Effect of Chinese outward FDI on youth unemployment in sub-Saharan Africa.

This paper investigates the effect of Chinese outward foreign direct investment (FDI) on youth unemployment in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) by using a modified labour demand model to identify the investment sources that are helpful for reducing youth unemployment in the region. The model is applied to a panel of 42 countries for the period 2003-2021 using random-effect, and generalized method of moment (GMM) estimators for robustness check. Our results suggest that Chinese FDI has direct short-term reducing effect on youth unemployment in SSA.

Halide exchange mediated cation exchange facilitates room temperature co-doping of d-and f-block elements in cesium lead halide perovskite nanoparticles.

This study presents a halide exchange mediated cation exchange reaction to co-dope d- and f-block elements in CsPbX NPs at room temperature. Addition of MnCl and YbCl to CsPbBr NPs induces ion exchange reactions generating the corresponding CsPbBr/MnClYbCl NPs. In addition to the perovskite emission, the NPs display sensitized Mn and Yb emissions in concert spanning the UV, visible, and NIR spectral region.

Size-dependent chiro-optical properties of CsPbBr nanoparticles.

Chiral metal halide perovskites have garnered substantial interest because of their promising properties for application in optoelectronics and spintronics. Understanding the mechanism of chiral imprinting is paramount for optimizing their utility. To elucidate the nature of the underlying chiral imprinting mechanism, we investigated how the circular dichroism (CD) intensity varies with nanoparticle size for quantum confined sizes of colloidal CsPbBr perovskite nanoparticles (NPs) capped by chiral β-methylphenethylammonium bromide ligands.

Emerging stock market reactions to shocks during various crisis periods.

This study investigates granger causal linkages among six Asian emerging stock markets and the US market over the period 2002-2020, taking into account several crisis periods. The pairwise Granger causality tests for investigating the short-run causality show significant bi- and uni-directional causal relationships in those markets and evidence that they have become more internationally integrated after every crisis period. An exception is Bangladesh with almost no significant short-term causal linkages with other markets.

A Study on FibroScan and Endoscopic Finding in Patients of Chronic Liver Disease attending Tripura Medical College and Dr. B.R. Ambedkar Memorial Teaching Hospital.

Introduction: Chronic liver disease (CLD) represents different liver disorders of varying severity and etiology in which hepatic inflammation and fibrosis continue at least for 6 months. Portal hypertension is one of the important complications of CLD and its early recognition is of paramount importance. Though liver biopsy remains the gold standard for diagnosing liver fibrosis and upper gastrointestinal (GI) endoscopy plays an important role in diagnosing different findings of portal hypertension, various noninvasive methods like FibroScan are being increasingly used to diagnose liver fibrosis.

Room temperature doping of Ln in perovskite nanoparticles: a halide exchange mediated cation exchange approach.

This study presents a halide exchange mediated cation exchange strategy for a room temperature doping of trivalent lanthanide cations (Ln) in cesium lead halide (CsPbX) nanoparticles (NPs). Post-synthetic addition of LnCl [Ln = Nd, Sm, Eu, Tb, Dy, and Yb] to a solution of CsPbBr NPs generates the corresponding lanthanide doped NPs which display host sensitized Ln emission. Structural and spectroscopic characterizations indicate a successful halide exchange and substitutional displacement of Pb by Ln.

Organophosphorus insecticides mineralizing endophytic and rhizospheric soil bacterial consortium influence eggplant growth-promotion.

This study was aimed to evaluate eggplant's growth-enhancing activity of chlorpyrifos and diazinon-degrading endophytic and rhizospheric soil bacteria isolated from cauliflower and tomato roots and the rhizospheric soil of rice roots, respectively. The identified endophytes belong to the Acinetobacter, Enterobacter and Klebsiella genera, while rhizospheric soil isolates belong to Pantoea, Acinetobacter, Kosakonia, Morganella, Enterobacter, and Klebsiella genera with species variation and genetic distances. All the strain's consumed 100% (50 mg/5 mL) chlorpyrifos and diazinon after 14 days of exposure, except for Pantoea sp.

Unveiling lignocellulolytic trait of a goat omasum inhabitant Klebsiella variicola strain HSTU-AAM51 in light of biochemical and genome analyses.

Klebsiella variicola is generally known as endophyte as well as lignocellulose-degrading strain. However, their roles in goat omasum along with lignocellulolytic genetic repertoire are not yet explored. In this study, five different pectin-degrading bacteria were isolated from a healthy goat omasum.

Using post-synthetic ligand modification to imprint chirality onto the electronic states of cesium lead bromide (CsPbBr) perovskite nanoparticles.

This study presents a post-synthetic ligand modification strategy for the generation of chiroptically active, blue emitting CsPbBr nanoparticles (NPs) - an expansion to the library of 3D chiral perovskite nanomaterials. Addition of [- and -] 1-phenylethylamine, 1-(1-naphthyl)ethylamine, or 2-aminooctane to the synthesized CsPbBr NPs is shown to induce Cotton effects in the NP first exciton transition, suggestive of a successful electronic coupling between the chiral ligands and the NPs. The availability of these chiral CsPbBr NPs thrusts them into the forefront of perovskite nanomaterials for examining the implications of the chiral induced spin selectivity (CISS) effect and other applications in spintronics.

Antibody Responses to SARS-CoV-2 mRNA Vaccines Are Detectable in Saliva.

The approved Pfizer and Moderna mRNA vaccines are well known to induce serum antibody responses to the SARS-CoV-2 Spike (S)-protein. However, their abilities to elicit mucosal immune responses have not been reported. Saliva antibodies represent mucosal responses that may be relevant to how mRNA vaccines prevent oral and nasal SARS-CoV-2 transmission.

Antibody responses to SARS-CoV-2 mRNA vaccines are detectable in saliva.

Vaccines are critical for curtailing the COVID-19 pandemic (1, 2). In the USA, two highly protective mRNA vaccines are available: BNT162b2 from Pfizer/BioNTech and mRNA-1273 from Moderna (3, 4). These vaccines induce antibodies to the SARS-CoV-2 S-protein, including neutralizing antibodies (NAbs) predominantly directed against the Receptor Binding Domain (RBD) (1-4).

Delivery of thymoquinone through hyaluronic acid-decorated mixed Pluronic® nanoparticles to attenuate angiogenesis and metastasis of triple-negative breast cancer.

Triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) is a highly aggressive and metastatic subtype of breast cancer showing non-responsiveness to most available therapeutic options. Therefore, smart therapeutic approaches to selectively transport and target TNBCs are required. Herein, we developed thymoquinone (TQ)-loaded, hyaluronic acid (HA)-conjugated Pluronic® P123 and F127 copolymer nanoparticles (HA-TQ-Nps) as a selective drug-carrying vehicle to deliver anticancer phytochemical TQ to TNBC cells.

Host sensitized lanthanide photoluminescence from post-synthetically modified semiconductor nanoparticles depends on reactant identity.

This work investigates the photoluminescence characteristics where cadmium selenide (CdSe) and zinc sulfide (ZnS) nanoparticles are treated post-synthetically by the trivalent lanthanide cations (Ln) [Ln = Pr, Nd, Sm, Eu, Tb, Dy, Ho, Er, Tm, Yb] separately to form either CdSe/Ln or ZnS/Ln nanoparticles. Host sensitized Ln emission was found to be present only in CdSe/Eu, CdSe/Tb, ZnS/Eu, ZnS/Tb and ZnS/Yb nanoparticles. In all the cases tuning of emission of the nanoparticles has been observed, irrespective of the presence or absence of host sensitization.

What Is Beyond Charge Trapping in Semiconductor Nanoparticle Sensitized Dopant Photoluminescence?

A systematic comparison of the Ln [Ln = Pr, Nd, Sm, Eu, Gd, Tb, Dy, Ho, Er, Tm, Yb] photoluminescence in doped tin dioxide [Sn(Ln)O] and doped titanium dioxide [Ti(Ln)O] nanoparticles shows that the emission efficiency of trivalent lanthanide cations (Ln) in an oxide matrix can be improved by change of the cation site symmetry. An analysis of Ln emission quantum yield and asymmetry ratio is used to identify the importance of symmetry breaking around the dopant site for enhancing the Ln emission intensity. These findings identify an important criterion for engineering the luminescence intensity of dopant ions in semiconductor nanoparticle-based luminophores, which goes beyond the primary criterion of engineering the relative positions of the dopant energy levels with respect to the band edges of the host nanoparticle matrix.

Role of reactant concentration and identity of added cation in controlling emission from post-synthetically modified terbium incorporated zinc sulfide nanoparticles: an avenue for the detection of lead(ii) cations.

This work reports the photophysical properties of 1-thioglycerol capped hydrophilic terbium cation incorporated (doped) zinc sulfide [Zn(Tb)S] nanoparticles, which have been post-synthetically modified using Pb [Zn(Tb)S/Pb] under ambient conditions with [Zn(Tb)S] : [Pb] = 1 : 10-1 : 10, essentially providing a scenario with low to heavy co-doping and ultimately the possibility of forming a material of different chemical identity. The effects of selected concentrations of [Zn(Tb)S] : [M ] = 1 : 1 and 1 : 10 have also been evaluated for the post-synthetic addition of Hg, Cd, Ca, Mg, Na and K. The broad zinc sulfide nanoparticle and sharp Tb emission have different dependence on the relative reactant concentration, with cation identity playing a significant role.

Epitopes for neutralizing antibodies induced by HIV-1 envelope glycoprotein BG505 SOSIP trimers in rabbits and macaques.

The native-like, soluble SOSIP.664 trimer based on the BG505 clade A env gene of HIV-1 is immunogenic in various animal species, of which the most studied are rabbits and rhesus macaques. The trimer induces autologous neutralizing antibodies (NAbs) consistently but at a wide range of titers and with incompletely determined specificities.

How Important is the Host (Semiconductor Nanoparticles) Identity and Absolute Band Gap in Host-Sensitized Dopant Photoluminescence?

This work reports the host (semiconductor nanoparticles) sensitized dopant (lanthanides, Ln) photoluminescence in near band gap matched Sn(Ln)O and Zn(Ln)S [Ln = Sm, Tb] nanoparticles to address the importance of the nanoparticle identity and absolute band gap in the underlying process. While the sensitization was evident in the Sn(Sm)O and Zn(Tb)S nanoparticles, the same was not observed in the Sn(Tb)O and Zn(Sm)S nanoparticles. This observation stresses the importance of nanoparticle identity as the determining factor in realizing the host-sensitized dopant photoluminescence and provides important insight into developing novel doped inorganic nanoparticle-based optical materials.

HIV-1 VACCINES. HIV-1 neutralizing antibodies induced by native-like envelope trimers.

A challenge for HIV-1 immunogen design is the difficulty of inducing neutralizing antibodies (NAbs) against neutralization-resistant (tier 2) viruses that dominate human transmissions. We show that a soluble recombinant HIV-1 envelope glycoprotein trimer that adopts a native conformation, BG505 SOSIP.664, induced NAbs potently against the sequence-matched tier 2 virus in rabbits and similar but weaker responses in macaques.

Abnormal erythroid maturation leads to microcytic anemia in the TSAP6/Steap3 null mouse model.

Genetic ablation of the ferrireductase STEAP3, also known as TSAP6, leads to severe microcytic and hypochromic red cells with moderate anemia in the mouse. However, the mechanism leading to anemia is poorly understood. Previous results indicate that TSAP6/Steap3 is a regulator of exosome secretion.

Impaired intestinal calcium absorption in protein 4.1R-deficient mice due to altered expression of plasma membrane calcium ATPase 1b (PMCA1b).

Protein 4.1R was first identified in the erythrocyte membrane skeleton. It is now known that the protein is expressed in a variety of epithelial cell lines and in the epithelia of many tissues, including the small intestine.

Lack of protein 4.1G causes altered expression and localization of the cell adhesion molecule nectin-like 4 in testis and can cause male infertility.

Protein 4.1G is a member of the protein 4.1 family, which in general serves as adaptors linking transmembrane proteins to the cytoskeleton.

Comprehensive characterization of expression patterns of protein 4.1 family members in mouse adrenal gland: implications for functions.

The members of the protein 4.1 family, 4.1R, 4.

Protein 4.1R links E-cadherin/beta-catenin complex to the cytoskeleton through its direct interaction with beta-catenin and modulates adherens junction integrity.

Protein 4.1R (4.1R) is the prototypical member of the protein 4.