Expression of Extracellular Matrix Proteins in Human Periodontal Ligament Cells During Mineralization In Vitro

Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/142249/1/jper0320.pd

Screening and brief interventions for hazardous and harmful alcohol use in primary care: a cluster randomised controlled trial protocol

A large number of randomised controlled trials in health settings have consistently reported positive effects of brief intervention in terms of reductions in alcohol use. However,although alcohol misuse is common amongst offenders, there is limited evidence of alcohol brief interventions in the criminal justice field. This factorial pragmatic cluster randomised controlledtrial with Offender Managers (OMs) as the unit of randomisation will evaluate the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of different models of screening to identify hazardous and harmful drinkers in probation and different intensities of brief intervention to reduce excessive drinking in probation clients. Ninety-six OMs from 9 probation areas across 3 English regions (the NorthEast Region (n = 4) and London and the South East Regions (n = 5)) will be recruited. OMs will berandomly allocated to one of three intervention conditions: a client information leaflet control condition (n = 32 OMs); 5-minute simple structured advice (n = 32 OMs) and 20-minute brieflifestyle counselling delivered by an Alcohol Health Worker (n = 32 OMs). Randomisation will be stratified by probation area. To test the relative effectiveness of different screening methods all OMs will be randomised to either the Modified Single Item Screening Questionnaire (M-SASQ) orthe Fast Alcohol Screening Test (FAST). There will be a minimum of 480 clients recruited into the trial. There will be an intention to treat analysis of study outcomes at 6 and 12 months postintervention. Analysis will include client measures (screening result, weekly alcohol consumption,alcohol-related problems, re-offending, public service use and quality of life) and implementation measures from OMs (the extent of screening and brief intervention beyond the minimum recruitment threshold will provide data on acceptability and feasibility of different models of brief intervention). We will also examine the practitioner and organisational factors associated with successful implementation.The trial will evaluate the impact of screening and brief alcohol intervention in routine probation work and therefore its findings will be highly relevant to probation teams and thus the criminal justice system in the UK

Academic Performance and Behavioral Patterns

Identifying the factors that influence academic performance is an essential part of educational research. Previous studies have documented the importance of personality traits, class attendance, and social network structure. Because most of these analyses were based on a single behavioral aspect and/or small sample sizes, there is currently no quantification of the interplay of these factors. Here, we study the academic performance among a cohort of 538 undergraduate students forming a single, densely connected social network. Our work is based on data collected using smartphones, which the students used as their primary phones for two years. The availability of multi-channel data from a single population allows us to directly compare the explanatory power of individual and social characteristics. We find that the most informative indicators of performance are based on social ties and that network indicators result in better model performance than individual characteristics (including both personality and class attendance). We confirm earlier findings that class attendance is the most important predictor among individual characteristics. Finally, our results suggest the presence of strong homophily and/or peer effects among university students

Desulfonatronovibrio halophilus sp. nov., a novel moderately halophilic sulfate-reducing bacterium from hypersaline chloride–sulfate lakes in Central Asia

Four strains of lithotrophic sulfate-reducing bacteria (SRB) have been enriched and isolated from anoxic sediments of hypersaline chloride–sulfate lakes in the Kulunda Steppe (Altai, Russia) at 2 M NaCl and pH 7.5. According to the 16S rRNA gene sequence analysis, the isolates were closely related to each other and belonged to the genus Desulfonatronovibrio, which, so far, included only obligately alkaliphilic members found exclusively in soda lakes. The isolates utilized formate, H2 and pyruvate as electron donors and sulfate, sulfite and thiosulfate as electron acceptors. In contrast to the described species of the genus Desulfonatronovibrio, the salt lake isolates could only tolerate high pH (up to pH 9.4), while they grow optimally at a neutral pH. They belonged to the moderate halophiles growing between 0.2 and 2 M NaCl with an optimum at 0.5 M. On the basis of their distinct phenotype and phylogeny, the described halophilic SRB are proposed to form a novel species within the genus Desulfonatronovibrio, D. halophilus (type strain HTR1T = DSM24312T = UNIQEM U802T)

Household Tobacco Smoke and Admission Weight Predict Severe Bronchiolitis in Infants Independent of Deprivation: Prospective Cohort Study

To examine demographic, environmental and clinical factors associated with severe bronchiolitis in infants admitted to hospital and quantify the independent effects of these factors

Parent-reported communication abilities of children with Sotos syndrome : evidence from the Children’s Communication Checklist-2

Sotos syndrome is a congenital overgrowth syndrome associated with intellectual disability. This study investigated communicative abilities of children with Sotos syndrome (n = 31), using the Children’s Communication Checklist, second edition. A cross-syndrome approach was used to establish the specificity of these abilities. Children with Williams syndrome (n = 34) were used as a comparison group. In both groups, the majority of participants had communicative impairment. Children with Sotos syndrome had an uneven pragmatic language profile and greater impairment with social relations, compared with restricted interests. Overall, children with Sotos syndrome had difficulties with both language structure and pragmatic language and a specific profile of relative difficulty with using nonverbal communication, using context-appropriate language and understanding peer relationships

Overexpressed vs mutated Kras in murine fibroblasts: a molecular phenotyping study

Ras acts in signalling pathways regulating the activity of multiple cellular functions including cell proliferation, differentiation, and apoptosis. Amino-acid exchanges at position 12, 13, or 61 of the Kras gene convert the proto-oncogene into an activated oncogene. Until now, a direct comparison of genome-wide expression profiling studies of Kras overexpression and different Kras mutant forms in a single assay system has not been carried out. In our study, we focused on the direct comparison of global gene expression effects caused by mutations in codon 12 or 13 of the Kras gene and Kras overexpression in murine fibroblasts. We determined Kras cellular mRNA, Ras protein and activated Ras protein levels. Further, we compared our data to the proteome analysis of the same transfected cell lines. Both overexpression and mutations of Kras lead to common altered gene expression patterns. Only two genes, Lox and Col1a1, were reversely regulated in the Kras transfectants. They may contribute to the higher aggressiveness of the Kras codon 12 mutation in tumour progression. The functional annotation of differentially expressed genes revealed a high frequency of proteins involved in tumour growth and angiogenesis. These data further support the important role of these genes in tumour-associated angiogenesis

Measurement of the Bottom-Strange Meson Mixing Phase in the Full CDF Data Set

We report a measurement of the bottom-strange meson mixing phase \beta_s using the time evolution of B0_s -> J/\psi (->\mu+\mu-) \phi (-> K+ K-) decays in which the quark-flavor content of the bottom-strange meson is identified at production. This measurement uses the full data set of proton-antiproton collisions at sqrt(s)= 1.96 TeV collected by the Collider Detector experiment at the Fermilab Tevatron, corresponding to 9.6 fb-1 of integrated luminosity. We report confidence regions in the two-dimensional space of \beta_s and the B0_s decay-width difference \Delta\Gamma_s, and measure \beta_s in [-\pi/2, -1.51] U [-0.06, 0.30] U [1.26, \pi/2] at the 68% confidence level, in agreement with the standard model expectation. Assuming the standard model value of \beta_s, we also determine \Delta\Gamma_s = 0.068 +- 0.026 (stat) +- 0.009 (syst) ps-1 and the mean B0_s lifetime, \tau_s = 1.528 +- 0.019 (stat) +- 0.009 (syst) ps, which are consistent and competitive with determinations by other experiments.Comment: 8 pages, 2 figures, Phys. Rev. Lett 109, 171802 (2012

Wnt signaling in breast cancer: have we come full circle?

Since the original identification of Wnt1 as a mammary oncogene in mouse mammary tumor virus infected mice, questions have been asked about its relevance to human breast cancer. Wnt1 is now known to be one of a large family of Wnt genes encoding structurally similar secreted signaling proteins, several of which are functionally redundant. The principal intracellular signaling pathway activated by these proteins has been elucidated in recent years. Components of this pathway include proto-oncogene products, such as β-catenin, and tumor suppressor proteins such as APC. Although WNT1 itself has not been implicated in human breast neoplasms, it has been reported that other WNT genes are sometimes overexpressed in human breast cancer and there is growing evidence that downstream components of the Wnt signaling pathway are activated in a significant proportion of breast tumors

Analysis of opo cis-regulatory landscape uncovers Vsx2 requirement in early eye morphogenesis

The self-organized morphogenesis of the vertebrate optic cup entails coupling the activation of the retinal gene regulatory network to the constriction-driven infolding of the retinal epithelium. Yet the genetic mechanisms underlying this coordination remain largely unexplored. Through phylogenetic footprinting and transgenesis in zebrafish, here we examine the cis-regulatory landscape of opo, an endocytosis regulator essential for eye morphogenesis. Among the different conserved enhancers identified, we isolate a single retina-specific element (H6_10137) and show that its activity depends on binding sites for the retinal determinant Vsx2. Gain- and loss-of-function experiments and ChIP analyses reveal that Vsx2 regulates opo expression through direct binding to this retinal enhancer. Furthermore, we show that vsx2 knockdown impairs the primary optic cup folding. These data support a model by which vsx2, operating through the effector gene opo, acts as a central transcriptional node that coordinates neural retina patterning and optic cup invagination in zebrafish.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio