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Culture is a key determinant of children's development both in its own right and as a measure of generalizability of developmental phenomena. Studying the role of culture in development requires information about participants' demographic backgrounds. However, both reporting and treatment of demographic data are limited and inconsistent in child development research. A barrier to reporting demographic data in a consistent fashion is that no standardized tool currently exists to collect these data. Variation in cultural expectations, family structures, and life circumstances across communities make the creation of a unifying instrument challenging. Here, we present a framework to standardize demographic reporting for early child development (birth to 3 years of age), focusing on six core sociodemographic construct categories: biological information, gestational status, health status, community of descent, caregiving environment, and socioeconomic status. For each category, we discuss potential constructs and measurement items and provide guidance for their use and adaptation to diverse contexts. These items are stored in an open repository of context-adapted questionnaires that provide a consistent approach to obtaining and reporting demographic information so that these data can be archived and shared in a more standardized format.

RNA viruses have evolved numerous strategies to overcome host resistance and immunity, including the use of multifunctional proteases that not only cleave viral polyproteins during virus replication but also deubiquitinate cellular proteins to suppress ubiquitin (Ub)-mediated antiviral mechanisms. Here, we report an approach to attenuate the infection of Arabidopsis thaliana by Turnip Yellow Mosaic Virus (TYMV) by suppressing the polyprotein cleavage and deubiquitination activities of the TYMV protease (PRO). Performing selections using a library of phage-displayed Ub variants (UbVs) for binding to recombinant PRO yielded several UbVs that bound the viral protease with nanomolar affinities and blocked its function. The strongest binding UbV (UbV3) candidate had a EC50 of 0.3 nM and inhibited both polyprotein cleavage and DUB activity of PRO in vitro. X-ray crystal structures of UbV3 alone and in complex with PRO reveal that the inhibitor exists as a dimer that binds two copies of PRO. Consistent with our biochemical and structural findings, transgenic expression of UbV3 in the cytosol of A. thaliana suppressed TYMV replication in planta, with the reduction in viral load being correlated to UbV3 expression level. Our results demonstrate the potential of using UbVs to protect plants from tymovirus infection, a family of viruses that contain numerous members of significant agricultural concern, as well as other plant viruses that express functionally related proteases with deubiquitinating activity. Author summary: Plant viruses pose significant threats to agricultural crops, and their presence in northern latitudes stands to increase as pests, including those vectoring viruses and pathogens, advance poleward due to continued global warming. Developing effective and environmentally responsible antiviral control measures for plants could be used to counteract the climate-related spread of plant viruses. Antiviral strategies based on genetic engineering have enhanced plant virus resistance, and some have met with commercial success. To further broaden the diversity of transgenic-based antiviral approaches for agricultural use, we have developed a protein-based inhibitor that can be expressed in plants to selectively block viral protease activity and suppress virus replication in planta. We demonstrate that ubiquitin variants (UbVs) can be rapidly isolated from a phage display library and used to potently and selectively inhibit the activity of the TYMV protease (PRO) from the model plant virus Turnip Yellow Mosaic Virus (TYMV). Moreover, transgenic expression of a UbV in the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana reduced TYMV viral load in challenged plants. Our study provides proof-of-principle that UbVs can be identified and used to impart resistance to Tymovirus infections in plants and potentially other plant viruses that code for proteases with deubiquitinating activity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Children learning language in multilingual settings have tolearn that objects take different labels within each differentlanguage to which they are exposed. Previous research hasshown that adults can learn one-to-one and two-to-one word-object mappings via cross-situational statistical learning(CSSL), and that socio-pragmatic cues may differentiallyinfluence monolingual and bilingual adults’ learning of suchmappings. However, the extent to which monolingual andbilingual learners can keep track of multiple labels frommultiple speakers has not yet been investigated. Wemanipulated the number of speakers in a CSSL task thatinvolved learning both mapping types. We successfullyreplicated previous studies that found that both monolingualsand bilinguals could learn both types of mappings via CSSL.In addition, we found that bilinguals showed a steeper learningrate for two-to-one mappings than monolinguals, andbilinguals were more likely to accept two words for the sameobject than monolinguals. These results show that the effect ofspeaker identity on tracking word-object mappings variesaccording to language experience.

Smurf1 and Smurf2 are two closely related member of the HECT (homologous to E6AP carboxy terminus) E3 ubiquitin ligase family and play important roles in the regulation of various cellular processes. Both were initially identified to regulate transforming growth factor‐β and bone morphogenetic protein signaling pathways through regulating Smad protein stability and are now implicated in various pathological processes. Generally, E3 ligases, of which over 800 exist in humans, are ideal targets for inhibition as they determine substrate specificity; however, there are few inhibitors with the ability to precisely target a particular E3 ligase of interest. In this work, we explored a panel of ubiquitin variants (UbVs) that were previously identified to bind Smurf1 or Smurf2. In vitro binding and ubiquitination assays identified a highly specific Smurf2 inhibitor, UbV S2.4, which was able to inhibit ligase activity with high potency in the low nanomolar range. Orthologous cellular assays further demonstrated high specificity of UbV S2.4 toward Smurf2 and no cross‐reactivity toward Smurf1. Structural analysis of UbV S2.4 in complex with Smurf2 revealed its mechanism of inhibition was through targeting the E2 binding site. In summary, we investigated several protein‐based inhibitors of Smurf1 and Smurf2 and identified a highly specific Smurf2 inhibitor that disrupts the E2–E3 protein interaction interface. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In an increasingly diverse society, young children are likely to speak different first languages that are not the majority language of society. Preschool might be one of the first and few environments where they experience the majority language. The present study investigated how preschool teachers communicate with monolingual English preschoolers and preschoolers learning English as an additional language (EAL). We recorded and transcribed four hours of naturalistic preschool classroom activities and observed whether and how preschool teachers tailored their speech to children of different language proficiency levels and linguistic backgrounds (monolingual English: n = 13; EAL: n = 10), using a suite of tools for analysing quantity and quality of speech. We found that teachers used more diverse vocabulary and more complex syntax with the monolingual children and children who were more proficient in English, showing sensitivity to individual children's language capabilities and adapting their language use accordingly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: With increasing prevalence of childhood obesity worldwide, the incidence of pediatric‐onset type 2 diabetes (T2D) is also increasing in many countries. We aim to analyze the time trend and incidence of T2D in children in Hong Kong from 2008 to 2017, and to characterize clinical characteristics at diagnosis. Methods: Data were retrieved from the Hong Kong Childhood Diabetes Registry. All children with T2D diagnosed at the age of less than 18 years from January 1, 2008 to December 31, 2017 and managed in the public health care system were included in this study. Results: In the incident years of 2008–2017 period, 391 children were diagnosed with T2D. The crude incidence rate was 3.42 per 100,000 persons/year [95% confidence interval (CI) 3.08–3.76], which was much higher than that in last registry of 1.27 per 100,000 persons/year in 1997–2007 (P < 0.001).Most children (76%) were asymptomatic and were diagnosed by routine screening. At presentation, a significant proportion presented with co‐morbidities including fatty liver (37.9%), dyslipidaemia (35.3%), hypertension (22.5%), and microalbuminuria (12.8%). Conclusions: The incidence of T2D in children has increased significantly in Hong Kong. Most of them were asymptomatic and picked up on routine health screening. Yet, comorbidities were commonly identified at diagnosis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]