Salmonella typhimurium harboring plasmid expressing interleukin-12 induced attenuation of infection and protective immune responses

IL-12 is known to be an essential cytokine which appears to provide protective immunity against intracellular bacteria, such as Salmonella. In this study, we investigated the possibility of developing a vaccine using IL-12 against virulent Salmonella. We used the host defense system activated by cytokine IL-12. The highly virulent Salmonella strain (Salmonella typhimurium UK-1) was transformed with cytokine-expressing plasmids. These live, wild-type pathogens were used as vaccine strains without undergoing any other biological or genetic attenuating processes. The newly developed strains induced partial protection from infections (30-40%). Of note, the interleukin-12 transformed pathogen was safe upon immunization with low doses (103 CFU), induced IgG responses, and stimulated protective immune responses against Salmonella Typhimurium in mice (80-100%). These results suggest that IL-12 induced attenuation of wild-type Salmonella in the host infection stage and vaccine development using the wild-type strain harboring IL-12 secreting plasmids may be considered as an alternative process for intracellular bacterial vaccine development without the inconvenience of time-consuming attenuation processes

The Effect of Repeated Ad Exposure and Physical Avoidance on Consumers’ Mobile Ad Response

Opt-in mobile advertisement platform services are increasingly popular. In this paper, we explore how repeated ad exposure and physical avoidance influence consumers’ responses to mobile ads. Using a unique panel-level data of 1,193,131 million users from Cash Slide, a Korean mobile advertising platform, we find that 1) repeated ad exposure and physical avoidance has a negative impact on a consumer’s response to mobile ads; 2) information richness in a mobile ad has a negative impact on mobile users’ response to ads; 3) the negative effect of a user’s repeated exposures to a mobile ad and physical avoidance increases in magnitude when the advertisement involves a context of higher information richness. Our finding bridges the gap in the extant literatures by examining the impact of repeated ad exposure and avoidance on consumers’ mobile ad response. Moreover, we provide practical implications to advertisers on the mobile platform

Inhibition of REV-ERBs stimulates microglial amyloid-beta clearance and reduces amyloid plaque deposition in the 5XFAD mouse model of Alzheimer\u27s disease

A promising new therapeutic target for the treatment of Alzheimer\u27s disease (AD) is the circadian system. Although patients with AD are known to have abnormal circadian rhythms and suffer sleep disturbances, the role of the molecular clock in regulating amyloid-beta (Aβ) pathology is still poorly understood. Here, we explored how the circadian repressors REV-ERBα and β affected Aβ clearance in mouse microglia. We discovered that, at Circadian time 4 (CT4), microglia expressed higher levels of the master clock protein BMAL1 and more rapidly phagocytosed fibrillary A

Optical properties of iron-based superconductor LiFeAs single crystal

We have measured the reflectivity spectra of the iron based superconductor LiFeAs (Tc = 17.6 K) in the temperature range from 4 to 300 K. In the superconducting state (T < Tc), the clear opening of the optical absorption gap was observed below 25 cm-1, indicating an isotropic full gap formation. In the normal state (T > Tc), the optical conductivity spectra display a typical metallic behavior with the Drude type spectra at low frequencies, but we found that the introduction of the two Drude components best fits the data, indicating the multiband nature of this superconductor. A theoretical analysis of the low temperature data (T=4K < Tc) also suggests that two superconducting gaps best fit the data and their values were estimated as {\Delta}1 = 1.59 meV and {\Delta}2 = 3.15 meV, respectively. Using the Ferrell-Glover-Tinkham (FGT) sum rule and dielectric function {\epsilon}1({\omega}), the superconducting plasma frequency ({\omega}ps) is consistently estimated to be 6,665 cm-1, implying that about 59 % of the free carriers in the normal state condenses into the SC condensate. To investigate the various interband transition processes (for {\omega} > 200 cm-1), we have also performed the local-density approximation (LDA) band calculation and calculated the optical spectra of the interband transitions. The theoretical results provided a qualitative agreement with the experimental data below 4000 cm-1Comment: 19 pages, 5 figures. This paper has been accepted for publication in New Journal of Physic

Plastic Shrinkage Properties of Natural Fiber Reinforced Shotcrete

Recently, natural hemp fibers have been developed for use in wet or dry mix shotcrete instead of conventional synthetic fibers made from petroleum. Synthetic fibers, which is mainly in polypropylene, has been used for controlling an initial shrinkage cracking in concrete, however, the effect was poor showing a severe plastic shrinkage cracking. Plastic shrinkage cracking is a nonstructural crack that occurs due to the surface drying of concrete in a plastic condition due to rapid evaporation of bleeding water. The volume reduction due to plastic shrinkage and the resulting tensile stress exceeds the tensile strength of the concrete. In particular, plastic shrinkage cracking occurs mainly in large surface area members. It may be evolved from the surface to a considerable depth, or in the case of a very thin structure, it may go all over the depth of the member. In addition, since it is long enough to be easily distinguished by naked eyes and cracks are generated widely, it is not aesthetically pleasing and anxiety about the stability of the concrete can be increased. Also, the plastic shrinkage crack accelerates penetration of chloride and moisture, causing corrosion of the reinforcing bar, and durability of the concrete is lowered. The theoretical effect of natural fibers on plastic shrinkage cracks is that when natural fibers are mixed into concrete, they become wet by absorbing the water. Then, in the pumping, water in the wet natural fiber is supplied to the concrete by the pumping pressure to increase the pumpability. Re-absorbing the water after spraying increases the adhesion and build-up thickness. The absorbed water could be supplied to the shotcrete and resulted in reducing a plastic shrinkage and dry shrinkage. This paper investigates the plastic shrinkage properties of shotcrete containing natural fibers. A series of experimental program were conducted to analysis the theoretical background and to select the optimized natural fiber content