Biological profiling of plasma neuropeptide Y in relation to posttraumatic stress symptoms in two combat cohorts

Publication date: Available online 19 February 2018
Source:Biological Psychology
Author(s): Alieke Reijnen, Elbert Geuze, Iris Eekhout, Adam X. Maihofer, Caroline M. Nievergelt, Dewleen G. Baker, Eric Vermetten
In order to decrease the risk of developing stress-related disorders after military deployment, biological vulnerability factors should be identified. Neuropeptide Y (NPY) is a peptide neurotransmitter that is associated with modulation of the stress response. Using the data of two longitudinal prospective cohort studies (N = 892 and N = 2427), plasma NPY (pNPY) was assessed as a possible susceptibility biomarker for the development of PTSD symptoms over time. Data collection started prior to deployment and follow-up assessments were completed up to two years after deployment. In pNPY levels, measured before and shortly after deployment, three distinct trajectories were identified. In both cohorts, these trajectories were not related to the level of reported PTSD symptoms over time and neither were pre-deployment pNPY levels. Whereas previous research suggested that high NPY levels might be a marker for resilience, the current findings suggest limited usefulness of peripherally measured NPY in the development of PTSD.



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Sensitivity to psychosocial chronic stressors and adolescents' externalizing problems: Combined moderator effects of resting heart rate and parental psychiatric history

Publication date: Available online 19 February 2018
Source:Biological Psychology
Author(s): Anna Roos E. Zandstra, Johan Ormel, Andrea Dietrich, Edwin R. van den Heuvel, Pieter J. Hoekstra, Catharina A. Hartman
From the literature it is not clear whether low resting heart rate (HR) reflects low or high sensitivity to the detrimental effects of adverse environments on externalizing problems. We studied parental psychiatric history (PH), reflecting general vulnerability, as possible moderator explaining these inconsistencies. Using Linear Mixed Models, we analyzed data from 1914 subjects, obtained in three measurement waves (mean age 11, 13.5, and 16 years) from the TRacking Adolescents' Individual Lives Survey population-based cohort and the parallel clinic-referred cohort. As hypothesized, more chronic stressors predicted more externalizing problems in vulnerable individuals with high resting HR but not in those with low resting HR, suggesting high vs. low sensitivity, respectively, to adverse environmental influences. Low sensitivity to adverse environmental influences in vulnerable individuals exposed to high stressor levels was additionally confirmed by high heart rate variability (Root Mean Squared Successive Difference; RMSSD). In adolescents with low vulnerability, in contrast, the association between chronic stressors and externalizing problems did not substantially differ by resting HR and RMSSD. Future research may demonstrate whether our findings extend to other adverse, or beneficial, influences. Notwithstanding their theoretical interest, the effects were small, only pertained to parent-reported externalizing problems, refer to a small subset of respondents in our sample, and are in need of replication. We conclude that HR and RMSSD are unlikely to be strong moderators of the association between stressors and externalizing problems.



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Editorial Board

Publication date: March 2018
Source:DNA Repair, Volume 63





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Editorial Board

Publication date: February 2018
Source:Current Opinion in Neurobiology, Volume 48





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Mixed selectivity encoding and action selection in the prefrontal cortex during threat assessment

Publication date: April 2018
Source:Current Opinion in Neurobiology, Volume 49
Author(s): Itamar S Grunfeld, Ekaterina Likhtik
The medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) regulates expression of emotional behavior. The mPFC combines multivariate information from its inputs, and depending on the imminence of threat, activates downstream networks that either increase or decrease the expression of anxiety-related motor behavior and autonomic activation. Here, we selectively highlight how subcortical input to the mPFC from two example structures, the amygdala and ventral hippocampus, help shape mixed selectivity encoding and action selection during emotional processing. We outline a model where prefrontal subregions modulate behavior along orthogonal motor dimensions, and exhibit connectivity that selects for expression of one behavioral strategy while inhibiting the other.



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Contents page

Publication date: February 2018
Source:Current Opinion in Neurobiology, Volume 48





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Toward true closed-loop neuromodulation: artifact-free recording during stimulation

Publication date: June 2018
Source:Current Opinion in Neurobiology, Volume 50
Author(s): Andy Zhou, Benjamin C Johnson, Rikky Muller
Closed-loop and responsive neuromodulation systems improve open-loop neurostimulation by responding directly to measured neural activity and providing adaptive, on-demand therapy. To be effective, these systems must be able to simultaneously record and stimulate neural activity, a task made difficult by persistent stimulation artifacts that distort and obscure underlying biomarkers. To enable simultaneous stimulation and recording, several techniques have been proposed. These techniques involve artifact-preventing system configurations, resilient recording front-ends, and back-end signal processing for removing recorded artifacts. Co-designing and integrating these artifact cancellation techniques will be key to enabling neuromodulation systems to stimulate and record at the same time. Here, we review the state-of-the-art for these techniques and their role in achieving artifact-free neuromodulation.



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Aims and Scope & Editorial Board

Publication date: January 2018
Source:Bioactive Carbohydrates and Dietary Fibre, Volume 13





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Novel Thiolated Chitosan- Polyethyleneglycol blend/Montmorillonite Composite formulations for the Oral Delivery of Insulin

Publication date: Available online 20 February 2018
Source:Bioactive Carbohydrates and Dietary Fibre
Author(s): Thayyath Sreenivasan Anirudhan, Jayasree Parvathy
A novel drug delivery system is architectured at achieving systematically improved therapeutic success for drugs including those that have limited use because of toxicity, uneven distribution pattern, stability and formulation of difficulties. In the present work, we report on the preparation of a novel composite formulation, i.e., biodegradable Thiolated Chitosan- Polyethylene Glycol (TCS-PEG) blend incorporated with medical clay, MMT called TCS-PEG/MMT composites for the oral delivery of insulin. The different stages of the preparation were well characterized and the effects of pH on insulin loading along with controlled release studies were carried out. The drug release was monitored by changing time, % drug loading and pH of the medium. Results showed only 5% release of insulin after 2h incubation in the simulating gastric condition and after 4h incubation in the simulating intestinal conditions, the release profile enhanced to 67% at basic pH (7.4), which shows the release was much pronounced in the basic medium than in the acidic medium.

Graphical abstract

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The evolution of eccrine sweat glands in human and nonhuman primates

Publication date: April 2018
Source:Journal of Human Evolution, Volume 117
Author(s): Andrew Best, Jason M. Kamilar
Sweating is an unusual thermoregulatory strategy for most mammals, yet is critical for humans. This trait is commonly hypothesized to result from human ancestors moving from a forest to a warmer and drier open environment. As soft tissue traits do not typically fossilize, this idea has been difficult to test. Therefore, we used a comparative approach to examine 15 eccrine gland traits from 35 primate species. For each trait we measured phylogenetic signal, tested three evolutionary models to explain trait variation, and used phylogenetic models to examine how traits varied in response to climate variables. Phylogenetic signal in traits varied substantially, with the two traits exhibiting the highest values being gland distribution on the body and percent eccrine vs. apocrine glands on the body. Variation in most traits was best explained by an Ornstein-Uhlenbeck model suggesting the importance of natural selection. Two traits were strongly predicted by climate. First, species with high eccrine gland glycogen content were associated with habitats exhibiting warm temperatures and low rainfall. Second, species with increased capillarization were associated with high temperature. Glycogen is a primary energy substrate powering sweat production and sodium reabsorption in the eccrine gland, and increased capillarization permits greater oxygen, glucose and electrolyte delivery. Thus, our results are evidence of natural selection for increased sweating capacity in primate species with body surface eccrine glands living in hot and dry climates. We suggest that selection for increased glycogen content and capillarization may have been part of initial increases in hominin thermoregulatory sweating capacity.



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Evidence for a neural signature of musical preference during silence

Publication date: Available online 20 February 2018
Source:International Journal of Psychophysiology
Author(s): Joucla Coralie, Nicolier Magali, Giustiniani Julie, Brunotte Gaelle, Noiret Nicolas, Monnin Julie, Magnin Eloi, Pazart Lionel, Moulin Thierry, Haffen Emmanuel, Vandel Pierre, Gabriel Damien
One of the most basic and person-specific affective responses to music is liking. The present investigation sought to determine whether liking was preserved during spontaneous auditory imagery. To this purpose, we inserted two-second silent intervals into liked and disliked songs, a method known to automatically recreate a mental image of these songs. Neural correlates of musical preference were measured by high-density electroencephalography in twenty subjects who had to listen to a set of five pre-selected unknown songs the same number of times for two weeks. Time frequency analysis of the two most liked and the two most disliked songs confirmed the presence of neural responses related to liking. At the beginning of silent intervals (400–900 ms and 1000–1300 ms), significant differences in theta activity were originating from the inferior frontal and superior temporal gyrus. These two brain structures are known to work together to process various aspects of music and are also activated when measuring liking while listening to music. At the end of silent intervals (1400–1900 ms), significant alpha activity differences originating from the insula were observed, whose exact role remains to be explored. Although exposure was controlled for liked and disliked songs, liked songs were rated as more familiar, underlying the strong relationship that exists between liking, exposure, and familiarity.



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How struggling adult readers use contextual information when comprehending speech: Evidence from event-related potentials

Publication date: March 2018
Source:International Journal of Psychophysiology, Volume 125
Author(s): Shukhan Ng, Brennan R. Payne, Elizabeth A.L. Stine-Morrow, Kara D. Federmeier
We investigated how struggling adult readers make use of sentence context to facilitate word processing when comprehending spoken language, conditions under which print decoding is not a barrier to comprehension. Stimuli were strongly and weakly constraining sentences (as measured by cloze probability), which ended with the most expected word based on those constraints or an unexpected but plausible word. Community-dwelling adults with varying literacy skills listened to continuous speech while their EEG was recorded. Participants, regardless of literacy level, showed N400 effects yoked to the cloze probability of the targets, with larger N400 amplitudes for less expected than more expected words. However, literacy-related differences emerged in an earlier time window of 170–300 ms: higher literacy adults produced a reduced negativity for strongly predictable targets over anterior channels, similar to previously reported effects on the Phonological Mapping Negativity (PMN), whereas low-literacy adults did not. Collectively, these findings suggest that in auditory sentence processing literacy may not notably affect the incremental activation of semantic features, but that comprehenders with underdeveloped literacy skills may be less likely to engage predictive processing. Thus, basic mechanisms of comprehension may be recruited differently as a function of literacy development—even in spoken language.



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Leptin Involvement in Primary Brain and Pituitary Tumors: Therapeutic Potential, Prognostic Value, and Proposed Diagnostic Application

Abstract

Brain tumors are associated with increased mortality and morbidity and are the most common cancer type in children and young adults. The present review focuses on the interplay between leptin, the most extensively studied adipokine, and the onset, development, and treatment of primary brain and intracranial tumors. The two main mechanisms for increased leptin levels in intracranial tumor survivors, leptin resistance caused by hypothalamic damage, or secondary to obesity, are discussed. The contradicting mechanistic observations on leptin being able to both promote tumorinogenesis (e.g., in gliomas) as well as inhibit it (e.g., in adenomas) are also reported. Additionally, the relevant current and future clinical applications, including most notably the proposed use of serum leptin measurements for non-invasive brain tumor diagnostics, are also reported.

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Antioxidant biomarkers in Gammarus pulex to evaluate the efficiency of electrocoagulation process in landfill leachate treatment

Abstract

The discharge of landfill leachate into the environment without effective treatment poses a serious threat for the aquatic ecosystems. This present study was undertaken to evaluate whether electrocoagulation process is efficient for treatment landfill leachate (LL) or not by using antioxidant biomarkers in Gammarus pulex. Glutathione peroxidase (GSH-Px), superoxide dismutase (SOD), and catalase (CAT) activities and malondialdehyde (MDA) and glutathione (GSH) levels in G. pulex exposed to untreated, treated, and diluted rates 1/10 and 1/20 in both LL during 24 and 96 h were tested. Physiochemical characteristics of leachate (chemical oxygen demand, electrical conductivity, pH, phosphate, turbidity, NH₃, Cl⁻, and color) were determined pre and post treatment. All physiochemical characteristics of LL decreased after treatment process. GSH-Px and CAT activities and GSH and MDA levels were increased in untreated groups when compared to control (p < 0.05). After treatment by electrocoagulation, MDA and GSH levels and CAT activities were returned to control values. In conclusion, the abilities of LL to stimulate oxidative stress in G. pulex have been proven. The results revealed that antioxidant parameters are useful biomarkers for determining the treatment efficiency of the electrocoagulation process.

http://ift.tt/2GwGnsT

Quantifying particulate matter accumulated on leaves by 17 species of urban trees in Beijing, China

Abstract

Airborne particulate matter (PM) has become a serious environmental problem and harms human health worldwide. Trees can effectively remove particles from the atmosphere and improve the air quality. In this study, a washing and weighing method was used to quantify accumulation of water-soluble ions and insoluble PM on the leaf surfaces and within the wax of the leaves for 17 urban plant species (including 4 shrubs and 13 trees). The deposited PM was determined in three size fractions: fine (0.2–2.5 μm), coarse (2.5–10 μm), and large (> 10 μm). Significant differences in the accumulation of PM were detected among various species. The leaves of Platycladus orientalis and Pinus armandi were the most effective in capturing PM. Across the species, 65 and 35% of PM, on average, deposited on the leaf surface and in the wax, respectively. The greatest PM accumulation by mass on leaves was in the largest PM size fraction, while the accumulation of coarse and fine particle size fractions was smaller. Water-soluble ions accumulated on the leaf surfaces contributed 28% to the total PM mass, on average. This study demonstrated that leaves of woody plants accumulate PM differently, and the most effective plant species should be selected in urban areas for attenuating ambient PM.

http://ift.tt/2Htl6lk

Exploring the effects of earthworms on bacterial profiles during vermicomposting process of sewage sludge and cattle dung with high-throughput sequencing

Abstract

This study aims to reveal the effects of earthworms (Eisenia fetida) on bacterial profiles during the vermicomposting process of sewage sludge and cattle dung with the high-throughput sequencing technology. The earthworms could accelerate organic degradation and improve the stabilization process. Moreover, the addition of earthworms not only affected the bacterial numbers, but also increased the bacterial community diversity. The activity of earthworms had significant effects on the bacterial community structure as the bacterial community was clearly different between the vermicomposting and the control treatment. Furthermore, the earthworms affected the physical and chemical properties of substrates, thus promoting the growth of some microorganisms, such as Flavobacteria, Acidbacteria, and Planctomycetes. Earthworms largely inhibited the growth of various human pathogenic bacteria. In summary, earthworms significantly affected the bacterial community in vermicomposting and it could be applied as an authentically effective technique for the stabilization of organic wastes.

http://ift.tt/2Gutr72

Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in multi-phases from the drinking water source area of the Pearl River Delta (PRD) in South China: Distribution, source apportionment, and risk assessment

Abstract

Sixteen priority polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) were investigated in the water dissolved phase (DP), suspended particulate matter (SPM), and sediment collected from the water source zone of the Pearl River Delta region. The sum of 16 PAH concentrations ranged from 92.8 to 324 ng/L in the water DP, from 28.8 to 205 ng/L in the SPM, and from 55.7 to 381 ng/g (d.w.) in the sediment. Compared with other areas globally, the PAH levels were considerably moderate in the DP and SPM and relatively low in the sediment. Spatial distribution of PAHs was site-specific, and relatively higher PAH levels were found in the areas with dense population and heavy traffic. The PAH profile was dominated by two- and three-ring PAHs, and PAH pollution was identified of pyrolytic origins. Based on risk quotient, the ecological risk in water was ranked as moderate, but the adverse health risk associated with water ingestion was minimal. Naphthalene and fluorene of the sediment samples showed potential biological impairment in some locations; nevertheless, the mean effects range median quotient suggested that the ecological risk of multiple PAHs was quite low (less than 10% incidence of adverse effects).

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Efficacy of instrument-assisted soft tissue mobilization in comparison to gastrocnemius-soleus stretching for dorsiflexion range of motion: A randomized controlled trial

Publication date: Available online 20 February 2018
Source:Journal of Bodywork and Movement Therapies
Author(s): Carrie A. Rowlett, William J. Hanney, Patrick S. Pabian, Jordan E. Holland, Carrie E. Rothschild, Morey J. Kolber
ObjectivesTo determine the efficacy of IASTM of the gastrocnemius-soleus complex in comparison to a traditional stretching intervention on dorsiflexion ROM.MethodsSixty healthy participants were randomly allocated to one of 3 groups: IASTM (n = 20), stretching (n = 20), or control group (n = 20). The dependent variables for this study was dorsiflexion range of motion (ROM) via three measurement methods which included Modified root position 1- knee extended (MRP1), Modified root position 2- knee flexed (MRP2), and weight bearing lunge test (WBLT). A multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was utilized to analyze the ROM differences between the groups (IASTM, stretching, and control groups), with a post-hoc Tukey and pairwise least significant difference tests to assess individual pairwise differences between the groups.ResultsThe MANOVA found significant ROM differences between the three intervention groups (F6,110 = 2.40, p = .032). Statistically significant differences were identified between both the IASTM and control as well as the stretching and control group through the WBLT and MRP2 assessments, but not in the MRP1 assessment. Further, there was no statistically significant difference between the IASTM and stretching groups using any of the three methods.ConclusionA single session of IASTM or stretching increased ankle dorsiflexion ROM in WBLT and MRP2. No significant difference was noted in the MRP1. Both IASTM and stretching appear to have a greater effect on soleus muscle flexibility as evidenced by ROM gains measured with the knee in a flexed position. No clinically significant difference was identified between the intervention groups in weight-bearing conditions; thus empowering patients with the use of self-stretching would seemingly be reasonable and efficient. Combined effects of stretching and IASTM warrant further investigation for increasing dorsiflexion range of motion as a summative effect is unknown.



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Investigation of the relationship of Epstein-Barr virus with in situ hybridization in renal-cell carcinomas

Publication date: June 2018
Source:Annals of Diagnostic Pathology, Volume 34
Author(s): Serap Karaarslan, Nazime Şen




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Scholar : These new articles for Dynamics of Asymmetric Conflict are available online

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The online platform for Taylor & Francis Online content New for Dynamics of Asymmetric Conflict and online now on Taylor & Francis Online: Original Articles Unipolar politics and global peace: a structural explanation of the globalizing jihad S. Yaqub Ibrahimi Pages: 1-11 | DOI: 10.1080/17467586.2018.1428763 The portrayal of drones in terrorist propaganda: a discourse analysis of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula's Inspire Jan Andre Lee Ludvigsen Pages: 1-24 | DOI: 10.1080/17467586.2018.1428764 2018 Future Directions Forum JOIN US at the 2018 Future Directions Forum for Journal of Clinical Child & Adolescent Psychology - June 15-16, 2018 To update which email alerts you receive, manage your alerts within the My Account area. Unsubscribe from new content alerts for this journal (both new issue and latest article notifications) with one click. If you need any further help, please contact us at support@tandfonline.com Please do not reply to this email. To ensure that you receive your alerts and information from Taylor & Francis Online, please add "alerts@tandfonline.com" and "info@tandfonline.com" to your safe senders list. Taylor & Francis, an Informa business. Taylor & Francis is a trading name of Informa UK Limited, registered in England under no. 1072954. Registered office: 5 Howick Place, London, SW1P 1WG.