Environmental Effects on Brain Estrogen Receptor Expression and Aggression

Best undergraduate poster award at the Society for Behavioral Neuroendocrinology conference, 2007It is broadly accepted that the environment influences the effects of genes on behavior, but the mechanisms mediating these environmental effects on phenotype are poorly defined. The present study examined whether photoperiod (day length) and reproductive experience, two important environmental variables, affect gene expression to influence aggressive behavior. Individuals respond to photoperiod because it predicts important variability in the environment; male rodents use photoperiod to time adaptive behaviors such as mating and aggression. For example, mating is more likely in rodents housed in long, summer-like days when testosterone concentrations are high, whereas aggression in some rodent species is paradoxically elevated when housed in short, winter-like days when testosterone concentrations are low. Previous work in Peromyscus polionotus indicated that brain estrogen receptor alpha expression is increased in short days (8L:16D), whereas brain estrogen receptor beta expression is increased in long days (16L:8D). Hormone manipulation studies suggested that the photoperiodic effect on aggression occurs independently of changes in estrogen receptor expression. This hypothesis was tested directly by examining the effects of photoperiod on aggression and estrogen receptor expression in monogamous P. californicus, which do not reduce testes size in short days. I also examined how aggression changes in relation to parental behavior. Nulliparous male P. californicus were significantly more aggressive when housed in short versus long days, and parental males were also significantly more aggressive than nulliparous mice kept in long days. Neither photoperiod nor reproductive experience affected the expression of either estrogen receptor subtype in brain nuclei that are components of the brain “social behavior network.” These results suggest that the effects of photoperiod and reproduction on aggression are independent of changes in estrogen receptor expression. Additionally, these data emphasize the importance of studying the biological mechanisms mediating aggression under different environmental conditions in order to better understand the neurobiological bases of this complex social behavior. Advisor: Randy J. NelsonSBS Undergraduate Research Award to M.S.F.NIH MH57535 to R.J.N.NSF grant IOS-16897 to R.J.N.No embarg

The Double Wreath: A Contribution to the History of Kingship in Bosnia

The fact that ban Tvrtko of Bosnia had maternal ties with Nemanjić dynasty and seized certain areas of the former Serbian Empire was used as a basis for him to be crowned king of the Serbs and Bosnia in 1377 in the monastery of Mileševa over the grave of Saint Sava. His charter issued to the Ragusans in 1378 contains the term “double wreath” which figuratively symbolized the rule of Tvrtko I over two Serb-inhabited states, Bosnia and Serbia. Tvrtko’s choice not to annex the conquered territory to his own state, Bosnia, but to be crowned king of Serbia as well required the development of a new ideology of kingship and a new form of legitimation of power. Although his royal title was recognized by his neighbours, including probably the rest of the Serbian lands, that the project was unrealistic became obvious in the aftermath of the Battle of Kosovo in 1389. What remained after his death was only the royal title, while the state ruled by his successors became exclusively related to Bosnia. Yet, echoes of his coronation in medieval Bosnia can be followed in the further development of the title and of the concept of crown and state. Interestingly, an attempt to revive the double crown concept was made in the early fifteenth century by the king Sigismund of Hungary, who requested that the Bosnians crown him the way Tvrtko had been crowned

LAPACK-Based Software for Subspace Identification

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Effect of voicing and articulation manner on aerosol particle emission during human speech.

Previously, we demonstrated a strong correlation between the amplitude of human speech and the emission rate of micron-scale expiratory aerosol particles, which are believed to play a role in respiratory disease transmission. To further those findings, here we systematically investigate the effect of different 'phones' (the basic sound units of speech) on the emission of particles from the human respiratory tract during speech. We measured the respiratory particle emission rates of 56 healthy human volunteers voicing specific phones, both in isolation and in the context of a standard spoken text. We found that certain phones are associated with significantly higher particle production; for example, the vowel /i/ ("need," "sea") produces more particles than /ɑ/ ("saw," "hot") or /u/ ("blue," "mood"), while disyllabic words including voiced plosive consonants (e.g., /d/, /b/, /g/) yield more particles than words with voiceless fricatives (e.g., /s/, /h/, /f/). These trends for discrete phones and words were corroborated by the time-resolved particle emission rates as volunteers read aloud from a standard text passage that incorporates a broad range of the phones present in spoken English. Our measurements showed that particle emission rates were positively correlated with the vowel content of a phrase; conversely, particle emission decreased during phrases with a high fraction of voiceless fricatives. Our particle emission data is broadly consistent with prior measurements of the egressive airflow rate associated with the vocalization of various phones that differ in voicing and articulation. These results suggest that airborne transmission of respiratory pathogens via speech aerosol particles could be modulated by specific phonetic characteristics of the language spoken by a given human population, along with other, more frequently considered epidemiological variables

Análise econômico-financeira da produção de carvão vegetal no Rio Grande do Sul.

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High-grade cervical dysplasia in pregnancy – psychological and medical challenges

Despite being rare, the incidence of pregnancy-related cancer is expected to rise as women continue to delay childbearing and give birth later in their reproductive years. In this broad category, tumors like breast cancer, dermatological neoplasia and cervical cancer are most common and tend to arise in women of childbearing age. All pregnant women with clinical and cytologic suspicion of cervical cancer, except for squamous atypia or low-grade squamous intraepithelial lesions, should undergo colposcopy, with or without biopsy, the latter being avoided if possible due to possible complications which, although rare, may involve preterm labor initiation. Some studies have attempted to assimilate comparable results of USG with MRI during the gestational period by determining the sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy of trans-rectal ultrasound (TRUS) in comparison to magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). In order to identify the proper way to diagnose and treat the disease, because of the complexity due to pregnancy, a multidisciplinary team consisting of a gynecologist, medical and surgical oncologist, and radiologist should be assembled. Both maternal and fetal wellbeing should be taken into consideration when the medical team must choose among termination of pregnancy, delay of maternal treatment, and iatrogenic preterm delivery. Psychological counseling also plays an important role and due to the sensitivity of the issue, should continue through gestation and the postpartum. In order to develop optimal guidelines for diagnosis, treatment, and outcome issues, large scale prospective studies are needed, but feasibility may be limited due to the scarcity of cervical cancer cases associated with pregnancy

The psychosocial impact of vaginal delivery and cesarean section in primiparous women

The aim of this study was to identify how the method of delivery and birth experience interfere with maternal psychological status early after puerperium. We conducted a prospective study on 148 women after puerperium from November 2017 to January 2018 in Bucur Maternity Hospital. Women that delivered vaginally mobilized in the first 6 hours in 73.7% of the cases, but for cesarean section after 12- 24 hours in 43.6% of the cases. Women described good support from the obstetrician in 58.1% of the cases. 90.5% of the women reported that the method of delivery did not have an impact on infant care and 73% had no lactation problems. The majority described little trauma, in 32.4% of the cases. 70.3% of the patients reported that they wanted to have more children and 59.5% of them desired the same method of delivery. Negative feelings, lactation, and taking care of the baby were not influenced in this study by the method of delivery, but by prematurity of birth and the complications that women experienced at birth

Separable nonlinear least squares fitting with linear bound constraints and its application in magnetic resonance spectroscopy data quantification

AbstractAn application in magnetic resonance spectroscopy quantification models a signal as a linear combination of nonlinear functions. It leads to a separable nonlinear least squares fitting problem, with linear bound constraints on some variables. The variable projection (VARPRO) technique can be applied to this problem, but needs to be adapted in several respects. If only the nonlinear variables are subject to constraints, then the Levenberg–Marquardt minimization algorithm that is classically used by the VARPRO method should be replaced with a version that can incorporate those constraints. If some of the linear variables are also constrained, then they cannot be projected out via a closed-form expression as is the case for the classical VARPRO technique. We show how quadratic programming problems can be solved instead, and we provide details on efficient function and approximate Jacobian evaluations for the inequality constrained VARPRO method