442 research outputs found
Characterization and Expression of Two cDNAs Encoding Carbonic Anhydrase in Arabidopsis thaliana
Regulation of Periplasmic Carbonic Anhydrase Expression in Chlamydomonas reinhardtii by Acetate and pH
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Learning to trust: trust and attachment in early psychosis
Background
Distrust and social dysfunction are characteristic in psychosis and may arise from attachment insecurity, which is elevated in the disorder. The relationship between trust and attachment in the early stages of psychosis is unknown, yet could help to understand interpersonal difficulties and disease progression. This study aimed to investigate whether trust is reduced in patients with early psychosis and whether this is accounted for by attachment avoidance and attachment anxiety.
Method
We used two trust games with a cooperative and unfair partner in a sample of 39 adolescents with early psychosis and 100 healthy controls.
Results
Patients had higher levels of attachment anxiety, but the groups did not differ in attachment avoidance. Basic trust was lower in patients than controls, as indicated by lower initial investments. During cooperation patients increased their trust towards levels of controls, i.e. they were able to learn and to override initial suspiciousness. Patients decreased their trust less than controls during unfair interactions. Anxious attachment was associated with higher basic trust and higher trust during unfair interactions and predicted trust independent of group status.
Discussion
Patients showed decreased basic trust but were able to learn from the trustworthy behaviour of their counterpart. Worries about the acceptance by others and low self-esteem are associated with psychosis and attachment anxiety and may explain behaviour that is focused on conciliation, rather than self-protection
Pilot-scale crossflow-microfiltration and pasteurization to remove spores of Bacillus anthracis (Sterne) from milk
High-temperature, short-time pasteurization of milk
is ineffective against spore-forming bacteria such as
Bacillus anthracis (BA), but is lethal to its vegetative
cells. Crossflow microfiltration (MF) using ceramic
membranes with a pore size of 1.4 μm has been shown
to reject most microorganisms from skim milk; and,
in combination with pasteurization, has been shown to
extend its shelf life. The objectives of this study were
to evaluate MF for its efficiency in removing spores
of the attenuated Sterne strain of BA from milk; to
evaluate the combined efficiency of MF using a 0.8-μm
ceramic membrane, followed by pasteurization (72°C,
18.6 s); and to monitor any residual BA in the permeates
when stored at temperatures of 4, 10, and 25°C
for up to 28 d. In each trial, 95 L of raw skim milk
was inoculated with about 6.5 log10 BA spores/mL of
milk. It was then microfiltered in total recycle mode
at 50°C using ceramic membranes with pore sizes of
either 0.8 μm or 1.4 μm, at crossflow velocity of 6.2 m/s
and transmembrane pressure of 127.6 kPa, conditions
selected to exploit the selectivity of the membrane.
Microfiltration using the 0.8-μm membrane removed
5.91 ± 0.05 log10 BA spores/mL of milk and the 1.4-
μm membrane removed 4.50 ± 0.35 log10 BA spores/
mL of milk. The 0.8-μm membrane showed efficient
removal of the native microflora and both membranes
showed near complete transmission of the casein proteins.
Spore germination was evident in the permeates
obtained at 10, 30, and 120 min of MF time (0.8-μm
membrane) but when stored at 4 or 10°C, spore levels
were decreased to below detection levels (≤0.3 log10
spores/mL) by d 7 or 3 of storage, respectively. Permeates
stored at 25°C showed coagulation and were
not evaluated further. Pasteurization of the permeate
samples immediately after MF resulted in additional
spore germination that was related to the length of
MF time. Pasteurized permeates obtained at 10 min of
MF and stored at 4 or 10°C showed no growth of BA
by d 7 and 3, respectively. Pasteurization of permeates
obtained at 30 and 120 min of MF resulted in spore
germination of up to 2.42 log10 BA spores/mL. Spore
levels decreased over the length of the storage period
at 4 or 10°C for the samples obtained at 30 min of MF
but not for the samples obtained at 120 min of MF.
This study confirms that MF using a 0.8-μm membrane
before high-temperature, short-time pasteurization
may improve the safety and quality of the fluid milk
supply; however, the duration of MF should be limited
to prevent spore germination following pasteurization
Understanding urbanicity: how interdisciplinary methods help to unravel the effects of the city on mental health
Twenty-first century urbanization poses increasing challenges for mental health. Epidemiological studies have shown that mental health problems often accumulate in urban areas, compared to rural areas, and suggested possible underlying causes associated with the social and physical urban environments. Emerging work indicates complex urban effects that depend on many individual and contextual factors at neighbourhood and country level and novel experimental work is starting to dissect potential underlying mechanisms. This review summarizes findings from epidemiology and population- based studies, neuroscience, experimental, and experience-based research and illustrates how a combined approach can move the field towards an increased understanding of the urbanicity-mental health nexus
Inhibition of Progenitor Dendritic Cell Maturation by Plasma from Patients with Peripartum Cardiomyopathy: Role in Pregnancy-associated Heart Disease
Dendritic cells (DCs) play dual roles in innate and adaptive immunity based
on their functional maturity, and both innate and adaptive immune responses have
been implicated in myocardial tissue remodeling associated with
cardiomyopathies. Peripartum cardiomyopathy (PPCM) is a rare disorder which
affects women within one month antepartum to five months postpartum. A high
occurrence of PPCM in central Haiti (1 in 300 live births) provided the unique
opportunity to study the relationship of immune activation and DC maturation
to the etiology of this disorder. Plasma samples from two groups (n = 12) of
age- and parity-matched Haitian women with or without evidence of PPCM were
tested for levels of biomarkers of cardiac tissue remodeling and immune
activation. Significantly elevated levels of GM-CSF, endothelin-1, proBNP and
CRP and decreased levels of TGF- were measured in PPCM subjects relative
to controls. Yet despite these findings, in vitro maturation of normal human
cord blood derived progenitor dendritic cells (CBDCs) was significantly
reduced (p < 0.001) in the presence of plasma from PPCM patients relative
to plasma from post-partum control subjects as determined by expression of
CD80, CD86, CD83, CCR7, MHC class II and the ability of these matured CBDCs
to induce allo-responses in PBMCs. These results represent the first findings
linking inhibition of DC maturation to the dysregulation of normal physiologic
cardiac
tissue remodeling during pregnancy and the pathogenesis of PPCM
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Reading the mind in the eyes and cognitive ability in schizophrenia- and autism spectrum disorders
Background
Schizophrenia (SZ) and autism spectrum disorders (ASD) are characterized by difficulties in theory of mind (ToM). We examined group differences in performance on a ToM-related test and associations with an estimated IQ.
Methods
Participants [N = 1227, SZ (n = 563), ASD (n = 159), and controls (n = 505), 32.2% female] completed the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test (RMET) and assessments of cognitive ability. Associations between IQ and group on RMET were investigated with regression analyses.
Results
SZ (d = 0.73, p < 0.001) and ASD (d = 0.37, p < 0.001) performed significantly worse on the RMET than controls. SZ performed significantly worse than ASD (d = 0.32, p = 0.002). Adding IQ to the model, SZ (d = 0.60, p < 0.001) and ASD (d = 0.44, p < 0.001) continued to perform significantly worse than controls, but no longer differed from each other (d = 0.13, p = 0.30). Small significant negative correlations between symptom severity and RMET performance were found in SZ (PANSS positive: r = −0.10, negative: r = −0.11, both p < 0.05). A small non-significant negative correlation was found for Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule scores and RMET in ASD (r = −0.08, p = 0.34).
Conclusions
SZ and ASD are characterized by impairments in RMET. IQ contributed significantly to RMET performance and accounted for group differences in RMET between SZ and ASD. This suggests that non-social cognitive ability needs to be included in comparative studies of the two disorders
Tensile Creep and Creep-Recovery Behavior of a SiC-Fiber Si 3 N 4 -Matrix Composite
Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/65802/1/j.1151-2916.1993.tb03753.x.pd
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Intracranial and subcortical volumes in adolescents with early‐onset psychosis: A multisite mega‐analysis from the ENIGMA consortium
Early‐onset psychosis disorders are serious mental disorders arising before the age of 18 years. Here, we investigate the largest neuroimaging dataset, to date, of patients with early‐onset psychosis and healthy controls for differences in intracranial and subcortical brain volumes. The sample included 263 patients with early‐onset psychosis (mean age: 16.4 ± 1.4 years, mean illness duration: 1.5 ± 1.4 years, 39.2% female) and 359 healthy controls (mean age: 15.9 ± 1.7 years, 45.4% female) with magnetic resonance imaging data, pooled from 11 clinical cohorts. Patients were diagnosed with early‐onset schizophrenia (n = 183), affective psychosis (n = 39), or other psychotic disorders (n = 41). We used linear mixed‐effects models to investigate differences in intracranial and subcortical volumes across the patient sample, diagnostic subgroup and antipsychotic medication, relative to controls. We observed significantly lower intracranial (Cohen's d = −0.39) and hippocampal (d = −0.25) volumes, and higher caudate (d = 0.25) and pallidum (d = 0.24) volumes in patients relative to controls. Intracranial volume was lower in both early‐onset schizophrenia (d = −0.34) and affective psychosis (d = −0.42), and early‐onset schizophrenia showed lower hippocampal (d = −0.24) and higher pallidum (d = 0.29) volumes. Patients who were currently treated with antipsychotic medication (n = 193) had significantly lower intracranial volume (d = −0.42). The findings demonstrate a similar pattern of brain alterations in early‐onset psychosis as previously reported in adult psychosis, but with notably low intracranial volume. The low intracranial volume suggests disrupted neurodevelopment in adolescent early‐onset psychosis
Vietnam military service history and prostate cancer
BACKGROUND: Three decades after US and Australian forces withdrew from Vietnam, there has been much public interest in the health consequences of service in Vietnam. One controversial question is whether the risk of prostate cancer amongst Vietnam veterans is increased. This paper examines relationships between military history, family history and risk of prostate cancer in a population-based case control study. METHODS: Cases were selected from the Cancer Registry of Western Australia as incident cases of histologically-confirmed prostate cancer, and controls were age-matched and selected from the Western Australian electoral roll. Study participants were asked to report any military service history and details about that service. RESULTS: Between January 2001 and September 2002, 606 cases and 471 controls aged between 40–75 years were recruited. An increased prostate cancer risk was observed in men reporting they were deployed in Vietnam although this was not statistically significant (OR = 2.12; 95% CI 0.88–5.06). An increased risk was also observed in men reporting prostate cancer in fathers (OR = 1.90; 95% CI 1.20–3.00) or brothers (OR = 2.05; 95% CI 1.20–3.50) diagnosed with prostate cancer. CONCLUSION: These findings support a positive association between prostate cancer and military service history in the Vietnam war and a first degree relative family history of prostate cancer
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