180 research outputs found
Innate Immune Deficiency of Extremely Premature Neonates Can Be Reversed by Interferon-γ
Background: Bacterial sepsis is a major threat in neonates born prematurely, and is associated with elevated morbidity and mortality. Little is known on the innate immune response to bacteria among extremely premature infants. Methodology/Principal Findings: We compared innate immune functions to bacteria commonly causing sepsis in 21 infants of less than 28 wks of gestational age, 24 infants born between 28 and 32 wks of gestational age, 25 term newborns and 20 healthy adults. Levels of surface expression of innate immune receptors (CD14, TLR2, TLR4, and MD-2) for Grampositive and Gram-negative bacteria were measured in cord blood leukocytes at the time of birth. The cytokine response to bacteria of those leukocytes as well as plasma-dependent opsonophagocytosis of bacteria by target leukocytes was also measured in the presence or absence of interferon-c. Leukocytes from extremely premature infants expressed very low levels of receptors important for bacterial recognition. Leukocyte inflammatory responses to bacteria and opsonophagocytic activity of plasma from premature infants were also severely impaired compared to term newborns or adults. These innate immune defects could be corrected when blood from premature infants was incubated ex vivo 12 hrs with interferon-c. Conclusion/Significance: Premature infants display markedly impaired innate immune functions, which likely account for their propensity to develop bacterial sepsis during the neonatal period. The fetal innate immune response progressivel
Search for charged Higgs decays of the top quark using hadronic tau decays
We present the result of a search for charged Higgs decays of the top quark,
produced in collisions at 1.8 TeV. When the charged
Higgs is heavy and decays to a tau lepton, which subsequently decays
hadronically, the resulting events have a unique signature: large missing
transverse energy and the low-charged-multiplicity tau. Data collected in the
period 1992-1993 at the Collider Detector at Fermilab, corresponding to
18.70.7~pb, exclude new regions of combined top quark and charged
Higgs mass, in extensions to the standard model with two Higgs doublets.Comment: uuencoded, gzipped tar file of LaTeX and 6 Postscript figures; 11 pp;
submitted to Phys. Rev.
Inclusive jet cross section in collisions at TeV
The inclusive jet differential cross section has been measured for jet
transverse energies, , from 15 to 440 GeV, in the pseudorapidity region
0.10.7. The results are based on 19.5 pb of data
collected by the CDF collaboration at the Fermilab Tevatron collider. The data
are compared with QCD predictions for various sets of parton distribution
functions. The cross section for jets with GeV is significantly
higher than current predictions based on O() perturbative QCD
calculations. Various possible explanations for the high- excess are
discussed.Comment: 8 pages with 2 eps uu-encoded figures Submitted to Physical Review
Letter
Search for New Particles Decaying to Dijets at CDF
We have used 106 pb^-1 of data collected with the Collider Detector at
Fermilab to search for new particles decaying to dijets. We exclude at the 95%
confidence level models containing the following new particles: axigluons and
flavor universal colorons with mass between 200 and 980 GeV/c, excited quarks
with mass between 80 and 570 GeV/c^2 and between 580 and 760 GeV/c^2, color
octet technirhos with mass between 260 and 480 GeV/c^2, W' bosons with mass
between 300 and 420 GeV/c^2, and E_6 diquarks with mass between 290 and 420
GeV/c^2.Comment: 18 pages, 4 figures, 1 table. Submitted to Physical Review D Rapid
Communications. Postscript file of paper is also available at
http://www-cdf.fnal.gov/physics/pub97/cdf3276_dijet_search_prd_rc.p
Measurement of Dijet Angular Distributions at CDF
We have used 106 pb^-1 of data collected in proton-antiproton collisions at
sqrt(s)=1.8 TeV by the Collider Detector at Fermilab to measure jet angular
distributions in events with two jets in the final state. The angular
distributions agree with next to leading order (NLO) predictions of Quantum
Chromodynamics (QCD) in all dijet invariant mass regions. The data exclude at
95% confidence level (CL) a model of quark substructure in which only up and
down quarks are composite and the contact interaction scale is Lambda_ud(+) <
1.6 TeV or Lambda_ud(-) < 1.4 TeV. For a model in which all quarks are
composite the excluded regions are Lambda(+) < 1.8 TeV and Lambda(-) < 1. 6
TeV.Comment: 16 pages, 2 figures, 2 tables, LaTex, using epsf.sty. Submitted to
Physical Review Letters on September 17, 1996. Postscript file of full paper
available at http://www-cdf.fnal.gov/physics/pub96/cdf3773_dijet_angle_prl.p
Psychological Determinants of Consumer Acceptance of Personalised Nutrition in 9 European Countries
YesObjective: To develop a model of the psychological factors which predict people’s intention to adopt personalised
nutrition. Potential determinants of adoption included perceived risk and benefit, perceived self-efficacy, internal locus of
control and health commitment.
Methods: A questionnaire, developed from exploratory study data and the existing theoretical literature, and including
validated psychological scales was administered to N = 9381 participants from 9 European countries (Germany, Greece,
Ireland, Poland, Portugal, Spain, the Netherlands, the UK, and Norway).
Results: Structural equation modelling indicated that the greater participants’ perceived benefits to be associated with
personalised nutrition, the more positive their attitudes were towards personalised nutrition, and the greater their intention
to adopt it. Higher levels of nutrition self-efficacy were related to more positive attitudes towards, and a greater expressed
intention to adopt, personalised nutrition. Other constructs positively impacting attitudes towards personalised nutrition
included more positive perceptions of the efficacy of regulatory control to protect consumers (e.g. in relation to personal
data protection), higher self-reported internal health locus of control, and health commitment. Although higher perceived
risk had a negative relationship with attitude and an inverse relationship with perceived benefit, its effects on attitude and
intention to adopt personalised nutrition was less influential than perceived benefit. The model was stable across the
different European countries, suggesting that psychological factors determining adoption of personalised nutrition have
generic applicability across different European countries.
Conclusion: The results suggest that transparent provision of information about potential benefits, and protection of
consumers’ personal data is important for adoption, delivery of public health benefits, and commercialisation of
personalised nutrition.This project has received funding from the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme for research, technological development and demonstration under grant agreement n u 265494 (http://cordis.europa.eu/fp7/home_en.html). Food4Me is the acronym of the project ‘‘Personalised nutrition: an integrated analysis of opportunities and challenges’’ (http://www.food4me.org/). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript
Bovine Lactoferrin Counteracts Toll-Like Receptor Mediated Activation Signals in Antigen Presenting Cells
Lactoferrin (LF), a key element in mammalian immune system, plays pivotal roles in host defence against infection and excessive inflammation. Its protective effects range from direct antimicrobial activities against a large panel of microbes, including bacteria, viruses, fungi and parasites, to antinflammatory and anticancer activities. In this study, we show that monocyte-derived dendritic cells (MD-DCs) generated in the presence of bovine LF (bLF) fail to undergo activation by up-modulating CD83, co-stimulatory and major histocompatibility complex molecules, and cytokine/chemokine secretion. Moreover, these cells are weak activators of T cell proliferation and retain antigen uptake activity. Consistent with an impaired maturation, bLF-MD-DC primed T lymphocytes exhibit a functional unresponsiveness characterized by reduced expression of CD154 and impaired expression of IFN-γ and IL-2. The observed imunosuppressive effects correlate with an increased expression of molecules with negative regulatory functions (i.e. immunoglobulin-like transcript 3 and programmed death ligand 1), indoleamine 2,3-dioxygenase, and suppressor of cytokine signaling-3. Interestingly, bLF-MD-DCs produce IL-6 and exhibit constitutive signal transducer and activator of transcription 3 activation. Conversely, bLF exposure of already differentiated MD-DCs completely fails to induce IL-6, and partially inhibits Toll-like receptor (TLR) agonist-induced activation. Cell-specific differences in bLF internalization likely account for the distinct response elicited by bLF in monocytes versus immature DCs, providing a mechanistic base for its multiple effects. These results indicate that bLF exerts a potent anti-inflammatory activity by skewing monocyte differentiation into DCs with impaired capacity to undergo activation and to promote Th1 responses. Overall, these bLF-mediated effects may represent a strategy to block excessive DC activation upon TLR-induced inflammation, adding further evidence for a critical role of bLF in directing host immune function
Linear Collider Physics Resource Book for Snowmass 2001, 3: Studies of Exotic and Standard Model Physics
This Resource Book reviews the physics opportunities of a next-generation e+e- linear collider and discusses options for the experimental program. Part 3 reviews the possible experiments on that can be done at a linear collider on strongly coupled electroweak symmetry breaking, exotic particles, and extra dimensions, and on the top quark, QCD, and two-photon physics. It also discusses the improved precision electroweak measurements that this collider will make available.This Resource Book reviews the physics opportunities of a next-generation e+e- linear collider and discusses options for the experimental program. Part 3 reviews the possible experiments on that can be done at a linear collider on strongly coupled electroweak symmetry breaking, exotic particles, and extra dimensions, and on the top quark, QCD, and two-photon physics. It also discusses the improved precision electroweak measurements that this collider will make available
Search for New Particles Decaying to Dijets in p-pbar Collisions at sqrt(s)=1.8 TeV
We have used 19 pb**-1 of data collected with the Collider Detector at
Fermilab to search for new particles decaying to dijets. We exclude at 95%
confidence level models containing the following new particles: axigluons with
mass between 200 and 870 GeV, excited quarks with mass between 80 and 570 GeV,
and color octet technirhos with mass between 320 and 480 GeV.Comment: Submitted to Physical Review Letters in December 199
Measurement of and in collisions at TeV
We present a measurement of and in proton - antiproton collisions at TeV
using a significantly improved understanding of the integrated luminosity. The
data represent an integrated luminosity of 19.7 pb from the 1992-1993
run with the Collider Detector at Fermilab (CDF). We find ~nb and ~nb.Comment: Uses Latex, Article 12 point, figure appended as uuencoded file The
full PostScript available via WWW at
http://www-cdf.fnal.gov/physics/pub95/cdf3312_sigma_1a_prl_v3.p
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