Quality of Minority Health Communication: An Analysis of Hispanic-Targeted Health Websites.

The Internet has become one of the most used forms of health communication media. Using the Health on the Net code of conduct, this study examined the quality of health information available on the Internet for one of the United State\u27s fastest growing minorities, Hispanics. When comparing Hispanic-targeted websites with those that target the majority population, this study found significant differences with respect to quality. Specifically, sites targeting Hispanics had a lower level of quality than those that targeted the majority population. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR

Cells that express all five proteins of vesicular stomatitis virus from cloned cDNAs support replication, assembly, and budding of defective interfering particles

An alternative approach to structurefunction analysis of vesicular stomatitis virus (VSV) gene products and their interactions with one another during each phase of the viral life cycle is described. We showed previously by using the vaccinia viruslT7 RNA polymerase expression system that when cells expressing the nucleocapsid protein (N), the phosphoprotein (NS), and the large polymerase protein (L) of VSV were superinfected with defective interfering (DI) particles, rapid and efflicient replication and amplification of DI particle RNA occurred. Here, we demonstrate that all five VSV proteins can be expressed simultaneously when cells are cotransfected with plasmids containing the matrix protein (M) gene and the glycoprotein (G) gene of VSV in addition to plasmids containing the genes for the N, NS, and L proteins. When cells coexpressing all five VSV proteins were superinfected with DI particles, which because of their defectiveness are unable to express any viral proteins or to replicate, DI particle replication, assembly, and budding were observed and infectious DI particles were released into the culture fluids. Omission of either the M or G protein expression resulted in no DI particle budding. The vector-supported DI particles were similar in size and morphology to the authentic DI particles generated from cells coinfected with DI particles and helper VSV and their infectivity could be blocked by anti-VSV or anti-G antiserum. The successful replication, assembly, and budding of DI particles from cells expressing all five VSV proteins from cloned cDNAs provide a powerful approach for detailed structure-function analysis of the VSV gene products in each step of the replicative cycle of the virus

How Spokesperson Rank and Selected Media Channels Impact Perceptions in Crisis Communication

This study examined the impact of spokesperson’s rank and selected media channels in crisis communication by employing different ranks (i.e., CEO and communication director spokespersons) and media channels (blogs, websites, and newspapers). Findings indicated that CEO spokespersons were more effective in terms of lowering publics’ crisis responsibility attributions than communication director spokespersons and that blogs were more effective in lowering crisis responsibility attributions than websites and newspapers