Ag and N acceptors in ZnO: ab initio study of acceptor pairing, doping efficiency, and the role of hydrogen

Efficiency of ZnO doping with Ag and N shallow acceptors, which substitute respectively cations and anions, was investigated. First principles calculations indicate a strong tendency towards formation of nearest neighbor Ag-N pairs and N-Ag-N triangles. Binding of acceptors stems from the formation of quasi-molecular bonds between dopants, and has a universal character in semiconductors. The pairing increases energy levels of impurities, and thus lowers doping efficiency. In the presence of donors, pairing is weaker or even forbidden. However, hydrogen has a tendency to form clusters with Ag and N, which favors the Ag-N aggregation and lowers the acceptor levels of such complexes.Comment: 10 pages, 4 figure

ТЕОРЕТИКО-ОРГАНІЗАЦІЙНІ ЗАСАДИ ВЗАЄМОДІЇ СТРАХОВИХ ТА АСИСТАНСЬКИХ КОМПАНІЙ. (THEORETICAL AND ORGANIZATIONAL PRINCIPLES OF INSURANCE AND ASSISTANCE COMPANIES INTERACTION).

У статті досліджено передумови формування страхового асистансу в Україні. Проаналізовано особливість та ефективність взаємодії страхових та асистанських компаній. Обґрунтовано перспективи розвитку асистанських компаній на страховому ринку. (THEORETICAL AND ORGANIZATIONAL PRINCIPLES OF INSURANCE AND ASSISTANCE COMPANIES INTERACTION)

КОНЦЕПТИ КОМУНІКАТИВНОГО РЕСУРСУ У ХВОРИХ НА РЕКУРЕНТНИЙ ДЕПРЕСИВНИЙ РОЗЛАД ТА ЇХ РЕФЕРЕНТНИХ РОДИЧІВ

The aim of our study was to determine the main characteristics of communication resources in patients with recurrent depressive disorder (RDR) and their reference relatives in social functioning context.Materials and methods. J. Sullivan and M. Guilford questionnaire and method of emotional empathy measuring by A. Mehrabian were used as psychological testing tools. After getting the informed consent, 45 families with a RDR patient and therefore 45 patients were included into our study. Control group included 35 families that do not have mentally sick members.Results. Indicators of empathic and affiliative tendencies were significantly lower, while indicators for the scale of "sensitivity to neglecting" were significantly higher in patients with RDR compared to respondents of control group (p<0.001). Composite evaluation of social intelligence in reference relatives of patients with RDR indicates that their individual adaptation resources in interpersonal interaction are reduced (RDR 3,66 ± 0,2, kg 4,43 ± 0,6, p <0,05).Conclusions. 1. Difficulties in understanding and predicting behavior of other people are associated with certain peculiarities of individual communication resources which include empathy, affiliation and social intelligence level.2. Patients with RDR revealed reduced capacity for empathy in social situations, reduced need for active communication, narrow range of interests, deterioration of interpersonal communication. High level of sensitivity towards neglecting on the background of underdeveloped empathic and affiliation tendencies observed in RDR patients may be predictive of the formation of maladaptive behavioral patterns.3. Low communication resources in patients with RDR and in their reference relatives considerably complicate relationships in families of patients, reduce opportunities for social adaptation in members of communicative process and break the homeostasis of family system that must be considered when creating relevant psychoeducational and psychocorrection programs.Мета – визначення особливостей комунікативних ресурсів у хворих на рекурентний депресивний розлад (РДР) та їх референтних родичів в контексті їх соціального функціонування.Матеріали і методи. В якості психодіагностичного інструментарію дослідження використані методика Дж. Гілфорда та М. Саллівена (російськомовна адаптація Михайлової Є. С.) та методика вимірювання емоційної емпатії А. Mehrabian. За умови інформованої згоди було обстежено 45 сімей, в яких проживає хворий на РДР, та, відповідно, 45 пацієнтів. Контрольну групу склали 35 сімей, в яких немає психічно хворих.Результати. Показники емпатичної та аффіліативної тенденцій були достовірно нижчими, а за шкалою «чутливість до знехтування» – достовірно вищими в групі хворих на РДР, порівняно з респондентами контрольної групи (р<0,001). Композитне оцінювання рівня соціального інтелекту свідчить про те, що у референтних родичів пацієнтів з РДР адаптаційні ресурси особистості в міжособистісній взаємодії знижені (РДР (3,66±0,2), КГ (4,43±0,6) P<0,05).Висновки. 1. Труднощі у розумінні та прогнозуванні поведінки людей пов’язані з особливостями комунікативного ресурсу особистості, до концептів якого можна віднести емпатично-аффіліативний статус та рівень соціального інтелекту.2. У пацієнтів з РДР виявлено знижену здатність до співпереживання ситуації, зменшення потреби в активному спілкуванні, звуження кола інтересів, погіршення міжособистісної комунікації. На фоні недостатньо розвинених емпатично-аффіліативних тенденцій відзначається підвищений рівень сенситивності до знехтування у спілкуванні, що може бути предиктором формування дезадаптивних поведінкових паттернів.3. Наявність низького комунікативного ресурсу як у хворих з РДР, так і у їх референтних родичів значно ускладнює стосунки у сім’ях хворих, знижує можливості соціальної адаптації членів комунікативного процесу та порушує гомеостаз сімейної системи, що необхідно враховувати при створенні відповідних психоосвітніх та психокорекційних програм

СТРАТЕГІЇ ПОДОЛАННЯ СТРЕСУ ТА ПЕРФЕКЦІОНІЗМ

Дезадаптивні стани, що порушують можливості адаптації до умов соціального середовища, виникають унаслідок комплексу взаємодії психологічних та соціальних факторів, які формують переживання стресу. Індивідуальні стилі подолання стресу, здатність до побудови інтегративної поведінки, зумовлюють ступінь стійкості до психічного стресу, ефективність навчання та міжособистісних взаємодій, стан здоров’я та якість життя студента, відповідно успішність у майбутній професійній діяльності. Набір копінг-стратегій студентів ВНМЗ характеризувався переважно як адаптивний: достовірно переважали особи з домінуючою адаптивною стратегією вирішення проблем, другою за частотоюбула умовно адаптивна стратегія пошуку соціальної підтримки, дезадаптивна стратегію уникнення застосовували як домінуючу найменша кількість студентів

Structural and biophysical analysis of nuclease protein antibiotics

© 2016 The Author(s); published by Portland Press Limited on behalf of the Biochemical Society. Protein antibiotics (bacteriocins) are a large and diverse family of multidomain toxins that kill specific Gram-negative bacteria during intraspecies competition for resources. Our understanding of the mechanism of import of such potent toxins has increased significantly in recent years, especially with the reporting of several structures of bacteriocin domains. Less well understood is the structural biochemistry of intact bacteriocins and how these compare across bacterial species. Here, we focus on endonuclease (DNase) bacteriocins that target the genomes of Escherichia coli and Pseudomonas aeruginosa, known as E-Type colicins and S-Type pyocins, respectively, bound to their specific immunity (Im) proteins. First, we report the 3.2 Å structure of the DNase colicin ColE9 in complex with its ultra-high affinity Im protein, Im9. In contrast with Im3, which when bound to the ribonuclease domain of the homologous colicin ColE3 makes contact with the translocation (T) domain of the toxin, we find that Im9 makes no such contact and only interactions with the ColE9 cytotoxic domain are observed. Second, we report small-Angle X-ray scattering data for two S-Type DNase pyocins, S2 and AP41, into which are fitted recently determined X-ray structures for isolated domains. We find that DNase pyocins and colicins are both highly elongated molecules, even though the order of their constituent domains differs. We discuss the implications of these architectural similarities and differences in the context of the translocation mechanism of protein antibiotics through the cell envelope of Gram-negative bacteria

PP270—Computational modeling of dravet syndrome

e102 Volume 35 Number 8S clorazepate (20mg 2× /d), and pregabalin (100 mg 3× /d). Because of resurgence of severe anxio-depressive symptoms, without any change of the treatment, the patient was readmitted 2 months later. Despite increasing the dose of clomipramine up to 225 mg/d, there was no clinical improvement, and the patient finally attempted to her life by abusing drugs. She then improved after 2 weeks on clomipramine IV (50 mg/d). Compliance was estimated good and no pharmacokinetic interactions with the rest of the treatment were found. C and DC plasma levels were measured, and CYP2D6/CYP2C19 genotype analyzed. Results: The plasma levels of C and DC are given in the Table below. Measures were done at the steady state and at trough concentration for IV treatment and 10 hours after the last dose for oral treatment

The Impact of QE on Liquidity: Evidence from the UK Corporate Bond Purchase Scheme

In August 2016, the Bank of England (BoE) announced a Corporate Bond Purchase Scheme (CBPS) to purchase up to $10bn of sterling corporate bonds. To investigate the impact of these purchases on liquidity, we create a novel dataset that combines transaction-level data from the secondary corporate bond market with proprietary offer-level data from the BoE's CBPS auctions. Identifying the impact of central bank asset purchases on liquidity is potentially impacted by reverse causality, because liquidity considerations might impact purchases. But the offer-level data allow us to construct proxy measures for the BoE's demand for bonds and auction participants' supply of bonds, meaning that we can control for the impact of liquidity on purchases. Across a range of liquidity measures, we find that CBPS purchases improved the liquidity of purchased bonds

Structures of the Ultra-High-Affinity Protein-Protein Complexes of Pyocins S2 and AP41 and Their Cognate Immunity Proteins from Pseudomonas aeruginosa

© 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. How ultra-high-affinity protein-protein interactions retain high specificity is still poorly understood. The interaction between colicin DNase domains and their inhibitory immunity (Im) proteins is an ultra-high-affinity interaction that is essential for the neutralisation of endogenous DNase catalytic activity and for protection against exogenous DNase bacteriocins. The colicin DNase-Im interaction is a model system for the study of high-affinity protein-protein interactions. However, despite the fact that closely related colicin-like bacteriocins are widely produced by Gram-negative bacteria, this interaction has only been studied using colicins from Escherichia coli. In this work, we present the first crystal structures of two pyocin DNase-Im complexes from Pseudomonas aeruginosa, pyocin S2 DNase-ImS2 and pyocin AP41 DNase-ImAP41. These structures represent divergent DNase-Im subfamilies and are important in extending our understanding of protein-protein interactions for this important class of high-affinity protein complex. A key finding of this work is that mutations within the immunity protein binding energy hotspot, helix III, are tolerated by complementary substitutions at the DNase-Immunity protein binding interface. Im helix III is strictly conserved in colicins where an Asp forms polar interactions with the DNase backbone. ImAP41 contains an Asp-to-Gly substitution in helix III and our structures show the role of a co-evolved substitution where Pro in DNase loop 4 occupies the volume vacated and removes the unfulfilled hydrogen bond. We observe the co-evolved mutations in other DNase-Immunity pairs that appear to underpin the split of this family into two distinct groups

Understanding Society Innovation Panel Wave 8: results from methodological experiments

This paper presents some preliminary findings from Wave 8 of the Innovation Panel (IP8) of Understanding Society: The UK Household Longitudinal Study. Understanding Society is a major panel survey in the UK. May 2015, the eighth wave of the Innovation Panel went into the field. IP8 used a mixed-mode design, using on-line interviews and face-to-face interviews. This paper describes the design of IP8, the experiments carried and the preliminary findings from early analysis of the data

Auditory stimuli mimicking ambient sounds drive temporal "delta-brushes" in premature infants

In the premature infant, somatosensory and visual stimuli trigger an immature electroencephalographic (EEG) pattern, "delta-brushes," in the corresponding sensory cortical areas. Whether auditory stimuli evoke delta-brushes in the premature auditory cortex has not been reported. Here, responses to auditory stimuli were studied in 46 premature infants without neurologic risk aged 31 to 38 postmenstrual weeks (PMW) during routine EEG recording. Stimuli consisted of either low-volume technogenic "clicks" near the background noise level of the neonatal care unit, or a human voice at conversational sound level. Stimuli were administrated pseudo-randomly during quiet and active sleep. In another protocol, the cortical response to a composite stimulus ("click" and voice) was manually triggered during EEG hypoactive periods of quiet sleep. Cortical responses were analyzed by event detection, power frequency analysis and stimulus locked averaging. Before 34 PMW, both voice and "click" stimuli evoked cortical responses with similar frequency-power topographic characteristics, namely a temporal negative slow-wave and rapid oscillations similar to spontaneous delta-brushes. Responses to composite stimuli also showed a maximal frequency-power increase in temporal areas before 35 PMW. From 34 PMW the topography of responses in quiet sleep was different for "click" and voice stimuli: responses to "clicks" became diffuse but responses to voice remained limited to temporal areas. After the age of 35 PMW auditory evoked delta-brushes progressively disappeared and were replaced by a low amplitude response in the same location. Our data show that auditory stimuli mimicking ambient sounds efficiently evoke delta-brushes in temporal areas in the premature infant before 35 PMW. Along with findings in other sensory modalities (visual and somatosensory), these findings suggest that sensory driven delta-brushes represent a ubiquitous feature of the human sensory cortex during fetal stages and provide a potential test of functional cortical maturation during fetal development. © 2013 Chipaux et al