A Contrastive Analysis of Emotional Terms in Bed-Night Stories Across Two Languages: Does it Affect Learners' Pragmatic Knowledge of Controlling Emotions? Seeking Implications to Teach English to EFL Learners.

The present investigation aimed at studying emotional terms (ETs) in Persian and English bed-night stories for children by adopting a contrastive analysis approach within two phases. Emotional terms were categorized into two theoretical models (tokens and types) in phase one of the study, and in the second phase, the effect of teaching emotive narratives on learners' pragmatic knowledge of controlling emotions was scrutinized. To this aim, 30 English bed-night stories (15 in English and 15 in Persian) with similar lengths and difficulty levels were selected randomly. In the first phase of the study, the frequency of occurrence of emotional terms (ETs) in English and Persian English bed-night stories were compared. The results indicated that there were not statistically significant differences between the two groups of stories in terms of the emotion tokens utilized in both languages. Nevertheless, there was a major disparity in the number of ETs found in English and Persian bed-night tales concerning various types of emotions. During the second phase of the study, a group of 25 EFL learners were explicitly taught emotive English bed-night tales. A pre-test post-test design using a Discourse Completion Test was used to seek the efficacy of teaching ETs on the learners' pragmatic knowledge of controlling emotions. Findings showed that teaching emotive narratives enhanced students' pragmatic knowledge of emotions significantly. In light of the findings of the study, a number of conclusions are drawn and the implications are discussed.

Recent advances in neurogenic and neuroprotective effects of curcumin through the induction of neural stem cells.

Curcumin is extensively used in the prevention and treatment of various diseases. Recently, growing attention has been paid to the use of curcumin as a neurogenic and neuroprotective agent. This review study is aimed to collect and categorize the recent findings regarding the effects of curcumin on various neurological diseases through the induction of neural stem cell proliferation and differentiation. In addition, we have discussed the molecular mechanisms modulated by curcumin that contribute to this efficacy and have summarized the recent advancements in the novel delivery strategies used to improve the induction of neural stem cells by curcumin.

Induction of JAK2/STAT3 pathway contributes to protective effects of different therapeutics against myocardial ischemia/reperfusion.

Insufficiency in coronary blood supply results in myocardial ischemia and consequently, various clinical syndromes and irreversible injuries. Myocardial damage occurs as a result of two processes during acute myocardial infarction (MI): ischemia and subsequent reperfusion. According to the available evidence, oxidative stress, excessive inflammation reaction, reactive oxygen species (ROS) generation, and apoptosis are crucial players in the pathogenesis of myocardial ischemia/reperfusion (IR) injury. There is emerging evidence that Janus tyrosine kinase 2 (JAK2) signal transducer and activator of the transcription 3 (STAT3) pathway offers cardioprotection against myocardial IR injury. This article reviews therapeutics that exert cardioprotective effects against myocardial IR injury through induction of JAK2/STAT3 pathway.

Protective effect of luteolin against chemical and natural toxicants by targeting NF-κB pathway.

Humans are continuously exposed to environmental, occupational, consumer and household products, food, and pharmaceutical substances. Luteolin, a flavone from the flavonoids family of compounds, is found in different fruits and vegetables. LUT is a strong anti-inflammatory (via inhibition of NF-κB, ERK1/2, MAPK, JNK, IL-6, IL-8, and TNF-α) and antioxidant agent (reducing ROS and enhancement of endogenous antioxidants). LUT can chelate transition metal ions responsible for ROS generation and consequently repress lipoxygenase. It has been proven that NF-κB, as a commom cellular pathway plays a considerable role in the progression of inflammatory process and stimulates the expression of genes encoding inducible pro-inflammatory enzymes (iNOS and COX-2) and cytokines including IL-1ß, IL-6, and TNF-α. This review summarizes the available literature discussing LUT and its potential protective role against pharmaceuticals-, metals-, and environmental compounds-induced toxicities. Furthermore, the review explains the involved protective mechanisms, especially inhibition of the NF-κB pathway.