Economic Sanctions, Transnational Terrorism, and the Incentive to Misrepresent

Can economic sanctions combat transnational terrorism effectively? Policy makers argue that sanctions can deter state sponsorship but are counterproductive against hosts of transnational terrorists. However, recent cases indicate that governments are often uncertain if foreign states are truly sponsors versus hosts and cannot perfectly determine the type of foreign support terrorists are receiving. We argue that this uncertainty, coupled with the proposed strategy of punishing sponsors while cooperating with hosts, creates incentives for sponsors to misrepresent themselves as host states while continuing their support for terrorists. We demonstrate that in this environment of uncertainty, governments rely on information regarding the state capacity of supporting states to deduce their relationship with terrorists. Consequently, governments are more likely to impose sanctions against foreign states with intermediate levels of state capacity but are less likely to impose sanctions against failing or stronger states

Biodegradation of 2,4-dichlorophenol originating from pharmaceutical industries

The aims of this work were to isolate a microorganism from the wastewater of pharmaceutical industries, to examine the difference in its growth utilization of 2,4-dichlorophenol as the sole carbonsource pre and post-exposure to UV-irradiation and to investigate its efficiency of biodegradation at different temperatures and pH values using a laboratory benchtop bioreactor. Sludge was obtainedfrom the wastewater and standard isolation and identification techniques were used to identify the microorganism. The biodegradability was tested at temperatures of 25, 30, 35 and 40°C and at pH values of 6.5, 7.0 and 8.0. The results indicated that the isolated microorganism was Pseudomonas alcaligenes, the maximum concentration of 2,4-dichlorophenol which bacteria can grow on before UVirradiation was 220 and 380 mg/l after UV-irradiation. The variation in temperature values resulted in different degradation rates and that the degradation of 2,4-dichlorophenol increased at a higher pHvalue. From these results, it is concluded that P. alcaligenes can be used for the degradation of 2,4-dichlorophenol, UV-irradiation can be successfully used for the improvement of P. alcaligenes biodegradability and that the best 2,4-dichlorophenol biodegradation was at 35°C and pH 7

The effect of parity on longitudinal maternal hemodynamics.

BACKGROUND: Parous women have a lower risk for pregnancy complications, such as preeclampsia or delivery of small-for-gestational-age neonates. However, parous women are a heterogeneous group of patients because they contain a low-risk cohort with previously uncomplicated pregnancies and a high-risk cohort with previous pregnancies complicated by preeclampsia and/or small for gestational age. Previous studies examining the effect of parity on maternal hemodynamics, including cardiac output and peripheral vascular resistance, did not distinguish between parous women with and without a history of preeclampsia or small for gestational age and reported contradictory results. OBJECTIVE: The objective of the study was to compare maternal hemodynamics in nulliparous women and in parous women with and without previous preeclampsia and/or small for gestational age. STUDY DESIGN: This was a prospective, longitudinal study of maternal hemodynamics, assessed by a bioreactance method, measured at 11+0 to 13+6, 19+0 to 24+0, 30+0 to 34+0, and 35+0 to 37+0 weeks' gestation in 3 groups of women. Group 1 was composed of parous women without a history of preeclampsia and/or small for gestational age (n = 632), group 2 was composed of nulliparous women (n = 829), and group 3 was composed of parous women with a history of preeclampsia and/or small for gestational age (n = 113). A multilevel linear mixed-effects model was performed to compare the repeated measures of hemodynamic variables controlling for maternal characteristics, medical history, and development of preeclampsia or small for gestational age in the current pregnancy. RESULTS: In groups 1 and 2, cardiac output increased with gestational age to a peak at 32 weeks and peripheral vascular resistance showed a reversed pattern with its nadir at 32 weeks; in group 1, compared with group 2, there was better cardiac adaptation, reflected in higher cardiac output and lower peripheral vascular resistance. In group 3 there was a hyperdynamic profile of higher cardiac output and lower peripheral vascular resistance at the first trimester followed by an earlier sharp decline of cardiac output and increase of peripheral vascular resistance from midgestation. The incidence of preeclampsia and small for gestational age was highest in group 3 and lowest in group 1. CONCLUSION: There are parity-specific differences in maternal cardiac adaptation in pregnancy

Viewpoint on Emv2, the onlhy endogenous ecotropic murine leukemia virus of C57BL/6 mice

Here I comment on the articles by Lee and colleagues (Retrovirology 2011, 8:82) and Lee and Cho (Retrovirology 2012, 9:23) dealing with an endogenous ecotropic mouse leukemia virus found in C57BL mice

First isolation of West Nile virus from a dromedary camel

published_or_final_versio

Polyphyletic origin of MERS coronaviruses and isolation of a novel clade A strain from dromedary camels in the United Arab Emirates

published_or_final_versio

Absence of miRNA-146a Differentially Alters Microglia Function and Proteome

Background: MiR-146a is an important regulator of innate inflammatory responses and is also implicated in cell death and survival. Methods: By sorting CNS resident cells, microglia were the main cellular source of miR-146a. Therefore, we investigated microglia function and phenotype in miR-146a knock-out (KO) mice, analyzed the proteome of KO and wild-type (WT) microglia by LC-MS/MS, and examined miR-146a expression in different brain lesions of patients with multiple sclerosis (MS). Results: When stimulated with LPS or myelin in vitro, microglia from KO mice expressed higher levels of IL-1β, TNF, IL-6, IL-10, CCL3, and CCL2 compared to WT. Stimulation increased migration and phagocytosis of WT but not KO microglia. CD11c+ microglia were induced by cuprizone (CPZ) in the WT mice but less in the KO. The proteome of ex vivo microglia was not different in miR-146a KO compared to WT mice, but CPZ treatment induced differential and reduced protein responses in the KO: GOT1, COX5b, CRYL1, and cystatin-C were specifically changed in KO microglia. We explored discriminative features of microglia proteomes: sparse Partial Least Squares-Discriminant Analysis showed the best discrimination when control and CPZ-treated conditions were compared. Cluster of ten proteins separated WT and miR-146a KO microglia after CPZ: among them were sensomes allowing to perceive the environment, Atp1a3 that belongs to the signature of CD11c+ microglia, and proteins related to inflammatory responses (S100A9, Ppm1g). Finally, we examined the expression of miR-146a and its validated target genes in different brain lesions of MS patients. MiR-146 was upregulated in all lesion types, and the highest expression was in active lesions. Nineteen of 88 validated target genes were significantly changed in active lesions, while none were changed in NAWM. Conclusion: Our data indicated that microglia is the major source of miR-146a in the CNS. The absence of miR-146a differentially affected microglia function and proteome, and miR-146a may play an important role in gene regulation of active MS lesions

Detection of weak gravitational lensing distortions of distant galaxies by cosmic dark matter at large scales

Most of the matter in the universe is not luminous and can be observed directly only through its gravitational effect. An emerging technique called weak gravitational lensing uses background galaxies to reveal the foreground dark matter distribution on large scales. Light from very distant galaxies travels to us through many intervening overdensities which gravitationally distort their apparent shapes. The observed ellipticity pattern of these distant galaxies thus encodes information about the large-scale structure of the universe, but attempts to measure this effect have been inconclusive due to systematic errors. We report the first detection of this ``cosmic shear'' using 145,000 background galaxies to reveal the dark matter distribution on angular scales up to half a degree in three separate lines of sight. The observed angular dependence of this effect is consistent with that predicted by two leading cosmological models, providing new and independent support for these models.Comment: 18 pages, 5 figures: To appear in Nature. (This replacement fixes tex errors and typos.