The Functions Of Cultural Schemata In The Chinese Reading Comprehension And Reading Time Of College Students In Taiwan

The study examined the effects of cultural familiarity with a text on Chinese students’ reading comprehension performance and reading time. In the first phase of the study, participants were required to read a culturally familiar text, write down the time they spent reading the passage, and immediately complete a cloze test without referring back to the culturally-embedded text. In the second phase, they went through the same procedure for a culturally unfamiliar text. Upon completion of the reading tasks, a topic familiarity questionnaire was distributed to them to complete in order to screen out those who were culturally familiar with both reading texts. A survey about their attitudes toward the role that background knowledge played in their reading process was administered to them following the topic familiarity questionnaire. The results showed that the students’ reading comprehension performance and reading time were both significantly affected by their familiarity with the target culture. They spent less time on and comprehended better the culturally-embedded text they were familiar with. Analysis of the survey also substantiated the claim that they relied on the facilitative role of background knowledge in reading so as to read in a faster and more efficient way. The findings suggest that a reader’s cultural schemata impacts memory, reading comprehension, interpretation and reading time. Pedagogical implications of the study and suggestions for future research are also discussed in the article

Strategically Smart Or Proficiency-Driven? An Investigation Of Reading Strategy Use Of EFL College Students In Relation To Language Proficiency

Reading strategy use has long been considered an important factor in the evaluation of effective second language (L2) reading. It is generally believed that proficient and less-proficient readers differ in their reading process and strategy use. The purpose of this study was to examine the reading strategy use of high- and low-proficiency level college students in Taiwan and the reading problems that might arise in their reading process. A General English Proficiency Test (GEPT) and a modified reading strategy questionnaire, based on Carrell (1989), were administered to 45 Taiwanese college students. The results show that language proficiency has a significant effect on strategy choice and use, and high achievers and low achievers are different in the quality and quantity of their reading strategy use. More proficient learners in the study were found to utilize more top-down and context-related strategies, while less-proficient learners tended to focus on bottom-up and lexical-related strategies. Also, limited vocabulary knowledge is the most important reader factor of Taiwanese college students’ reading problems. The study concludes with a discussion of implications for L2 reading instruction and learning in the classroom setting

The Induction of Apoptosis by SV40 T Antigen Correlates with c-junOverexpression

AbstractSimian virus (SV40) T antigen shares many characteristics with adenovirus E1A which is known to induce apoptosis. To verify the potential of SV40 T antigen-mediated apoptosis, we stably expressed T antigen in immortalized human epithelial cells (Z172 and HaCaT). We found that SV40 T antigen could directly cause apoptosis in 22–27% of these cells under normal growth condition as measured by chromatin condensation and nucleosomal fragmentation. The apoptosis of HaCaT cells which contain mutant p53 suggests the p53-independent nature of T antigen-mediated apoptosis. T antigen-induced apoptosis was associated with increased expression of c-Jun protein. Moreover, the overexpression of c-junalone in these cells also induced apoptosis, indicating that c-junmight play an important role in T antigen-induced apoptosis

Efficient Prodrug Activator Gene Therapy by Retroviral Replicating Vectors Prolongs Survival in an Immune-Competent Intracerebral Glioma Model.

Prodrug activator gene therapy mediated by murine leukemia virus (MLV)-based retroviral replicating vectors (RRV) was previously shown to be highly effective in killing glioma cells both in culture and in vivo. To avoid receptor interference and enable dual vector co-infection with MLV-RRV, we have developed another RRV based on gibbon ape leukemia virus (GALV) that also shows robust replicative spread in a wide variety of tumor cells. We evaluated the potential of GALV-based RRV as a cancer therapeutic agent by incorporating yeast cytosine deaminase (CD) and E. coli nitroreductase (NTR) prodrug activator genes into the vector. The expression of CD and NTR genes from GALV-RRV achieved highly efficient delivery of these prodrug activator genes to RG-2 glioma cells, resulting in enhanced cytotoxicity after administering their respective prodrugs 5-fluorocytosine and CB1954 in vitro. In an immune-competent intracerebral RG-2 glioma model, GALV-mediated CD and NTR gene therapy both significantly suppressed tumor growth with CB1954 administration after a single injection of vector supernatant. However, NTR showed greater potency than CD, with control animals receiving GALV-NTR vector alone (i.e., without CB1954 prodrug) showing extensive tumor growth with a median survival time of 17.5 days, while animals receiving GALV-NTR and CB1954 showed significantly prolonged survival with a median survival time of 30 days. In conclusion, GALV-RRV enabled high-efficiency gene transfer and persistent expression of NTR, resulting in efficient cell killing, suppression of tumor growth, and prolonged survival upon CB1954 administration. This validates the use of therapeutic strategies employing this prodrug activator gene to arm GALV-RRV, and opens the door to the possibility of future combination gene therapy with CD-armed MLV-RRV, as the latter vector is currently being evaluated in clinical trials