Cerebral Epiphyseal Proteins and Melatonin Modulate the Hepatic and Renal Antioxidant Defense of Rats

The cerebral epiphysis (pineal gland) secrets melatonin and number of other proteins and peptides. It was thus hypothesized that antioxidant properties of epiphyseal proteins and melatonin could potentially benefit from exogenous therapies. In view of the therapeutic potential of these proteins, the present experiment was conducted to investigate the effect of buffalo epiphyseal proteins (BEP, at 100 μg/kg BW, i.p.) and melatonin (MEL, at 10 mg/kg BW, i.p) on changes in hepatic and renal antioxidant enzymes of adult female Wistar rats. Buffalo epiphyseal proteins significantly (P < .05) increased hepatic lipid peroxidation (LPO), superoxide dismutase (SOD), glutathione reductase (GR), glutathione peroxidase (GPx), reduced glutathione (GSH), and renal LPO, catalase (CAT), GR, GSH, GPx levels as compared to control animals. Similarly, MEL treatment significantly (P < .05) up-regulated hepatic SOD and GPx activity, whereas CAT, GR, GPx, and GSH levels in renal tissues were increased while SOD and LPO remained unaffected. Buffalo epiphyseal protein treatment produced greater effects on hepatic GPx and renal CAT and GSH levels than did MEL. These findings support the conclusion that buffalo epiphyseal proteins and melatonin activate a number of antioxidant mechanisms in hepatic and renal tissues

Making sense of nanocrystal lattice fringes

The orientation-dependence of thin-crystal lattice fringes can be gracefully quantified using fringe-visibility maps, a direct-space analog of Kikuchi maps. As in navigation of reciprocal space with the aid of Kikuchi lines, fringe-visibility maps facilitate acquisition of 3D crystallographic information in lattice images. In particular, these maps can help researchers to determine the 3D lattice parameters of individual nano-crystals, to ``fringe fingerprint'' collections of randomly-oriented particles, and to measure local specimen-thickness with only modest tilt. Since the number of fringes in an image increases with maximum spatial-frequency squared, these strategies (with help from more precise goniometers) will be more useful as aberration-correction moves resolutions into the subangstrom range.Comment: 12 pages, 15 figures, 2 tables, 60 refs, RevTex4, notes http://www.umsl.edu/~fraundor/help/imagnxtl.ht

Doll Play narratives about starting school in children of socially anxious mothers, and their relation to subsequent child school-based anxiety

Background: Child social anxiety is common, and predicts later emotional and academic impairment. Offspring of socially anxious mothers are at increased risk. It is important to establish whether individual vulnerability to disorder can be identified in young children. Method: The responses of 4.5 year-old children of mothers with social phobia (N = 62) and non-anxious mothers (N = 60) were compared, two months before school entry, using a Doll Play (DP) procedure focused on the social challenge of starting school. DP responses were examined in relation to teacher reports of anxious-depressed symptoms and social worries at the end of the child’s first school term. The role of earlier child behavioral inhibition and attachment, assessed at 14 months, was also considered. Results: Compared to children of non-anxious mothers, children of mothers with social phobia were significantly more likely to give anxiously negative responses in their school DP (OR = 2.57). In turn, negative DP predicted teacher reported anxious-depressed and social worry problems. There were no effects of infant behavioral inhibition or attachment. Conclusion: Vulnerability in young children at risk of anxiety can be identified using Doll Play narratives

A Comprehensive Model of Audiovisual Perception: Both Percept and Temporal Dynamics

The sparse information captured by the sensory systems is used by the brain to apprehend the environment, for example, to spatially locate the source of audiovisual stimuli. This is an ill-posed inverse problem whose inherent uncertainty can be solved by jointly processing the information, as well as introducing constraints during this process, on the way this multisensory information is handled. This process and its result - the percept - depend on the contextual conditions perception takes place in. To date, perception has been investigated and modeled on the basis of either one of two of its dimensions: the percept or the temporal dynamics of the process. Here, we extend our previously proposed audiovisual perception model to predict both these dimensions to capture the phenomenon as a whole. Starting from a behavioral analysis, we use a data-driven approach to elicit a Bayesian network which infers the different percepts and dynamics of the process. Context-specific independence analyses enable us to use the model's structure to directly explore how different contexts affect the way subjects handle the same available information. Hence, we establish that, while the percepts yielded by a unisensory stimulus or by the non-fusion of multisensory stimuli may be similar, they result from different processes, as shown by their differing temporal dynamics. Moreover, our model predicts the impact of bottom-up (stimulus driven) factors as well as of top-down factors (induced by instruction manipulation) on both the perception process and the percept itself

Utilisation of an operative difficulty grading scale for laparoscopic cholecystectomy

Background A reliable system for grading operative difficulty of laparoscopic cholecystectomy would standardise description of findings and reporting of outcomes. The aim of this study was to validate a difficulty grading system (Nassar scale), testing its applicability and consistency in two large prospective datasets. Methods Patient and disease-related variables and 30-day outcomes were identified in two prospective cholecystectomy databases: the multi-centre prospective cohort of 8820 patients from the recent CholeS Study and the single-surgeon series containing 4089 patients. Operative data and patient outcomes were correlated with Nassar operative difficultly scale, using Kendall’s tau for dichotomous variables, or Jonckheere–Terpstra tests for continuous variables. A ROC curve analysis was performed, to quantify the predictive accuracy of the scale for each outcome, with continuous outcomes dichotomised, prior to analysis. Results A higher operative difficulty grade was consistently associated with worse outcomes for the patients in both the reference and CholeS cohorts. The median length of stay increased from 0 to 4 days, and the 30-day complication rate from 7.6 to 24.4% as the difficulty grade increased from 1 to 4/5 (both p < 0.001). In the CholeS cohort, a higher difficulty grade was found to be most strongly associated with conversion to open and 30-day mortality (AUROC = 0.903, 0.822, respectively). On multivariable analysis, the Nassar operative difficultly scale was found to be a significant independent predictor of operative duration, conversion to open surgery, 30-day complications and 30-day reintervention (all p < 0.001). Conclusion We have shown that an operative difficulty scale can standardise the description of operative findings by multiple grades of surgeons to facilitate audit, training assessment and research. It provides a tool for reporting operative findings, disease severity and technical difficulty and can be utilised in future research to reliably compare outcomes according to case mix and intra-operative difficulty

The Proprioceptive Map of the Arm Is Systematic and Stable, but Idiosyncratic

Visual and somatosensory signals participate together in providing an estimate of the hand's spatial location. While the ability of subjects to identify the spatial location of their hand based on visual and proprioceptive signals has previously been characterized, relatively few studies have examined in detail the spatial structure of the proprioceptive map of the arm. Here, we reconstructed and analyzed the spatial structure of the estimation errors that resulted when subjects reported the location of their unseen hand across a 2D horizontal workspace. Hand position estimation was mapped under four conditions: with and without tactile feedback, and with the right and left hands. In the task, we moved each subject's hand to one of 100 targets in the workspace while their eyes were closed. Then, we either a) applied tactile stimulation to the fingertip by allowing the index finger to touch the target or b) as a control, hovered the fingertip 2 cm above the target. After returning the hand to a neutral position, subjects opened their eyes to verbally report where their fingertip had been. We measured and analyzed both the direction and magnitude of the resulting estimation errors. Tactile feedback reduced the magnitude of these estimation errors, but did not change their overall structure. In addition, the spatial structure of these errors was idiosyncratic: each subject had a unique pattern of errors that was stable between hands and over time. Finally, we found that at the population level the magnitude of the estimation errors had a characteristic distribution over the workspace: errors were smallest closer to the body. The stability of estimation errors across conditions and time suggests the brain constructs a proprioceptive map that is reliable, even if it is not necessarily accurate. The idiosyncrasy across subjects emphasizes that each individual constructs a map that is unique to their own experiences

Antimicrobial resistance among migrants in Europe: a systematic review and meta-analysis

BACKGROUND: Rates of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) are rising globally and there is concern that increased migration is contributing to the burden of antibiotic resistance in Europe. However, the effect of migration on the burden of AMR in Europe has not yet been comprehensively examined. Therefore, we did a systematic review and meta-analysis to identify and synthesise data for AMR carriage or infection in migrants to Europe to examine differences in patterns of AMR across migrant groups and in different settings. METHODS: For this systematic review and meta-analysis, we searched MEDLINE, Embase, PubMed, and Scopus with no language restrictions from Jan 1, 2000, to Jan 18, 2017, for primary data from observational studies reporting antibacterial resistance in common bacterial pathogens among migrants to 21 European Union-15 and European Economic Area countries. To be eligible for inclusion, studies had to report data on carriage or infection with laboratory-confirmed antibiotic-resistant organisms in migrant populations. We extracted data from eligible studies and assessed quality using piloted, standardised forms. We did not examine drug resistance in tuberculosis and excluded articles solely reporting on this parameter. We also excluded articles in which migrant status was determined by ethnicity, country of birth of participants' parents, or was not defined, and articles in which data were not disaggregated by migrant status. Outcomes were carriage of or infection with antibiotic-resistant organisms. We used random-effects models to calculate the pooled prevalence of each outcome. The study protocol is registered with PROSPERO, number CRD42016043681. FINDINGS: We identified 2274 articles, of which 23 observational studies reporting on antibiotic resistance in 2319 migrants were included. The pooled prevalence of any AMR carriage or AMR infection in migrants was 25·4% (95% CI 19·1-31·8; I2 =98%), including meticillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (7·8%, 4·8-10·7; I2 =92%) and antibiotic-resistant Gram-negative bacteria (27·2%, 17·6-36·8; I2 =94%). The pooled prevalence of any AMR carriage or infection was higher in refugees and asylum seekers (33·0%, 18·3-47·6; I2 =98%) than in other migrant groups (6·6%, 1·8-11·3; I2 =92%). The pooled prevalence of antibiotic-resistant organisms was slightly higher in high-migrant community settings (33·1%, 11·1-55·1; I2 =96%) than in migrants in hospitals (24·3%, 16·1-32·6; I2 =98%). We did not find evidence of high rates of transmission of AMR from migrant to host populations. INTERPRETATION: Migrants are exposed to conditions favouring the emergence of drug resistance during transit and in host countries in Europe. Increased antibiotic resistance among refugees and asylum seekers and in high-migrant community settings (such as refugee camps and detention facilities) highlights the need for improved living conditions, access to health care, and initiatives to facilitate detection of and appropriate high-quality treatment for antibiotic-resistant infections during transit and in host countries. Protocols for the prevention and control of infection and for antibiotic surveillance need to be integrated in all aspects of health care, which should be accessible for all migrant groups, and should target determinants of AMR before, during, and after migration. FUNDING: UK National Institute for Health Research Imperial Biomedical Research Centre, Imperial College Healthcare Charity, the Wellcome Trust, and UK National Institute for Health Research Health Protection Research Unit in Healthcare-associated Infections and Antimictobial Resistance at Imperial College London