Exploitation and resistance: a comparative analysis of the Chinese cheap labour electronics and high-value added IT sectors.

This article compares the electronics sector in the area of Shenzhen, based on cheap labour assembling goods for export, with the IT sector in the area of Shanghai, relying on a more skilled workforce manufacturing high-value added goods. It is asked in what way these rather different locations within the global political economy condition the form and contents of resistance in these two sectors. The article concludes that industrial relations are more confrontational in the electronics sector with informal labour NGOs supporting workers in getting their individual and collective rights. The IT sector, in contrast, is characterised by consensual relationships. Informal labour NGOs concentrate on organising cultural activities for workers’ free time, performing a mediating role between employers and employees, supported by the government

B5, a thioredoxin reductase inhibitor, induces apoptosis in human cervical cancer cells by suppressing the thioredoxin system, disrupting mitochondrion-dependent pathways and triggering autophagy

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Design and baseline characteristics of the finerenone in reducing cardiovascular mortality and morbidity in diabetic kidney disease trial

Background: Among people with diabetes, those with kidney disease have exceptionally high rates of cardiovascular (CV) morbidity and mortality and progression of their underlying kidney disease. Finerenone is a novel, nonsteroidal, selective mineralocorticoid receptor antagonist that has shown to reduce albuminuria in type 2 diabetes (T2D) patients with chronic kidney disease (CKD) while revealing only a low risk of hyperkalemia. However, the effect of finerenone on CV and renal outcomes has not yet been investigated in long-term trials. Patients and Methods: The Finerenone in Reducing CV Mortality and Morbidity in Diabetic Kidney Disease (FIGARO-DKD) trial aims to assess the efficacy and safety of finerenone compared to placebo at reducing clinically important CV and renal outcomes in T2D patients with CKD. FIGARO-DKD is a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, parallel-group, event-driven trial running in 47 countries with an expected duration of approximately 6 years. FIGARO-DKD randomized 7,437 patients with an estimated glomerular filtration rate >= 25 mL/min/1.73 m(2) and albuminuria (urinary albumin-to-creatinine ratio >= 30 to <= 5,000 mg/g). The study has at least 90% power to detect a 20% reduction in the risk of the primary outcome (overall two-sided significance level alpha = 0.05), the composite of time to first occurrence of CV death, nonfatal myocardial infarction, nonfatal stroke, or hospitalization for heart failure. Conclusions: FIGARO-DKD will determine whether an optimally treated cohort of T2D patients with CKD at high risk of CV and renal events will experience cardiorenal benefits with the addition of finerenone to their treatment regimen. Trial Registration: EudraCT number: 2015-000950-39; ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT02545049

Validation of a Speech Database for Assessing College Students&rsquo; Physical Competence under the Concept of Physical Literacy

This study developed a speech database for assessing one of the elements of physical literacy&mdash;physical competence. Thirty-one healthy and native Cantonese speakers were instructed to read a material aloud after various exercises. The speech database contained four types of speech, which were collected at rest and after three exercises of the Canadian Assessment of Physical Literacy 2nd Edition. To show the possibility of detecting each exercise state, a support vector machine (SVM) was trained on the acoustic features. Two speech feature sets, the extended Geneva Minimalistic Acoustic Parameter Set (eGeMAPS) and Computational Paralinguistics Challenge (ComParE), were utilized to perform speech signal processing. The results showed that the two stage four-class SVM were better than the stage one. The performances of both feature sets could achieve 70% accuracy (unweighted average recall (UAR)) in the three-class model after five-fold cross-validation. The UAR result of the resting and vigorous state on the two-class model running with the ComParE feature set was 97%, and the UAR of the resting and moderate state was 74%. This study introduced the process of constructing a speech database and a method that can achieve the short-time automatic classification of physical states. Future work on this corpus, including the prediction of the physical competence of young people, comparison of speech features with other age groups and further spectral analysis, are suggested

Brain-Targeting Delivery of Two Peptidylic Inhibitors for Their Combination Therapy in Transgenic Polyglutamine Disease Mice via Intranasal Administration

Polyglutamine diseases are a set of progressive neurodegenerative disorders caused by misfolding and aggregation of mutant CAG RNA and polyglutamin protein. To date, there is a lack of effective therapeutics that can counteract the polyglutamine neurotoxicity. Two peptidylic inhibitors, QBP1 and P3, targeting the protein and RNA toxicities, respectively, have been previously demonstrated by us with combinational therapeutic effects on the Drosophila polyglutamine disease model. However, their therapeutic efficacy has never been investigated in vivo in mammals. The current study aims to (a) develop a brain-targeting delivery system for both QBP1 and L1P3V8 (a lipidated variant of P3 with improved stability) and (b) evaluate their therapeutic effects on the R6/2 transgenic mouse model of polyglutamine disease. Compared with intravenous administration, intranasal administration of QBP1 significantly increased its brain-to-plasma ratio. In addition, employment of a chitosan-containing in situ gel for the intranasal administration of QBP1 notably improved its brain concentration for up to 10-fold. Further study on intranasal cotreatment with the optimized formulation of QBP1 and L1P3V8 in mice found no interference on the brain uptake of each other. Subsequent efficacy evaluation of 4-week daily QBP1 (16 μmol/kg) and L1P3V8 (6 μmol/kg) intranasal cotreatment in the R6/2 mice demonstrated a significant improvement on the motor coordination and explorative behavior of the disease mice, together with a full suppression on the RNA- and protein-toxicity markers in their brains. In summary, the current study developed an efficient intranasal cotreatment of the two peptidylic inhibitors, QBP1 and L1P3V8, for their brain-targeting, and such a novel therapeutic strategy was found to be effective on a transgenic polyglutamine disease mouse model

Adoption and correlates of Postgraduate Hospital Educational Environment Measure (PHEEM) in the evaluation of learning environments – A systematic review^*

<p><b>Background:</b> The Postgraduate Hospital Educational Environment Measure (PHEEM) is a highly reliable and valid instrument to measure the educational environment during post graduate medical training. This review extends earlier reports by evaluating the extant adoption of PHEEM in various international clinical training sites, and its significant correlations in order to expand our understanding on the use of PHEEM and facilitate future applications and research.</p> <p><b>Method:</b> A systematic literature review was conducted on all articles between 2005 and October 2015 that adopted and reported data using the PHEEM.</p> <p><b>Results:</b> Overall 30 studies were included, encompassing data from 14 countries internationally. Notable differences in the PHEEM scores were found between different levels of training, disciplines, and clinical training sites. Common strengths and weaknesses in learning environments were observed and there were significant correlations between PHEEM scores and In-Training Exam (ITE) performance (positive correlation) and level of burnout (negative correlation), respectively.</p> <p><b>Conclusions:</b> PHEEM is widely adopted in different learning settings, and is a useful tool to identify the strengths and weaknesses of an educational environment. Future research can examine other correlates of PHEEM and longitudinal changes in interventional studies.</p

Sera from HIV-1(+) individuals can sensitize moDC for DC-SIGN dependent CD40L-mediated apoptosis.

<p>(<b><i>A</i></b>) moDC were treated with HIV(+) serum before or after immunoprecipitation (IP) with anti-gp120 mAbs, or with or without anti-DC-SIGN or isotype control mAbs, and subsequently co-cultured with autologous activated CD4 T cells. After 3 d, cells were harvested and subjected to TUNEL assays. Cell death was assessed as the percentage of cells expressing terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase (TdT). DC pulsed with HIV(+) serum without coculture with activated CD4 T cells (top panel) were also used as a control. Data are representative of 4 experiments. (<b><i>B</i></b>) MoDCs were treated with anti-DC-SIGN mAbs, isotype control Ab, or anti-CD40L mAb before pulse with HIV serum (before or after immunoprecipitation of gp120) and cocultured with activated CD4 T cells. Data are expressed as mean ± SD (n = 4); *p<0.05 and **p<0.01 compared with ‘HIV(+) serum-DC plus isotype Ab’. (<b><i>C</i></b>,<b><i>D</i></b>) moDC were treated with normal AB serum or HIV-1(+) serum with viral RNA copies >400,000/ml (<a href="http://www.plospathogens.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.ppat.1003100#ppat.1003100.s013" target="_blank">Table S1</a>), with or without pre-treatment with anti-CD4 plus chemokine receptor or anti-DC-SIGN mAbs, or with gp120-depleted (immunoprecipitated, IP) HIV(+) serum, and co-cultured with CD40L Tf for 3 d. Data are representative of 4 experiments in panel <b><i>C</i></b> and individual datum with the mean is shown in panel <b><i>D</i></b>; †: P<0.001 between with and without IP of gp120 from the HIV serum, **: P<0.01 between with and without pre-treatment with anti-DC-SIGN mAbs.</p

Cross-linked recombinant gp120 sensitizes moDC for CD40L-mediated apoptosis after co-culture with activated CD4 T cells.

<p>(<b><i>A</i></b>) moDC were treated for 24 h with anti-His mAb alone (control DC, left panels) or with 25 nM gp120_ADA cross-linked with anti-His mAb (gp120-DC, right panels), and co-cultured with autologous activated (upper panels) or naïve (lower panels) CD4 T cells for 3 d. The moDC (<a href="http://www.plospathogens.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.ppat.1003100#ppat.1003100.s001" target="_blank">Fig. S1</a>) were analyzed for Annexin V (AV) and propidium iodide (PI) expression to assess the extent of apoptosis, as manifested by the percentage of the AV-positive [AV(+)] cells. Data are representative of 5 experiments. (<b><i>B</i></b>) Apoptosis of moDC was analyzed after treatment with different concentrations of cross-linked recombinant gp120_ADA or gp120_HXBc2 and co-culture with activated CD4 T cells for 3 d. DC treated with monomeric gp120 (not cross-linked with anti-His or anti-FLAG mAb) were used as a control. Data represent mean ± SD from 5 experiments; **p<0.01. The use of cross-linked recombinant gp120_BAL gave similar results (not shown). (<b><i>C</i></b>) Apoptosis of moDC was analyzed after treatment with the indicated cross-linked recombinant gp120, or appropriate mAb controls, at the indicated time points after co-culture with activated CD4 T cells. Data represent mean ± SD from 5 experiments (data for anti-His and anti-FLAG controls were indistinguishable); *P<0.05 and **P<0.01 compared with control group (DC with no gp120 pulse or DC plus anti-His/FLAG Ab). (<b><i>D</i></b>) moDC were respectively not treated (Control DC), or treated with gp120_ADA cross-linked with mouse IgG2a anti-His mAb (dimeric gp120-DC), or treated with cross-linked gp120_ADA supplemented with isotype control mouse IgG (gp120-DC+isotype IgG), and subsequently co-cultured with autologous activated CD4 T cells for 3 days before AV/PI staining. Data are representative of 3 experiments. (<b><i>E</i></b>) moDC were treated with cross-linked gp120_ADA and co-cultured for 3 d with autologous activated or naïve CD4 T cells, that had been pre-treated without or with 10 µg/ml isotype control or anti-CD40L mAb, before cell viability analysis. Data are expressed as mean ± SD from 5 experiments. **p<0.01.</p

Cross-linked gp120 sensitizes DC through DC-SIGN and MCLRs for CD40L-mediated apoptosis.

<p>(<b><i>A</i></b>, <b><i>B</i></b>) moDC were pretreated with anti-DC-SIGN mAbs or isotype control Ab before pulse with cross-linked gp120_ADA and co-culture for 3 d with autologous activated CD4 T cells, and subsequently subjected to cell viability assay. Data are representative of 3 experiments and are expressed as mean ± SD from 3 experiments in <b><i>B</i></b>. (<b><i>C, D</i></b>) moDC were treated with cross-linked recombinant gp120_ADA with or without pre-treatment by soluble ICAM-3-Fc chimeric protein, anti-CD4 plus anti-CCR5 mAbs, or anti-DC-SIGN mAbs. Cells were subsequently co-cultured with mock- or CD40L-transfected (CD40L Tf) cells for 3 d. Data are representative of 7 experiments in panel <b><i>C</i></b> and are expressed as mean ± SD (n = 7) in <b><i>D</i></b>; ***p<0.005. (<b><i>E, F</i></b>) Recombinant gp120_ADA were treated with or without EndoH, and then cross-linked with anti-His Ab before use to pulse moDC. Prior to gp120 pulsing, moDC were pre-treated with or without mannan or FcR blocking reagent, or anti-DC-SIGN mAbs for 30 minutes. After gp120 pulsing, DC were subsequently cocultured with CD40 Tf for 3 days. DC without any pre-treatment and only pulsed with anti-His Ab were used as a control (control DC). Data are representative of 3 experiments and expressed as mean ± SD from 3 experiments in <b><i>F</i></b>; *p<0.05, **p<0.01.</p