Search results for " switching"
showing 10 items of 176 documents
NF-κB-inducing kinase is essential for B-cell maintenance in mice
2015
NF-κB-inducing kinase (NIK) is a key mediator of the noncanonical NF-κB signaling pathway, which is critical for normal B-cell development and function. It is well established that the complete deletion of NIK in mice results in defective B cells and impaired secondary lymphoid organogenesis. To address the role of NIK deficiency specifically in B cells, we generated a new mouse strain for the conditional deletion of this kinase. Deletion of NIK during B-cell development results in a drastic reduction of mature B cells from the transitional 2 stage on, while B-1 B cells are less affected. Moreover, deletion of NIK in the germinal centers decreases the numbers of germinal center B cells and …
Vitellogenin-like A–associated shifts in social cue responsiveness regulate behavioral task specialization in an ant
2018
Division of labor and task specialization explain the success of human and insect societies. Social insect colonies are characterized by division of labor, with workers specializing in brood care early and foraging later in life. Theory posits that this task switching requires shifts in responsiveness to task-related cues, yet experimental evidence is weak. Here, we show that a Vitellogenin (Vg) ortholog identified in an RNAseq study on the ant T. longispinosus is involved in this process: using phylogenetic analyses of Vg and Vg-like genes, we firstly show that this candidate gene does not cluster with the intensively studied honey bee Vg but falls into a separate Vg-like A cluster. Second…
Testosterone and attention deficits as possible mechanisms underlying impaired emotion recognition in intimate partner violence perpetrators
2016
Several studies have reported impairments in decoding emotional facial expressions in intimate partner violence (IPV) perpetrators. However, the mechanisms that underlie these impaired skills are not well known. Given this gap in the literature, we aimed to establish whether IPV perpetrators (n = 18) differ in their emotion decoding process, attentional skills, and testosterone (T), cortisol (C) levels and T/C ratio in comparison with controls (n = 20), and also to examine the moderating role of the group and hormonal parameters in the relationship between attention skills and the emotion decoding process. Our results demonstrated that IPV perpetrators showed poorer emotion recognition and …
Switching from omalizumab to mepolizumab: real-life experience from Southern Italy.
2020
Background: Current availability of several biologic treatments for severe asthma makes it possible to choose the most appropriate for each patient. Sometimes a good percentage of patients with severe asthma may be eligible for biologics that target either the allergic phenotype or the eosinophilic one, but not all respond to that selected as first choice. The aim of our real-life study was to assess whether, for patients with severe eosinophilic allergic asthma, not previously controlled by the anti-IgE omalizumab, the shift to another biologic targeting interleukin-5, such as mepolizumab, may represent a good therapeutic choice. Methods: A total of 41 consecutive patients with severe, per…
Marginal soft tissue stability around conical abutments inserted with the one abutment-one time protocol after 5 years of prosthetic loading
2018
BACKGROUND Soft tissue stability is crucial to obtain and maintain optimal esthetic results. PURPOSE This study aimed to investigate, over 5 years, the soft tissue response using a conical abutment together with the "one-abutment one-time" (OA-OT) protocol in the restoration of implants inserted in the anterior esthetic area. MATERIAL AND METHODS From January 2011 to January 2012, all consecutive patients requiring an implant n the maxillary area between canines were enrolled. After submerged healing and osseointegration, a definitive abutment with a provisional crown was inserted. After 1 month, the definitive crown was delivered (Tdef). Analog impressions were taken before tooth extractio…
Intrathecal somatic hypermutation of IgM in multiple sclerosis and neuroinflammation
2014
Intrathecal oligoclonal bands of the cerebrospinal fluid are considered the most important immunological biomarkers of multiple sclerosis. They typically consist of clonally expanded IgG antibodies that underwent affinity maturation during sustained stimulation by largely unknown antigens. In addition, ∼40% of patients with multiple sclerosis have oligoclonal bands that consist of expanded IgM antibodies. We investigated the molecular composition of IgM- and IgG-chains from cerebrospinal fluid of 12 patients with multiple sclerosis, seven patients with other neurological diseases, and eight healthy control subjects by high-throughput deep-sequencing and single-cell PCR. Further, we studied …
Dual-Energy CT Material Density Iodine Quantification for Distinguishing Vascular From Nonvascular Renal Lesions: Normalization Reduces Intermanufact…
2019
OBJECTIVE. The purpose of this study was to determine whether a single, uniform normalized iodine threshold reduces variability and enables reliable differentiation between vascular and nonvascular renal lesions independent of the dual-energy CT (DECT) platform used. MATERIALS AND METHODS. In this retrospective, HIPAA-compliant, institutional review board-approved study, 247 patients (156 men, 91 women; mean age ± SD, 67 ± 12 years old) with 263 renal lesions (193 nonvascular, 70 vascular) underwent unenhanced single- energy and contrast-enhanced DECT scans. One hundred and six nonvascular and 38 vascular lesions were scanned on two dual-source DECT (dsDECT) scanners, and 87 nonvascular and…
Frequency, indications, outcomes, and predictive factors of opioid switching in an acute palliative care unit.
2007
The aim of this study was to prospectively evaluate the frequency, indications, outcomes, and predictive factors associated with opioid switching, using a protocol that had been clinically applied and viewed as effective for many years. A prospective study was carried out on a cohort of consecutive cancer patients who were receiving opioids but had an unacceptable balance between analgesia and adverse effects, despite symptomatic treatment of side effects. The initial conversion ratio between opioids and routes was as follows (mg/day): oral morphine 100=intravenous morphine 33=transdermal fentanyl 1=intravenous fentanyl 1=oral methadone 20=intravenous methadone 16=oral oxycodone 70=transder…
Measuring Task-Switching Ability in the Implicit Association Test
2005
Abstract. Recently, the role of method-specific variance in the Implicit Association Test (IAT) was examined ( McFarland & Crouch, 2002 ; Mierke & Klauer, 2003 ). This article presents a new content-unspecific control task for the assessment of task-switching ability within the IAT methodology. Study 1 showed that this task exhibited good internal consistency and stability. Studies 2-4 examined method-specific variance in the IAT and showed that the control task is significantly associated with conventionally scored IAT effects of the IAT-Anxiety. Using the D measures proposed by Greenwald, Nosek, and Banaji (2003 ), the amount of method-specific variance in the IAT-Anxiety could b…
Efficacy of single-source rapid kV-switching dual-energy CT for characterization of non-uric acid renal stones: a prospective ex vivo study using ant…
2019
Purpose To investigate the accuracy of rapid kV-switching single-source dual-energy computed tomography (rsDECT) for prediction of classes of non-uric-acid stones. Materials and methods Non-uric-acid renal stones retrieved via percutaneous nephrolithotomy were prospectively collected between January 2017 and February 2018 in a single institution. Only stones >= 5 mm and with pure composition (i.e., >= 80% composed of one component) were included. Stone composition was determined using Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy. The stones were scanned in 32-cm-wide anthropomorphic whole-body phantom using rsDECT. The effective atomic number (Zeff), the attenuation at 40 keV (HU40), 70 ke…