Historically, empathy has been thought to motivate prosocial behaviour and inhibit aggressive behaviour. Contrary to current assumptions and theoretical support, a meta-analysis revealed a small ...effect of empathy on aggression among adults (Vachon, Lynam, & Johnson, 2014). The current study sought to determine whether broadening the focus from empathy to include other socially relevant affective characteristics (i.e., callous-unemotional traits) was advantageous in predicting aggressive behaviour. As little is known about the strength of this association among youth, the current study meta-analytically examined 192 unique effect sizes drawn from published and unpublished studies reporting on samples of children and adolescents. Analyses were conducted across general, cognitive, and emotional empathy, as well as callous-unemotional traits, and general, direct, indirect, proactive, and reactive aggression. Significant variability was noted across effect sizes. Consistent with a prior meta-analysis involving adults (Vachon et al., 2014), small to moderate associations were identified between aggression and traditional measures of empathy (i.e., general, emotional, cognitive); these effects ranged from r = −0.06 to −0.26. Among broader measures of emotional style (i.e., callous-unemotional traits), moderate to large effects were found; ranging from r = 0.30 to 0.37. Results suggested that broader affective measures may be more strongly associated with aggression than empathy alone. The results raise questions about the nature of empathy assessment and indicate the utility of targeting multiple emotion-related factors during treatment to effectively reduce aggressive behaviour. In particular, the results underscore of the importance of considering the limited prosocial emotions specifier (perhaps trans-diagnostically given the varied nature of the sample) when considering implications for prognosis and treatment targets.
•Small to moderate associations between aggression and traditional empathy measures.•Moderate to large association between aggression and CU trait measures.•CU traits predict all aggression types better than traditional empathy measures.•Important to consider broader affective traits in the prediction of aggression.•Limited prosocial emptions may be important cross-diagnostically.
The truncation of Tau is thought to be important in promoting aggregation, with this feature characterising the pathology of dementias such as Alzheimer disease. Antibodies to the C-terminal and ...N-terminal regions of Tau were employed to examine Tau cleavage in five human brain regions: the entorhinal cortex, prefrontal cortex, motor cortex, hippocampus, and cerebellum. These were obtained from normal subjects ranging in age from 18 to 104 years. Tau fragments of approximately 40 kDa and 45 kDa with an intact N-terminus retained were found in soluble and insoluble brain fractions. In addition, smaller C-terminal Tau fragments ranging in mass from 17 kDa to 25 kDa were also detected. These findings are consistent with significant Tau cleavage taking place in brain regions from 18 years onwards. It appears that site-specific cleavage of Tau is widespread in the normal human brain, and that large Tau fragments that contain the N-terminus, as well as shorter C-terminal Tau fragments, are present in brain cells across the age range.
Crown rust, caused by
Puccinia coronata
f. sp.
avenae
(
Pca
), is a significant impediment to global oat production. Some 98 alleles at 92 loci conferring resistance to
Pca
in
Avena
have been ...designated; however, allelic relationships and chromosomal locations of many of these are unknown. Long-term monitoring of
Pca
in Australia, North America and elsewhere has shown that it is highly variable even in the absence of sexual recombination, likely due to large pathogen populations that cycle between wild oat communities and oat crops. Efforts to develop cultivars with genetic resistance to
Pca
began in the 1950s. Based almost solely on all all-stage resistance, this has had temporary benefits but very limited success. The inability to eradicate wild oats, and their common occurrence in many oat growing regions, means that future strategies to control
Pca
must be based on the assumption of a large and variable prevailing pathogen population with high evolutionary potential, even if cultivars with durable resistance are deployed and grown widely. The presence of minor gene, additive APR to
Pca
in hexaploid oat germplasm opens the possibility of pyramiding several such genes to give high levels of resistance. The recent availability of reference genomes for diploid and hexaploid oat will undoubtedly accelerate efforts to discover, characterise and develop high throughput diagnostic markers to introgress and pyramid resistance to
Pca
in high yielding adapted oat germplasm.
The bromodomain and extraterminal (BET) family of bromodomain-containing proteins are important regulators of the epigenome through their ability to recognize N-acetyl lysine (KAc) post-translational ...modifications on histone tails. These interactions have been implicated in various disease states and, consequently, disruption of BET–KAc binding has emerged as an attractive therapeutic strategy with a number of small molecule inhibitors now under investigation in the clinic. However, until the utility of these advanced candidates is fully assessed by these trials, there remains scope for the discovery of inhibitors from new chemotypes with alternative physicochemical, pharmacokinetic, and pharmacodynamic profiles. Herein, we describe the discovery of a candidate-quality dimethylpyridone benzimidazole compound which originated from the hybridization of a dimethylphenol benzimidazole series, identified using encoded library technology, with an N-methyl pyridone series identified through fragment screening. Optimization via structure- and property-based design led to I-BET469, which possesses favorable oral pharmacokinetic properties, displays activity in vivo, and is projected to have a low human efficacious dose.
In the fall of 2011 I received a letter from the Supreme Council of Culture in Egypt inviting me to speak on the global Occupy movement at a celebration of the first anniversary of the Egyptian ...Revolution. The invitation (indefinitely postponed because of the still-uncertain fate of that revolution) stipulated that I should reflect on the "role of images and media in the 25th January Revolution and the Occupy Wall Street Movement." The following paper is my response to that invitation. Adapted from the source document.
ABSTRACT The BESS-Polar Collaboration measured the energy spectra of cosmic-ray protons and helium during two long-duration balloon flights over Antarctica in 2004 December and 2007 December at ...substantially different levels of solar modulation. Proton and helium spectra probe the origin and propagation history of cosmic rays in the galaxy, and are essential to calculations of the expected spectra of cosmic-ray antiprotons, positrons, and electrons from interactions of primary cosmic-ray nuclei with the interstellar gas, and to calculations of atmospheric muons and neutrinos. We report absolute spectra at the top of the atmosphere for cosmic-ray protons in the kinetic energy range 0.2-160 GeV and helium nuclei in the range 0.15-80 GeV/nucleon. The corresponding magnetic-rigidity ranges are 0.6-160 GV for protons and 1.1-160 GV for helium. These spectra are compared to measurements from previous BESS flights and from ATIC-2, PAMELA, and AMS-02. We also report the ratio of the proton and helium fluxes from 1.1 to 160 GV and compare this to the ratios from PAMELA and AMS-02.
Summary
The antifungal plant defensin RsAFP2 isolated from radish interacts with fungal glucosylceramides and induces apoptosis in Candida albicans. To further unravel the mechanism of RsAFP2 ...antifungal action and tolerance mechanisms, we screened a library of 2868 heterozygous C. albicans deletion mutants and identified 30 RsAFP2‐hypersensitive mutants. The most prominent group of RsAFP2 tolerance genes was involved in cell wall integrity and hyphal growth/septin ring formation. Consistent with these genetic data, we demonstrated that RsAFP2 interacts with the cell wall of C. albicans, which also contains glucosylceramides, and activates the cell wall integrity pathway. Moreover, we found that RsAFP2 induces mislocalization of septins and blocks the yeast‐to‐hypha transition in C. albicans. Increased ceramide levels have previously been shown to result in apoptosis and septin mislocalization. Therefore, ceramide levels in C. albicans membranes were analysed following RsAFP2 treatment and, as expected, increased accumulation of phytoC24‐ceramides in membranes of RsAFP2‐treated C. albicans cells was detected. This is the first report on the interaction of a plant defensin with glucosylceramides in the fungal cell wall, causing cell wall stress, and on the effects of a defensin on septin localization and ceramide accumulation.
We have previously identified peroxiredoxin-3 (PRDX-3) as a cell-surface protein that is androgen regulated in the LNCaP prostate cancer (PCa) cell line. PRDX-3 is a member of the peroxiredoxin ...family that are responsible for neutralising reactive oxygen species.
PRDX-3 expression was examined in tissue from 32 patients using immunohistochemistry. Subcellular distribution was determined using confocal microscopy. PRDX-3 expression was determined in antiandrogen-resistant cell lines by western blotting and quantitative RT-PCR. The pathways of PRDX-3 overexpression and knockdown on apoptosis and response to oxidative stress were investigated using protein arrays.
PRDX-3 is upregulated in a number of endocrine-regulated tumours; in particular in PCa and prostatic intraepithelial neoplasia. Although the majority of PRDX-3 is localised to the mitochondria, we have confirmed that PRDX-3 at the cell membrane is androgen regulated. In antiandrogen-resistant LNCaP cell lines, PRDX-3 is upregulated at the protein but not RNA level. Resistant cells also possess an upregulation of the tricarboxylic acid (TCA) pathway and resistance to H₂O₂-induced apoptosis through a failure to activate pro-apoptotic pathways. Knockdown of PRDX-3 restored H₂O₂ sensitivity.
Our results suggest that PRDX-3 has an essential role in regulating oxidation-induced apoptosis in antiandrogen-resistant cells. PRDX-3 may have potential as a therapeutic target in castrate-independent PCa.
The power conversion efficiency of organic and hybrid solar cells is commonly reduced by a low open‐circuit voltage (VOC). In these cases, the VOC is significantly less than the energy of the lowest ...energy absorbed photon, divided by the elementary charge q. The low photovoltage originates from characteristically large band offsets between the electron donor and acceptor species. Here a simple method is reported to systematically tune the band offset in a π‐conjugated polymer–metal oxide hybrid donor–acceptor system in order to maximize the VOC. It is demonstrated that substitution of magnesium into a zinc oxide acceptor (ZnMgO) reduces the band offset and results in a substantial increase in the VOC of poly(3‐hexylthiophene) (P3HT)–ZnMgO planar devices. The VOC is seen to increase from 500 mV at x = 0 up to values in excess of 900 mV for x = 0.35. A concomitant increase in overall device efficiency is seen as x is increased from 0 to 0.25, with a maximum power‐conversion efficiency of 0.5 % obtained at x = 0.25, beyond which the efficiency decreases because of increased series resistance in the device. This work provides a new tool for understanding the role of the donor–acceptor band offset in hybrid photovoltaics and for maximizing the photovoltage and power‐conversion efficiency in such devices.
Substitution of magnesium into a zinc oxide acceptor (Zn1–xMgxO) results in a simple method to systematically tune the band offset in a p‐conjugated polymer–metal oxide hybrid donor– acceptor system in order to maximize the VOC (see figure). The VOC is seen to increase from 500 mV at x = 0 up to values in excess of 900 mV at x = 0.35. This work provides a tool to understand the role of the donor–acceptor band offset in hybrid photovoltaics.
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