The relationship between Islamic religiosity, depression and anxiety among Muslim cancer patients.

There is a growing body of evidence that religiosity and spirituality can buffer depression and anxiety and support the healing process in cancer patients. However, literature on the role of Islamic religiosity in the healing of Muslim cancer patients are few. This study aimed to examine the relationship between Islamic religiosity with depression and anxiety in Muslim cancer patients. 59 cancer patients were approached in oncology day care and ward at a Malaysian government hospital and in a cancer support group activity. Patients completed the Muslim Religiosity and Personality Inventory which assessed their Islamic religiosity scores through the constructs of Islamic beliefs and Manifestation of Islamic belief. Self-rated depression and anxiety were assessed using validated Beck Depression Inventory and Beck Anxiety Inventory in Malay. Ten of the patients were interviewed about their spiritual experiences and emotions. Questionnaire findings revealed a significant negative correlation between Islamic religiosity with depression and anxiety. Higher manifestation of Islamic belief was associated with lower depression while higher Islamic belief was associated with higher education. Higher Islamic religiosity was associated with older age, married and pensioned patients. Interview findings revealed that being ill brought the patients closer to God and many thanked God for the blessing and time spared for them to repent and do more good actions. All of them used prayers to heal their pain. Patients also reported strong feelings of anger, frustration and sadness after the initial diagnosis which slowly disappeared as they began to accept their illness as a blessing in disguise. It is concluded that there is a need to respond to the meaning and values given to human existence besides responding to physical and mental suffering in cancer patients

Islamic religiosity, depression and anxiety among Muslim cancer patients

Active religious practice is central to Muslim livelihood. Among Muslims, this religious engagement is rarely studied with regards to its association in coping with critical illnesses. This study investigated the association between Islamic religiosity with depression and anxiety in Muslim cancer patients. Fifty-nine cancer patients recruited from a Malaysian public hospital and a cancer support group completed the Muslim Religiosity and Personality Inventory, Beck Depression Inventory and Beck Anxiety Inventory in July and August 2010. Islamic religiosity score, obtained from the sum of subscale scores of Islamic worldview and religious personality represents a greater understanding and practice of Islam in a comprehensive manner. Results yielded a significant negative correlation between Islamic religiosity score with both depression and anxiety. Depression was also found to be negatively associated with religious personality subscale. Older patients scored significantly higher on both Islamic worldview and religious personality whereas patients with higher education scored higher on Islamic worldview. Married patients scored significantly higher scores on religious personality than the single patients. Results provided an insight into the significant role of religious intervention which has huge potentials to improve the psychological health of cancer patients particularly Muslims in Malaysia. Research implication includes the call for professionals to meet the spiritual needs of Muslim cancer patients and incorporating religious components in their treatment, especially in palliative care

Recombinase-Based Genetic Circuit Optimization

International audienceThe rapid advancements of synthetic biology show promising potential in biomedical and other applications. Recently, recombinases were proposed as a tool to engineer genetic logic circuits with long-term memory in living and even mammalian cells. The technology is under active development, and the complexity of engineered genetic circuits grows continuously. However, how to minimize a genetic circuit composed of recombinase-based logic gates remain largely open. In this paper, we formulate the problem as a cubic-time assignment problem and solved by a 0/1-ILP solver to minimize DNA sequence length of genetic circuits. Experimental results show effective reduction of our optimization method, which may be crucial to enable practical realization of complex genetic circuits

Spontaneous Arrangement of Two-way Flow in Water Bridge

By revisiting the century-old problem of water bridge, we demonstrate that it is in fact dynamic and comprises of two coaxial currents that carry different charges and flow in opposite directions. Initially, the inner flow is facilitated by the cone jet that is powered by H+ and flows out of the anode beaker. The negative cone jet from cathode is established later and forced to take the outer route. This spontaneous arrangement of two-way flow is revealed by the use of chemical dyes, e.g., fluorescein and FeCl3, carbon powder, and the Particle Image Velocimetry. These two opposing flows are found to carry non-equal flux that results in a net transport of water to the cathode beaker. By combining the above information and taking into account the counter flow to equate the water level from the connecting pipe, we can estimate the cross section and flow speed of these co-axial flows as a function of time and applied voltage.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figure

UMARS: Un-MAppable Reads Solution

[[abstract]]Background: Un-MAppable Reads Solution (UMARS) is a user-friendly web service focusing on retrieving valuable information from sequence reads that cannot be mapped back to reference genomes. Recently, next-generation sequencing (NGS) technology has emerged as a powerful tool for generating high-throughput sequencing data and has been applied to many kinds of biological research. In a typical analysis, adaptor-trimmed NGS reads were first mapped back to reference sequences, including genomes or transcripts. However, a fraction of NGS reads failed to be mapped back to the reference sequences. Such un-mappable reads are usually imputed to sequencing errors and discarded without further consideration.Methods: We are investigating possible biological relevance and possible sources of un-mappable reads. Therefore, we developed UMARS to scan for virus genomic fragments or exon-exon junctions of novel alternative splicing isoforms from un-mappable reads. For mapping un-mappable reads, we first collected viral genomes and sequences of exon-exon junctions. Then, we constructed UMARS pipeline as an automatic alignment interface.Results: By demonstrating the results of two UMARS alignment cases, we show the applicability of UMARS. We first showed that the expected EBV genomic fragments can be detected by UMARS. Second, we also detected exon-exon junctions from un-mappable reads. Further experimental validation also ensured the authenticity of the UMARS pipeline. The UMARS service is freely available to the academic community and can be accessed via http://musk.ibms.sinica.edu.tw/UMARS/.Conclusions: In this study, we have shown that some un-mappable reads are not caused by sequencing errors. They can originate from viral infection or transcript splicing. Our UMARS pipeline provides another way to examine and recycle the un-mappable reads that are commonly discarded as garbage

Lasing on nonlinear localized waves in curved geometry

The use of geometrical constraints opens many new perspectives in photonics and in fundamental studies of nonlinear waves. By implementing surface structures in vertical cavity surface emitting lasers as manifolds for curved space, we experimentally study the impacts of geometrical constraints on nonlinear wave localization. We observe localized waves pinned to the maximal curvature in an elliptical-ring, and confirm the reduction in the localization length of waves by measuring near and far field patterns, as well as the corresponding dispersion relation. Theoretically, analyses based on a dissipative model with a parabola curve give good agreement remarkably to experimental measurement on the transition from delocalized to localized waves. The introduction of curved geometry allows to control and design lasing modes in the nonlinear regime.Comment: 6 pages, 6 figure