Amygdala reactivity predicts adolescent antisocial behavior but not callous-unemotional traits.

Recent neuroimaging studies have suggested divergent relationships between antisocial behavior (AB) and callous-unemotional (CU) traits and amygdala reactivity to fearful and angry facial expressions in adolescents. However, little work has examined if these findings extend to dimensional measures of behavior in ethnically diverse, non-clinical samples, or if participant sex, ethnicity, pubertal stage, and age moderate associations. We examined links between amygdala reactivity and dimensions of AB and CU traits in 220 Hispanic and non-Hispanic Caucasian adolescents (age 11-15; 49.5% female; 38.2% Hispanic), half of whom had a family history for depression and thus were at relatively elevated risk for late starting, emotionally dysregulated AB. We found that AB was significantly related to increased right amygdala reactivity to angry facial expressions independent of sex, ethnicity, pubertal stage, age, and familial risk status for depression. CU traits were not related to fear- or anger-related amygdala reactivity. The present study further demonstrates that AB is related to increased amygdala reactivity to interpersonal threat cues in adolescents, and that this relationship generalizes across sex, ethnicity, pubertal stage, age, and familial risk status for depression

The Impact of Winter-Sown Chickpeas on Insect Pests and their Management

Recent research has shown that in and around Syria, winter-sown chickpea substantially outyields the spring-sown crops. It is expected that there will be a substantial adoption of this practice in farmers' fields in the near future. Any substantial change in the sowing date of a crop that is already well established in a traditional cropping system can bring about some changes in pest incidence, not only on that crop but alsoon other crops in the system. Although it is probable that winter.sown chickpea will suffer no greatcr pest attack than the spring-sown, it is possible that the introduction of a winter-sown crop might provide an earlier buildup of pests that will then disperse lo subsequent $pringsown crops including chickpea. Alternatively, a relatively unimporlant insect might become important either on the winter or succeeding crop, and so cause problems for the farmers

Diversity, distribution and conservation status of mangrove species in Pulias Bay, Indonesia

As an ecosystem, the mangrove ecosystem serves various purposes. The objectives of this study are to (1) identify the community structure of the important value index; and (2) evaluate the importance of the mangrove species diversity index in Pulias Bay in Ogodeide District, Tolitoli Regency. The study was conducted in 2021 using a quantitative descriptive methodology and survey method. The number of discovered species will be used to establish the species composition. The structure of the mangrove communities is being evaluated by calculating the relative density (RD) and frequency (FR). The data is tabulated to calculate the Important Value Index (IVI) value according to the Shannon-Wiener formula. There were 18 different species of mangroves discovered, including Rhizophora apiculata, Rh. mucronata, Rh. stylosa, Bruguiera parviflora, B. gymnorrhiza, Ceriops tagal, C. decandra, Sonneratia alba, S. caseolaris, S. ovata, Avicennia lanata, Xylocarpus moluccensis, Acrostichum aureum, Nypa fruticans, and Pemphis acidula. The Rhizophoraceae family predominated at each observation station, according to the findings of the vegetation analysis. Meanwhile the most rarely found species of mangrove were Acrostichum aureum, Sonneratia casiolaris, and Xylocarpus moluccensis, each with two specimens. The community structure reveals that X. moluccensis has the lowest IVI value of 12.7%, while Rhizophora mucronata has an IVI value of 101.3%. The mangrove Diversity Index (H') has a value of 2.48 and meets the standards for moderate diversity. Physical and chemical parameter measurements often indicate that the four stations or sites where the data was collected have similar conditions. Interestingly, we also found Avicennia lanata, a mangrove species that falls under the Vulnerable category. The collected information can be used to manage the mangrove forest in Pulias Bay in the Ogodeide Sub-District of the Tolitoli Regency and serve as a database for efforts to conserve mangroves and mitigate the effects of global warming

Challenges of providing healthcare worker education and training in protracted conflict: a focus on non-government controlled areas in north west Syria

Without healthcare workers (HCWs), health and humanitarian provision in Syria cannot be sustained either now or in the post-conflict phase. The protracted conflict has led to the exodus of more than 70% of the healthcare workforce. Those remaining work in dangerous conditions with insufficient resources and a healthcare system that has been decimated by protracted conflict. For many HCWs, particularly those in non-government-controlled areas (NGCAs) of Syria, undergraduate education and postgraduate training has been interrupted with few opportunities to continue. In this manuscript, we explore initiatives present in north west Syria at both undergraduate and postgraduate level for physician and non-physician HCWs. Conclusion: Challenges to HCW education in north west Syria can be broadly divided into 1. Organisational (local healthcare leadership and governance, coordination and collaboration between stakeholders, competition between stakeholders and insufficient funding.) 2. Programmatic (lack of accreditation or recognition of qualifications, insufficient physical space for teaching, exodus of faculty affecting teaching and training, prioritisation of physicians over non-physicians, informally trained healthcare workers.) 3. Healthcare system related (politicisation of healthcare system, changing healthcare needs of the population, ongoing attacks on healthcare.) Locally implementable strategies including dedicated funding are key to supporting retention of HCWs and return during post-conflict reconstruction

Examining the Factor Structure of the Self-Report of Psychopathy Short-Form Across Four Young Adult Samples

Psychopathy refers to a range of complex behaviors and personality traits, including callousness and antisocial behavior, typically studied in criminal populations. Recent studies have used self-reports to examine psychopathic traits among noncriminal samples. The goal of the current study was to examine the underlying factor structure of the Self-Report of Psychopathy Scale–Short Form (SRP-SF) across complementary samples and examine the impact of gender on factor structure. We examined the structure of the SRP-SF among 2,554 young adults from three undergraduate samples and a high-risk young adult sample. Using confirmatory factor analysis, a four-correlated factor model and a four-bifactor model showed good fit to the data. Evidence of weak invariance was found for both models across gender. These findings highlight that the SRP-SF is a useful measure of low-level psychopathic traits in noncriminal samples, although the underlying factor structure may not fully translate across men and women

Brain-age in midlife is associated with accelerated biological aging and cognitive decline in a longitudinal birth-cohort

An individual’s brainAGE is the difference between chronological age and age predicted from machine-learning models of brain-imaging data. BrainAGE has been proposed as a biomarker of age-related deterioration of the brain. Having an older brainAGE has been linked to Alzheimer’s, dementia and mortality. However, these findings are largely based on cross-sectional associations which can confuse age differences with cohort differences. To illuminate the validity of brainAGE as a biomarker of accelerated brain aging, a study is needed of a large cohort all born in the same year who nevertheless vary on brainAGE. In the Dunedin Study, a population-representative 1972–73 birth cohort, we measured brainAGE at age 45 years, as well as the pace of biological aging and cognitive decline in longitudinal data from childhood to midlife (N=869). In this cohort, all chronological age 45 years, brainAGE was measured reliably (ICC=.81) and ranged from 24 to 72 years. Those with older midlife brainAGEs tended to have poorer cognitive function in both adulthood and childhood, as well as impaired brain health at age 3. Furthermore, those with older brainAGEs had an accelerated pace of biological aging, older facial appearance and early signs of cognitive decline from childhood to midlife. These findings help to validate brainAGE as a potential surrogate biomarker for midlife intervention studies that seek to measure dementia-prevention efforts in midlife. However, the findings also caution against the assumption that brainAGE scores represent only age-related deterioration of the brain as they may also index central nervous system variation present since childhood

Comparison of 5-year progression of retinitis pigmentosa involving the posterior pole among siblings by means of SD-OCT: a retrospective study

The blockchain technology promises to transform finance, money and evengovernments. However, analyses of blockchain applicability and robustness typicallyfocus on isolated systems whose actors contribute mainly by running the consensusalgorithm. Here, we highlight the importance of considering trustless platformswithin the broader ecosystem that includes social and communication networks. Asan example, we analyse the flash-crash observed on 21st June 2017 in the Ethereumplatform and show that a major phenomenon of social coordination led to acatastrophic cascade of events across several interconnected systems. We proposethe concept of “emergent centralisation” to describe situations where a single systembecomes critically important for the functioning of the whole ecosystem, and arguethat such situations are likely to become more and more frequent in interconnectedsocio-technical systems. We anticipate that the systemic approach we propose willhave implications for future assessments of trustless systems and call for the attentionof policy-makers on the fragility of our interconnected and rapidly changing world

A New Tissue Resonator Indenter Device and Reliability Study

Knowledge of tissue mechanical properties is widely required by medical applications, such as disease diagnostics, surgery operation, simulation, planning, and training. A new portable device, called Tissue Resonator Indenter Device (TRID), has been developed for measurement of regional viscoelastic properties of soft tissues at the Bio-instrument and Biomechanics Lab of the University of Toronto. As a device for soft tissue properties in-vivo measurements, the reliability of TRID is crucial. This paper presents TRID’s working principle and the experimental study of TRID’s reliability with respect to inter-reliability, intra-reliability, and the indenter misalignment effect as well