The Levels of Cortisol,Oxidative Stress,and DNA Damage in the Victims of Childhood Sexual Abuse: A Preliminary Study

In this study we aimed to investigate serum cortisol, oxidative stress, and DNA damage in children who are sexual abuse victims. The study included 38 children who sustained child sexual abuse and 38 age- and gender-matched children who did not have a history of trauma. Cortisol levels reflecting the status of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis, anti-oxidant enzymes glutathione peroxidase, superoxide dismutase, natural anti-oxidant coenzyme Q, and 8-hydroxy-2-deoxyguanosine as the indicator of DNA damage were analyzed in serum samples using the enzyme linked immunosorbent assay method. Cortisol levels were significantly higher in the child sexual abuse group compared to the control group. There were no significant differences between the groups in terms of oxidative stress and DNA damage. Cortisol and 8-hydroxy-2-deoxyguanosine levels decreased as the time elapsed since the sexual abuse increased. Coenzyme Q level was lower in victims who sustained multiple assaults than in the victims of a single assault. Cortisol and superoxide dismutase levels were lower in the victims of familial sexual abuse. Decreases in cortisol and 8-hydroxy-2-deoxyguanosine levels as time elapsed may be an adaptation to the toxic effects of high cortisol levels over a prolonged period of time. Child sexual abuse did not result in oxidative stress and DNA damage; however, some features of sexual abuse raised the level of oxidative stress.     

挑战风车的巨人是谁:塞万提斯再研究

西班牙作家塞万提斯创造的、大战风车的神奇骑士堂吉诃德在全世界家喻户晓。但是这一形象以及作者的读取却延续着种种误解。本文梳理了20世纪西班牙语学术界对塞万提斯研究的成果,客观而审慎地排列诸家所说,展示出的结论令人吃惊:这部世界名著之中充斥着对当时西班牙所执的宗教压迫和血统清除国策的控诉,一代文学伟人的身世也可能与穆斯林有着深切纠葛。由于塞万提斯所处的16世纪末至17世纪初乃是西方战胜了穆斯林世界,并完成了资本主义奠基、资本积累和殖民主义扩张的时代,对塞万提斯和《堂吉诃德》的突破性解读,无疑将形成对被遮蔽的历史叙述以及文学研究中西方霸权话语的有力挑战。时值全球正在纪念《堂吉诃德》第一部发表400周年,这一研究无疑将击破死水,引导人们重新理解逝去的安达卢斯穆斯林文明以及当前的世界,从而成为一件思想史和文学史上的大事。     

A Bayesian approach to inference about a change point model with application to DNA copy number experimental data

In this paper, we study the change-point inference problem motivated by the genomic data that were collected for the purpose of monitoring DNA copy number changes. DNA copy number changes or copy number variations (CNVs) correspond to chromosomal aberrations and signify abnormality of a cell. Cancer development or other related diseases are usually relevant to DNA copy number changes on the genome. There are inherited random noises in such data, therefore, there is a need to employ an appropriate statistical model for identifying statistically significant DNA copy number changes. This type of statistical inference is evidently crucial in cancer researches, clinical diagnostic applications, and other related genomic researches. For the high-throughput genomic data resulting from DNA copy number experiments, a mean and variance change point model (MVCM) for detecting the CNVs is appropriate. We propose to use a Bayesian approach to study the MVCM for the cases of one change and propose to use a sliding window to search for all CNVs on a given chromosome. We carry out simulation studies to evaluate the estimate of the locus of the DNA copy number change using the derived posterior probability. These simulation results show that the approach is suitable for identifying copy number changes. The approach is also illustrated on several chromosomes from nine fibroblast cancer cell line data (array-based comparative genomic hybridization data). All DNA copy number aberrations that have been identified and verified by karyotyping are detected by our approach on these cell lines.     

《西游记》中的儒释道思想探析

儒家、道教和佛教三家思想互相借鉴与融合,对中国各个时期的思想文化和社会生活产生了重要影响。明清时期,儒释道三足鼎立,其融合发展逐渐成熟深刻,文学艺术作品中多见其影响。儒释道的融会贯通在明清小说代表之一的《西游记》中有着典型深刻的反映。《西游记》不仅仅是师徒四人西天取经的故事,它还将儒释道三家文化融合,开篇就以石头文化来讲述儒释道三家的联系。同时,作为明清小说的代表,它用具体的人物代表三家,反映了儒释道融合的必然性。     

Informal Giving in Turkey

VOLUNTAS: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations - Scholarly research about philanthropy has de-emphasized informal giving to friends, neighbors and others in need. Yet,...     

Effects of heart rate reduction with ivabradine on the international ındex of erectile function (IIEF-5) in patients with heart failure

Introduction: The presence of concomitant erectile dysfunction (ED) with heart failure (HF) is not surprising, because endothelial dysfunction is pathophysiologic signature of both ED and HF. ED significantly and adversely affects quality of life in patients with HF. It was demonstrated that ivabradine treatment can improve endothelial function and ED in experimental models. In this study, we aimed to determine the effect of ivabradine treatment on ED in patients with HF via International Index of Erectile Function (IIEF-5) questionaire.

Material and methods: Consequently, 29 patients, between 18 and 70?years of age, male with chronic HF known for at least 1?year, New York Heart Association functional class I–II, left ventricule ejection fraction less than 40%, in sinus rhythm with a resting HR of at least 70 beats per minute (b.p.m.), who were intended to be treated with ivabradine according to the decision of their physicians were evaluated to determine ED. We used the Turkish version of the IIEF-5 questionnaire to evaluate ED on the last 6-month period. Twenty-four of 29 patients who scored ≤21 were considered to have ED and included to the study. IIEF-5 scores for each question and domains were calculated for all responders at baseline and at 6-month follow-up visit in order to determine any effect of ivabradine treatment on ED in patients with HF.

Results: According to the data of survey, Cronbach's alpha coeffient for all of the patients who were included into the study were 0.84 and detected highly reliable. IEFF-5 questionnaire scores increased significantly (p?=?.003) after the ivabradine treatment, on the contrary, significant decrease in HR was revealed as expected. HR is decreased steadily after ivabradine treatment and mean decrease in HR was 11.5?±?9.4 in this study population. Likewise, negative correlation was demonstrated between decrease in HR (p?p?=?.003).

Conclusion: Although lack of patients with HF have been evaluated in this study population, initial results seem promising that ivabradine has favorable effects on ED. These findings were postulated to be dependent exclusively on HR reduction. As a sequel, cardiologist should avoid neglecting ED to improve medical compliance as well as quality of life in patients with heart failure. This pilot study provide some data for further randomized controlled studies.     

Optimal progressive group censoring scheme under cost considerations for pareto distribution

In this article, optimal design under the restriction of pre-determined budget of experiment is developed for the Pareto distribution when the life test is progressively group censored. We use the maximum-likelihood method to obtain the point estimator of the Pareto parameter. We propose two approaches to decide the number of test units, the number of inspections, and the length of inspection interval under limited budget such that the asymptotic variance of estimator of Pareto parameter is minimum. A numerical example is given to illustrate the proposed method. Some sensitivity analysis is also studied.     

人口老龄化对制造业转型升级的影响

制造业转型升级是我国经济高质量发展的核心动力。为分析辽宁省人口老龄化对于制造业转型升级的影响,从劳动力禀赋效应、劳动生产率效应、资本积累效应、人力资本积累效应、消费需求效应五个方面分析人口老龄化对制造业转型升级的作用机理。在此基础上,利用辽宁省时间序列数据实证分析人口老龄化对制造业转型升级的影响。结果表明,人口老龄化对辽宁省制造业转型升级具有显著正向影响,外商直接投资、对外贸易、城镇化水平和研发强度对辽宁省制造业转型升级也发挥了重要作用。可从加强顶层设计、完善社会保障体系、提高劳动力素质等方面入手,进一步促进制造业转型升级。     

Robust Estimation and Hypothesis Testing of Linear Contrasts in Analysis of Covariance with Stochastic Covariates

Estimators of parameters are derived by using the method of modified maximum likelihood (MML) estimation when the distribution of covariate X and the error e are both non-normal in a simple analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) model. We show that our estimators are efficient. We also develop a test statistic for testing a linear contrast and show that it is robust. We give a real life example.     

A new biased estimator based on ridge estimation

In this paper we introduce a new biased estimator for the vector of parameters in a linear regression model and discuss its properties. We show that our new biased estimator is superior, in the mean square error(mse) sense, to the ordinary least squares (OLS) estimator, the ordinary ridge regression (ORR) estimator and the Liu estimator. We also compare the performance of our new biased estimator with two other special Liu-type estimators proposed in Liu (2003). We illustrate our findings with a numerical example based on the widely analysed dataset on Portland cement.