0000000000747176
AUTHOR
M. Kozlowski
Impact of clinical phenotypes on management and outcomes in European atrial fibrillation patients: a report from the ESC-EHRA EURObservational Research Programme in AF (EORP-AF) General Long-Term Registry
Abstract Background Epidemiological studies in atrial fibrillation (AF) illustrate that clinical complexity increase the risk of major adverse outcomes. We aimed to describe European AF patients’ clinical phenotypes and analyse the differential clinical course. Methods We performed a hierarchical cluster analysis based on Ward’s Method and Squared Euclidean Distance using 22 clinical binary variables, identifying the optimal number of clusters. We investigated differences in clinical management, use of healthcare resources and outcomes in a cohort of European AF patients from a Europe-wide observational registry. Results A total of 9363 were available for this analysis. We identified three …
The Lineshape of Inelastic Neutron Scattering in Relaxor Ferroelectrics
We show that a microscopic reason for the steep drop of the optical phonon branch into an acoustic one (the so-called waterfall effect) in relaxor ferroelectrics may be the coupling of phonons with defects and impurities of different kinds, which is always present in relaxors. Namely, we do not specify the type of impurities but rather represent them as an ensemble of so-called two-level systems (TLS). This approach makes it possible to trace the evolution of the “waterfall” with temperature and the TLS concentration. To facilitate the planning of experiments on inelastic neutron scattering, we present a modification of the so-called Latin hypercube sampling method, which, based on some sig…
Study on compatibilization of polypropylene-liquid crystalline polymer blends
The mechanical properties, melt rheology, and morphology of binary blends comprised of two polypropylene (PP) grades and two liquid crystalline polymers (LCP) have been studied. Compatibilization with polypropylene grafted with maleic anhydride (PP-g-MAH) has been attempted. A moderate increase in the tensile moduli and no enhancements in tensile strength have been revealed. Those findings have been attributed to the morphology of the blends, which is predominantly of the disperse mode. LCP fibers responsible for mechanical reinforcement were only exceptionally evidenced. Discussion of PP-LCP interfacial characteristics with respect to mechanical properties-morphology interrelations allowed…