The Slavic branch of the Balto-Slavic sub-family of Indo-European languages underwent rapid divergence as a result of the spatial expansion of its speakers from Central-East Europe, in early medieval times. This expansion–mainly to East Europe and the northern Balkans–resulted in the incorporation of genetic components from numerous autochthonous populations into the Slavic gene pools. Here, we characterize genetic variation in all extant ethnic groups speaking Balto-Slavic languages by analyzing mitochondrial DNA (n = 6,876), Y-chromosomes (n = 6,079) and genome-wide SNP profiles (n = 296), within the context of other European populations. We also reassess the phylogeny of Slavic languages within the Balto-Slavic branch of Indo-European. We find that genetic distances among Balto-Slavic populations, based on autosomal and Y-chromosomal loci, show a high correlation (0.9) both with each other and with geography, but a slightly lower correlation (0.7) with mitochondrial DNA and linguistic affiliation. The data suggest that genetic diversity of the present-day Slavs was predominantly shaped in situ, and we detect two different substrata: ‘central-east European’ for West and East Slavs, and ‘south-east European’ for South Slavs. A pattern of distribution of segments identical by descent between groups of East-West and South Slavs suggests shared ancestry or a modest gene flow between those two groups, which might derive from the historic spread of Slavic people.

Prevalence of Caprine Arthritis Encephalitis Virus (CAEV) and occurrence of clinical arthritis were investigated on 543 goats of French Alpine breed on six intensive production farms in North-Western Croatia. The aim of the study was to determine seropositivity to CAEV and to examine the occurrence of clinical arthritis in relation to CAEV seropositive goats. All goats were examined clinically and presence of arthritis was noted. The blood samples were tested for antibodies against CAEV using the immunoenzyme test. All collected data were cross-classified in two-way contingency tables. Of the total number of goats, CAEV was serologically confirmed in 50.8% and 31.6% of all goats were diagnosed with clinical arthritis. CAEV seropositive goats were 21.9% and they also expressed clinical signs of arthritis. Statistical tests confirmed positive association between clinical arthritis diagnosis and seropositivity to CAEV with Phi coefficient of 0.25 (P<0.01). Results suggest that serious eradication programs should be introduced in north western Croatian goat herds, but also that further investigations in all Croatian herds should be conducted and measures should be applied on all herds.

Oko 40 na svakih 100,000 stanovika u svim starosnim grupama svake godine prokrvari iz ulkusa želuca ili duodenuma. Smrtnost ovih pacijenta je i dalje visoka, između 8 i 10%, bez obzira na stalan napredak u modalitetima lecenja. Kod pacijenata koji krvare iz ulkusa treba sto pre uraditi endoskopiju i sprovesti direktnu lokalnu hemostazu mehanickim, hemijskim ili termickim metodama. Dok pacijent ceka na endoskopiju treba poceti sa intravenskom primenom visokih doza blokatora protonske pumpe, koja se nastavlja do isteka 72 sata od njenog uvođenja. Primena eritromicina oko sat vremena pre endoskopije povecava vidljivost unutrasnjosti želuca i olaksava endoskopsku terapiju. Intravensku primenu blokatora protonske pumpe treba nastaviti oralnim preparatima istih lekova tokom 7 nedelja, i ukoliko je pacijent pozitivan na Helicobacter pylori, sprovesti eradikacionu terapiju. Za uspesno izlecenje i prevenciju ponovnog krvarenja neophodni su optimalni izbor, raspored primene i doziranje lekova koji prate endoskopsku dijagnostiku i terapiju.

Background: To investigate the impact of schizophrenia on quality of life (QoL) of patients and caregivers in seven CEE countries, by conducting a literature search. Methods: Search was performed in publicly available databases to identify publications from 1995 to 2012 related to schizophrenia and QoL. Publications included those describing health-related QoL data of negative symptoms in patients with schizophrenia. Results: Out of an initial search of 2882 abstracts, 1587 were excluded based on duplication or preliminary screening of titles, and a further 1550 publications were excluded based on screening of the abstracts (1510) or full-texts (40). Thus, 37 primary publications related to QoL of patients with schizophrenia and caregivers were identified. Due to differences observed in the identified studies, it was not possible to make direct comparisons nor to pool data for analysis. However, it was consistently reported that schizophrenia greatly affected the QoL of patients and had a significant negative impact on the QoL of caregivers, such that their QoL was considered similar to the patients themselves. In addition, patients with schizophrenia experienced significant stigmatization and discrimination. In general, the presence of negative symptoms was not well-documented in the literature and available antipsychotics had limited impact on the treatment of negative symptoms. Conclusion: Schizophrenia significantly reduces QoL of patients and their caregivers. Further research is needed to better understand the drivers of impaired QoL caused by schizophrenia, in particular the negative symptoms of schizophrenia, and how best the burden of illness and associated stigmatization and discrimination may be reduced.

Abstract Acute pancreatitis represents an acute nonbacterial inflammation of the pancreas caused by a premature and ectopic activation of pancreatic digestive enzymes. Two of the most important genes in pancreatic autodigestion, PRSS1 and SPINK1, were implicated in the earliest discoveries of the genetic background of pancreatitis. However, the distribution of their variations displays interethnic variability, which could significantly affect the magnitude of their proposed effects on this disease worldwide. The aim of the present study was to investigate the distribution of the most important functional variations of PRSS1 (86A>T and 365G>A) and SPINK1 (101A>G), and their influence on the clinical course of acute pancreatitis in Serbian patients. The study enrolled 81 subjects, the severity of disease course was determined using the Atlanta Classification system, and the genotyping was conducted using a PCR-RFLP method. PRSS1 86A>T and 365G>A SNPs were not observed in the study population, while SPINK1 101A>G was present with the frequency of 0.62% (95% CI: 0.00, 3.83%). Due to extremely low frequencies or absences of examined variations, the proposed effect of these SNPs on the severity of acute pancreatitis could not be confirmed. The results do not support routine genotyping of either PRSS1 or SPINK1 in Serbs.

Colchicine poisonings are serious and highly fatal conditions that occur as a result of food poisoning from plants that contain this alkaloid or overdose with drug containing colchicine. The leaves of edible wild garlic because of their similarity are often replaced with highly poisonous leaves of autumn crocus, causing poisoning. Described are two cases of food poisoning with Colchicum autumnale, who had similar symptoms in the initial stage, but different clinical course and outcome. Signs of poisoning require early identification and intensive supportive therapy, which increases the chances of survival.

Knowledge of the human grasp pose is crucial in common control schemes for human-robot object manipulation tasks. Biased estimates of the grasp pose cause undesired interaction wrenches on the human partner, which disturbs the interaction and the recognition of motion intention. A use of wearable motion sensors for tracking the human motion facilitates the grasp pose estimation without a global sensing system. This paper presents an approach for estimating an unknown grasp pose of the human using wearable motion sensors while minimizing undesired interaction wrenches applied to the human. A condition necessary for convergence of the estimator together with appropriate robot motion strategies are provided. Estimation of relative orientation and displacement is performed online and based on minimizing the error in the least-square sense. The estimation process does not rely on a global sensing system and it considers only the measurements of the velocity and acceleration of the cooperating partners in their respective local frames. The approach is experimentally evaluated in a physical human-robot interaction scenario.