Cognitive features of self-stigmatization among juvenile delinquents

The present study investigates cognitive features of stigmatization phenomenon among juvenile delinquents in Kyrgyzstan. It attempts to describe certain peculiarities of juvenile delinquents’ self-schemas and self-stigmatization. The study, additionally, tackles the issue of currently existing stigmas regarding juvenile delinquency in the country. One hundred and fifty four university students were asked to complete a questionnaire that would measure the level of external stigmatization towards juvenile delinquents and those who were once placed into correctional institution. Students showed presence of stigmatization towards people with a criminal record. Fifteen juveniles from the detention school who attended a socio-psychological training as well as eighteen delinquent juveniles who attended the same detention school, but did not have any training, were asked to complete semantic differential self-questionnaires that measured the level of internal stigmatization. It was found that delinquent juveniles in Kyrgyzstan self stigmatize, when compared to the control group of fifty four non-delinquent juveniles, who attended a regular school. However, there was a trend towards positive effect of the socio-psychological training that was intended to develop delinquents’ social skills. Since self-stigmatization was shown to influence the process of rehabilitation and social adaptation, it might become one of the major obstacles for successful rehabilitation and re-integration of juvenile delinquents into society after graduation from the detention school. Our study, therefore, argues for the high need of specialized socio-psychological training program for juvenile delinquents

Pollutants degradation and power generation by photocatalytic fuel cells: A comprehensive review

Abstract Wastewater contains organic compounds (fatty acids, amino acids, and carbohydrates) that have a significant amount of chemical energy. In this regard, the use of wastewater for recovering energy by some appropriate energy conversion technologies can be considered as an appropriate approach to simultaneously achieve the reduction of environmental contamination and increasing supply of energy. The Photocatalytic Fuel Cell (PFC) can provide a new approach in developing technology for simultaneous organic pollutants removal from wastewaters and power generation, but it also has disadvantages, such as requires higher voltage, more cost and complexity. To present a comprehensive vision of the current state of the art, and progress the treatment efficiency and agitate new studies in these fields, this review discussed the study covering PFC aspects, with a focus on the comparison of pollutant degradation, power generation, different photoanode and photocathode materials as well as the application of the Fenton process in PFCs

The Arabic Version of the Impact of Event Scale-Revised : psychometric evaluation among psychiatric patients and the general public within the context of COVID-19 outbreak and quarantine as collective traumatic events

The Coronavirus Disease-19 (COVID-19) pandemic has provoked the development of negative emotions in almost all societies since it first broke out in late 2019. The Impact of Event Scale-Revised (IES-R) is widely used to capture emotions, thoughts, and behaviors evoked by traumatic events, including COVID-19 as a collective and persistent traumatic event. However, there is less agreement on the structure of the IES-R, signifying a need for further investigation. This study aimed to evaluate the psychometric properties of the Arabic version of the IES-R among individuals in Saudi quarantine settings, psychiatric patients, and the general public during the COVID-19 outbreak. Exploratory factor analysis revealed that the items of the IES-R present five factors with eigenvalues > 1. Examination of several competing models through confirmatory factor analysis resulted in a best fit for a six-factor structure, which comprises avoidance, intrusion, numbing, hyperarousal, sleep problems, and irritability/dysphoria. Multigroup analysis supported the configural, metric, and scalar invariance of this model across groups of gender, age, and marital status. The IES-R significantly correlated with the Depression Anxiety Stress Scale-8, perceived health status, and perceived vulnerability to COVID-19, denoting good criterion validity. HTMT ratios of all the subscales were below 0.85, denoting good discriminant validity. The values of coefficient alpha in the three samples ranged between 0.90 and 0.93. In path analysis, correlated intrusion and hyperarousal had direct positive effects on avoidance, numbing, sleep, and irritability. Numbing and irritability mediated the indirect effects of intrusion and hyperarousal on sleep and avoidance. This result signifies that cognitive activation is the main factor driving the dynamics underlying the behavioral, emotional, and sleep symptoms of collective COVID-19 trauma. The findings support the robust validity of the Arabic IES-R, indicating it as a sound measure that can be applied to a wide range of traumatic experiences

Quantitative cardiac magnetic resonance T2 imaging offers ability to non-invasively predict acute allograft rejection in children

BACKGROUND: Monitoring for acute allograft rejection improves outcomes after cardiac transplantation. Endomyocardial biopsy is the gold standard test defining rejection, but carries risk and has limitations. Cardiac magnetic resonance T2 mapping may be able to predict rejection in adults, but has not been studied in children. Our aim was to evaluate T2 mapping in identifying paediatric cardiac transplant patients with acute rejection. METHODS: Eleven paediatric transplant patients presenting 18 times were prospectively enrolled for non-contrast cardiac magnetic resonance at 1.5 T followed by endomyocardial biopsy. Imaging included volumetry, flow, and T2 mapping. Regions of interest were manually selected on the T2 maps using the middle-third technique in the left ventricular septal and lateral wall in a short-axis and four-chamber slice. Mean and maximum T2 values were compared with Student\u27s t-tests analysis. RESULTS: Five cases of acute rejection were identified in three patients, including two cases of grade 2R on biopsy and three cases of negative biopsy treated for clinical symptoms attributed to rejection (new arrhythmia, decreased exercise capacity). A monotonic trend between increasing T2 values and higher biopsy grades was observed: grade 0R T2 53.4 ± 3 ms, grade 1R T2 54.5 ms ± 3 ms, grade 2R T2 61.3 ± 1 ms. The five rejection cases had significantly higher mean T2 values compared to cases without rejection (58.3 ± 4 ms versus 53 ± 2 ms, p = 0.001). CONCLUSIONS: Cardiac magnetic resonance with quantitative T2 mapping may offer a non-invasive method for screening paediatric cardiac transplant patients for acute allograft rejection. More data are needed to understand the relationship between T2 and rejection in children

Picosecond pulsed 532 nm laser system for roughening and secondary electron yield reduction of inner surfaces of up to 15 m long tubes

Laser-induced surface structuring is a promising method to suppress electron mulitpacting in the vacuum pipes of particle accelerators. Electrons are scattered inside the rough surface structure, resulting in a low Secondary Electron Yield (SEY) of the material. However, laser processing of internal pipe surfaces with a large aspect ratio is technologically challenging in terms of laser beam guidance and focusing. We present a 532 nm ultrashort-pulse laser setup to process the inner parts of 15 m long beam vacuum tubes of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). Picosecond pulses at a repetition rate of 200 kHz are guided through an optical fiber toward an inchworm robot traveling inside the beam pipe. The system was installed, characterized, and tested for reliability. First surface treatments achieved the required scan precision. Cu2O-dominated nano-features were observed when processing at high average laser power (5 W) and slow scanning speed (5 mm s−1) in nitrogen flow, and the maximum SEY of copper was decreased from 2.1 to 0.7

Therapeutic targeting of replicative immortality

One of the hallmarks of malignant cell populations is the ability to undergo continuous proliferation. This property allows clonal lineages to acquire sequential aberrations that can fuel increasingly autonomous growth, invasiveness, and therapeutic resistance. Innate cellular mechanisms have evolved to regulate replicative potential as a hedge against malignant progression. When activated in the absence of normal terminal differentiation cues, these mechanisms can result in a state of persistent cytostasis. This state, termed “senescence,” can be triggered by intrinsic cellular processes such as telomere dysfunction and oncogene expression, and by exogenous factors such as DNA damaging agents or oxidative environments. Despite differences in upstream signaling, senescence often involves convergent interdependent activation of tumor suppressors p53 and p16/pRB, but can be induced, albeit with reduced sensitivity, when these suppressors are compromised. Doses of conventional genotoxic drugs required to achieve cancer cell senescence are often much lower than doses required to achieve outright cell death. Additional therapies, such as those targeting cyclin dependent kinases or components of the PI3K signaling pathway, may induce senescence specifically in cancer cells by circumventing defects in tumor suppressor pathways or exploiting cancer cells’ heightened requirements for telomerase. Such treatments sufficient to induce cancer cell senescence could provide increased patient survival with fewer and less severe side effects than conventional cytotoxic regimens. This positive aspect is countered by important caveats regarding senescence reversibility, genomic instability, and paracrine effects that may increase heterogeneity and adaptive resistance of surviving cancer cells. Nevertheless, agents that effectively disrupt replicative immortality will likely be valuable components of new combinatorial approaches to cancer therapy

Beyond graphene oxide: Laser engineering functionalized graphene for flexible electronics

Carbon nanomaterials, especially graphene, are promising due to their abundance and the possibility to exploit them in lightweight, flexible, and wearable electronics enabling paradigms such as the Internet of Things. However, conventional methods to synthesize and integrate graphene into functional materials and flexible devices are either hazardous, time demanding, or excessively energy-consuming. To overcome these issues, here we propose a new concept based on the laser processing of single-layer diazonium-functionalized graphene. This is a safe, inexpensive, and environmentally-friendly method making it a competitive alternative for graphene-device fabrication. Flexible chemiresistors exhibit sensitivity for breath (water vapor and CO2) and ethanol detection up to 1500% higher than laser-reduced graphene oxide devices. We attribute this enhanced sensitivity to an optimal balance between structural defects and electrical conductivity. Flexible electronic circuits demonstrate a superb resilience against scratching and high current stability up to 98% with durability against 180° bending cycles for continuous operation of several weeks. This work can impact biomedical technology and electronics where tunable electrical conductivity, sensitivity, and mechanical stability are of uttermost importance. © 2020 The Royal Society of Chemistry

Genomic instability in human cancer: molecular insights and opportunities for therapeutic attack and prevention through diet and nutrition

Genomic instability can initiate cancer, augment progression, and influence the overall prognosis of the affected patient. Genomic instability arises from many different pathways, such as telomere damage, centrosome amplification, epigenetic modifications, and DNA damage from endogenous and exogenous sources, and can be perpetuating, or limiting, through the induction of mutations or aneuploidy, both enabling and catastrophic. Many cancer treatments induce DNA damage to impair cell division on a global scale but it is accepted that personalized treatments, those that are tailored to the particular patient and type of cancer, must also be developed. In this review, we detail the mechanisms from which genomic instability arises and can lead to cancer, as well as treatments and measures that prevent genomic instability or take advantage of the cellular defects caused by genomic instability. In particular, we identify and discuss five priority targets against genomic instability: (1) prevention of DNA damage; (2) enhancement of DNA repair; (3) targeting deficient DNA repair; (4) impairing centrosome clustering; and, (5) inhibition of telomerase activity. Moreover, we highlight vitamin D and B, selenium, carotenoids, PARP inhibitors, resveratrol, and isothiocyanates as priority approaches against genomic instability. The prioritized target sites and approaches were cross validated to identify potential synergistic effects on a number of important areas of cancer biology

Biomass burning, land-cover change, and the hydrological cycle in Northern sub-Saharan Africa

The Northern Sub-Saharan African (NSSA) region, which accounts for 20%–25%of the global carbon emissions from biomass burning, also suffers from frequent drought episodes and other disruptions to the hydrological cycle whose adverse societal impacts have been widely reported during the last several decades. This paper presents a conceptual framework of the NSSA regional climate system components that may be linked to biomass burning, as well as detailed analyses of a variety of satellite data for 2001–2014 in conjunction with relevant model-assimilated variables. Satellite fire detections in NSSA show that the vast majority (\u3e75%) occurs in the savanna and woody savanna land-cover types. Starting in the 2006–2007 burning season through the end of the analyzed data in 2014, peak burning activity showed a net decrease of 2–7%/yr in different parts of NSSA, especially in the savanna regions. However, fire distribution shows appreciable coincidence with land-cover change. Although there is variable mutual exchange of different land cover types, during 2003–2013, cropland increased at an estimated rate of 0.28%/yr of the total NSSA land area,with most of it (0.18%/yr) coming from savanna.During the last decade, conversion to croplands increased in some areas classified as forests and wetlands, posing a threat to these vital and vulnerable ecosystems. Seasonal peak burning is anticorrelated with annual water-cycle indicators such as precipitation, soil moisture, vegetation greenness, and evapotranspiration, except in humid West Africa (5°–10° latitude),where this anti-correlation occurs exclusively in the dry season and burning virtually stops when monthly mean precipitation reaches 4 mm d−1. These results provide observational evidence of changes in land-cover and hydrological variables that are consistent with feedbacks from biomass burning in NSSA, and encourage more synergistic modeling and observational studies that can elaborate this feedback mechanism