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Social stress contributes to major societal health burdens, such as anxiety disorders and nervousness. Nx4 has been found to modulate stress responses. We investigated whether dampening of such responses is associated with neuronal correlates in brain regions involved in stress and anxiety. In a randomized, placebo-controlled, double-blind, cross-over trial, 39 healthy males took a single dose (three tablets) of either placebo or Nx4, 40 to 60 minutes before an fMRI scan session. We here report on drug effects on amygdala responses during a face-matching task, which was performed during a complex test battery further including resting-state brain connectivity and a social stress experiment. The first of the Primary Outcomes, defined in a hierarchical order, concerned reduced amygdala effects after intake of verum compared to placebo. We found a statistically significant reduction in differential activations in the left amygdala for the contrast negative faces versus forms during verum versus placebo condition. Our results indicate that effects of Nx4 can be monitored in the brain. Previously noted effects on stress responses may thus be modulated by affective brain regions including the amygdala. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Large tumor suppressor (LATS) proteins are putative tumor suppressors and poorly expressed associated with poor outcome in many cancers. A recent immunohistochemistry study showed that LATS protein expression correlated with poor outcome in serous ovarian cancer. Materials and methods: We analyzed LATS expression in various ovarian cancer transcriptomic data sets and immunohistochemically assessed LATS protein expression in a Swiss ovarian tumor cohort. Results were compared to clinicopathological characteristics and outcome. We also compared LATS protein expression in serous ovarian cancer cell lines to their EMT status (Western blotting) and drug sensitivity (MTT assay). Results: The analysis of 15 different transcriptomic data sets showed that LATS2 was associated with poorer outcome, while LATS1 was irrelevant (HR = 1.19 and HR = 1.00, respectively). The TCGA-RNASeqV2 data set showed that low LATS1 and LATS2 were associated with better survival in serous ovarian carcinoma. Despite heterogeneity among the different data sets, LATS expression is not an indicator of survival in serous ovarian cancer and LATS2 expression may even be tumorigenic. LATS expression was neither associated with survival nor with the stage and grade in the Swiss cohort. It was low in cystadenoma, intermediate in carcinoma, and high in borderline tumors and was higher in serous than mucinous ovarian carcinoma. LATS protein expression extent was comparable in epithelial-, intermediate-, and mesenchymal-type ovarian cancer cells and was not associated with drug sensitivity. Conclusion: These results are largely incompatible with a tumor-suppressive function of LATS in ovarian cancer, and LATS protein level is also not an indicator for drug sensitivity and EMT status of ovarian cancer cells. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Developmental dyslexia is a specific deficit in reading and spelling that often persists into adulthood. In the present study, we used slow event-related fMRI and independent component analysis to identify brain networks involved in perception of audio-visual speech in a group of adult readers with dyslexia (RD) and a group of fluent readers (FR). Participants saw a video of a female speaker saying a disyllabic word. In the congruent condition, audio and video input were identical whereas in the incongruent condition, the two inputs differed. Participants had to respond to occasionally occurring animal names. The independent components analysis (ICA) identified several components that were differently modulated in FR and RD. Two of these components including fusiform gyrus and occipital gyrus showed less activation in RD compared to FR possibly indicating a deficit to extract face information that is needed to integrate auditory and visual information in natural speech perception. A further component centered on the superior temporal sulcus (STS) also exhibited less activation in RD compared to FR. This finding is corroborated in the univariate analysis that shows less activation in STS for RD compared to FR. These findings suggest a general impairment in recruitment of audiovisual processing areas in dyslexia during the perception of natural speech. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Playing violent video games have been linked to long-term emotional desensitization. We hypothesized that desensitization effects in excessive users of violent video games should lead to decreased brain activations to highly salient emotional pictures in emotional sensitivity brain regions. Twenty-eight male adult subjects showing excessive long-term use of violent video games and age and education matched control participants were examined in two experiments using standardized emotional pictures of positive, negative and neutral valence. No group differences were revealed even at reduced statistical thresholds which speaks against desensitization of emotion sensitive brain regions as a result of excessive use of violent video games. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Interpretation of myoelectric interference patterns during movement relies on suitably formulated models. In the review, various modelling approaches are described and discussed. The importance of incorporating the time lag between mechanical and electrical activities in models of myoelectric activity is underlined. It is suggested that a portion of electrical activity is not related to force production but represents muscle efforts at damping oscillations in the surrounding soft tissues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Precise data for quasi-free photoproduction of η-mesons off the deuteron have been measured at the Bonn ELSA accelerator with the combined Crystal Barrel/TAPS detector for incident photon energies up to 2.5GeV. The η-mesons have been detected in coincidence with recoil protons and neutrons. Possible nuclear effects like Fermi motion and re-scattering can be studied via a comparison of the quasi-free reaction off the bound proton to η-production off the free proton. No significant effects beyond the folding of the free cross-section with the momentum distribution of the bound protons have been found. These Fermi motion effects can be removed by an analysis using the invariant mass of the η-nucleon pairs reconstructed from the final-state four-momenta of the particles. The total cross-section for quasi-free η-photoproduction off the neutron reveals even without correction for Fermi motion a pronounced bump-like structure around 1GeV of incident photon energy, which is not observed for the proton. This structure is even narrower in the invariant-mass spectrum of the η-neutron pairs. Position and width of the peak in the invariant-mass spectrum are W ≈ 1665 MeV and FWHM Γ ≈ 25 MeV. The data are compared to the results of different models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The reaction γp → pπ0γ′ has been measured with the Crystal Ball/TAPS detectors using the energy-tagged photon beam at the electron accelerator facility MAMI-B. Energy and angular differential cross-sections for the emitted photon γ′ and angular differential cross-sections for the π0 have been determined with high statistics in the energy range of the Δ+ (1232)-resonance. Cross-sections and the ratio of the cross-section to the nonradiative process γp → pπ0 are compared to theoretical reaction models, having the anomalous magnetic moment κ Δ as free parameter. As the shape of the experimental distributions is not reproduced in detail by the model calculations, currently no extraction of κ Δ is feasible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A precise measurement of the Dalitz plot parameter, $ \alpha$ , for the $ \eta$ → 3 $ \pi^{0}_{}$ decay is presented. The experiment was performed with the Crystal Ball and TAPS large-acceptance photon detectors at the tagged photon beam facility of the MAMI-B electron accelerator in Mainz. High statistics of 1.8 · 106 $ \eta$ → 3 $ \pi^{0}_{}$ events were obtained, giving the result $ \alpha$ = - 0.032±0.002stat±0.002syst . [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The exclusive reactions γ p → K *0Σ+(1189) and γ p → K 0π0Σ+(1189) , leading to the p 4π0 final state, have been measured with a tagged photon beam for incident energies from threshold up to 2.5GeV. The experiment has been performed at the tagged photon facility of the ELSA accelerator (Bonn). The Crystal Barrel and TAPS detectors were combined to a photon detector system of almost 4π geometrical acceptance. Differential and total cross-sections are reported. At energies close to the threshold, a flat angular distribution has been observed for the reaction γ p → K 0π0Σ+ suggesting dominant s -channel production. Σ*(1385) and higher-lying hyperon states have been observed. An enhancement in the forward direction in the angular distributions of the reaction γ p → K *0Σ+ indicates a t -channel exchange contribution to the reaction mechanism. The experimental data are in reasonable agreement with recent theoretical predictions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hyperon production off the proton in the K 0Σ+ channel has been studied at the tagged-photon beam facility at the ELSA electron accelerator in Bonn. This experiment was part of a series of neutral meson production experiments on various targets. For this purpose, the Crystal Barrel and TAPS photon spectrometers have been combined to provide a 4π detector for multi-neutral-particle final states. A high-quality excitation function, recoil polarizations, and angular distributions from threshold up to 2.3GeV center-of-mass energy were obtained. The results are compared with predictions of recent coupled-channel calculations within the K -matrix formalism and are interpreted by the partial-wave analysis within the Bonn-Gatchina model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Forces and displacements at the elbow joint have been related to EMG responses of flexor and extensor muscles during landing from jump downs at heights of 1.2 m to 0.6 m in five cats. Prelanding EMG activity consisted of two prelanding extensor bursts. Onset of both bursts was constant across all jump heights with reference to landing and not to take-off, occurring on average 73 ± 12 ms and 17 ± 8 ms prior to ground contact for the lateral triceps. Post-landing EMG activity was less than prelanding activity and was often packaged in three bursts, occurring on average at 18 ± 6, 34 ± 8 and 50 ± 9 ms after touchdown. Other measurements from extensor EMG including burst duration and integrated activity pre- and post-landing were also invariant. Across jump heights, maximum flexion angular velocity and elbow displacement were reached on average 28 ± 5 and 85 ± 7 ms postlanding, respectively. Although vertical (y) and horizontal (x) ground reaction forces increased with jump height, torque values at the elbow joint were not significantly different and were small in magnitude. At landing an animal typically experienced a 20 ms flexor torque (0.3 Nm/kg b.wt.) followed by an extensor torque (0.4 Nm/kg b.wt.) that continued for the major portion of elbow flexion. The temporal constancy of the kinematic and kinetic data and EMG activity across jump heights suggests that a generalized motor program can be used to activate extensor muscles at the elbow joint during the prelanding phase of self-initiated jumps. Since the onset of extensor activity is related to landing rather than to take-off, it is hypothesized that this activity is triggered by visual cues rather than by vestibular reflexes. After impact, adjustments for slight differences in post-landing torque about the elbow may be accomplished by intrinsic properties of the activated muscle as well as through segmental reflexes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent studies have shown that microbial communities are composed of groups of functionally cohesive taxa whose abundance is more stable and better-associated with metabolic fluxes than that of any individual taxon. However, identifying these functional groups in a manner that is independent of error-prone functional gene annotations remains a major open problem. Here we tackle this structure-function problem by developing a novel unsupervised approach that coarse-grains taxa into functional groups, solely on the basis of the patterns of statistical variation in species abundances and functional read-outs. We demonstrate the power of this approach on three distinct datasets. On data of replicate microcosms with heterotrophic soil bacteria, our unsupervised algorithm recovered experimentally validated functional groups that divide metabolic labour and remain stable despite large variation in species composition. When leveraged against the ocean microbiome data, our approach discovered a functional group that combines aerobic and anaerobic ammonia oxidizers whose summed abundance tracks closely with nitrate concentrations in the water column. Finally, we show that our framework can enable the detection of species groups that are probably responsible for the production or consumption of metabolites abundant in animal gut microbiomes, serving as a hypothesis-generating tool for mechanistic studies. Overall, this work advances our understanding of structure-function relationships in complex microbiomes and provides a powerful approach to discover functional groups in an objective and systematic manner., (© 2023. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Limited.)