Academic Success and Christian Affiliation in College

The goal of our study was to provide a more thorough understanding of the relationship between religious attitudes and academic success, and will provide direction for future research in this domain. Our research examined the relationship between Christianity, academic achievement, and mediating variables in college-aged students. Past studies regarding religion and academic success have found that in some communities, academic success is positively correlated with religious involvement. However, these studies primarily looked at academic success in relation to involvement in a religious community, and not to personal attitudes regarding religion. To gain a better understanding of the role of personal religious attitudes in academic success, this study specifically examined academic success in relation to Christian affiliation and spirituality, as well as intrinsic dispositions of positivity and mastery. These mediating variables were included to control for factors that may relate to both academic success and religiosity, providing a more complete view of the relationship between religious attitudes and academic success. Study participants included college students currently attending a small, public, liberal-arts university. The study utilized a descriptive research design in which participants self-reported details about their demographics, academic performance (i.e. GPA and participation in honors programming), religious beliefs, and personality characteristics associated with outlook and hopefulness. Our presentation will examine the results of our study in relation to questions regarding the role of personal beliefs and dispositions in academic success.https://digitalcommons.morris.umn.edu/urs_2015/1002/thumbnail.jp

Understanding and Contextualizing Precedents in e-Discovery: The Illusion of Stare Decisis and Best Practices to Avoid Reliance on Outdated Guidance

But as precedents survive like the clavicle in the cat, long after the use they once served is at an end, and the reason for them has been forgotten, the result of following them must often be failure and confusion from the merely logical point of view

Mechanism of human PINK1 activation at the TOM complex by reconstitution

Loss of function mutations in PTEN-induced kinase 1 (PINK1) are a frequent cause of earlyonset Parkinson’s disease (PD). Stabilisation of PINK1 at the Translocase of Outer Membrane (TOM) complex of damaged mitochondria is a critical step for its activation. To date the mechanism of how PINK1 is activated in the TOM complex is unclear. Herein we report coexpression of human PINK1 and all seven TOM subunits in Saccharomyces cerevisiae is sufficient for PINK1 activation. We use this reconstitution system to systematically assess the role of each TOM subunit towards PINK1 activation. We unambiguously demonstrate that the TOM20 and TOM70 receptor subunits are required for optimal PINK1 activation and map their sites of interaction with PINK1 using AlphaFold structural modelling and mutagenesis. We also demonstrate an essential role of the pore-containing subunit TOM40 and its structurally associated subunits TOM7 and TOM22 for PINK1 activation. These molecular findings will aid in the development of small molecule activators of PINK1 as a therapeutic strategy for PD

Mechanism of human PINK1 activation at the TOM complex by reconstitution

Loss of function mutations in PTEN-induced kinase 1 (PINK1) are a frequent cause of earlyonset Parkinson’s disease (PD). Stabilisation of PINK1 at the Translocase of Outer Membrane (TOM) complex of damaged mitochondria is a critical step for its activation. To date the mechanism of how PINK1 is activated in the TOM complex is unclear. Herein we report coexpression of human PINK1 and all seven TOM subunits in Saccharomyces cerevisiae is sufficient for PINK1 activation. We use this reconstitution system to systematically assess the role of each TOM subunit towards PINK1 activation. We unambiguously demonstrate that the TOM20 and TOM70 receptor subunits are required for optimal PINK1 activation and map their sites of interaction with PINK1 using AlphaFold structural modelling and mutagenesis. We also demonstrate an essential role of the pore-containing subunit TOM40 and its structurally associated subunits TOM7 and TOM22 for PINK1 activation. These molecular findings will aid in the development of small molecule activators of PINK1 as a therapeutic strategy for PD

Mechanism of human PINK1 activation at the TOM complex in a reconstituted system

Loss-of-function mutations in PTEN-induced kinase 1 (PINK1) are a frequent cause of early-onset Parkinson's disease (PD). Stabilization of PINK1 at the translocase of outer membrane (TOM) complex of damaged mitochondria is critical for its activation. The mechanism of how PINK1 is activated in the TOM complex is unclear. Here, we report that co-expression of human PINK1 and all seven TOM subunits in Saccharomyces cerevisiae is sufficient for PINK1 activation. We use this reconstitution system to systematically assess the role of each TOM subunit toward PINK1 activation. We unambiguously demonstrate that the TOM20 and TOM70 receptor subunits are required for optimal PINK1 activation and map their sites of interaction with PINK1 using AlphaFold structural modeling and mutagenesis. We also demonstrate an essential role of the pore-containing subunit TOM40 and its structurally associated subunits TOM7 and TOM22 for PINK1 activation. These findings will aid in the development of small-molecule activators of PINK1 as a therapeutic strategy for PD.</p

Mechanism of human PINK1 activation at the TOM complex in a reconstituted system

Loss-of-function mutations in PTEN-induced kinase 1 (PINK1) are a frequent cause of early-onset Parkinson's disease (PD). Stabilization of PINK1 at the translocase of outer membrane (TOM) complex of damaged mitochondria is critical for its activation. The mechanism of how PINK1 is activated in the TOM complex is unclear. Here, we report that co-expression of human PINK1 and all seven TOM subunits in Saccharomyces cerevisiae is sufficient for PINK1 activation. We use this reconstitution system to systematically assess the role of each TOM subunit toward PINK1 activation. We unambiguously demonstrate that the TOM20 and TOM70 receptor subunits are required for optimal PINK1 activation and map their sites of interaction with PINK1 using AlphaFold structural modeling and mutagenesis. We also demonstrate an essential role of the pore-containing subunit TOM40 and its structurally associated subunits TOM7 and TOM22 for PINK1 activation. These findings will aid in the development of small-molecule activators of PINK1 as a therapeutic strategy for PD.</p

Structure of the human protein kinase ZAK in complex with vemurafenib.

The mixed lineage kinase ZAK is a key regulator of the MAPK pathway mediating cell survival and inflammatory response. ZAK is targeted by several clinically approved kinase inhibitors, and inhibition of ZAK has been reported to protect fromdoxorubicin-induced cardiomyopathy. On the other hand, unintended targeting of ZAK has been linked to severe adverse effects such as the development of cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma. Therefore, both specific inhibitors of ZAK, as well as anticancer drugs lacking off-target activity against ZAK, may provide therapeutic benefit. Here we report the first crystal structure of ZAK in complex with the B-RAF inhibitor vemurafenib. The co-crystal structure displayed a number of ZAK-specific features including a highly distorted P loop conformation enabling rational inhibitor design. Positional scanning peptide library analysis revealed a unique substrate specificity of the ZAK kinase including unprecedented preferences for istidine residues at positions -1 and +2 relative to the phosphoacceptor site. In addition, we screened a library of clinical kinase inhibitors identifying several inhibitors that potently inhibit ZAK, demonstrating that this kinase is commonly mistargeted by currently used anticancer drugs

Evaluation of the standard battery of in vitro genotoxicity tests to predict in vivo genotoxicity through mathematical modeling: A report from the 8th International Workshop on Genotoxicity Testing

In human health risk assessment of chemicals and pharmaceuticals, identification of genotoxicity hazard usually starts with a standard battery of in vitro genotoxicity tests, which is needed to cover all genotoxicity endpoints. The individual tests included in the battery are not designed to pick up all endpoints. This explains why resulting data can appear contradictory, thereby complicating accurate interpretation of the findings. Such interpretation could be improved through application of mathematical modeling. One of the advantages of mathematical modeling is that the strengths and weaknesses of each test are taken into account. Furthermore, the generated predictions are objective and convey the associated uncertainties. This approach was explored by the working group “Predictivity of In Vitro Genotoxicity Testing,” convened in the context of the 8th International Workshop on Genotoxicity Testing (IWGT). Specifically, we applied mathematical modeling to a database with publicly available in vitro and in vivo data for genotoxicity. The results indicate that a mammalian in vitro clastogenicity test and a mammalian cell gene mutation test together provide strong predictive weight-of-evidence for evaluating genotoxic hazard of a substance, although they are better in predicting absence of genotoxic potential than in predicting presence of genotoxic potential. Remarkably, the bacterial reverse mutation (Ames) test did not significantly change these predictions when used in combination with in vitro mutagenicity and clastogenicity tests using cells of mammalian origin. However, in case only data from a bacterial reverse mutation test are available for the assessment of genotoxic potential, these do bear weight of evidence and thus can be used. Genotoxicity assays are generally executed in tiers, in which the bacterial reverse mutation test often is the starting point. Thus, it is reasonable to suspect that early in development test results from the bacterial reverse mutation test have influenced the composition of the database studied here. We performed several tests on the robustness of the database used for the analyses presented here, and the forthcoming results do not indicate a strong bias. Further research comparing in vitro genotoxicity data with in vivo data for additional compounds will provide more insights whether it is indeed time to reconsider the composition of the standard in vitro genotoxicity battery