Publications by authors named "Lerche J"

The North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services plans to utilize a data-driven approach to evaluate the impacts of Medicaid expansion in the state. The evaluation plan includes tracking enrollment counts, creating metrics for monitoring of activities, setting measurable goals, and involving trusted community partners throughout.

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Covid-19 generated a crisis in capitalism, but not of capitalism. Capitalism reproduces itself in crisis and in ways that have significant but uneven impacts on the conditions and struggles of agrarian classes of labour. This article explores preliminary studies of how Covid-19 has affected agrarian social formations in Africa, Asia and Latin America and the farmers, petty commodity producers, labourers and agribusinesses who populate them.

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Piketty's propositions for arresting inequality are discussed through the lens of racism/casteism. We focus on the case of India's George Floyds-the persistence of caste and tribe oppression under economic growth in India-through the insights of our long-term ethnographic research. We show that inequalities are intimately tied to dynamics of capitalist accumulation in which racial/ethnic/caste/tribe and gender difference is crucial.

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North Carolina has made progress toward improving the health of its citizens, yet much more needs to be done. Now is the right time for the state to transform its Medicaid and North Carolina Health Choice programs into a managed care delivery system that gives providers more flexibility to deliver care that focuses on the whole person and benefits people's lives beyond the medical setting. The North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services is focused on maximizing opportunities and managing challenges, and the department understands that collaboration of health care professionals and other stakeholders is essential to achieve the right results for North Carolinians.

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Phosphatidylinositol (PtdIns) is a structural phospholipid that can be phosphorylated into various lipid signaling molecules, designated polyphosphoinositides (PPIs). The reversible phosphorylation of PPIs on the 3, 4, or 5 position of inositol is performed by a set of organelle-specific kinases and phosphatases, and the characteristic head groups make these molecules ideal for regulating biological processes in time and space. In yeast and mammals, PtdIns3P and PtdIns(3,5)P2 play crucial roles in trafficking toward the lytic compartments, whereas the role in plants is not yet fully understood.

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The functions of the minor phospholipid phosphatidylinositol-4,5-bisphosphate [PtdIns(4,5)P2] during vegetative plant growth remain obscure. Here, we targeted two related phosphatidylinositol 4-phosphate 5-kinases (PI4P 5-kinases) PIP5K1 and PIP5K2, which are expressed ubiquitously in Arabidopsis thaliana. A pip5k1 pip5k2 double mutant with reduced PtdIns(4,5)P2 levels showed dwarf stature and phenotypes suggesting defects in auxin distribution.

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North Carolina policymakers had initially planned for North Carolina to run its own health insurance marketplaces, but they have since decided to leave the operation of the marketplaces to the federal government alone. This article explores what it will mean for North Carolina to have federally facilitated marketplaces.

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The bioactive lipid ceramide is produced by the enzyme ceramide synthase, which exists in several isoforms in most eukaryotic organisms. Here, we investigated functional differences between the three ceramide synthase isoforms in Arabidopsis thaliana. The biochemical properties of the three ceramide synthases were investigated by comparing lipid profiles of yeast strains expressing LOH1, LOH2 or LOH3 with those of wild-type and loh1, loh2 and loh3 knockout plants.

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PtdIns-4,5-bisphosphate is a lipid messenger of eukaryotic cells that plays a critical role in processes such as cytoskeleton organization, intracellular vesicular trafficking, secretion, cell motility, regulation of ion channels and nuclear signalling pathways. The enzymes responsible for the synthesis of PtdIns(4,5)P₂ are phosphatidylinositol phosphate kinases (PIPKs). The moss Physcomitrella patens contains two PIPKs, PpPIPK1 and PpPIPK2.

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Plants exposed to hyperosmotic stress undergo changes in membrane dynamics and lipid composition to maintain cellular integrity and avoid membrane leakage. Various plant species respond to hyperosmotic stress with transient increases in PtdIns(4,5)P(2); however, the physiological role of such increases is unresolved. The plasma membrane represents the outermost barrier between the symplast of plant cells and its apoplastic surroundings.

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Catatonia is a psychomotor syndrome with motor and behavioral abnormalities which may be due to alterations in fronto-parietal cortical function. We therefore investigated neuropsychological tasks (attention, executive, visual-spatial, working memory) associated with frontal and parietal cortical function. Thirteen catatonic patients, diagnosed as catatonic according to criteria by Rosebush and Bush, were compared with 13 psychiatric non-catatonic controls (matched with regard to underlying psychiatric diagnosis, age, sex, and medication), and 13 age- and sex-matched healthy controls.

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The present study was designed to determine the intercorrelation between schizophrenic symptoms, brain morphology, electrophysiological and neuropsychological variables. 44 patients, who met ICD-10 criteria for schizophrenic disorder, were included. At baseline, after 3 and 6 weeks BPRS, CGI, psychometric measurements and QEEG/ERP were performed.

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The efficacy and immunomodulatory effects of low-dose gamma-interferon (gamma IFN) were investigated in an unselected population of patients with metastasising renal cell carcinoma. 36 patients suffering from metastasising renal cell carcinoma with a performance status exceeding Karnofsky index of 50 were entered into the open phase I/II trial. The majority of the patients recruited displayed a large tumour burden, and 28 patients (78%) had metastases involving two to six organ sites.

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