People believe political opponents accept blatant moral wrongs, fueling partisan divides.

Efforts to bridge political divides often focus on navigating complex and divisive issues, but eight studies reveal that we should also focus on a more basic misperception: that political opponents are willing to accept basic moral wrongs. In the United States, Democrats, and Republicans overestimate the number of political outgroup members who approve of blatant immorality (e.g.

AllergenAI: a deep learning model predicting allergenicity based on protein sequence.

Innovations in protein engineering can help redesign allergenic proteins to reduce adverse reactions in sensitive individuals. To accomplish this aim, a better knowledge of the molecular properties of allergenic proteins and the molecular features that make a protein allergenic is needed. We present a novel AI-based tool, AllergenAI, to quantify the allergenic potential of a given protein.

Displaying alphavirus physicochemical consensus antigens on immunogenic liposomes enhances antibody elicitation in mice.

Cobalt-porphyrin phospholipid displays recombinant protein antigens on liposome surfaces via antigen polyhistidine-tag (His-tag), and when combined with monophosphorylated lipid A and QS-21 yields the "CPQ" vaccine adjuvant system. In this proof of principle study, CPQ was used to generate vaccine prototypes that elicited antibodies for two different alphaviruses (AV). Mice were immunized with computationally designed, His-tagged, physicochemical property consensus (PCP) protein antigens representing the variable B-domain of the envelope protein 2 (E2) from the serotype specific Venezuelan Equine Encephalitis Virus (VEEV) or a broad-spectrum AV-antigen termed EVC The CPQ adjuvant enhanced the antigenicity of both proteins without eliciting detectable anti-His-tag antibodies.

The updated Structural Database of Allergenic Proteins (SDAP 2.0) provides 3D models for allergens and incorporated bioinformatics tools.

Background: Allergenic proteins can cause IgE-mediated adverse reactions in sensitized individuals. Although the sequences of many allergenic proteins have been identified, bioinformatics data analysis with advanced computational methods and modeling is needed to identify the basis for IgE binding and cross-reactivity.

Objective: We aim to present the features and use of the updated Structural Database of Allergenic Proteins 2.

Identifying Similar Allergens and Potentially Cross-Reacting Areas Using Structural Database of Allergenic Proteins (SDAP) Tools and D-Graph.

The Structural Database of Allergenic Proteins (SDAP) provides rapid search tools to identify similarities among allergens, their IgE epitopes, and to determine the potential allergenicity of any novel protein. Many labs have identified IgE-binding proteins and their antibody binding or T cell epitopes using dotspots or microarrays. This chapter describes how to determine the relationship of these proteins and peptides to known allergens using the tools implemented in SDAP.

Alanine Scanning of the Unstructured Region of Ara h 2 and of a Related Mimotope Reveals Critical Amino Acids for IgE Binding.

Scope: The unstructured region of Ara h 2, referred to as epitope 3, contains a repeated motif, DYPSh (h = hydroxyproline) that is important for IgE binding.

Methods And Results: IgE binding assays to 20mer and shorter peptides of epitope 3, defines a 16mer core sequence containing one copy of the DPYSh motif, DEDSYERDPYShSQDP. This study performs alanine scanning of this and a related 12mer mimotope, LLDPYAhRAWTK.

Peptide immunotherapy for aeroallergens.

Allergen specific immunotherapy (SIT) has been used for more than a century. Researchers have been working to improve efficacy and reduce the side effects. We have reviewed the literature about peptides immunotherapy for inhaled allergens.

The Problem of Purity in Moral Psychology.

Academic Abstract: The idea of "purity" transformed moral psychology. Here, we provide the first systematic review of this concept. Although often discussed as one construct, we reveal ~9 understandings of purity, ranging from respecting God to not eating gross things.

Morally excused but socially excluded: Denying agency through the defense of mental impairment.

Defendants can deny they have agency, and thus responsibility, for a crime by using a defense of mental impairment. We argue that although this strategy may help defendants evade blame, it may carry longer-term social costs, as lay people's perceptions of a person's agency might determine some of the moral rights they grant them. Three randomized between-group experiments (N = 1601) used online vignettes to examine lay perceptions of a hypothetical defendant using a defense of mental impairment (versus a guilty plea).

PCP consensus protein/peptide alphavirus antigens stimulate broad spectrum neutralizing antibodies.

Vaccines based on proteins and peptides may be safer and if calculated based on many sequences, more broad-spectrum than those designed based on single strains. Physicochemical Property Consensus (PCP) alphavirus (AV) antigens from the B-domain of the E2 envelope protein were designed, synthesized recombinantly and shown to be immunogenic (i.e.

Still SDAPing Along: 20 Years of the Structural Database of Allergenic Proteins.

The introduction of plant extracts to mitigate the symptoms of "hay fever", about a century ago, led to discoveries beginning sixty years ago on determining the sequences and eventually structures of allergenic proteins. As more proteins were cloned, there was a need to rapidly identify and categorize those with significant similarity to known allergens. The Structural Database of Allergenic Proteins (SDAP) was created at the beginning of the 21st century as the first cross-referenced website to allow rapid overview of the structures and sequences of allergenic proteins.

The affective harm account (AHA) of moral judgment: Reconciling cognition and affect, dyadic morality and disgust, harm and purity.

Moral psychology has long debated whether moral judgment is rooted in harm versus affect. We reconcile this debate with the affective harm account (AHA) of moral judgment. The AHA understands harm as an intuitive perception (i.

Structure, Immunogenicity, and IgE Cross-Reactivity among Walnut and Peanut Vicilin-Buried Peptides.

Vicilin-buried peptides (VBPs) from edible plants are derived from the N-terminal leader sequences (LSs) of seed storage proteins. VBPs are defined by a common α-hairpin fold mediated by conserved CxxxCxCxxxC motifs. Here, peanut and walnut VBPs were characterized as potential mediators of both peanut/walnut allergenicity and cross-reactivity despite their low (∼17%) sequence identity.

DGraph Clusters Flaviviruses and β-Coronaviruses According to Their Hosts, Disease Type, and Human Cell Receptors.

Motivation: There is a need for rapid and easy-to-use, alignment-free methods to cluster large groups of protein sequence data. Commonly used phylogenetic trees based on alignments can be used to visualize only a limited number of protein sequences. DGraph, introduced here, is an application developed to generate 2-dimensional (2D) maps based on similarity scores for sequences.

Morally excused but socially excluded: Denying agency through the defense of mental impairment.

Defendants can deny they have agency, and thus responsibility, for a crime by using a defense of mental impairment. We argue that although this strategy may help defendants evade blame, it may carry longer-term social costs, as lay people's perceptions of a person's agency might determine some of the moral rights they grant them. In this registered report protocol, we seek to expand upon preliminary findings from two pilot studies to examine how and why those using the defense of mental impairment are seen as less deserving of certain rights.

Synthetic proteins for COVID-19 diagnostics.

There is an urgent need for inexpensive, rapid and specific antigen-based assays to test for vaccine efficacy and detect infection with SARS-CoV-2 and its variants. We have identified a small, synthetic protein (JS7), representing a region of maximum variability within the receptor binding domain (RBD), which binds antibodies in sera from nine patients with PCR-verified COVID-19 of varying severity. Antibodies binding to either JS7 or the SARS-CoV-2 recombinant RBD, as well as those that disrupt binding between a fragment of the ACE2 receptor and the RBD, are proportional to disease severity and clinical outcome.

Designing multivalent immunogens for alphavirus vaccine optimization.

There is a pressing need for vaccines against mosquito-borne alphaviruses such as Venezualen and eastern equine encephalitis viruses (VEEV, EEEV). We demonstrate an approach to vaccine development based on physicochemical properties (PCP) of amino acids to design a PCP-consensus sequence of the epitope-rich B domain of the VEEV major antigenic E2 protein. The consensus "spike" domain was incorporated into a live-attenuated VEEV vaccine candidate (ZPC/IRESv1).

Repurposing approved drugs for cancer therapy.

Background: Many drugs approved for other indications can control the growth of tumor cells and limit adverse events (AE).

Data Sources: Literature searches with keywords 'repurposing and cancer' books, websites: https://clinicaltrials.gov/, for drug structures: https://pubchem.

Personal experiences bridge moral and political divides better than facts.

Both liberals and conservatives believe that using facts in political discussions helps to foster mutual respect, but 15 studies-across multiple methodologies and issues-show that these beliefs are mistaken. Political opponents respect moral beliefs more when they are supported by personal experiences, not facts. The respect-inducing power of personal experiences is revealed by survey studies across various political topics, a field study of conversations about guns, an analysis of YouTube comments from abortion opinion videos, and an archival analysis of 137 interview transcripts from Fox News and CNN.

The importance of the 2S albumins for allergenicity and cross-reactivity of peanuts, tree nuts, and sesame seeds.

Allergies to peanuts, tree nuts, and sesame seeds are among the most important food-related causes of anaphylaxis. Important clinical questions include: Why is there a variable occurrence of coallergy among these foods and Is this immunologically mediated? The clinical and immunologic data summarized here suggest an immunologic basis for these coallergies that is based on similarities among the 2S albumins. Data from component resolved diagnostics have highlighted the relationship between IgE binding to these allergens and the presence of IgE-mediated food allergy.

D-graph clusters flaviviruses and β-coronaviruses according to their hosts, disease type and human cell receptors.

Motivation: There is a need for rapid and easy to use, alignment free methods to cluster large groups of protein sequence data. Commonly used phylogenetic trees based on alignments can be used to visualize only a limited number of protein sequences. DGraph, introduced here, is a dynamic programming application developed to generate 2D-maps based on similarity scores for sequences.

Producing physicochemical property consensus alphavirus protein antigens for broad spectrum vaccine design.

There is a pressing need for new vaccines against alphaviruses, which can cause fatal encephalitis (Venezuelan equine encephalitis virus (VEEV) and others) and severe arthralgia (e.g. Chikungunya virus, CHIKV).