KU Leuven

Experiences of insemination fraud: discovering and navigating unexpected and entangled connections

The increasing use of direct-to-consumer genetic testing revealed not only more, but also different types of insemination fraud worldwide, making research into the topic urgently needed. This study explores how donor-conceived people and parents experience insemination fraud and...

Improving Functional Oral Intake in Head and Neck Cancer Survivors with Chronic Radiation-Associated Dysphagia – The Multicenter Randomized Controlled HIT-CRAD Trial

This randomized controlled trial evaluated the efficacy of home-based treatment programs for chronic radiation associated dysphagia (CRAD) in head and neck cancer (HNC) patients, comparing high-volume strength training to combined strength-skill training with either real or sham...

Sexuality in Kenya: A Media Framing and Content Analysis of The Nation and The Standard Newspapers

The 2014 and 2019 reproductive healthcare bills tabled in the Kenyan parliament were withdrawn amid tensions involving the state, cultural values, and religious ideologies, whose norms regarding sexuality shaped the national debate. Public discourse framed these bills as contradi...

Delivering building demand flexibility for grid-interactive operation: from perception and cognition to decision, execution, and verification

As both buildings and power systems undergo rapid decarbonization, demand flexibility (DF) in buildings has emerged as a key enabler for renewable energy integration, grid reliability, energy resilience, and efficient and low carbon operation. By dynamically adjusting building en...

Histological aging signatures for monitoring tissue-specific aging and disease

Aging is the primary risk factor for chronic disease and is characterized by profound structural and architectural remodeling of human tissues. Here, we present a comprehensive assessment of these changes using 25,712 whole-slide histopathological images from 40 tissue types acro...

LIPOGRID: A HIGH-THROUGHPUT MULTI-OMICS PERTURBATION SCREEN DISSECTS THE GENETIC ARCHITECTURE OF LIPID METABOLISM

Lipids constitute one of the largest and most diverse classes of cellular molecules, sustaining membrane architecture, energy storage, and signaling. Consequently, their dysregulation underlies a broad spectrum of human disease. However, the genetic mechanisms governing lipid hom...

On the Order of Intersecting Hypergraphs

Abstract. Determining the maximum number of edges in an intersecting hypergraph on a fixed ground set under additional constraints is one of the central topics in extremal combinatorics. In contrast, there are few results on analogous problems concerning the maximum order of such...

Data-driven mapping of known and novel fluid biomarker progression profiles in genetic frontotemporal lobar degeneration

Abstract Introduction Recent proteomic studies have identified both established and novel proteins in genetic frontotemporal lobar degeneration (FTLD). However, it remains unclear at what point in the disease these proteins deviate from normal levels and how their trajectories re...

Management of high-risk (B3) breast lesions in symptomatic practice: evidence review and practical recommendations for multidisciplinary care

Borderline breast lesions (B3 lesions, also termed lesions of uncertain malignant potential or high-risk lesions) represent a heterogeneous group of entities associated with variable risks of malignancy. While the management of screen-detected B3 lesions has become increasingly s...

Silent yet Not Deserted: Associations Between Ringer Modes, Mobile Phone Use, and Digital Stress

While digital disconnection and smartphone regulation have gained scholarly attention, little is known about phone setting customizations. Currently, there is inconsistent evidence on whether modifying ringer modes reduces actual smartphone use and digital stress. Some studies su...

Lightweight Asymmetric Convolutional Residual Network for Efficient Motion Image Deblurring

Motion image deblurring remains challenging because many existing models rely on complex architectures, leading to high computational cost and parameter redundancy, particularly under non-uniform blur in real-world scenes. To mitigate these limitations, we propose a Lightweight A...

Technical note: reconstructing dose distributions from manually planned electron boosts in breast radiotherapy

Purpose In breast radiotherapy, delivery of manually-calculated electron boosts limits retrospective dose–response analyses as dose distribution is unavailable. This work evaluates the feasibility of reconstructing dose distributions from manually planned electron boosts in breas...

Percentiles for crying, regurgitation, stool consistency, and CoMiSSTM in presumed healthy infants

Parents frequently consult health care professionals because of infant regurgitation, crying and stool consistency. The Cow’s Milk-related Symptom Score (CoMiSS TM ) is an awareness tool for cow’s milk allergy. We aimed to characterize the distribution of CoMiSS items in presumed...

Household Refrigerators as the “Last Mile” of the Cold Chain: Impacts on Dietary Quality in Rural China

ABSTRACT Household refrigerators extend the last mile of the cold chain into the home, but their implications for dietary quality in developing food systems remain unclear. Using household panel data from China's Fixed Observation Rural Survey for 2003–2018, we estimate the effec...

Identification of Impurities in Norvancomycin Hydrochloride Drug Substance Using UHPLC‐QTOF‐MS

ABSTRACT Rationale Norvancomycin (NVCM) hydrochloride belongs to a group of glycopeptide antibiotics and exhibits strong effects against Gram‐positive cocci and bacilli. The safety of patients' lives is directly related to the quality of drugs. The impurities play often an import...

Modeling local vulnerability to COVID-19 in an outbreak setting

Identifying factors that affect the vulnerability of areas to COVID-19 infection is essential, as it helps to identify the locations or risk groups that require additional attention. While connectivity among regions is a crucial driver in the epidemic growth, it is also observed...

Challenges and needs of people living with diabetes in self-management in Ethiopia: A qualitative exploration

Abstract Background Diabetes is unique due to its cross-cutting nature, impacting multiple organ systems and increasing the risk for other communicable and non-communicable diseases if not managed properly. Managing diabetes involves frequent blood glucose measurement, medication...

Prevalence and prognostic implications of systemic autoinflammatory and autoimmune diseases in myelodysplastic neoplasms: a retrospective Belgian cohort study

Myelodysplastic neoplasms (MDS) are clonal hematopoietic disorders marked by ineffective hematopoiesis and an increased risk of progression to acute myeloid leukemia (AML). Growing evidence highlights the role of inflammation in MDS pathogenesis, and systemic autoinflammatory and...

Multicenter retrospective study on perceived effectiveness, reported side effects, and cognitive outcomes of SSRIs in 22q11.2 deletion syndrome

22q11.2 deletion syndrome (22q11DS) markedly increases risk of psychiatric disorders, including anxiety and mood disorders, and is associated with a spectrum of cognitive impairment, from borderline functioning to intellectual disability, with cognitive decline frequently reporte...

Defining Language Profiles in Young Autistic Children Across Verbal, Speaking, and Generative Dimensions

Language trajectories in autism are highly heterogeneous and cannot be captured by unidimensional classifications. Research and clinical practice often rely on verbal/non-verbal or speaking/non-speaking labels, but these categories, when used in isolation, obscure distinct lingui...