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William F. Tolmie at Fort Nisqually : letters, 1850-1853
\"A documentary source book revealing activities at the Hudson's Bay Company's Fort Nisqually on Puget Sound during the early settlement period\"-- Provided by publisher.
Book
Identifying factors contributing to child and family outcome 30 months after traumatic brain injury in children
Objective: To examine the contributions of injury severity, physical and cognitive disability, child and family function to outcome 30 months after traumatic brain injury (TBI) in children. Design: A prospective, longitudinal, between group design, comparing function before and after injury across three levels of injury severity. Subjects: One hundred and fifty children, 3.0–12.11 years old, admitted to hospital with a diagnosis of TBI. The sample was divided according to injury severity: mild (n = 42), moderate (n = 70), severe (n = 38). Children with a history of neurological, developmental, and psychiatric disorders were excluded from participation. Main outcome measures: Post injury physical function, cognitive ability (incorporating intellect, memory, and attention), behavioural and family functioning, and level of family burden. Results: A dose–response relation was identified for injury severity and physical and cognitive outcome, with significant recovery documented from acute to six months after TBI. Behavioural functioning was not related to injury severity, and where problems were identified, little recovery was noted over time. Family functioning remained unchanged from preinjury to post injury assessments. The level of family burden was high at both six and 30 months after injury, and was predicted by injury severity, functional impairment, and post injury child behavioural disturbance. Conclusions: These results suggest ongoing problems for the child and significant family burden 30 months after TBI. The nature and severity of the physical and cognitive problems are closely related to injury severity, with child and family function predicted by psychosocial and premorbid factors.
Journal Article
New Pregnane Glycosides from Mandevilla dardanoi and Their Anti-Inflammatory Activity
Mandevilla Lindl. is an important genus of the Apocynaceae family, not only as ornamental plants but also for its medicinal uses. In Brazil, Mandevilla species are indicated to treat asthma and skin infections, their anti-inflammatory potential and wound healing properties are also reported in the literature. Concerning their chemical composition, this group of plants is a conspicuous producer of pregnane glycosides. Mandevilla dardanoi is an endemic species from the Brazilian semiarid region not studied by any phytochemical methods. In view of the medicinal potential of Mandevilla species, this study aimed to isolate new pregnane glycosides from M. dardanoi. To achieve this main goal, modern chromatography techniques were employed. Five new pregnane glycosides, dardanols A-E, were isolated from the roots of M. dardanoi by HPLC. Their structures were determined using extensive 1D and 2D-NMR and mass spectrometry (MSn and HRESIMS) data. The cytotoxicity and the anti-inflammatory potential of these compounds were evaluated. The first was evaluated by measuring proinflammatory cytokines and nitric oxide production by stimulated macrophages. Dardanols were able to inhibit the production of nitric oxide and reduce IL-1β and TNF-α. The current work demonstrates the chemodiversity of Brazilian semiarid species and contributes to amplifying knowledge about the biological potential of the Mandevilla genus.
Journal Article
Semantic Assembly and Annotation of Draft RNAseq Transcripts without a Reference Genome
Transcriptomes are one of the first sources of high-throughput genomic data that have benefitted from the introduction of Next-Gen Sequencing. As sequencing technology becomes more accessible, transcriptome sequencing is applicable to multiple organisms for which genome sequences are unavailable. Currently all methods for de novo assembly are based on the concept of matching the nucleotide context overlapping between short fragments-reads. However, even short reads may still contain biologically relevant information which can be used as hints in guiding the assembly process. We propose a computational workflow for the reconstruction and functional annotation of expressed gene transcripts that does not require a reference genome sequence and can be tolerant to low coverage, high error rates and other issues that often lead to poor results of de novo assembly in studies of non-model organisms. We start with either raw sequences or the output of a context-based de novo transcriptome assembly. Instead of mapping reads to a reference genome or creating a completely unsupervised clustering of reads, we assemble the unknown transcriptome using nearest homologs from a public database as seeds. We consider even distant relations, indirectly linking protein-coding fragments to entire gene families in multiple distantly related genomes. The intended application of the proposed method is an additional step of semantic (based on relations between protein-coding fragments) scaffolding following traditional (i.e. based on sequence overlap) de novo assembly. The method we developed was effective in analysis of the jellyfish Cyanea capillata transcriptome and may be applicable in other studies of gene expression in species lacking a high quality reference genome sequence. Our algorithms are implemented in C and designed for parallel computation using a high-performance computer. The software is available free of charge via an open source license.
Journal Article
Cognitive and academic outcome following cranial irradiation and chemotherapy in children: a longitudinal study
Cranial irradiation therapy (CRT) and chemotherapy are associated with neurobehavioural deficits. Many studies have investigated late effects of these treatments, but few have evaluated changes in abilities over time. This study employed a longitudinal design to map abilities following these treatments. Three groups of children were studied: Group 1 (
n
= 35): children treated with CRT (18 Gy) + chemotherapy, aged 5 years or less at time of diagnosis; Group 2 (
n
= 19): children treated with chemotherapy alone, aged 5 years or less at time of diagnosis; Group 3 (
n
= 35): healthy children. All children were aged 7–13 years at time of initial assessment, with no pre-diagnosis history of neurologic, developmental, or psychiatric disorder. Intellectual and educational abilities were evaluated twice: T1, not less than 2 years post-treatment, and T2, 3 years later. Group 1 achieved poorest results at T1, with comparison groups performing similarly. At T2 group differences were maintained. For verbal skills differences remained stable. Group 1 exhibited deterioration on non-verbal and processing tasks, while comparison groups showed improved abilities. Group 1 exhibited increases in literacy skills, with educational intervention predicting progress. Results suggest cumulative deficits in non-verbal and information processing skills for children treated with CRT + chemotherapy, with other deficits remaining relatively stable over time. Improved literacy skills suggest that gains can occur with remediation. © 2000 Cancer Research Campaign
Journal Article
White matter microstructure predicts longitudinal social cognitive outcomes after paediatric traumatic brain injury: a diffusion tensor imaging study
Deficits in social cognition may be among the most profound and disabling sequelae of paediatric traumatic brain injury (TBI); however, the neuroanatomical correlates of longitudinal outcomes in this domain remain unexplored. This study aimed to characterize social cognitive outcomes longitudinally after paediatric TBI, and to evaluate the use of sub-acute diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) to predict these outcomes.
The sample included 52 children with mild complex-severe TBI who were assessed on cognitive theory of mind (ToM), pragmatic language and affective ToM at 6- and 24-months post-injury. For comparison, 43 typically developing controls (TDCs) of similar age and sex were recruited. DTI data were acquired sub-acutely (mean = 5.5 weeks post-injury) in a subset of 65 children (TBI = 35; TDC = 30) to evaluate longitudinal prospective relationships between white matter microstructure assessed using Tract-Based Spatial Statistics and social cognitive outcomes.
Whole brain voxel-wise analysis revealed significantly higher mean diffusivity (MD), axial diffusivity (AD) and radial diffusivity (RD) in the sub-acute TBI group compared with TDC, with differences observed predominantly in the splenium of the corpus callosum (sCC), sagittal stratum (SS), dorsal cingulum (DC), uncinate fasciculus (UF) and middle and superior cerebellar peduncles (MCP & SCP, respectively). Relative to TDCs, children with TBI showed poorer cognitive ToM, affective ToM and pragmatic language at 6-months post-insult, and those deficits were related to abnormal diffusivity of the sCC, SS, DC, UF, MCP and SCP. Moreover, children with TBI showed poorer affective ToM and pragmatic language at 24-months post-injury, and those outcomes were predicted by sub-acute alterations in diffusivity of the DC and MCP.
Abnormal microstructure within frontal-temporal, limbic and cerebro-cerebellar white matter may be a risk factor for long-term social difficulties observed in children with TBI. DTI may have potential to unlock early prognostic markers of long-term social outcomes.
Journal Article
Examining Practitioner Competencies, Organizational Support and Barriers to Engaging Fathers in Parenting Interventions
Evidence-based parenting interventions have been developed and evaluated largely with mothers. This study examined practitioner reports of rates of father attendance, barriers to engagement, organizational support for father-inclusive practice, participation in training in father engagement, and competencies in working with fathers. It also explored predictors of practitioner competence and rates of father attendance. Practitioners (N = 210) who delivered parenting interventions completed an online survey. Participants reported high levels of confidence in engaging fathers, but only one in three had participated in training and levels of father attendance in parenting interventions were low. Logistic regressions showed that high levels of practitioner competence were predicted by participation in training. Moderate levels of father attendance (vs. low levels) were predicted by greater number of years of experience while high levels of attendance (vs. low levels) were predicted by greater experience, higher levels of competence and higher levels of organizational support. The implications of the findings to informing policy and practice for enhancing father engagement are discussed.
Journal Article
Physiological and chemical analysis of neurotransmitter candidates at a fast excitatory synapse in the jellyfish Cyanea capillata (Cnidaria, Scyphozoa)
Motor nerve net (MNN) neurons in the jellyfish Cyanea capillata communicate with one another by way of fast, bidirectional excitatory chemical synapses. As is the case with almost all identified chemical synapses in cnidarians, the identity of the neurotransmitter at these synapses is unclear. MNN neurons are large enough for stable intracellular recordings. This, together with the fact that they can be exposed, providing unlimited access to them and to their synapses, prompted a study of the action of a variety of neurotransmitter candidates, including those typically associated with fast synapses in higher animals. Only the amino acids taurine and β-alanine produced physiological responses consistent with those of the normal EPSP in these cells. Moreover, chemical analysis revealed that both taurine and β-alanine are present in the neurons and released by depolarization. These various findings strongly suggest that either or both of these amino acids, or a closely related compound is the neurotransmitter at the fast chemical synapses between MNN neurons.
Journal Article
Evidence for a Common Pattern of Peptidergic Innervation of Cnidocytes
Tentacles from representatives of all four classes of the phylum Cnidaria were examined using antibodies against the neuropeptides FMRFamide and RFamide to reveal the organization of neurons and nerve nets associated with cnidocytes. The tentacles of all species examined contained FMRFamide- or RFamide-immunoreactive neurons, in varying densities. In representatives from the Scyphozoa, Hydrozoa, and Cubozoa, the FMRFamide-immunoreactive neurons formed plexuses at the base of the cnidocyte assemblages; in anthozoans, the absence of discrete assemblies of cnidocytes precluded visual co-localization of cnidocytes and immunoreactive neurons. In all four classes, immunoreactive sensory cells connected these peptidergic nerve nets to the surface of the tentacle. These findings suggest that members of all four cnidarian classes share a common organizational pattern, and it is proposed that this peptidergic innervation may be involved in the chemosensory regulation of cnidocyte discharge.
Journal Article
Immunolocalization of a Voltage-Gated Calcium Channel β Subunit in the Tentacles and Cnidocytes of the Portuguese Man-of-War, Physalia physalis
This study investigated the localization of a voltage-gated calcium channel (VGCC) β subunit in the tentacles and cnidocytes of the Portuguese man-of-war using confocal immunocytochemistry. An antibody specific to the Ca2+ channel β subunit of the Portuguese-man-of-war (PpCavβ) was generated, and characterized by Western immunoblotting. The antibody labeling was widespread in the ectoderm of cnidosacs of the tentacles. The binding of the antibody on isolated cnidocytes was distributed at the base of the cell and appeared as multiple strong fluorescent plaques located around the basal hemisphere of the cell. The distribution of PpCavβ in the cnidocyte is consistent with previous studies on other hydrozoans that demonstrated that cnidocytes convey sensory information to other cnidocytes through chemical synapses in which the cnidocyte is presynaptic to elements of the animal's nervous system. Importantly and surprisingly, PpCavβ did not localize to the apical surface of the cnidocyte where the exocytotic events involved in cnidocyst discharge are thought to take place.
Journal Article