Advanced maternal age (AMA; ≥35 years) is an increasing trend and is reported to be associated with various pregnancy complications.
To determine the risk of stillbirth and other adverse pregnancy ...outcomes in women of AMA.
Embase, Medline (Ovid), Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, ClinicalTrials.gov, LILACS and conference proceedings were searched from ≥2000.
Cohort and case-control studies reporting data on one or more co-primary outcomes (stillbirth or fetal growth restriction (FGR)) and/or secondary outcomes in mothers ≥35 years and <35 years.
The effect of age on pregnancy outcome was investigated by random effects meta-analysis and meta-regression. Stillbirth rates were correlated to rates of maternal diabetes, obesity, hypertension and use of assisted reproductive therapies (ART).
Out of 1940 identified titles; 63 cohort studies and 12 case-control studies were included in the meta-analysis. AMA increased the risk of stillbirth (OR 1.75, 95%CI 1.62 to 1.89) with a population attributable risk of 4.7%. Similar trends were seen for risks of FGR, neonatal death, NICU unit admission restriction and GDM. The relationship between AMA and stillbirth was not related to maternal morbidity or ART.
Stillbirth risk increases with increasing maternal age. This is not wholly explained by maternal co-morbidities and use of ART. We propose that placental dysfunction may mediate adverse pregnancy outcome in AMA. Further prospective studies are needed to directly test this hypothesis.
Autism spectrum disorder is a construct used to describe individuals with a specific combination of impairments in social communication and repetitive behaviours, highly restricted interests and/or ...sensory behaviours beginning early in life. The worldwide prevalence of autism is just under 1%, but estimates are higher in high-income countries. Although gross brain pathology is not characteristic of autism, subtle anatomical and functional differences have been observed in post-mortem, neuroimaging and electrophysiological studies. Initially, it was hoped that accurate measurement of behavioural phenotypes would lead to specific genetic subtypes, but genetic findings have mainly applied to heterogeneous groups that are not specific to autism. Psychosocial interventions in children can improve specific behaviours, such as joint attention, language and social engagement, that may affect further development and could reduce symptom severity. However, further research is necessary to identify the long-term needs of people with autism, and treatments and the mechanisms behind them that could result in improved independence and quality of life over time. Families are often the major source of support for people with autism throughout much of life and need to be considered, along with the perspectives of autistic individuals, in both research and practice.
Meta-analytic results have established that workplace coaching is effective, however, little is known about the determinants of coaching effectiveness. This paper reports an inclusive systematic ...literature review, covering the quantitative and qualitative research on workplace coaching. We focus on seven promising areas in the current workplace coaching literature that emerged by the synthesis of 117 empirical studies: self-efficacy, coaching motivation, goal orientation, trust, interpersonal attraction, feedback intervention, and supervisory support. The major contribution of our paper is the systematic integration of well-established theoretical constructs in the workplace coaching context and the new insights we provide in the synthesis of these literatures. Based on our review, we provide specific recommendations to be addressed in future research, including recommended research methodologies, which we propose will significantly progress the field of workplace coaching theory and practice.
Prevention and repair of DNA damage is essential for maintenance of genomic stability and cell survival. DNA replication during S-phase can be a source of DNA damage if endogenous or exogenous ...stresses impair the progression of replication forks. It has become increasingly clear that DNA-damage-response pathways do not only respond to the presence of damaged DNA, but also modulate DNA replication dynamics to prevent DNA damage formation during S-phase. Such observations may help explain the developmental defects or cancer predisposition caused by mutations in DNA-damage-response genes. The present review focuses on molecular mechanisms by which DNA-damage-response pathways control and promote replication dynamics in vertebrate cells. In particular, DNA damage pathways contribute to proper replication by regulating replication initiation, stabilizing transiently stalled forks, promoting replication restart and facilitating fork movement on difficult-to-replicate templates. If replication fork progression fails to be rescued, this may lead to DNA damage and genomic instability via nuclease processing of aberrant fork structures or incomplete sister chromatid separation during mitosis.
Background: The nosology of autism spectrum disorders (ASD) is at a critical point in history as the field seeks to better define dimensions of social‐communication deficits and ...restricted/repetitive behaviors on an individual level for both clinical and neurobiological purposes. These different dimensions also suggest an increasing need for quantitative measures that accurately map their differences, independent of developmental factors such as age, language level and IQ.
Method: Psychometric measures, clinical observation as well as genetic, neurobiological and physiological research from toddlers, children and adults with ASD are reviewed.
Results: The question of how to conceptualize ASDs along dimensions versus categories is discussed within the nosology of autism and the proposed changes to the DSM‐5 and ICD‐11. Differences across development are incorporated into the new classification frameworks.
Conclusions: It is crucial to balance the needs of clinical practice in ASD diagnostic systems, with neurobiologically based theories that address the associations between social‐communication and restricted/repetitive dimensions in individuals. Clarifying terminology, improving description of the core features of ASD and other dimensions that interact with them and providing more valid and reliable ways to quantify them, both for research and clinical purposes, will move forward both practice and science.
The heart develops from 2 sources of mesoderm progenitors, the first and second heart field (FHF and SHF). Using a single-cell transcriptomic assay combined with genetic lineage tracing and live ...imaging, we find the FHF and SHF are subdivided into distinct pools of progenitors in gastrulating mouse embryos at earlier stages than previously thought. Each subpopulation has a distinct origin in the primitive streak. The first progenitors to leave the primitive streak contribute to the left ventricle, shortly after right ventricle progenitor emigrate, followed by the outflow tract and atrial progenitors. Moreover, a subset of atrial progenitors are gradually incorporated in posterior locations of the FHF. Although cells allocated to the outflow tract and atrium leave the primitive streak at a similar stage, they arise from different regions. Outflow tract cells originate from distal locations in the primitive streak while atrial progenitors are positioned more proximally. Moreover, single-cell RNA sequencing demonstrates that the primitive streak cells contributing to the ventricles have a distinct molecular signature from those forming the outflow tract and atrium. We conclude that cardiac progenitors are prepatterned within the primitive streak and this prefigures their allocation to distinct anatomical structures of the heart. Together, our data provide a new molecular and spatial map of mammalian cardiac progenitors that will support future studies of heart development, function, and disease.
Objective: Adolescence is a developmental period that entails substantial changes in risk-taking behavior and experimentation with alcohol and drugs. Understanding how the brain is changing during ...this period relative to childhood and adulthood and how these changes vary across individuals are key in predicting risk for later substance abuse and dependence. Method: This review discusses recent human imaging and animal work in the context of an emerging view of adolescence as characterized by a tension between early emerging "bottom-up" systems that express exaggerated reactivity to motivational stimuli and later maturing "top-down" cognitive control regions. Behavioral, clinical, and neurobiological evidences are reported for dissociating these two systems developmentally. The literature on the effects of alcohol and its rewarding properties in the brain is discussed in the context of these two systems. Results: Collectively, these studies show curvilinear development of motivational behavior and the underlying subcortical brain regions, with a peak inflection from 13 to 17 years. In contrast, prefrontal regions, important in top-down regulation of behavior, show a linear pattern of development well into young adulthood that parallels that seen in behavioral studies of impulsivity. Conclusions: The tension or imbalance between these developing systems during adolescence may lead to cognitive control processes being more vulnerable to incentive-based modulation and increased susceptibility to the motivational properties of alcohol and drugs. As such, behavior challenges that require cognitive control in the face of appetitive cues may serve as useful biobehavioral markers for predicting which teens may be at greater risk for alcohol and substance dependence. (Contains 3 figures.)
Self-awareness is often seen as a critical component in leadership and career success, and has therefore become a feature in MBAs, leadership development, and management education. It has become a ...popular “buzzword” in management literature, yet when reviewing this literature, there appears to be no consistent definition of the construct. This article reports a systematic literature review, covering how the construct of self-awareness is defined and how it differs from self-consciousness and self-knowledge within the context of management education. After screening, 31 articles were included in the review, analysis of which identified there is an overlap with how self-awareness, self-consciousness, and self-knowledge are defined. Other themes from our analysis include the identification of the components of self-awareness, how to be self-aware, and the purpose of self-awareness. The contribution of our article is the provision of clarity on the construct of self-awareness and a working definition, which can be used in the fields of leadership and management development by practitioners in education and organizations, and for future research within the context of adult development and the workplace.
Cancer is a disease associated with genomic instability that often results from oncogene activation. This in turn leads to hyperproliferation and replication stress. However, the molecular mechanisms ...that underlie oncogene-induced replication stress are still poorly understood. Oncogenes such as HRAS
promote proliferation by upregulating general transcription factors to stimulate RNA synthesis. Here we investigate whether this increase in transcription underlies oncogene-induced replication stress. We show that in cells overexpressing HRAS
, elevated expression of the general transcription factor TATA-box binding protein (TBP) leads to increased RNA synthesis, which together with R-loop accumulation results in replication fork slowing and DNA damage. Furthermore, overexpression of TBP alone causes the hallmarks of oncogene-induced replication stress, including replication fork slowing, DNA damage and senescence. Consequently, we reveal that increased transcription can be a mechanism of oncogene-induced DNA damage, providing a molecular link between upregulation of the transcription machinery and genomic instability in cancer.
This paper reports findings from a project that aimed to generate new feminist visions of later life, inspired directly by Sandberg and Marshall's paper ‘Queering Aging Futures’ (Sandberg & Marshall, ...2017). Creative workshops with groups of self-identified feminists led to the generation of a range of artefacts exploring personal visions of a good feminist old age. This paper firstly considers the features that participants most frequently imagined – which were independence, social connection, pleasurable encounters with water, and good health – here treating feminism as a participants' resource explored through inductive analysis. The paper then explores the extent to which participants were able to imagine good feminist old age beyond the normativities of ‘successful ageing’, using a more deductive style of analysis drawing on feminist theory and feminist gerontology. Several participants imagined powerful and agentic old women who resisted the idea of older women's powerlessness. Some imagined new emotional and psychological foci for later life, clearly distinct from those of mid-life. Others imagined future physical decline and ways of embracing or overcoming it. Finally, drawing on feminist theory about the need to be reflexive and accountable in knowledge production, the paper concludes with consideration of the researcher's own imagined feminist old age and feminist history, and the implications this might have for the analysis presented.
•Ordinary people can use the idea of feminism to imagine better old age.•Feminist theory helps us to move beyond the normativities of successful ageing.•Creative methods help people to think about old age in new ways.
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