Pupillary Stroop effects

We recorded the pupil diameters of participants performing the words’ color-naming Stroop task (i.e., naming the color of a word that names a color). Non-color words were used as baseline to firmly establish the effects of semantic relatedness induced by color word distractors. We replicated the classic Stroop effects of color congruency and color incongruency with pupillary diameter recordings: relative to non-color words, pupil diameters increased for color distractors that differed from color responses, while they reduced for color distractors that were identical to color responses. Analyses of the time courses of pupil responses revealed further differences between color-congruent and color-incongruent distractors, with the latter inducing a steep increase of pupil size and the former a relatively lower increase. Consistent with previous findings that have demonstrated that pupil size increases as task demands rise, the present results indicate that pupillometry is a robust measure of Stroop interference, and it represents a valuable addition to the cognitive scientist’s toolbox

MCL-1 is a prognostic indicator and drug target in breast cancer

Analysis of publicly available genomic and gene expression data demonstrates that MCL1 expression is frequently elevated in breast cancer. Distinct from other pro-survival Bcl-2 family members, the short half-life of MCL-1 protein led us to investigate MCL-1 protein expression in a breast cancer tissue microarray and correlate this with clinical data. Here, we report associations between high MCL-1 and poor prognosis in specific subtypes of breast cancer including triple-negative breast cancer, an aggressive form that lacks targeted treatment options. Deletion of MCL-1 in the mammary epithelium of genetically engineered mice revealed an absolute requirement for MCL-1 in breast tumorigenesis. The clinical applicability of these findings was tested through a combination of approaches including knock-down or inhibition of MCL-1 to show triple-negative breast cancer cell line dependence on MCL-1 in vitro and in vivo. Our data demonstrate that high MCL-1 protein expression is associated with poor outcome in breast cancer and support the therapeutic targeting of MCL-1 in this disease