Publicaties

Zooplankton organisms are rarely the target of nature conservation efforts, probably because they are small and not well known to the public. Yet, information on zooplankton organisms may be very useful for nature conservation. First, some rare species have very specific habitat requirements. Secondly, the species composition and size distribution of the zooplankton community may reveal a wealth of information on habitat characteristics, ...

Millions of people are exposed daily to harmful levels of noise in their work environment. This renders noise-induced hearing loss (NIHL) one of the most important occupational health hazards. Beside age-related hearing loss, NIHL is the second most frequent form of hearing loss. It is a complex condition that is influenced by both environmental factors and genetic factors. Association studies have identified the first genetic factors that may ...

Evaluation of genetic diversity is of great interest for the management of germplasm collections and breeding programs. Management can be efficient when the evaluation is focused on a subset of accessions that represents the variability observed in the whole germplasm collection. Most core sets have been developed for seed crops using different approaches and sampling size to select entries on the basis of genetic and/or phenotypic data, while ...

Frontotemporal lobar degeneration (FTLD) comprises a highly heterogeneous group of disorders clinically associated with behavioral and personality changes, language impairment, and deficits in executive functioning, and pathologically associated with degeneration of frontal and temporal lobes. Some patients present with motor symptoms including amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. Genetic research over the past two decades in FTLD families led to the ...

Large variance in reproductive success is the primary factor that reduces effective population size (Ne) in natural populations. In sequentially hermaphroditic (sex-changing) fish, the sex ratio is typically skewed and biased towards the 'first' sex, while reproductive success increases considerably after sex change. Therefore, sex-changing fish populations are theoretically expected to have lower Ne than gonochorists (separate sexes), assuming ...

Animal models are widely used to gain insight into the role of genetics on bone structure and function. One of the main strategies to map the genes regulating specific traits is called quantitative trait loci (QTL) analysis, which generally requires a very large number of animals (often more than 1000) to reach statistical significance. QTL analysis for mechanical traits has been mainly based on experimental mechanical testing, which, in view of ...

To accurately determine the frequency and nature of the family history of seizures in patients with benign childhood epilepsy with centrotemporal spikes (BECTS).

To address the need for standardization of osteoarthritis (OA) phenotypes by examining the effect of heterogeneity among symptomatic (SOA) and radiographic osteoarthritis (ROA) phenotypes.