Youth at risk in the Russian Federation: reasons for social protection

The article analyses the main reasons as to why children and teenagers are at risk and are committing crimes. The most serious reasons are related to crises in family relations due to the growth in poverty rates, the decrease in living standards, the deterioration in moral values and the educative potential of families. So-called ‘exterior’ reasons; namely, ineffective youth offence prevention, the general growth in crime, the influence of TV and advertising, the influence of a child’s mates or ‘bad street children’ are important as well, although their influence is less intensive as compared to problems which exist within individual families. The analysis shows that in contrast to general trends, regions and municipalities have certain specific characteristics. In some regions the most common problems are drug addiction, youth unemployment, child neglect and homelessness and juvenile delinquency. The negative general trends and regional characteristics require the creation of a multi-level system of social support and protection for young people at risk and their families

A Study of the Coupling of FET Temperament Traits with Major Depression

Objective: Temperament and mental illness have been linked to the same systems of behavioural regulation. A temperament model, carefully structured to respond to subtle differences within systems of behavior regulation, should exhibit distinct temperament patterns in the presence of mental illness. Previous comparisons of temperament profiles in mental disorders used mostly emotionality-related traits. In contrast, the Functional Ensemble of Temperament (FET) model differentiates not only between emotionality traits, but also between traits related to physical, verbal and mental aspects of behavior and maps 12 functional aspects of behavior to temperament traits as well as to symptoms of mental illnesses. This article reports on the coupling of sex, age and temperament traits with Major Depression using the FET framework. Method: Intake records of 467, ages 17-24, 25-45, 46-65, 66-84 were examined, with temperament assessed by the Structure of Temperament Questionnaire (based on the FET). Results: The presence of Major Depression was associated with changes in mean temperament scores on 9 of the 12 traits. The results were in line with the DSM-5 criteria of fatigue (patients with MD reported a significant decrease in three types of endurance - motor-physical, social-verbal and mental), of psychomotor retardation (a significant decrease in physical and social-verbal tempo) and of worthlessness (as low Self-Confidence). The results also showed that three new symptoms, high Impulsivity, high Neuroticism and diminished Plasticity, should be considered as depressive symptoms in future versions of the DSM. As a significant negative result, no interaction of age or sex (with the exception of the Self-Confidence scale) with MD was found for temperament traits. Conclusions: The value of differentiating between physical, social and mental aspects of behaviour is demonstrated in the differential effects of major depression and gender. The value of differentiating between endurance, dynamical and orientation-related aspects of behaviour is demonstrated in the differential effects of age. The deleterious impact of Major Depression on temperament scores appeared to be similar across all age groups. The appearance of high impulsivity, neuroticism and low plasticity deserve further study as associated factors in future versions of the DSM/ICD

Temperament and arousal systems: A new synthesis of differential psychology and functional neurochemistry.

This paper critically reviews the unidimensional construct of General Arousal as utilised by models of temperament in differential psychology for example, to underlie 'Extraversion'. Evidence suggests that specialization within monoamine neurotransmitter systems contrasts with the attribution of a "general arousal" of the Ascending Reticular Activating System. Experimental findings show specialized roles of noradrenaline, dopamine, and serotonin systems in hypothetically mediating three complementary forms of arousal that are similar to three functional blocks described in classical models of behaviour within kinesiology, clinical neuropsychology, psychophysiology and temperament research. In spite of functional diversity of monoamine receptors, we suggest that their functionality can be classified using three universal aspects of actions related to expansion, to selection-integration and to maintenance of chosen behavioural alternatives. Monoamine systems also differentially regulate analytic vs. routine aspects of activities at cortical and striatal neural levels. A convergence between main temperament models in terms of traits related to described functional aspects of behavioural arousal also supports the idea of differentiation between these aspects analysed here in a functional perspective

The digital transformation of Russia: digital skills and its potential

65 percent of children entering primary school today will work in employment that does not yet exist; and by 2022 approximately 22 percent of employment in the global economy will be created by digital technologies. 73 percent of company managers say they have serious problems finding specialists qualified in such technologies, compared with 10 percent in 2010. This shows the speed of the changes to which digitalisation is fundamenta

Audiovisual content analysis in the translation process

The article presents a comprehensive approach to the process of audiovisual translation that includes application of multimodal analysis of semiotic codes present in audiovisual productions. The article dwells on how the proposed approach can be applied to analyzing audiovisual productions for different types of audiovisual translation. Due to its multimodal nature, an audiovisual production is understood by the authors as an audiovisual text that combines image, sound and verbal means, that is, different modes conveying meaning. The means of conveying meaning in an audiovisual production include the visual non-verbal elements, visual verbal elements as well as audio non-verbal and verbal elements. The priority of these means of meaning transfer and their interaction in meaning generation differ significantly depending on the genre of audiovisual productions and the specifics of the process of its creation

Immunogenetic markers definition in latvian patients with lyme borreliosis and lyme neuroborreliosis

Funding Information: This work was supported by the European Social Fund (ESF) project ?Support for doctoral study program and scientific degree receiving in Riga Stradi?? University, agreement No. 2009/0147/1DP/1.1.2.1.2/09/IPIA/VIAA/009?. Publisher Copyright: © 2016 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. Copyright: Copyright 2017 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.The aim of this study was to determine the human leukocyte antigen (HLA)-DRB1 alleles in two groups of patients in Latvia: patients with Lyme borreliosis and patients with Lyme neuroborreliosis. The study included 216 patients with Lyme borreliosis, 29 patients with Lyme neuroborreliosis and 282 control persons. All surveyed persons were residents of Latvia. The HLA-DR genotyping was performed by polymerase chain reaction-sequence specific primer (PCR-SSP). The predisposition to the Lyme borreliosis is associated with the HLA-DRB1*07, -DRB1*17(03), -DRB1*04, -DRB1*15(02) alleles. The allele -DRB1*11(05), -DRB1*14(06) and -DRB1*13(06) were significantly more frequent in controls. In-group with Lyme neuroborreliosis differences were found for the -DRB1*07 and -DRB1*04 alleles, but only HLA-DRB1*07 allele was statistically significant after Bonferroni correction and associated with Lyme neuroborreliosis in Latvian patients.Peer reviewe

Reciprocal inhibition of immunogenic performance in mice of two potent dna immunogens targeting hcv-related liver cancer

Funding Information: This study was supported by the Latvian Science Council grants LZP-2018/2-0308 to M.I. and LZP-2020/2-0376 to J.J. and M.I., and FoBe grant of Karolinska Institutet 2018-02329 to S.P. M.I. and S.P. were partly supported by EU Twinning project VACTRAIN no. 692293, and M.I. Additionally by EAVI2020 no. 681137. Funding Information: Funding: This study was supported by the Latvian Science Council grants LZP-2018/2-0308 to M.I. and LZP-2020/2-0376 to J.J. and M.I., and FoBe grant of Karolinska Institutet 2018-02329 to S.P. M.I. and S.P. were partly supported by EU Twinning project VACTRAIN no. 692293, and M.I. Additionally by EAVI2020 no. 681137. Publisher Copyright: © 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.Chronic HCV infection and associated liver cancer impose a heavy burden on the healthcare system. Direct acting antivirals eliminate HCV, unless it is drug resistant, and partially reverse liver disease, but they cannot cure HCV-related cancer. A possible remedy could be a multi-component immunotherapeutic vaccine targeting both HCV-infected and malignant cells, but also those not infected with HCV. To meet this need we developed a two-component DNA vaccine based on the highly conserved core protein of HCV to target HCV-infected cells, and a renowned tumor-associated antigen telomerase reverse transcriptase (TERT) based on the rat TERT, to target malignant cells. Their synthetic genes were expression-optimized, and HCV core was truncated after aa 152 (Core152opt) to delete the domain interfering with immunogenicity. Core152opt and TERT DNA were highly immunogenic in BALB/c mice, inducing IFN-γ/IL-2/TNF-α response of CD4+ and CD8+ T cells. Additionally, DNA-immunization with TERT enhanced cellular immune response against luciferase encoded by a co-delivered plasmid (Luc DNA). However, DNA-immunization with Core152opt and TERT mix resulted in abrogation of immune response against both components. A loss of bioluminescence signal after co-delivery of TERT and Luc DNA into mice indicated that TERT affects the in vivo expression of luciferase directed by the immediate early cytomegalovirus and interferon-β promoters. Panel of mutant TERT variants was created and tested for their expression effects. TERT with deleted N-terminal nucleoli localization signal and mutations abrogating telomerase activity still suppressed the IFN-β driven Luc expression, while the inactivated reverse transcriptase domain of TERT and its analogue, enzymatically active HIV-1 reverse transcriptase, exerted only weak suppressive effects, implying that suppression relied on the presence of the full-length/nearly full-length TERT, but not its enzymatic activity. The effect(s) could be due to interference of the ectopically expressed xenogeneic rat TERT with biogenesis of mRNA, ribosomes and protein translation in murine cells, affecting the expression of immunogens. HCV core can aggravate this effect, leading to early apoptosis of co-expressing cells, preventing the induction of immune response.publishersversionPeer reviewe

Modern view on the issues of diagnosis and verification of axillary lymph nodes involvement in early breast cancer

The involvement of axillary lymph nodes is one of the most important prognostic factors, significantly affecting the treatment strategy for early breast cancer (BC). The risk of axillary lymph node metastases depends directly on a number of factors (age of women, size of tumor, presence of lymphovascular invasion and biological characteristics of cancer). The evaluation of regional lymph node status in patients with early BC includes the clinical examination of regional zones and the ultrasound study (US), using these methods can help to study lymph nodes shape, borders, margins and structure. The sensitivity of ultrasound in the evaluation of regional lymph nodes status directly depends on the biological subtype of the tumor; the minimum level of ultrasound sensitivity in the evaluation of lymph nodes status is detected for luminal HER2-negative cancer (less than 40%), and maximum sensitivity is detected for triple negative and HER2-positive subtypes (6871%). Clinical examination and modern ultrasound are the most accessible methods for the evaluation of regional lymph nodes status, but the possibility to misjudge metastatic process can be detected in 1/4 of patients. Verification of the diagnosis in the preoperative phase (fine-needle aspiration biopsy/core-needle biopsy under ultrasound guidance) allows minimize the number of errors for the regional staging. The sentinel lymph node biopsy (SLNB) is the gold standard of regional treatment in patients with early stage BC, nowadays. The randomized trials (NSABP B-32, ACOSOG q0011) show the safety of recession of performing regional lymph node dissection in favor of SLNB not only in case of clinically negative lymph nodes, but also in patients with metastases in 2 sentinel lymph nodes, upon condition that organ-conservative treatment and subsequent radiation therapy will be used. High-quality regional staging, the choice of the therapeutic algorithm in accordance with the biological characteristics of carcinoma, the application of the most effective modern drug regimes, the optimal radiation therapy allow not only minimize the extent of surgery, but also achieve high long-term survival results, provide excellent functional results and high quality of life in patients with the involvement of axillary lymph nodes

Diversity in action: Exchange of perspectives and reflections on taxonomies of individual differences

Throughout the last 2500 years, the classification of individual differences in healthy people and their extreme expressions in mental disorders has remained one of the most difficult challenges in science that affects our ability to explore individuals' functioning, underlying psychobiological processes and pathways of development. To facilitate analyses of the principles required for studying individual differences, this theme issue brought together prominent scholars from diverse backgrounds of which many bring unique combinations of cross-disciplinary experiences and perspectives that help establish connections and promote exchange across disciplines. This final paper presents brief commentaries of some of our authors and further scholars exchanging perspectives and reflecting on the contributions of this theme issue

Taphonomic phenomenon of ancient hair from Glacial Beringia:perspectives for palaeoecological reconstructions

An accumulation of mammoth hair, discovered in the Bol'shaya Chukochya River valley (northeast Yakutia, Russia), was found to contain remains of terrestrial and aquatic organisms, including plants, insects, crustaceans, birds and mammals. Radiocarbon dating indicated that this post-mortem taphocoenosis represented multiple time periods. The mammoth hair was dated to older than 45 ka BP, the plants were dated to 12 750 +/- 50 a BP (which corresponds to a shift in the environmental conditions and landscapes during the formation of thermokarst in northeastern Russia) and the bird feathers were dated to 4115 +/- 40 a BP. A scenario of the formation of this fossil assemblage is proposed, covering the MIS 3-1 time range. The hair also yielded various Arctic branchiopod crustaceans, which inhabit shallow temporary water bodies and therefore are important for reconstruction of palaeoenvironments. The cladoceran subgenus Daphnia (Ctenodaphnia), currently absent from the Asian part of Beringia, is reported from this region for the first time. The study demonstrates that the discovered permafrostpreserved hair is a unique repository of Ice Age organisms.</p