5,129 research outputs found
Does comorbid anxiety counteract emotion recognition deficits in conduct disorder?
Background: Previous research has reported altered emotion recognition in both conduct disorder (CD) and anxiety disorders (ADs) - but these effects appear to be of different kinds. Adolescents with CD often show a generalised pattern of deficits, while those with ADs show hypersensitivity to specific negative emotions. Although these conditions often cooccur, little is known regarding emotion recognition performance in comorbid CD+ADs. Here, we test the hypothesis that in the comorbid case, anxiety-related emotion hypersensitivity counteracts the emotion recognition deficits typically observed in CD. Method: We compared facial emotion recognition across four groups of adolescents aged 12-18 years: those with CD alone (n = 28), ADs alone (n = 23), cooccurring CD+ADs (n = 20) and typically developing controls (n = 28). The emotion recognition task we used systematically manipulated the emotional intensity of facial expressions as well as fixation location (eye, nose or mouth region). Results: Conduct disorder was associated with a generalised impairment in emotion recognition; however, this may have been modulated by group differences in IQ. AD was associated with increased sensitivity to low-intensity happiness, disgust and sadness. In general, the comorbid CD+ADs group performed similarly to typically developing controls. Conclusions: Although CD alone was associated with emotion recognition impairments, ADs and comorbid CD+ADs were associated with normal or enhanced emotion recognition performance. The presence of comorbid ADs appeared to counteract the effects of CD, suggesting a potentially protective role, although future research should examine the contribution of IQ and gender to these effects
The absolute position of a resonance peak
It is common practice in scattering theory to correlate between the position
of a resonance peak in the cross section and the real part of a complex energy
of a pole of the scattering amplitude. In this work we show that the resonance
peak position appears at the absolute value of the pole's complex energy rather
than its real part. We further demonstrate that a local theory of resonances
can still be used even in cases previously thought impossible
Chlorpromazine for schizophrenia: a Cochrane systematic review of 50 years of randomised controlled trials
BACKGROUND:
Chlorpromazine (CPZ) remains one of the most common drugs used for people with schizophrenia worldwide, and a benchmark against which other treatments can be evaluated. Quantitative reviews are rare; this one evaluates the effects of chlorpromazine in the treatment of schizophrenia in comparison with placebo.
METHODS:
We sought all relevant randomised controlled trials (RCT) comparing chlorpromazine to placebo by electronic and reference searching, and by contacting trial authors and the pharmaceutical industry. Data were extracted from selected trials and, where possible, synthesised and random effects relative risk (RR), the number needed to treat (NNT) and their 95% confidence intervals (CI) calculated.
RESULTS:
Fifty RCTs from 1955–2000 were included with 5276 people randomised to CPZ or placebo. They constitute 2008 person-years spent in trials. Meta-analysis of these trials showed that chlorpromazine promotes a global improvement (n = 1121, 13 RCTs, RR 0.76 CI 0.7 to 0.9, NNT 7 CI 5 to 10), although a considerable placebo response is also seen. People allocated to chlorpromazine tended not to leave trials early in both the short (n = 945, 16 RCTs, RR 0.74 CI 0.5 to 1.1) and medium term (n = 1861, 25 RCTs, RR 0.79 CI 0.6 to 1.1). There were, however, many adverse effects. Chlorpromazine is sedating (n = 1242, 18 RCTs, RR 2.3 CI 1.7 to 3.1, NNH 6 CI 5 to 8), increases a person's chances of experiencing acute movement disorders, Parkinsonism and causes low blood pressure with dizziness and dry mouth.
CONCLUSION:
It is understandable why the World Health Organization (WHO) have endorsed and included chlorpromazine in their list of essential drugs for use in schizophrenia. Low- and middle-income countries may have more complete evidence upon which to base their practice compared with richer nations using recent innovations
Phenotypic Plasticity and Contemporary Evolution in Introduced Populations: Evidence from Translocated Populations of White Sands Pupfish (Cyrpinodon tularosa)
Contemporary evolution has been shown in a few studies to be an important component of colonization ability, but seldom have researchers considered whether phenotypic plasticity facilitates directional evolution from the invasion event. In the current study, we evaluated body shape divergence of the New Mexico State-threatened White Sands pupfish (Cyprinodon tularosa) that were introduced to brackish, lacustrine habitats at two different time in the recent past (approximately 30 years and 1 year previously) from the same source population (saline river environment). Pupfish body shape is correlated with environmental salinity: fish from saline habitats are characterized by slender body shapes, whereas fish from fresher, yet brackish springs are deep-bodied. In this study, lacustrine populations consisted of an approximately 30-year old population and several 1-year old populations, all introduced from the same source. The body shape divergence of the 30-year old population was significant and greater than any of the divergences of the 1-year old populations (which were for the most part not significant). Nonetheless, all body shape changes exhibited body deepening in less saline environments. We conclude that phenotypic plasticity potentially facilitates directional evolution of body deepening for introduced pupfish populations
Leaf-applied sodium chloride promotes cadmium accumulation in durum wheat grain
Cadmium (Cd) accumulation in durum wheat grain is a growing concern. Among the factors affecting Cd accumulation in plants, soil chloride (Cl) concentration plays a critical role. The effect of leaf NaCl application on grain Cd was studied in greenhouse-grown durum wheat (Triticum turgidum L. durum, cv. Balcali-2000) by immersing (10 s) intact flag leaves into Cd and/or NaCl-containing solutions for 14 times during heading and dough stages. Immersing flag leaves in solutions containing increasing amount of Cd resulted in substantial increases in grain Cd concentration. Adding NaCl alone or in combination with the Cd-containing immersion solution promoted accumulation of Cd in the grains, by up to 41%. In contrast, Zn concentrations of grains were not affected or even decreased by the NaCl treatments. This is likely due to the effect of Cl complexing Cd and reducing positive charge on the metal ion, an effect that is much smaller for Zn. Charge reduction or removal (CdCl2 0 species) would increase the diffusivity/lipophilicity of Cd and enhance its capability to penetrate the leaf epidermis and across membranes. Of even more significance to human health was the ability of Cl alone to penetrate leaf tissue and mobilize and enhance shoot Cd transfer to grains, yet reducing or not affecting Zn transfer
The UK's Global Health Respiratory Network: Improving respiratory health of the world's poorest through research collaborations.
Respiratory disorders are responsible for considerable morbidity, health care utilisation, societal costs and approximately one in five deaths worldwide [1-4]. Yet, despite this substantial health and societal burden – which particularly affects the world’s poorest populations and as such is a major contributor to global health inequalities – respiratory disorders have historically not received the
policy priority they warrant. For example, despite causing an estimated 1000 deaths per day, less than half of the world’s countries collect data on asthma prevalence (http://www.globalasthmareport.org/). This
is true for both communicable and non-communicable respiratory disorders, many of which are either amenable to treatment or preventable
Impact-parameter dependent nuclear parton distribution functions: EPS09s and EKS98s and their applications in nuclear hard processes
We determine the spatial (impact parameter) dependence of nuclear parton
distribution functions (nPDFs) using the -dependence of the spatially
independent (averaged) global fits EPS09 and EKS98. We work under the
assumption that the spatial dependence can be formulated as a power series of
the nuclear thickness functions . To reproduce the -dependence over the
entire range we need terms up to . As an outcome, we release two
sets, EPS09s (LO, NLO, error sets) and EKS98s, of spatially dependent nPDFs for
public use. We also discuss the implementation of these into the existing
calculations. With our results, the centrality dependence of nuclear
hard-process observables can be studied consistently with the globally fitted
nPDFs for the first time. As an application, we first calculate the LO nuclear
modification factor for primary partonic-jet production in
different centrality classes in Au+Au collisions at RHIC and Pb+Pb collisions
at LHC. Also the corresponding central-to-peripheral ratios are
studied. We also calculate the LO and NLO nuclear modification factors for
single inclusive neutral pion production, , at mid- and
forward rapidities in different centrality classes in d+Au collisions at RHIC.
In particular, we show that our results are compatible with the PHENIX
mid-rapidity data within the overall normalization uncertainties given by the
experiment. Finally, we show our predictions for the corresponding
modifications in the forthcoming p+Pb collisions at LHC.Comment: 36 page
Cimetidine in colorectal cancer – are the effects immunological or adhesion-mediated?
British Journal of Cancer (2002) 86, 159–160. DOI: 10.1038/sj/bjc/6600097 www.bjcancer.co
Liquid-infiltrated photonic crystals - enhanced light-matter interactions for lab-on-a-chip applications
Optical techniques are finding widespread use in analytical chemistry for
chemical and bio-chemical analysis. During the past decade, there has been an
increasing emphasis on miniaturization of chemical analysis systems and
naturally this has stimulated a large effort in integrating microfluidics and
optics in lab-on-a-chip microsystems. This development is partly defining the
emerging field of optofluidics. Scaling analysis and experiments have
demonstrated the advantage of micro-scale devices over their macroscopic
counterparts for a number of chemical applications. However, from an optical
point of view, miniaturized devices suffer dramatically from the reduced
optical path compared to macroscale experiments, e.g. in a cuvette. Obviously,
the reduced optical path complicates the application of optical techniques in
lab-on-a-chip systems. In this paper we theoretically discuss how a strongly
dispersive photonic crystal environment may be used to enhance the light-matter
interactions, thus potentially compensating for the reduced optical path in
lab-on-a-chip systems. Combining electromagnetic perturbation theory with
full-wave electromagnetic simulations we address the prospects for achieving
slow-light enhancement of Beer-Lambert-Bouguer absorption, photonic band-gap
based refractometry, and high-Q cavity sensing.Comment: Invited paper accepted for the "Optofluidics" special issue to appear
in Microfluidics and Nanofluidics (ed. Prof. David Erickson). 11 pages
including 8 figure
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