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This study identified potential definitions of psychological abuse by having 381 citizens and 452 social workers rate vignettes of adult behaviors. Nine types of adult behaviors were identified by both groups, including confining a child in a small space, severe public humiliation, severe verbal abuse, threatening a child, and not allowing social and emotional growth. Gender differences were noted. (Author/DB)

Therapeutic anticancer vaccines are designed to boost patients' immune responses to tumors. One approach is to use a viral vector to deliver antigen to in situ DCs, which then activate tumor-specific T cell and antibody responses. However, vector-specific neutralizing antibodies and suppressive cell populations such as Tregs remain great challenges to the efficacy of this approach. We report here that an alphavirus vector, packaged in virus-like replicon particles (VRP) and capable of efficiently infecting DCs, could be repeatedly administered to patients with metastatic cancer expressing the tumor antigen carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) and that it overcame high titers of neutralizing antibodies and elevated Treg levels to induce clinically relevant CEA-specific T cell and antibody responses. The CEA-specific antibodies mediated antibody-dependent cellular cytotoxicity against tumor cells from human colorectal cancer metastases. In addition, patients with CEA-specific T cell responses exhibited longer overall survival. These data suggest that VRP-based vectors can overcome the presence of neutralizing antibodies to break tolerance to self antigen and may be clinically useful for immunotherapy in the setting of tumor-induced immunosuppression., Introduction Efficacious therapeutic anticancer vaccines are now becoming a reality, but a number of challenges remain. More efficient platforms for delivering antigen to in situ DCs, critical for activation of [...]

In Asian epidemiological studies, health benefits, including reduced incidence of breast and prostate cancers, are attributed to soy food and isoflavone consumption. The recent increased intake of soy foods and supplements in the American diet has raised concerns about the possible estrogen-like effects of natural isoflavones and possible promotion or propagation of estrogen-sensitive cancers. These concerns are primarily based on in vitro and rodent data which suggest that genistein aglycone can stimulate tumor cell proliferation and growth in mice having deficient immune systems. In contrast, a recent nested case-control study and meta-analysis of numerous epidemiological studies show an inverse correlation between genistein intake and breast cancer risk. Furthermore, clinical studies in osteopenic and osteoporotic, postmenopausal women support the breast and uterine safety of purified naturally derived genistein administered for up to 3 years. In this review, we summarize the in vitro, preclinical and clinical evidence for the safety of natural genistein.

RecA filaments containing single-stranded DNA rapidly attach duplex DNA into a three-stranded helix by a passive process, whereas additional energy is required to convert the three-stranded intermediate into products or back into substrates, both of which involve the unwinding of many turns of a three-stranded helix. During the process homologous duplex DNA is taken up by the filament, and homologous naked duplex DNA is put out by the filament. The formation of these static joints occurred at a rate in excess of 100 bp per second, without requiring hydrolysis of ATP.

The effects of haploid copy number on the essentiality of GroEL for growth of cells is determined by investigating a set of COOH-terminal domains of the GroEL in Escherichia coli. The Escherichia coli strains could be isolated only with the deletion of more than 28 codons. Variable effects are observed when the COOH-terminal amino acid Va1521 is substituted in the 27-amino acid-deleted mutant. The variable effects include phenotypic defects such as filamentous morphology, slow growth and defective lambda plating.

Most states have included sections on psychological abuse or emotional maltreatment in their child abuse statutes, however, interest in this type of abuse has lagged in litigation, treatment, or research. Lack of public sanctions to examine or prosecute these cases may be a reason for this reluctance. This research project aimed at identifying potential definitions of psychological abuse, by submitting vignettes with adult behaviors to be rated as abuse or not by a group of citizens and also comparing these results with a professional social work cohort. Both groups identified nine types of adult behavior to be abuse. There was no difference on the ratings between respondent groups (citizen-social work; age groups, experience with child abuse, and parenthood), except for gender. Female respondents rated the vignettes to be child abuse, serious, and wanted more drastic intervention than male respondents. Support existed for intervention in these cases.

Background: Shared decision making (SDM) implementation remains challenging. The factors that promote or hinder implementation of SDM tools for use during the consultation, including contextual factors such as clinician burnout and organizational support, remain unclear. We explored these factors in the context of a practical multicenter randomized trial evaluating the effectiveness of an SDM conversation tool for patients with atrial fibrillation considering anticoagulation therapy.Methods: In this cross-sectional study, we recruited clinicians who were regularly involved in conversations with patients regarding anticoagulation for atrial fibrillation. Clinicians reported their characteristics and burnout symptoms using the two-item Maslach Burnout Inventory. Clinicians were trained in using the SDM tool, and they recorded their perceptions of the tool's normalization potential using the Normalization MeAsure Development (NoMAD) survey instrument and verbally reflected on their answers to these survey questions. When possible, the training sessions and clinicians' verbal responses to the conversation tool were recorded.Results: Our study comprised 183 clinicians recruited into the trial (168 with survey responses and 112 with recordings). Overall, clinicians gave high scores to the normalization potential of the intervention; they endorsed all domains of normalization to the same extent, regardless of site, clinician characteristics, or burnout ratings. In interviews, clinicians paid significant attention to making sense of the tool. Tool buy-in seemed to depend heavily on their ability to see the tool as accurate and "evidence-based" and their perceptions of having time in the consultation to use it.Conclusions: While time in the consultation remains a barrier, we did not find a significant association between burnout symptoms and normalization of an SDM conversation tool. Possible areas for improving the normalization of SDM conversation tools in clinical practice include enabling collaboration among clinicians to implement the tool and reporting how clinicians elsewhere use the tool. Direct measures of normalization (i.e., observing how often clinicians access the tool in practice outside of the clinical trial) may further elucidate the role that contextual factors, such as clinician burnout, play in the implementation of SDM.Trial Registration: ClinicalTrials.gov, NCT02905032. Registered on 9 September 2016. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores how early-career teachers working in high-poverty schools in Australia account for their decision-making during critical classroom incidents. Classroom management solutions are problematized by investigating how two teachers take up particular positions, make decisions, and enact what they believe to be 'quality teaching' in context. Through a combination of interviews and observations of teachers 'in situ', we examine what these teachers do, why they do it, what informs their decisions, and how they reflect on their actions. The complexity of teachers' work in schools located in high-poverty areas is highlighted. We argue that both early-career teachers prefer to position themselves within 'pastoral', in contrast to 'disciplinarian', discourses, as part of constituting the school as a site of possibility and teachers who advocate for youth growing up in poverty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides three case studies of initiatives developed to improve educational opportunities in vulnerable urban communities. The cities in the three countries involved, Australia, the United States, and Spain, are different in many ways; however, each has persistent and entrenched inequalities between the educational opportunities and outcomes of historically marginalised students and their mainstream counterparts. Here, we focus on conceptualising and describing urban examples of poverty from three different countries, and reporting on programs and strategies aimed at enhancing the quality of teaching in schools in high-poverty areas. By providing and comparing the three cases, we aim to contribute to broader understandings of poverty in three locations and how teachers and schools in high-poverty urban settings can re-think their practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]