The Effects of Transposing Mitochondria From Drug Resistant to Drug Sensitive Breast Cancer Cells

Faculty adviser: Andrew SkildumThis research was supported by the Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (UROP)

Lateralized connectivity in the alpha band between parietal and occipital sources when spatial attention is externally and internally directed

External spatial attention refers to the selection of currently present information at a specific external location, whereas internal spatial attention refers to the selection of stored information in short-term memory initially presented at a specific location. Electroencephalographic (EEG) and magnetoencephalographic (MEG) studies revealed that these two types of selection may involve the same underlying neural mechanism as in both cases a reduction in posterior alpha power was observed. However, the posterior alpha rhythm may consist of different components, which can even be related to opposite behavioral effects. Furthermore, the employed paradigms to study both selection processes are often quite different, which makes a proper comparison cumbersome. In the current EEG experiment, two-stimulus displays were preceded or followed by non-spatial pre-cues and post-cues that specified the target, thereby minimizing procedural differences. Results of time-frequency analyses revealed that in both cue conditions the selection of relevant information was associated with an increase of ipsilateral vs. contralateral posterior alpha power. An opposite effect, an increase in contralateral vs. ipsilateral posterior power was observed in the theta-band, but only in the pre-cue condition. This activity was related to stimulus onset and likely reflects target selection. To assess attention-related connectivity, we separated posterior alpha power in a medial-parietal and two parieto-occipital sources and computed alpha phase coherence between these sources. Results revealed that in both cue conditions, increased ipsilateral vs. contralateral connectivity in the alpha band was present between the medial-parietal and parieto-occipital sources. The results seem to reflect a modulation from parietal to occipital areas, providing support for the view that internal and external spatial attention share a common neural mechanism

The liver X receptor pathway is highly upregulated in rheumatoid arthritis synovial macrophages and potentiates TLR-driven cytokine release

<p>Objectives: Macrophages are central to the inflammatory processes driving rheumatoid arthritis (RA) synovitis. The molecular pathways that are induced in synovial macrophages and thereby promote RA disease pathology remain poorly understood.</p> <p>Methods: We used microarray to characterise the transcriptome of synovial fluid (SF) macrophages compared with matched peripheral blood monocytes from patients with RA (n=8).</p> <p>Results: Using in silico pathway mapping, we found that pathways downstream of the cholesterol activated liver X receptors (LXRs) and those associated with Toll-like receptor (TLR) signalling were upregulated in SF macrophages. Macrophage differentiation and tumour necrosis factor α promoted the expression of LXRα. Furthermore, in functional studies we demonstrated that activation of LXRs significantly augmented TLR-driven cytokine and chemokine secretion.</p> <p>Conclusions: The LXR pathway is the most upregulated pathway in RA synovial macrophages and activation of LXRs by ligands present within SF augments TLR-driven cytokine secretion. Since the natural agonists of LXRs arise from cholesterol metabolism, this provides a novel mechanism that can promote RA synovitis.</p&gt

The Relative Composition of the Inflammatory Infiltrate as an Additional Tool for Synovial Tissue Classification

10.1371/journal.pone.0072494PLoS ONE88-POLN

Demographic, clinical and antibody characteristics of patients with digital ulcers in systemic sclerosis: data from the DUO Registry

OBJECTIVES: The Digital Ulcers Outcome (DUO) Registry was designed to describe the clinical and antibody characteristics, disease course and outcomes of patients with digital ulcers associated with systemic sclerosis (SSc). METHODS: The DUO Registry is a European, prospective, multicentre, observational, registry of SSc patients with ongoing digital ulcer disease, irrespective of treatment regimen. Data collected included demographics, SSc duration, SSc subset, internal organ manifestations, autoantibodies, previous and ongoing interventions and complications related to digital ulcers. RESULTS: Up to 19 November 2010 a total of 2439 patients had enrolled into the registry. Most were classified as either limited cutaneous SSc (lcSSc; 52.2%) or diffuse cutaneous SSc (dcSSc; 36.9%). Digital ulcers developed earlier in patients with dcSSc compared with lcSSc. Almost all patients (95.7%) tested positive for antinuclear antibodies, 45.2% for anti-scleroderma-70 and 43.6% for anticentromere antibodies (ACA). The first digital ulcer in the anti-scleroderma-70-positive patient cohort occurred approximately 5 years earlier than the ACA-positive patient group. CONCLUSIONS: This study provides data from a large cohort of SSc patients with a history of digital ulcers. The early occurrence and high frequency of digital ulcer complications are especially seen in patients with dcSSc and/or anti-scleroderma-70 antibodies