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I denne rapporten gir Overvåkingsgruppen, for første gang, en felles vurdering av miljøtilstanden i Barentshavet og havområdene utenfor Lofoten, Norskehavet og Nordsjøen med Skagerrak. Det er også første rapport som bruker resultater fra det nylig utviklede fagsystemet for vurdering av økologisk tilstand. I denne rapporten dekkes to hovedtemaer: (1) Dominerende trekk i status og utvikling i økosystemet i alle tre havområdene, basert på vurderingene av økologisk tilstand, Overvåkingsgruppens rapport om forurensning fra 2022, indikatorer fra Overvåkingsgruppen som ikke er dekket under vurdering av økologisk tilstand, samt rapporter og annen relevant informasjon fra forskning, og (2) en vurdering av karbonbinding i marint plankton, marine vegetasjonstyper og marine sedimenter. I tillegg er det gitt en oppsummering for endringer i ytre påvirkning, vurdering av kunnskapsbehov samt en vurdering av indikatorverdier i forhold til referanseverdier og tiltaksgrenser. Vurderingen av dominerende trekk i utvikling og tilstand av miljøet som er gitt i kapittel 2, utgjør Overvåkingsgruppens bidrag til Faglig forums samlerapport om det faglige grunnlaget for revisjon og oppdatering av de helhetlige forvaltningsplanene for norske havområder. Status for miljøet i norske havområder - Rapport fra Overvåkingsgruppen 2023

The FAS phonemic fluency test is a commonly used neuropsychological test of executive function and processing speed. Although Norwegian discrete norms have been developed for the FAS test, American regression-based norms are frequently used by clinicians in Norway. However, language and cultural differences impact performance on the FAS test, and using foreign norms may not be appropriate. Moreover, while discrete norming relies on stratified subgroups of demographics, regression-based norming uses the entire sample to estimate the influence of demographics on performance and may thus improve normative estimates. Here we develop regression-based norms for the FAS phonemic fluency test based on n = 204 healthy Norwegian controls between the ages 40−84 from the Norwegian Dementia Disease Initiation cohort (DDI). We compare the proposed regression norms to published Norwegian discrete norms and American regression-based norms in an independent sample of n = 182 cognitively healthy adults reporting subjective cognitive decline (SCD). We found that years of education was the only significant predictor of FAS performance in our normative sample, accounting for 14.9% of the variance. Both the proposed regression-based norms and previously published discrete norms adequately adjusted for demographics in the independent sample. In contrast, the American norms underestimated the effect of education and overestimated the effect of age. While both the proposed Norwegian regression norms and the previously published discrete norms are suitable for use in Norway, the proposed regression norms may be less vulnerable to sub-stratification sample characteristics posed by discrete norming procedures, and thereby improve normative estimation.

Background Chronic wasting disease (CWD) is a prion disease of cervids first reported in North America in the 1960s. In Europe, CWD was first diagnosed in 2016 in a wild reindeer in Norway. Detection of two more cases in the same mountain area led to the complete culling of this partially confined reindeer population of about 2400 animals. A total of 19 CWD positive animals were identified. The affected area is extensively used for the grazing of sheep during summers. There are many mineral licks intended for sheep in the area, but these have also been used by reindeer. This overlap in area use raised concerns for cross-species prion transmission between reindeer and sheep. In this study, we have used global positioning system (GPS) data from sheep and reindeer, including tracking one of the CWD positive reindeer, to investigate spatial and time-relevant overlaps between these two species. Since prions can accumulate in lymphoid follicles following oral uptake, samples of gut-associated lymphoid tissue (GALT) from 425 lambs and 78 adult sheep, which had grazed in the region during the relevant timeframe, were analyzed for the presence of prions. The recto-anal mucosa associated lymphoid tissue (RAMALT) from all the animals were examined by histology, immunohistochemistry (IHC) and enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), and the ileal Peyer's patch (IPP) from a subsample of 37 lambs were examined by histology and IHC, for the detection of prions. Results GPS data showed an overlap in area use between the infected reindeer herd and the sheep. In addition, the GPS positions of an infected reindeer and some of the sampled sheep showed temporospatial overlap. No prions were detected in the GALT of the investigated sheep even though the mean lymphoid follicle number in RAMALT and IPP samples were high. Conclusion The absence of prions in the GALT of sheep that have shared pasture with CWD-infected reindeer, may suggest that transmission of this novel CWD strain to sheep does not easily occur under the conditions found in these mountains. We document that the lymphoid follicle rich RAMALT could be a useful tool to screen for prions in sheep.

Objective: The Rey Auditory Verbal Learning Test (RAVLT) is a widely used measure of episodic verbal memory. To our knowledge, culturally adapted and demographically adjusted norms for the RAVLT are currently not available for Norwegian and Swedish adults, and imported North American norms are often used. We here develop regression-based norms for Norwegian and Swedish adults and compare our norms to North American norms in an independent sample of cognitively healthy adults. Method: Participants were 244 healthy adults from Norway and Sweden between the aged 49 and 79years, with between 6 and 24years of education. Using a multiple multivariate regression-based norming procedure, we estimated effects of age, sex, and years of education on basic and derived RAVLT test scores. The newly developed norms were assessed in an independent comparison group of cognitively healthy adults (n=145) and compared to recently published North American regression-based norms. Results: Lower age, female sex and more years of education predicted higher performance on the RAVLT. The new norms adequately adjusted for age, education, and sex in the independent comparison group. The American norms corrected for demographics on all RAVLT trials except trials 4, 7, list B, and trials 1–5 total. Test-retest (M=2.55 years) reliability varied from poor to good. Conclusion: We propose regression-based norms for the RAVLT adjusting for pertinent demographics. The norms may be used for assessment of Norwegian and Swedish adults between the aged of 49 and 79years, with between 6 and 24years of education.

Denne masteroppgaven ser på muligheten for å benytte posisjonsdata fra treningsapplikasjonen Strava til å undersøke hvorvidt oppgradering av sykkelinfrastruktur i Oslo har en innvirkning på antallet syklister på strekningen. Dette er gjort ved å sammenligne tall fra Strava med tall fra sykkeltellere for så å studere likheten mellom disse. På denne måten kan bruken og nytten av nye sykkelveier evalueres gjennom modeller som benytter data fra nettdugnad som input. This master’s thesis looks at the possibility of using loaction data from the training application Strava to examine whether upgrading the cycling infrastructure in Oslo has an impact on the number of cyclists. This is done by comparing data from Strava with data from bicycle counters and then studying the similarities between these. In this way, the use and usefulness of new cycle paths can be evaluated through models that use data from crowdsoursing as input. M-GEOM

Online collaboration is becoming increasingly more common in work life and education, a development that is accentuated by the Covid-19 pandemic. It is thus imperative that students learn to work in and as teams in online settings, and that teachers and educational researchers and policymakers understand how online environments enable and constrain student collaboration. However, what has been missing in research on online student collaboration is a focus on students as agents rather than passive learners as well as a lack of focus on student teams as self-organizing teams. This paper reports on a study that investigated the experiences of 1611 graduate students in 315 teams enrolled in an interdisciplinary project-based course during their (forced) transition from face-to-face to online collaboration due to the COVID-19 pandemic. We explored how the transition to online learning affected social interaction and how teams changed their practices to support and sustain social interaction in the online environment. The findings show that the changed conditions of the learning environment influenced social interaction in negative ways, but also that team reflection seemed to enable the students to reverse some of the adverse effects and develop practices that supported both the cognitive and socio-emotional dimensions of social interaction. Theoretically, this study suggests possible causes for why social interaction was reduced and provides in-depth knowledge about the relationships between social interaction, social presence, and social space. The study also provides support for theories of learning that emphasize the need to consider students as active agents rather than merely users of the affordances of a virtual learning environment or guided by the teacher's interventions. It makes a unique contribution to the scarce empirical literature on virtual self-organizing student teams in higher education and provides practical implications for teachers and educational researchers and policy makers.

Studies in mice with ablation of Prnp, the gene that encodes the cellular prion protein (PrPC), have led to the hypothesis that PrPC is important for peripheral nerve myelin maintenance. Here, we have used a nontransgenic animal model to put this idea to the test; namely, goats that, due to a naturally occurring nonsense mutation, lack PrPC. Teased nerve fiber preparation revealed a demyelinating pathology in goats without PrPC. Affected nerves were invaded by macrophages and T cells and displayed vacuolated fibers, shrunken axons, and onion bulbs. Peripheral nerve lipid composition was similar in young goats with or without PrPC, but markedly different between corresponding groups of adult goats, reflecting the progressive nature of the neuropathy. This is the first report of a subclinical demyelinating polyneuropathy caused by loss of PrPC function in a nontransgenic mammal. © 2019 Norwegian University of Life Sciences. The FASEB Journal published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of The FASEB Journal This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution‐NonCommercial License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited and is not used for commercial purposes

Mutations in the N-myc downstream-regulated gene 1 (NDRG1) cause degenerative polyneuropathy in ways that are poorly understood. We have investigated Alaskan Malamute dogs with neuropathy caused by a missense mutation in NDRG1. In affected animals, nerve levels of NDRG1 protein were reduced by more than 70% (p < 0.03). Nerve fibers were thinly myelinated, loss of large myelinated fibers was pronounced and teased fiber preparations showed both demyelination and remyelination. Inclusions of filamentous material containing actin were present in adaxonal Schwann cell cytoplasm and Schmidt-Lanterman clefts. This condition strongly resembles the human Charcot-MarieTooth type 4D. However, the focally folded myelin with adaxonal infoldings segregating the axon found in this study are ultrastructural changes not described in the human disease. Furthermore, lipidomic analysis revealed a profound loss of peripheral nerve lipids. Our data suggest that the low levels of mutant NDRG1 is insufficient to support Schwann cells in maintaining myelin homeostasis. (C) 2020 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY license.

The FAS phonemic fluency test is a commonly used neuropsychological test of executive function and processing speed. Although Norwegian discrete norms have been developed for the FAS test, American regression-based norms are frequently used by clinicians in Norway. However, language and cultural differences impact performance on the FAS test, and using foreign norms may not be appropriate. Moreover, while discrete norming relies on stratified subgroups of demographics, regression-based norming uses the entire sample to estimate the influence of demographics on performance and may thus improve normative estimates. Here we develop regression-based norms for the FAS phonemic fluency test based on n = 204 healthy Norwegian controls between the ages 40−84 from the Norwegian Dementia Disease Initiation cohort (DDI). We compare the proposed regression norms to published Norwegian discrete norms and American regression-based norms in an independent sample of n = 182 cognitively healthy adults reporting subjective cognitive decline (SCD). We found that years of education was the only significant predictor of FAS performance in our normative sample, accounting for 14.9% of the variance. Both the proposed regression-based norms and previously published discrete norms adequately adjusted for demographics in the independent sample. In contrast, the American norms underestimated the effect of education and overestimated the effect of age. While both the proposed Norwegian regression norms and the previously published discrete norms are suitable for use in Norway, the proposed regression norms may be less vulnerable to sub-stratification sample characteristics posed by discrete norming procedures, and thereby improve normative estimation.

Mutations in the N-myc downstream-regulated gene 1 (NDRG1) cause degenerative polyneuropathy in ways that are poorly understood. We have investigated Alaskan Malamute dogs with neuropathy caused by a missense mutation in NDRG1. In affected animals, nerve levels of NDRG1 protein were reduced by more than 70% (p< 0.03). Nerve fibers were thinly myelinated, loss of large myelinated fibers was pronounced and teased fiber preparations showed both demyelination and remyelination. Inclusions of filamentous material containing actin were present in adaxonal Schwann cell cytoplasm and Schmidt-Lanterman clefts. This condition strongly resembles the human Charcot-Marie-Tooth type 4D. However, the focally folded myelin with adaxonal infoldings segregating the axon found in this study are ultrastructural changes not described in the human disease. Furthermore, lipidomic analysis revealed a profound loss of peripheral nerve lipids. Our data suggest that the low levels of mutant NDRG1 is insufficient to support Schwann cells in maintaining myelin homeostasis.

Semantic verbal fluency is among the most employed tasks in cognitive aging research and substantial work is devoted to understanding the underlying mechanisms behind age-related differences at the neural and behavioral levels. The present investigation aimed to evaluate the role of moderating variables, such as age, sex, MMSE, and proxies of cognitive reserve (CR) on the hemodynamic response evoked by semantic verbal fluency in healthy young and healthy older adults. So far, no study has been conducted to this end. To elucidate the exclusive effect of the mentioned variables on brain activation during semantic fluency, finger tapping was included as a control task. Results showed that disregarding adjustments for age, older adults displayed important parietal activations during semantic fluency as well as during finger-tapping. Specifically, the anterior intra-parietal sulcus (IPS) and left inferior parietal lobule (IPL) were areas activated in both tasks in the older group. Younger adults, only displayed parietal activations related to age and sex when these demographics were employed as predictors. Concerning proxies of CR in semantic fluency, the only vocabulary was an important moderator in both age groups. Higher vocabulary scores were associated with lesser activation in occipital areas. Education did not show significant correlations with brain activity during semantic fluency in any of the groups. However, both CR proxies were significantly correlated to brain activations of older adults during finger tapping. Specifically, vocabulary was associated with frontal regions, while education correlated with parietal lobe and cingulate gyrus. Finally, the effects of MMSE were mostly observed on brain activation of older adults in both tasks. These findings demonstrate that the effects of moderating variables on shaping brain activation are intricate and not exclusive of complex verbal tasks. Thus, before adjusting for “nuisance variables,” their importance needs to be established. This is especially true for samples including older adults for whom a motor task may be a demanding operation due to normal age-related processes of dedifferentiation.

While APOE ɛ4 is the major genetic risk factor for Alzheimer’s disease (AD), amyloid dysmetabolism is an initial or early event predicting clinical disease and is an important focus for secondary intervention trials. To improve identification of cases with increased AD risk, we evaluated recruitment procedures using pathological CSF concentrations of Aβ42 (pAβ) and APOE ɛ4 as risk markers in a multi-center study in Norway. In total, 490 subjects aged 40–80 y were included after response to advertisements and media coverage or memory clinics referrals. Controls (n = 164) were classified as normal controls without first-degree relatives with dementia (NC), normal controls with first-degree relatives with dementia (NCFD), or controls scoring below norms on cognitive screening. Patients (n = 301) were classified as subjective cognitive decline or mild cognitive impairment. Subjects underwent a clinical and cognitive examination and MRI according to standardized protocols. Core biomarkers in CSF from 411 and APOE genotype from 445 subjects were obtained. Cases (both self-referrals (n = 180) and memory clinics referrals (n = 87)) had increased fractions of pAβ and APOE ɛ4 frequency compared to NC. Also, NCFD had higher APOE ɛ4 frequencies without increased fraction of pAβ compared to NC, and cases recruited from memory clinics had higher fractions of pAβ and APOE ɛ4 frequency than self-referred. This study shows that memory clinic referrals are pAβ enriched, whereas self-referred and NCFD cases more frequently are pAβ negative but at risk (APOE ɛ4 positive), suitable for primary intervention.

A homozygous mutation has been identified in the N-myc downstream-regulated gene 1 (NDRG1) in recent cases of polyneuropathy in Alaskan malamute dogs from the Nordic countries and USA. The objective of the present study was to determine if cases diagnosed 30–40 years ago with polyneuropathy in the Alaskan malamute breed in Norway had the same hereditary disease as the recent cases. Fourteen historical cases and 12 recently diagnosed Alaskan malamute dogs with hereditary polyneuropathy, and their parents and littermates (n = 88) were included in this study (total n = 114). After phenotyping of historical and recent cases, NDRG1 genotyping was performed using DNA extracted from archived material from five Norwegian dogs affected by the disease in the late 1970s and 1980s. In addition, pedigrees were analysed. Our study concluded that historical and recent phenotypic polyneuropathy cases were carrying the same NDRG1-mutation. The pedigree analysis showed that all affected Alaskan malamute cases with polyneuropathy could be traced back to one common ancestor of North American origin. By this study, a well-documented example of the silent transmission of recessive disease-causing alleles through many generations is provided, demonstrated by the re-emergence of a phenotypically and genetically uniform entity in the Scandinavian Alaskan malamute population.

Background The cellular prion protein (PrPC) is an evolutionary conserved protein abundantly expressed not only in the central nervous system but also peripherally including the immune system. A line of Norwegian dairy goats naturally devoid of PrPC (PRNP Ter/Ter) provides a novel model for studying PrPC physiology. Methods In order to explore putative roles for PrPC in acute inflammatory responses, we performed a lipopolysaccharide (LPS, Escherichia coli O26:B6) challenge of 16 goats (8 PRNP +/+ and 8 PRNP Ter/Ter) and included 10 saline-treated controls (5 of each PRNP genotype). Clinical examinations were performed continuously, and blood samples were collected throughout the trial. Genome-wide transcription profiles of the choroid plexus, which is at the blood-brain interface, and the hippocampus were analyzed by RNA sequencing, and the same tissues were histologically evaluated. Results All LPS-treated goats displayed clinical signs of sickness behavior, which were of significantly (p

Additional file 1. Kinship and degree of inbreeding.

Prion diseases are progressive and fatal, neurodegenerative disorders described in humans and animals. According to the “protein-only” hypothesis, the normal host-encoded prion protein (PrPC) is converted into a pathological and infectious form (PrPSc) in these diseases. Transgenic knockout models have shown that PrPC is a prerequisite for the development of prion disease. In Norwegian dairy goats, a mutation (Ter) in the prion protein gene (PRNP) effectively blocks PrPC synthesis. We inoculated 12 goats (4 PRNP+/+, 4 PRNP+/Ter, and 4 PRNPTer/Ter) intracerebrally with goat scrapie prions. The mean incubation time until clinical signs of prion disease was 601 days post-inoculation (dpi) in PRNP+/+ goats and 773 dpi in PRNP+/Ter goats. PrPSc and vacuolation were similarly distributed in the central nervous system (CNS) of both groups and observed in all brain regions and segments of the spinal cord. Generally, accumulation of PrPSc was limited in peripheral organs, but all PRNP+/+ goats and 1 of 4 PRNP+/Ter goats were positive in head lymph nodes. The four PRNPTer/Ter goats remained healthy, without clinical signs of prion disease, and were euthanized 1260 dpi. As expected, no accumulation of PrPSc was observed in the CNS or peripheral tissues of this group, as assessed by immunohistochemistry, enzyme immunoassay, and real-time quaking-induced conversion. Our study shows for the first time that animals devoid of PrPC due to a natural mutation do not propagate prions and are resistant to scrapie. Clinical onset of disease is delayed in heterozygous goats expressing about 50% of PrPC levels.

Objective The trail making test (TMT) is one of the most widely used neuropsychological tests. TMT-A provides measures of visual scanning/visuomotor speed and TMT-B involves additional demands on executive functions. Derived scores TMT B-A and TMT B/A enhance measures of executive functioning. However, simple B-A subtraction may lead to false estimates of executive dysfunction in clinical samples. Norms for TMT have been published in several countries but are currently lacking for Scandinavia. Methods A total of 292 healthy controls between age 41 and 84 years were included from the Norwegian “Dementia Disease Initiation” (DDI) study (n = 170) and the Gothenburg Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) study (n = 122). We used a regression-based procedure to develop demographically adjusted norms for basic (TMT-A and TMT-B) and derived measures (TMT B-A and B/A). We also propose a regression-based alternative to the TMT B-A measure named “TMT-β”. The proposed norms were compared to norms from Heaton et al. and Tombaugh. Results Due to differences in the estimated normative effects of demographics on performance, the proposed norms for TMT were better suited in the Scandinavian sample compared with published non-Scandinavian norms. The proposed TMT-β measure was highly correlated to TMT B-A (r = 0.969, p