Marriage, social integration and loneliness in the second half of life: A comparison of Dutch and german men and women

Contains fulltext : 55589.pdf (publisher's version ) (Closed access)Although marriage is usually considered to be socially integrative, some studies indicate that it can be privatizing, enclosing couples in isolated dyads. This study compared the availability of support, companionship, and negative relational experiences in various types of relationships for married men and women aged 40 to 85 years in the Netherlands and Germany. The Dutch demonstrated a more varied pattern of relationships beyond the nuclear family than the Germans but also reported worrying about a greater variety of people. In both countries, men relied more strongly on their partners, whereas women had more varied networks and experienced more worries. A continuum of social involvement can be drawn with German men, for whom marriage is privatizing, at one end and Dutch women, for whom marriage is highly socially integrating, at the other. Loneliness was related to the provisions of social relations, but no national and gender differences in predictors of loneliness were found.17 p

Multi-messenger observations of a binary neutron star merger

On 2017 August 17 a binary neutron star coalescence candidate (later designated GW170817) with merger time 12:41:04 UTC was observed through gravitational waves by the Advanced LIGO and Advanced Virgo detectors. The Fermi Gamma-ray Burst Monitor independently detected a gamma-ray burst (GRB 170817A) with a time delay of ~1.7 s with respect to the merger time. From the gravitational-wave signal, the source was initially localized to a sky region of 31 deg2 at a luminosity distance of 40+8-8 Mpc and with component masses consistent with neutron stars. The component masses were later measured to be in the range 0.86 to 2.26 Mo. An extensive observing campaign was launched across the electromagnetic spectrum leading to the discovery of a bright optical transient (SSS17a, now with the IAU identification of AT 2017gfo) in NGC 4993 (at ~40 Mpc) less than 11 hours after the merger by the One- Meter, Two Hemisphere (1M2H) team using the 1 m Swope Telescope. The optical transient was independently detected by multiple teams within an hour. Subsequent observations targeted the object and its environment. Early ultraviolet observations revealed a blue transient that faded within 48 hours. Optical and infrared observations showed a redward evolution over ~10 days. Following early non-detections, X-ray and radio emission were discovered at the transient’s position ~9 and ~16 days, respectively, after the merger. Both the X-ray and radio emission likely arise from a physical process that is distinct from the one that generates the UV/optical/near-infrared emission. No ultra-high-energy gamma-rays and no neutrino candidates consistent with the source were found in follow-up searches. These observations support the hypothesis that GW170817 was produced by the merger of two neutron stars in NGC4993 followed by a short gamma-ray burst (GRB 170817A) and a kilonova/macronova powered by the radioactive decay of r-process nuclei synthesized in the ejecta

Absence of MHC class II on cDCs results in microbial-dependent intestinal inflammation.

Conventional dendritic cells (cDCs) play an essential role in host immunity by initiating adaptive T cell responses and by serving as innate immune sensors. Although both innate and adaptive functions of cDCs are well documented, their relative importance in maintaining immune homeostasis is poorly understood. To examine the significance of cDC-initiated adaptive immunity in maintaining homeostasis, independent of their innate activities, we generated a cDC-specific Cre mouse and crossed it to a floxed MHC class II (MHCII) mouse. Absence of MHCII on cDCs resulted in chronic intestinal inflammation that was alleviated by antibiotic treatment and entirely averted under germ-free conditions. Uncoupling innate and adaptive functions of cDCs revealed that innate immune functions of cDCs are insufficient to maintain homeostasis and antigen presentation by cDCs is essential for a mutualistic relationship between the host and intestinal bacteria

The nesprin-cytoskeleton interface probed directly on single nuclei is a mechanically rich system

The cytoskeleton provides structure and plays an important role in cellular function such as migration, resisting compression forces, and transport. The cytoskeleton also reacts to physical cues such as fluid shear stress or extracellular matrix remodeling by reorganizing filament associations, most commonly focal adhesions and cell-cell cadherin junctions. These mechanical stimuli can result in genome-level changes, and the physical connection of the cytoskeleton to the nucleus provides an optimal conduit for signal transduction by interfacing with nuclear envelope proteins, called nesprins, within the LINC (linker of the nucleus to the cytoskeleton) complex. Using single-molecule on single nuclei assays, we report that the interactions between the nucleus and the cytoskeleton, thought to be nesprin-cytoskeleton interactions, are highly sensitive to force magnitude and direction depending on whether cells are historically interfaced with the matrix or with cell aggregates. Application of ~10-30 pN forces to these nesprin linkages yielded structural transitions, with a base transition size of 5-6 nm, which are speculated to be associated with partial unfoldings of the spectrin domains of the nesprins and/or structural changes of histones within the nucleus.This research work was funded and supported by NSF DMR BMAT under 1506717 and NIH EB under 019509 (D.A.B. and H.J.S.). H.J.S. was also supported by the Faculty Research Assistance Program of Yonsei University College of Medicine for 2000 (6–2016–0031). U.H.K was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) under MEST-2015M3A9B3028216. This work was also supported, in part, by Singapore-MIT Alliance for Research and Technology – BioSym, NSF under 1330792, and GAANN under P200A090323 (S.K.B and M.J.L).Peer Reviewe