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Multiple myeloma (MM) is a malignancy of antibody-secreting plasma cells in the bone marrow (BM). MM is the second most common hematological malignancy, accounting for about 14% of blood cancers. Despite the improvements in the treatment of MM, the disease remains incurable, and essentially all patients end up relapsing. Deletion of chromosome 16q, the location of tumor suppressor CYLD, occurs in 35% of MM patients. CYLD is a deubiquitinase, most recognized for its function as a negative regulator of the nuclear factor kappa B (NF-κB) pathway. The loss of CYLD is associated with disease progression and worse survival in MM, but its significance in drug response is unknown. As the loss of CYLD is common in MM, determining its effect on drug response is essential. Analysis of data gained from MM patient samples were used to study the effect of CYLD copy number status on drug response. The treatments were selected based on previous research performed by our group. The effect of homozygous deletion was most significant in inducing resistance to BMS-754807, an inhibitor of insulin-like growth factor 1 receptor. To investigate the role of loss of CYLD on drug response in vitro, cell lines with CYLD knockout (KO) were created using the clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR) – CRISPR associated protein 9 (Cas9) technology. An established CYLD-KO cell line was treated with carfilzomib, bortezomib, dexamethasone and BMS-754807 to assess the effect of CYLD-KO. The CYLD-KO slightly increased the sensitivity to BMS-754807, but essentially no differences were detected in response to the drugs. The effect of CYLD-KO was additionally explored to NF-κB - and Wnt-pathway activation by Western blot analysis, but due to technical difficulties, the results were inconclusive. The loss of CYLD is a common genetic aberration in MM, giving a survival benefit for the malignant cells. Based on the results from patient data analysis, the loss of CYLD could promote drug resistance to BMS-754807, and the effect should be further studied with more cell lines with CYLD-KO. As the population ages, and as the median age of newly diagnosed patients is 70, the need for efficient MM therapies increases. Studying the mechanisms behind drug resistance and sensitivity is essential in the aim of improving the efficacy of MM therapy and, in the end, the overall survival of the patients.

The use of fossil fuels is a significant contributor to greenhouse gas emissions, making the transition to zero-carbon energy systems and the improvements in energy efficiency important in climate change mitigation. The energy transition also puts the citizen in a more influential position and changes the traditional dynamics between energy producers and consumers when citizens produce their own energy. Furthermore, due to the opportunity and capacity of the demand side, the energy transition places a greater emphasis on energy planning at the local level, which requires new solutions and changes in the management of the energy system. One rising phenomenon is the potential of bottom-up developments like energy communities. Within the building sector, housing cooperatives have started to emerge as energy communities, offering a way to address the energy transition through bottom-up-driven energy actions that provide renewable energy and other benefits to the local community. This master thesis examines housing cooperatives' energy communities and their role in the energy transition. The research addresses the shared renovation project in Hepokulta, Turku, seen from the energy community perspective. Furthermore, the research highlights the importance of niche development in sustainable transition, acknowledging energy communities as socio-technical niches where development is partly embedded in renewable energy technology and partly in new practices. The concept of energy community is therefore analysed through the lens of Strategic Niche Management, which focuses on expectations, networks, and learning. This research aims to analyse how residents in Hepokulta perceive the energy community project through the niche processes and how the development of energy communities might affect urban development. Analysing the residents' perceptions provide insight into the energy community characteristics and the relationship between residents and the project development processes. Additionally, the analysis identifies matters that could be changed to improve the development. The thesis is a mixed methods research combining quantitative and qualitative data, which was collected through a survey sent to the eight housing cooperatives in Hepokulta. The research showed that residents perceive the shared project in Hepokulta as essential for the area's development. Moreover, many residents overlooked the social aspects of the development, highlighting the absence of the energy community perspective in the renovation. The findings suggest some weaknesses within the three niche processes, including the early involvement of residents and communication. Furthermore, although the residents perceived themselves as important actors and the literature emphasised the importance of the demand side in future energy systems, the research revealed that the connection between project development and the residents is still lacking. However, the analysis indicates that introducing additional actors could help the energy community develop. External assistance could, for instance, benefit the housing cooperatives by facilitating improvements in the decision-making processes, the network between actors, and the sharing of information and skills.

This master’s thesis includes two sections: the present summarizing report and the article manuscript. The purpose of the study is to explore the benefits of an acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT)-based intervention course to university students’ well-being, using both quantitative and qualitative methods. The COVID-19 pandemic has decreased university students’ well-being and increased their risk of burnout. The declined state of student well-being calls for measures in exploring ways of promoting student well-being and preventing study-related burnout. The intervention course aimed to increase students’ psychological flexibility and organized studying skills, as means to positively impact their well-being and studying. A total of 189 participated in the study in the spring of 2021. Students’ risk of burnout was measured pre- and post-intervention, to statistically define whether students experienced that the course impacted their risk of burnout. To explore the course benefits in depth, students’ written reflective reports post-intervention were analyzed using abductive content analysis. The results were statistically compared according to the risk of burnout group assigned pre-intervention. The results showed that the intervention course led to a positive change in students' risk of burnout. The content analysis revealed seven main categories of benefits of the course: 1. improved general well-being, 2. improved self-knowledge, 3. increased psychological flexibility, 4. improved study practices and study motivation, 5. increased self-compassion, 6. gained peer-support, and 7. improved organized studying. These benefits were experienced by students regardless of their initial risk of burnout. The study highlights the potential of ACT-based intervention courses in improving the well-being and studying skills of university students, suggesting a need for further research on burnout prevention through such measures. The prospective publication channel for the research article manuscript is Research in Higher Education by Springer.

Highly skilled migrants are an exception in otherwise tightening immigration policies in Europe, as they are welcomed and competed by most countries due to aspired effects to competitiveness and economic growth of countries. Meanwhile, the effects to shrinking and ageing population underline the need for immigration. However, policies to retain highly skilled migrants seem to lack concrete measures, and research regarding integration of highly skilled migrants seem to focus on their labor market and workplace integration as workforce and economic advantage, rather than on their integration as individuals with need to feel a sense of belonging to other parts of society, as well. Therefore, the objective of this master’s thesis is to increase the understanding of highly skilled migrants’ perceptions and experiences of the process of social integration, as well as the factors influencing to them. The theoretical and conceptual framework of this thesis is constructed around two key concepts: highly skilled migrant refers to a migrant with a tertiary education degree and specific skills, while the process of social integration is defined in this thesis as a dimension of the process of integration, which refers to the sense of belonging of the migrant, as well as to the role of society in accepting the migrant. The regional context of this thesis is Helsinki metropolitan area in Finland due to its large number of foreigners and the importance of the information and communication technology sector in the area. In order to achieve the objective of this thesis, four highly skilled migrants working in the ICT sector and living in Helsinki metropolitan area were interviewed and requested to write diaries. The gathered research material was then analyzed by applying thematic analysis. This thesis indicates that highly skilled migrants perceive social integration as a subjective process, which they experience mainly as their own responsibility. The process is, however, influenced by the attitudes, expectations and atmosphere of different levels of the society. The experiences of highly skilled migrants indicate that they are welcomed especially because of their social status as highly skilled, as the negative experiences seemed to be mainly related to their foreignness. The sense of belonging was also observed to be influenced positively by having a citizenship of a European country. Connections with Finnish people and cultural context particularly have a strong impact on the sense of belonging to society, and studies in Finland prior to working were perceived as having a positive impact to that. On the other hand, creating connections and relationships with Finns was perceived as difficult, especially due to challenges in getting to know Finns and to learn Finnish language. Although this thesis indicates that workplace can play a significant role in the process of social integration, work is perceived as only one part of life, and therefore, further examination of other dimensions of integration regarding highly skilled migrants is needed.

This master’s thesis focuses on exploring the impact of basic income experiments and pilots in the Global North on the social dimension of well-being and their implications for families. The background to this research is that basic income has a definition but often basic income experiments do not fully fulfil this definition. Studies indicate that a good economic situation has a positive effect on well-being. Studies also suggest that social relationships, social activities, a sense of belonging, and good interpersonal relationships can increase well-being. By supporting families, society supports individuals and the people close to them. Supporting parents in particular often has a direct impact on the well-being of their children. However, previous studies have focused more on the effects of basic income on employment. The aim is to gain a deeper understanding of the impact of basic income experiments on the social dimension of well-being and the impact on families. Previous research on the effects of poverty on the well-being of families and individuals through social relationships and a sense of belonging serve as a frame of reference for this thesis. The research questions were: What are the results of basic income experiments in the Global North regarding the social dimension of well-being? Based on these results, what kind of problems could basic income address? News articles from the Basic Income Earth Network website (BIEN, https://basicincome.org/news/) from January 9, 2014 to May 31, 2022 (n=2250) are used as the data for this thesis. The methods of the thesis were web scraping and a scoping review. The material of the thesis consisted of the analysis of the results of ten different experiments. Therefore, the final results from the experiments were collected through a scoping review of ten reports for more in-depth analysis (n=10). The results of the thesis indicated that basic income helped those who participated in basic income experiments to deepen their social relationships, improved their sense of belonging, relieved stress, and had a positive effect on family relationships. However, the results also suggested that well-being may be a subjective experience and many factors may have influenced these outcomes. In addition, the results showed that the effects on individuals as well as families were positive and similar, but there were also differences. Future research could focus on a more in-depth study of the effects of the basic income experiment on social well-being and sense of belonging. In addition, the long-term effects should be examined, in particular the impact of basic income on the increased risks of poverty over the course of life and at different stages of life.

This thesis examines the macroeconomic impact of Covid-19, constructing a DSGE model incorporating wage rigidity and consumption habit. This paper captures the characteristics of the Finnish economy, such as high wages and high consumption habits, and aims to analyze the macroeconomic impact of Covid-19 in Finland. Based on the New Keynesian DSGE model and combined with the SVAR method, focusing on the adverse effects of Covid-19 and analyzing how to mitigate its negative effects. After building the DSGE model, Bayesian estimation was performed using the parameters of Kilponen (2016) as the prior distribution, after which impulse response analysis was performed. At the same time, the effectiveness of fiscal policy and monetary policy is analyzed. The results of the empirical model support the conclusions in the theoretical model. The results show that the decline in utility due to insufficient consumption preferences significantly impacts consumption and output, causing aggregate consumption to decline and remain below steady-state levels for a long time. The level of labor supply is negatively affected by underconsumption. But the shock to consumer preference increased investment, offsetting some of the negative shock to output. Inflation and real interest rates also took a downward hit. Real interest rates first fall and then rise but remain below a stable level for a long time as the supply of capital rises when the demand for capital falls. A negative shock to technology causes aggregate consumption and aggregate output, and labor and capital goods to fall. In contrast, a fall in capital value causes Tobin's q to fall. Looking at the impact time of the impulse response, we find that the negative impact on macroeconomic variables is large and long-lasting. A positive government spending shock of one standard deviation would directly increase aggregate output, but its impact on output would be diminished. Compared with fiscal policy and monetary policy, the role of government spending is more likely to bring the economy into a stable state, and its response is more sensitive. We find that fiscal policy has a more significant impact on macroeconomic regulation; this suggests that monetary and fiscal policy need to work together in the context of high inflation and low interest rates. Fiscal policy drives economic recovery and can provide strong support for the realization of monetary policy.

One of the greatest challenges of our time is securing the global protein supply for the growing population in a sustainable manner. Fermentation with lactic acid bacteria has a long history of successful employment for the production of fermented foods and beverages. During this study, the ability of diverse lactic acid bacteria for fermentation and sensory improvement of leguminous and cereal protein concentrates was investigated.The main aim of this study was to overcome the sensory limitations of these plant protein ingredients by finding suitable candidates for the design of new starter cultures for their fermentation. A collection of 82 lactic acid bacteria was screened for fermentation of leguminous and cereal protein concentrates with different nutrient supplementations. Most strains required additional nutrients to adequately acidify the leguminous protein concentrate during a 24-h fermentation, while the cereal-based substrate appeared to be a more complete growth substrate. Descriptive sensory analysis also revealed differences in the aroma perceived by a panel depending on the matrix, supplementation and fermenting strain employed. Three of the strains that produced the most desirable aromas and acidified sufficiently the test matrixes were further studied. All three strains preferentially fermented glucose to lactic acid rather than any other sugar. The concentration of hexanal, one of the volatile compounds involved in grassy and beany off-flavor formation, reduced during fermentations in favor of 1-hexanol, a compound with a significantly higher odor threshold. However, only two of the cultures were able to prevent the growth of contaminating bacteria during fermentation. The results of this study can provide guidance for selecting potential starter cultures and fermentation substrate composition to improve the aroma of plant protein ingredients. Two of the selected strains especially have shown potential to be used as starter cultures for the leguminous protein concentrate. Further studies are required to optimize the performance of the selected strains in the test matrixes and to quantitatively characterize their effect on the substrates’ volatile profile, taste and antinutritional factor content

Development is a fundamental issue for many countries especially, developing nations. The media can play an important role in national development by connecting the government, people and development process. Thus, development journalism is one form of media function that emphasizes on advancement of living conditions of people by investigating and scrutinizing development plans, policies and actions of the government. This is why I decided to examine development issues in the media of developing country, Bangladesh. Specifically, my purpose was to explore how Bangladeshi journalists represent development issues in their media as notion of development journalism implies that it should focus on advancement of ordinary people. To conduct the research, I selected three most popular and influential newspapers (e-version) of Bangladesh in which one English and two other Bengali. These are: The Daily Star, Prothom Alo and Jugantor and the data regarding the development news stories were selected from January 2018 to June 2018. By applying mixed method, I carried out the quantitative and qualitative content analysis of development issues, for qualitative approach frame analysis was used. The study was based on the Modernization and Participatory theory of development communication and it explored representative nature of development news published by those newspapers in that period as well frequency of development news and themes in those papers. The findings revealed that development issues get little attention to the Bangladeshi media. Newspapers of this study published less than 3 percent development news in the time duration of January 2018 to June 2018 which showed a disappointing trend towards the practice of development journalism. The analysis also showed that among 13 development news themes, energy and infrastructure was the most published news topic followed by trade and business, education; on the contrary, gender equality and women empowerment, ethnic and minority rights, environmental sustainability, good governance and administrative reforms were the least preferable themes. Among three papers The Daily Star and Prothom Alo covered more diverse themes than that of Jugantor. In addition to those, development priorities exhibited in three newspapers overall reflected Bangladesh’s government development goals; however, discrepancies among them implied development journalism differ on the basis of each newspapers’ structural imperatives. Finally, this study examined the representative nature of development news in three newspapers of Bangladesh. The analysis revealed that journalists of Bangladeshi print media prefer unidirectional or modernization development communication approach (59%) in development journalism practice, it also showed a moderate portion (41%) of the representation of the participatory approach. This indicate they represent a combined approach of development communication approach with persuasive communication and Western-styled development model along with acknowledging the general peoples’ view although the participatory portion is not satisfactory to the expectation level of development journalism practice.

Plants are vital to all terrestrial ecosystems by providing ecosystem services through photosynthesis- derived compounds. Throughout the millennia, plant metabolism has diversified in the form of all plant secondary metabolites, ranging from metabolite groups such as terpenes to alkaloids to flavonoids. Many of these secondary metabolites are economically valued for their chemical, pharmaceutical and physical properties. The flavonoids are one of the largest groups and are known to provide competitional advantages and increase of survival of many plant species in extreme environments. One of the critical enzymes in the whole biosynthesis pathway of flavonoids is the dihydroflavonol 4- reductase (DFR). DFR regulates the formation of leucoanthocyanidins, predecessors of colourful anthocyanins. Anthocyanins are an economically significant group of molecules, especially for horticulturists and plant breeders, but also for nutritional and health scientists due to their potential health benefits. Dihydroflavonol 4-reductase is a much-studied enzyme due to its significant role in flavonoid biosynthesis and the economic interests of plant breeders and alike. Previous studies have expanded the knowledge of flavonoid biosynthesis and have identified several amino acid residues in the DFR structure affecting the substrate specificity of the enzyme and, consequently, the flower colours. However, only a single crystal structure model of the dihydroflavonol 4-reductase has been solved so far, originating from the grapevine Vitis vinifera. Although a single crystal structure can facilitate further structure-to-function studies associated with dihydroflavonol 4-reductase, further studies need to be carried out to shine a light on the functional basis of the enzyme. Therefore, this study aims to resolve petunia and gerbera dihydroflavonol 4-reductase crystal structures, expanding the knowledge of structural variations within the uncharted families of angiosperms, Solanaceae and Asteraceae. Several recombinant protein expression systems were utilised in my attempts to solve the crystal structure of the DFRs. These systems ranged from the bacterium Escherichia coli to yeast species such as Saccharomyces cerevisiae and Pichia pastoris, as well as the tobacco plant Nicotiana benthamiana. The genes encoding for Petunia wildtype DFRA, three mutants, and three Gerbera DFR variants were cloned to several expression vectors. Their presence and expression were identified using various genetic methodologies and enzymological assays. The expression of DFRs using an E. coli-based expression system was verified. However, the trials with E. coli were deemed unsuccessful due to the majority of the protein ending in inclusion bodies with no detectable activity. An alternative system using agroinfiltration of N. benthamiana was later utilised, as significant amounts were detected in the plant tissue extracts following the agrobacterial infiltration. Although the proteins were expressed in high quantities, no purification procedures have been established to provide plant tissue-extracted protein in crystallography-grade purity. With the protein supplied by a plant-based system and several small- scale purification steps, purified DFR enzymes could be utilised in crystallisation studies. Due to significant contamination by RuBisCO in the protein samples, alternative systems based on S. cerevisiae and Pichia pastoris were investigated, and a successful Pichia-based expression was established. Several sets of plasmids with variable expression systems were constructed in this study, facilitating future experiments into the dynamics and structure of dihydroflavonol 4-reductases. Ground-breaking techniques based on computational modelling were utilised to hypothesise the role of prior determined amino acid residues in enzyme catalysis and substrate recognition. Possible crystallisation-related issues originating from protein structure were approached using the same techniques, opening new windows and possibilities into determining the structure of Petunia hybrida and Gerbera hybrida dihydroflavonol 4-reductase structures using tools of protein engineering.

This MA thesis explores the use of English on Instagram in the Finnish capital region that consists of the municipalities of Helsinki, Vantaa, Espoo and Kauniainen. Building on previous research on Virtual Linguistic Landscapes and English as a lingua franca, this thesis investigates the extent to which English is used in the study area and how different types of areas and locations differ in terms of English use in the study area. For this purpose, I use geotagged social media data and methods from the fields of natural language processing and geoinformatics. Firstly, I analyse the general linguistic make-up of the study area to understand the use of English in relation to other languages. Secondly, I analyse and compare how the use of English and Finnish are spread geographically across the Finnish capital region on Instagram and identify spatial clusters by means of spatial autocorrelation analysis. Lastly, I seek to provide further insights into the different types of locations where English, Finnish and other languages are used by using the Corine Land Cover inventory for categorising different types of locations. The results of this study show that the English language has a very strong presence as the second most used language in the Virtual Linguistic Landscape of the Finnish capital region. English is used especially often by users who use more than one language on Instagram. The spatial patterns of English use show that the language is used particularly often in the Helsinki city centre, western Helsinki and eastern Espoo and least in north-eastern Helsinki and Vantaa. English has a strong presence in essentially all the studied location types, especially in commercial and urban contexts. The relative proportions of English use are highest at airport areas and lowest in various sport and leisure facilities, where Finnish is used significantly more than any other language. In the analysis, I also include frequent observations on Finnish and other languages, which provide further insights into the rich Virtual Linguistic Landscape of the capital city region.