Induction of the Synthesis of Triton-Soluble Proteins in Human Keratinocytes by Gamma Interferon

Recombinant human gamma interferon (r-IFN-γ) induces the synthesis and expression of HLA-DR antigen on cultured, normal, human keratinocytes depleted of Langerhans cells. After removal of r-IFN-γ from the culture medium of keratinocytes that are expressing HLA-DR antigen, the cells continue to express this antigen for at least 2 days. r-IFN-γ induces, in a dose dependent fashion, the synthesis of several triton-soluble proteins with the most prominent having an apparent molecular weight of 53,000. Whereas normal keratinocytes do not express HLADR antigen in vivo, they do express HLA-DR in a variety of skin diseases such as lichen planus, graft-versushost disease, and mycosis fungoides. We propose that an understanding of lymphocyte-keratinocyte interactions in vivo may be achieved by further studies of the mechanism of action of r-IFN-γ on cultured keratinocytes and that the results may provide insight into the pathophysiology leading to a number of common inflammatory and neoplastic skin diseases

Effects of Recombinant Interleukin 1 and Interleukin 2 on Human Keratinocytes

The effects of recombinant interleukin 1 alpha and beta, as well as recombinant interleukin 2, on human keratinocyte proliferation were studied in serum-containing as well as defined media. Both interleukin 1 preparations did not stimulate keratinocyte growth; interleukin 2 also did not stimulate keratinocyte growth. To determine whether interleukin 1 beta binds to keratinocytes, a cell membrane assay was developed for these cells. Iodinated interleukin 1 beta binds to keratinocytes with a kD of 6.2nm and 2500 receptors per cell. To determine the effects of interleukin 1 beta on protein synthesis, the molecular patterns of radiolabeled cell extracts of interleukin 1 beta-treated and nontreated keratinocytes were compared using two-dimensional polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis. No significant changes in the molecular pattern of newly synthesized proteins were detected. Finally, none of these lymphokines induced HLA-DR expression by keratinocytes

'Word from the street' : when non-electoral representative claims meet electoral representation in the United Kingdom

Taking the specific case of street protests in the UK – the ‘word from the street’– this article examines recent (re)conceptualizations of political representation, most particularly Saward’s notion of ‘representative claim’. The specific example of nonelectoral claims articulated by protestors and demonstrators in the UK is used to illustrate: the processes of making, constituting, evaluating and accepting claims for and by constituencies and audiences; and the continuing distinctiveness of claims based upon electoral representation. Two basic questions structure the analysis: first, why would the political representative claims of elected representatives trump the nonelectoral claims of mass demonstrators and, second, in what ways does the ‘perceived legitimacy’ of the former differ from the latter

Resourcing Scholar-Activism: Collaboration, Transformation, and the Production of Knowledge

In this article we offer a set of resources for scholar-activists to reflect on and guide their practice. We begin by suggesting that research questions should be triangulated to consider not only their scholarly merit but the intellectual and political projects the findings will advance and the research questions of interest to community and social movement collaborators

Equal Partners in Dialogue? Participation Equality in a Transnational Deliberative Poll (Europolis)

By gathering a representative sample of citizens from all 27 EU Member States, the deliberative poll Europolis created the opportunity for the inclusion of a wide variety of European voices. Taking up claims of difference democrats who argue that informal hurdles to participation can endure even after individuals gain formal access to the floor, this article argues for an extended approach to evaluate equality in deliberative minipublics. Specifically, it assesses whether participants contributed in roughly equal measures to the discussion and whether their discussion partners considered their contributions on equal merits. In doing so, the article adds to the small but growing literature on deliberation that expresses reservations about taking the willingness to engage with others' claims for granted. In order to account for the intrinsically relational aspect of interpersonal communication, measures of social network analysis are introduced as possible tools to evaluate participation equality in deliberative encounters

Designing effective public participation

This paper reviews the various connections that can exist between the design of participatory processes and the different kind of results that they can entail. It details how effective participatory processes can be designed, whatever are the results that participation is deemed to elicit. It shows the main trends pertaining to design choicesand considers how to classify different arrangements in order to choose from among them. Then the paper deals with the main dilemmas that tend to arise when designing participatory processes. Thanks to this review, the paper argues that participatory processes tend to display a certain degree of ambivalence that cannot be completely overcome through the design choices

Explicating ways of consensus-making in science and society: distinguishing the academic, the interface and the meta-consensus

In this chapter, we shed new light on the epistemic struggle between establishing consensus and acknowledging plurality, by explicating different ways of consensus-making in science and society and examining the impact hereof on their field of intersection, i.e. consensus conferences (in particular those organized by the National Institute of Health). We draw a distinction between, what we call, academic and interface consensus, to capture the wide appeal to consensus in existing literature. We investigate such accounts - i.e. from Miriam Solomon, John Beatty and Alfred Moore, and Boaz Miller - as to put forth a new understanding of consensus-making, focusing on the meta-consensus. We further defend how (NIH) consensus conferences enable epistemic work, through demands of epistemic adequacy and contestability, contrary to the claim that consensus conferences miss a window for epistemic opportunity (Solomon M, The social epistemology of NIH consensus conferences. In: Kincaid H, McKitrick J (ed) Establishing medical reality: methodological and metaphysical issues in philosophy of medicine. Springer, Dordrecht, 2007). Paying attention to the dynamics surrounding consensus, moreover, allows us to illustrate how the public understanding of science and the public use of the ideal of consensus could be well modified

Feature Extraction and Random Forest to Identify Sheep Behavior from Accelerometer Data

Sensor technologies play an essential part in the agricultural community and many other scientific and commercial communities. Accelerometer signals and Machine Learning techniques can be used to identify and observe behaviours of animals without the need for an exhaustive human observation which is labour intensive and time consuming. This study employed random forest algorithm to identify grazing, walking, scratching, and inactivity (standing, resting) of 8 Hebridean ewes located in Cheshire, Shotwick in the UK. We gathered accelerometer data from a sensor device which was fitted on the collar of the animals. The selection of the algorithm was based on previous research by which random forest achieved the best results among other benchmark techniques. Therefore, in this study, more focus was given to feature engineering to improve prediction performance. Seventeen features from time and frequency domain were calculated from the accelerometer measurements and the magnitude of the acceleration. Feature elimination was utilised in which highly correlated ones were removed, and only nine out of seventeen features were selected. The algorithm achieved an overall accuracy of 99.43% and a kappa value of 98.66%. The accuracy for grazing, walking, scratching, and inactive was 99.08%, 99.13%, 99.90%, and 99.85%, respectively. The overall results showed that there is a significant improvement over previous methods and studies for all mutually exclusive behaviours. Those results are promising, and the technique could be further tested for future real-time activity recognition

Beyond “Political” Communicative Spaces: Talking Politics on the Wife Swap Discussion Forum

Net-based public sphere researchers have examined online deliberation in numerous ways. However, most studies have focused exclusively on political discussion forums. This article moves beyond such spaces by analyzing political talk from an online forum dedicated to reality television. The purpose is to examine the democratic quality of political talk that emerges in this space in light of a set of normative criteria of the public sphere. The analysis also moved beyond an elite model of deliberation by investigating the use of expressives (humor, emotional comments, and acknowledgments). The findings reveal that participants engaged in political talk that was often deliberative. It was a space where the use of expressives played a significant role in enhancing such talk