Difficulty in disengaging from threat and temperamental negative affectivity in early life: A longitudinal study of infants aged 12–36 months

BACKGROUND: Attention disengagement is reportedly influenced by perceiving a fearful facial expression even in the first year of life. In the present study, we examined whether individual differences in disengaging from fearful expressions predict temperamental negative affectivity. METHOD: Twenty-six infants were studied longitudinally at 12, 18, 24, and 36 months, using an overlap paradigm and two temperament questionnaires: the Japanese versions of the revised Infant Behavior Questionnaire and Early Childhood Behavior Questionnaire. RESULTS: The infants fixated significantly more frequently to fearful than to happy or neutral faces. The attentional bias to threat (i.e., the number of fixed responses on fearful faces divided by the total number of fixed responses on faces) at 12 months was significantly positively correlated with negative affect at 12 months, and its relations with negative affect measured later in development was in the expected positive direction at each age. In addition, a moderation analysis indicates that the orienting network and not the executive network marginally moderated the relation between early attentional bias and later fear. CONCLUSIONS: The results suggest that at 12 months, infants with more negative affectivity exhibit greater difficulty in disengaging their attention from fearful faces. We also found evidence that the association between parent-reported fear and disengagement might be modulated in the second year, perhaps because of the differences in temperamental control networks

Infant eye and head movements toward the side opposite the cue in the anti-saccade paradigm

BACKGROUND: The anti-saccade task, when people must respond in the direction opposite to a visual stimulus, has been used as a marker of operation of the frontal cortical oculomotor area. However, early development of oculomotor control has been little studied with the infant anti-saccade paradigm, and a few studies did not recognize anti-saccades in infants in light of the results of adult anti-saccade. Since the characteristics of infant eye movements are little known, applying the criteria used in adult study is by no means the best way to study infant anti-saccade. As it is indicated that coordinated eye and head movements often enable infants to control the direction of their gaze, head movements should be examined as an infant orienting response. The aim of this study was to address how infants used eye and head movements during the anti-saccade paradigm. To distinguish infants' responses, we also investigated eye and head movements during a task for an inhibition of return. Inhibition of return, in which delayed responses occur in the direction to which attention had previously been oriented, has been thought to mark activity of the superior colliculus. Since the superior colliculus is thought to develop much earlier in life than the frontal lobes, we thought it useful to compare these task performances during infancy. METHODS: Infants were divided into three groups according to age. Anti-saccade and inhibition-of-return tasks were given. Their eye and head movements during tasks were independently recorded by the corneal reflection method in the head-free condition. RESULTS: Younger infants tended to initiate eye movement less than older ones in both tasks. In the anti-saccade task, responses opposite to the cue tended to show longer latency than responses to the cue. Infants made faster responses toward the side opposite the cue when it was to the right than when it was left of fixation. Regarding the comparison of responses toward the side opposite the cue between two tasks, the leftward eye movement was faster than the leftward head movements in the inhibition-of-return task, while no difference of latency was observed between eye and head movements in the anti-saccade task. A qualitative analysis of the trajectory of these responses revealed that head movement trajectories were steeper in the anti-saccade than in the inhibition-of-return task. CONCLUSION: Younger infants move head and eyes together, with head movements frequently starting first. On the other hand, both the leftward latency difference between eye and head and gentle trajectories of head in inhibition of return indicate that eye movements are more predominant over head movements in the inhibition-of-return task than in the anti-saccade task. This would suggest an earlier developing inhibition-of-return mechanism

The temporal relationship between reduction of early imitative responses and the development of attention mechanisms

BACKGROUND: To determine whether early imitative responses fade out following the maturation of attentional mechanisms, the relationship between primitive imitation behaviors and the development of attention was examined in 4-month-old infants. They were divided into high and low imitators, based on an index of imitation. The status of attention was assessed by studying inhibition of return (IOR). Nine-month-old infants were also tested to confirm the hypothesis. RESULTS: The IOR latency data replicate previous results that infants get faster to produce a covert shift of attention with increasing age. However, those 4-month-olds who showed less imitation had more rapid saccades to the cue before target presentation. CONCLUSION: The cortical control of saccade planning appears to be related to an apparent drop in early imitation. We interpret the results as suggesting a relationship between the status of imitation and the neural development of attention-related eye movement

Magnetization Curves of the Reentrant-Spin-Glass Fe_<0.65>Mn_<0.35>TiO_3 : Dependence on the Sweep Rate of Magnetic Fields(Magnetism)

The magnetization curves of the reentrant-spin-glass Fe_Mn_TiO_3 have been observed at 4.2 K and 1.4 K in applied fields with various sweep rates. Depending on the sweep rates and temperatures, the anomalous jumps of the magnetizations towards the values of the field-cooled-magnetization M^ are observed. This phenomenon is interpreted to be closely related to the properties of the spin-glass state

monochorionic dizygotic twin with some blood chimerism

We report a very rare case of monochorionic dizygotic twins conceived spontaneously. The fetuses were sex-discordant in ultrasonography in spite of monochorionic twins. After birth, the girl and boy showed normal phenotypes but they showed blood chimerism in karyotype and blood group type

Intracellular Group A Streptococcus Induces Golgi Fragmentation To Impair Host Defenses through Streptolysin O and NAD-Glycohydrolase

人食いバクテリアの新たな免疫回避機構を発見. 京都大学プレスリリース. 2021-02-15.Group A Streptococcus (GAS; Streptococcus pyogenes) is a major human pathogen that causes streptococcal pharyngitis, skin and soft tissue infections, and life-threatening conditions such as streptococcal toxic-shock syndrome. During infection, GAS not only invades diverse host cells but also injects effector proteins such as NAD-glycohydrolase (Nga) into the host cells through a streptolysin O (SLO)-dependent mechanism without invading the cells; Nga and SLO are two major virulence factors that are associated with increased bacterial virulence. Here, we have shown that the invading GAS induces fragmentation of the Golgi complex and inhibits anterograde transport in the infected host cells through the secreted toxins SLO and Nga. GAS infection-induced Golgi fragmentation required both bacterial invasion and SLO-mediated Nga translocation into the host cytosol. The cellular Golgi network is critical for the sorting of surface molecules and is thus essential for the integrity of the epithelial barrier and for the immune response of macrophages to pathogens. In epithelial cells, inhibition of anterograde trafficking by invading GAS and Nga resulted in the redistribution of E-cadherin to the cytosol and an increase in bacterial translocation across the epithelial barrier. Moreover, in macrophages, interleukin-8 secretion in response to GAS infection was found to be suppressed by intracellular GAS and Nga. Our findings reveal a previously undescribed bacterial invasion-dependent function of Nga as well as a previously unrecognized GAS-host interaction that is associated with GAS pathogenesis

ビセイブツ ノ プロテアーゼインヒビター カッセイ ノ ブンプ

（1）トリプシンの阻害活性は、細菌の菌体に広く分布していた。また、分泌性のものは活性は弱いが、CandidaとProtetcsにおいて非透析性の活性成分の存在が認められた。 ②パパインの阻害活性は、菌体内、分泌性のいずれの場合も、PenicilliumやMonαSCZtSなどのカビ類で多くみられた。 ③培養液がペプシン阻害活性を示すケースが見られ、大部分はアンモニアの生成によると思われた。菌体抽出物では3種の細菌でペプシン阻害活性が検出された。 （4）サーモライシンの阻害はいずれの微生物においても微弱であった

Prenatal Diagnosis of Ventriculocoronary Communication in a Fetus with Pulmonary Atresia with Intact Ventricular Septum : a Case Report

純型肺動脈閉鎖（pulmonary atresia with intact ventricular septum：以下PAIVS）の治療方針の決定には右室の大きさ，肺動脈の閉鎖様式に加え，冠動脈が右室内腔と繋がる異常交通（類洞交通）の有無や程度が重要とされる．今回胎児期に類洞交通を評価できたPAIVSの一例を経験したので報告する． 超音波検査にて胎児の右室が小さいことを指摘され妊娠23週に紹介となった．初診時の超音波検査にてPAIVSと診断した．また右室心尖部に心筋を貫通する両方向性血流を認め，類洞交通の存在が疑われた．その後冠動脈を起始部から系統的に描出することで，左冠動脈前下行枝からの大きな類洞交通であることを確認した．右室が高度の低形成でかつ大きな類洞交通があることから単心室修復が必要となることが予想された．児は出生後，心臓超音波検査，心臓血管造影にて同様の診断がなされ，単心室修復に至った． 胎児超音波で冠動脈を起始部から系統的に観察することで，類洞交通の評価が可能となりそれにより，出生前から治療方針の検討ができ，家族への説明に有用であった．Abnormal coronary connections between the ventricles and aorta can have significant impacts on myocardial perfusion and consequently on the approach for surgical intervention．Presence of ventriculocoronary communication（VCC），or ventriculo-coronary fistula，may be critical to peri- and postpartum management．We report the prenatal diagnosis of VCC associated with pulmonary atresia with intact ventricular septum（PAVIS）． A24-year-old woman was referred to our institution at 23＋3weeks’ gestation because of an abnormally small right ventricle（RV）in the fetus．Fetal echocardiography showed a small RV with trivial diastolic filling flow，an intact ventricular septum，and a hypoplastic pulmonary trunk with retrograde perfusion through the ductus arteriosus．Color and pulsed Doppler sonography revealed bidirectional flow at the right ventricular apex，which was confirmed as large VCC between the left anterior descending（LAD）coronary artery and RV by delineating coronary arteries from the aortic origin with color Doppler sonography． A3，070g male infant was vaginally delivered at 40＋1 weeks’ gestation．Postnatal echocardiography，computed tomography and angiography confirmed PAIVS and large VCC between the LAD coronary artery and RV．A BIalock-Taussig shunt was placed on postnatal day 11．Subsequently，a Glenn shunt was inserted at the age of 13 months，and Fontan procedure was performed at the age of 3 years． In summary，we accurately diagnosed fetal PAIVS and VCC accurately by meticulous echocardiography．Thus，we could provide appropriate counseling to parents and optimize peri- and postpartum management