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Brain Structure & Function Jan 2023Proper names are an important part of language and communication. They are thought to have a special status due to their neuropsychological and psycholinguistic profile....
Proper names are an important part of language and communication. They are thought to have a special status due to their neuropsychological and psycholinguistic profile. To what extent proper names rely on the same semantic system as common names is not clear. In an fMRI study, we presented the same group of participants with both proper and common names to compare the associated activations. Both person and place names, as well as personally familiar and famous names were used, and compared with words representing concrete and abstract concepts. A whole-brain analysis was followed by a detailed analysis of subdivisions of four regions of interest known to play a central role in the semantic system: angular gyrus, anterior temporal lobe, posterior cingulate complex, and medial temporal lobe. We found that most subdivisions within these regions bilaterally were activated by both proper names and common names. The bilateral perirhinal and right entorhinal cortex showed a response specific to proper names, suggesting an item-specific role in retrieving person and place related information. While activation to person and place names overlapped greatly, place names were differentiated by activating areas associated with spatial memory and navigation. Person names showed greater right hemisphere involvement compared to places, suggesting a wider range of associations. Personally familiar names showed stronger activation bilaterally compared to famous names, indicating representations that are enhanced by autobiographic and episodic details. Both proper and common names are processed in the wider semantic system that contains associative, episodic, and spatial components. Processing of proper names is characterized by a somewhat stronger involvement these components, rather than by a fundamentally different system.
Topics: Humans; Semantics; Temporal Lobe; Brain; Language; Entorhinal Cortex; Magnetic Resonance Imaging
PubMed: 36372812
DOI: 10.1007/s00429-022-02593-9 -
Frontiers in Microbiology 2020Viruses are ubiquitous. They infect almost every species and are probably the most abundant biological entities on the planet, yet they are excluded from the Tree of... (Review)
Review
Viruses are ubiquitous. They infect almost every species and are probably the most abundant biological entities on the planet, yet they are excluded from the Tree of Life (ToL). However, there can be no doubt that viruses play a significant role in evolution, the force that facilitates all life on Earth. Conceptually, viruses are regarded by many as non-living entities that hijack living cells in order to propagate. A strict separation between living and non-living entities places viruses far from the ToL, but this may be theoretically unsound. Advances in sequencing technology and comparative genomics have expanded our understanding of the evolutionary relationships between viruses and cellular organisms. Genomic and metagenomic data have revealed that co-evolution between viral and cellular genomes involves frequent horizontal gene transfer and the occasional co-option of novel functions over evolutionary time. From the giant, ameba-infecting marine viruses to the tiny Porcine circovirus harboring only two genes, viruses and their cellular hosts are ecologically and evolutionarily intertwined. When deciding how, if, and where viruses should be placed on the ToL, we should remember that the Tree functions best as a model of biological evolution on Earth, and it is important that models themselves evolve with our increasing understanding of biological systems.
PubMed: 33519747
DOI: 10.3389/fmicb.2020.604048 -
The American Journal of Hospice &... May 2017Palliative care for infants, children, and adolescents encompasses numerous transitions and thresholds of uncertainty that challenge conventional clinical medicine....
Palliative care for infants, children, and adolescents encompasses numerous transitions and thresholds of uncertainty that challenge conventional clinical medicine. Palliative care clinicians have opportunities to be more comfortable amid such challenges, or perhaps even overcome them, if they are attuned to the unique times and places in which patients, their families, and caregivers find themselves throughout illness and recovery or transitioning toward the end of life. Patient-clinician encounters often dwell in these liminal places. The concept of liminality gives validation to the patient or family's being "stuck in places betwixt and between" a past life rich with relationship and purpose and an acute, chronic, or critical illness. Or having resolved the acute crisis of hospitalization that place between the past bounds of illness and the uncertain path forward, perhaps even toward death. Liminality provides a framework for addressing the unbound spaces that patients and families occupy: What is past is behind-the present place is tenuous and temporary, and what is ahead uncertain. This place is where palliative care clinicians can offer clinicians and families guidance.
Topics: Adolescent; Caregivers; Child; Child, Preschool; Family; Humans; Infant; Palliative Care; Pediatrics; Terminal Care; Uncertainty
PubMed: 26861443
DOI: 10.1177/1049909116629758 -
Frontiers in Immunology 2022Over the past few decades, tremendous advances in the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of cancer have taken place. However for head and neck cancers, including oral... (Review)
Review
Over the past few decades, tremendous advances in the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of cancer have taken place. However for head and neck cancers, including oral cancer, the overall survival rate is below 50% and they remain the seventh most common malignancy worldwide. These cancers are, commonly, aggressive, genetically complex, and difficult to treat and the delay, which often occurs between early recognition of symptoms and diagnosis, and the start of treatment of these cancers, is associated with poor prognosis. Cancer development and progression occurs in concert with alterations in the surrounding stroma, with the immune system being an essential element in this process. Despite neutrophils having major roles in the pathology of many diseases, they were thought to have little impact on cancer development and progression. Recent studies are now challenging this notion and placing neutrophils as central interactive players with other immune and tumor cells in affecting cancer pathology. This review focuses on how neutrophils and their sub-phenotypes, N1, N2, and myeloid-derived suppressor cells, both directly and indirectly affect the anti-tumor and pro-tumor immune responses. Emphasis is placed on what is currently known about the interaction of neutrophils with myeloid innate immune cells (such as dendritic cells and macrophages), innate lymphoid cells, natural killer cells, and fibroblasts to affect the tumor microenvironment and progression of oral cancer. A better understanding of this dialog will allow for improved therapeutics that concurrently target several components of the tumor microenvironment, increasing the possibility of constructive and positive outcomes for oral cancer patients. For this review, PubMed, Web of Science, and Google Scholar were searched for manuscripts using keywords and combinations thereof of "oral cancer, OSCC, neutrophils, TANs, MDSC, immune cells, head and neck cancer, and tumor microenvironment" with a focus on publications from 2018 to 2021.
Topics: Humans; Immunity, Innate; Killer Cells, Natural; Mouth Neoplasms; Neutrophils; Tumor Microenvironment
PubMed: 35784290
DOI: 10.3389/fimmu.2022.894021 -
Indian Journal of Dermatology 2022The term toponym means any name that is derived from a place name. Numerous dermatological conditions have their names derived from geographic places. Although most...
The term toponym means any name that is derived from a place name. Numerous dermatological conditions have their names derived from geographic places. Although most conditions may have some association to the place they have been derived from, some of them are fortuitous.
PubMed: 36386102
DOI: 10.4103/ijd.ijd_71_22 -
Leveraging the metacoupling framework for sustainability science and global sustainable development.National Science Review Jul 2023Sustainability science seeks to understand human-nature interactions behind sustainability challenges, but has largely been place-based. Traditional sustainability... (Review)
Review
Sustainability science seeks to understand human-nature interactions behind sustainability challenges, but has largely been place-based. Traditional sustainability efforts often solved problems in one place at the cost of other places, compromising global sustainability. The metacoupling framework offers a conceptual foundation and a holistic approach to integrating human-nature interactions within a place, as well as between adjacent places and between distant places worldwide. Its applications show broad utilities for advancing sustainability science with profound implications for global sustainable development. They have revealed effects of metacoupling on the performance, synergies, and trade-offs of United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) across borders and across local to global scales; untangled complex interactions; identified new network attributes; unveiled spatio-temporal dynamics and effects of metacoupling; uncovered invisible feedbacks across metacoupled systems; expanded the nexus approach; detected and integrated hidden phenomena and overlooked issues; re-examined theories such as Tobler's First Law of Geography; and unfolded transformations among noncoupling, coupling, decoupling, and recoupling. Results from the applications are also helpful to achieve SDGs across space, amplify benefits of ecosystem restoration across boundaries and across scales, augment transboundary management, broaden spatial planning, boost supply chains, empower small agents in the large world, and shift from place-based to flow-based governance. Key topics for future research include cascading effects of an event in one place on other places both nearby and far away. Operationalizing the framework can benefit from further tracing flows across scales and space, uplifting the rigor of causal attribution, enlarging toolboxes, and elevating financial and human resources. Unleashing the full potential of the framework will generate more important scientific discoveries and more effective solutions for global justice and sustainable development.
PubMed: 37305165
DOI: 10.1093/nsr/nwad090 -
Frontiers in Psychology 2023In the mobile era, place attachment among rural migrants and returnees has become dynamic and diversified. However, research on place attachment to native place among...
In the mobile era, place attachment among rural migrants and returnees has become dynamic and diversified. However, research on place attachment to native place among rural migrants and returnees is limited. The focus of previous research has primarily been on the destination place attachment of rural migrants, which makes it difficult to gain a comprehensive understanding of the place attachment among both rural migrants and returnees. This study aims to investigate the state of place attachment to both native and destination places among rural migrants and returnees originating from the same birthplace. It explores their place attachment after migrating from rural areas to cities. A quantitative research approach was adopted, garnering questionnaire responses from 274 rural migrants and returnees, all born in Shuangfeng County, Hunan Province. The questionnaire encompassed a Likert scale for measuring place attachment, as well as sociodemographic statistical information. Exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis were conducted to ascertain the reliability and validity of the questionnaire. Based on the factor scores of place attachment to both places from migrants and returnees, a two-step cluster analysis identified three types of migrants and two types of returnees. Chi-square tests revealed significant differences among migrants in terms of property ownership, educational level, marital status, presence of children, age at departure, and time away from hometown. The study discovered that, regardless of being a migrant or returnee, the overall attachment to hometown was stronger than that to the current or previously inhabited city. In the context of existing literature primarily concerned with the integration of rural migrants into urban areas, this paper offers a fresh research perspective, highlighting the significance of emotional ties to one's hometown for rural migrants. The findings of this paper provide direction and a theoretical basis for rural areas to attract return migration and for urban regions to facilitate the integration of migrants.
PubMed: 38090189
DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1279679 -
Australian and New Zealand Journal of... Aug 2022This study aims to understand the context of place associated with smoking in urban Hamilton parks from a Te Ao Māori perspective (the worldview of Māori, the...
OBJECTIVE
This study aims to understand the context of place associated with smoking in urban Hamilton parks from a Te Ao Māori perspective (the worldview of Māori, the Indigenous people of Aotearoa New Zealand).
METHODS
Our study approached smokefree environments in Hamilton through a Māori lens, undertaking interviews with family groups and people from organisations involved in the local Smokefree environments policy.
RESULTS
The majority of the 26 adult participants identified as Māori, with 30% being current smokers. Parks had a place in the sporting memories of participants. Smoking was merged with these memories. Important features of places that influenced smoking behaviours were raised, with signage a key talking point.
CONCLUSIONS
The colonial construct of parks do not make visible Māori values and historical associations with the land, nor do they set a framework that would promote Māori ways of being and doing, including enacting smokefree spaces and places.
IMPLICATIONS FOR PUBLIC HEALTH
This study provides the incentive to address change in parks and reserve management that would support Māori aspirations for their health and wellbeing associated with ancestral land, and give meaning to smokefree environments.
Topics: Adult; Humans; Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander; New Zealand; Smoke-Free Policy; Smoking
PubMed: 35678963
DOI: 10.1111/1753-6405.13228 -
Veterinary Parasitology Feb 2015The protozoan flagellate Histomonas meleagridis is the etiological agent of histomonosis, first described in 1893. It is a fastidious disease in turkeys, with... (Review)
Review
The protozoan flagellate Histomonas meleagridis is the etiological agent of histomonosis, first described in 1893. It is a fastidious disease in turkeys, with pathological lesions in the caeca and liver, sometimes with high mortality. In chickens the disease is less fatal and lesions are often confined to the caeca. The disease was well controlled by applying nitroimidazoles and nitrofurans for therapy or prophylaxis. Since their introduction into the market in the middle of the previous century, research nearly ceased as outbreaks of histomonosis occurred only very rarely. With the ban of these drugs in the last two decades in North America, the European Union and elsewhere, in combination with the changes in animal husbandry, the disease re-emerged. Consequently, research programs were set up in various places focusing on different features of the parasite and the disease. For the first time studies were performed to elucidate the molecular repertoire of the parasite. In addition, research has been started to investigate the parasite's interaction with its host. New diagnostic methods and tools were developed and tested with samples obtained from field outbreaks or experimental infections. Some of these studies aimed to clarify the introduction of the protozoan parasite into a flock and the transmission between birds. Finally, a strong focus was placed on research concentrated on the development of new treatment and prophylactic strategies, urgently needed to combat the disease. This review aims to summarize recent research activities and place them into context with older literature.
Topics: Animals; Host-Parasite Interactions; Poultry Diseases; Protozoan Infections, Animal; Trichomonadida; Turkeys
PubMed: 25576442
DOI: 10.1016/j.vetpar.2014.12.018 -
Placemaking and infrastructure through the lens of levelling up for health equity: A scoping review.Health & Place Mar 2023The planning and delivery of infrastructure influences how places create health equity. The scholarship on place and health has recently been developed into 'levelling... (Review)
Review
The planning and delivery of infrastructure influences how places create health equity. The scholarship on place and health has recently been developed into 'levelling up' principles for equity focussed policy and planning. We conducted a scoping review of the literature on infrastructure through urban regeneration and placemaking interventions. We interrogated the 15 final selected articles for their use of one or more of the five 'levelling' up principles. No article encompassed all five principles. It was most common to find two or three principles in action. Reviewing the articles against the principles allows a deeper explanation of how infrastructure planning practice can positively impact on health equity. We conclude that applying all the principles in standard infrastructure planning practice has great potential for creating places that are positive for health equity.
Topics: Humans; Health Equity; Environment
PubMed: 36774810
DOI: 10.1016/j.healthplace.2023.102975