Culture Expansion Research Articles

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Based on the experience of armed conflicts, the analysis of scientific and methodological literature and the legal framework, the article examines issues related to the theoretical foundations and practical use of information warfare tools in armed conflicts. The purpose of the article is to study and determine the essence, particular qualities and characteristics of psychological operations carried out during modern armed conflicts. Psychological operation is considered as a category of modern armed conflict, the essence, types, and particular qualities of various types of psychological operations are revealed. Psychological operation is the main element of psychological warfare. The essence of PO consists in the practical use in the conditions of armed struggle of a set of agreed, coordinated and interconnected tasks, place and time, objects and procedures of types, forms, methods and methods of psychological influence. One-time measures of psychological warfare involve short-term, targeted actions of special units or individual specialists, which differ in a certain nature and are carried out on a local scale. Psychological operations can be classified: 1) by terms of implementation (strategic, operational, tactical); 2) by the time of implementation (implemented in peacetime, implemented in wartime, implemented in peacekeeping operations); 3) by orientation (against the civilian population, against the enemy's troops, against the enemy's command, misleading the enemy, facilitating the opposition and dissident movements, carrying out cultural expansion and sabotage, consolidating psychological operations); 4) by types (conversion psychological operation, demarcation psychological operation, consolidation psychological war, psychological-propaganda operation, informational-psychological countermeasure).

The relevance of study of visual identification of the Olympic ceremonial costume of the national team of Ukraine: the question of cultural expansion

The issue of national identity, in particular visual identification, requires considerable attention in the direction of the conformity of the declared sign or their combinations. Certain signs and their compositions influence the social perception of the information consumer, correcting the already existing opinion about the communicator at the stage of his or her development of relations with the recipients. Vestimentary code of ceremonial costume in projects of international cooperation is a component of illustrative representation of states, peoples or nations. These and other specified reasons determine the importance of scientific and applied research on the Olympic ceremonial costume of the national team of Ukraine, that is, a versatile study of the relay of cultural codes, meanings and ideas of a nation that participates in competitions covering millions of audiences of various representations. Within the framework of the study of the Olympic ceremonial parade costume of the national team of Ukraine 1994– 2022, its symbolic system and aspects of the transformation of the determinants of artistic and informational identification are comprehensively studied in accordance with the semiotics of design, national constructs, globalization requirements and the provisions of the Olympic Charter. This work determines the relevance of the study of the visual identification of the Olympic ceremonial costume of the Ukrainian national team and the role of the cultural expansion of russia, which was the result of the symbolic uncertainty of identification at world competitions.

УКРАЇНСЬКИЙ БУДДИЗМ І НЕОБУДДИЗМ В УМОВАХ ВІЙНИ

The article is devoted to the analysis of the peculiarities of the functioning of Buddhist and neo- Buddhist movements in the conditions of the war in Ukraine. It is noted that the modernization of Ukrainian culture, which is accompanied by the development of post-secular trends, manifests itself not only in the revival and transformation of religious beliefs traditional for our people, but also in the spread of non-traditional and neo-religious teachings and movements, among which Buddhism and Neo-Buddhism occupy a special place. The revival of Buddhism in Ukraine in the 90s of the last century took place mainly with the mediation of Russia. In the situation that developed at that time, Buddhism acted as a kind of "agent" of Russian cultural expansion. In the conditions of the war against rashism, it largely became independent from Russian influence. Among the most striking manifestations of Buddhism in Ukraine is the sangha of the Mahayanist direction of the Nipponzan Myōhōji Order, whose representatives have suffered from racist aggression since 2014 and until today. As a result of the occupation by Russian terrorists of parts of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, neo-religious groups, including Buddhists, were displaced from these territories. Seeking refuge, Ukrainian Buddhists were directly faced with the need to form a clear position in relation to Russia's military invasion of Ukraine, not hiding behind the general Buddhist notion of the absurdity of any war as a way to resolve conflicts. During the analysis, it was also established that under the influence of transformational processes in Western European Buddhism, domestic Buddhism is being modernized. In Ukraine, neo-Buddhist practices are identified with such directions and schools as Karma Kagyu, Zen Buddhism, Nittiren, White Lotus, as well as with Protestant and cyber Buddhism. Within the boundaries of neo-Buddhist teachings, the problem of Russia's aggressive war of aggression against Ukraine is discussed sporadically, but it is already possible to distinguish certain trends in the understanding and interpretation of its essence and the preference for a negative assessment of the moral component of rashist aggression, which certainly indicates positive shifts in the ideas of domestic followers of the doctrine and hope on the useful application of Buddhist methods and practices to improve the spiritual and psychological state of the Ukrainian community, as well as on the further development of antitotalitarian tendencies and tolerance towards non-traditional religious phenomena in its environment.

МОЛОДЕЖЬ В ФОКУСЕ ИНФОРМАЦИОННО-ПСИХОЛОГИЧЕСКОЙ ВОЙНЫ

The article deals with the phenomenon of the impact of information-psychological warfare on youth consciousness. In the article, the socio-political category «information-psychological war» is considered as a psychological impact on the civilian population, primarily on the younger generation, with the aim of demoralizing it and reformatting it with media. The Internet has made it possible to most fully synthesize modern psychotechnologies with information technologies, thereby effectively influencing the unconscious behavior of a person. In the article, the principles of modern information-psychological warfare, technologies of ideological, information-psychological and cultural influence on the younger generation are analyzed. The main directions of Westernization as a cultural expansion of the Western world by means of modern Internet technologies are indicated. The mechanisms of reformatting the consciousness of young people by means of network-centric technologies with manipulative and fake content are conclusively described. The article was prepared on the material of the scientific research AR 14869235 «Youth work as a condition for the successful socialization of young students», within the framework of the state grant funding of the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Republic of Kazakhstan.

Guideline for design of substrate stiffness for mesenchymal stem cell culture based on heterogeneity of YAP and RUNX2 responses.

Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) have the potential for self-renewal and multipotency to differentiate into various lineages. Thus, they are of great interest in regenerative medicine as a cell source for tissue engineering. Substrate stiffness is one of the most extensively studied exogenous physical factors; however, consistent results have not always been reported for controlling MSCs. Conventionally used stiff culture substrates, such as tissue-culture polystyrene and glass, enhance nuclear localization of a mechanotransducer YAP and a pre-osteogenic transcription factor RUNX2, and bias MSCs towards the osteogenic lineage, even without osteogenic-inducing soluble factors. The mechanosensitive nature and intrinsic heterogeneity present challenges for obtaining reproducible results. This review summarizes the heterogeneity in human MSC response, specifically, nuclear/cytoplasmic localization changes in the mechanotransducer yes-associated protein (YAP) and the osteogenic transcription factor RUNX2, in response to substrate stiffness. In addition, a perspective on the intracellular factors attributed to response heterogeneity is discussed. The optimal range of stiffness parameters, Young's modulus, for MSC expansion culture to suppress osteogenic differentiation bias through the suppression of YAP and RUNX2 nuclear localization, and cell cycle progression is likely to be surprisingly narrow for a cell population from an identical donor and vary among cell populations from different donors. We believe that characterization of the heterogeneity of MSCs and understanding their biological meaning is an exciting research direction to establish guidelines for the design of culture substrates for the sophisticated control of MSC properties.

The One-Way (Agri)Cultural Mirror: A Case Study of How Young Agricultural Leaders Understand and Experience Culture

As the global economy continues to advance, cultural competence has become a buzzword in education, professional development, and research. Despite this, little research has been devoted to understanding cultural competence in agriculture. Thus, a need emerged to describe the cultural competence of young agricultural leaders in Louisiana. Through data analysis, four themes emerged: (a) cultural anxiety, (b) cultural pressure, (c) the one-way (agri)cultural mirror, and (d) cultural lens expansion. The participants expressed anxiety to discuss cultural issues because of a fear of negative social ramifications. As a result, this yielded a pressure to adopt a culturally competent mindset to be successful. Additionally, participants recognized that the agricultural profession exhibited a unique cultural identity that produced a one-way cultural mirror whereby consumers and producers cannot understand one another. Because of this cultural barrier, participants recognized a need to expand their cultural lens, through domestic and international experiences, to better serve diverse populations. Therefore, we recommend that future research explore strategies that can cultivate cultural competence at earlier ages. For example, perhaps opportunities that feature cultural concepts could be offered more purposefully through 4-H, FFA, and Ag in the Classroom.

As palavras que se ouçam: uma reflexão sobre a linguagem do Projeto «Capacitação Inclusiva» e a prática artístico-pedagógica como forma de invenção

The article investigates the pedagogical proposal of the “Capacitação Inclusiva” Project, developed at the Associação de Pais e Amigos dos Autistas de Guarujá (APAAG), a city on the south coast of São Paulo, between April 2021 and January 2022. Art in its structure, the Project announced the desire to promote “culture and art in the municipality, creating cultural programs and actions for people with special needs”. (APAAG, 2021, p. 7). It is intended to debate, from the unveiling of the knowledge sorted for circulation in the Project, and in the determination of its language, which views about the autistic learner and about Art constitute “Capacitação Inclusiva”. It is estimated to confront such perspectives with contemporary notions of Art/Education, Disability Studies and Cultural Action, with the objective of understanding how the Project mobilizes itself in the fulfillment of its formative intentions and the expansion of culture. It is also a goal of the article to present an artistic-pedagogical proposal that was built at APAAG, based on the principles of a border pedagogy, in the terms of Henry Giroux, from the understanding of the right to aesthetic learning of autistic people.   &nbsp

Ukrainian Book Market as a Factor of National Security in the Context of russia’s Armed and Information Aggression

The purpose of the article is to consider the main challenges and problems associated with the formation of the Ukrainian book market in the context of the escalating war with Russia and to analyze its functioning as an important factor of national and human security.
 The research methodology is based on the method of modelling, which involves a comprehensive study of the book market as a set of interactive and interdependent (market and non-market) components that form an integrated whole; the method of synergetic research, which explains linear and nonlinear options for the formation of the book market, fixes bifurcation points, takes into account their main challenges and threats; the system-communication method, the use of which makes it possible to clarify the specifics and opportunities for the development of publishing and book distribution in Ukraine in a complex system of information and cultural communications at the present stage.
 The scientific novelty of the research is as follows: substantiation of the understanding of the Ukrainian book market as an essential factor of national and human security in the context of the main challenges and threats as of 2022, the need to regulate it, create favourable conditions for the growth of the publishing industry and promote the culture of reading in Ukraine.
 Conclusions. For a long time, the sphere of publishing and book business did not have proper attention from the state. There was a robust expansion of Russian publishing products into the cultural space of Ukraine. The Russian-Ukrainian war became a powerful catalyst that changed the state of affairs in the book market. It has been emphasized that legislative initiatives and institutional transformations of recent years have contributed to the quality indicators improvement of the Ukrainian publishing industry. Despite the positive statistics, the search for new mechanisms to counteract the Russian cultural expansion, which results in the military occupation, the impossibility of penetration and distribution of Russian-language printed products on the territory of Ukraine, remains urgent.

Expanded NK cells used for adoptive cell therapy maintain diverse clonality and contain long-lived memory-like NK cell populations

Multiple clinical trials exploring the potential of adoptive natural killer (NK) cell therapy for cancer have employed exvivo expansion using feeder cells to obtain large numbers of NK cells. We have previously utilized the rhesus macaque model to clonally track the NK cell progeny of barcode-transduced CD34+ stem and progenitor cells after transplant. In this study, NK cells from barcoded rhesus macaques were used to study the changes in NK cell clonal patterns that occurred during exvivo expansion using culture protocols similar to those employed in clinical preparation of human NK cells including irradiated lymphoblastoid cell line (LCL) feeder cells or K562 cells expressing 4-1BBL and membrane-bound interleukin-21 (IL-21). NK expansion cultures resulted in the proliferation of clonally diverse NK cells, which, at day 14 harvest, contained greater than 50% of the starting barcode repertoire. Diversity as measured by Shannon index was maintained after culture. With both LCL and K562 feeders, proliferation of long-lived putative memory-like NK cell clones was observed, with these clones continuing to constitute a mean of 31% of the total repertoire of expanded cells. These experiments provide insight into the clonal makeup of expanded NK cell clinical products.

The potential for Treg-enhancing therapies in transplantation.

Since the discovery of regulatory T cells (Tregs) as crucial regulators of immune tolerance against self-antigens, these cells have become a promising tool for the induction of donor-specific tolerance in transplantation medicine. The therapeutic potential of increasing in vivo Treg numbers for a favorable Treg to Teff cell ratio has already been demonstrated in several sophisticated pre-clinical models and clinical pilot trials. In addition to improving cell quantity, enhancing Treg function utilizing engineering techniques led to encouraging results in models of autoimmunity and transplantation. Here we aim to discuss the most promising approaches for Treg-enhancing therapies, starting with adoptive transfer approaches and ex vivo expansion cultures (polyclonal vs. antigen-specific), followed by selective in vivo stimulation methods. Furthermore, we address next generation concepts for Treg function enhancement (CARs, TRUCKs, BARs) as well as the advantages and caveats inherit to each approach. Finally, this review will discuss the clinical experience with Treg therapy in ongoing and already published clinical trials, however, data on long-term results and efficacy is still very limited and many questions that might complicate clinical translation remain open. Here, we discuss the hurdles for clinical translation and elaborate on current Treg based therapeutic options as well as their potencies for improving long-term graft survival in transplantation.

THE RESPONSE OF SOME ROMANIAN AND FOREIGN APPLE CULTIVARS TO THE NATURAL INFECTIONS CAUSED BY PODOSPHERA LEUCOTRICHA, IN BISTRIȚA AREA

It is desirable that in the newly established apple orchards to be promoted as many Romanian cultivars that have genetic resistance to diseases. That is why we considered important the evaluation of some Romanian apple varieties whose expansion in culture is desired, in terms of their behaviour to the attack of the fungus Podosphera leucotricha, one of the most harmful pathogens that damage apples. The evaluation of the cultivars was performed in the period 2019 – 2021, in the experimental plots of Research Station for Fruit Growing (RSFG) Bistrita and targeted six Romanian cultivars and five foreign cultivars. Observations were made both in the untreated plots and in the plots where conventional treatment schemes were applied. The results highlight the varieties created at SCDP Bistriţa: 'Bistrițean' and 'Starkprim' which, together with 'Starkrimson', stood out due to the absence of powdery mildew symptoms in the three years of study.The cultivars known to be sensitive to powdery mildew, 'Idared' and 'Jonathan' were most affected, followed by 'Golden Delicious'. The cultivars 'Florina', 'Generos' and 'Auriu de Bistrița' showed a medium to low sensitivity and 'Aura' and 'Salva' very low sensitivity.

Buddhism and Nationalism as Sources of Identity in in Asia of the Late 19th and Early 20th Centuries

The article examines the influence of Buddhism and nationalism on identification processes in Asian countries in the context of political transformations in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Significant revitalization of Buddhism (sometimes called “Buddhist Modernism”) in a number of countries coincided with the growth of nationalism (especially in Russia, Mongolia, Tibet, China, and Japan), as well as the growing perception of Buddhist transnational unity. Nationalism and religion collaborated in their reactions to a number of important phenomena: the anti-colonial movement, the resistance against western cultural expansion (India, China, Japan), the aspiration of independence (Tibet, Mongolia), the renovation processes (in particular, among the Russian Buddhists). These phenomena were caused by objective factors, the changes in worldviews, as well as with activity of some individuals (Tagore, Tai-su, Uchida Ryohei, Dalai Lama, Agvan Dorjiev). The high level of civilizational depth allowed Buddhists of various traditions to assert their basic principles as important to identity resources.

Perception of the filmed urban space: an analysis of the imaginaries of Madrid constructed through series and social networks

Concurrent with the expansion of visual culture, film tourism has experienced a significant boost in recent decades, and the motivation to visit places where series made for television or similar platforms were filmed has been added to this modality. In this context, and taking the city of Madrid as a reference, this work proposes a line of research wherein analysis of the relationships between geographical and audiovisual spaces through cultural and tourist use unites the representation of both, by way of social networks (specifically, Twitter). As regards methodology, an ‘application programming interface’ has been designed which permits the download of a sample of tweets useful for both quantitative and qualitative analysis. The main results indicate the impacts that fiction series have had on recognition of the city (or certain of its elements) as well as relationships established between the narrative and geographical spaces when the latter are referenced via on-site activities. Theoretically, this research focuses on the relationship between real geographies, imagined geographies, and simulacra, as well as their involvement in the commodification of space and in the construction of vicarious geographical experiences.

Decades of Global Sturgeon Conservation Efforts Are Threatened by an Expanding Captive Culture Industry

After centuries of overexploitation and habitat loss, many of the world's sturgeon (Acipenseridae) populations are at the brink of extinction. Although significant resources are invested into the conservation and restoration of imperiled sturgeons, the burgeoning commercial culture industry poses an imminent threat to the persistence of many populations. In the past decade, the number and distribution of captive sturgeon facilities has grown exponentially and now encompasses diverse interest groups ranging from hobby aquarists to industrial‐scale commercial facilities. Expansion of sturgeon captive culture has largely fallen outside the purview of existing regulatory frameworks, raising concerns that continued growth of this industry has real potential to jeopardize conservation of global sturgeon populations. Here, we highlight some of the most significant threats commercial culture poses to wild populations, with particular emphasis on how releases can accelerate wild population declines through mechanisms such as hybridization, introgression, competition, and disease transmission. We also note that in some circumstances, commercial captive culture has continued to motivate harvest of wild populations, potentially accelerating species' declines. Given the prevalence and trajectory of sturgeon captive culture programs, we comment on modifications to regulatory frameworks that could improve the ability of captive culture to support wild sturgeon conservation.

Radical practices, radical pedagogies: intercultural explorations in language and meaning

This article reflects on the visual, spatial, and textual devices deployed by the Architettura Radicale in the 1960s and 1970s through a discussion of a pedagogical project developed for undergraduate architecture students from Monash University, Australia, as part of a travelling intensive based in Prato, Italy. At the time, Prato became the subject of debate about the rapid expansion of consumer culture in Italy, as underscored in Claudio Greppi’s graduating project, ‘Territorial City-Factory’ (1964-5). This architectural proposal rendered the area between Prato and Florence as a totalising city-factory, a proposition that was later developed under Archizoom as ‘No-Stop City’ (1968-70). Greppi’s recasting of Prato as a site for political and architectural experimentation became the catalyst for a teaching-led research project, re-examining the work of the Radical movement in Tuscany. In collaboration with architect and artist Gianni Pettena, the intensive sought to draw out the performative and embodied approaches implicit in his own work and that of his peers including UFO and 9999, as well as the rhetorical devices embedded within the critical fictions of Superstudio and Archizoom. By first dissecting and then redeploying these techniques in response to a site-specific brief, the ultimate pedagogical aim was to expose the students to an expanded range of architectural approaches and to re-evaluate the nature of radical practices ‘within and against’ the omnipresent struggles of late capitalism, and the contemporary cultural and educational context of neoliberalism and the university.

LGBTQ Politics in Nicaragua: Revolution, Dictatorship, and Social Movements by Karen Kampwirth

Reviewed by: LGBTQ Politics in Nicaragua: Revolution, Dictatorship, and Social Movements by Karen Kampwirth Jesse Edward Tenenbaum Karen Kampwirth LGBTQ Politics in Nicaragua: Revolution, Dictatorship, and Social Movements. Tucson, Arizona, USA: University of Arizona Press, 2022. 360 pp. Photographs, references, index. $50 hardcover (IBSN 978-0-8165-4279-6); $50 eBook (ISBN 978-0-8165-4525-4). Nicaragua is not notable for being especially repressive nor particularly accepting in terms of gay rights, but it is notable that there is an absence, an ambivalence, and a lack of specific policies, especially when compared to other parts of Latin America. This is to say that Nicaragua has a consistent lack of specific laws and policies regarding homosexuality or trans individuals (the anti-sodomy law of 1992 to 2008 notwithstanding). As political scientist Karen Kampwirth posits in LGBTQ Politics in Nicaragua: Revolution, Dictatorship, and Social Movements, perhaps the knowledge that a number of gay and lesbian Sandinistas were fairly influential in the movement prevented the early adoption of anti-gay laws, as happened in Cuba and Nicaragua (p. 54). Donald Casco is an interesting figure to focus on: a 9amboyant and openly gay man who had a popular TV show during the Sandinista revolution. Casco is reminiscent of Walter Mercado in the sense that he was very spiritual and intellectual, and his show focused largely on horoscopes and psychic topics. Unlike Walter Mercado, however, Casco was openly homosexual, which is impressive in the context of Nicaragua of the 1980s. His show ran through the 1980s, during the revolution, so one had to have a television in their home to see it, and many of the people who remember him were women who worked at home, or were too young or too old to fight at the time. Regardless, Casco made an impression because many children who suspected they were gay, lesbian, or transgender looked up to him as a cultural icon. He was from a relatively well-off family, which likely contributed to his being able to safely be open about his sexuality. Casco's experience can be linked to contemporary realities in Nicaragua relating to the influence of class on LGBTQ experiences. Nicaraguans who have higher educational attainment and [End Page 223] higher incomes have the possibility to be more open about their "nonnormative" sexuality (p. 117) or gender identity without as much risk of negative consequences in their social and family circles, compared to Nicaraguans from working class backgrounds. Another key idea that Kampwirth discusses in this work is the phenomenon of a so-called queer culture that originated in the Global North and has been exported to the Global South. She discusses how this is ironic, given the historical reality of the West slowing the expansion of queer cultures in "exotic" places that may have previously been more accepting of homosexuality and non-binary gender identities. In other words, first the Western/Christian/capitalistic societies stifled queer sexualities and identities in places they colonized, and now the opposite seems true, where Global North countries are perceived to be imposing more progressive ideas about sexuality and gender in Global South countries that have very conservative norms. The irony is rather mind-boggling. Kampwirth sheds light on the importance of keeping a culturally specific lens in mind when examining LGBTQ politics and experiences in Nicaragua from our Global North perspective. For example, the importance of coming out as a political strategy to gain more widespread social acceptance has been relatively successful in the Global North, but it has also developed in a very different political and economic reality from that in Nicaragua. This is especially the case considering the United States's highly individualistic culture and the economic ability of many U.S. citizens to move away from their families as young adults and experience queer lifestyles in greater privacy. By comparison, many Nicaraguans cannot afford to live on their own, and consequently live with their families for most of their lives, which does not as readily lend itself to the privacy or space to explore alternative sexualities, identities, and lifestyles. It is notable that in Nicaragua as well as in the Global North, universities provide safe places where young...

Executive Editor-in-Chief’s introduction for This Special Issue

Executive Editor-in-Chief’s introduction for This Special Issue

Validation of Kinetic Stem Cell (KSC) counting algorithms for rapid quantification of human hematopoietic stem cells

Specific quantification of therapeutic tissue stem cells (TSCs) is a major challenge. We recently described a computational simulation method for accurate and specific counting of TSCs. The method quantifies TSCs based on their unique asymmetric cell kinetics, which is rate-limiting for TSCs’ production of transiently-amplifying lineage-committed cells and terminally arrested cells during serial cell culture. Because of this basis, the new method is called kinetic stem cell (KSC) counting. Here, we report further validations of the specificity and clinical utility of KSC counting. First, we demonstrate its quantification of the expected increase in the hematopoietic stem cell (HSC) fraction of CD34+-selected preparations of human-mobilized peripheral blood cells, an approved treatment product routinely used for HSC transplantation therapies. Previously, we also used the KSC counting technology to define new mathematical algorithms with the potential for rapid determination of TSC-specific fractions without the need for serial culture. A second important HSC transplantation treatment, CD34+-selected umbilical cord blood (UCB) cells, was used to investigate this prediction. We show that, with an input of only simple population doubling time (PDT) data, the KSC counting-derived “Rabbit algorithms” can be used to rapidly determine the specific HSC fraction of CD34+-selected UCB cell preparations with a high degree of statistical confidence. The algorithms define the stem cell fraction half-life (SCFHL), a new parameter that projects stem cell numbers during expansion culture. These findings further validate KSC counting’s potential to meet the long-standing unmet need for a method to determine stem cell-specific dosage in stem cell medicine.

The Serenata of Baroque Period at the Court of the Austrian Habsburgs in the Context of Italian Cultural Expansion

Relevance of the study. Contemporary performance has recently increasingly turned to ancient music, striving for historical authenticity in musical interpretations. In this regard, important questions arise, related both to the technical side of interpretation and deepening into the historical processes that influenced the emergence of certain genres, as well as the context of the creation of baroque works. «Archaeological excavations» are becoming justified, aimed at understanding the historical processes that influenced the formation of the baroque genre system, as well as the development of European musical culture in general. Of particular importance is the study of the specifics of such works as serenatas, which are difficult for genre identification due to their similarity with other works established in the genre coordinate system, such as opera and cantata.
 Main objective(s) — to analyze the historical and cultural processes that influenced the emergence and popularization of the baroque serenata at the Habsburg court, to identify the characteristic features of the genre, to show the significance of the serenata for the formation and development of musical art in Vienna.
 Methodology the methodology is based on cultural-historical and structural-functional analysis, which allow for a comprehensive consideration of the issues of art and politics and provide for highlighting among the colorful life of the Viennese aristocrats important trends that were related to the trends of the era and had a certain influence on the musical environment. Genre analysis was used to determine the specific features of works "in occasione".
 Results/findings and Conclusions. The article considers the musical and theatrical genre of the Baroque era, the serenata, popular in the aristocratic environment. The characteristic features inherent in the works of the serenate type are revealed, which makes it possible to identify them as a separate genre. The fate of the serenata at the Vienna court of the Habsburg emperors is traced, starting from the first third of the 17th to the middle of the 18th centuries, the historical and political context of the life of the Austrian sovereigns is highlighted. It is shown that the spread of the serenata genre in Vienna occurred as a result of the Italian cultural expansion associated with the prolongation of the Counter-Reformation and the frequent marriages of emperors with princesses of influential Italian houses. It is indicated that the consequences of the Italian expansion influenced the further fate of the development of musical art in Vienna. On the example of the compositions of A. Bertali, M. A. Cesti, G. Bononcini, A. Caldara and others, the place of compositions in occasione at court is shown, the variety of their genre definitions associated with certain circumstances of their performance is revealed.

Suppression of Multiple Myeloma Via Inhibition of EFNB2 Reverse Signaling

Multiple myeloma (MM) cells display a reciprocal relationship with neighboring niche cells in the bone marrow (BM), particularly vascular endothelial cells (BM ECs). This relationship drives disease initiation, progression, and therapy resistance, but the mechanisms underlying this interaction remain incompletely understood. Here, we show that silencing ephrin B2 (EFNB2) blocked MM cell proliferation and survival in vitro and abrogated MM engraftment and repopulation in vivo. EFNB2 expression is also increased in MM patients with adverse-risk cytogenetics and decreased survival, suggesting an important role for EFNB2 in MM disease progression. To identify novel regulators of MM pathogenesis, we performed transcriptome analyses of ECs from multiple human tissues and analyzed their capacity to promote MM growth. The EPH receptor, EPHB1, was overexpressed in human ECs that support MM expansion in culture. Silencing EPHB1 expression in ECs using siRNA or a lentiviral shRNA abrogated MM cell expansion compared to EC co-cultures treated with non-targeting shRNA and blocked the expansion of MM cells capable of in vivo repopulation in immune deficient mice. Additionally, transgenic Vk*MYC mice, which develop indolent murine MM through activation-induced deaminase-dependent MYC activation in germinal B cells, displayed increased expression of EPHB1 and EPHB4 in BM ECs compared to wild type BM ECs. We found that expression of EFNB2, an EPHB1/4 binding partner, is upregulated in 3 human MM cell lines and in primary MM cell populations from patients, whereas other EPHB1/4 binding partners were either not detected or expressed at a low level. shRNA-mediated inhibition of EFNB2 in MM cells blocked MM cell cycling, leading to a near 70-fold reduction in MM cell growth at day 12 of culture, and blunted MM cell repopulation when transplanted into NSG mice. In order to determine the therapeutic potential of targeting EFNB2 in MM in vivo, we transplanted irradiated NSG mice with MM cells and subsequently administered a single chain variable fragment (scFv) targeting EFNB2 on days +4, +6, +10 and +12. Mice treated with the EFNB2 scFv displayed significantly decreased engraftment of MM cells in vivo compared to control mice. MM reconstitution in vivo. Silencing EFNB2 expression in MM cells downregulated several pathways including those involved in cellular movement, cell death and survival, cellular assembly, cell cycle and DNA repair. Several STAT5 target genes were also downregulated in MM cells treated with shRNA-EFNB2, supporting the notion that STAT5 signaling is activated by ephrin B proteins (Bong et al. Proc Natl Acad Sci. 2007;104(44):17305-17310). Consistent with these findings, EFNB2 overexpression via dCas9-VPR increased MM cell survival, proliferation and STAT5 phosphorylation. Conversely, silencing EFNB2 decreased STAT5 activation, increased MM apoptosis, and decreased MM proliferation. Importantly, STAT5 inhibition in MM cells overexpressing EFNB2 blocked EFNB2-mediated MM cell proliferation, suggesting that EFNB2-mediated MM growth is dependent on STAT5. Overexpressing a mutant form of human EFNB2 with GFP replacing the intracellular cytoplasmic PDZ signaling domain did not result in cell growth comparable to overexpressing the full-length EFNB2. Silencing EPHB4, the main EFNB2 binding partner expressed on MM cells, resulted in significant impairment of growth in wild-type MM cells but not those with full-length EFNB2 overexpression. Updated downstream signaling and in vivo data of these will be presented at the meeting. Interrogation of MM clinical databases, including the Total Therapy studies (Zhan F. et al. Blood. 2006;108(6):2020-2028) and the CoMMpass data (Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation, https://research.themmrf.org/, accessed on 20 October 2021, n = 773 patients), revealed that EFNB2 expression is increased in MM patients with adverse risk cytogenetics, including t(4;14) and gain of chromosome 1q, while lower EFNB2 expression is associated with the more favorable, "standard risk" disease category, hyperdiploid MM. Increased EFNB2 expression is also associated with advanced stage disease and decreased survival in MM patients. Our analyses suggest that EFNB2 signaling represents an important new mechanistic target in MM. Figure 1View largeDownload PPTFigure 1View largeDownload PPT Close modal