The purpose of this study was to analyze cardiac tissue and blood for viral genomes using polymerase chain reaction (PCR) to define the common viral etiologies of myocarditis by age group.
...Enteroviruses are considered the most common cause of myocarditis at all ages. Diagnosis relies on viral cultures, serology, and cardiac histology, which lack sensitivity, as well as PCR. However, in many cases enteroviruses are not detected.
Cardiac samples were obtained for PCR analysis from patients with myocarditis (n = 624) and dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) (n = 149). Patients were analyzed by age group, including neonates (n = 116), infants (n = 191), toddlers (n = 87), children (n = 110), adolescents (n = 92), and adults (n = 177). After nucleic acids had been extracted from an endomyocardial biopsy, an explant, or autopsy samples, PCR and reverse transcription PCR were performed to detect the genomic sequences of enterovirus, adenovirus, cytomegalovirus (CMV), herpes simplex virus (HSV), Epstein-Barr virus (EBV), parvovirus, respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), and influenza A virus.
Viral genome was amplified (adenovirus = 142, enterovirus = 85, CMV = 18, parvovirus = 6, influenza A = 5, HSV = 5, EBV = 3, RSV = 1) from 239 (38%) of the 624 samples from myocarditis patients, including 26 patient samples in which dual infection was found. Virus was detected in 30 (20%) of 149 DCM patient samples; only adenovirus (n = 18) and enterovirus (n = 12) were detected.
Polymerase chain reaction identified adenovirus as the most common virus in the myocardium of children and adults with myocarditis and DCM. Although enteroviruses are also found in these patients, they appear to be a less common cause of myocarditis than adenovirus.
High-quality optical resonant cavities require low optical loss, typically on the scale of parts per million. However, unintended micron-scale contaminants on the resonator mirrors that absorb the ...light circulating in the cavity can deform the surface thermoelastically and thus increase losses by scattering light out of the resonant mode. The point absorber effect is a limiting factor in some high-power cavity experiments, for example, the Advanced LIGO gravitational-wave detector. In this Letter, we present a general approach to the point absorber effect from first principles and simulate its contribution to the increased scattering. The achievable circulating power in current and future gravitational-wave detectors is calculated statistically given different point absorber configurations. Our formulation is further confirmed experimentally in comparison with the scattered power in the arm cavity of Advanced LIGO measured by in situ photodiodes. The understanding presented here provides an important tool in the global effort to design future gravitational-wave detectors that support high optical power and thus reduce quantum noise.
How can we maximize what is learned from a replication study? In the creative destruction approach to replication, the original hypothesis is compared not only to the null hypothesis, but also to ...predictions derived from multiple alternative theoretical accounts of the phenomenon. To this end, new populations and measures are included in the design in addition to the original ones, to help determine which theory best accounts for the results across multiple key outcomes and contexts. The present pre-registered empirical project compared the Implicit Puritanism account of intuitive work and sex morality to theories positing regional, religious, and social class differences; explicit rather than implicit cultural differences in values; self-expression vs. survival values as a key cultural fault line; the general moralization of work; and false positive effects. Contradicting Implicit Puritanism's core theoretical claim of a distinct American work morality, a number of targeted findings replicated across multiple comparison cultures, whereas several failed to replicate in all samples and were identified as likely false positives. No support emerged for theories predicting regional variability and specific individual-differences moderators (religious affiliation, religiosity, and education level). Overall, the results provide evidence that work is intuitively moralized across cultures.
•This “creative destruction” replication initiative added new measures and populations to four original study designs.•The theory of Implicit Puritanism was competed against seven alternative accounts of work morality.•A number of original findings replicated across multiple cultures, whereas two were identified as likely false positives.•The best-fitting model suggests work is intuitively moralized across cultures.
An improved method for the preparation of a series of oxazole-containing dual PPARα/γ agonists is described. A synthetic sequence utilizing a Dakin−West reaction was devised that allows for the ...introduction of the oxazole ring either late in the synthetic sequence via aminomalonate-derived chemistry or in pivotal SAR intermediates derived from aspartic acid.
Over the past decade, a large number of jet substructure observables have been proposed in the literature, and explored at the LHC experiments. Such observables attempt to utilize the internal ...structure of jets in order to distinguish those initiated by quarks, gluons, or by boosted heavy objects, such as top quarks and W bosons. This report, originating from and motivated by the BOOST2013 workshop, presents original particle-level studies that aim to improve our understanding of the relationships between jet substructure observables, their complementarity, and their dependence on the underlying jet properties, particularly the jet radius and jet transverse momentum. This is explored in the context of quark/gluon discrimination, boosted W boson tagging and boosted top quark tagging.
Celotno besedilo
Dostopno za:
DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
It has been suggested that formal thought disorder, the incoherent speech of schizophrenia, may involve a language disturbance among other abnormalities, or even be a form of dysphasia. Six patients ...with and seven without formal thought disorder were evaluated on an aphasia test battery. Spontaneous speech was also analysed using Brief Syntactic Analysis. Poor performance on the aphasia lest battery was found to be associated with general intellectual impairment but not with formal thought disorder. Naming was preserved in both groups. Patients with formal thought disorder, but not those without, produced semantic errors in their spontaneous speech, and these were unrelated to general intellectual status. The disorder of language in formal thought disorder thus appears to be one of expressive semantic abnormality, which, however, spares naming. Further analysis of two intellectually preserved patients suggested that formal thought disorder may be associated with an additional difficulty in constructing an appropriate model for generating one's own speech.
Besides the crucial role in the treatment of acute ischemic stroke (AIS), mechanical thrombectomy represents a unique opportunity for researchers to study the retrieved clots, with the possibility of ...unveiling biological patterns linked to stroke pathophysiology and etiology. We aimed to develop a shotgun proteomic approach to study and compare the proteome of formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded (FFPE) cardioembolic and large artery atherosclerotic (LAA) clots.
We used 16 cardioembolic and 15 LAA FFPE thrombi from 31 AIS patients. The thrombus proteome was analyzed by label-free quantitative liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS). MaxQuant v1.5.2.8 and Perseus v.1.6.15.0 were used for bioinformatics analysis. Protein classes were identified using the PANTHER database and the STRING database was used to predict protein interactions.
We identified 1,581 protein groups as part of the AIS thrombus proteome. Fourteen significantly differentially abundant proteins across the two etiologies were identified. Four proteins involved in the ubiquitin-proteasome pathway, blood coagulation or plasminogen activating cascade were identified as significantly abundant in LAA clots. Ten proteins involved in the ubiquitin proteasome-pathway, cytoskeletal remodeling of platelets, platelet adhesion or blood coagulation were identified as significantly abundant in cardioembolic clots.
Our results outlined a set of 14 proteins for a proof-of-principle characterization of cardioembolic and LAA FFPE clots, advancing the proteome profile of AIS human thrombi and understanding the pathophysiology of ischemic stroke.
We present a search for gravitational waves from 116 known millisecond and young pulsars using data from the fifth science run of the LIGO detectors. For this search ephemerides overlapping the run ...period were obtained for all pulsars using radio and X-ray observations. We demonstrate an updated search method that allows for small uncertainties in the pulsar phase parameters to be included in the search. We report no signal detection from any of the targets and therefore interpret our results as upper limits on the gravitational wave signal strength. The most interesting limits are those for young pulsars. We present updated limits on gravitational radiation from the Crab pulsar, where the measured limit is now a factor of seven below the spin-down limit. This limits the power radiated via gravitational waves to be less than ~2% of the available spin-down power. For the X-ray pulsar J0537-6910 we reach the spin-down limit under the assumption that any gravitational wave signal from it stays phase locked to the X-ray pulses over timing glitches, and for pulsars J1913+1011 and J1952+3252 we are only a factor of a few above the spin-down limit. Of the recycled millisecond pulsars several of the measured upper limits are only about an order of magnitude above their spin-down limits. For these our best (lowest) upper limit on gravitational wave amplitude is 2.3x10^-26 for J1603-7202 and our best (lowest) limit on the inferred pulsar ellipticity is 7.0x10^-8 for J2124-3358.
The Hedgehog signalling pathway has been implicated in the development of prostate cancer, although this area remains controversial. Some but not all studies have noted relatively high Hedgehog ...pathway activity in commonly used prostate cancer cell lines. We aimed to evaluate the widely used PC-3 cell line as a model to investigate Hedgehog signalling in a prostate cancer setting. Using a sensitive Hedgehog inducible luciferase reporter assay, we found no evidence of autonomous Hedgehog signalling in PC-3 cells, irrespective of passage number. In addition, manipulations that should either increase (an oxysterol) or decrease (cyclopamine) Hedgehog pathway activity had no effect on reporter activity, and cyclopamine treatment did not affect PC-3 cell viability. Therefore, our findings contradict some earlier reports and caution against the use of PC-3 cells to investigate the Hedgehog pathway in a prostate cancer setting.
PDF
