Green mathematics: Benefits of including biological variation in your data analysis
Biological variation is omnipresent in nature. It contains useful information that is neglected by the usually applied statistical procedures. To extract this information special procedures have to be applied. Biological variation is seen in properties (e.g. size, colour, firmness), but the underlying issue is almost always to the variation in development or maturity in a batch of individuals generated by small scale environmental differences. The principles of assessing biological variation in batches of individuals are explained without putting emphasis on mathematical details. Obtained explained parts increase from about 60 to 80 % for the usual approach to 95 when the biological variation is taken into account. When technical variation or measuring error is small even 99 % can be achieved. The benefit of the presented technology is highlighted based on a number of already published studies covering the colour of apples during growth and storage and the firmness of cut tomatoes during storage.
The biological shift factor. Biological age as a tool for modelling in pre- and postharvest horticulture
Individuals differ in development stage or biological age. This difference can be taken into account when modelling the quality behaviour of various fruits and vegetables. Even on a batch level, the same principle can be applied, provided the variation within a batch is not too large. By applying the biological shift factor, i.e. a shift in calendar time, the effects of different growing and harvesting condition can be included in modelling quality behaviour, which widely opens alleys for producing models applicable in the entire globalised food chain. The variation in biological shift factor over individuals in a batch and over several batches seems to exhibit a normal distribution pattern.
New insights into juvenile parotitis
Aim: We enquired about the possibility of a familial trend in juvenile parotitis and evaluated the role of SPINK1 mutations in juvenile parotitis.