Anatomy integration: Effective change or change of affect?

Anatomy is fundamental to clinical practice, and is key to professional identity formation. Many US medical schools are integrating anatomy into an organ–based preclinical curricula. This curricular change could affect one or more of the three domains of learning: cognitive, affective and psychomotor, including learner preparation to work in teams. Our previous study prospectively queried the effects of integrating anatomy into the existing organ-­based curriculum at the University of New Mexico School of Medicine. Results showed that students with integrated anatomy initially increased content acquisition, but had similar mastery of anatomical concepts at the end of the first year of the pre-­clinical curriculum. Interestingly, attitudinal differences towards anatomy dissection, working in teams, reflective practices and professional identity formation were seen between students in the two curricula. The current study set out to test the hypothesis that the differences in attitudes would persist as students progressed through the pre-­clinical curriculum. It also asked if additional changes in the affective domain could be detected that may impact content mastery and patient care

Pseudomonas Survive Thermal Processing and Grow during Vacuum Packaged Storage in an Emulsified Beef System

New research has suggested the ability of Pseudomonas, a common spoilage microorganism, to grow in cooked beef products stored under vacuum which challenges the traditional understanding of the role of Pseudomonas during cooked beef spoilage. Understanding the mechanisms of survival and growth of Pseudomonas in these products is crucial for improving shelf life. The objective of this experiment was to determine Pseudomonas survival in a thermally processed, emulsified cooked beef model system. After eight weeks of refrigerated storage, Pseudomonas was recovered from cooked emulsified beef, indicating the potential for Pseudomonas to survive thermal processing and cause spoilage in cooked vacuum packaged beef products

Analysis of wheat SAGE tags reveals evidence for widespread antisense transcription

BACKGROUND: Serial Analysis of Gene Expression (SAGE) is a powerful tool for genome-wide transcription studies. Unlike microarrays, it has the ability to detect novel forms of RNA such as alternatively spliced and antisense transcripts, without the need for prior knowledge of their existence. One limitation of using SAGE on an organism with a complex genome and lacking detailed sequence information, such as the hexaploid bread wheat Triticum aestivum, is accurate annotation of the tags generated. Without accurate annotation it is impossible to fully understand the dynamic processes involved in such complex polyploid organisms. Hence we have developed and utilised novel procedures to characterise, in detail, SAGE tags generated from the whole grain transcriptome of hexaploid wheat. RESULTS: Examination of 71,930 Long SAGE tags generated from six libraries derived from two wheat genotypes grown under two different conditions suggested that SAGE is a reliable and reproducible technique for use in studying the hexaploid wheat transcriptome. However, our results also showed that in poorly annotated and/or poorly sequenced genomes, such as hexaploid wheat, considerably more information can be extracted from SAGE data by carrying out a systematic analysis of both perfect and "fuzzy" (partially matched) tags. This detailed analysis of the SAGE data shows first that while there is evidence of alternative polyadenylation this appears to occur exclusively within the 3' untranslated regions. Secondly, we found no strong evidence for widespread alternative splicing in the developing wheat grain transcriptome. However, analysis of our SAGE data shows that antisense transcripts are probably widespread within the transcriptome and appear to be derived from numerous locations within the genome. Examination of antisense transcripts showing sequence similarity to the Puroindoline a and Puroindoline b genes suggests that such antisense transcripts might have a role in the regulation of gene expression. CONCLUSION: Our results indicate that the detailed analysis of transcriptome data, such as SAGE tags, is essential to understand fully the factors that regulate gene expression and that such analysis of the wheat grain transcriptome reveals that antisense transcripts maybe widespread and hence probably play a significant role in the regulation of gene expression during grain development

Girls’ and boys’ problem talk: Implications for emotional closeness in friendships.

This research highlights the critical role of gender in the context of problem talk and social support in adolescents’ friendships. Early- and middle-adolescents’ (N = 314 friend dyads; Ms = 13.01 and 16.03 years) conversations about problems were studied using observation and a short-term longitudinal design. Mean-level gender differences emerged in that girls participated in problem talk more than boys and responded in a more positive and engaged manner to friends’ statements about problems (e.g., by saying something supportive, asking a question) than did boys. Interestingly, boys used humor during problem talk more than girls. Despite mean-level differences, there were not gender differences in the functional significance of participating in problem talk and positive engaged responses in that these behaviors predicted increased friendship closeness for both boys and girls. In contrast, humor during problem talk predicted increased closeness only for boys, highlighting an understudied pathway to closeness in boys’ friendships

Quantitative trait mapping in Diversity Outbred mice identifies novel genomic regions associated with the hepatic glutathione redox system.

The tripeptide glutathione (GSH) is instrumental to antioxidant protection and xenobiotic metabolism, and the ratio of its reduced and oxidized forms (GSH/GSSG) indicates the cellular redox environment and maintains key aspects of cellular signaling. Disruptions in GSH levels and GSH/GSSG have long been tied to various chronic diseases, and many studies have examined whether variant alleles in genes responsible for GSH synthesis and metabolism are associated with increased disease risk. However, past studies have been limited to established, canonical GSH genes, though emerging evidence suggests that novel loci and genes influence the GSH redox system in specific tissues. The present study marks the most comprehensive effort to date to directly identify genetic loci associated with the GSH redox system. We employed the Diversity Outbred (DO) mouse population, a model of human genetics, and measured GSH and the essential redox cofactor NADPH in liver, the organ with the highest levels of GSH in the body. Under normal physiological conditions, we observed substantial variation in hepatic GSH and NADPH levels and their redox balances, and discovered a novel, significant quantitative trait locus (QTL) on murine chromosome 16 underlying GSH/GSSG; bioinformatics analyses revealed Socs1 to be the most likely candidate gene. We also discovered novel QTL associated with hepatic NAD

Opioid And Naloxone Prescribing Practices In Mississippi

The purpose of this study was to determine whether primary care providers (PCPs) in Mississippi are following the selected Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) guidelines published in March 2016 for prescribing opioids for chronic, non-cancer pain. The study also sought to determine if the selected providers prescribed naloxone for opioid overdose reversal. Drug overdoses have increased exponentially in the last 3 decades in the United States (Doyon, Aks, & Schaeffer, 2014) — leading to opioid overdose becoming the most frequent cause of accidental death. Opioid overdose death rates are so high the CDC declared it a problem of “epidemic” status in 2012 (Canada, DiRocco, & Day, 2014). Mississippi ranks as one of the highest prescribing states for opioid analgesics. For the purpose of this research, focus was placed on specific aspects o f the CDC guidelines as follows: (a) consider nonpharmacological treatment or treat with nonopioids first, (b) avoid prescribing opioids and benzodiazepines concurrently, and (c) check a urine drug screen prior to opioid initiation and yearly thereafter (CDC, 2016). The CDC now recommends prescribing naloxone, an opioid antagonist, to patients at risk for opioid overdose. Naloxone has demonstrated effectiveness in reducing opioid overdose mortality. A nonexperimental, quantitative, descriptive, retrospective review of charts was performed in 6 primary care clinics in Mississippi staffed by physicians and family nurse practitioners. A convenience sampling of 600 charts for retrospective chart review was conducted. Inclusion criteria were age 18 years or older, medically treated long-term with opioids (\u3e 2 prescriptions written \u3e21 days apart) for chronic non-cancer pain, and prescribed by a PCP. The findings suggested that PCPs in Mississippi are not eonsistently following CDC guidelines for opioid prescribing. It should also be noted that, of the 600 charts reviewed, none of the patients were prescribed naloxone for reversal of a potential opioid overdose. Research demonstrated a need for increased awareness and education among PCPs regarding CDC guidelines for prescribing opioids

Spoilage \u3ci\u3ePseudomonas\u3c/i\u3e survive common thermal processing schedules and grow in emulsified meat during extended vacuum storage

Some Pseudomonas species are common meat spoilage bacteria that are often associated with the spoilage of fresh meat. The recently reported ability of these bacteria to also spoil cooked and vacuum packaged meat products has created the need to investigate all potential routes of spoilage they may be able to utilize. The objective of this experiment was to determine if spoilage Pseudomonas spp. survive thermal processing and grow during refrigerated storage under vacuum. Pseudomonas spp. isolates collected from spoiled turkey products were inoculated into a salted and seasoned meat emulsion that was vacuum sealed and thermally treated to final temperatures of 54.4 and 71.1◦C to mimic thermal processes commonly used in the meat industry. Samples were stored for a total of 294 days at 4 and 10◦C and plated using Pseudomonas spp. specific agar plates. Pseudomonas spp. concentrations were below the detection limit (0.18 log10 CFU/g) immediately after thermal processing andwere first recovered from thermally processed samples after 14 days of storage. The final concentrationwas greater than 2 log10 CFU/g (p \u3c 0.05 compared to post-thermal processing) in thermally processed treatment groups at the end of storage, indicating that these Pseudomonas spp. isolateswere able to survive thermal processing and growduring extended vacuum storage. This raises concerns about the ability of spoilage bacteria to survive the thermal processing schedules commonly used in the meat industry and confirms that some Pseudomonas spp. are capable of thriving in products other than aerobically stored fresh meat

Label-efficient Contrastive Learning-based model for nuclei detection and classification in 3D Cardiovascular Immunofluorescent Images

Recently, deep learning-based methods achieved promising performance in nuclei detection and classification applications. However, training deep learning-based methods requires a large amount of pixel-wise annotated data, which is time-consuming and labor-intensive, especially in 3D images. An alternative approach is to adapt weak-annotation methods, such as labeling each nucleus with a point, but this method does not extend from 2D histopathology images (for which it was originally developed) to 3D immunofluorescent images. The reason is that 3D images contain multiple channels (z-axis) for nuclei and different markers separately, which makes training using point annotations difficult. To address this challenge, we propose the Label-efficient Contrastive learning-based (LECL) model to detect and classify various types of nuclei in 3D immunofluorescent images. Previous methods use Maximum Intensity Projection (MIP) to convert immunofluorescent images with multiple slices to 2D images, which can cause signals from different z-stacks to falsely appear associated with each other. To overcome this, we devised an Extended Maximum Intensity Projection (EMIP) approach that addresses issues using MIP. Furthermore, we performed a Supervised Contrastive Learning (SCL) approach for weakly supervised settings. We conducted experiments on cardiovascular datasets and found that our proposed framework is effective and efficient in detecting and classifying various types of nuclei in 3D immunofluorescent images.Comment: 11 pages, 5 figures, MICCAI Workshop Conference 202