Sirimavo Bandaranaike was born on 17 April 1916, as Sirimavo Ratwatte. Her family was part of the aristocracy. She was a Buddhist, but went to school at a convent in Colombo, Sri Lanka, where she was taught by Roman Catholic nuns. In 1940, she married Solomon Bandaranaike, who was a member of parliament at the time. He became prime minister in 1956 as the leader of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP). Sirimavo and Solomon had three children, Chandrika, Sunethra and Anura.
Sirimavo did not begin a career in politics until after her husband was shot dead on 26 September 1959. She was named successor to her husband's leadership of the party. She led that party to win elections in July 1960, promising to continue her husband's policies. Bandaranaike became Prime Minister on 21 July 1960. She was the first female prime minister in the world, and the first woman to be elected head of government.
Bandaranaike was a socialist. She continued her husband's policies of nationalising major sectors of the economy. She also brought all schools that were owned by the Roman Catholic Church under the government's control. The most famous of her early policies was the Sinhala Only Act, also started by her husband but never finished. This included a plan to wikt:repatriate, send Tamil residents to India (get them Indian citizenship and deport them). It also made Sinhala the state's only official language by removing English. This was seen as discriminatory and was the beginning of human rights protests and Tamil militancy.
The government's takeover of foreign businesses, particularly petroleum companies, upset Britain and the United States, who both ended aid to Sri Lanka. As a result, Bandaranaike made a closer relationship with China and the Soviet Union. In 1962, Christian officers of the military made an unsuccessful attempt at a coup d'état. Bandaranaike lost a vote of confidence in 1964, and her party was defeated in the resulting elections in 1965. Before she was replaced, Bandaranaike's government signed an agreement with India over the status of about one million Tamils: 600,000 were to be granted Indian citizenship and repatriated, and 375,000 were to be granted Sri Lankan citizenship.
Bandaranaike became prime minister again in the 1970 elections. military aid from India and Pakistan.
A new constitution was introduced in 1972. The monarchy was abolished, and the Commonwealth realm known as Ceylon was replaced by the modern republic of Sri Lanka. The President of Sri Lanka replaced Queen Elizabeth II as head of state.
During her second term, Bandaranaike became more and more intolerant of criticism. She forced critical media outlets to shut down. She also nationalised the country's largest newspaper, "Lake House". Bandaranaike was chosen chairman of the Non-Aligned Movement in 1976. Despite success in foreign affairs, she was losing popular support in Sri Lanka very quickly. Her government was accused of corruption while the economy was quickly declining. Elections were scheduled to be held in 1975, but Bandaranaike used a clause of the new constitution to delay them indefinitely. The elections took place in 1977, and her party was defeated severely. In 1980, Bandaranaike was charged with abusing her power for delaying the elections. She was forced out of her seat in parliament and banned from public office for seven years.
Bandaranaike stayed as leader of the SLFP despite losing every general election in the next ten years. Her party led a coalition (the People's Alliance) to win the general elections in 1994. Bandaranaike's daughter, Chandrika, became prime minister, and was then elected president the same year. Bandaranaike became prime minister again, but the constitution had changed since her last term. As prime minister she was now subordinate to her daughter, the President. She stayed in office until a few months before her death, but had little real power. She resigned on 10 August 2000. Exactly two months later she died, aged 84, of a heart attack.
Protein folding
Protein folding is the process by which a protein gets its functional shape or 'conformation'. It is mainly a self-organising process. Starting from a random coil, polypeptides fold into their characteristic working shape. The structure is held together by hydrogen bonds.
The stages are:
Without its correct three-dimensional structure a protein does not work. However, some parts of proteins may not fold: this is normal.
If proteins do not fold into their native shape, they are inactive and are usually toxic. Several diseases are believed to result from misfolded proteins. Many allergies are caused by the folding of the proteins, for the immune system does not produce antibodies for all possible protein structures.
On 30 November 2020, the process was solved by artificial intelligence company DeepMind.
Chaperonins are large proteins which help the folding of some proteins after synthesis. Chaperones in general were first discovered helping histones and DNA join up to form nucleosomes. Nucleosomes are the builing blocks for chromosomes. It is now clear that this is the way many cell organelles are built up.
Anfinsen's dogma
Anfinsen's dogma is a hypothesis in molecular biology suggested by Christian Anfinsen. The idea is that a protein folding into its native structure is done automatically by the protein's amino acid sequence. It is only true for some proteins. For other proteins, chaperones are needed.
Anfinsen shared the 1972 Nobel Prize for Chemistry for his work on the structure of the enzyme ribonuclease A. The dogma suggests that, in the conditions at which folding occurs, the native structure is a unique and stable state.
There are three conditions:
How the protein reaches this structure is the subject of the field of protein folding, which has a related dogma called Levinthal's paradox. The Levinthal paradox states that the number of possible conformations available to a given protein is astronomically large, such that even a small protein of 100 residues would require more time than the universe has existed to explore all possible conformations (10 seconds) and choose the appropriate one.
Prions are an exception to Anfinsen's dogma. Prions are stable conformations of proteins which differ from the native folding state. In Bovine spongiform encephalopathy (Mad Cow Disease), native proteins re-fold into a different stable conformation, which causes fatal amyloid buildup. Other amyloid diseases, including Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease, are also exceptions to Anfinsen's dogma.
Murder of Polly Klaas
Polly Klaas (January 3, 1981 - October 1, 1993) is an American murder victim. She was abducted from her California home by Richard Allen Davis (born 1954) during what had been a slumber party with two other girls. Davis later strangled her. He was convicted of her kidnapping and murder and was given a death sentence. He is on death row. Actress Winona Ryder offered two hundred thousand in reward for the return of Klaas; after Klaas was killed, Ryder dedicated a movie version of "Little Women" for her memory.
Vanessa Hessler
Vanessa Hessler (Rome, January 21, 1988) is an American-Italian model and actress.
She began modeling when she was 15. Hessler has appeared in many publications in Italy and Germany.
Hessler's father is American. He mother is Italian. She lived in Rome until she was 8, then moved to Washington DC. She lived in Rockville, MD as a teenager. In 2002 she returned to Italy. She speaks Italian, English and French. She lives in Rome and Washington
Hessler has been in commercials for Baby Star, Nara Camicie and Gilli.
Hessler planned to work in television. In early 2006, she wanted to replace Alessia Marcuzzi to host "Le Iene". She lost the job to Cristina Chiabotto.
Hessler has appeared in advertising for GUESS, Calvin Klein, Giorgio Armani, L'Oréal, and Ferrero SpA.