Media Exposure and Social Response as Predictors of Citizen\u27s Attitudes Toward Police

Police-involved deaths of African Americans have increased over the past two decades, with continued high-profile media exposure. The problem is that extant research provided only a partial understanding and disparate focus about how media exposure, social responses, social media use, and attitudes towards police were possibly related to citizens witnessing acts of police-initiated actions against African Americans in the United States. The purpose of this quantitative study was to assess the predictive nature of media exposure, social response, and social media use concerning citizens\u27 attitudes towards police. The two theories supporting this study and shaped this hypothetical system are media dependency and the structural strain theory. Data were collected using a characteristic profile survey, Index of Social Networking, Offline and Online Activity Levels Measure, and Attitudes Towards Police Scale with a convenience sample of 132 respondents who were 18 year of age or older who are identified as users of the social media platforms Facebook and LinkedIn. Data were analyzed using Pearson Correlation and forward entry multiple linear regression. The overall model was significant (p = .002) and accounted for 12.3% of the variance in the respondent\u27s attitude toward the police, however, media was not significant. This study represented an effort into understanding the sentiments of police and police activity coupled with media-driven and public attitudes towards police-initiated actions. These findings can be used to enhance relationships between communities and the police, especially in the practice of community policing and resolving negative perceptions based on cultural imprints that hinder effective policing

Retrospective evaluation of whole exome and genome mutation calls in 746 cancer samples

Funder: NCI U24CA211006Abstract: The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) and International Cancer Genome Consortium (ICGC) curated consensus somatic mutation calls using whole exome sequencing (WES) and whole genome sequencing (WGS), respectively. Here, as part of the ICGC/TCGA Pan-Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes (PCAWG) Consortium, which aggregated whole genome sequencing data from 2,658 cancers across 38 tumour types, we compare WES and WGS side-by-side from 746 TCGA samples, finding that ~80% of mutations overlap in covered exonic regions. We estimate that low variant allele fraction (VAF < 15%) and clonal heterogeneity contribute up to 68% of private WGS mutations and 71% of private WES mutations. We observe that ~30% of private WGS mutations trace to mutations identified by a single variant caller in WES consensus efforts. WGS captures both ~50% more variation in exonic regions and un-observed mutations in loci with variable GC-content. Together, our analysis highlights technological divergences between two reproducible somatic variant detection efforts

Cultured proteins: An analysis of the policy and regulatory environment in selected geographies

The global burden of malnutrition is unacceptably high. Animal-source foods are important components of diverse diets and provide high-quality proteins and other essential nutrients that promote optimal growth and development. The global demand for animal-source foods is projected to increase substantially, particularly in many low- and lower-middle income countries (LMICs). However, cost is a significant barrier to access and meeting this growing demand through livestock production will be highly resource intensive. As such, sustainable, high-quality alternatives to protein from livestock have the potential for significant transformative impact for both people and the planet. Through a process known as fermentation-based cellular agriculture, animal proteins found in milk and eggs can be produced without animals. According to this method, a gene encoded with an animal protein is introduced into a starter culture of microflora (e.g., fungi or yeast). This culture is grown in controlled fermentation tanks, where it expresses the desired protein. Finally, the protein is separated from the microflora, generally producing a purified protein powder. These resulting “cultured” proteins are designed to be identical to the corresponding animal-source proteins produced through traditional livestock farming and can be used as ingredients in existing or new food products. Although there are many potential sustainability and nutritionrelated benefits of these nnovations, they also face several challenges to commercialization and market uptake

Data from: Complex disease and phenotype mapping in the domestic dog

The domestic dog is becoming an increasingly valuable model species in medical genetics, showing particular promise to advance our understanding of cancer and orthopaedic disease. Here we undertake the largest canine genome-wide association study to date, with a panel of over 4,200 dogs genotyped at 180,000 markers, to accelerate mapping efforts. For complex diseases, we identify loci significantly associated with hip dysplasia, elbow dysplasia, idiopathic epilepsy, lymphoma, mast cell tumour and granulomatous colitis; for morphological traits, we report three novel quantitative trait loci that influence body size and one that influences fur length and shedding. Using simulation studies, we show that modestly larger sample sizes and denser marker sets will be sufficient to identify most moderate- to large-effect complex disease loci. This proposed design will enable efficient mapping of canine complex diseases, most of which have human homologues, using far fewer samples than required in human studies

plink files for cornell canine dataset

chromosome, name, location, alleles for each SN

plink files for cornell canine dataset

genotypes for each dog at each SN