceptual level, considering the enriched representation of these documents. Extensive evaluation in the context of Emergency Response (ER) and Violence Detection (VD) revealed that our approach outperforms previous approaches using single KS without linked data and Twitter data only up to 31.4% in terms of F1 measure. Our main findings indicate that the new category graph contains useful information for TC and achieves comparable results to previously used semantic graphs. Furthermore our results also indicate that the accuracy of a topic classifier can be accurately predicted using the enhanced text representation, outperforming previous approaches considering content-based similarity measures. © 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Harnessing linked knowledge sources for topic classification in social media

Topic classification (TC) of short text messages offers an effective and fast way to reveal events happening around the world ranging from those related to Disaster (e.g. Sandy hurricane) to those related to Violence (e.g. Egypt revolution). Previous approaches to TC have mostly focused on exploiting individual knowledge sources (KS) (e.g. DBpedia or Freebase) without considering the graph structures that surround concepts present in KSs when detecting the topics of Tweets. In this paper we introduce a novel approach for harnessing such graph structures from multiple linked KSs, by: (i) building a conceptual representation of the KSs, (ii) leveraging contextual information about concepts by exploiting semantic concept graphs, and (iii) providing a principled way for the combination of KSs. Experiments evaluating our TC classifier in the context of Violence detection (VD) and Emergency Responses (ER) show promising results that significantly outperform various baseline models including an approach using a single KS without linked data and an approach using only Tweets. Copyright 2013 ACM.

A magyarországi közművállalatok tehernövekedését eredményező állami intézkedések hatása. Három magyarországi víziközmű-vállalkozás GDP-megoszlásának tanulságai

A közmű-szolgáltatások fogyasztói árának általános hatósági csökkentése, a gazdasági és pénzügyi válság sújtotta magyar lakosságot "védő" kormányzati intézkedéssorozat részeként, mára szervesen betagozódott az európai közvéleményt egyaránt foglalkoztató kérdések sorába. A tagországok által eleddig szakpolitikai szinten kezelt témakör az általános politika szintjére emelkedett. Az árcsökkentéssel együtt járó, a közműcégeket az eddigieknél nagyobb mértékű tehervállalásra kényszerítő intézkedések következményei azonban egyelőre még nem ismertek. Az elemzés három magyarországi víziközmű-vállalkozás által előállított GDP megoszlását vizsgálja, az elmúlt években állandósult adóterhek következtében kialakult, valamint azok esetleges további növelése esetén bekövetkező szolgáltatói magatartás modellezésére tesz kísérletet. Az eredmények elemzése során pedig arra a következtetésre jut, hogy a vállalatokat eddigiekben terhelő elvonási arányok negatív irányba történő megváltoztatása, a jövőben fenntarthatatlan működésre kényszerítheti ezeket a vállalkozásokat.

Prevalência e fatores associados à alteração vocal em idosos institucionalizados com capacidade cognitiva preservada

Voice disorders (VD) in the elderly can interfere negatively in communication, emotional well-being and quality of life, conditions that correspond to greater exposure to illness and social isolation bringing consequent economic impact for the health system. It is assumed that institutionalized confinement, weakness and morbidity associated to nursing home (NH) contribute to transform VD an especially prevalent condition in institutionalized elderly, including those without cognitive impairment. Thus, the aim of this study was to determine the prevalence and associated factors of VD in NH elderly residents without cognitive impairment. There is no epidemiological diagnostic instruments of VD for elderly populations, so the first step of this study was dedicated to prepare and analyze the psychometric properties of a short, inexpensive and easy to use questionnaire named Screening for Voice Disorders in Older Adults (Rastreamento de Alterações Vocais em Idosos—RAVI). The methodological procedures of this step followed the guidelines of the Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing and contemplated validity evidence based on test content, based on response processes, based on internal structure and based on relations with other variables, as well as reliability analysis and clinical consistency. The result of the validation process showed that the RAVI final score generate valid and reliable interpretations for the epidemiological diagnosis of VD in the elderly, which endorsed the use of the questionnaire in the second stage of the study, performed in ten NH located in the city of Natal, Rio Grande do Norte. At this stage, data from socioeconomic and demographic variables, lifestyle, general health conditions and characterization of the institution were collected. It was performed a bivariate analysis and it was calculated the prevalence ratio as a magnitude association measure, with a confidence interval of 95%. The variables with p-value less than 0.20 were included in the multiple logistic regression model that followed the Forward selection method. The odds ratio found in the multivariate model was converted into prevalence ratio and the level of significance was 5%. The sample consisted of 117 subjects with predominance of females and average of 79.68 (± 7.92) years old. The prevalence of VD was 39.3% (95% CI: 30.4-48.1%). The multivariate model showed statistically significant association between VD and depressive symptoms, smoking for a year or more and selfreported hearing loss. In conclusion, VD is a prevalent health condition in NH elderly residents without cognitive impairment and is associated with factors involving psychosocial, lifestyle and communicative disability that require attention of managers and professionals involved with NH environment. Strategies to encourage communication and social integration, actions to combat smoking and minimizing the effects of hearing loss could stimulate the physical well-being, emotional and mental health of institutionalized elderly population, contributing to the vocal and communicative maintenance, a more effective social inclusion and better overall health condition.

Prevalência, fatores associados e efeitos da violência doméstica na mobilidade em idosos: evidências do estudo imias (international mobility in aging study) sob a perspectiva epidemiológica do curso da vida

A capacidade de mover-se com independência e segurança é fundamental para a execução das atividades de vida diária e manutenção da qualidade de vida do indivíduo. Diversos fatores, dentre eles o envelhecimento podem contribuir para seu declínio. Estudos têm demonstrado associação entre experiências de violência doméstica (VD) e diversos problemas de saúde física e mental. Até o momento, não há estudos que tenham avaliado a associação entre experiências de VD no curso de vida e limitações de mobilidade na senescência. OBJETIVOS: estimar a prevalência da VD (física e psicológica) em idosos, e avaliar o impacto da VD no curso de vida na limitação de mobilidade. MATERIAIS E MÉTODO: Estudo observacional analítico a partir da primeira coleta de dados do estudo longitudinal International Mobility in Aging Study (IMIAS). Idosos (n = 1995) de ambos os sexos entre 65 e 74 anos de cinco localidades distintas (Kingston e Saint-Hyacinthe, Canadá; Tirana, Albânia; Maniazales, Colômbia; e Natal, Brasil) participaram do estudo. Dados sobre variáveis sociodemográficas, econômicas, condições de saúde e experiências de VD (física e psicológica) durante o curso de vida foram coletados. A limitação de mobilidade na senescência foi avaliada pelo Short Physical Performance Battery (SPPB) e pela dificuldade de andar 400 metros e/ou subir um lance de escadas. As prevalências foram avaliadas mediante frequências absolutas e relativas das exposições à VD, limitação de mobilidade e co-variáveis. Diferenças de gênero, bem como entre cidades foram analisadas utilizando o teste de qui-quadrado. Associação entre exposição à VD e limitação de mobilidade foi avaliada utilizando a regressão logística binária multivariada, ajustando pelas co-variáveis. Análise de mediação foram utilizadas, para avaliar possíveis caminhos entre a exposição à VD no curso de vida e a limitação de mobilidade. RESULTADOS: A violência física foi rara, com valores entre 0,63 e 0,85%. Relatos de violência psicológica variaram entre 3,2% e 23,5% (homens) e de 9% para 26% (mulheres). Mulheres experimentaram mais violência do que os homens em Saint-Hyacinthe (homens: 3,2% vs mulheres: 14%, p <0,001), Tirana (homens: 4,3% vs mulheres: 10,3%, p = 0,017), em Manizales (homens: 8,3 % vs mulheres: 18,3%, p = 0,004) e Natal (homens: 11,1% vs mulheres: 26%, p = 0,002). Em geral, o baixo suporte social pelo parceiro foi associado com a VD. Estar trabalhando foi associado a vitimização entre os homens, enquanto o oposto foi verdade para as mulheres. Arranjos de vida Multi-familiares e baixo suporte pelos parceiros, filhos e família foram associados com a VD. Baixo suporte social foi da maior importância para as mulheres do que os homens. A VD física foi associada tanto com o SPPB < 8 (OR 1,623 95%IC 1,161-2,269) como com a dificuldade para andar 400 metros e/ou subir um lance de escadas (OR 1,394 95%IC 1,063-1,829). A limitação de mobilidade decorrente da violência física no curso de vida pelo parceiro íntimo foi mediada pelas condições crônicas (efeito 25,56% 95%IC 0,036-0,277) e depressão (efeito 33,05% 95%IC 0,087-0,333). No caso da violência física por outros familiares, a limitação de mobilidade foi mediada pelas condições crônicas (efeito 20,85% 95%IC 0,022-0,202), não adesão à prática de atividades físicas (efeito 34,14% 95%IC 0,076-0,351) e depressão (efeito 44,40% 95%IC 0,144-0,315). CONCLUSÕES: A violência doméstica no curso de vida é uma realidade, que pode acarretar consequências que favorecem a limitação de mobilidade em idosos. São necessárias políticas públicas que combatam efetivamente a violência doméstica, garantindo um envelhecimento mais digno e independente funcionalmente.

Engineering Highly-functional, Self-regenerative Skeletal Muscle Tissues with Enhanced Vascularization and Survival in Vivo

Tissue engineering of biomimetic skeletal muscle may lead to development of new therapies for myogenic repair and generation of improved in vitro models for studies of muscle function, regeneration, and disease. For the optimal therapeutic and in vitro results, engineered muscle should recreate the force-generating and regenerative capacities of native muscle, enabled respectively by its two main cellular constituents, the mature myofibers and satellite cells (SCs). Still, after 20 years of research, engineered muscle tissues fall short of mimicking contractile function and self-repair capacity of native skeletal muscle. To overcome this limitation, we set the thesis goals to: 1) generate a highly functional, self-regenerative engineered skeletal muscle and 2) explore mechanisms governing its formation and regeneration in vitro and survival and vascularization in vivo.

By studying myogenic progenitors isolated from neonatal rats, we first discovered advantages of using an adherent cell fraction for engineering of skeletal muscles with robust structure and function and the formation of a SC pool. Specifically, when synergized with dynamic culture conditions, the use of adherent cells yielded muscle constructs capable of replicating the contractile output of native neonatal muscle, generating >40 mN/mm2 of specific force. Moreover, tissue structure and cellular heterogeneity of engineered muscle constructs closely resembled those of native muscle, consisting of aligned, striated myofibers embedded in a matrix of basal lamina proteins and SCs that resided in native-like niches. Importantly, we identified rapid formation of myofibers early during engineered muscle culture as a critical condition leading to SC homing and conversion to a quiescent, non-proliferative state. The SCs retained natural regenerative capacity and activated, proliferated, and differentiated to rebuild damaged myofibers and recover contractile function within 10 days after the muscle was injured by cardiotoxin (CTX). The resulting regenerative response was directly dependent on the abundance of SCs in the engineered muscle that we varied by expanding starting cell population under different levels of basic fibroblast growth factor (bFGF), an inhibitor of myogenic differentiation. Using a dorsal skinfold window chamber model in nude mice, we further demonstrated that within 2 weeks after implantation, initially avascular engineered muscle underwent robust vascularization and perfusion and exhibited improved structure and contractile function beyond what was achievable in vitro.

To enhance translational value of our approach, we transitioned to use of adult rat myogenic cells, but found that despite similar function to that of neonatal constructs, adult-derived muscle lacked regenerative capacity. Using a novel platform for live monitoring of calcium transients during construct culture, we rapidly screened for potential enhancers of regeneration to establish that many known pro-regenerative soluble factors were ineffective in stimulating in vitro engineered muscle recovery from CTX injury. This led us to introduce bone marrow-derived macrophages (BMDMs), an established non-myogenic contributor to muscle repair, to the adult-derived constructs and to demonstrate remarkable recovery of force generation (>80%) and muscle mass (>70%) following CTX injury. Mechanistically, while similar patterns of early SC activation and proliferation upon injury were observed in engineered muscles with and without BMDMs, a significant decrease in injury-induced apoptosis occurred only in the presence of BMDMs. The importance of preventing apoptosis was further demonstrated by showing that application of caspase inhibitor (Q-VD-OPh) yielded myofiber regrowth and functional recovery post-injury. Gene expression analysis suggested muscle-secreted tumor necrosis factor-α (TNFα) as a potential inducer of apoptosis as common for muscle degeneration in diseases and aging in vivo. Finally, we showed that BMDM incorporation in engineered muscle enhanced its growth, angiogenesis, and function following implantation in the dorsal window chambers in nude mice.

In summary, this thesis describes novel strategies to engineer highly contractile and regenerative skeletal muscle tissues starting from neonatal or adult rat myogenic cells. We find that age-dependent differences of myogenic cells distinctly affect the self-repair capacity but not contractile function of engineered muscle. Adult, but not neonatal, myogenic progenitors appear to require co-culture with other cells, such as bone marrow-derived macrophages, to allow robust muscle regeneration in vitro and rapid vascularization in vivo. Regarding the established roles of immune system cells in the repair of various muscle and non-muscle tissues, we expect that our work will stimulate the future applications of immune cells as pro-regenerative or anti-inflammatory constituents of engineered tissue grafts. Furthermore, we expect that rodent studies in this thesis will inspire successful engineering of biomimetic human muscle tissues for use in regenerative therapy and drug discovery applications.

"På andra sidan betongväggen" : En fallstudie om engagemang och motivation i arbetslivet

Intresset för engagemang och dess påverkan i organisationer ligger till grund för studien. Syftet är att genom en ökad förståelse av anställdas upplevda grad av engagemang och motivation, urskilja de faktorer som ligger till grund för ett lägre engagemang, för att sedan ha möjlighet att definiera faktorer som kan höja det. En kvalitativ undersökning har genomförts på ett företag inom tillverkningsindustrin. Sammanlagt har tolv respondenter intervjuats - VD, en chef och två ledare samt åtta stycken av de produktionssanställda. De tre olika nivåerna av respondenter har analyserats separat med relevant teori för att sedan jämföras samt ge möjligheten att studera likheter och skillnader dem emellan. Resultatet och analysen visar att engagemanget på företaget upplevs vara lågt samt att definitionen av engagemang och motivation kan ha olika betydelse för olika individer. Det bristande engagemanget grundar sig i olika faktorer - framför allt i upplevelsen av att det finns en "vi och dom"-känsla på företaget - samt anseendet av bristande kommunikation. I diskussionen resoneras kring lösningar och problem som individerna på varje nivå bör ta hänsyn till för att öka engagemanget. Studien resulterar i tre olika handlingsplaner som tilldelas varje nivå, där konkreta förslag och lösningar presenteras och ligger till grund för ett ökat engagemang. De främsta slutsatserna av studien är således att engagemanget måste öka inom företaget samt att den negativa inställningen måste försvinna hos de anställda, då det har en destruktiv påverkan på de anställdas vardagliga arbete. Studien visar även att ett aktivt arbete och ett hänsynstagande till engagemang på arbetsplatsen kan leda till mer lojal, produktiv, effektiv och välmående personal.

Efecto de la suplementación con vitamina D en monodosis en niños con parálisis cerebral. Estudio preliminar controlado y aleatorizado

Los niños con parálisis cerebral (PC) tienen mayor riesgo de deficiencia de vitamina D (VD). Aunque existen bastantes estudios sobre VD en PC, hay limitada información sobre suplementación con VD en estos pacientes. El objetivo de este artículo es evaluar el efecto de la suplementación con VD en monodosis en las concentraciones plasmáticas de 25-hidroxi-vitamina-D (25OHD) en niños con PC.

Vestibular and oculomotor influences on visual dependency

The degree to which a person relies on visual stimuli for spatial orientation is termed visual dependency (VD). VD is considered a perceptual trait or cognitive style influenced by psychological factors and mediated by central re-weighting of the sensory inputs involved in spatial orientation. VD is often measured using the rod-and-disk test, wherein participants align a central rod to the subjective visual vertical (SVV) in the presence of a background that is either stationary or rotating around the line of sight - dynamic SVV. Although this task has been employed to assess VD in health and vestibular disease, it is unknown what effect torsional nystagmic eye movements may have on individual performance. Using caloric ear irrigation, 3D video-oculography and the rod-and-disk test, we show that caloric torsional nystagmus modulates measures of visual dependency and demonstrate that increases in tilt after irrigation are positively correlated with changes in ocular torsional eye movements. When the direction of the slow phase of the torsional eye movement induced by the caloric is congruent with that induced by the rotating visual stimulus, there is a significant increase in tilt. When these two torsional components are in opposition there is a decrease. These findings show that measures of visual dependence can be influenced by oculomotor responses induced by caloric stimulation. The findings are of significance for clinical studies as they indicate that VD, which often increases in vestibular disorders, is not only modulated by changes in cognitive style but also by eye movements, in particular nystagmus.

Estacionalidad de la vitamina D plasmática: su importancia en la clínica y en la salud

Un nivel adecuado de vitamina D (VD) es importante no solo para el hueso y el metabolismo fosfocálcico, sino también para la inmunomodulación, la regulación genética, la producción hormonal y la salud a lo largo del ciclo vital. Numerosos estudios observacionales han demostrado una variación estacional en los niveles plasmáticos de la VD, habitualmente con un máximo en torno al verano y un mínimo en torno al invierno. La latitud geográfica juega un papel considerable en la influencia de los rayos ultravioleta del espectro solar. Estudios hechos en Uruguay en la década del 2000 confirmaron la estacionalidad de la VD plasmática y se enfocaron en los vínculos con el metabolismo fosfocálcico y la osteoporosis, generando un marco terapéutico e inclusive preventivo para esta patología. Además de los efectos sobre la calcemia y fosfatemia, el déficit de esta vitamina está involucrado en el origen o desarrollo de patologías crónicas de actual relevancia, tales como algunos tipos de cáncer, enfermedades autoinmunes, cardiovasculares y degenerativas, así como también en la mortalidad global. Desde una perspectiva clínica y de salud pública, es importante comprender la influencia de la estacionalidad en el nivel plasmático de VD a fin de evaluar e interpretar adecuadamente las mediciones individuales y la suplementación destinada a combatir la deficiencia de la vitamina, todo lo cual hace necesaria una actualización del conocimiento.

THE RELATIVE SIGNIFICANCE OF SYNTACTIC KNOWLEDGE AND VOCABULARY KNOWLEDGE IN SECOND LANGUAGE LISTENING COMPREHENSION

The main purpose of the current study was to examine the role of vocabulary knowledge (VK) and syntactic knowledge (SK) in L2 listening comprehension, as well as their relative significance. Unlike previous studies, the current project employed assessment tasks to measure aural and proceduralized VK and SK. In terms of VK, to avoid under-representing the construct, measures of both breadth (VB) and depth (VD) were included. Additionally, the current study examined the role of VK and SK by accounting for individual differences in two important cognitive factors in L2 listening: metacognitive knowledge (MK) and working memory (WM). Also, to explore the role of VK and SK more fully, the current study accounted for the negative impact of anxiety on WM and L2 listening. The study was carried out in an English as a Foreign Language (EFL) context, and participants were 263 Iranian learners at a wide range of English proficiency from lower-intermediate to advanced. Participants took a battery of ten linguistic, cognitive and affective measures. Then, the collected data were subjected to several preliminary analyses, but structural equation modeling (SEM) was then used as the primary analysis method to answer the study research questions. Results of the preliminary analyses revealed that MK and WM were significant predictors of L2 listening ability; thus, they were kept in the main SEM analyses. The significant role of WM was only observed when the negative effect of anxiety on WM was accounted for. Preliminary analyses also showed that VB and VD were not distinct measures of VK. However, the results also showed that if VB and VD were considered separate, VD was a better predictor of L2 listening success. The main analyses of the current study revealed a significant role for both VK and SK in explaining success in L2 listening comprehension, which differs from findings from previous empirical studies. However, SEM analysis did not reveal a statistically significant difference in terms of the predictive power of the two linguistic factors. Descriptive results of the SEM analysis, along with results from regression analysis, indicated to a more significant role for VK.

Ledningens ansvar för icke-finansiell information och dess rapportering i aktiebolag.

Syftet med avhandlingen är att redogöra för ledningens ansvar för icke-finansiell information och dess rapportering i aktiebolag. Avhandlingen utgår från finsk bolagsrätt och särskiljer mellan små, medelstora och stora samt mellan onoterade och noterade aktiebolag. Ledningen definieras som aktiebolagets styrelse och VD. Avhandlingen inleds med att redogöra för vad icke-finansiell information är, vad det innebär för aktiebolag och vad som reglerar rapporteringen av informationen. Avhandlingen diskuterar bolagets intressen för att utreda vinstsyftet ur ett aktieägarperspektiv och som en del av ett större företagsansvar. Detta för att klargöra hur långt ledningen kan gå i sitt arbete med icke-finansiell information och hållbarhet. Avhandlingen avslutas med en redogörelse för ledningens skadeståndsrättsliga och straffrättsliga ansvar. Rapportering av icke-finansiell information har tre tydliga problemområden. För det första skapar den oklara definitionen förvirring. Informationen är företagsspecifik vilket försvårar en granskning av kvaliteten. För det andra så finns det olika tolkningar av vad som är bolagets intressen och hur verksamhetens syfte ska tolkas. Ett kortsiktigt vinstsyfte prioriterar ett aktieägarperspektiv medan en långsiktig värdeökning tenderar att se till flera sidogrupper som mottagare av icke-finansiell information. För det tredje så är gränsen mellan frivillig och obligatorisk rapportering diffus. Dessa tre problemområden innebär att ledningens ansvar är tolkningsbart beroende på den aktuella situationen och det specifika aktiebolaget. Regleringen måste göras tydligare och de olika begreppen inom icke-finansiell information definieras. Ledningen har en rättighet att arbeta för hållbarhet och rapportera icke-finansiell information, dock så har de ingen uttrycklig skyldighet att göra det. Sanktionsmöjligheterna vid bristfällig eller felaktig informationsutgivning är i praktiken svaga.

Parameterization of quasigeostrophic eddies in primitive equation ocean models

A parameterization of mesoscale eddy fluxes in the ocean should be consistent with the fact that the ocean interior is nearly adiabatic. Gent and McWilliams have described a framework in which this can be approximated in L-coordinate primitive equation models by incorporating the effects of eddies on the buoyancy field through an eddy-induced velocity. It is also natural to base a parameterization on the simple picture of the mixing of potential vorticity in the interior and the mixing of buoyancy at the surface. The authors discuss the various constraints imposed by these two requirements and attempt to clarify the appropriate boundary conditions on the eddy-induced velocities at the surface. Quasigeostrophic theory is used as a guide to the simplest way of satisfying these constraints.