BackgroundRacket sports are typically not associated with doping. Despite the common characteristics of being non-contact and mostly individual, racket sports differ in their physiological demands, which might be reflected in substance use and misuse (SUM). The aim of this study was to investigate SUM among Slovenian Olympic racket sport players in the context of educational, sociodemographic and sport-specific factors.MethodsElite athletes (N = 187; mean age = 22 ± 2.3; 64% male) representing one of the three racket sports, table tennis, badminton, and tennis, completed a paper-and-pencil questionnaire on substance use habits. Athletes in this sample had participated in at least one of the two most recent competitions at the highest national level and had no significant difference in competitive achievement or status within their sport.ResultsA significant proportion of athletes (46% for both sexes) reported using nutritional supplements. Between 10% and 24% of the studied males would use doping if the practice would help them achieve better results in competition and if it had no negative health consequences; a further 5% to 10% indicated potential doping behaviour regardless of potential health hazards. Females were generally less oriented toward SUM than their male counterparts with no significant differences between sports, except for badminton players. Substances that have no direct effect on sport performance (if timed carefully to avoid detrimental effects) are more commonly consumed (20% binge drink at least once a week and 18% report using opioids), whereas athletes avoid substances that can impair and threaten athletic achievement by decreasing physical capacities (e.g. cigarettes), violating anti-doping codes or potentially transgressing substance control laws (e.g. opiates and cannabinoids). Regarding doping issues, athletes' trust in their coaches and physicians is low.ConclusionSUM in sports spreads beyond doping-prone sports and drugs that enhance athletic performance. Current anti-doping education, focusing exclusively on rules and fair play, creates an increasingly widening gap between sports and the athletes' lives outside of sports. To avoid myopia, anti-doping programmes should adopt a holistic approach to prevent substance use in sports for the sake of the athletes' health as much as for the integrity of sports.

The aim of the paper is to define which biomechanical parameters explain and define the difficulty vault value. The study sample included 64 vaults from the Code of Points (COP) of the International Gymnastics Federation (FIG, 2009). The dependent variable included all difficulty values ranging from 2-7.2 points, while the sample of independent variables included 12 biomechanical variables (data was collected from the literature and our measurements). With regression analysis we explained 92.4% of the difficulty vault value. Only three biomechanical variables were predictors: degrees of turns around transversal axis, degrees of turns around longitudinal axis and body's moment of inertia around transversal axis in the second flight phase. 

We demonstrate nearly approximation-free electrostatic calculations of micromesh detectors that can be extended to any other type of micropattern detectors. Using a newly developed Boundary Element Method called Robin Hood Method, we can easily handle objects with huge number of boundary elements (hundreds of thousands) without any compromise in numerical accuracy. In this paper we show how such calculations can be applied to Micromegas detectors by comparing electron transparencies and gains for four different types of meshes. We also demonstrate the inclusion of dielectric material by calculating the electric field around different types of dielectric spacers.

It is suspected that bone marrow (BM) microenvironmental factors may influence the evolution of chronic myeloid leukaemia (CML). In this study, we postulated that adipocytes and lipids could be involved in the progression of CML. To test this hypothesis, adipocytes were co-cultured with two BCR-ABL positive cell lines (PCMDS and K562). T cell (Jurkat) and stroma cell (HS-5) lines were used as controls. In the second set of experiments, leukemic cell lines were treated with stearic, oleic, linoleic or α-linolenic acids in presence or absence of leptin. Survival, proliferation, leptin production, OB-R isoforms (OB-Ra and OB-Rb), phosphoinositide 3-kinase (PI3k) and BCL-2 expression have been tested after 24h, 48h and 72h of treatment. Our results showed that adipocytes induced a decrease of CML proliferation and an increase in lipid accumulation in leukemic cells. In addition, CML cell lines induced adipocytes cell death. Chromatography analysis showed that BM microenvironment cells were full of saturated (SFA) and monounsaturated (MUFA) fatty acids, fatty acids that protect tumor cells against external agents. Stearic acid increased Bcl-2 expression in PCMDS, whereas oleic and linoleic acids had no effects. In contrast, α-linolenic acid decreased the proliferation and the survival of CML cell lines as well as BCL-2 and OB-R expression. The effect of α-linolenic acids seemed to be due to PI3K pathway and Bcl-2 inhibition. Leptin production was detected in the co-culture medium. In the presence of leptin, the effect of α-linolenic acid on proliferation, survival, OB-R and BCl-2 expression was reduced.

The picture of the capital market and financial sectors of B&H is still relatively unfavorable. In comparison with the advanced transition economies, capital market in B&H is underdeveloped and less important to the domestic economy in general and to corporate finance in particular. The focus of this paper is to analyze and examine the trends in capital market in B&H with the assessments and perspectives of its development in the future. In order to understand better the functioning of the financial system and its workings the paper discusses some general aspects of the financial system and its impact on economic development of national economies, and provides a brief overview of developments in the banking sector of the countries of former Yugoslavia. The analysis is then directed to review developments in the financial sector of B&H, their direct links with the capital market, followed by analysis of current events and the dynamics of trading as well as capital markets activities in B&H.