Russell and the revolutionaries: A study of Anglo-Irish relations, 1842-1852

Perhaps no time in the history of Anglo-Irish relations has brought more criticism on a British administration than the period of the great of 1846-50. The man most responsible for British policy during those years, Lord John Russell, has been accused of having only a superficial interest in the well-being of millions of Irish people, and it had been said that his actions were motivated primarily by political considerations. At the same time, the period is marked by an apparent complete failure of Irish leadership, beginning with the declining influence of Danel O\u27Connell and the Repeal Association after 1843, and typified by a group of idealistic young men known as Young Ireland. This study will examine the interaction between the Irish leaders and Russell\u27s administration, the attitudes that prevailed on both sides of St. George\u27s Channel and suggest how those attitudes contributed to the succeeding relationship of England and Ireland

Urocortin protects chondrocytes from NO-induced apoptosis: a future therapy for osteoarthritis?

Osteoarthritis (OA) is characterized by a loss of joint mobility and pain resulting from progressive destruction and loss of articular cartilage secondary to chondrocyte death and/ or senescence. Certain stimuli including nitric oxide (NO) and the pro-inflammatory cytokine tumor necrosis factor α (TNF-α have been implicated in this chondrocyte death and the subsequent accelerated damage to cartilage. In this study, we demonstrate that a corticotrophin releasing factor (CRF) family peptide, urocortin (Ucn), is produced by a human chondrocyte cell line, C-20/A4, and acts both as an endogenous survival signal and as a cytoprotective agent reducing the induction of apoptosis by NO but not TNF-α when added exogenously. Furthermore, treatment with the NO donor S-nitroso-N-acetyl-D-L-penicillamine upregulates chondrocyte Ucn expression, whereas treatment with TNF-α does not. The chondroprotective effects of Ucn are abolished by both specific ligand depletion (with an anti-Ucn antibody) and by CRF receptor blockade with the pan-CRFR antagonist α-helical CRH(9-41). CRFR expression was confirmed by reverse transcription-PCR with subsequent amplicon sequence analysis and demonstrates that C-20/A4 cells express both CRFR1 and CRFR2, specifically CRFR1α and CRFR2β. Protein expression of these receptors was confirmed by western blotting. The presence of both Ucn and its receptors in these cells, coupled with the induction of Ucn by NO, suggests the existence of an endogenous autocrine/paracrine chondroprotective mechanism against stimuli inducing chondrocyte apoptosis via the intrinsic/mitochondrial pathway

Racism as a determinant of health: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Despite a growing body of epidemiological evidence in recent years documenting the health impacts of racism, the cumulative evidence base has yet to be synthesized in a comprehensive meta-analysis focused specifically on racism as a determinant of health. This meta-analysis reviewed the literature focusing on the relationship between reported racism and mental and physical health outcomes. Data from 293 studies reported in 333 articles published between 1983 and 2013, and conducted predominately in the U.S., were analysed using random effects models and mean weighted effect sizes. Racism was associated with poorer mental health (negative mental health: r = -.23, 95% CI [-.24,-.21], k = 227; positive mental health: r = -.13, 95% CI [-.16,-.10], k = 113), including depression, anxiety, psychological stress and various other outcomes. Racism was also associated with poorer general health (r = -.13 (95% CI [-.18,-.09], k = 30), and poorer physical health (r = -.09, 95% CI [-.12,-.06], k = 50). Moderation effects were found for some outcomes with regard to study and exposure characteristics. Effect sizes of racism on mental health were stronger in cross-sectional compared with longitudinal data and in non-representative samples compared with representative samples. Age, sex, birthplace and education level did not moderate the effects of racism on health. Ethnicity significantly moderated the effect of racism on negative mental health and physical health: the association between racism and negative mental health was significantly stronger for Asian American and Latino(a) American participants compared with African American participants, and the association between racism and physical health was significantly stronger for Latino(a) American participants compared with African American participants.<br /

Mapping Hansard Impression Management Strategies through Time and Space

Impolite behaviour is thought to be easier to investigate than polite or politic behaviour in diachronic contexts, because of attracting more evaluative comment. But an approach based on such metapragmatic commentary can miss a lot of facework strategies in contexts such as the UK parliament (modern and historical). In this paper, I draw on Historic Hansard datasets (1812–2003) to demonstrate how a (semi)automatic method involving contiguous searches of two-to-four features can better reveal the nuances of these MPs’ facework strategies than a focus on metapragmatic terms has afforded hitherto. The (semi)automatic method uses the recently created Historic Thesaurus Semantic Tagger (HTST) to search for meaning constellations (Archer and Malory 2017). Meaning constellations relating to facework are made up of sequences of semantic fields and/or parts-of-speech which, when organised in certain ways, achieve im/politeness, politic behaviour, strategic ambiguity, a combination of face enhancement and face threat, etc. This paper discusses a number of these meaning constellations, with a particular focus on those which engage in both face enhancement and face aggravation simultaneously (whilst nonetheless avoiding the label, “unparliamentary language”)

Finishing the euchromatic sequence of the human genome

The sequence of the human genome encodes the genetic instructions for human physiology, as well as rich information about human evolution. In 2001, the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium reported a draft sequence of the euchromatic portion of the human genome. Since then, the international collaboration has worked to convert this draft into a genome sequence with high accuracy and nearly complete coverage. Here, we report the result of this finishing process. The current genome sequence (Build 35) contains 2.85 billion nucleotides interrupted by only 341 gaps. It covers ∼99% of the euchromatic genome and is accurate to an error rate of ∼1 event per 100,000 bases. Many of the remaining euchromatic gaps are associated with segmental duplications and will require focused work with new methods. The near-complete sequence, the first for a vertebrate, greatly improves the precision of biological analyses of the human genome including studies of gene number, birth and death. Notably, the human enome seems to encode only 20,000-25,000 protein-coding genes. The genome sequence reported here should serve as a firm foundation for biomedical research in the decades ahead

Detection, subspecific differentation and epidemiology of Serpulina hyodysenteriae

Serpulina hyodysenteriae is the aetiological agent of swine dysentery, an important disease of pigs worldwide. Control measures have been hampered by difficulties in diagnosis, and limited knowledge of the epidemiology of the infection. In this study, DNA-based techniques were developed for use in addressing these problems. Whole chromosomal DNA probes were used to identify S. hyodysenteriae isolates. In dot-blot hybridisation, their sensitivity ranged from 84.6 to 100%, and their specificity from 71.4 to 92.3%. A recombinant DNA probe of 1.7 kb was subsequently developed and shown to have both a sensitivity and specificity of 100%; it also detected 10 ng of S. hyodysenteriae DNA, 1 x 106 purified cells, and 2.5 x 107 cells per gram of pig faeces. This was improved to 1 x 103 to 1 x 104 cells by growing seeded faeces on solid medium, and then hybridising the probe with DNA extracted from the total bacterial growth. The 1.7 kb probe DNA was partially sequenced, and a polymerase chain reaction technique developed to amplify a 288 bp fragment. One ng of DNA and 1 x 103 S. hyodysenteriae cells could be detected using this method. The distribution and epidemiology of S. hyodysenteriae in Australia was investigated, by using serogrouping, DNA restriction endonuclease analysis (REA), and restriction fragment length polymorphism analysis (RFLP) to type 136 isolates from 83 properties. These isolates belonged to eight serogroups, the most common of which were B and D, found on 37 and 27 properties respectively. The isolates were divided into nine major REA patterns, and 45 minor patterns. Twenty of the 45 patterns were shared between properties, but the transmission of SD between piggeries appeared more common within states than between states. REA typing was used to confirm that the introduction of pigs to piggeries was the source of SD in four separate outbreaks, and to show that rats were an ongoing source of infection for pigs on another property. Isolates with the same major REA pattern generally had the same RFLP group supporting the view that the nine major REA patterns were clonal groups. RFLP typing was not as discriminatory for identifying specific strains as REA , but it was useful for determining genetic relatedness between isolates