Incomprehensible emotions : a neuropsychological perspective on alexithymia

Aleksytymia jest określana jako zespół względnie stałych własności jednostki, przejawiający się głównie trudnościami w umysłowym odzwierciedlaniu własnych emocji. Zawiera składniki zaliczane do wymiaru poznawczego, obejmujące trudności w identyfikowaniu, werbalizowaniu i analizowaniu własnych uczuć, oraz komponenty tworzące wymiar afektywny, czyli słabą pobudliwość emocjonalną oraz ograniczone zdolności wyobrażeniowe. U osób z wysokim poziomem aleksytymii stwierdza się deficyty regulacji emocjonalnej i zwiększone ryzyko wystąpienia zaburzeń psychicznych, zwłaszcza depresyjnych i lękowych. Rozpowszechnienie aleksytymii ocenia się na ok. 10% w populacji ogólnej i ok. 20% wśród pacjentów z zaburzeniami psychicznymi. W pierwszej części artykułu przedstawiono związki aleksytymii z zaburzeniami psychicznymi. Następnie dokonano przeglądu wyników badań nad mózgowymi korelatami i mechanizmami aleksytymii ze szczególnym uwzględnieniem technik neuroobrazowania funkcjonalnego. Komponenty aleksytymii należące do jej poznawczego i afektywnego wymiaru wykazały związki z aktywnością odmiennych struktur mózgowych, a wzorzec zależności okazał się częściowo zróżnicowany ze względu na znak prezentowanych w badaniach bodźców emocjonalnych. Przedstawione powyżej zależności wskazują na dużą złożoność neuropsychologicznych mechanizmów aleksytymii. Wyniki omówionych badań pozwalają na dokonanie cennego wglądu w możliwe neuropsychologiczne mechanizmy aleksytymii, jednak należy je uznać za niewystarczające do ich pełnego zidentyfikowania. Na zakończenie zaproponowano konkretne metodologiczne zalecenia dla przyszłych badań, jak również możliwe implikacje terapeutyczne rezultatów badań neuroobrazowych dotyczących osób z wysokim poziomem aleksytymii.Alexithymia is defined as a syndrome of relatively constant individual characteristics, manifested primarily in problems with mental reflection on one’s emotions. It embraces the components included in the cognitive dimension, involving difficulties in identifying, verbalizing and analysing one’s feelings, as well as the components of the affective dimension, namely weak emotional arousability and constricted imaginal capacities. Among individuals with a high level of alexithymia, disturbed emotion regulation and increased risk of developing mental health problems, depressive and anxiety disorders, in particular, are found. The prevalence of alexithymia is estimated at approximately 10% in the general population and over 20% in the clinical population. The first part of the article covers the relation of alexithymia to mental disorders. Subsequently, the evidence of neural correlates and mechanisms of alexithymia is reviewed, with particular focus on functional neuroimaging studies. Cognitive and affective components of alexithymia were found to be associated with activation of different brain structures. Furthermore, the pattern of those relations was found to vary depending on the valence of presented emotional stimuli. The foregoing associations indicate great complexity of the neuropsychological underpinnings of alexithymia. The discussed evidence provides a valuable insight into the possible neuropsychological mechanisms of alexithymia. Nevertheless, it should be considered insufficient for their complete identification. Finally, specific methodological recommendations for further research, as well as some possible therapeutic implications of the results of neuroimaging studies on alexithymia, are offered

The degree of approximation of functions from exponential weight spaces

This paper presents a study of the approximation properties of modified Szász-Mirakyan operators for functions from exponential weight spaces. We present theorems giving the degree of approximation by these operators using a modulus of continuity

Approximation of functions of two variables from exponential weight spaces

In this paper we study approximative properties of modified Szasz-Mirakyan operators for functions of two variables from exponential weight spaces. We present theorems giving a degree of approximation by these operators for exponential bounded functions

Approximation theorems for modified Szasz-Mirakjan operators in polynomial weight spaces

In this paper we will study properties of Szasz-Mirakjan type operators A_n^ν , B_n^ ν defined by modified Bessel function I_ν . We shall present theorems giving a degree of approximation for these operators

Das Zweitwohnungsgesetz und sein Einfluss auf lokale Wachstumskoalitionen : Erste Überlegungen am Fallbeispiel Oberengadin

2012 nahm die Schweizer Stimmbevölkerung mit einer knappen Mehrheit von 50,6 Prozent die Volksinitiative «Schluss mit dem uferlosen Bau von Zweitwohnungen!» an. Die mögliche Auswirkung des neuen Gesetzes auf das Langzeit Entwicklungs-Modell von Schweizer Alpendestinationen hat die Forschungsstelle Tourismus (CRED-T) in Zusammenarbeit mit dem CRED-Geographie (Gruppe Raumentwicklung und -planung) untersucht. Basierend auf der «Urban Regime Theory» wurden fünf Faktoren eruiert, die zu einer Schwächung der oft dominanten Wachstumskoalitionen beitragen können und dadurch eine Auswirkung auf die Entwicklung von Zweitwohnungen haben. Die Analyse wurde durchgeführt unter der Prämisse, dass es in den alpinen Gebieten häufig eine Wachstumskoalition gibt, welche bei der wirtschaftlichen Entwicklung auf die Ausschöpfung von Bodenrenten fokussiert. Als exemplarisches Fallbeispiel von alpinen Gebieten wurde das Oberengadin untersucht. Obwohl das neue Gesetz durch eine direkte Regulierung der Ausschöpfung von Bodenrenten durchaus Potential zur Abschwächung von lokalen Wachstumskoalitionen aufweist, sprechen die verbleibenden vier Faktoren eher für ein sich fortsetzendes Bestehen solch starker Koalitionen, was Bauentwicklungen in den alpinen Regionen weiter voranschreiten lässt

Prediction of Means and Variances of Crosses With Genome-Wide Marker Effects in Barley

Background: The expected genetic variance is an important criterion for the selection of crossing partners which will produce superior combinations of genotypes in their progeny. The advent of molecular markers has opened up new vistas for obtaining precise predictors for the genetic variance of a cross, but fast prediction methods that allow plant breeders to select crossing partners based on already available data from their breeding programs without complicated calculations or simulation of breeding populations are still lacking. The main objective of the present study was to demonstrate the practical applicability of an analytical approach for the selection of superior cross combinations with experimental data from a barley breeding program. We used genome-wide marker effects to predict the yield means and genetic variances of 14 DH families resulting from crosses of four donor lines with five registered elite varieties with the genotypic information of the parental lines. For the validation of the predicted parameters, the analytical approach was extended by the masking variance as a major component of phenotypic variance. The predicted parameters were used to fit normal distribution curves of the phenotypic values and to conduct an Anderson-Darling goodness-of-fit test for the observed phenotypic data of the 14 DH families from the field trial.Results: There was no evidence that the observed phenotypic values deviated from the predicted phenotypic normal distributions in 13 out of 14 crosses. The correlations between the observed and the predicted means and the observed and predicted variances were r = 0.95 and r = 0.34, respectively. After removing two crosses with downward outliers in the phenotypic data, the correlation between the observed and predicted variances increased to r = 0.76. A ranking of the 14 crosses based on the sum of predicted mean and genetic variance identified the 50% best crosses from the field trial correctly.Conclusions: We conclude that the prediction accuracy of the presented approach is sufficiently high to identify superior crosses even with limited phenotypic data. We therefore expect that the analytical approach based on genome-wide marker effects is applicable in a wide range of breeding programs

The Amino-Terminus of Nitric Oxide Sensitive Guanylyl Cyclase α1 Does Not Affect Dimerization but Influences Subcellular Localization

BACKGROUND: Nitric oxide sensitive guanylyl cyclase (NOsGC) is a heterodimeric enzyme formed by an α- and a β₁-subunit. A splice variant (C-α₁) of the α₁-subunit, lacking at least the first 236 amino acids has been described by Sharina et al. 2008 and has been shown to be expressed in differentiating human embryonic cells. Wagner et al. 2005 have shown that the amino acids 61-128 of the α₁-subunit are mandatory for quantitative heterodimerization implying that the C-α₁-splice variant should lose its capacity to dimerize quantitatively. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: In the current study we demonstrate preserved quantitative dimerization of the C-α₁-splice by co-purification with the β₁-subunit. In addition we used fluorescence resonance energy transfer (FRET) based on fluorescence lifetime imaging (FLIM) using fusion proteins of the β₁-subunit and the α₁-subunit or the C-α₁ variant with ECFP or EYFP. Analysis of the respective combinations in HEK-293 cells showed that the fluorescence lifetime was significantly shorter (≈0.3 ns) for α₁/β₁ and C-α₁/β₁ than the negative control. In addition we show that lack of the amino-terminus in the α₁ splice variant directs it to a more oxidized subcellular compartment. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: We conclude that the amino-terminus of the α₁-subunit is dispensable for dimerization in-vivo and ex-vivo, but influences the subcellular trafficking

A genome-wide association study of anorexia nervosa

Anorexia nervosa (AN) is a complex and heritable eating disorder characterized by dangerously low body weight. Neither candidate gene studies nor an initial genome wide association study (GWAS) have yielded significant and replicated results. We performed a GWAS in 2,907 cases with AN from 14 countries (15 sites) and 14,860 ancestrally matched controls as part of the Genetic Consortium for AN (GCAN) and the Wellcome Trust Case Control Consortium 3 (WTCCC3). Individual association analyses were conducted in each stratum and meta-analyzed across all 15 discovery datasets. Seventy-six (72 independent) SNPs were taken forward for in silico (two datasets) or de novo (13 datasets) replication genotyping in 2,677 independent AN cases and 8,629 European ancestry controls along with 458 AN cases and 421 controls from Japan. The final global meta-analysis across discovery and replication datasets comprised 5,551 AN cases and 21,080 controls. AN subtype analyses (1,606 AN restricting; 1,445 AN binge-purge) were performed. No findings reached genome-wide significance. Two intronic variants were suggestively associated: rs9839776 (P=3.01×10−7) in SOX2OT and rs17030795 (P=5.84×10−6) in PPP3CA. Two additional signals were specific to Europeans: rs1523921 (P=5.76×10−6) between CUL3 and FAM124B and rs1886797 (P=8.05×10−6) near SPATA13. Comparing discovery to replication results, 76% of the effects were in the same direction, an observation highly unlikely to be due to chance (P= 4×10−6), strongly suggesting that true findings exist but that our sample, the largest yet reported, was underpowered for their detection. The accrual of large genotyped AN case-control samples should be an immediate priority for the field

A genome-wide association study of anorexia nervosa suggests a risk locus implicated in dysregulated leptin signaling

J. Kaprio, A. Palotie, A. Raevuori-Helkamaa ja S. Ripatti ovat työryhmän Eating Disorders Working Group of the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium jäseniä. Erratum in: Sci Rep. 2017 Aug 21;7(1):8379, doi: 10.1038/s41598-017-06409-3We conducted a genome-wide association study (GWAS) of anorexia nervosa (AN) using a stringently defined phenotype. Analysis of phenotypic variability led to the identification of a specific genetic risk factor that approached genome-wide significance (rs929626 in EBF1 (Early B-Cell Factor 1); P = 2.04 x 10(-7); OR = 0.7; 95% confidence interval (CI) = 0.61-0.8) with independent replication (P = 0.04), suggesting a variant-mediated dysregulation of leptin signaling may play a role in AN. Multiple SNPs in LD with the variant support the nominal association. This demonstrates that although the clinical and etiologic heterogeneity of AN is universally recognized, further careful sub-typing of cases may provide more precise genomic signals. In this study, through a refinement of the phenotype spectrum of AN, we present a replicable GWAS signal that is nominally associated with AN, highlighting a potentially important candidate locus for further investigation.Peer reviewe