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Clinical and Experimental Rheumatology Jan 2024To estimate digit circumference and the impact of sex and body mass index (BMI) for the calculation of the Leeds Dactylitis Index (LDI) in psoriatic arthritis (PsA)...
OBJECTIVES
To estimate digit circumference and the impact of sex and body mass index (BMI) for the calculation of the Leeds Dactylitis Index (LDI) in psoriatic arthritis (PsA) patients with bilateral dactylitis.
METHODS
Digit circumference of the hands and the foot were measured with a dactylometer and were studied according to sex and BMI (divided in 4 weight categories) in healthy Portuguese subjects, using Student's t-test and One-way ANOVA, respectively. The effect size of sex and BMI were calculated using Cohen's d test and Eta squared, respectively. Multiple linear regression was used to calculate the effect of sex and BMI, as well as their interaction, to create a formula to predict digit circumference.
RESULTS
Fifty-nine participants (33 women, 26 men) with a mean BMI of 24.8 were included. Men's mean digit circumferences were statistically higher than those of women (p<0.001), with a large sex effect size in most of the digits. Differences in the mean circumference between the four BMI categories were statistically significant (p<0.05) for all digits, with a large BMI effect size. Sex and BMI were independent variables to predict mean digit circumference (p<0.001). A new tool (based on regression analysis) allowing to estimate the circumference of digits for males and females of different BMIs is presented.
CONCLUSIONS
Our data allows the calculation of digit circumference for males and females of different BMIs in the Portuguese population; and shows that BMI influences digital circumference supporting BMI inclusion in LDI references tables.
Topics: Male; Humans; Female; Body Mass Index; Arthritis, Psoriatic; Hand; Regression Analysis; Waist Circumference
PubMed: 38179711
DOI: 10.55563/clinexprheumatol/v78pc5 -
Beijing Da Xue Xue Bao. Yi Xue Ban =... Jun 2021To analyze the clinical characteristics of 170 cases of macrodactyly.
OBJECTIVE
To analyze the clinical characteristics of 170 cases of macrodactyly.
METHODS
Medical records of 170 macrodactyly patients at Beijing Jishuitan Hospital between March 2006 and October 2019, including demographic characteristics, clinical presentations, anatomical distributions, X-rays, pathological findings, and treatments, were reviewed. PIK3CA mutation analyses of 12 patients were also reviewed.
RESULTS
Disease incidence was similar across sex and geographical regions. Multiple-digit involvement was 3.9 times more frequent than single-digit involvement. In upper deformit: ies, the index finger, middle finger and thumb were mostly involved, and the second and third toes were the most affected on the foot. Two digits were affected more often than three digits, with the affected multiple digits were adjacent most time. The cases of progressive macrodactyly, in which the affected digits grew at a faster rate than the unaffected digits, were found more than static type. Most of progressive macrodactyly were noticed at birth. In terms of nerve involvement, affected fingers mostly occurred in the median nerve innervation area (79.4%) accompanied by median nerve and brunches enlargement and fat infiltration, i.e., nerve territory oriented; affected toes mostly occurred in the medial plantar nerve innervation area (89.1%), marked with overgrowth of adipose tissue with a lesser degree of neural overgrowth, i.e., lipomatous. Only 17 cases had comorbid of syndactyly. The metacarpal bones were involved only in progressive type of macrodactyly. Ten of the 12 cases subjected to mutation analysis were positive. Among all tested specimens, mutation levels ranged from 7% to 27%. In terms of tissue sources in which a mutation was found, adipose tissue had the highest mutation detection rate, followed by nerve and skin. All the DNA samples of blood from the 12 mutation-positive patients were negative.
CONCLUSION
Macrodactyly fingers mostly occurred in the median nerve innervation area accompanied by median nerve and brunches enlargement and fat infiltration. The index and middle fingers were mostly involved. Macrodactyly toes mostly occurred in the medial plantar nerve innervation area, marked with overgrowth of adipose tissue with a lesser degree of neural overgrowth. The second and third toes were the most affected on the foot. A high proportion (83%) of isolated macrodactyly patients carry activating PIK3CA mutations. Adipose, nerve, and skin tissues provide the highest PIK3CA mutation detection yield among all types of tissue studied.
Topics: DNA Mutational Analysis; Fingers; Humans; Infant, Newborn; Limb Deformities, Congenital; Mutation; Toes
PubMed: 34145866
DOI: 10.19723/j.issn.1671-167X.2021.03.025 -
Proceedings of the National Academy of... Jan 2024Repeating patterns of synovial joints are a highly conserved feature of articulated digits, with variations in joint number and location resulting in diverse digit...
Repeating patterns of synovial joints are a highly conserved feature of articulated digits, with variations in joint number and location resulting in diverse digit morphologies and limb functions across the tetrapod clade. During the development of the amniote limb, joints form iteratively within the growing digit ray, as a population of distal progenitors alternately specifies joint and phalanx cell fates to segment the digit into distinct elements. While numerous molecular pathways have been implicated in this fate choice, it remains unclear how they give rise to a repeating pattern. Here, using single-cell RNA sequencing and spatial gene expression profiling, we investigate the transcriptional dynamics of interphalangeal joint specification in vivo. Combined with mathematical modeling, we predict that interactions within the BMP signaling pathway-between the ligand GDF5, the inhibitor NOGGIN, and the intracellular effector pSMAD-result in a self-organizing Turing system that forms periodic joint patterns. Our model is able to recapitulate the spatiotemporal gene expression dynamics observed in vivo, as well as phenocopy digit malformations caused by BMP pathway perturbations. By contrasting in silico simulations with in vivo morphometrics of two morphologically distinct digits, we show how changes in signaling parameters and growth dynamics can result in variations in the size and number of phalanges. Together, our results reveal a self-organizing mechanism that underpins amniote digit segmentation and its evolvability and, more broadly, illustrate how Turing systems based on a single molecular pathway may generate complex repetitive patterns in a wide variety of organisms.
Topics: Animals; Body Patterning; Joints; Extremities; Signal Transduction; Birds; Mammals
PubMed: 38175868
DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2304470121 -
Temperature (Austin, Tex.) 2023The fingers have a large surface area to volume ratio (SA:V), minimal muscle mass, and potent vasoconstrictor capacity. These qualities make the fingers prone to heat...
The fingers have a large surface area to volume ratio (SA:V), minimal muscle mass, and potent vasoconstrictor capacity. These qualities make the fingers prone to heat loss and freezing injuries during whole-body or local cold exposure. Anthropologists have proposed that the large inter-individual variability in human finger anthropometrics may be an ecogeographic evolutionary adaptation, where shorter and thicker digits (i.e. smaller SA:V ratio) provide a favorable adaptation for cold climate natives. We hypothesized that the SA:V ratio of a digit has an inverse relationship with finger blood flux and finger temperature (T) during cooling and rewarming from cold. Fifteen healthy adults with no or limited cold experiment experience performed 10 min of baseline immersion in warm water (35.0 ± 0.1°C), 30 min in cold water (8.4 ± 0.2°C), and a final 10 min of rewarming in ambient air (~22°C, ~40% relative humidity). T and finger blood flux were measured continuously across multiple digits per participant. Average T (p = 0.05; R = 0.06) and area under the curve for T (p = 0.05; R = 0.07) during hand cooling showed significant, negative correlations to digit SA:V ratio. There was no relationship between digit SA:V ratio and blood flux (i.e. average blood flux and AUC) during cooling as well as between SA:V ratio and digit temperature (i.e. average T and AUC) or blood flux (i.e. average blood flux and AUC) during rewarming. Overall, digit anthropometrics do not appear to play a dominant role in extremity cold response.
PubMed: 37332307
DOI: 10.1080/23328940.2022.2091901 -
Genome Biology 2008Asymmetric regulation of Hox gene expression pre-dates the appearance of tetrapod digits, and was co-opted in the development of 'thumbness'. This asymmetric expression... (Review)
Review
Asymmetric regulation of Hox gene expression pre-dates the appearance of tetrapod digits, and was co-opted in the development of 'thumbness'. This asymmetric expression correlates with independent morphological evolutionary variation of digit 1.
Topics: Animals; Biological Evolution; Gene Expression Regulation, Developmental; Homeodomain Proteins; Humans; Morphogenesis; Thumb
PubMed: 18341703
DOI: 10.1186/gb-2008-9-3-213 -
Data in Brief Oct 2021In the field of transportation and logistics, smart vision systems have been employed successfully to automate various tasks such as number-plate recognition and vehicle...
In the field of transportation and logistics, smart vision systems have been employed successfully to automate various tasks such as number-plate recognition and vehicle identity recognition. The development of such automated systems is possible with the availability of large image datasets having proper annotations. The TRODO dataset is a rich-annotated collection of odometer displays that can enable automatic mileage reading from raw images. Initially, the dataset consisted of 2613 frames captured in different conditions in terms of resolution, quality, illumination and vehicle type. After data pre-processing and cleaning, the number of images was reduced to 2389. The images were annotated using the CVAT image annotation tool. The dataset provides the following information for each frame: the type of odometer (analog or digital), the mileage value displayed on the odometer, the bounding boxes of the odometer, and the digits and characters displayed on the screen. Combined with machine learning and artificial intelligence, the TRODO dataset can be used to train odometer classifiers, digit recognition and number reading models from odometers and similar types of displays.
PubMed: 34522730
DOI: 10.1016/j.dib.2021.107321 -
Frontiers in Human Neuroscience 2017Understanding speech in noise (SiN) is a complex task involving sensory encoding and cognitive resources including working memory and attention. Previous work has shown...
Understanding speech in noise (SiN) is a complex task involving sensory encoding and cognitive resources including working memory and attention. Previous work has shown that brain oscillations, particularly alpha rhythms (8-12 Hz) play important roles in sensory processes involving working memory and attention. However, no previous study has examined brain oscillations during performance of a continuous speech perception test. The aim of this study was to measure cortical alpha during attentive listening in a commonly used SiN task (digits-in-noise, DiN) to better understand the neural processes associated with "top-down" cognitive processing in adverse listening environments. We recruited 14 normal hearing (NH) young adults. DiN speech reception threshold (SRT) was measured in an initial behavioral experiment. EEG activity was then collected: (i) while performing the DiN near SRT; and (ii) while attending to a silent, close-caption video during presentation of identical digit stimuli that the participant was instructed to ignore. Three main results were obtained: (1) during attentive ("active") listening to the DiN, a number of distinct neural oscillations were observed (mainly alpha with some beta; 15-30 Hz). No oscillations were observed during attention to the video ("passive" listening); (2) overall, alpha event-related synchronization (ERS) of central/parietal sources were observed during active listening when data were grand averaged across all participants. In some participants, a smaller magnitude alpha event-related desynchronization (ERD), originating in temporal regions, was observed; and (3) when individual EEG trials were sorted according to correct and incorrect digit identification, the temporal alpha ERD was consistently greater on correctly identified trials. No such consistency was observed with the central/parietal alpha ERS. These data demonstrate that changes in alpha activity are specific to listening conditions. To our knowledge, this is the first report that shows almost no brain oscillatory changes during a passive task compared to an active task in any sensory modality. Temporal alpha ERD was related to correct digit identification.
PubMed: 28286478
DOI: 10.3389/fnhum.2017.00088 -
Stem Cell Research & Therapy Feb 2022Structural regeneration of amputated appendages by blastema-mediated, epimorphic regeneration is a process whose mechanisms are beginning to be employed for inducing...
BACKGROUND
Structural regeneration of amputated appendages by blastema-mediated, epimorphic regeneration is a process whose mechanisms are beginning to be employed for inducing regeneration. While epimorphic regeneration is classically studied in non-amniote vertebrates such as salamanders, mammals also possess a limited ability for epimorphic regeneration, best exemplified by the regeneration of the distal mouse digit tip. A fundamental, but still unresolved question is whether epimorphic regeneration and blastema formation is exhaustible, similar to the finite limits of stem-cell mediated tissue regeneration.
METHODS
In this study, distal mouse digits were amputated, allowed to regenerate and then repeatedly amputated. To quantify the extent and patterning of the regenerated digit, the digit bone as the most prominent regenerating element in the mouse digit was followed by in vivo µCT.
RESULTS
Analyses revealed that digit regeneration is indeed progressively attenuated, beginning after the second regeneration cycle, but that the pattern is faithfully restored until the end of the fourth regeneration cycle. Surprisingly, when unamputated digits in the vicinity of repeatedly amputated digits were themselves amputated, these new amputations also exhibited a similarly attenuated regeneration response, suggesting a systemic component to the amputation injury response.
CONCLUSIONS
In sum, these data suggest that epimorphic regeneration in mammals is finite and due to the exhaustion of the proliferation and differentiation capacity of the blastema cell source.
Topics: Amputation, Surgical; Animals; Cell Differentiation; Extremities; Mammals; Mice; Wound Healing
PubMed: 35130972
DOI: 10.1186/s13287-022-02741-2 -
Psychological Research May 2016The present study aimed at investigating the underlying cognitive processes and language specificities of three-digit number processing. More specifically, it was...
The present study aimed at investigating the underlying cognitive processes and language specificities of three-digit number processing. More specifically, it was intended to clarify whether the single digits of three-digit numbers are processed in parallel and/or sequentially and whether processing strategies are influenced by the inversion of number words with respect to the Arabic digits [e.g., 43: dreiundvierzig ("three and forty")] and/or by differences in reading behavior of the respective first language. Therefore, English- and German-speaking adults had to complete a three-digit number comparison task while their eye-fixation behavior was recorded. Replicating previous results, reliable hundred-decade-compatibility effects (e.g., 742_896: hundred-decade compatible because 7 < 8 and 4 < 9; 362_517: hundred-decade incompatible because 3 < 5 but 6 > 1) for English- as well as hundred-unit-compatibility effects for English- and German-speaking participants were observed, indicating parallel processing strategies. While no indices of partial sequential processing were found for the English-speaking group, about half of the German-speaking participants showed an inverse hundred-decade-compatibility effect accompanied by longer inspection time on the hundred digit indicating additional sequential processes. Thereby, the present data revealed that in transition from two- to higher multi-digit numbers, the homogeneity of underlying processing strategies varies between language groups. The regular German orthography (allowing for letter-by-letter reading) and its associated more sequential reading behavior may have promoted sequential processing strategies in multi-digit number processing. Furthermore, these results indicated that the inversion of number words alone is not sufficient to explain all observed language differences in three-digit number processing.
Topics: Adult; Attention; Female; Humans; Male; Pattern Recognition, Visual; Photic Stimulation; Reaction Time
PubMed: 26669690
DOI: 10.1007/s00426-015-0729-y -
PloS One 2012An often overlooked aspect of digit development is the special nature of the terminal phalanx, a specialized structure with characteristics distinct from other...
An often overlooked aspect of digit development is the special nature of the terminal phalanx, a specialized structure with characteristics distinct from other phalanges, for example the presence of ectodermal derivatives such as nails and claws. Here, we describe the unique ossification pattern of distal phalanges and characteristic gene expression in the digit tips of chick and duck embryos. Our results show that the distal phalanx of chick wing digit 1 is a genuine tip with a characteristic ossification pattern and expression of Bambi and Sp8; however, the terminal phalanx of digits 2* and 3 is not a genuine tip, and these are therefore truncated digits. Bambi and Sp8 expression in the chick wing provides a direct molecular assessment of digit identity changes after experimental manipulations of digit primordia. In contrast, digits 1 and 2 of the duck wing both possess true tips. Although chick wing-tip development was not rescued by application of Fgf8, this treatment induced the development of extra phalanges. Grafting experiments show that competence for tip formation, including nails, is latent in the interdigital tissue. Our results deepen understanding of the mechanisms of digit tip formation, highlighting its developmental autonomy and modular nature, with implications for digit reduction or loss during evolution. * Numbering of wing digits is 1, 2, 3 from anterior to posterior.
Topics: Animals; Body Patterning; Chick Embryo; Ducks; Extremities; Gene Expression Regulation, Developmental; Osteogenesis; Transcription Factors; Wings, Animal
PubMed: 23285181
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0052781