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The laboratory culture of human stem cells seeks to capture a cellular state as an in vitro surrogate of a biological system. For the results and outputs from this research to be accurate, meaning-ful, and durable, standards that ensure reproducibility and reli-ability of the data should be applied. Although such standards have been previously proposed for repositories and distribution centers, no widely accepted best practices exist for laboratory research with human pluripotent and tissue stem cells. To fill that void, the International Society for Stem Cell Research has developed a set of recommendations, including reporting criteria, for scientists in basic research laboratories. These criteria are de-signed to be technically and financially feasible and, when imple-mented, enhance the reproducibility and rigor of stem cell research.

This is an R-based script for compiling textual data scraped from a subreddit and into a searchable corpus of TXT-files. It is based around the package 'RedditExtractoR: Reddit Data Extraction Toolkit'.

This paper presents a corpus-based Cultural-Linguistic study of the usage of the word honour in Pakistani and Indian Englishes, addressing underlying cultural conceptualisations of the notion of honour. Honour emerges as a complex cultural model which involves several cultural schemas, cultural categories and cultural metaphors, in which women are cast as responsible pro-tectors and upholders of the honour of men, families, and communities, their bodies being the very locus of men’s honour. The study is based on relatively simple qualitative and quantitative analysis of two specialized corpora representing discourse on honour and related phenomena in Pakistani and Indian Englishes

Although DNA‐based cancer vaccines have been successfully tested in mouse models, a major drawback of cancer vaccination still remains, namely that tumour antigens are weak and fail to generate a vigorous immune response in tumour‐bearing patients. Genetic technology offers strategies for promoting immune pathways by adding immune‐activating genes to the tumour antigen sequence. In this work, we converted a model non‐immunogenic antigen into a vaccine by fusing it to domain I of the filamentous bacteriophage coat protein III gene. Vaccination with a DNA construct encoding the domain I fusion generated antigen‐specific T helper 1‐type cellular immune responses. These results demonstrate that the incorporation of protein III into a DNA vaccine formulation can modulate the gene‐mediated immune response and may thus provide a strategy for improving its therapeutic effect., Depto. de Bioquímica y Biología Molecular, Fac. de Farmacia, TRUE, pub

Gold nanoparticles (Au NPs) and gold-based nanomaterials combine unique properties relevant for medicine, imaging, optics, sensing, catalysis, and energy conversion. While the Turkevich-Frens and Brust-Schiffrin methods remain the state-of-the-art colloidal syntheses of Au NPs, there is a need for more sustainable and tractable synthetic strategies leading to new model systems. In particular, stabilizers are almost systematically used in colloidal syntheses, but they can be detrimental for fundamental and applied studies. Here, a surfactant-free synthesis of size-controlled colloidal Au NPs stable for months is achieved by the simple reduction of HAuCl4 at room temperature in alkaline solutions of low-viscosity mono-alcohols such as ethanol or methanol and water, without the need for any other additives. Palladium (Pd) and bimetallic Au x Pd y NPs, nanocomposites and multimetallic samples, are also obtained and are readily active (electro)catalysts. The multiple benefits over the state-of-the-art syntheses that this simple synthesis bears for fundamental and applied research are highlighted.

Electrolyte effects play an important role in the activity of the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) of Pt-based electrodes. Herein, we combine a computational model and rotating disk electrode measurements to investigate the effects from phosphate anion poisoning for the ORR on well-defined extended Pt surfaces. We construct a model including the poisoning effect from phosphate species on Pt(111) and Cu/Pt(111) based on density functional theory simulations. By varying the subsurface Cu content of the Cu/Pt(111) alloy, we tune the *OH binding energies on the surface by means of ligand effects, and as a result, we tune the ORR activity. We have investigated the effect of adsorbed phosphate species at low overpotentials when tuning *OH binding energies. Our results display a direct scaling relationship between adsorbed *OH and phosphate species. From the model, we observe how the three-fold binding sites of phosphate anions limit the packing of poisoning phosphate on the surface, thus allowing for *OH adsorption even when poisoned. Our work shows that, regardless of surface site blockage from phosphate, the trend in the catalytic oxygen reduction activity is predominantly governed by the *OH binding.