Purification and quantification of recombinant Epstein-Barr viral glycoproteins gp350/220 from Chinese hamster ovary cells

Truncated Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) membrane antigen gp350/220 (EBV-MA) lacking the membrane anchor was expressed and secreted into the medium of recombinant Chinese hamster ovary cells that had been cultured in Plasmapur hollow-fibre modules using defined serum-free medium. The EBV-MA in the medium was concentrated by 70% (w/v) ammonium sulphate precipitation and subsequently purified by immunoaffinity chromatography using an anti-EBV-MA (EBV.0T6) monoclonal antibody (mAb) column. Adsorbed antigen was eluted with 3 M MgCl2 in phosphate-buffered saline, concentrated by Mono Q anion-exchange chromatography and analysed by sodium dodecyl sulphate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis, silver staining and Western blotting using EBV-positive serum and anti-EBV-MA specific mAbs. Monospecific polyclonal rabbit antibodies against the purified EBV-MA were raised and purified by protein G affinity chromatography. For the measurement of EBV-MA antigen levels a sandwich enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay using rabbit polyclonal antibodies and a horseradish peroxidase-conjugated anti-MA mAb was developed having a detection level of 10 ng/ml

Needy or Greedy? The Social Psychology of Individuals Who Fraudulently Claim Unemployment Benefits

This study explored the relationships between diverse social psychological and economic variables and self‐reported and officially documented unemployment benefit fraud. Two groups receiving unemployment benefit were studied; a fraudulent group of 45 individuals and an honest group of 51 individuals. Interview measures of financial strain, social norms, opportunity for fraud, social controls, personal strain, personal orientation, perceived risk of punishment, and intolerance of fraud were obtained. The results of univariate and regression analyses revealed that although financial strain and social norms did not differ between the two groups, the fraudulent group had more opportunity, were less well educated, were more alienated and inclined to take risks, and had more positive attitudes toward a variety of kinds of fraud. Copyrigh

Averaging lifetimes for B hadron species

The measurement of the lifetimes of the individual B species are of great interest. Many of these measurements are well below the 10 $\%$ level of precision. However, in order to reach the precision necessary to test the current theoretical predictions, the results from different experiments need to be averaged. Therefore, the relevant systematic uncertainties of each measurement need to be well defined in order to understand the correlations between the results from different experiments. \par In this paper we discuss the dominant sources of systematic errors which lead to correlations between the different measurements. We point out problems connected with the conventional approach of combining lifetime data and discuss methods which overcome these problems

Purification of Parvalbumin from Carp: A Protocol That Avoids Heat Treatment

Parvalbumin from carp, a major allergen,was purified to homogeneity using ion exchange chromatography and size exclusion chromatography (estimated purity \u3e 95% to 98% based on SDS-PAGE and native PAGE) with a yield of 318 mg, and a number of basic biochemical characteristics were determined. The identity was confirmed by peptide-mass fingerprinting, and IgE-binding was demonstrated. The UV/Vis absorbance spectra were explained using the previously published amino acid sequences. Far UV-CD spectroscopy was used to confirm the folding character of parvalbumin. We conclude that parvalbumin from carp can be purified on a comparatively large (hundreds of milligrams) scale using a purification protocol that does not include denaturing steps. The purified protein resembles biochemical characteristics as were earlier published for carp parvalbumin, that is, a molecular weight of approximately 12 kDa, amino acid sequence identity and a secondary structure containing α-helices and β-structures. The described method provides a yield sufficient to produce and characterize antibodies to construct immunochemical methods to detect parvalbumin in food as well as for use as a standard calibrator for such assays. Practical Application: Parvalbumin is a major allergen from fish. Here,we have purified a comparatively large quantity from carp that can be used to develop antisera for use in an assay method to detect fish allergens

Breaking Traditions:An Isotopic Study on the Changing Funerary Practices in the Dutch Iron Age (800-12 bc)

Urnfields in the Dutch river area were replaced by cemeteries with a mixture of cremation and inhumation graves around the sixth century bc. This study provides the first biogeochemical evidence that the Iron Age communities were heterogeneous in terms of geological origins. The high percentage of non-locally born individuals (~48%) supports the hypothesis that the change in burial practice was the result of the influx of foreign people, who were being allowed to keep their own burial customs, whereas some of the local inhabitants adapted the burial rites of foreign cultures, leading to a heterogeneous burial rite for some centuries

Search for charginos in e+e- interactions at sqrt(s) = 189 GeV

An update of the searches for charginos and gravitinos is presented, based on a data sample corresponding to the 158 pb^{-1} recorded by the DELPHI detector in 1998, at a centre-of-mass energy of 189 GeV. No evidence for a signal was found. The lower mass limits are 4-5 GeV/c^2 higher than those obtained at a centre-of-mass energy of 183 GeV. The (\mu,M_2) MSSM domain excluded by combining the chargino searches with neutralino searches at the Z resonance implies a limit on the mass of the lightest neutralino which, for a heavy sneutrino, is constrained to be above 31.0 GeV/c^2 for tan(beta) \geq 1.Comment: 22 pages, 8 figure

Search for composite and exotic fermions at LEP 2

A search for unstable heavy fermions with the DELPHI detector at LEP is reported. Sequential and non-canonical leptons, as well as excited leptons and quarks, are considered. The data analysed correspond to an integrated luminosity of about 48 pb^{-1} at an e^+e^- centre-of-mass energy of 183 GeV and about 20 pb^{-1} equally shared between the centre-of-mass energies of 172 GeV and 161 GeV. The search for pair-produced new leptons establishes 95% confidence level mass limits in the region between 70 GeV/c^2 and 90 GeV/c^2, depending on the channel. The search for singly produced excited leptons and quarks establishes upper limits on the ratio of the coupling of the excited fermio