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The steady increase in greenhouse gas concentrations is inducing a detectable rise in global temperatures. The sensitivity of human societies to warming temperatures is, however, a transcendental question not comprehensively addressed to date. Here we show the link between temperature, humidity and daily numbers of deaths in nearly 200 European regions, which are subsequently used to infer transient projections of mortality under state-of-the-art high-resolution greenhouse gas scenario simulations. Our analyses point to a change in the seasonality of mortality, with maximum monthly incidence progressively shifting from winter to summer. The results also show that the rise in heat-related mortality will start to completely compensate the reduction of deaths from cold during the second half of the century, amounting to an average drop in human lifespan of up 3–4 months in 2070–2100. Nevertheless, projections suggest that human lifespan might indeed increase if a substantial degree of adaptation to warm temperatures takes place. The sensitivity of human populations to rising global temperatures is not yet fully understood. The authors describe the link between temperature and daily mortality in over 200 European regions and calculate projections of mortality from climate models under greenhouse gas scenario simulations.

Mortality rates based on data representing 400 million people in 200 European regions show countries other than the UK, the Netherlands and Belgium remain exposed to increased mortality due to winter temperature fluctuations. Recent studies have vividly emphasized the lack of consensus on the degree of vulnerability (see ref.  1 ) of European societies to current and future winter temperatures. Here we consider several climate factors, influenza incidence and daily numbers of deaths to characterize the relationship between winter temperature and mortality in a very large ensemble of European regions representing more than 400 million people. Analyses highlight the strong association between the year-to-year fluctuations in winter mean temperature and mortality, with higher seasonal cases during harsh winters, in all of the countries except the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Belgium. This spatial distribution contrasts with the well-documented latitudinal orientation of the dependency between daily temperature and mortality within the season. A theoretical framework is proposed to reconcile the apparent contradictions between recent studies, offering an interpretation to regional differences in the vulnerability to daily, seasonal and long-term winter temperature variability. Despite the lack of a strong year-to-year association between winter mean values in some countries, it can be concluded that warmer winters will contribute to the decrease in winter mortality everywhere in Europe.

Background: Friend leukaemia integration-1 (FLI-1) antibody is a useful marker for Ewing’s sarcoma/primitive neuroectodermal tumour (EWS/PNET) and vascular tumours. However, it is also expressed in subsets of lymphoblastic lymphoma, Merkel cell carcinoma (MCC) and desmoplastic small round cell tumour (DSRCT). Aim: To determine expression of FLI-1 in various benign and malignant neoplasms, by immunohistochemical analysis on 4323 tumours using multiple tumour microarrays, as well as on whole sections. Results: FLI-1 was expressed in 46/62 EWS/PNETs, 2/3 olfactory neuroblastomas, 7/102 small cell carcinomas of the lung, 10/34 MCCs, 1/14 rhabdomyosarcoma, 19/132 non-Hodgkin’s lymphomas, 2/3 DSRCTs, and in 53/74 benign and malignant vascular tumours. In addition, 27/508 squamous cell carcinomas, 19/837 adenocarcinomas, 10/400 urothelial bladder cancers, 1/40 basal cell carcinomas, 3/29 liposarcomas, 1/40 glioblastoma multiforme and 9/29 medullar carcinomas of the breast expressed FLI-1. The sensitivity and specificity of FLI-1 to distinguish EWS/PNET from all types of malignancies were 74.2% and 96.0%, respectively. Finally, the sensitivity and specificity of FLI-1 to distinguish EWS/PNET from other small round cell tumours (SRCTs) were 74.2% and 91.6%, respectively. Conclusion: This study was the first to show that FLI-1 can be seen in a variety of solid tumours, some of which had never been explored before. This finding should be kept in mind, especially when using FLI-1 as a marker for finding the primary origin of poorly differentiated metastatic tumour. Finally, despite the expression of FLI-1 in numerous malignancies, it is still considered to be highly sensitive and specific in distinguishing EWS/PNET from other tumour types in general and from other SRCTs in particular.

While hip fractures represent the most dramatic consequence of osteoporosis, fractures of the humerus, forearm and wrist account for one-third of the total incidence of fractures due to osteoporosis in the older population. The aim of this retrospective cohort study was to evaluate rehabilitation care utilization and associated factors in elderly individuals with upper limb fracture. Over two years, 667 patients 65 years of age or older were studied, who presented to the emergency department either from their private homes or nursing homes with an upper extremity fracture. The following outcome variables were collected: gender; age; residence; location of fracture; treatment; discharge destination; length of hospitalization; length of stay in a rehabilitation facility; and ultimate place of habitation after the event. The most frequent sites of fracture were distal radius (37.2%) and proximal humerus (29.1%). Two-thirds of the patients were treated non-operatively. Inpatient rehabilitation care was necessary for 248 patients (37.2%; length of stay, 46 days). Factors associated with increased care included older age (> or = 80 years), coming from private home, sustaining two fractures, fractures of the humerus, and operative treatment. Six percent of the patients required permanent nursing home care. Upper extremity fractures in older people often require prolonged hospitalization and therefore account for considerable health care costs. Reasons are more related to advanced age and living conditions than to particular injury or treatment.

In this work, we demonstrate a discrete dispersion scan scheme using a low number of flat windows to vary the dispersion of laser pulses in discrete steps. Monte Carlo simulations indicate that the pulse duration can be retrieved accurately with less than 10 dispersion steps, which we verify experimentally by measuring few-cycle pulses and material dispersion curves at 3 and 10 micrometer wavelength. This minimal measuring scheme using only five optical components without the need for high-precision positioners and interferometric alignment can be readily implemented in many wavelength ranges and situations.

Fast tuning of the transition frequency of superconducting qubits using magnetic flux is essential, for example, for realizing high-fidelity two-qubit gates with low leakage or for reducing errors in dispersive qubit readout. To apply accurately shaped flux pulses, signal distortions induced by the flux control lines need to be carefully compensated for. This requires their in situ characterization at the reference plane of the qubit. However, many existing approaches are limited in time resolution or in pulse duration. Here, we overcome these limitations and demonstrate accurate flux control with sub-permille residual frequency errors on time scales ranging from nanoseconds to tens of microseconds. We achieve this by combining two complementary methods to characterize and compensate for pulse distortions. We have deployed this approach successfully in a quantum error correction experiment calibrating 24 flux-activated two-qubit gates. Reliable calibration methods, as the ones presented here, are essential in experiments scaling up superconducting quantum processors.