A Punishing Look: Skin Tone and Afrocentric Features in the Halls of Justice.

Two related lines of research have gained traction in the social sciences during the past three decades. One examines the association between race and punishment, while a second investigates stratification and colorism, defined as discrimination based on skin tone. Yet rarely do scholars examine these issues together. The current study uses new data to investigate the association between offender's skin tone, Afrocentric facial features, and criminal punishment. More than 850 booking photos of black and white male offenders in two Minnesota counties were coded and then matched to detailed sentencing records. Results indicate that darker skin tone and Afrocentric facial features are associated with harsher sanctions and that the latter effect is particularly salient for white defendants. The findings add to existing work on skin tone and stratification and suggest that future research should consider other aspects of appearance, such as facial features, in the study of punishment and inequality.

Citizenship and Punishment: The Salience of National Membership in U.S. Criminal Courts.

When compared to research on the association between immigration and crime, far less attention has been given to the relationship between immigration, citizenship, and criminal punishment. As such, several fundamental questions about how noncitizens are sanctioned and whether citizenship is a marker of stratification in U.S. courts remain unanswered. Are citizens treated differently than noncitizens-both legal and undocumented-in U.S. federal criminal courts? Is the well-documented Hispanic-white sentencing disparity confounded by citizenship status? Has the association between citizenship and sentencing remained stable over time? And are punishment disparities contingent on the demographic context of the court? Analysis of several years of data from U.S. federal courts indicates that citizenship status is a salient predictor of sentencing outcomes-more powerful than race or ethnicity. Other notable findings include the following: accounting for citizenship substantially attenuates disparities between whites and Hispanics; the citizenship effect on sentencing has grown stronger over time; and the effect is most pronounced in districts with growing noncitizen populations. These findings suggest that as international migration increases, citizenship may be an emerging and powerful axis of sociolegal inequality.

Coconut oil enhances tomato carotenoid tissue accumulation compared to safflower oil in the Mongolian gerbil ( Meriones unguiculatus ).

Evidence suggests that monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats facilitate greater absorption of carotenoids than saturated fats. However, the comparison of consuming a polyunsaturated fat source versus a saturated fat source on tomato carotenoid bioaccumulation has not been examined. The goal of this study was to determine the influence of coconut oil and safflower oil on tomato carotenoid tissue accumulation in Mongolian gerbils ( Meriones unguiculatus ) fed a 20% fat diet. Coconut oil feeding increased carotenoid concentrations among many compartments including total carotenoids in the serum (p = 0.0003), adrenal glandular phytoene (p = 0.04), hepatic phytofluene (p = 0.0001), testicular all-trans-lycopene (p = 0.01), and cis-lycopene (p = 0.006) in the prostate-seminal vesicle complex compared to safflower oil. Safflower oil-fed gerbils had greater splenic lycopene concentrations (p = 0.006) compared to coconut oil-fed gerbils. Coconut oil feeding increased serum cholesterol (p = 0.0001) and decreased hepatic cholesterol (p = 0.0003) compared to safflower oil. In summary, coconut oil enhanced tissue uptake of tomato carotenoids to a greater degree than safflower oil. These results may have been due to the large proportion of medium-chain fatty acids in coconut oil, which might have caused a shift in cholesterol flux to favor extrahepatic carotenoid tissue deposition.

Herpes simplex virus type 1 infection increases the carbohydrate binding activity and the secretion of cellular galectin-3.

Galectin-3 binds beta-galactoside-containing sugars and is a chemoattractant for monocytes, macrophages, and neutrophils. Galectin-3 was identified by mass spectrometry from an anti-gI affinity column; however, we determined that galectin-3 did not bind gI, but rather that HSV-1 infection increased galectin-3 binding to carbohydrate residues on IgG. Our conclusions are based on the following observations: (1) galectin-3 from cells infected with a gI-deleted HSV-1 mutant virus bound anti-gI IgG; (2) galectin-3 from wild-type HSV-1 infected cells bound nonimmune IgG; (3) more galectin-3 from infected than uninfected cells bound IgG; and (4) binding to IgG was blocked by lactose, a competitive inhibitor of galectin-3 carbohydrate binding. HSV-1 infection did not increase galectin-3 expression, but did increase its secretion. We propose that increased carbohydrate binding and secretion of galectin-3 contribute to an early pro-inflammatory innate immune response to HSV-1 infection.

Conservatism, institutionalism, and the social control of intergroup conflict.

This research investigates the state social control of intergroup conflict by assessing the sociopolitical determinants of hate crime prosecutions. Consistent with insights from the political sociology of punishment, group-threat accounts of intergroup relations and the state, and neoinstitutional theory, the findings suggest that hate crime prosecutions are fewer where political conservatism, Christian fundamentalism, and black population size are higher, although this last effect is nonlinear. Linkages between district attorneys' offices and communities, on the other hand, increase hate crime prosecutions and the likelihood of offices' creating hate crime policies. Yet these policies are sometimes decoupled from actual enforcement, and such decoupling is more likely in politically conservative districts. The results indicate that common correlates of criminal punishment have very different effects on types of state social control that are protective of minority groups, and also suggest conditions under which policy and practice become decoupled in organizational settings.

Implications for herpes simplex virus vaccine strategies based on antibodies produced to herpes simplex virus type 1 glycoprotein gC immune evasion domains.

Herpes simplex virus type I (HSV-1) glycoprotein gC (gC-1) is an immune evasion molecule that inhibits complement activation by binding C3b. Three assays were used to assess whether IgG antibodies produced by HSV-1 infection in humans block the interaction between C3b and gC-1. In two assays human IgG had no effect, while in one assay IgG partially inhibited C3b binding, which occurred at IgG concentrations approaching the upper limits of those found in human serum. Mice infected with HSV-1 produced antibodies that partially blocked C3b binding at lower IgG concentrations than human IgG. Importantly, gC-1 immunization in mice produced higher titers of gC-1 antibodies than infection. We previously reported that gC-1 immunization in mice totally blocks C3b binding and reduces disease severity. Therefore, gC-1 immunization in humans may also induce blocking antibodies that modify disease, despite the rather limited ability of infection to produce these antibodies.