Search results for: political expression

Authors: M. Błoch, P. Karpiński, P. Gasperowicz, R. Płoski, A. Lebioda, P. Skiba, A. Rozensztrauch, D. Patkowski, R. Śmigiel

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Introduction: The cause of the isolated form of esophageal atresia has been yet unknown. Objectives: The primary objective of this study was to indicate epigenetic factors which may play an important role in the etiopathogenesis of esophageal atresia. Methods: We recruited a group of 6 pairs of twins, among whom one of the twins developed EA. The selection of such a group for testing allows for excluding external factors (e.g., infections, drugs, toxins) as the cause of the birth defect. The analyzes were performed with the use of genetic material isolated from the whole blood and esophagus tissue of a patient with EA. The reduced representation bisulphite sequencing (RRBS) technique was used to study the change in the genomic imprinting -a change in the expression of genes, which may be the epigenetic cause of EA. Results: In the course of the analyzes, significant hypomethylation and hypermethylation regions were identified. 65 genes with probably increased expression and 65 with decreased expression were selected. These genes have not been marked in literature as possibly pathogenic in esophageal atresia. However, their participation in the pathogenesis of esophageal atresia cannot be clearly excluded. Conclusion: We suggest a role of hypomethylation or hypermethylation of selected genes as one of the possible epigenetic factors in EA pathogenesis. The use of the RRBS technique in the search for the cause of EA is pioneer research; therefore, it seems necessary to extend the research group to new patients with EA. Acknowledgment: The work was supported by the National Science Centre, Poland, under research project 2016/21/N/NZ5/01927.

Keywords: esophageal atresia, epigenetics, embryonic development, surgery, genes expression, twins

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Authors: A. Y. Tsidulko, T. M. Pankova, E. V. Grigorieva

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High-grade gliomas are the most frequent and most aggressive brain tumors which are characterized by active invasion of tumor cells into the surrounding brain tissue, where the extracellular matrix (ECM) plays a crucial role. Disruption of ECM can be involved in anticancer drugs effectiveness, side-effects and also in tumor relapses. The anti-inflammatory agent dexamethasone is a common drug used during high-grade glioma treatment for alleviating cerebral edema. Although dexamethasone is widely used in the clinic, its effects on normal brain tissue ECM remain poorly investigated. It is known that proteoglycans (PGs) are a major component of the extracellular matrix in the central nervous system. In our work, we studied the effects of dexamethasone on the ECM proteoglycans (syndecan-1, glypican-1, perlecan, versican, brevican, NG2, decorin, biglican, lumican) using RT-PCR in the experimental animal model. It was shown that proteoglycans in rat brain have age-specific expression patterns. In early post-natal rat brain (8 days old rat pups) overall PGs expression was quite high and mainly expressed PGs were biglycan, decorin, and syndecan-1. The overall transcriptional activity of PGs in adult rat brain is 1.5-fold decreased compared to post-natal brain. The expression pattern was changed as well with biglycan, decorin, syndecan-1, glypican-1 and brevican becoming almost equally expressed. PGs expression patterns create a specific tissue microenvironment that differs in developing and adult brain. Dexamethasone regimen close to the one used in the clinic during high-grade glioma treatment significantly affects proteoglycans expression. It was shown that overall PGs transcription activity is 1.5-2-folds increased after dexamethasone treatment. The most up-regulated PGs were biglycan, decorin, and lumican. The PGs expression pattern in adult brain changed after treatment becoming quite close to the expression pattern in developing brain. It is known that microenvironment in developing tissues promotes cells proliferation while in adult tissues proliferation is usually suppressed. The changes occurring in the adult brain after dexamethasone treatment may lead to re-activation of cell proliferation due to signals from changed microenvironment. Taken together obtained data show that dexamethasone treatment significantly affects the normal brain ECM, creating the appropriate microenvironment for tumor cells proliferation and thus can reduce the effectiveness of anticancer treatment and promote tumor relapses. This work has been supported by a Russian Science Foundation (RSF Grant 16-15-10243)

Keywords: dexamthasone, extracellular matrix, glioma, proteoglycan

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Authors: Petra Borilova Linhartova, Michaela Ruckova, Sabina Sevcikova, Natalie Mlcuchova, Jan Bohm, Katerina Zukalova, Monika Vlachova, Jiri Dolina, Lumir Kunovsky, Radek Kroupa, Zdenek Pavlovsky, Zdenek Danek, Tereza Deissova, Lydie Izakovicova Holla, Ondrej Slaby, Zdenek Kala

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Esophageal adenocarcinoma (EAC) is a highly aggressive malignancy that frequently develops from Barrett's esophagus (BE), a premalignant pathologic change occurring in the lower end of the esophagus. Specific microRNAs (miRNAs), small non-coding RNAs that function as posttranscriptional regulators of gene expression, were repeatedly proved to play key roles in the pathogenesis of these diseases. This pilot study aimed to analyze four selected miRNAs in esophageal tissues from healthy controls (HC) and patients with reflux esophagitis (RE)/BE/EAC, as well as to compare expression at the site of Barrett's mucosa/adenocarcinoma and healthy esophageal tissue outside the area of the main pathology in patients with BE/EAC. In this pilot study, 22 individuals (3 HC, 8 RE, 5 BE, 6 EAC) were included and endoscopically examined. RNA was isolated from the fresh-frozen esophageal tissue (stored in the RNAlater™ Stabilization Solution −70°C) using the AllPrep DNA/RNA/miRNA Universal Kit. Subsequent RT-qPCR analysis was performed using selected TaqMan MicroRNA Assays for miR-21, miR-34a, miR-196a, miR-196b, and endogenous control (RNU44). While the expression of miR-21 in the esophageal tissue with the main pathology was decreased in BE and EAC patients in comparison to the group of HC and RE patients (p=0.01), the expression of miR-196a was increased in the BE and EAC patients (p<0.01). Correlations between those miRNAs expression in tissue and severity of diagnosis were observed (p<0.05). In addition, miR-196a was significantly more expressed at the site with the main pathology than in paired adjacent esophageal tissue in BE and EAC patients (p<0.01). In conclusion, our pilot results showed that miR-196a, which regulates the proliferation, invasion, and migration (and was previously associated with esophageal squamous cell carcinoma and marked as a potential therapeutic target), could be a diagnostic tissue biomarker for BE and EAC as well.

Keywords: microRNA, barrett´s esophagus, esophageal adenocarcinoma, biomarker

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Authors: Zhang Zhenzhen

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Valproate (VPA) is commonly used in the treatment of bipolar disorder and epilepsy. The mechanism is complicated, including its ability to inhibit histone deacetylases (HDACs). Here, we show that VPA attenuated VEGF gene expression and the morphological changes in choroidal neovascularization (CNV) induced by photocoagulation in retina. C57BL/6 mice were injected subcutaneously at 300mg/kg twice daily with VPA before insult. Vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF)-A and VEGF-B were examined in the eyes of VPA-treated mice and in human retinal pigment epithelial cell lines (ARPE-19) exposed to VPA. In addition, CNV was induced by photocoagulation in mice injected with VPA, and the volume of CNV was compared by fluorescence-labeled choroidal flat mount. Morphological changes were analyzed on stained histological sections. Western blot analysis was used to determine protein levels of VEGF-A and VEGF-B, and acetylation of histone H3 in each group. VPA injected intraperitoneally attenuated the VEGF-A and VEGF-B expression in the retina, accompanied by the hyperacetylation of retina tissue, indicating that VPA acts directly on retina tissues through acetylation to reduce the expression of VEGF. VPA also attenuated the VEGF-A mRNA expression in the retinal pigment epithelium showed by immunohistochemistry. Moreover, the administration of VPA significantly attenuated photocoagulation-induced CNV in mice. These results demonstrate that VPA attenuated VEGF production in retina associated with choroidal neovascularization possibly via the HDAC inhibition.

Keywords: retina, acetylation, chorodial neovascularization, vascular endothelial growth factor

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Authors: Natasha Petrovska, Mirjana Pavlovic, Maria M. Larrondo-Petrie

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Neural stem cells (NSCs) are multi-potent, self-renewing cells that generate new neurons. Three subtypes of NSCs can be separated regarding the stages of NSC lineage: quiescent neural stem cells (qNSCs), activated neural stem cells (aNSCs) and neural progenitor cells (NPCs), but their gene expression signatures are not utterly understood yet. Single-cell examinations have started to elucidate the complex structure of NSC populations. Nevertheless, there is a lack of thorough molecular interpretation of the NSC lineage heterogeneity and an increasing need for tools to analyze and improve the efficiency and correctness of single-cell sequencing data. Feature selection and ordering can identify and classify the gene expression signatures of these subtypes and can discover novel subpopulations during the NSCs activation and differentiation processes. The aim here is to review the implementation of the feature selection technique on NSC subtypes and the classification techniques that have been used for the identification of gene expression signatures.

Keywords: feature selection, feature similarity, neural stem cells, genes, feature selection methods

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Authors: Mohammad Saif

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In the post-Westphalianworld order, the concept of sovereignty has been a fundamental area of inquiry in Political Science, International Relations, and International Law. Modern Islamic political thought has also dedicated a fair share of debate on the subject. The debate fundamentally revolves around the ‘ontological differentiation’ between western and Islamic political thought. While the centrality of the individual in western political thought regards the individual as the center of universe, Islamic Political thought provides that space to God. The modern liberal democratic principles suggest sovereignty as one of the major attributes of modern nation state; Islamists regard sovereignty as an attribute of God. However, the position regarding God’ssovereignty in Islamic political thought is not coherent in conception. Some scholars regard such a position as ‘the political interpretation of Islam’. This paper is an attempt to first analyze the fundamental discord between two rival political ideologies (western and Islamic), and then forward a debate on the subject of sovereignty in South Asian Islamic Political thought, particularly between Syed Abul Ala Maududi (ideological father of modern islamist movements) andHifzurrahmanSeoharvi (lesser known in Academia but highly influential in shaping Deobandi position of principles related to political nature of Islamic theology). Maududi regardssovereignty as an attribute of God and the rulers as subservient to Gods will, Seoharvi suggests that God's sovereignty does not entail that the caliph or amir cannot be a ruler or hakim, nor can his command or hukum be an order. Certain references have also been made to contemporary scholars like Sayidd Qutub, Rashid al Ghanouchi, who in one way or the other have contributed to the debate on ‘sovereignty in Islamic thought’.

Keywords: nation state, sovereigty, sovereignty of God (Hakimmiyah), deoband

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Authors: Djehich Mohamed Yousri

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With the advent of social media, political communication scholars have systematically reviewed theories and empirical findings that revolve around media use and democracy. It is interesting that around the same time period, there has been a trend towards revitalization of political populism in different latitudes around the world. This wide-ranging populist movement has expanded regardless of whether these political systems are established democracies, emerging democracies, or societies mired in endangered political contexts. This article serves as an introductory piece to a special issue on populism. First, it highlights the ways in which "populism", as an ancient phenomenon, has transmigrated into the political sphere in the age of social media. Second, the article seeks to better define the populist context and how it has evolved in today's hybrid media society. Finally, this introduction also lays the groundwork for six data-driven theoretical core papers that cover many of the important issues revolving around the phenomenon of populism today.

Keywords: democracy, facebook, populism, social media, twitter

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Authors: Songul Miftakhov

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This study explores political representation and engagement of Eastern and Southeastern Anatolia regions, known to have dense Kurdish population and referred further to as Eastern region, in the Turkish parliament between 1946 and 1980. Traditional local notables had most of the privileges to be represented given their connectedness with political parties. Traditional local notables integrated into right-wing parties considering political and economic aspects. At the same time, they kept control over local political involvement channels. As a result, political representation and presence were monopolized at central, local and civil society levels. One part of Kurdish intellectuals was marginalized from the parliament after addressing issues in Eastern Anatolia and trying to develop solutions apart from the mainstream. Some of them took part in Kurdish oppositional left wing in the 1960s and jounced power of settled notables in 1970s in local administrations or as independent members of the parliament.

Keywords: Kurdish representation, parliament, local nobles, Eastern and Southeastern Anatolia

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Authors: Paola Modesto, Floriana Fruscione, Isabella Martini, Simona Perga, Federica Riccardo, Mariateresa Camerino, Davide Giacobino, Cecilia Gola, Luca Licenziato, Elisabetta Razzuoli, Katia Varello, Lorella Maniscalco, Elena Bozzetta, Angelo Ferrari

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Canine and human melanoma, osteosarcoma (OSA), and mammary carcinomas are aggressive tumors with common characteristics making dogs a good model for comparative oncology. Novel therapeutic strategies against these tumors could be useful to both species. In humans, chondroitin sulphate proteoglycan 4 (CSPG4) is a marker involved in tumor progression and could be a candidate target for immunotherapy. The anti-CSPG4 DNA electrovaccination has shown to be an effective approach for canine malignant melanoma (CMM) [1]. An immunohistochemistry evaluation of CSPG4 expression in tumour tissue is generally performed prior to electrovaccination. To assess the possibility to perform a rapid molecular evaluation and in order to validate these spontaneous canine tumors as the model for human studies, we investigate the CSPG4 gene expression by RT qPCR in CMM, OSA, and canine mammary tumors (CMT). The total RNA was extracted from RNAlater stored tissue samples (CMM n=16; OSA n=13; CMT n=6; five paired normal tissues for CMM, five paired normal tissues for OSA and one paired normal tissue for CMT), retro-transcribed and then analyzed by duplex RT-qPCR using two different TaqMan assays for the target gene CSPG4 and the internal reference gene (RG) Ribosomal Protein S19 (RPS19). RPS19 was selected from a panel of 9 candidate RGs, according to NormFinder analysis following the protocol already described [2]. Relative expression was analyzed by CFX Maestro™ Software. Student t-test and ANOVA were performed (significance set at P<0.05). Results showed that gene expression of CSPG4 in OSA tissues is significantly increased by 3-4 folds when compared to controls. In CMT, gene expression of the target was increased from 1.5 to 19.9 folds. In melanoma, although an increasing trend was observed, no significant differences between the two groups were highlighted. Immunohistochemistry analysis of the two cancer types showed that the expression of CSPG4 within CMM is concentrated in isles of cells compared to OSA, where the distribution of positive cells is homogeneous. This evidence could explain the differences in gene expression results.CSPG4 immunohistochemistry evaluation in mammary carcinoma is in progress. The evidence of CSPG4 expression in a different type of canine tumors opens the way to the possibility of extending the CSPG4 immunotherapy marker in CMM, OSA, and CMT and may have an impact to translate this strategy modality to human oncology.

Keywords: canine melanoma, canine mammary carcinomas, canine osteosarcoma, CSPG4, gene expression, immunotherapy

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Authors: Nahush Modak, Meena Pangarkar, Anand Pathak, Ankita Tamhane

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Background: Breast cancer is the prominent cause of cancer and mortality among women. This study was done to show the statistical analysis of a cohort of over 250 patients detected with breast cancer diagnosed by oncologists using Immunohistochemistry (IHC). IHC was performed by using ER; PR; HER2; Ki-67 antibodies. Materials and methods: Formalin fixed Paraffin embedded tissue samples were obtained by surgical manner and standard protocol was followed for fixation, grossing, tissue processing, embedding, cutting and IHC. The Ventana Benchmark XT machine was used for automated IHC of the samples. Antibodies used were supplied by F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd. Statistical analysis was performed by using SPSS for windows. Statistical tests performed were chi-squared test and Correlation tests with p<.01. The raw data was collected and provided by National Cancer Insitute, Jamtha, India. Result: Luminal B was the most prevailing molecular subtype of Breast cancer at our institute. Chi squared test of homogeneity was performed to find equality in distribution and Luminal B was the most prevalent molecular subtype. The worse prognostic indicator for breast cancer depends upon expression of Ki-67 and her2 protein in cancerous cells. Our study was done at p <.01 and significant dependence was observed. There exists no dependence of age on molecular subtype of breast cancer. Similarly, age is an independent variable while considering Ki-67 expression. Chi square test performed on Human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2) statuses of patients and strong dependence was observed in percentage of Ki-67 expression and Her2 (+/-) character which shows that, value of Ki depends upon Her2 expression in cancerous cells (p<.01). Surprisingly, dependence was observed in case of Ki-67 and Pr, at p <.01. This shows that Progesterone receptor proteins (PR) are over-expressed when there is an elevation in expression of Ki-67 protein. Conclusion: We conclude from that Luminal B is the most prevalent molecular subtype at National Cancer Institute, Jamtha, India. There was found no significant correlation between age and Ki-67 expression in any molecular subtype. And no dependence or correlation exists between patients’ age and molecular subtype. We also found that, when the diagnosis is Luminal A, out of the cohort of 257 patients, no patient shows >14% Ki-67 value. Statistically, extremely significant values were observed for dependence of PR+Her2- and PR-Her2+ scores on Ki-67 expression. (p<.01). Her2 is an important prognostic factor in breast cancer. Chi squared test for Her2 and Ki-67 shows that the expression of Ki depends upon Her2 statuses. Moreover, Ki-67 cannot be used as a standalone prognostic factor for determining breast cancer.

Keywords: breast cancer molecular subtypes , correlation, immunohistochemistry, Ki-67 and HR, statistical analysis

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Authors: Vilasinee Jintalikhitdee, Phusit Phukamchanoad, Sakapas Saengchai

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This research aims to study the level of democratic political culture and the factors that affect the democratic political culture of 5th and 6th graders under the authority of Dusit District Office, Bangkok by using stratified sampling for probability sampling and using purposive sampling for non-probability sampling to collect data toward the distribution of questionnaires to 300 respondents. This covers all of the schools under the authority of Dusit District Office. The researcher analyzed the data by using descriptive statistics which include arithmetic mean, standard deviation, and inferential statistics which are Independent Samples T-test (T-test) and One-Way ANOVA (F-test). The researcher also collected data by interviewing the target groups, and then analyzed the data by the use of descriptive analysis. The result shows that 5th and 6th graders under the authority of Dusit District Office, Bangkok have exposed to democratic political culture at high level in overall. When considering each part, it found out that the part that has highest mean is “the constitutional democratic governmental system is suitable for Thailand” statement. The part with the lowest mean is “corruption (cheat and defraud) is normal in Thai society” statement. The factor that affects democratic political culture is grade levels, occupations of mothers, and attention in news and political movements.

Keywords: democratic, political culture, political movements, democratic governmental system

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Authors: Fahimeh Hooshyar, Seyyed Mojtaba Abtahi

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Democracy which is, in its greek roots, consisted of “Demo” (People) and “Kratic” (people) is referring to governing of the people or governing by the people. in its widest definition it refers to a common lifestyle in which all the people has the equal potentials for social participating. But in political perspective, democracy is looking for the equal participation right of the citizens in political decision-making process. in this viewpoint, the democracy is solely a political construct or a social-political style in which all the values are relative. In this definition of the democracy emphasis is on equality of the people based on the governing rule and the natural social and political rights of every member of humankind. This notion of democracy by no means is a self reliant idea and the need of an ideological basis for approaching to this idea is inevitable. In this paper we are trying to define the inter-relations of democracy and its philosophical basis to Islamic fundamental ideas. Our approach to this topic would be a philosophical ideological one.

Keywords: Islam, democracy, democracy’s philosophical basis, secularism, fundamentalism

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Authors: Jer-Yuh Liu, Je-Chiuan Ye, Jin-Ming Hwang

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Protein kinase C alpha (PKCα) is a key signaling molecule in human cancer development. As a therapeutic strategy, targeting PKCα is difficult because the molecule is ubiquitously expressed in non-malignant cells. PKCα is regulated by the cooperative interaction of the transcription factors myeloid zinc finger 1 (MZF-1) and Ets-like protein-1 (Elk-1) in human cancer cells. By conducting tissue array analysis, herein, we determined the protein expression of MZF-1/Elk-1/PKCα in various cancers. The data show that the expression of MZF-1/Elk-1 is correlated with that of PKCα in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), but not in bladder and lung cancers. In addition, the PKCα down-regulation by shRNA Elk-1 was only observed in the HCC SK-Hep-1 cells. Blocking the interaction between MZF-1 and Elk-1 through the transfection of their binding domain MZF-160–72 decreased PKCα expression. This step ultimately depressed the epithelial-mesenchymal transition potential of the HCC cells. These findings could be used to develop an alternative therapeutic strategy for patients with the PKCα-derived HCC.

Keywords: protein kinase C alpha, myeloid zinc finger 1, ets-like protein-1, hepatocellular carcinoma

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Authors: Vesile Evrim, Aliyu Awwal

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Today as in the other domains, there are an enormous number of political transcripts available in the Web which is waiting to be mined and used for various purposes such as statistics and recommendations. Therefore, automatically determining the political orientation on these transcripts becomes crucial. The methodologies used by machine learning algorithms to do the automatic classification are based on different features such as Linguistic. Considering the ideology differences between Liberals and Conservatives, in this paper, the effect of Personality Traits on political orientation classification is studied. This is done by considering the correlation between LIWC features and the BIG Five Personality Traits. Several experiments are conducted on Convote U.S. Congressional-Speech dataset with seven benchmark classification algorithms. The different methodologies are applied on selecting different feature sets that constituted by 8 to 64 varying number of features. While Neuroticism is obtained to be the most differentiating personality trait on classification of political polarity, when its top 10 representative features are combined with several classification algorithms, it outperformed the results presented in previous research.

Keywords: politics, personality traits, LIWC, machine learning

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Authors: F. Saleh, F. Lyall, A. Abdulsid, L. Marks

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Background: Labour in human is a complex biological process that involves interactions of neurological, hormonal and inflammatory pathways, with the placenta being a key regulator of these pathways. It is known that uterine contractions and labour pain cause physiological changes in gene expression in maternal and fetal blood, and in placenta during labour. Oxidative and inflammatory stress pathways are implicated in labour and they may cause alteration of placental gene expression. Additionally, in placental tissues, labour increases the expression of genes involved in placental oxidative stress, inflammatory cytokines, angiogenic regulators and apoptosis. Recently, Hydrogen Sulphide (H2S) has been considered as an endogenous gaseous mediator which promotes vasodilation and exhibits cytoprotective anti-inflammatory properties. The endogenous H2S is synthesised predominantly by two enzymes: cystathionine β-synthase (CBS) and cystathionine γ-lyase (CSE). As the H2S pathway has anti-oxidative and anti-inflammatory characteristics thus, we hypothesised that the expression of CBS and CSE in placental tissues would alter during labour. Methods: CBS and CSE expressions were examined in placentas using western blotting and RT-PCR in inner, middle and outer placental zones in placentas obtained from healthy non labouring women who delivered by caesarian section. These were compared with the equivalent zone of placentas obtained from women who had uncomplicated labour and delivered vaginally. Results: No differences in CBS and CSE mRNA or protein levels were found between the different sites within placentas in either the labour or non-labour group. There were no significant differences in either CBS or CSE expression between the two groups at the inner site and middle site. However, at the outer site there was a highly significant decrease in CBS protein expression in the labour group when compared to the non-labour group (p = 0.002). Conclusion: To the best of author’s knowledge, this is the first report to suggest that, CBS is expressed in a spatial manner within the human placenta. Further work is needed to clarify the precise function and mechanism of this spatial regulation although it is likely that inflammatory pathways regulation is a complex process in which this plays a role.

Keywords: anti-inflammatory, hydrogen sulphide, labour, oxidative stress

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Authors: Sagri Sharma

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Analysis of diseases integrating multi-factors increases the complexity of the problem and therefore, development of frameworks for the analysis of diseases is an issue that is currently a topic of intense research. Due to the inter-dependence of the various parameters, the use of traditional methodologies has not been very effective. Consequently, newer methodologies are being sought to deal with the problem. Supervised Learning Algorithms are commonly used for performing the prediction on previously unseen data. These algorithms are commonly used for applications in fields ranging from image analysis to protein structure and function prediction and they get trained using a known dataset to come up with a predictor model that generates reasonable predictions for the response to new data. Gene expression profiles generated by DNA analysis experiments can be quite complex since these experiments can involve hypotheses involving entire genomes. The application of well-known machine learning algorithm - Support Vector Machine - to analyze the expression levels of thousands of genes simultaneously in a timely, automated and cost effective way is thus used. The objectives to undertake the presented work are development of a methodology to identify genes relevant to Hepatocellular Carcinoma (HCC) from gene expression dataset utilizing supervised learning algorithms and statistical evaluations along with development of a predictive framework that can perform classification tasks on new, unseen data.

Keywords: artificial intelligence, biomarker, gene expression datasets, hepatocellular carcinoma, machine learning, supervised learning algorithms, support vector machine

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Authors: Gohar Madoyan, Kristine Harutyunyan, Gevorg Barseghyan

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It is common knowledge that linguistic manipulation is and has always been a powerful instrument of political discourse. Politicians from different countries and through centuries have successfully used linguistic means to persuade the public. Yet, this persuasion should be linguistically unobtrusive. Small changes in wording may result in a huge difference in perception by the audience. Thus, manipulation is a strategy that is mostly used to convey a certain message to the manipulators, who should be aware of the vulnerabilities of their audience and who must use them to achieve control. Political manipulation, though commonly observed in the 21st century, can easily be traced back to ancient rhetoric, which warns us to choose words carefully while addressing the audience. On the other hand, modern manipulative techniques have become more sophisticated, making use of all scientific advances.

Keywords: manipulators, politics, persuasion, political discourse, linguo-stylistic analysis, rhetoric

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Authors: Noé D. Lazos-Gallardo, Sonia E. Ruiz, Federico Valenzuela-Beltran

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A simplified mathematical expression to estimate ductility reduction factors of the displacement spectra corresponding to the soft soil zone of Mexico City is proposed. The aim is to allow a better characterization of the displacement spectra and provide a simple expression to be used in displacement based design (DBD). Emphasis is on the Mexico City Building Code. The study is based on the analysis of single degree of freedom (SDOF) systems with elasto-plastic hysteretic behavior. Several seismic ground motions corresponding to subduction events with magnitudes equal to or greater than 6 and recorded in different stations of Mexico City are used. The proposed expression involves the ratio of elastic and inelastic pseudo-aceleration spectra, and depends on factors such the ductility demand and the vibration period of the structural system. The resulting ductility reduction factors obtained in this study are compared with others existing in the literature, and their advantages and disadvantages are discussed.

Keywords: displacement based design, displacements spectrum, ductility reduction factors, soft soil

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Authors: Majority Oji

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The print media played a major role in the agitation for self-rule in Nigeria in the 1950s. It remains as a bastion of hope in the dark days of military rule in the country. But in the troubled waters of Nigeria’s politics, accusing fingers are pointed in the direction of the print media as problematic to the political development of the nation. Thus, Nigeria as a nation is torn between the paralyzing forces of political instability and the building powers of political stability. The press assigned a constitutional role to hold everyone, especially government officials accountable to the public, appears to be at the center of these forays. The paper takes a look at the strength and weakness of the print media as a stabilizing or destabilizing agent to the political development of Nigeria. Engaging in this study is essential and the findings fundamental to the sustainability of Nigeria’s nascent democracy. The study draws on the content analysis method. News items from major newspapers across the country were content analyzed to test the validity of the claims that the press serve as agent of political stability or political instability, and whether to accept or reject such claims. The study found that the press has published more stories that unite the people politically as found in the tested hypothesis which shows that P>0.05 implying that media publications are not significant to political instability of the nation regardless of the number of published news stories. The study recommends that all issues relating to professional and ethical standards that affect the practice of journalism in the print media should be addressed by regulatory bodies to starve of chances of information that could lead to intolerance being peddled in the print media.

Keywords: Nigeria, political instability, political stability, print media

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Authors: Chao Sima, Shanaz Ghandhi, Sally A. Amundson, Michael L. Bittner, David J. Brenner

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In a large-scale radiologic emergency, potentially affected population need to be triaged efficiently using various biomarkers where personal dosimeters are not likely worn by the individuals. It has long been established that radiation injury can be estimated effectively using panels of genetic biomarkers. Furthermore, the rate of radiation, in addition to dose of radiation, plays a major role in determining biological responses. Therefore, a better and more accurate triage involves estimating both the dose level of the exposure and the length of time of that exposure. To that end, a large in vivo study was carried out on mice with internal emitter caesium-137 (¹³⁷Cs). Four different injection doses of ¹³⁷Cs were used: 157.5 μCi, 191 μCi, 214.5μCi, and 259 μCi. Cohorts of 6~7 mice from the control arm and each of the dose levels were sacrificed, and blood was collected 2, 3, 5, 7 and 14 days after injection for microarray RNA gene expression analysis. Using a generalized linear model with penalized maximum likelihood, a panel of 244 genes was established and both the doses of injection and the number of days after injection were accurately predicted for all 155 subjects using this panel. This has proven that microarray gene expression can be used effectively in radiation biodosimetry in predicting both the dose levels and the length of exposure time, which provides a more holistic view on radiation exposure and helps improving radiation damage assessment and treatment.

Keywords: caesium-137, gene expression microarray, multivariate responses prediction, radiation biodosimetry

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Authors: P. Afsharian, S. Mousazadeh, M. Shahhoseini, R. Aflatoonian

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Introduction: Matrix MetalloProteinases (MMPs) degrade extracellular matrix components to provide normal remodeling and contribute to pathological tissue destruction and cell migration in endometriosis. It is accepted that MMPs are resistant to suppression by progesterone in endometriotic tissues. The physiological effects of progesterone are mediated by its two progesterone receptor (PGR) isoforms, namely PGR-A and PGR-B. The capacity of progesterone affect to gene expression is dependent on the PGR-A/PGR-B ratio. The imbalance ratio in endometriotic tissue may be an important mechanism to be resulted in Progesterone resistance and modify progesterone action via differential regulation of specific progesterone response genes and improve endometriosis disease. Material and methods: RNA was extracted from twenty ectopic (endometriotic) and eutopic (endometrial) tissue samples of women undergoing laparoscopy for endometriosis and 20 healthy fertile women at Royan Institute, Tehran, Iran. Analysis of PGR-A, PGR-B, MMP-2 and MMP-9 mRNA expression was performed using Real-time PCR in ectopic and eutopic tissues. Then, Statistical analysis was calculated according to the 2-ΔΔCT equation for all samples. Results: Quantitative RT–PCR analyses of PGR-A and PGR-B mRNA revealed that there were differences in both isoformes of PGRs mRNA expressions between ectopic and control eutopic tissues. We were able to demonstrate low expression levels of PGR-B isoforms in ectopic tissues. Although, PGR-A expression was significantly higher in the same ectopic samples compare to controls.This method permitted us to demonstrate significant overexpression of MMP-2 and MMP-9 in ectopic samples compared to control endometrial tissues, as well. Conclusions: Our data suggest that low expression levels of PGR-B and overexpression of PGR-A can alter PGR-A/PGR-B ratio in endometriotic ectopic tissues. Imbalance ratio of PGRs in endometriotic tissue may be able to consequence MMP-2 and MMP-9 overexpression which can be important in pathogenesis and treatment of disease.

Keywords: endometriosis, matrix metalloproteinases, progesterone receptor -A and -B, PGR-A/PGR-B ratio

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Authors: Temitope Abiodun Balogun

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Political interviews are one of the ways by which political office-seekers in Nigeria sell themselves to the electorates. Extant studies have examined the discourse of political interviews from conversational, philosophical, rhetorical, stylistic and pragmatic perspectives with insufficient attention paid to grammatical forms and communicative intentions of the interviews granted by the two presidential aspirants in the 2015 Nigerian general election. This study fills this scholarly gap to unmask their grammatical forms and communicative styles, intention and credibility. The paper adopts Halliday’s Systemic Functional Grammar, specifically interpersonal function coupled with Searle’s Model of Speech Acts Theory as a theoretical framework. A total of six interviews granted by the two presidential aspirants in media serve as the source of data. It is discovered that, in most cases, politicians’ communicative intention is to “pull-down” their political opponents. While declarative and interrogatives are simple, direct and straightforward, the intention is to condemn, lambast and castigate their opponents. This communicative style does not allow the general populace to decipher the political manifestoes of the political aspirants and the party they represent. The paper recommends that before Nigeria can boast of any sustainable growth and development, there is the need for her political office-seekers to adopt effective communication strategies and styles to unveil their intention and manifestoes so that electorates can evaluate their performance after their tenure of office.

Keywords: general election, grammatical forms and function, political interviews, presidential aspirants

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Authors: Thanny Noeem Taiwo

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The study is an attempt to gauge the way political parties advertised their candidates and parties during the 2015 presidential election. It examined the prominence given to political advertisement by newspapers and their patrons. It also looked at the campaign issues that the candidates emphasized in their campaign and also the appeals used in the advertisements. This research work is examined against the backdrop of the Framing Theory. The agenda setting and framing effects theories are media effects theories that explain how the media affects the people, events and situations in the society. Samples comprising of three daily newspapers were selected to represent the newspapers in the Nigeria. The Punch Newspaper, the Nation and the Vanguard will be used for population of this study. These newspapers were chosen because they are widely read national dailies and also because of its affiliation with some political parties. The study revealed that low prominence was given to political messages because most of the advertisements were in the inside pages of the newspapers. The media or the print medium could be a partner in a political setting as the fourth estate of the realm. While the press was trying hard to be professional, its operations were considerably inhibited by the political adventures of the patrons of the media. There is the need for strict professionalism to the ethics of journalism in the commercialization of political messages that would eventually rub off positively on the way the media is perceived.

Keywords: aAdvertisement, election, framing, newspaper

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Authors: Ali Bayram, Burak Uz, Remzi Yiğiter

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The impairment of lipid metabolism in the central nervous system has been suggested as a critical factor of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) pathogenesis. Homo sapiens acyl-coenyme A synthetase short-chain family member 2 (ACSS2) gene encodes the enzyme acetyl-Coenzyme A synthetase (AMP forming; AceCS) providing acetyl-coenzyme A (Ac-CoA) for various physiological processes, such as cholesterol and fatty acid synthesis, as well as the citric acid cycle. We investigated ACSS2, transcript variant 1 (ACSS2*1), mRNA levels in the peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) of patients with AD and compared them with the controls. The study group comprised 50 patients with the diagnosis of AD who have applied to Gaziantep University Faculty of Medicine, and Department of Neurology. 49 healthy individuals without any neurodegenerative disease are included as controls. ACSS2 mRNA expression in PBMC of AD/control patients was 0.495 (95% confidence interval: 0.410-0.598), p= .000000001902). Further studies are needed to better clarify this association.

Keywords: Alzheimer’s disease, ACSS2 Genes, mRNA expression, RT-PCR

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Authors: Tsegyu Santas

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The aim of this study was to examine the utilization of social media for political communication during the 2011 presidential election in Nigeria. The research design adopted for the study was survey; 294 copies of questionnaire were distributed to students of mass communication in three selected universities in North Central Nigeria. Simple random sampling technique was used to select the respondents for the study. The results of the descriptive statistics show that majority of the respondents choice of presidential candidates during the 2011 presidential election was influenced by the use of social media as indicated by high value of mean (1.5805). Similarly, a large number of respondents were of the opinion that the two selected presidential candidates were popular because they used social media in their political campaign (mean value of 1.5575). In addition, the respondents affirmed that their voting pattern during the 2011 presidential elections was influenced by social media usage. This was validated by a high mean value of (1.6667). Similarly, the result of the test of hypothesis indicated that voters’ choice of political candidates was influenced by political communication on social media. In view of the findings of this study, the study, therefore, concludes that social media have redefined the landscape of political communication in Nigeria. Based on the findings of the study, it was recommended that social media should be fully integrated in Nigeria political communication system.

Keywords: communication, election, politics, social media

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Authors: Scott A. Ochsner, Christopher M. Watkins, Apollo McOwiti, David L. Steffen Lauren B. Becnel, Neil J. McKenna

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Understanding signaling by nuclear receptors (NRs) requires an appreciation of their cognate ligand- and tissue-specific transcriptomes. While target gene regulation data are abundant in this field, they reside in hundreds of discrete publications in formats refractory to routine query and analysis and, accordingly, their full value to the NR signaling community has not been realized. One of the mandates of the Nuclear Receptor Signaling Atlas (NURSA) is to facilitate access of the community to existing public datasets. Pursuant to this mandate we are developing a freely-accessible community web resource, Transcriptomine, to bring together the sum total of available expression array and RNA-Seq data points generated by the field in a single location. Transcriptomine currently contains over 25,000,000 gene fold change datapoints from over 1200 contrasts relevant to over 100 NRs, ligands and coregulators in over 200 tissues and cell lines. Transcriptomine is designed to accommodate a spectrum of end users ranging from the bench researcher to those with advanced bioinformatic training. Visualization tools allow users to build custom charts to compare and contrast patterns of gene regulation across different tissues and in response to different ligands. Our resource affords an entirely new paradigm for leveraging gene expression data in the NR signaling field, empowering users to query gene fold changes across diverse regulatory molecules, tissues and cell lines, target genes, biological functions and disease associations, and that would otherwise be prohibitive in terms of time and effort. Transcriptomine will be regularly updated with gene lists from future genome-wide expression array and expression-sequencing datasets in the NR signaling field.

Keywords: target gene database, informatics, gene expression, transcriptomics

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Authors: Andrey Angorsky

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In the article an issue about the possible number of fundamental physical interactions is studied. The theory of similarity on the dimensionless quantity as the damping ratio serves as the instrument of analysis. The structure with the features of Higgs field comes out from non-commutative expression for this ratio. The experimentally checked up supposition about the nature of dark energy is spoken out.

Keywords: damping ratio, dark energy, dimensionless quantity, fundamental physical interactions, Higgs field, non-commutative expression

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Authors: Justine Ugochukwu Osuagwu, Sazali Abd Wahab

Abstract:

The performance and operation of NNPC have faced series of attacks by all stakeholders as many have observed lots of inefficiency not only on the part of the management but the staff. This has raised questions of whether their operations and performance are being seriously affected by lack of transformational leadership, and the political competition prevalent in the country. The author has applied the administrative leadership theory and institutional theory as a guide to this study and empirically relates such theories to the study. The study also has utilized the quantitative approach where questionnaires were distributed to 370 participants, and the correctly filled and returned questionnaires were used for the analysis using structural equation modeling. The path coefficient of transformational leadership to performance is strong and positive with β = 0.672; t-value = 14.245; p-value = 0.000. Also, the result found that political competition does not mediate the relationship between transformational leadership and performance of NNPC. (β = -0.008; t-value = -0.600; p- value > 0.05). However, the indirect path is all insignificant, meaning that transformational leadership has relationship with corporate performance.The study found that,while political competition does not serve as a mediator in the relationship between transformational leadership and corporate performance, these styles of leadership have a direct and positive impact on corporate performance. The direct relationship between transformational leadership and political competition was not discovered, despite the fact that political competition has a direct and significant impact, both positive and negative, on corporate performance. As a result, both political competition and transformational leadership have the potential to significantly alter corporate performance.

Keywords: performance, transformational leadership, political competition, corporation performance, Nigeria national petroleum corporation

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Authors: Zsolt Szabolcsi

Abstract:

Political communication in Hungary has undergone a significant change in the 2010s. One element of the transformation is the Flashnews. This media product was launched in March 2015 and since then 40-50 blocks are broadcasted, daily, on 5 channels. Flashnews blocks are condensed news sessions, containing the summary of political narratives. It starts with the introduction of the narrator, then, usually four news topics are presented and, finally, the narrator concludes the block. The block lasts only one minute and, therefore, it provides a blink session into the main narratives of political communication at the time. Beyond its rapid pace, what makes its avoidance difficult is that these blocks are always in the first position in the commercial break of a non-political media product. Although it is only one minute long, its significance is high. The content of the Flashnews reflects the main governmental narratives and, therefore, the Flashnews is part of the agenda-setting capacity of political communication. It reaches media consumers who have limited knowledge and interest in politics, and their use of media products is not politically related. For this audience, the Flashnews pops up in the same way as commercials. Due to its structure and appearance, the impact of Flashnews seems to be similar to commercials, imbedded into the break of media products. It activates existing knowledge constructs, builds up associational links and maintains their presence in a way that the recipient is not aware of the phenomenon. The research aims to examine the extent to which the Flashnews and the main news narratives are identical in their content. This aim is realized with the content analysis of the two news products by examining the Flashnews and the evening news during main sport events from 2016 to 2018. The initial hypothesis of the research is that Flashnews is a contribution to the news management technique for an effective articulation of political narratives in public service media channels.

Keywords: flashnews, political communication, political marketing, news management

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Authors: Hanan Alsaeid Alshenawy

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Background: Cervical dysplasia, which is potentially precancerous, has increased in young women. Detection of cervical is important for reducing morbidity and mortality in cervical cancer. This study analyzes the immunohistochemical expression of p16, HPV L1 capsid protein and Ki67 in cervical intraepithelial lesions and correlates them with lesion grade to develop a set of markers for diagnosis and detect the prognosis of cervical cancer precursors. Methods: 75 specimens were analyzed including 15 cases CIN 1, 28 CIN 2, 20 CIN 3, and 12 cervical squamous carcinoma, besides 10 normal cervical tissues. They were stained for p16, HPV L1 and Ki-67. Sensitivity, specificity, predictive values and accuracy were evaluated for each marker. Results: p16 expression increased during the progression from CIN 1 to carcinoma. HPV L1 positivity was detected in CIN 2 and decreased gradually as the CIN grade increased but disappear in carcinoma. Strong Ki-67 expression was observed with high grades CIN and carcinoma. p16, HPV L1 and Ki67 were sensitive but with variable specificity in detecting CIN lesions. Conclusions: p16, HPV L1 and Ki67 are useful set of markers in establishing the risk of high-grade CIN. They complete each other to reach accurate diagnosis and prognosis.

Keywords: p16, HPV L1, Ki67, CIN, cervical carcinoma

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