A Study of the Interaction Between the Basigin Transmembrane Domain and Monocarboxylate Transporter 1

It is thought that a lactate shuttle complex of Basigin gene products and Monocarboxylate transporter 1 (MCT1) is necessary for photoreceptor cell maturation and function. The purpose of this study was to investigate the assembly of the lactate shuttle by determining which amino acids within Basigin interact with MCT1. It has been hypothesized that these two membrane proteins interact via the transmembrane domain of Basigin. Therefore, a full-length histidine-tagged peptide of the transmembrane domain (24 amino acids), as well as histidine-tagged deletion mutants were generated using the pET1 02/0 vector (Invitrogen) to test for binding to MCT1 via enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). The probe containing the entire transmembrane domain of Basigin (amino acids 1 to 24) did interact with MCT1. An interaction was also observed when a probe containing amino acids 13 to 24 of the Basigin transmembrane domain was used. A comparable interaction was observed when amino acids 19 to 24 were used as a probe, but no signal was observed when amino acids 13 to 18 were used. This indicates that some or all of the six C-terminal amino acids of the Basigin transmembrane domain bind to MCT1. Site-directed mutagenesis of each of the six C-terminal amino acids, and subsequent ELISA analysis, . indicates that isoleucine - 20, isoleucine - 21, isoleucine - 23, and tyrosine - 24 interact with MCT1. Vll

Neighborhood Effects on Health: Concentrated Advantage and Disadvantage

We investigate an alternative conceptualization of neighborhood context and its association with health. Using an index that measures a continuum of concentrated advantage and disadvantage, we examine whether the relationship between neighborhood conditions and health varies by socio-economic status. Using NHANES III data geo-coded to census tracts, we find that while largely uneducated neighborhoods are universally deleterious, individuals with more education benefit from living in highly educated neighborhoods to a greater degree than individuals with lower levels of education

Impact of Capitation on the Non-Institutionalized Aged: An Evaluation of the Hennepin County Medicaid Demonstration Project. Final Report - Part 1.

Supported by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation; Hennepin County Office of Medicaid Demonstration; the Bush Foundation; School of Public Health and the Center for Urban and Regional Affairs, University of Minnesota

Database tools for ecological data integration and synthesis

The SGS-LTER research site was established in 1980 by researchers at Colorado State University as part of a network of long-term research sites within the US LTER Network, supported by the National Science Foundation. Scientists within the Natural Resource Ecology Lab, Department of Forest and Rangeland Stewardship, Department of Soil and Crop Sciences, and Biology Department at CSU, California State Fullerton, USDA Agricultural Research Service, University of Northern Colorado, and the University of Wyoming, among others, have contributed to our understanding of the structure and functions of the shortgrass steppe and other diverse ecosystems across the network while maintaining a common mission and sharing expertise, data and infrastructure.The challenge: 1. To synthesize across research sites syntactically disparate, but thematically similar, data. 2. To efficiently perform cross-site synthesis, using new informatics tools that exploit database component technology. 3. To aid analysis of ecological data through visualization tools that take advantage of informatics-processed data

Sample designs for measuring the health of small racial/ethnic subgroups

Most national health surveys do not permit precise measurement of the health of racial/ethnic subgroups that comprise <1 per cent of the U.S. population. We identify three potentially promising sample design strategies for increasing the accuracy of national health estimates for a small target subgroup when used to supplement a small probability sample of that group and apply these strategies to American Indians/Alaska Natives (AI/AN) and Chinese using National Health Interview Survey data. These sample design strategies include (1) complete sampling of targets within households, (2) oversampling selected macrogeographic units, and (3) oversampling from an incomplete list frame. Stage (1) is promising for Chinese and AI/AN; (2) works for both groups, but it would be more cost-effective for AI/AN because of their greater residential concentration; (3) is somewhat effective for groups like Chinese with viable surname lists, but not for AI/AN. Both (2) and (3) efficiently improve measurement precision when the supplement is the same size as the existing core sample, with diminishing additional returns as the supplement grows relative to the core sample, especially for (3). To avoid large design effects, the oversampled geographic areas or lists must have good coverage of the target population. To reduce costs, oversampled geographic tracts and lists must consist primarily of targets. These techniques can be used simultaneously to substantially increase effective sample sizes (ESSs). For example, (1) and (2) in combination can be used to multiply the nominal sample size of AI/AN or Chinese by 8 and the ESS by 4. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/60911/1/3244_ftp.pd

Neighborhood context and ethnicity differences in body mass index: A multilevel analysis using the NHANES III (1988-1994)

A growing body of literature has documented a link between neighborhood context and health outcomes. However, little is known about the relationship between neighborhood context and body mass index (BMI) or whether the association between neighborhood context and BMI differs by ethnicity. This paper investigates several neighborhood characteristics as potential explanatory factors for the variation of BMI across the United States; further, this paper explores to what extent segregation and the concentration of disadvantage across neighborhoods help explain ethnic disparities in BMI. Using data geo-coded at the census tract-level and linked with individual-level data from the Third National Health and Examination Survey in the United States (U.S.), we find significant variation in BMI across U.S. neighborhoods. In addition, neighborhood characteristics have a significant association with body mass and partially explain ethnic disparities in BMI, net of individual-level adjustments. These data also reveal evidence that ethnic enclaves are not in fact advantageous for the body mass index of Hispanics - a relationship counter to what has been documented for other health outcomes

Novel mutations in TARDBP (TDP-43) in patients with familial amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.

The TAR DNA-binding protein 43 (TDP-43) has been identified as the major disease protein in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and frontotemporal lobar degeneration with ubiquitin inclusions (FTLD-U), defining a novel class of neurodegenerative conditions: the TDP-43 proteinopathies. The first pathogenic mutations in the gene encoding TDP-43 (TARDBP) were recently reported in familial and sporadic ALS patients, supporting a direct role for TDP-43 in neurodegeneration. In this study, we report the identification and functional analyses of two novel and one known mutation in TARDBP that we identified as a result of extensive mutation analyses in a cohort of 296 patients with variable neurodegenerative diseases associated with TDP-43 histopathology. Three different heterozygous missense mutations in exon 6 of TARDBP (p.M337V, p.N345K, and p.I383V) were identified in the analysis of 92 familial ALS patients (3.3%), while no mutations were detected in 24 patients with sporadic ALS or 180 patients with other TDP-43-positive neurodegenerative diseases. The presence of p.M337V, p.N345K, and p.I383V was excluded in 825 controls and 652 additional sporadic ALS patients. All three mutations affect highly conserved amino acid residues in the C-terminal part of TDP-43 known to be involved in protein-protein interactions. Biochemical analysis of TDP-43 in ALS patient cell lines revealed a substantial increase in caspase cleaved fragments, including the approximately 25 kDa fragment, compared to control cell lines. Our findings support TARDBP mutations as a cause of ALS. Based on the specific C-terminal location of the mutations and the accumulation of a smaller C-terminal fragment, we speculate that TARDBP mutations may cause a toxic gain of function through novel protein interactions or intracellular accumulation of TDP-43 fragments leading to apoptosis

Does Place Explain Racial Health Disparities? Quantifying the Contribution of Residential Context to the Black/White Health Gap in the United States

The persistence of the black health disadvantage has been a puzzling component of health in the United States in spite of general declines in rates of morbidity and mortality over the past century. Studies that have focused on well-established individual-level determinants of health such as socio-economic status and health behaviors have been unable to fully explain these disparities. Recent research has begun to focus on other factors such as racism, discrimination, and segregation. Variation in neighborhood context - socio-demographic composition, social aspects, and built environment - has been postulated as an additional explanation for racial disparities, but few attempts have been made to quantify its overall contribution to the black/white health gap. This analysis is an attempt to generate an estimate of place effects on explaining health disparities by utilizing data from the US National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) (1989-1994), combined with a methodology for identifying residents of the same blocks both within and across NHIS survey cross-sections. Our results indicate that controlling for a single point-in-time measure of residential context results in a roughly 15 to 76 percent reduction of the black/white disparities in self-rated health that were previously unaccounted for by individual-level controls. The contribution of residential context toward explaining the black /white self-rated health gap varies by both age and gender such that contextual explanations of disparities decline with age and appear to be smaller among females

Revealing the True Nature of Hen 2-428

The nucleus of Hen 2-428 is a short orbital period (4.2 h) spectroscopic binary, whose status as potential supernovae type Ia progenitor has raised some controversy in the literature. We present preliminary results of a thorough analysis of this interesting system, which combines quantitative non-local thermodynamic (non-LTE) equilibrium spectral modelling, radial velocity analysis, multi-band light curve fitting, and state-of-the art stellar evolutionary calculations. Importantly, we find that the dynamical system mass that is derived by using all available He II lines does not exceed the Chandrasekhar mass limit. Furthermore, the individual masses of the two central stars are too small to lead to an SN Ia in case of a dynamical explosion during the merger process.Instituto de Astrofísica de La Plat