Diploid males support a two-step mechanism of endosymbiont-induced thelytoky in a parasitoid wasp.

BACKGROUND: Haplodiploidy, where females develop from diploid, fertilized eggs and males from haploid, unfertilized eggs, is abundant in some insect lineages. Some species in these lineages reproduce by thelytoky that is caused by infection with endosymbionts: infected females lay haploid eggs that undergo diploidization and develop into females, while males are very rare or absent. It is generally assumed that in thelytokous wasps, endosymbionts merely diploidize the unfertilized eggs, which would then trigger female development. RESULTS: We found that females in the parasitoid wasp Asobara japonica infected with thelytoky-inducing Wolbachia produce 0.7-1.2 % male offspring. Seven to 39 % of these males are diploid, indicating that diploidization and female development can be uncoupled in A. japonica. Wolbachia titer in adults was correlated with their ploidy and sex: diploids carried much higher Wolbachia titers than haploids, and diploid females carried more Wolbachia than diploid males. Data from introgression lines indicated that the development of diploid individuals into males instead of females is not caused by malfunction-mutations in the host genome but that diploid males are most likely produced when the endosymbiont fails to activate the female sex determination pathway. Our data therefore support a two-step mechanism by which endosymbionts induce thelytoky in A. japonica: diploidization of the unfertilized egg is followed by feminization, whereby each step correlates with a threshold of endosymbiont titer during wasp development. CONCLUSIONS: Our new model of endosymbiont-induced thelytoky overthrows the view that certain sex determination mechanisms constrain the evolution of endosymbiont-induced thelytoky in hymenopteran insects. Endosymbionts can cause parthenogenesis through feminization, even in groups in which endosymbiont-diploidized eggs would develop into males following the hosts' sex determination mechanism. In addition, our model broadens our understanding of the mechanisms by which endosymbionts induce thelytoky to enhance their transmission to the next generation. Importantly, it also provides a novel window to study the yet-poorly known haplodiploid sex determination mechanisms in haplodiploid insects.

Integrating Group Support Systems to innovation process of a forest company

The objective of this study was to analyze the effects of Group Support Systems (GSS) to overall efficiency of innovation process. Overall efficiency was found to be a sum of meeting efficiency, product effectiveness, and learning efficiency. These components were studied in various working situations common in early stages of innovation process. In the empirical part of this study, the suitability of GSS at the forest company was assessed. The basics for this study were idea generation meetings held at LUT and results from the surveys done after the sessions. This data combined with the interviews and theoretical background was used to analyze suitability of this technology to organizational culture at the company. The results of this study are divided to theory and case level. On theory level GSS was found to be a potentially valuable tool for innovation managers, especially at the first stages of the process. On case level, GSS was found to be a suitable tool at Stora Enso for further utilization. A five step implementation proposal was built to illustrate what would be the next stages of GSS implementation, if technology was chosen for further implementation.

Wage differentials between native and immigrant women in Spain: accounting for differences in support

Purpose: The objective of the study is to quantify the wage gap between native and immigrant women in Spain, taking into account differences in their characteristics and the need to control for common support. If immigrant women are segregated in occupations with few native women, it is important to take this into account to analyse wage differentials between both collectives. Methodology: We use microdata from the Continuous Sample of Working Histories (Muestra Continua de Vidas Laborales) on wages and other personal characteristics such as gender, country of origin, and age to apply the matching procedure and the decomposition of the wage gap along the lines of Ñopo (2008) for the analysis of wage differentials between native and immigrant women. The advantage of this procedure is that we can simultaneously estimate the common support and the mean counterfactual wage for the women on the common support (i.e., comparing native and immigrant women with similar observable characteristics). In addition, we can describe differences not only at the mean but also along the entire wage distribution. Findings: The results obtained indicate that, on average, immigrant women earn less than native women in the Spanish labour market. This wage gap is bigger when we consider immigrant women from developing countries, but our main finding is that an important part of this wage gap is related to differences in common support (i.e., immigrant women are segregated in certain jobs with low wages different from those occupied by native women). If the need to control for common support is neglected, estimates of the wage gap will be biased. Originality: Studying the case of Spain is particularly interesting because it is a country with abundant and recent immigration. Immigrant women account for more than half of the total immigrants in Spain, and unlike other host countries, they come from a highly varied range of countries, with origins as diverse as Latin America, the Maghreb and Eastern Europe. To our knowledge, no other study has explicitly focused on the analysis of the wage differential of immigrant women in the Spanish labour market by taking into account the need to control for common support. Moreover, published papers illustrating the potentiality of Ñopo"s (2008) methodology are also very scarce.

Development of support and drive systems for defiberization drum

Diplomityön tarkoituksena oli kuidutusrumpulaitteiston käytön- ja kannatuksen kehittä-minen. Työ rajattiin laajuutensa vuoksi koskemaan tuotesarjan viittä pienintä kokoa. Työn alkuosassa käsitellään kuidutuksen teoriaa ja siihen soveltuvia laitteistoja. Käytön suunnittelun kannalta olennaista käynnistystehon tarvetta on tarkasteltu lähtökohdaisesti fysiikan avulla. Perustietoja teorialle on haettu aiemmista tutkimuksista sekä kirjallisuu-desta. Tarkastelun tuloksena teoriaa on kehitty ja se on saatu vastaamaan todellisuutta aiempaa paremmin. Kannatuksen ja käytön toteuttamisvaihtoja etsittäessä on käytetty systemaattisen koneen-suunnittelun keinoja. Saatuja ideoita on arvioitu teknillis-taloudellisin perustein ja näistä on valittu parhaat vaihtoehdot jatkokehitykseen. Jatkokehitysvaiheessa ratkaisuvaihto-ehtoja on tarkasteltu komponenttitasolla ja näistä on tehty yksityiskohtaiset kustannus-laskelmat. Työn tuloksena on esitetty kannatuksen ja käytön toteutusvaihtoehto, jonka avulla voidaan saavuttaa merkittäviä kustannussäästöjä. Korkea, 30 prosentin kustannussäästö-tavoite saavutettiin.

Social justice in education : how the function of selection in educational institutions predicts support for (non)egalitarian assessment practices

Educational institutions are considered a keystone for the establishment of a meritocratic society. They supposedly serve two functions: an educational function that promotes learning for all, and a selection function that sorts individuals into different programs, and ultimately social positions, based on individual merit. We study how the function of selection relates to support for assessment practices known to harm vs. benefit lower status students, through the perceived justice principles underlying these practices. We study two assessment practices: normative assessment-focused on ranking and social comparison, known to hinder the success of lower status students-and formative assessment-focused on learning and improvement, known to benefit lower status students. Normative assessment is usually perceived as relying on an equity principle, with rewards being allocated based on merit and should thus appear as positively associated with the function of selection. Formative assessment is usually perceived as relying on corrective justice that aims to ensure equality of outcomes by considering students' needs, which makes it less suitable for the function of selection. A questionnaire measuring these constructs was administered to university students. Results showed that believing that education is intended to select the best students positively predicts support for normative assessment, through increased perception of its reliance on equity, and negatively predicts support for formative assessment, through reduced perception of its ability to establish corrective justice. This study suggests that the belief in the function of selection as inherent to educational institutions can contribute to the reproduction of social inequalities by preventing change from assessment practices known to disadvantage lowerstatus student, namely normative assessment, to more favorable practices, namely formative assessment, and by promoting matching beliefs in justice principles.

Students support demographically-based quotas with distributive justice rules favoring their selection at university

We manipulate distributive justice rules of demographic quotas in university selection. Results show that quotas involving students' need are preferred over equity and authority ranking quotas. International students also differentiate more between quotas than locals, preferring those advantaging them. This suggests that universities should consider students' need in their selection.

Financial Modeling to Support Organizational Control

Tutkimus tarkastelee taloudellisia mallintamismahdollisuuksia metsäteollisuuden liiketoimintayksikössä. Tavoitteena on suunnitella ja luoda taloudellinen malli liiketoimintayksikölle, jonka avulla sen tuloksen analysoiminen ja ennustaminen on mahdollista. Tutkimusta tarkastellaan konstruktiivisen tutkimusmenetelmän avulla. Teoreettinen viitekehys tarkastelee olemassa olevan informaation muotoilemista keskittyen tiedon jalostamisen tarpeisiin, päätöksenteon asettamiin vaatimuksiin sekä mallintamiseen. Toiseksi, teoria esittää informaatiolle asetettavia vaatimuksia organisatorisen ohjauksen näkökulmasta.Empiirinen tieto kerätään osallistuvan havainnoinnin avulla hyödyntäen epävirallisia keskusteluja, tietojärjestelmiä ja laskentatoimen dokumentteja. Tulokset osoittavat, että liikevoiton ennustaminen mallin avulla on vaikeaa, koska taustalla vaikuttavien muuttujien määrä on suuri. Tästä johtuen malli täytyykin rakentaa niin, että se tarkastelee liikevoittoa niin yksityiskohtaisella tasolla kuin mahdollista. Testauksessa mallin tarkkuus osoittautui sitä paremmaksi, mitä tarkemmalla tasolla ennustaminen tapahtui. Lisäksi testaus osoitti, että malli on käyttökelpoinen liiketoiminnan ohjauksessa lyhyellä aikavälillä. Näin se luo myös pohjan pitkän aikavälin ennustamiselle.

Comparison of application frameworks designed to support application extensibility

Reusability has become more popular factor in modern software engineering. This is mainly because object-orientation has brought methods that allow reusing more easily. Today more and more application developer thinks how they can reuse already existing applications in their work. If the developer wants to use existing components outside the current project, he can use design patterns, class libraries or frameworks. These provide solution for specific or general problems that has been already encountered. Application frameworks are collection of classes that provides base for the developer. Application frameworks are mostly implementation phase tools, but can also be used in application design. The main purpose of the frameworks is separate domain specific functionalities from the application specific. Usually the frameworks are divided into two categories: black and white box. Difference between those categories is the way the reuse is done. The application frameworks provide properties that can be examined and compared between different frameworks. These properties are: extensibility, reusability, modularity and scalability. These examine how framework will handle different platforms, changes in framework, increasing demand for resources, etc. Generally application frameworks do have these properties in good level. When comparing general purpose framework and more specific purpose framework, the main difference can be located in reusability of frameworks. It is mainly because the framework designed to specific domain can have constraints from external systems and resources. With general purpose framework these are set by the application developed based on the framework.

Differential patterns of functional and structural plasticity within and between inferior frontal gyri support training-induced improvements in inhibitory control proficiency.

Ample evidence indicates that inhibitory control (IC), a key executive component referring to the ability to suppress cognitive or motor processes, relies on a right-lateralized fronto-basal brain network. However, whether and how IC can be improved with training and the underlying neuroplastic mechanisms remains largely unresolved. We used functional and structural magnetic resonance imaging to measure the effects of 2 weeks of training with a Go/NoGo task specifically designed to improve frontal top-down IC mechanisms. The training-induced behavioral improvements were accompanied by a decrease in neural activity to inhibition trials within the right pars opercularis and triangularis, and in the left pars orbitalis of the inferior frontal gyri. Analyses of changes in brain anatomy induced by the IC training revealed increases in grey matter volume in the right pars orbitalis and modulations of white matter microstructure in the right pars triangularis. The task-specificity of the effects of training was confirmed by an absence of change in neural activity to a control working memory task. Our combined anatomical and functional findings indicate that differential patterns of functional and structural plasticity between and within inferior frontal gyri enhanced the speed of top-down inhibition processes and in turn IC proficiency. The results suggest that training-based interventions might help overcoming the anatomic and functional deficits of inferior frontal gyri manifesting in inhibition-related clinical conditions. More generally, we demonstrate how multimodal neuroimaging investigations of training-induced neuroplasticity enable revealing novel anatomo-functional dissociations within frontal executive brain networks. Hum Brain Mapp 36:2527-2543, 2015. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

The specificity of the familial aggregation of early-onset bipolar disorder: A controlled 10-year follow-up study of offspring of parents with mood disorders.

BACKGROUND: Two major sources of heterogeneity of mood disorders that have been demonstrated in clinical, family and genetic studies are the mood disorder subtype (i.e. bipolar (BPD) and major depressive disorder (MDD)) and age of onset of mood episodes. Using a prospective high-risk study design, our aims were to test the specificity of the parent-child transmission of BPD and MDD and to establish the risk of psychopathology in offspring in function of the age of onset of the parental disorder. METHODS: Clinical information was collected on 208 probands (n=81 with BPD, n=64 with MDD, n=63 medical controls) as well as their 202 spouses and 372 children aged 6-17 years at study entry. Parents and children were directly interviewed every 3 years (mean duration of follow-up=10.6 years). Parental age of onset was dichotomized at age 21. RESULTS: Offspring of parents with early onset BPD entailed a higher risk of BPD HR=7.9(1.8-34.6) and substance use disorders HR=5.0(1.1-21.9) than those with later onset and controls. Depressive disorders were not significantly increased in offspring regardless of parental mood disorder subtype or age of onset. LIMITATIONS: Limited sample size, age of onset in probands was obtained retrospectively, age of onset in co-parents was not adequately documented, and a quarter of the children had no direct interview. CONCLUSIONS: Our results provide support for the independence of familial aggregation of BPD from MDD and the heterogeneity of BPD based on patterns of onset. Future studies should further investigate correlates of early versus later onset BPD.

Fifty years after Ehrlich and Raven, is there support for plant-insect coevolution as a major driver of species diversification?

Since Ehrlich & Raven's seminal paper 50 years ago, coevolution has been seen as a major driver of species diversification. Here, we review classical and more recent case studies on the coevolution of plants and associated insects, to examine whether the coevolutionary component holds as an explanation of their current diversity. We discuss the main dogmas in coevolution and argue that coevolutionary processes should not be considered as major drivers of diversification in plants and insects. Instead, we suggest that coevolution essentially occurs through relatively short 'interludes', making the pattern difficult to detect. We also criticize the use of comparative phylogenetics to investigate coevolutionary processes, as coevolution may not necessarily produce congruent phylogenies among interacting lineages and, in turn, other processes may produce patterns of codivergence. Finally, we propose new lines of investigation for future research.

Implementing Role Based Access Control into the Enterprise Environment to Support Business and IT Functions

The thesis studies role based access control and its suitability in the enterprise environment. The aim is to research how extensively role based access control can be implemented in the case organization and how it support organization’s business and IT functions. This study points out the enterprise’s needs for access control, factors of access control in the enterprise environment and requirements for implementation and the benefits and challenges it brings along. To find the scope how extensively role based access control can be implemented into the case organization, firstly is examined the actual state of access control. Secondly is defined a rudimentary desired state (how things should be) and thirdly completed it by using the results of the implementation of role based access control application. The study results the role model for case organization unit, and the building blocks and the framework for the organization wide implementation. Ultimate value for organization is delivered by facilitating the normal operations of the organization whilst protecting its information assets.