The Media, Accountability and Civic Engagement in Africa

human development, democracy

The challenge of synthetic drugs in East and South-East Asia and Oceania

The demand for synthetic drugs in East and Southeast Asia and Oceania continues to rise, while rapid economic integration is creating new opportunities for transnational criminal groups to expand the illicit drug trade, warns the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) in this report released by the Global Synthetics Monitoring: Analyses, Reporting and Trends (SMART) Programme. This report analyses recent trends and developments of the synthetic drugs market in the region, comprising both amphetamine-type stimulants (ATS) and new psychoactive substances (NPS), which are designed to mimic the effects of substances under international control. The report also highlights the harmful impact of the illicit trade in synthetic drugs on development and the evolving challenges for governments in their efforts to respond to the threat. East and Southeast Asia and Oceania is one of the world\u27s largest synthetic drug markets, and is dominated by methamphetamine in crystalline or ice and tablet (referred to as yaba or yama locally) forms. The illegal synthetic drug trade in the region is also expanding and diversifying with increasing availability of NPS. Moreover, the availability of precursor chemicals in the region increases the risk of diversion for methamphetamine production. &nbsp

Defining a Particular Social Group Based on Gender

lt is now accepted in refugee jurisprudence that gender-based social groups fall within the meaning of Particular Social Group for purposes of according Convention refugee protection. However, the criteria for identifying gender-based social groups remains to be settled. The tendency has been to identify the at-risk group by the common victimization which confronts group members. This is neither innate nor constant. The author takes the position that the group should simply be identified by the gender of its members-women, although there may be subgroups of women united by other characteristics such as race, nationality or religion. Not aIl group members will automatically be eligible for refugee protection; only women who are genuinely at risk of persecution will be accorded Convention refugee status.Il est maintenant reconnu, dans la jurisprudence en matière de droit des réfugiés, que les groupes sociaux fondés sur le sexage sont un type de groupe social particulier aux fins de l'allocation des protections dues aux réfugiés en vertu de la Convention. Cependant, le critère d'identification des groupes sociaux fondés sur le sexage reste a définir. La tendance a été à identifier les groupes à risque par le dénominateur commun de la victimisation à laquelle les membres du groupe sont confrontés. Ceci n'est ni une inhérence ni une constance. L'auteure du présent article assume la position que le groupe devrait simplement être identifié de par le sexe de ses membres: des femmes, quoiqu'il y ait des sous-groupes de femmes unis par d'autres caractéristiques, telles la race, la nationalité ou la religion. Ce ne sont pas tous les membres du groupe qui seront automatiquement éligibles au statut de réfugié: seules les femmes qui sont réellement confrontées à un sérieux danger de persécution obtiendrons le statut de réfugiées en vertu de la Convention

Roles of the Histone Chaperone FACT in Drosophila Gene Regulation and Chromatin Architecture

The highly conserved histone chaperone FACT (Facilitates Chromatin Transcription) is thought to contribute to the disassembly and reassembly of nucleosomes in the wake of RNA polymerase II passage through chromatin. In yeast, mutation of FACT subunits leads to decreased nucleosome occupancy at the promoters and transcribed regions of genes. In addition, genetic experiments suggest that yeast FACT plays a critical role in restricting initiation of transcription to promoters, ensuring that only appropriate mRNAs are synthesized. However, FACT’s roles in chromatin biology and transcriptional regulation in higher eukaryotes are not well understood. Using Drosophila S2 cells as a model, I observe that depleting levels of the FACT complex results in aberrant transcriptional regulation of approximately 20% of expressed genes. We hypothesized that FACT-dependent alterations in transcription occur because nucleosome disassembly and reassembly are defective in FACT deficient S2 cells. To address that hypothesis, I monitored the nucleosome positioning using genome-wide micrococcal nuclease protection assays, and the distribution of bulk histones, histone variants, and histone modifications using ChIP-seq. I observed that FACT depletion has little effect on total nucleosome occupancy or positioning or on the distribution of either the histone variant H2Av or the histone 3 lysine 56 acetylation (H3K56ac) mark. On the other hand, the loss of FACT alters the distribution of other histone modifications, including histone 3 lysine 4 trimethylation (H3K4me3) and histone 3 lysine 36 trimethylation (H3K36me3), in the promoters and transcribed regions of genes. In particular, H3K4me3, a mark of active promoters, was reduced at promoters and increased in gene bodies of the FACT depleted cells. Furthermore, levels of H3K36me3, a mark of active transcription over transcribed regions, was reduced in gene bodies but increased beyond the polyadenylation site. The levels of total (Rpb3) and transcriptionally engaged Pol II (PRO-seq) were reduced at promoters upon the loss of FACT. Taken together, our results are consistent with the model that FACT contributes to the interplay between chromatin architecture and control of promoter-proximal pausing

Modulating Nanoparticle Film Assembly Using Amphiphiles

Nanocomposite thin films comprised of nanoparticles have shown great promise for use in electronics, photonics, biomedical as well as energy storage and conversion devices. One versatile method for fabricating such thin films is layer-by-layer (LbL) assembly, a process that involves sequential deposition of oppositely charged species to create conformal thin films. The advantage of LbL assembly lies in the fact that the properties and structure of films can be tuned by varying assembly conditions such as pH and ionic strength. Furthermore, a variety of nanomaterials with useful properties can be incorporated within LbL assembled thin films. Despite these advantages, there are a few limitations to using LbL assembly to fabricate nanoparticle films: (1) Favorable film growth of all-nanoparticle LbL assembly in aqueous phase occurs within a narrow processing window thus limiting the versatility of LbL assembly. (2) nanoparticle LbL assembly has generally been limited to aqueous phase due to the ease of charging nanomaterials in water. (3) The fabrication of nanoparticle films via LbL assembly is slow and typically takes several hours to complete. In this thesis, amphiphiles will be used to address these three limitations of nanoparticle LbL assembly. The first limitation is addressed by using a small amphiphilic molecule, hexylamine to broaden the narrow nanoparticle LbL assembly window. In addition, an array of experimental techniques is used to reveal the mechanism leading to a broad processing window. It will be demonstrated that the second limitation of nanoparticle LbL assembly to aqueous phase can be overcome by using a surfactant Aerosol-OT (AOT) to charge stabilize particles in toluene for non-polar LbL assembly. Furthermore, the effect of the surface chemistry of particles and dispersion moisture content on the charge of particles in non-polar media is probed along with the role of relative humidity on the LbL assembly process in non-polar media. Lastly, electrophoretic deposition (EPD) of surfactant-charged particles in a non-polar solvent is used to rapidly assemble nanocomposite films, thus overcoming the third limitation of nanoparticle LbL assembly

Classification Of Civilian Vehicle Sounds Using A Large Database Of Vehicle Sounds

We have completed the building of an extensive database of civilian vehicle sounds. The database consists of correlated acoustic and seismic signatures of a large number (exceeding 850) of civilian vehicles. Each acoustic signature is obtained through two high-quality microphones separated by 25 feet, and whose signals are exactly synchronized. In this work, spectral and tristimulus features of civilian vehicle sounds are computed and then submitted to further processing using principal component analysis. The “super†features, derived after principal component analysis is performed, are then used for classification. In this research effort, the performance of the quadratic classifier with that of the neural network classifier is compared. Results presented here show that the neural network classifier out-performs the quadratic classifier in distinguishing different and same branded vehicle sounds. The classification usually has small (at times 0%) classification errors

Insights on the molecular mechanisms of SINEUP activity

Translation initiation during protein synthesis is one of the rate limiting steps in regulating gene expression in eukaryotes. It may occur through a cap- dependent or independent mechanism. Cap-independent translation initiation usually takes place when the canonical cap-dependent process involving the cap-eIF4F complex and/or the ternary complex (TC) are inhibited, mostly during cellular stress. It can be activated by modular RNA elements like internal ribosome entering sites (IRESs) that can act alone or in conjunction with other RNA cis-acting elements such as upstream open reading frames (uORF), terminal oligopyrimidines (TOPs) and N6-methyladenosine (m6A). Recently, antisense (AS) long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) to mouse and human gene targets were reported to up-regulate translation of those genes, representing a new functional class of lncRNAs termed SINEUPs, for SINE sequences UP-regulating translation. SINEUP modular organization consists of a binding domain (BD) which specifically targets the mRNA of interest by an antisense sequence to its 5\u2019UTR, and an effector domain (ED) constituted by an embedded SINE sequence which confers the biological function of translation activation. However, the underlying molecular mechanism mediated by SINEUPs is unknown. Here, I show using both SINEUP- and IRES-activity assays that the ED of AS Uchl1, the lncRNA representative member of SINEUPs, promotes cap-independent translation through an internal ribosome entry site that is mediated by the inverted SINEB2 stem loop 1 (SL1) hairpin structure, which probably recruits the ribosome using an IRES-like mechanism similar to the one in Hepatitis Virus C. Since synthetic SINEUPs can be targeted to potentially any gene of interest by swapping the BDs, they can be used as molecular tools, in protein manufacturing and RNA therapeutics to increase protein synthesis. Therefore, in this work I optimized a miniaturized version, the synthetic microSINEUP, and showed for the first time that SINEUPs are functional in Drosophila cells. In addition, taking advantage of SINEUP modular organization, I synthesized IRES-containing SINEUPs, called SINEUP-IRESs, that present cellular and viral IRESs acting as ED in SINEUP RNA molecules and therefore proving that IRES sequences can activate translation in trans through a BD. By the study of IRES-containing c-myc mRNA, I discovered the ability of natural IRES elements to increase endogenously expressed, targeted proteins synthesis in trans. These data are the first evidence for a potential new molecular mechanism of gene expression control with long-range consequences in health and disease