Early glycinergic axon contact with the Mauthner neuron during zebrafish development

One important aspect of empathy is a “resonance mechanism”, which includes emotional cue detection, facial mimicry (measured by electromyography, EMG) and a specific cortical response. This study explored the convergence of these three measures of affective empathy. The twenty students who took part in the study were required to empathise with the situation by entering into the other person's situation. The four emotions portrayed were anger, fear, happiness, and neutral, and the subjects were instructed to make a two-alternative response (emotion or no emotion) to each emotion. A repeated transcranial magnetic stimulation was used to produce a temporary inhibition of the medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC). The results support the hypothesis that there is a direct relationship between emotional cue recognition, EMG-measured facial response and prefrontal activity. First, both facial expression detection and autonomic mimicry in reaction to emotional faces were systematically modulated in response to inhibition of the MPFC. Second, the MPFC was implicated in facial cue detection and the subsequent autonomic response because an impaired performance on both measures was observed when this brain area was inhibited. Third, this effect increased when negative-valenced stimuli (angry and fearful faces) were presented to the subjects. These results revealed a significant effect of the MPFC on both cue detection and facial mimicry that was distinctly related to different types of emotions.     

Improved response to infliximab after leukocytapheresis in a patent with rheumatoid arthritis

This is the first report on effective leukocytapheresis (LCAP) in an acquired infliximab (IFM) resistant patient with rheumatoid arthritis (RA). A 44-year-old Japanese woman with RA was treated with prednisolone, cyclosporine A, and methotrexate, which failed to stabilize the disease. Infliximab was then administered and the disease activity was controlled on December 2003. However, RA became active again on June 2004 so that LCAP was administered weekly for 5 weeks. After the LCAP treatment, the ACR20% response was obtained again and IFM has regained its efficacy.     

Pulmonary edema after electroconvulsive therapy in a patient treated for long-standing asthma with a beta2 stimulant

A 68-year-old man was scheduled to receive 8 treatments of electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) for severe depression. He was being treated for long-standing asthma with a beta2 stimulant, clenbuterol hydrochloride, and had experienced no asthma attack for 9 years. Although he experienced no adverse consequence in his 7 treatments, pulmonary edema ensued from his eighth treatment despite no change in anesthesia and in the technical parameters of ECT. He was treated with oxygen and intravenous hydrocortisone, after which he quickly recovered. Transient eosinophilia was observed, but clinical symptoms of asthma did not appear. Although the association between pulmonary edema and well-controlled asthma was unclear, thiopental as induction of anesthesia or esmolol as poststimulus delivery might have played a role in the event. There may be a possibility of pulmonary edema even after several uneventful ECT treatments in a patient with asthma.     

Increased chitotriosidase activity in serum of leprosy patients: Association with bacillary leprosy

Human phagocyte-specific chitotriosidase is associated with several diseases involving macrophage activation. Since macrophage activation plays an important role in the control of Mycobacterium leprae infection, we studied the association of chitotriosidase with leprosy both in serum and in situ in lesional skin biopsies from patients. Serum samples from 78 Indonesian leprosy patients (39 non-reactional and 39 reactional leprosy patients) and 36 healthy controls (HC) from the same endemic region were investigated. The patients were classified as multibacillary (MB, n = 69) or paucibacillary (PB, n = 9) based on the bacterial index in slit-skin smears. Thirty-six of the reactional patients had erythema nodosum leprosum (ENL), while only 3 had reversal reaction (RR). Follow-up serum samples after corticosteroid treatment were also obtained from 17 patients with ENL and one with RR. Multibacillary (MB) patients showed increased chitotriosidase activity in serum as compared to paucibacillary (PB) patients and healthy controls. Although no significant difference was observed between reactional and the corresponding non-reactional groups, ENL showed significantly higher chitotriosidase activity as compared to HC. Furthermore, corticosteroid treatment resulted in significant decline of enzyme activity in ENL sera. Chitotriosidase activity correlated with levels of neopterin, another macrophage activation marker, but not with IL-6, IFN-γ, TNF-α and IL-10. Immunohistochemical staining of 6 MB (LL = 5, BL = 1) lesional skin sections from stored material showed positive staining for chitotriosidase within lipid-laden macrophages suggesting that macrophages are the source of the enzyme detected in serum. Thus, serum chitotriosidase activity is potentially useful in distinguishing MB from PB leprosy and in monitoring response to therapy in ENL.     

Common risk factors for changes in body weight and psychological well-being in Japanese male middle-aged workers

Objectives  

Overweight and poor psychological well-being are becoming serious health issues in the Japanese workplace. Concurrence of those physical and mental conditions has been pointed out, especially in middle-aged workers. Therefore, we tried to determine common risk factors for body weight gain and the deterioration of psychological well-being in male middle-aged office workers using a five-year follow-up study.     

Identification of the primary outcomes that result from deficient spiral arterial modification in pregnant mice

Pre-eclampsia, an acute complication of human pregnancy, is associated within complete physiological modification of decidual spiral arteries. This is thought to promote oxidative stress from perfusion/reperfusion of the placenta and to restrict placental and fetal growth. Alymphoid (genotype Rag2(-/-)/Il2rg(-/-)) mice, sufficient in dendritic and myeloid cell functions, lack spiral arterial modification with individual spiral arteries having ~1.7x the vascular resistance and 0.66x the blood velocity of +/+ mice. Their placentae are measurably hypoxic yet neither placental growth nor fetal survival is impaired and gestational hypertension is not seen. Thus, lymphocytes rather than vascular adaptations appear to be the pivotal contributors to the clinical complications of pre-eclampsia.     

Glycine substitution mutations by different amino acids in the same codon of COL7A1 lead to heterogeneous clinical phenotypes of dominant dystrophic epidermolysis bullosa

Abstract Dystrophic epidermolysis bullosa (DEB), caused by mutations in the gene encoding type VII collagen (COL7A1), is known to show heterogeneous clinical phenotypes. Certain correlations between the nature or position of COL7A1 mutations and the resultant DEB phenotypes have been suggested, although such relationships may be more complex than initially thought. The purpose of the present study was to clarify the molecular basis of two different subtypes of dominant DEB (DDEB), EB pruriginosa and classical type. Interestingly, we found that both cases were caused by a missense glycine substitution mutation by different amino acids in the same codon of COL7A1 (G2028R and G2028A). These results further support the notion that different glycine substitution mutations in the same codon can lead to heterogeneous clinical phenotypes of DDEB, EB pruriginosa and classical type. Received: 17 December 1999 / Revised: 17 April 2000 / Accepted: 19 June 2000