White-tailed deer were introduced into the Czech Republic about one hundred years ago. Population numbers have remained stable at low density despite almost no harvesting. This differs from other introductions of this species in Europe. We presumed that one of the possible factors preventing expansion of the white-tailed deer population is lack of high-quality food components in an area overpopulated by sympatric roe, fallow and red deer. We analyzed the WTD winter diet and diets of the other deer species to get information on their feeding strategy during a critical period of a year. We focused primarily on conifer needle consumption, a generally accepted indicator of starvation and on bramble leaves as an indicator of high-quality items. We tested the following hypotheses: (1) If the environment has a limited food supply, the poorest competitors of the four deer species will have the highest proportion of conifer needles in the diet ; (2) the deer will overlap in trophic niches and will share limited nutritious resource (bramble). White-tailed, roe, fallow, and red deer diets were investigated by microscopic analysis of plant remains in their faeces. The volume of bramble decreased in the diet of all four deer species from November to March. The content of conifer needles in the diet of white-tailed and roe deer was negatively correlated with bramble and in spring made up 90 % of their diet volume. On the other hand conifer needles in the diet of red and fallow deer occurred only in January with snow cover. Fallow and red deer started the compensation of winter starvation at least one monthearlier than both roe and white-tailed deer. a high content of conifers in white-tailed deer diet in the second half of the winter fully support the presumption about low nutritional food supply and its diet. It can lead to a markedly impaired condition for white-tailed and roe deer and negatively affect their condition. The dietary overlap of four sympatric deer species was extensive in winter. All species share a limited good quality food supply (bramble) when food is scarce, suggesting that interspecific competition may occur.
This article analyses recent developments in Croatian housing finance to update the established account of housing finance and peripheral financialisation in Eastern Europe that is based on the boom-bust cycle of the 2000s and early-to-mid 2010s. During the bust stage of that cycle, changes in regulation and in the behaviour of debtors and creditors resulted in deleveraging and a shift away from the risky and exploitative lending practices characteristic of peripheral housing finance. However, new increases in household debt and housing prices since 2016–17, coupled with the COVID-19 pandemic, seem to have reversed these trends. While a boom-bust cycle of similar scope and modality to the first one is unlikely to be repeated, peripheral forms of housing finance have persisted to some degree.
Implicit causality (IC) verbs influence the pronoun ambiguity resolution by directing the speakers’ (readers’ or listeners’) attention to the referent that is likely to be the cause of the event or state. Although IC bias is considered universal, there are cross-linguistic differences in its direction and strength. Previous studies have attempted to build large datasets of IC verbs, but very few Slavic languages have been investigated. In this experimental study, we examined the direction and strength of IC bias in Croatian, an understudied Slavic language in this regard, and compared it with IC bias observed in English. After selecting 137 verbs and classifying them according to thematic roles (agent-patient, agent-evocator, stimulus-experiencer, experiencer-stimulus), 86 participants were asked to complete sentence fragments containing these verbs. The study was conducted under the semantic structure account. Our results show that most Croatian verbs followed the predicted direction, which is consistent with findings suggesting that the direction of IC bias is relatively generalizable across languages. We also detected cross-linguistic variability in the strength of IC bias, especially in stimulus-experiencer verbs. This is consistent with studies showing that the strength of IC bias can vary across languages. Implications for theoretical and methodological approaches are discussed. and Implicitnouzročni glagoli utječu na razdvosmislenje upućivanja zamjenicom usmjeravajući govornikovu (čitateljevu ili slušateljevu) pozornost na referent koji je vjerojatniji uzrok događaja ili stanja. Iako se implicitnouzročna pristranost smatra univerzalnom, pronađene su međujezične razlike u smjeru i jačini glagolske pristranosti. U prijašnjim se istraživanjima težilo stvaranju velikih baza implicitnouzročnih glagola, no ta je jezična pojava nedovoljno istražena u slavenskim jezicima. Cilj ovoga eksperimentalnoga istraživanja bio je ispitati smjer i jačinu pristranosti implicitnouzročnih glagola u hrvatskome, koji je slavenski jezik i u kojem je ta pojava slabo istražena, te dobivene podatke usporediti s podatcima u engleskom jeziku. Izabrano je 137 glagola koji su razvrstani prema semantičkim ulogama (agens – pacijens, agens – pobuđivač, poticajnik – doživljavač, doživljavač – poticajnik). Ukupno je 86 sudionika dovršavalo rečenice s tim glagolima. Istraživanje je provedeno u okviru pristupa značenjske strukture. Rezultati pokazuju da većina hrvatskih glagola pokazuje predviđeni smjer pristranosti, što je u skladu s istraživanjima koja upućuju na to da je smjer implicitnouzročne pristranosti sličan u različitim jezicima. S druge strane, pronađene su međujezične razlike u snazi glagolske pristranosti, ponajprije u kategoriji poticajnik – doživljavač. Taj je rezultat u skladu s istraživanjima koja pokazuju da se jačina implicitnouzročne pristranosti može razlikovati među jezicima. U radu se raspravlja o teorijskim i metodološkim implikacijama.
High incidence of thrombosis and venous thromboembolism was reported in patients with COVID-19. In this study, we focused on analysis of thrombophilic mutations performed without a standard DNA extraction step. In one hundred of COVID-19 positive outpatients, real-time PCR for Leiden mutation in the FV gene and G20210A mutation in the FII gene was carried out from DNA extracts and modified whole blood samples, and their cycle threshold (Ct) values were evaluated. In the extracts, healthy homozygotes (wt/wt), heterozygotes (M/wt), and homozygous carriers of Leiden mutation (M/M) provided median Ct values of 18.5, 19.4/22.0, and 20.9. In the whole blood, Ct values were 25.3 (wt/wt), 24.8/27.2 (M/wt), and 26.9 (M/M). Median Ct values for G20210A in the extracts were 19.6 for homozygotes (wt/wt), and 19.7/20.4 for heterozygous carriers. The whole blood samples provided Ct values of 23.9 in healthy homozygotes and 26.3/27.2 in heterozygotes for G20210A mutation. No homozygous subjects for G20210A and no double heterozygotes (for Leiden and G20210A mutations) were found. Despite significant differences in the Ct values, genotyping showed complete result concordance of the DNA extracts and the whole blood samples. The integrity and amplificability of DNA molecules in the whole blood samples during 28 days of deep freezing, interrupted by four cycles of thawing, did not significantly change. In conclusion, we demonstrated a new protocol for the detection of the thrombophilic mutations via real-time PCR on the modified whole blood of COVID-19 positive patients. The blood modification was reliable, easy, cheap, and saving costs and turnaround time of the whole laboratory process.
The thermoluminescence signals from leaflets of the same pea plant varied gradually according to their developmental stage. The AG emission, due to a back flow of electrons towards photosystem 2 (PS2) along a cyclic/chlororespiratory pathway, was stronger in mature leaves than in the growing ones. These age-related variations could be explained by a higher capacity of cyclic electron flow in mature leaves.
In the following essay-manifesto, Contradictions editor Joseph Grim Feinberg lays out his view of the journal as a platform for confronting the central contradictions of post-communism, working through the problems of Central and Eastern Europe in global context, and seeking the continued contemporary relevance of the history of emancipatory and critical thought. Contradictions, he writes, should enable philosophy and its neighboring fields to engage with this region, at this moment, while telling world history something that no other time or place has told it before.
During the last decades several studies in cognitive psychology have shown that many of our actions do not depend on the reasons that we adduce afterwards, when we have to account for them. Our decisions seem to be often influenced by normatively or explanatorily irrelevant features of the environment of which we are not aware, and the reasons we offer for those decisions are a posteriori rationalisations. But exactly what reasons has the psychological research uncovered? In philosophy, a distinction has been commonly made between normative and motivating reasons: normative reasons make an action right, whereas motivating reasons explain our behaviour. Recently, Maria Alvarez has argued that, apart from normative (or justifying) reasons, we should further distinguish between motivating and explanatory reasons. We have, then, three kinds of reasons, and it is not clear which of them have been revealed as the real reasons for our actions by the psychological research. The answer we give to this question will have important implications both for the validity of our classifications of reasons and for our understanding of human action.
Purkinje fibers were the first discovered component of the cardiac conduction system. Origin ally described in sheep in 1839 as pale subendocardial cells, they were found to be present, although with different morphology, in all mammalian and avian hearts. Here we review differences in their appearance and extent in different species, summarize the current state of knowledge of their function, and provide an update on markers for these cells. Special emphasis is given to popular model species and human anatomy., D. Sedmera, R. G. Gourdie., and Obsahuje bibliografii a bibliografické odkazy