Cohomologically hyperbolic endomorphisms of complex manifolds

We show that if a compact Kahler manifold X admits a cohomologically hyperbolic surjective endomorphism then its Kodaira dimension is non-positive. This gives an affirmative answer to a conjecture of Guedj in the holomorphic case. The main part of the paper is to determine the geometric structure and the fundamental groups (up to finite index) for those X of dimension 3.Comment: International Journal of Mathematics (to appear

Cohomological characterizations of projective spaces and hyperquadrics

We confirm Beauville's conjecture that claims that if the p-th exterior power of the tangent bundle of a smooth projective variety contains the p-th power of an ample line bundle, then the variety is either the projective space or the p-dimensional quadric hypersurface.Comment: Added Lemma 2.8 and slightly changed proof of Lemma 6.2 to make them apply for torsion-free sheaves and not only to vector bundle

Morphological features of microglial cells in the hippocampal dentate gyrus of Gunn rat: a possible schizophrenia animal model

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Schizophrenia is a debilitating and complex mental disorder whose exact etiology remains unknown. There is growing amount of evidence of a relationship between neuroinflammation, as demonstrated by microglial activation, and schizophrenia. Our previous studies have proposed that hyperbilirubinemia plays a role in the pathophysiology of schizophrenia. Furthermore, we suggested the Gunn rat, an animal model of bilirubin encephalopathy, as a possible animal model of schizophrenia. However, the effects of unconjugated bilirubin on microglia, the resident immune cell of the CNS, in Gunn rats have never been investigated. In the present study, we examined how microglial cells respond to bilirubin toxicity in adult Gunn rats.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Using immunohistochemical techniques, we compared the distribution, morphology, and ultrastructural features of microglial cells in Gunn rats with Wistar rats as a normal control. We also determined the ratio of activated and resting microglia and observed microglia-neuron interactions. We characterized the microglial cells in the hippocampal dentate gyrus.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We found that microglial cells showed activated morphology in the hilus, subgranular zone, and granular layer of the Gunn rat hippocampal dentate gyrus. There was no significant difference between cell numbers between in Gunn rats and controls. However, there was significant difference in the area of CD11b expression in the hippocampal dentate gyrus. Ultrastructurally, microglial cells often contained rich enlarged rich organelles in the cytoplasm and showed some phagocytic function.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>We propose that activation of microglia could be an important causal factor of the behavioral abnormalities and neuropathological changes in Gunn rats. These findings may provide basic information for further assessment of the Gunn rat as an animal model of schizophrenia.</p

Stand-alone tsunami alarm equipment

One of the quickest means of tsunami evacuation is transfer to higher ground soon after strong and long ground shaking. Ground shaking itself is a good initiator of the evacuation from disastrous tsunami. Longer period seismic waves are considered to be more correlated with the earthquake magnitude. We investigated the possible application of this to tsunami hazard alarm using single-site ground motion observation. Information from the mass media is sometimes unavailable due to power failure soon after a large earthquake. Even when an official alarm is available, multiple information sources of tsunami alert would help people become aware of the coming risk of a tsunami. Thus, a device that indicates risk of a tsunami without requiring other data would be helpful to those who should evacuate. Since the sensitivity of a low-cost MEMS (microelectromechanical systems) accelerometer is sufficient for this purpose, tsunami alarm equipment for home use may be easily realized. Amplitude of long-period (20 s cutoff) displacement was proposed as the threshold for the alarm based on empirical relationships among magnitude, tsunami height, hypocentral distance, and peak ground displacement of seismic waves. Application of this method to recent major earthquakes indicated that such equipment could effectively alert people to the possibility of tsunami

No association between polymorphisms of WNT2 and schizophrenia in a Korean population

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Wingless-type MMTV integration site family member 2 (WNT2) has a potentially important role in neuronal development; however, there has yet to be an investigation into the association between single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) of <it>WNT2 </it>and schizophrenia. This study aimed to determine whether certain SNPs of <it>WNT2 </it>were associated with schizophrenia in a Korean population.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>e genotyped 7 selected SNPs in the <it>WNT2 </it>gene region (approximately 46 Kb) using direct sequencing in 288 patients with schizophrenia and 305 healthy controls.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Of the SNPs examined, one SNP showed a weak association with schizophrenia (p = 0.017 in the recessive model). However, this association did not remain statistically significant after Bonferroni correction.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>The present study does not support a major role for <it>WNT2 </it>in schizophrenia. This could be due to the size of the population. Therefore, additional studies would be needed to definitively rule out the gene's minor effects.</p

A randomized controlled multicenter trial of post-suicide attempt case management for the prevention of further attempts in Japan (ACTION-J)

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>A previous suicide attempt is a potent risk factor for suicide later on. Crisis intervention, psychiatric and psychosocial evaluation at emergency medical facilities, and follow-up care for suicide attempters are considered important components for suicide prevention. The Japanese Multimodal Intervention Trials for Suicide Prevention (J-MISP) includes a randomized, controlled, multicenter trial of post-suicide attempt case management for the prevention of further attempts (ACTION-J) to address the continuing increase in suicides in Japan. The primary aim of ACTION-J is to examine the effectiveness of an extensive intervention for suicide attempters in prevention of recurrent suicidal behavior, as compared with standard intervention. This paper describes the rationale and protocol of the ACTION-J trial.</p> <p>Methods/Design</p> <p>In this clinical trial, case management intervention will be provided at 19 emergency medical facilities in Japan. After crisis intervention including psychiatric evaluation, psychosocial assessment, and psychological education, subjects will be randomly assigned to either a group receiving continuous case management or a control group receiving standard care. Suicidal ideation, depressive symptoms, and general health condition will be evaluated as secondary measures. The intervention was initiated in July 2006. By December, 2009, 842 subjects will be randomized. Subject follow-up will continue for 1.5 to 5 years.</p> <p>Discussion</p> <p>Suicide is a complex phenomenon that encompasses multiple factors. Case management by multi-sector collaboration is needed. ACTION-J may provide valuable information on suicide attempters and may develop effective case management to reduce future risk for suicide attempters.</p> <p>Trial registration</p> <p>UMIN Clinical Trials Registry number, UMIN000000444. ClinicalTrials.gov number, NCT00736918.</p

High-mobility group box-1 protein, lipopolysaccharide-binding protein, interleukin-6 and C-reactive protein in children with community acquired infections and bacteraemia: a prospective study

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Introduction</p> <p>Even though sepsis is one of the common causes of children morbidity and mortality, specific inflammatory markers for identifying sepsis are less studied in children. The main aim of this study was to compare the levels of high-mobility group box-1 protein (HMGB1), Lipopolysaccharide-binding protein (LBP), Interleukin-6 (IL-6) and C-reactive protein (CRP) between infected children without systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS) and children with severe and less severe sepsis. The second aim was to examine HMGB1, LBP, IL6 and CRP as markers for of bacteraemia.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Totally, 140 children with suspected or proven infections admitted to the Children's Clinical University Hospital of Latvia during 2008 and 2009 were included. Clinical and demographical information as well as infection focus were assessed in all patients. HMGB1, LBP, IL-6 and CRP blood samples were determined. Children with suspected or diagnosed infections were categorized into three groups of severity of infection: (i) infected without SIRS (n = 36), (ii) sepsis (n = 91) and, (iii) severe sepsis (n = 13). They were furthermore classified according bacteraemia into (i) bacteremia (n = 30) and (ii) no bacteraemia (n = 74).</p> <p>Results</p> <p>There was no statistically significant difference in HMGB1 levels between children with different levels of sepsis or with and without bacteraemia. The levels of LBP, IL-6 and CRP were statistically significantly higher among patients with sepsis compared to those infected but without SIRS (<it>p </it>< 0.001). Furthermore, LBP, IL-6 and CRP were significantly higher in children with severe sepsis compared to those ones with less severe sepsis (<it>p </it>< 0.001). Median values of LBP, IL6 and CRP were significantly higher in children with bacteraemia compared to those without bacteraemia. The area under the receiver operating curve (ROC) for detecting bacteraemia was 0.87 for both IL6 and CRP and 0.82 for LBP, respectively.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Elevated levels of LBP, IL-6 and CRP were associated with a more severe level of infection in children. Whereas LBP, IL-6 and CRP seem to be good markers to detect patients with bacteraemia, HMGB1 seem to be of minor importance. LBP, IL-6 and CRP levels may serve as good biomarkers for identifying children with severe sepsis and bacteraemia and, thus, may be routinely used in clinical practice.</p

Shared neural representations of tactile roughness intensities by somatosensation and touch observation using an associative learning method

Previous human fMRI studies have reported activation of somatosensory areas not only during actual touch, but also during touch observation. However, it has remained unclear how the brain encodes visually evoked tactile intensities. Using an associative learning method, we investigated neural representations of roughness intensities evoked by (a) tactile explorations and (b) visual observation of tactile explorations. Moreover, we explored (c) modality-independent neural representations of roughness intensities using a cross-modal classification method. Case (a) showed significant decoding performance in the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) and the supramarginal gyrus (SMG), while in the case (b), the bilateral posterior parietal cortices, the inferior occipital gyrus, and the primary motor cortex were identified. Case (c) observed shared neural activity patterns in the bilateral insula, the SMG, and the ACC. Interestingly, the insular cortices were identified only from the cross-modal classification, suggesting their potential role in modality-independent tactile processing. We further examined correlations of confusion patterns between behavioral and neural similarity matrices for each region. Significant correlations were found solely in the SMG, reflecting a close relationship between neural activities of SMG and roughness intensity perception. The present findings may deepen our understanding of the brain mechanisms underlying intensity perception of tactile roughness

Daily omega-3 fatty acid intake and depression in Japanese patients with newly diagnosed lung cancer

patients with newly diagnosed lung cance