Comparing self-perception of attractiveness and overall life satisfaction : the differences between men and women

This study examined differences in self-perceived attractiveness and life satisfaction. The participants included 190 college students (108 females and 62 males). It was hypothesized that a positive correlation between perceived attractiveness and life satisfaction would exist; sex differences on attractiveness would exist with men rating themselves as more attractive than women rating themselves; attractiveness is a better predictor of life satisfaction for females than for males; and sex differences on partners’ level of attractiveness will exist, with men rating their partners as more attractive than women rating their partners. Participants completed the Estimating Physical Attractiveness Scale, the Satisfaction With Scale, and a demographics form. A positive correlation between self-perceived attractiveness and life satisfaction was found for both males and females. However, this correlation was weak. In addition, self-perceived attractiveness was not found to be a better predictor of life satisfaction for women than for men. Men and women’s ratings of self-perception of attractiveness did not significantly differ. In addition, both men and women rated their partner as more attractive then themselves, but men rated their partners as more physically attractive than women rated their partners. Exploratory analyses revealed that high levels of partner perceived attractiveness were found to be related to high levels of self-perceived attractiveness and low levels of partner perceived attractiveness were related to low levels of self-perceived attractiveness. These analyses also revealed that males and females did not significantly differ in their self-perception of attractiveness on the following domains: overall physical attractiveness, overall facial attractiveness, overall body weight or size, overall body shape or figure, and overall height. Males and females did not significantly differ in their perception of their partner’s attractiveness on the following domains: overall physical attractiveness, overall facial attractiveness, overall body weight or size, overall body shape or figure, and overall height

Reprogramming of Sheep Fibroblasts into Pluripotency under a Drug-Inducible Expression of Mouse-Derived Defined Factors

Animal embryonic stem cells (ESCs) provide powerful tool for studies of early embryonic development, gene targeting, cloning, and regenerative medicine. However, the majority of attempts to establish ESC lines from large animals, especially ungulate mammals have failed. Recently, another type of pluripotent stem cells, known as induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs), have been successfully generated from mouse, human, monkey, rat and pig. In this study we show sheep fibroblasts can be reprogrammed to pluripotency by defined factors using a drug-inducible system. Sheep iPSCs derived in this fashion have a normal karyotype, exhibit morphological features similar to those of human ESCs and express AP, Oct4, Sox2, Nanog and the cell surface marker SSEA-4. Pluripotency of these cells was further confirmed by embryoid body (EB) and teratoma formation assays which generated derivatives of all three germ layers. Our results also show that the substitution of knockout serum replacement (KSR) with fetal bovine serum in culture improves the reprogramming efficiency of sheep iPSCs. Generation of sheep iPSCs places sheep on the front lines of large animal preclinical trials and experiments involving modification of animal genomes

Synaptic Dysbindin-1 Reductions in Schizophrenia Occur in an Isoform-Specific Manner Indicating Their Subsynaptic Location

Background: An increasing number of studies report associations between variation in DTNBP1, a top candidate gene in schizophrenia, and both the clinical symptoms of the disorder and its cognitive deficits. DTNBP1 encodes dysbindin-1, reduced levels of which have been found in synaptic fields of schizophrenia cases. This study determined whether such synaptic reductions are isoform-specific. Methodology/Principal Findings: Using Western blotting of tissue fractions, we first determined the synaptic localization of the three major dysbindin-1 isoforms (A, B, and C). All three were concentrated in synaptosomes of multiple brain areas, including auditory association cortices in the posterior half of the superior temporal gyrus (pSTG) and the hippocampal formation (HF). Tests on the subsynaptic tissue fractions revealed that each isoform is predominantly, if not exclusively, associated with synaptic vesicles (dysbindin-1B) or with postsynaptic densities (dysbindin-1A and -1C). Using Western blotting on pSTG (n = 15) and HF (n = 15) synaptosomal fractions from schizophrenia cases and their matched controls, we discovered that synaptic dysbindin-1 is reduced in an isoform-specific manner in schizophrenia without changes in levels of synaptophysin or PSD-95. In pSTG, about 92% of the schizophrenia cases displayed synaptic dysbindin-1A reductions averaging 48% (p = 0.0007) without alterations in other dysbindin-1 isoforms. In the HF, by contrast, schizophrenia cases displayed normal levels of synaptic dysbindin-1A, but 67% showed synaptic reductions in dysbindin-1B averaging 33% (p = 0.0256), while 80% showed synaptic reductions in dysbindin-1C averaging 35% (p = 0.0171). Conclusions/Significance: Given the distinctive subsynaptic localization of dysbindin-1A, -1B, and -1C across brain regions, the observed pSTG reductions in dysbindin-1A are postsynaptic and may promote dendritic spine loss with consequent disruption of auditory information processing, while the noted HF reductions in dysbindin-1B and -1C are both presynaptic and postsynaptic and could promote deficits in spatial working memory

Comparative Genomic Analyses of Copper Transporters and Cuproproteomes Reveal Evolutionary Dynamics of Copper Utilization and Its Link to Oxygen

Copper is an essential trace element in many organisms and is utilized in all domains of life. It is often used as a cofactor of redox proteins, but is also a toxic metal ion. Intracellular copper must be carefully handled to prevent the formation of reactive oxygen species which pose a threat to DNA, lipids, and proteins. In this work, we examined patterns of copper utilization in prokaryotes by analyzing the occurrence of copper transporters and copper-containing proteins. Many organisms, including those that lack copper-dependent proteins, had copper exporters, likely to protect against copper ions that inadvertently enter the cell. We found that copper use is widespread among prokaryotes, but also identified several phyla that lack cuproproteins. This is in contrast to the use of other trace elements, such as selenium, which shows more scattered and reduced usage, yet larger selenoproteomes. Copper transporters had different patterns of occurrence than cuproproteins, suggesting that the pathways of copper utilization and copper detoxification are independent of each other. We present evidence that organisms living in oxygen-rich environments utilize copper, whereas the majority of anaerobic organisms do not. In addition, among copper users, cuproproteomes of aerobic organisms were larger than those of anaerobic organisms. Prokaryotic cuproproteomes were small and dominated by a single protein, cytochrome c oxidase. The data are consistent with the idea that proteins evolved to utilize copper following the oxygenation of the Earth

Dcc Regulates Asymmetric Outgrowth of Forebrain Neurons in Zebrafish

The guidance receptor DCC (deleted in colorectal cancer) ortholog UNC-40 regulates neuronal asymmetry development in Caenorhabditis elegans, but it is not known whether DCC plays a role in the specification of neuronal polarity in vertebrates. To examine the roles of DCC in neuronal asymmetry regulation in vertebrates, we studied zebrafish anterior dorsal telencephalon (ADt) neuronal axons. We generated transgenic zebrafish animals expressing the photo-convertible fluorescent protein Kaede in ADt neurons and then photo-converted Kaede to label specifically the ADt neuron axons. We found that ADt axons normally project ventrally. Knock down of Dcc function by injecting antisense morpholino oligonucleotides caused the ADt neurons to project axons dorsally. To examine the axon projection pattern of individual ADt neurons, we labeled single ADt neurons using a forebrain-specific promoter to drive fluorescent protein expression. We found that individual ADt neurons projected axons dorsally or formed multiple processes after morpholino knock down of Dcc function. We further found that knock down of the Dcc ligand, Netrin1, also caused ADt neurons to project axons dorsally. Knockdown of Neogenin1, a guidance receptor closely related to Dcc, enhanced the formation of aberrant dorsal axons in embryos injected with Dcc morpholino. These experiments provide the first evidence that Dcc regulates polarized axon initiation and asymmetric outgrowth of forebrain neurons in vertebrates

Treatment of complicated skin and soft-tissue infections caused by resistant bacteria: value of linezolid, tigecycline, daptomycin and vancomycin

Antibiotic-resistant organisms causing both hospital-and community-acquired complicated skin and soft-tissue infections (cSSTI) are increasingly reported. A substantial medical and economical burden associated with MRSA colonisation or infection has been documented. The number of currently available appropriate antimicrobial agents is limited. Good quality randomised, controlled clinical trial data on antibiotic efficacy and safety is available for cSSTI caused by MRSA. Linezolid, tigecycline, daptomycin and vancomycin showed efficacy and safety in MRSA-caused cSSTI. None of these drugs showed significant superiority in terms of clinical cure and eradication rates. To date, linezolid offers by far the greatest number of patients included in controlled trials with a strong tendency of superiority over vancomycin in terms of eradication and clinical success

Carbon uptake by mature Amazon forests has mitigated Amazon nations' carbon emissions

BACKGROUND: Several independent lines of evidence suggest that Amazon forests have provided a significant carbon sink service, and also that the Amazon carbon sink in intact, mature forests may now be threatened as a result of different processes. There has however been no work done to quantify non-land-use-change forest carbon fluxes on a national basis within Amazonia, or to place these national fluxes and their possible changes in the context of the major anthropogenic carbon fluxes in the region. Here we present a first attempt to interpret results from ground-based monitoring of mature forest carbon fluxes in a biogeographically, politically, and temporally differentiated way. Specifically, using results from a large long-term network of forest plots, we estimate the Amazon biomass carbon balance over the last three decades for the different regions and nine nations of Amazonia, and evaluate the magnitude and trajectory of these differentiated balances in relation to major national anthropogenic carbon emissions. RESULTS: The sink of carbon into mature forests has been remarkably geographically ubiquitous across Amazonia, being substantial and persistent in each of the five biogeographic regions within Amazonia. Between 1980 and 2010, it has more than mitigated the fossil fuel emissions of every single national economy, except that of Venezuela. For most nations (Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, French Guiana, Guyana, Peru, Suriname) the sink has probably additionally mitigated all anthropogenic carbon emissions due to Amazon deforestation and other land use change. While the sink has weakened in some regions since 2000, our analysis suggests that Amazon nations which are able to conserve large areas of natural and semi-natural landscape still contribute globally-significant carbon sequestration. CONCLUSIONS: Mature forests across all of Amazonia have contributed significantly to mitigating climate change for decades. Yet Amazon nations have not directly benefited from providing this global scale ecosystem service. We suggest that better monitoring and reporting of the carbon fluxes within mature forests, and understanding the drivers of changes in their balance, must become national, as well as international, priorities

Systems microscopy approaches to understand cancer cell migration and metastasis

Cell migration is essential in a number of processes, including wound healing, angiogenesis and cancer metastasis. Especially, invasion of cancer cells in the surrounding tissue is a crucial step that requires increased cell motility. Cell migration is a well-orchestrated process that involves the continuous formation and disassembly of matrix adhesions. Those structural anchor points interact with the extra-cellular matrix and also participate in adhesion-dependent signalling. Although these processes are essential for cancer metastasis, little is known about the molecular mechanisms that regulate adhesion dynamics during tumour cell migration. In this review, we provide an overview of recent advanced imaging strategies together with quantitative image analysis that can be implemented to understand the dynamics of matrix adhesions and its molecular components in relation to tumour cell migration. This dynamic cell imaging together with multiparametric image analysis will help in understanding the molecular mechanisms that define cancer cell migration

Dysregulation of specialized delay/interference-dependent working memory following loss of dysbindin-1A in schizophrenia-related phenotypes

Dysbindin-1, a protein that regulates aspects of early and late brain development, has been implicated in the pathobiology of schizophrenia. As the functional roles of the three major isoforms of dysbindin-1, (A, B, and C) remain unknown, we generated a novel mutant mouse, dys-1A -/-, with selective loss of dysbindin-1A and investigated schizophrenia-related phenotypes in both males and females. Loss of dysbindin-1A resulted in heightened initial exploration and disruption in subsequent habituation to a novel environment, together with heightened anxiety-related behavior in a stressful environment. Loss of dysbindin-1A was not associated with disruption of either long-term (olfactory) memory or spontaneous alternation behavior. However, dys-1A -/-showed enhancement in delay-dependent working memory under high levels of interference relative to controls, ie, impairment in sensitivity to the disruptive effect of such interference. These findings in dys-1A -/-provide the first evidence for differential functional roles for dysbindin-1A vs dysbindin-1C isoforms among phenotypes relevant to the pathobiology of schizophrenia. Future studies should investigate putative sex differences in these phenotypic effects