2,407 research outputs found
Shock Incarceration Programs Creative Problem Solving
Abstract of Project
Shock Incarceration Programs Creative Problem Solving
Many women who are incarcerated inside correctional boot camp prisons might have substantial low self-esteem that could worsen due to the stress of the prison environment, confinement, and being far away from their children and family members. Shock Incarceration or “boot camp” male correctional programs are degrading for female inmates: They do not meet the special needs and problems of women. Programs are based on control theory, which implies that an individual’s behavior assimilates to that which is expected by society. Female inmates are taught discipline and responsibility by “breaking down and building up” to make certain they will become law abiding citizens. Boot camp prison programs were developed to address the lawlessness of men. This paper seeks to discuss the need to implement feminist programs and creativity for creative problem solving. Feminist theory advances social change for women in overcoming dominant cultural and societal norms. Creativity, a deliberate process that opens the door to change, will be effective to enable women to build their high self-esteem. The Creative Problem-Solving Workbook: For Building Women’s Self-Esteem will be introduced. It was created to develop deliberate thinking processes for self-esteem while incarcerated
5' heterogeneity of glucocorticoid receptor mRNA: associations with tissue-specific, constitutive and auto-regulation
Glucocorticoids are steroid hormones that exert profound effects on virtually all
tissues. The principal determinant of cellular sensitivity to glucocorticoids is the
level of glucocorticoid receptor (GR). Despite near-ubiquitous expression, GR levels
vary widely between tissues. A complete lack of GR is lethal at birth and even mild
dysregulation has significant pathophysiological consequences. The rat GR gene
includes a complex 5' promoter region encoding at least eleven untranslated alternate
exons 1, eight of which lie in a ~3kb CpG island region close to exon 2. The subject
for this investigation has been the association between the alternate exons 1 of the
GR promoter and the tissue-specific, constitutive and auto-regulation of GR.Cell-specific alternate exon 1 expression was analysed by RT-PCR in various rodent
cell lines. All 'CpG island' exons 1 examined (I4, I5, 16, I7, 110 andln) were
expressed in all cell lines tested, while expression of exon 11, which lies outside the
CpG island region, ~30.2kb upstream of exon 2, was restricted to cells of the
immune system. Promoter activity was analysed by transient transfection in B103
(rat neural), C6 (rat glioma) and H4IIE (rat liver) cell lines, using constructs forming
both a 3' and 5' deletion series of the CpG island region fused to a luciferase reporter
gene. 'P2' contains the entire promoter and was the most active construct in all cell
lines tested. Transfections using the 3' deletion series, which assesses individual
exon 1-associated promoter activity, demonstrated that only 'PI7' showed high
tissue-specific activity restricted to the neural cell lines B103 and C6. Further
transfections with constructs based on Pl7 identified a 134bp region required for high
promoter activity in neural cells, which was orientation-specific and did not show
properties associated with a classical enhancer. This directionality was mirrored in
DNasel protection studies in which a footprint was identified on only one strand of
the 134bp fragment. While gel mobility shift assays showed evidence of Spl binding
over the region, the physiological significance of this remains unclear. It may be the
case that this fragment represents a region at which directional transcription is
initiated. Transfections in B103 cells using the 5' deletion series identified two
regions important for high promoter activity. Further analysis showed that the activity of these regions was position-dependent within the context of the whole
promoter. It appears, therefore, that alternate GR exons 1 are not associated with
individual promoters that are selectively regulated in different cell types. Rather,
tissue-specific levels of GR arise through a complex arrangement of interacting
regulatory elements over the whole promoter region.The role of individual exon 1 splice donor sites was investigated by site-directed
mutagenesis of splice donor sites at exons U, lio and In within P2. Following
transient transfection in B103 cells, none of the mutant constructs showed a loss in
promoter activity relative to intact P2. RT-PCR identified longer transcripts
associated with the mutant exons, reflecting the use of downstream 'cryptic' splice
donor sites. There appears to be redundancy between alternate exons 1, which can
therefore be seen to form a robust promoter mechanism that ensures constitutive GR
expression. DNasel hypersensitive site mapping in H4IIE cells showed that a ~3kb
fragment, encompassing the entire CpG island region, is bounded by hypersensitive
sites and shows general sensitivity to nuclease digestion, consistent with an extended
region of transcriptionally active chromatin.The role of individual exons 1 in the autoregulation of GR was investigated by
transient transfection of the 3' and 5' deletion series of the GR promoter into B103
cells treated with the synthetic glucocorticoid, dexamethasone. Results showed that
the mechanism of autoregulation does not operate selectively on individual exons 1,
but instead down-regulates the transcriptional activity of the whole GR CpG island
region.Results were therefore consistent with a model of GR transcriptional regulation in
which exons 1 are not associated with individual promoters that are selectively
regulated by tissue-specific or auto-regulatory signals; rather, regulation occurs
through position-dependent interactions of elements arranged over the whole CpG
island promoter 'region'. However, while selection of alternate exon 1 transcription
initiation sites may not be of primary importance to the tissue-specific or auto¬
regulation of GR, the multiple exon 1 structure does ensure that promoter activity is
especially robust to mutations and thus ensures the constitutive expression of this
vital housekeeping gene
Protein kinases associated with the yeast phosphoproteome
BACKGROUND: Protein phosphorylation is an extremely important mechanism of cellular regulation. A large-scale study of phosphoproteins in a whole-cell lysate of Saccharomyces cerevisiae has previously identified 383 phosphorylation sites in 216 peptide sequences. However, the protein kinases responsible for the phosphorylation of the identified proteins have not previously been assigned. RESULTS: We used Predikin in combination with other bioinformatic tools, to predict which of 116 unique protein kinases in yeast phosphorylates each experimentally determined site in the phosphoproteome. The prediction was based on the match between the phosphorylated 7-residue sequence and the predicted substrate specificity of each kinase, with the highest weight applied to the residues or positions that contribute most to the substrate specificity. We estimated the reliability of the predictions by performing a parallel prediction on phosphopeptides for which the kinase has been experimentally determined. CONCLUSION: The results reveal that the functions of the protein kinases and their predicted phosphoprotein substrates are often correlated, for example in endocytosis, cytokinesis, transcription, replication, carbohydrate metabolism and stress response. The predictions link phosphoproteins of unknown function with protein kinases with known functions and vice versa, suggesting functions for the uncharacterized proteins. The study indicates that the phosphoproteins and the associated protein kinases represented in our dataset have housekeeping cellular roles; certain kinases are not represented because they may only be activated during specific cellular responses. Our results demonstrate the utility of our previously reported protein kinase substrate prediction approach (Predikin) as a tool for establishing links between kinases and phosphoproteins that can subsequently be tested experimentally
Modulation of Tumor Tolerance in Primary Central Nervous System Malignancies
Central nervous system tumors take advantage of the unique immunology of the CNS and develop exquisitely complex stromal networks that promote growth despite the presence of antigen-presenting cells and tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes. It is precisely this immunological paradox that is essential to the survival of the tumor. We review the evidence for functional CNS immune privilege and the impact it has on tumor tolerance. In this paper, we place an emphasis on the role of tumor-infiltrating myeloid cells in maintaining stromal and vascular quiescence, and we underscore the importance of indoleamine 2,3-dioxygenase activity as a myeloid-driven tumor tolerance mechanism. Much remains to be discovered regarding the tolerogenic mechanisms by which CNS tumors avoid immune clearance. Thus, it is an open question whether tumor tolerance in the brain is fundamentally different from that of peripheral sites of tumorigenesis or whether it simply stands as a particularly strong example of such tolerance
Blocking of the B7-CD28 pathway increases the capacity of FasL<sup>+</sup> (CD95L<sup>+</sup>) dendritic cells to kill alloactivated T cells
Writing and publishing for early career academics
This panel will describe strategies to help early career academics prepare a first publication and develop a research agenda. This interactive session provides graduate students and early career scholars with an overview of the types of papers frequently found in academic journals, and shares approaches to writing for both peer-reviewed and non-peer-reviewed sections. The panel includes engaging participants in discussion around current research topics, drafting a manuscript, and building and executing a research agenda. The strategies and insights we share will be particularly useful to those wanting to understand the academic publishing process more thoroughly
Issues concerning Landowner Management Plan Adoption Decisions: A Recursive Bivariate Probit Approach
Despite the likely benefits of having a written forest management plan, a small number of landowners in the United States have the one. A recursive bivariate probit model was used to identify the possible relationship between landowners’ decision to obtain a management plan and their interest in future timber harvesting. Our study results based on recursive bivariate model suggest that landowners having larger land ownerships, longer forest ownership tenure, and higher education were more likely to have a forest management plan and future timber harvesting interest. While the landowners having interest for wildlife management were also interested to have a written management plan, they did not prefer to harvest in future. Study results indicate that written management plan means more than a timber harvesting strategy to landowners in general. Many elderly landowners with a low level of income and less formal education and those having small or medium sized tracts of forestland are less likely to own a written management plan. Therefore, this group requires special attention in various government sponsored forest management related extension activities. Future research on understanding landowner perception behind written management plan is recommended
Predictors of non‐adherence to prescribed prophylactic clotting‐factor treatment regimens among adolescent and young adults with a bleeding disorder
Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/133588/1/hae12951_am.pdfhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/133588/2/hae12951.pd
Las17p–Vrp1p but not Las17p–Arp2/3 interaction is important for actin patch polarization in yeast
AbstractThe actin cytoskeleton plays a central role in many important cellular processes such as cell polarization, cell division and endocytosis. The dynamic changes to the actin cytoskeleton that accompany these processes are regulated by actin-associated proteins Wiskott–Aldrich Syndrome Protein (WASP) (known as Las17p in yeast) and WASP-Interacting Protein (WIP) (known as Vrp1p in yeast). Both yeast and human WASP bind to and stimulate the Arp2/3 complex which in turn nucleates assembly of actin monomers into filaments at polarized sites at the cortex. WASP–WIP interaction in yeast and humans are important for Arp2/3 complex stimulation in vitro. It has been proposed that these interactions are also important for polarized actin assembly in vivo. However, the redundancy of actin-associated proteins has made it difficult to test this hypothesis. We have identified two point mutations (L80T and H94L) in yeast WASP that in combination abolish WASP–WIP interaction in yeast. We also identify an N-terminal fragment of Las17p (N-Las17p1–368) able to interact with Vrp1p but not Arp2/3. Using these mutant and truncated forms of yeast WASP we provide novel evidence that WASP interaction with WIP is more important than interaction with Arp2/3 for polarized actin assembly and endocytosis in yeast
- …