Pre-existing virus-specific CD8+ T-cells provide protection against pneumovirus-induced disease in mice

Pneumoviruses such as pneumonia virus of mice (PVM), bovine respiratory syncytial virus (bRSV) or human (h)RSV are closely related pneumoviruses that cause severe respiratory disease in their respective hosts. It is well-known that T-cell responses are essential in pneumovirus clearance, but pneumovirus-specific T-cell responses also are important mediators of severe immunopathology. In this study we determined whether memory- or pre-existing, transferred virus-specific CD8 + T-cells provide protection against PVM-induced disease. We show that during infection with a sublethal dose of PVM, both natural killer (NK) cells and CD8 + T-cells expand relatively late. Induction of CD8 + T-cell memory against a single CD8 + T-cell epitope, by dendritic cell (DC)-peptide immunization, leads to partial protection against PVM challenge and prevents Th2 differentiation of PVM-induced CD4 T-cells. In addition, adoptively transferred PVM-specific CD8 + T-cells, covering the entire PVM-specific CD8 + T-cell repertoire, provide partial protection from PVM-induced disease. From these data we infer that antigen-specific memory CD8 + T-cells offer significant protection to PVM-induced disease. Thus, CD8 + T-cells, despite being a major cause of PVM-associated pathology during primary infection, may offer promising targets of a protective pneumovirus vaccine

The clean conscience at work: Emotions, intuitions and morality

How do people decide what is right and wrong, and to what extent are their actions guided by such moral considerations? Inspired by philosophical traditions, early approaches to morality focused on rationality, and assumed that people arrive at moral standards by logical thought. More recently, however, psychologists have explored the influence of emotions and intuitions on morality, and evidence has been accumulating that moral decisions and behaviors are far from rational, but instead, are guided by intuitions and situational considerations. For example, seemingly irrelevant concerns such as keeping one’s mind and spirit clean and pure can change people’s moral judgment. Emotions can also influence behavior, and positive, uplifting emotions such as elevation and gratitude can be harnessed to produce beneficial outcomes for individuals and organizations alike. Furthermore, people appear to aspire to an equilibrium of moral self-worth, and engage in more or less ethical behavior depending on their currently perceived moral integrity. Thus, morality and ethical behavior is less likely to reside in the person than in the context, and thus, for the study of spirituality, it might be beneficial to focus on people’s situational constraints in the workplace rather than their stable dispositions. Further, because of their potential to inspire positive action, organizations might aim to make positive moral emotions, such as gratitude, elevation, and awe part of everyday work contexts. Overall, in organizations and the workplace, the goal shifts from trying to identify the moral individual to providing the contextual conditions that appeal to spiritual concerns in order to foster moral behavior.</jats:p

Probing the limit of nuclear existence: Proton emission from 159Re

AbstractThe observation of the new nuclide 15975Re84 provides important insights into the evolution of single-particle structure and the mass surface in heavy nuclei beyond the proton drip line. This nuclide, 26 neutrons away from the nearest stable rhenium isotope, was synthesised in the reaction 106Cd(58Ni, p4n) and identified via its proton radioactivity using the ritu gas-filled separator and the great focal-plane spectrometer. Comparisons of the measured proton energy (Ep=1805±20 keV) and decay half-life (t1/2=21±4 μs) with values calculated using the WKB method indicate that the proton is emitted from an h11/2 state. The implications of these results for future experimental investigations into even more proton unbound nuclei using in-flight separation techniques are considered

Soil nutrients and beta diversity in the Bornean Dipterocarpaceae: evidence for niche partitioning by tropical rain forest trees

1   The relative importance of niche- and dispersal-mediated processes in structuring diverse tropical plant communities remains poorly understood. Here, we link mesoscale beta diversity to soil variation throughout a lowland Bornean watershed underlain by alluvium, sedimentary and granite parent materials ( c . 340 ha, 8–200 m a.s.l.). We test the hypothesis that species turnover across the habitat gradient reflects interspecific partitioning of soil resources. 2   Floristic inventories (≥ 1 cm d.b.h.) of the Dipterocarpaceae, the dominant Bornean canopy tree family, were combined with extensive soil analyses in 30 (0.16 ha) plots. Six samples per plot were analysed for total C, N, P, K, Ca and Mg, exchangeable K, Ca and Mg, extractable P, texture, and pH. 3   Extractable P, exchangeable K, and total C, N and P varied significantly among substrates and were highest on alluvium. Thirty-one dipterocarp species ( n  = 2634 individuals, five genera) were recorded. Dipterocarp density was similar across substrates, but richness and diversity were highest on nutrient-poor granite and lowest on nutrient-rich alluvium. 4   Eighteen of 22 species were positively or negatively associated with parent material. In 8 of 16 abundant species, tree distribution (≥ 10 cm d.b.h.) was more strongly non-random than juveniles (1–10 cm d.b.h.), suggesting higher juvenile mortality in unsuitable habitats. The dominant species Dipterocarpus sublamellatus (> 50% of stems) was indifferent to substrate, but nine of 11 ‘subdominant’ species (> 8 individuals ha −1 ) were substrate specialists. 5   Eighteen of 22 species were significantly associated with soil nutrients, especially P, Mg and Ca. Floristic variation was significantly correlated with edaphic and geographical distance for all stems ≥ 1 cm d.b.h. in Mantel analyses. However, juvenile variation (1–10 cm d.b.h.) was more strongly related to geographical distance than edaphic factors, while the converse held for established trees (≥ 10 cm d.b.h.), suggesting increased importance of niche processes with size class. 6   Pervasive dipterocarp associations with soil factors suggest that niche partitioning structures dipterocarp tree communities. Yet, much floristic variation unrelated to soil was correlated with geographical distance between plots, suggesting that dispersal and niche processes jointly determine mesoscale beta diversity in the Bornean Dipterocarpaceae. Journal of Ecology (2005) doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2745.2005.01077.xPeer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/72822/1/j.1365-2745.2005.01077.x.pd

Horizontal Branch Stars: The Interplay between Observations and Theory, and Insights into the Formation of the Galaxy

We review HB stars in a broad astrophysical context, including both variable and non-variable stars. A reassessment of the Oosterhoff dichotomy is presented, which provides unprecedented detail regarding its origin and systematics. We show that the Oosterhoff dichotomy and the distribution of globular clusters (GCs) in the HB morphology-metallicity plane both exclude, with high statistical significance, the possibility that the Galactic halo may have formed from the accretion of dwarf galaxies resembling present-day Milky Way satellites such as Fornax, Sagittarius, and the LMC. A rediscussion of the second-parameter problem is presented. A technique is proposed to estimate the HB types of extragalactic GCs on the basis of integrated far-UV photometry. The relationship between the absolute V magnitude of the HB at the RR Lyrae level and metallicity, as obtained on the basis of trigonometric parallax measurements for the star RR Lyrae, is also revisited, giving a distance modulus to the LMC of (m-M)_0 = 18.44+/-0.11. RR Lyrae period change rates are studied. Finally, the conductive opacities used in evolutionary calculations of low-mass stars are investigated. [ABRIDGED]Comment: 56 pages, 22 figures. Invited review, to appear in Astrophysics and Space Scienc

I will not go, I cannot go: cultural and social limitations of disaster preparedness in Asia, Africa, and Oceania

While much work has been invested in addressing the economic and technical basis of disaster preparedness, less effort has been directed towards understanding the cultural and social obstacles to and opportunities for disaster risk reduction. This paper presents local insights from five different national settings into the cultural and social contexts of disaster preparedness. In most cases, an early warning system was in place, but it failed to alert people to diverse environmental shocks. The research findings show that despite geographical and typological differences in these locations, the limitations of the systems were fairly similar. In Kenya, people received warnings, but from contradictory systems, whereas in the Philippines and on the island of Saipan, people did not understand the messages or take them seriously. In Bangladesh and Nepal, however, a deeper cultural and religious reasoning serves to explain disasters, and how to prevent them or find safety when they strike

Unravelling the phylogenetic relationships of lichenised fungi in Dothideomyceta

We present a revised phylogeny of lichenised Dothideomyceta (Arthoniomycetes and Dothideomycetes) based on a combined data set of nuclear large subunit (nuLSU) and mitochondrial small subunit (mtSSU) rDNA data. Dothideomyceta is supported as monophyletic with monophyletic classes Arthoniomycetes and Dothideomycetes; the latter, however, lacking support in this study. The phylogeny of lichenised Arthoniomycetes supports the current division into three families: Chrysothrichaceae (Chrysothrix), Arthoniaceae (Arthonia s. l., Cryptothecia, Herpothallon), and Roccellaceae (Chiodecton, Combea, Dendrographa, Dichosporidium, Enterographa, Erythrodecton, Lecanactis, Opegrapha, Roccella, Roccellographa, Schismatomma, Simonyella). The widespread and common Arthonia caesia is strongly supported as a (non-pigmented) member of Chrysothrix. Monoblastiaceae, Strigulaceae, and Trypetheliaceae are recovered as unrelated, monophyletic clades within Dothideomycetes. Also, the genera Arthopyrenia (Arthopyreniaceae) and Cystocoleus and Racodium (Capnodiales) are confirmed as Dothideomycetes but unrelated to each other. Mycomicrothelia is shown to be unrelated to Arthopyrenia s.str., but is supported as a monophyletic clade sister to Trypetheliaceae, which is supported by hamathecium characters. The generic concept in several groups is in need of revision, as indicated by non-monophyly of genera, such as Arthonia, Astrothelium, Cryptothecia, Cryptothelium, Enterographa, Opegrapha, and Trypethelium in our analyses

History of clinical transplantation

How transplantation came to be a clinical discipline can be pieced together by perusing two volumes of reminiscences collected by Paul I. Terasaki in 1991-1992 from many of the persons who were directly involved. One volume was devoted to the discovery of the major histocompatibility complex (MHC), with particular reference to the human leukocyte antigens (HLAs) that are widely used today for tissue matching.1 The other focused on milestones in the development of clinical transplantation.2 All the contributions described in both volumes can be traced back in one way or other to the demonstration in the mid-1940s by Peter Brian Medawar that the rejection of allografts is an immunological phenomenon.3,4 © 2008 Springer New York