Porcine Sialoadhesin (CD169/Siglec-1) Is an Endocytic Receptor that Allows Targeted Delivery of Toxins and Antigens to Macrophages

Sialoadhesin is exclusively expressed on specific subpopulations of macrophages. Since sialoadhesin-positive macrophages are involved in inflammatory autoimmune diseases, such as multiple sclerosis, and potentially in the generation of immune responses, targeted delivery of drugs, toxins or antigens via sialoadhesin-specific immunoconjugates may prove a useful therapeutic strategy. Originally, sialoadhesin was characterized as a lymphocyte adhesion molecule, though recently its involvement in internalization of sialic acid carrying pathogens was shown, suggesting that sialoadhesin is an endocytic receptor. In this report, we show that porcine sialoadhesin-specific antibodies and F(ab')2 fragments trigger sialoadhesin internalization, both in primary porcine macrophages and in cells expressing recombinant porcine sialoadhesin. Using chemical inhibitors, double immunofluorescence stainings and dominant-negative constructs, porcine sialoadhesin internalization was shown to be clathrin- and Eps15-dependent and to result in targeting to early endosomes but not lysosomes. Besides characterizing the sialoadhesin endocytosis mechanism, two sialoadhesin-specific immunoconjugates were evaluated. We observed that porcine sialoadhesin-specific immunotoxins efficiently kill sialoadhesin-expressing macrophages. Furthermore, porcine sialoadhesin-specific albumin immunoconjugates were shown to be internalized in macrophages and immunization with these immunoconjugates resulted in a rapid and robust induction of albumin-specific antibodies, this compared to immunization with albumin alone. Together, these data expand sialoadhesin functionality and show that it can function as an endocytic receptor, a feature that cannot only be misused by sialic acid carrying pathogens, but that may also be used for specific targeting of toxins or antigens to sialoadhesin-expressing macrophages

Social Mobility of Men and Women in Contemporary Italy

This working paper of the Dipartimento di Politica Sociale of the University of Trento is a slightly modified version of a paper we presented in September 1989 in Antwerpen at the congress on Gender and class. A considerably shortened version, with less technical detail and fewer tables, has appeared in Italian in Polis IV: 1: 1990. The longer version in English is meant to document our analyses in more detail than is normally possible within the compass of an article in a scientific journal, moreover we hope it will be useful to those of our colleagues who do not read Italian but who may be interested in the topic dealt with

L'impatto dell'immigrazione sulla delinquenza: una verifica dell'ipotesi della sostituzione nell'Italia degli anni '90

Immigrants from outside the European Union in Italy have higher reported crime rates, especially illegal immigrants, than the Italian population. For some crimes, such as pushing drugs or exploitation of prostitution, hich provide requested services and are crimes without victims, the higher rates might be explained by noting that illegal markets are typically marginal and find their workers among marginal groups in society. There are then two possible consequences of the larger involvement of immigrants in these illegal markets: the immigrants substitute for native labor an the amount of crime remains the same, or they add their own activity to the existing illegal activity and the total amount of crime increases. With aggregate data for the 95 Italian provinces for the nineties (1991-2000) the paper considers whether, controlling for previous years crime rates the (growing) presence of immigrants contributes to the total amount of crime. The five crimes considered are exploitation of prostitution and drug offenses, as the main crimes involving illegal services, car theft as a crime in which the number of unreported crimes is minimal, murder and robbery. Crime rates and presence of strangers are modeled as separate endogeneous processes, and only positive links between these two processes provide evidence that immigrants contribute to crime rates beyond had would be predicted by the substitution hypothesis. Only in the case of exploitation of prostitution there was a relationship between the percentage of immigrant and the rate of crime; for the other crimes the substitution hypothesis has been confirmed.Gli immigrati extracomunitari in Italia, soprattutto se irregolari, sono caratterizzati da una frequenza di denunce penali superiore a quella degli italiani. Per reati "di servizio" quali la vendita di droga o lo sfruttamento della prostituzione, le più alte frequenze di denunce possono essere spiegate dal fatto che i mercati illegali sono spesso condotti da persone marginali, il cui accesso a lavori regolari è limitato. Il coinvolgimento degli immigrati nella criminalità può comportare una sostituzione degli italiani nelle attività criminali (ipotesi della sostituzione), ovvero una aggiunta di nuovi reati a quelli preesistenti (ipotesi della addizione). Utilizzando dati aggregati relativi alle 95 Province italiane negli anni '90 (1991- 2000) questa ricerca valuta se, controllando per la criminalità preesistente, la crescita della presenza degli immigrati contribuisce alla crescita dei reati. I cinque reati considerati sono alcuni reati "di servizio" come lo spaccio di droga e lo sfruttamento della prostituzione, ma anche reati che suscitano grande allarme sociale, come l'omicidio e la rapina, ed un reato che viene sempre denunciato, il furto d'auto. I tassi di denunce dei reati e la presenza di stranieri sono modellizzati come processi endogeni separati, e soltanto legami positivi tra questi due processi costituiscono una prova che la presenza di immigrati implica un contributo ai tassi di reati che va al di là dell'ipotesi della sostituzione. Solo nel caso dello sfruttamento della prostituzione vi è una relazione tra l'incremento degli immigrati e l'aumento dei reati; per gli altri quattro reati l'ipotesi della sostituzione è confermat

Uso di alcool, delinquenza e vittimizzazione tra i giovani in Europa: Analisi preliminare dei risultati di una ricerca multicentrica internazionale (isrd-2)

The existence of a significant correlation between alcohol use and crime has long been acknowledged in the scientific literature. Moreover, alcohol use constitutes a serious public health problem. In order to ascertain the existence of significant relationships among alcohol use, victimization and delinquency among young people, and to describe the nature and characteristics of such relationships, a database was set up to record the results of the "International Self-Report Delinquency Study 2". This database was created by selecting a sample of young people (N=57,771) of both sexes, aged between 12 and 16 years, in 25 European countries. The research focused chiefly on the role of alcohol use and the various modes of alcohol consumption, and sought to analyze the influence exerted by different life situations (age, sex, lifestyle, friendships and personality traits). Alcohol consumption proved to be a very widespread phenomenon among young people, particularly among youths who commit crimes and those who are victims of crime. Moreover, it emerged that the abuse of alcohol was the consumption modality most closely associated with delinquency and victimization. A risky lifestyle, a lack of self-control, a positive attitude toward violence and an involvement in deviant youth groups are factors significantly associated with involvement in the use of alcohol. The results yielded by the present study indicate that alcohol use is strongly associated with delinquency among young people in Europe, and that so-called "binge drinking" is the consumption modality most closely associated with both offending and being offended against

Uso di alcol, delinquenza e vittimizzazione tra i giovani in Europa: Analisi preliminare dei risultati di una ricerca multicentrica internazionale (isrd-2)

The existence of a significant correlation between alcohol use and crime has long been acknowledged in the scientific literature. Moreover, alcohol use constitutes a serious public health problem. In order to ascertain the existence of significant relationships among alcohol use, victimization and delinquency among young people, and to describe the nature and characteristics of such relationships, a database was set up to record the results of the "International Self-Report Delinquency Study 2". This database was created by selecting a sample of young people (N=57,771) of both sexes, aged between 12 and 16 years, in 25 European countries. The research focused chiefly on the role of alcohol use and the various modes of alcohol consumption, and sought to analyze the influence exerted by different life situations (age, sex, lifestyle, friendships and personality traits). Alcohol consumption proved to be a very widespread phenomenon among young people, particularly among youths who commit crimes and those who are victims of crime. Moreover, it emerged that the abuse of alcohol was the consumption modality most closely associated with delinquency and victimization. A risky lifestyle, a lack of self-control, a positive attitude toward violence and an involvement in deviant youth groups are factors significantly associated with involvement in the use of alcohol. The results yielded by the present study indicate that alcohol use is strongly associated with delinquency among young people in Europe, and that so-called "binge drinking" is the consumption modality most closely associated with both offending and being offended against. \ua9 Pensa MultiMedia Editore - ISSN 1121-1717

Neighborhood Social Capital, Juvenile Delinquency, and Victimization: Results from the International Self-Report Delinquency Study - 3 in 23 Countries

Since the beginning of the twentieth century, criminology has attempted to identify ecological factors affecting the rise or the decrease in crime rates. In this framework, concepts of \u201csocial disorganization\u201d, \u201ccollective efficacy\u201d, and \u201csocial capital\u201d have been coined. Particularly in recent years, the perspective of \u201csocial capital\u201d has attracted the interest of criminologists, but, despite the numerous studies conducted in this field, some issues remain open. Firstly, studies conducted outside the US context are few. Secondly, even in North American studies, there is a disagreement over the impact of social capital on crime, in particular on violent crimes. The results of this study, conducted on data obtained by the ISRD3 survey in 23 countries around the world, and addressed to 7th, 8th, and 9th grade students (N = 55,201), try to address such issue: they show a negative correlation between social capital and self-reported crime also outside North America, both for violent crimes and general delinquency. The preventive role played by social capital on crime is also confirmed considering the self-reported data on victimization

\u201cEffects of delinquency on alcohol use among juveniles in Europe: results from the ISRD-2 study\u201d

The existence of a correlation between the use of alcohol and juvenile delinquency has long been acknowledged. In order to evaluate the strength and the characteristics of this association in various cultural contexts, we analysed data collected as part of the International Self-Report Delinquency Study- 2 (ISRD-2) The sample consisted of of young people (N=57,771) of both sexes, aged between 12 and 16 years, in 25 European countries. After estimating the prevalence of alcohol consumption among young people involved in property offences and violent offences, we assessed the degree to which these types of delinquency were associated with the use of alcohol in the 25 countries. In addition, we attempted to ascertain the influence of belonging to various types of deviant groups on alcohol use. To this end, we used a Mokken Scale Analysis. With this method, we constructed a scale of "gangness" and correlated the scores with alcohol use among juveniles. The results yielded by the present study indicate that alcohol use and delinquency are closely related with one another. In particular, we observed that alcohol consumption seems to be strongly influenced by involvement in delinquent activities. The nature and characteristics of these relationships suggest that the associations between alcohol use and delinquency are reciprocal rather than one-directional. Consequently, alcohol use constitutes a risk factor for criminal behaviour. Likewise, involvement in delinquency increase the risk of alcohol consumption and, especially, of alcohol abuse

Rassegna di alcuni elementi metodologici degli studi sul processo psicoterapeutico

In questo breve capitolo vengono presentate alcune tecniche statistiche utilizzabili per la ricerca sulla valutazione del processo in psicoterapia. Lo scopo non è quello di fornire una descrizione dettagliata ed esaustiva di ogni tecnica, ma di indicare al lettore alcuni elementi metodologici utili per analizzare e progettare criticamente studi di valutazione del processo terapeutico