Oligarchs after the Maidan: the old system in a 'new' Ukraine. OSW Commentary No. 162, 2015-02-16

From the Introduction. There have been major changes in the balance of forces among the key Ukrainian oligarchs, representatives of big business with strong political influence, since the victory of the Maidan revolution. However, these changes have not undermined the oligarchic system per se. Over the past decade or so, the oligarchs have been key players in Ukrainian politics and economy, and they have retained this position until the present. One of the effects of the change of the government in Kyiv and the war in the Donbas was the elimination of the influence of ‘the family’ – the people from Viktor Yanukovych’s inner circle who formed the most expansive oligarchic group in Ukraine at the time of his presidency. The influence of Rinat Akhmetov, the country’s wealthiest man, has also weakened significantly; Akhmetov was one of the most influential people in Ukraine for more than ten years, partly owing to his close bonds with Yanukovych. Dmytro Firtash’s group has also lost a great deal of its influence since Firtash was arrested in Austria in March 2014.

Managing atypical and typical herpetic central nervous system infections: results of a multinational study

There have been many studies pertaining to the management of herpetic meningoencephalitis (HME), but the majority of them have focussed on virologically unconfirmed cases or included only small sample sizes. We have conducted a multicentre study aimed at providing management strategies for HME. Overall, 501 adult patients with PCR-proven HME were included retrospectively from 35 referral centres in 10 countries; 496 patients were found to be eligible for the analysis. Cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) analysis using a PCR assay yielded herpes simplex virus (HSV)-1 DNA in 351 patients (70.8%), HSV-2 DNA in 83 patients (16.7%) and undefined HSV DNA type in 62 patients (12.5%). A total of 379 patients (76.4%) had at least one of the specified characteristics of encephalitis, and we placed these patients into the encephalitis presentation group. The remaining 117 patients (23.6%) had none of these findings, and these patients were placed in the nonencephalitis presentation group. Abnormalities suggestive of encephalitis were detected in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in 83.9% of the patients and in electroencephalography (EEG) in 91.0% of patients in the encephalitis presentation group. In the nonencephalitis presentation group, MRI and EEG data were suggestive of encephalitis in 33.3 and 61.9% of patients, respectively. However, the concomitant use of MRI and EEG indicated encephalitis in 96.3 and 87.5% of the cases with and without encephalitic clinical presentation, respectively. Considering the subtle nature of HME, CSF HSV PCR, EEG and MRI data should be collected for all patients with a central nervous system infection.

Maize Stress DIESI-MS Data and R Script

Climatic change is an increasing challenge for agriculture that is driving the development of suitable crops in order to ensure supply for both human nutrition and animal feed. In this context, it is increasingly important to understand the biochemical responses of cells to environmental cues at the whole system level, an aim that is being brought closer by advances in high throughput, cost-efficient plant metabolomics. To support molecular breeding activities, we have assessed the economic, technical and statistical feasibility of using direct mass spectrometry methods to evaluate the physiological state of maize (Zea mays L.) plants grown under different stress conditions.