Issues Associated with Late Onset Deafness

Late deafened adults are individuals who have acquired a severe or profound hearing loss in adulthood. They comprise the largest proportion of the deaf population, yet little information is available about their condition and its influence on them. The current article will discuss problems experienced by late deafened adults, psychosocial aspects associated with late hearing loss, and suggestions that might assist professionals in working with these individuals. In addition to a literature review, personal accounts of the first author will be provided

Multivalent Epigraph Hemagglutinin Vaccine Protects against Influenza B Virus in Mice

Influenza B virus is a respiratory pathogen that contributes to seasonal epidemics, accounts for approximately 25% of global influenza infections, and can induce severe disease in young children. While vaccination is the most commonly used method of preventing influenza infections, current vaccines only induce strain-specific responses and have suboptimal efficacy when mismatched from circulating strains. Further, two influenza B virus lineages have been described, B/Yamagatalike and B/Victoria-like, and the limited cross-reactivity between the two lineages provides an additional barrier in developing a universal influenza B virus vaccine. Here, we report a novel multivalent vaccine using computationally designed Epigraph hemagglutinin proteins targeting both the B/Yamagata-like and B/Victoria-like lineages. When compared to the quadrivalent commercial vaccine, the Epigraph vaccine demonstrated increased breadth of neutralizing antibody and T cell responses. After lethal heterologous influenza B virus challenge, mice immunized with the Epigraph vaccine were completely protected against both weight loss and mortality. The superior cross-reactive immunity conferred by the Epigraph vaccine immunogens supports their continued investigation as a universal influenza B virus vaccine

An Examination of Student Engagement and Retention in an Honors Program

Honors programs at colleges and universities provide academic and developmental opportunities for high-ability students. Learning communities, defined as a group of students who live together, are connected through membership in a common organization, and take classes together, are often a component of honors programs. Learning communities provide an academic and social community that complements curricular requirements. At the University of Nebraska at Kearney (UNK), a higher education institution in the Midwest, ninety percent of the freshman honor students live together and ninety-five percent take an honors class in their first semester on campus. The honors program at UNK is classified as a learning community; however, the term has varying definitions based on the classification of upper- and lower-division students at different institutions. Most research on learning communities focuses just on first-year students and the first-year experience. Very little research focuses on learning communities that include upper-division students

Issues Associated with Late Onset Deafness

Late deafened adults are individuals who have acquired a severe or profound hearing loss in adulthood. They comprise the largest proportion of the deaf population, yet little information is available about their condition and its influence on them. The current article will discuss problems experienced by late deafened adults, psychosocial aspects associated with late hearing loss, and suggestions that might assist professionals in working with these individuals. In addition to a literature review, personal accounts of the first author will be provided

Investigation of the polarization-dependent diffraction of deep dielectric rectangular transmission gratings illuminated in Littrow mounting

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Multivalent Epigraph Hemagglutinin Vaccine Protects against Influenza B Virus in Mice

Influenza B virus is a respiratory pathogen that contributes to seasonal epidemics, accounts for approximately 25% of global influenza infections, and can induce severe disease in young children. While vaccination is the most commonly used method of preventing influenza infections, current vaccines only induce strain-specific responses and have suboptimal efficacy when mismatched from circulating strains. Further, two influenza B virus lineages have been described, B/Yamagata-like and B/Victoria-like, and the limited cross-reactivity between the two lineages provides an additional barrier in developing a universal influenza B virus vaccine. Here, we report a novel multivalent vaccine using computationally designed Epigraph hemagglutinin proteins targeting both the B/Yamagata-like and B/Victoria-like lineages. When compared to the quadrivalent commercial vaccine, the Epigraph vaccine demonstrated increased breadth of neutralizing antibody and T cell responses. After lethal heterologous influenza B virus challenge, mice immunized with the Epigraph vaccine were completely protected against both weight loss and mortality. The superior cross-reactive immunity conferred by the Epigraph vaccine immunogens supports their continued investigation as a universal influenza B virus vaccine

Multi-Level Switching and Reversible Current Driven Domain-Wall Motion in Single CoFeB/MgO/CoFeB-Based Perpendicular Magnetic Tunnel Junctions

One of the critical issues in spintronics-based technologies is to increase the data storage density. Current strategy is based on shrinking the devices size down to tens of nanometers, or several nanometers, which is reaching its limit. A new proposal is to use multi-level cells (MLCs) to store more than two bits in each cell. In this work, the multi-level switching is realized in CoFeB/MgO/CoFeB based nano-scale single perpendicular magnetic tunnel junctions (p-MTJs) with three or four stable resistance states. A large range of writing currents for each state is obtained, accompanying with a good repeatability of set-reset operations between different states. The developed multi-domain model perfectly matches the experimental results, reflecting the magnetic behaviors during multi-level switching. Furthermore, current-driven domain wall (DW) motion is revealed in the circular p-MTJs, where the DW position can be reversibly manipulated by applied current. To design high-performance multi-level p-MTJs, the parameter diagrams are calculated, suggesting various feasible strategies to improve the multi-level switching through materials optimization and devices geometry. In summary, the demonstration of multi-level switching in single p-MTJ shows the high potential of realizing the new generation of p-MTJ-based multi-level spintronic devices, such as multi-level memories and spin-neuron devices