Top–Down Cognitive Control in Students with a Rigid Set-on Facial Expression

Top–down cognitive control was studied in students by the model of fixed set for facial expression. In subjects with errors in the set fixing, it is weakened to the greatest extent. The hypothesis about the influence on the top–down cognitive control of the functional state of subjects caused by signs of autonomic dysfunction, personal anxiety, depression and sleep quality is considered

Beyond microarrays: Finding key transcription factors controlling signal transduction pathways

BACKGROUND: Massive gene expression changes in different cellular states measured by microarrays, in fact, reflect just an "echo" of real molecular processes in the cells. Transcription factors constitute a class of the regulatory molecules that typically require posttranscriptional modifications or ligand binding in order to exert their function. Therefore, such important functional changes of transcription factors are not directly visible in the microarray experiments. RESULTS: We developed a novel approach to find key transcription factors that may explain concerted expression changes of specific components of the signal transduction network. The approach aims at revealing evidence of positive feedback loops in the signal transduction circuits through activation of pathway-specific transcription factors. We demonstrate that promoters of genes encoding components of many known signal transduction pathways are enriched by binding sites of those transcription factors that are endpoints of the considered pathways. Application of the approach to the microarray gene expression data on TNF-alpha stimulated primary human endothelial cells helped to reveal novel key transcription factors potentially involved in the regulation of the signal transduction pathways of the cells. CONCLUSION: We developed a novel computational approach for revealing key transcription factors by knowledge-based analysis of gene expression data with the help of databases on gene regulatory networks (TRANSFAC(® )and TRANSPATH(®)). The corresponding software and databases are available at

Human gut microbiota community structures in urban and rural populations in Russia

The microbial community of the human gut has a crucial role in sustaining host homeostasis. High-throughput DNA sequencing has delineated the structural and functional configurations of gut metagenomes in world populations. The microbiota of the Russian population is of particular interest to researchers, because Russia encompasses a uniquely wide range of environmental conditions and ethnogeographical cohorts. Here we conduct a shotgun metagenomic analysis of gut microbiota samples from 96 healthy Russian adult subjects, which reveals novel microbial community structures. The communities from several rural regions display similarities within each region and are dominated by the bacterial taxa associated with the healthy gut. Functional analysis shows that the metabolic pathways exhibiting differential abundance in the novel types are primarily associated with the trade-off between the Bacteroidetes and Firmicutes phyla. The specific signatures of the Russian gut microbiota are likely linked to the host diet, cultural habits and socioeconomic status. © 2013 Macmillan Publishers Limited. All rights reserved

Top–Down Cognitive Control in Students with A Rigid Set-on Facial Expression

Top–down cognitive control was studied in students by the model of fixed set for facial expression. In subjects with errors in the set fixing, it is weakened to the greatest extent. The hypothesis about the influence on the top–down cognitive control of the functional state of subjects caused by signs of autonomic dysfunction, personal anxiety, depression and sleep quality is considered. Keywords: top–down cognitive control, emotional facial expression, errors recognition, EEG, alpha oscillation

Pacific Symposium on Biocomputing 8:291-302(2003)

Phylogenetic footprinting is an efficient approach for revealing potential transcription factor binding sites in promoter sequences. The idea is based on an assumption that functional sites in promoters should evolve much slower then other regions that do not bear any conservative function. Therefore, potential transcription factor (TF) binding sites that are found in the evolutionally conservative regions of promoters have more chances to be considered as “real ” sites. The most difficult step of the phylogenetic footprinting is alignment of promoter sequences between different organisms (f.e. human and mouse). The conventional alignment methods often can not align promoters due to the high level of sequence variability. We have developed a new alignment method that takes into account similarity in distribution of potential binding sites (motif-based alignment). This method has been used effectively for promoter alignment and for revealing new potential binding sites for various transcription factors. We made a systematic phylogenetic footprinting of human/mouse conserved noncoding sequences (CNS). 60 thousand potential binding sites were revealed in human and mouse genomes. We have developed a database of the predicted potential TF binding sites. Availability

Difficulties in diagnosing delirium in elderly patients in a general hospital

[No abstract available

Difficulties in diagnosing delirium in elderly patients in a general hospital

[No abstract available