The Effects of Adherence to Asian Values and Extraversion on Cardiovascular Reactivity: A Comparison Between Asian and European Americans

This study investigated the effects of personality type and ethnicity on reactivity to stressful stimuli by examining acculturation and adherence to Asian American cultural values as moderators. Twenty-two Asian American and twenty-two European American students performed a mental arithmetic task and a speech task while cardiovascular (CV) reactivity was monitored. Level of extraversion, acculturation, and adherence to Asian American values were assessed. As predicted, Asian Americans exhibited less CV reactivity to stressful stimuli and lower levels of extraversion than European Americans. Support was found for adherence to Asian American values as a moderator of the relationship between level of extraversion and CV reactivity to stressful stimuli. The results illustrate that being connected to Asian American culture has protective value for less extraverted individuals, as adherence to Asian American values predicted less CV reactivity to stress. These findings shed light on how culture influences the form and function of personality and can influence physiological reactivity to stress. To the best of my knowledge, no research has investigated whether personality type has an effect on stress responses in Asian Americans and examined the differences in responses based on cultural adherence

Evidence for the h_b(1P) meson in the decay Upsilon(3S) --> pi0 h_b(1P)

Using a sample of 122 million Upsilon(3S) events recorded with the BaBar detector at the PEP-II asymmetric-energy e+e- collider at SLAC, we search for the $h_b(1P)$ spin-singlet partner of the P-wave chi_{bJ}(1P) states in the sequential decay Upsilon(3S) --> pi0 h_b(1P), h_b(1P) --> gamma eta_b(1S). We observe an excess of events above background in the distribution of the recoil mass against the pi0 at mass 9902 +/- 4(stat.) +/- 2(syst.) MeV/c^2. The width of the observed signal is consistent with experimental resolution, and its significance is 3.1sigma, including systematic uncertainties. We obtain the value (4.3 +/- 1.1(stat.) +/- 0.9(syst.)) x 10^{-4} for the product branching fraction BF(Upsilon(3S)-->pi0 h_b) x BF(h_b-->gamma eta_b).Comment: 8 pages, 4 postscript figures, submitted to Phys. Rev. D (Rapid Communications

Deficient Induction Response in a Xenopus Nucleocytoplasmic Hybrid

Defects in induction signaling and response underlie the nucleocytoplasmic incompatibility between two evolutionarily distant frog species, while specific treatments partially restore this response in explants and whole embryos

The Physics of the B Factories

This work is on the Physics of the B Factories. Part A of this book contains a brief description of the SLAC and KEK B Factories as well as their detectors, BaBar and Belle, and data taking related issues. Part B discusses tools and methods used by the experiments in order to obtain results. The results themselves can be found in Part C

No association between the HLA-A2 allele and Alzheimer disease

The apolipoprotein E (APOE)-4 allele is a major risk factor for late-onset Alzheimer disease (AD), but it does not account for all the genetic variation in late-onset AD; thus, other genetic markers must be examined. Previous studies suggest an HLA-A2 allele association with risk and earlier onset age of AD. Because these effects may be additive to those of APOE-4, we studied HLA-A2 and APOE-4 frequencies in AD patients and cognitively intact controls. A total of 712 unrelated Caucasian subjects included 479 patients with AD (435 sporadic, 44 familial) and 233 controls. Patients (mean±SD age 73.9±7.9 years, range 42–93 years) had probable AD, according to standard diagnostic criteria; controls (mean±SD age 70.4±8.5 years, range 37–92 years) were cognitively intact. APOE and HLA-A2 typing used polymerase chain reaction to indicate the number of APOE-4 alleles present as well as the presence (A1/A2, A2/A2 genotypes) or absence (A1/A1 genotype) of HLA-A2. A two-way analysis of variance was used to assess the effect of the HLA-A2 allele on age at onset of dementia. No association between HLA-A2 and APOE-4 was found, and the presence of HLA-A2 allele did not increase AD risk. There was also no evidence for an association between HLA-A2 and earlier onset age of AD. Examination age, sex, family history of AD, and recruitment site had no influence on these results. In conclusion, the HLA-A2 allele did not influence AD risk or onset age in this study population. A2 heterozygosity, and population differences, including stratification sub-structures, and other undetermined factors could contribute to discrepant findings among studies

No genetic association between the LRP receptor and sporadic or late-onset familial Alzheimer disease

The low-density lipoprotein receptor-related protein gene (LRP1) is often mentioned as a candidate gene for Alzheimer disease (AD) because of its role as a receptor for apolipoprotein E (apoE), a major genetic risk factor for late-onset familial and sporadic AD. A recent association study of a tetranucleotide repeat polymorphism located 5′ to the LRP1 gene detected an increase in the 87 base pair allele in AD cases compared to unaffected controls. Additionally, an independent study involving a genomic screen for genes associated with late-onset AD identified a region as a possible location of a late-onset AD gene on chromosome 12p between D12S373 and D12S390, about 10 cM proximal to LRP1. We examined 144 late-onset multiplex AD families, 436 sporadic AD cases, and 240 controls and found no evidence of linkage or association of LRP1 and AD. Our data indicate that genetic variation of the LRP1 gene is not a major risk factor in the etiology of AD

Association between bleomycin hydrolase and Alzheimer's disease in caucasians

A recent study showed modest evidence for an increased frequency of the bleomycin hydrolase (BH) V/V genotype in Alzheimer's disease (AD) patients compared with nondemented controls. To test this hypothesis, we examined this polymorphism in 621 rigorously evaluated patients and 502 control subjects (all caucasian) but were unable to detect an association between BH and AD even after controling for age, gender, and apolipoprotein E (ApoE) genotype. We conclude that this polymorphism does not account for inherited susceptibility to AD in the populations represented in this sample