Impact of Dictionary Use Skills Instruction on Second Language Writing

The dictionary is one of the common learning tools for second and foreign language learners. Various types of dictionaries are used to help learners work on their language development. A bilingual dictionary is often the first dictionary that a foreign language learner encounters. A study conducted on dictionary usage in seven European countries, including over 1,100 learners of English (Atkins & Knowles, 1990), showed that the majority of the language learners (75%) who identified themselves as dictionary users utilized bilingual dictionaries. Another choice for second/foreign language learners is a monolingual dictionary. Several studies (e.g., Atkins & Varantola, 1997; Baxter, 1980) reported that a monolingual dictionary was found to be effective in helping learners find relevant information. Recently gaining popularity among language learners and teachers is the bilingualized dictionary which has features of the learners’ monolingual dictionary and a translation of each entry. A study which investigated the effectiveness of bilingualized dictionaries showed that they were the most effective of the three types (Laufer & Hadar, 1997)

Impact of Dictionary Use Skills Instruction on Second Language Writing

The dictionary is one of the common learning tools for second and foreign language learners. Various types of dictionaries are used to help learners work on their language development. A bilingual dictionary is often the first dictionary that a foreign language learner encounters. A study conducted on dictionary usage in seven European countries, including over 1,100 learners of English (Atkins & Knowles, 1990), showed that the majority of the language learners (75%) who identified themselves as dictionary users utilized bilingual dictionaries. Another choice for second/foreign language learners is a monolingual dictionary. Several studies (e.g., Atkins & Varantola, 1997; Baxter, 1980) reported that a monolingual dictionary was found to be effective in helping learners find relevant information. Recently gaining popularity among language learners and teachers is the bilingualized dictionary which has features of the learners’ monolingual dictionary and a translation of each entry. A study which investigated the effectiveness of bilingualized dictionaries showed that they were the most effective of the three types (Laufer & Hadar, 1997)

No Metathesis in Harmonic Serialism

This paper presents a Harmonic Serialism analysis of synchronic metathesis, proposing to eliminate metathesis as an atomic operation, instead analyzing apparent metathesis cases as a result of the sequential application of simpler operations such as copy + deletion or fusion + fission, and not as segment reordering. The analysis of Rotuman phase alternation in this paper offers a unified account of apparent metathesis, deletion, and umlaut as all going through the processes of copy + deletion and subsequent fusion. Balangao CC metathesis is analyzed as fusion + fission incorporating an idea that CC metathesis is phonetically motivated. Removing the atomic metathesis operation has several benefits: (a) it simplifies the inventory of operations in Harmonic Serialism, (b) it correctly predicts locality restrictions on metathesis patterns without the help of other constraints that are otherwise needed in HS analysis, (c) and it correctly predicts the typological restrictions on the types of segments that undergo CC metathesis

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PDZ domain-binding motif of human T-cell leukemia virus type 1 Tax oncoprotein is essential for the interleukin 2 independent growth induction of a T-cell line

BACKGROUND: Human T-cell leukemia virus type 1 (HTLV-1) is the etiologic agent of adult T-cell leukemia (ATL), whereas HTLV type 2 (HTLV-2), is not associated with ATL or any other leukemia. HTLV-1 encodes the transforming gene tax1, whose expression in an interleukin (IL)-2-dependent T-cell line (CTLL-2) induces IL-2-independent growth. RESULTS: In this study, we demonstrated that IL-2-independent growth induction by Tax1 was abrogated by mutations of the PDZ domain-binding motif (PBM) at the Tax1 C-terminus. HTLV-2 Tax2, which shares 75% amino acid identity with Tax1 but does not have a PBM, was not able to induce IL-2-independent growth of CTLL-2. CONCLUSION: Our results suggest that Tax1, through interaction with PDZ domain protein(s) induces IL-2-independent growth, which may be a factor in multi-step leukemogenesis caused by HTLV-1

Too little, too late: A longitudinal study of English corrective focus by Mandarin speakers

This study tracks the production of English corrective focus by Mandarin speakers (MS) living in the US over a two-year period. We show that the MS differed from English speakers (ES) in the alignment of the corrective focus pitch accent: while ES productions typically showed a pitch peak on the stressed syllable, followed by an abrupt fall, the pitch rise and fall for MS was later and less steep. While the MS productions became more English-like over time in some respects, the failure to correctly align pitch accent persisted over time. We argue that this misalignment of pitch peak cannot be attributed to a lack of sensitivity to English stress, but rather represents a common failure to master the complex timing patterns involved in synchronizing pitch, intensity, and duration cues with segmental structure in a second language

A stress-reduced passaging technique improves the viability of human pluripotent cells

Xeno-free culture systems have expanded the clinical and industrial application of human pluripotent stem cells (PSCs). However, reproducibility issues, often arising from variability during passaging steps, remain. Here, we describe an improved method for the subculture of human PSCs. The revised method significantly enhances the viability of human PSCs by lowering DNA damage and apoptosis, resulting in more efficient and reproducible downstream applications such as gene editing and directed differentiation. Furthermore, the method does not alter PSC characteristics after long-term culture and attenuates the growth advantage of abnormal subpopulations. This robust passaging method minimizes experimental error and reduces the rate of PSCs failing quality control of human PSC research and application

Native and non-native speaker processing and production of contrastive focus prosody

Several studies have found that the presence of L+H* accent on a contrastive adjective assists native-speaking listeners in narrowing the referent of the noun following the adjective (e.g., Ito & Speer 2008, Weber et al. 2006). Our study addresses two questions: whether non-native speakers use prosodic cues in processing, as previous studies have shown for native speakers, and whether there is a relationship between the use of prosodic cues in processing and in production. Twenty-one Mandarin speakers living in the US and twenty-one native English speakers participated in two tasks investigating their processing and production of prosodic cues to contrastive focus. In the processing task, participants responded to the same recorded instruction containing an accented adjective in different contexts, in which the adjective was either contrastive (and therefore appropriately accented) or was repeated and followed by a contrasting noun, making focus accent on the adjective inappropriate. In the production task, participants guided an experimenter to place colored objects on a whiteboard, with some contexts designed to elicit contrastive focus. Overall results indicate that the Mandarin speakers made use of prosodic cues in both processing and production, although their focus prosody production differed from that of native speakers in several respects. Comparison of the results in the two experiments did not find strong correlations between processing and production. These results suggest that there is considerable heterogeneity even among native speakers in the use of prosodic cues in processing and production, and even those who do not use prosodic cues in processing may use them in production