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This study combines experimental techniques and mathematical modeling to investigate the dynamics of C. elegans body-wall muscle cells. Specifically, by conducting voltage clamp and mutant experiments, we identify key ion channels, particularly the L-type voltage-gated calcium channel (EGL-19) and potassium channels (SHK-1, SLO-2), which are crucial for generating action potentials. We develop Hodgkin-Huxley-based models for these channels and integrate them to capture the cells' electrical activity. To ensure the model accurately reflects cellular responses under depolarizing currents, we develop a parallel simulation-based inference method for determining the model's free parameters. This method performs rapid parallel sampling across high-dimensional parameter spaces, fitting the model to the responses of muscle cells to specific stimuli and yielding accurate parameter estimates. We validate our model by comparing its predictions against cellular responses to various current stimuli in experiments and show that our approach effectively determines suitable parameters for accurately modeling the dynamics in mutant cases. Additionally, we discover an optimal response frequency in body-wall muscle cells, which corresponds to a burst firing mode rather than regular firing mode. Our work provides the first experimentally constrained and biophysically detailed muscle cell model of C. elegans, and our analytical framework combined with robust and efficient parametric estimation method can be extended to model construction in other species., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist., (Copyright: © 2025 Du et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the CreativeCommonsAttributionLicense, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.)

Objectives: Scholarly, clinical, and policy interest in cognitive function has grown over the last several decades in part due to large increases in Alzheimer's disease and related dementias as populations age. However, adequate measures of cognitive function have not been available in many research data sets. We argue that a wealth of previously unexploited survey data exists to model cognition and cognitive decline., Methods: We use metadata of the time it takes older respondents in the National Social Life, Health, and Aging Survey, which we label response times (RTs), to answer questions in a standard cognitive assessment. We compare several measures of RT to a survey-adapted form of the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA)., Results: We show that RTs predict both concurrent and future MoCA scores. Our results show that longer and more varied RT at baseline predict lower MoCA scores 5 years later, net of baseline scores and controls. We also show that the effect of RT measures on predicting current MoCA differs for individuals of different races and ages, but are not different by gender., Discussion: Our paper demonstrates that RTs constitute a separate powerful measure of cognitive functioning. RTs may be remarkably useful both to clinicians and social scientists because they can increase the accuracy of cognitive assessment without increasing the time it takes to administer the assessment., (© The Author(s) 2024. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Gerontological Society of America. All rights reserved. For commercial re-use, please contact reprints@oup.com for reprints and translation rights for reprints. All other permissions can be obtained through our RightsLink service via the Permissions link on the article page on our site—for further information please contact journals.permissions@oup.com.)

Left-handed G-quadruplexes (LHG4s) belong to a class of recently discovered noncanonical DNA structures under the larger umbrella of G-quadruplex DNAs (G4s). The biological relevance of these structures and their ability to be targeted with classical G4 ligands is underexplored. Here, we explore whether the putative LHG4 DNA sequence from the SLC2A1 oncogene promoter maintains its left-handed characteristics upon addition of nucleotides in the 5'- and 3'-direction from its genomic context. We also investigate whether this sequence interacts with a well-established G4 binder, N-methylmesoporphyrin IX (NMM). We employed biophysical and X-ray structural studies to address these questions. Our results indicate that the sequence d[G(TGG)3TGA(TGG)4] (termed here as SLC) adopts a two-subunit, four-tetrad hybrid left-/right-handed G4 (LH/RHG4) topology. Addition of 5'-G or 5'-GG abolishes the left-handed fold in one subunit, while the addition of 3'-C or 3'-CA maintains the original fold. X-ray crystal structure analyses show that SLC maintains the same hybrid LH/RHG4 fold in the solid state and that NMM stacks onto the right-handed subunit of SLC. NMM binds to SLC with a 1:1 stoichiometry and a moderate-to-tight binding constant of 15 μM-1. This work deepens our understanding of LHG4 structures and their binding with traditional G4 ligands., (© The Author(s) 2024. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Nucleic Acids Research.)

Gender categorization is central to everyday life. Discussions about gender have traditionally focused on gender identities , or gender categories to which a person might have an internal sense of belonging (e.g., men and women, boys and girls). More recently, discussions about gender also include gender modality (transgender or cisgender), or how a person's gender identity relates to their sex assigned at birth. In this registered report, we investigate gender-relevant categorization including gender identity and gender modality using measures assessing the automatic encoding of categories and explicit beliefs about the similarity between categories. We also compare performance on these tasks in transgender and cisgender youth and adults to help shed light on long-standing debates about the role of experience in categorization. Across two studies ( N = 1144), we found that participants automatically encoded both gender identity and gender modality, and that variations in categorization between participant groups were largely mediated by participants' attitudes (i.e., openness to nonbinary identities) and experiences (i.e., contact with trans people). These results thus help refine our psychological theories of gender categorization to more accurately reflect the landscape of gender categories permeating modern society.

Yousif et al. (2024) have raised a number of pertinent objections to the idea that number adaptation is a straightforward account of the readily-observable aftereffects that affect perceived numerosity. Their criticisms appear well-motivated, but their particular version of the old-news proposal, involving specific dots, may be insufficiently abstract given that adaptation accumulates. Two new experiments are presented that are meant to buttress their critique by (1) confirming their predictions concerning neutral adaptation, and (2) re-evaluating related claims concerning number vs. density comparisons that have been widely accepted. Present behavioral evidence dissociating effects of adapter size, adapter number and adapter density, supports the idea that density adaptation is implicated as a primary source of most phenomenologically-compelling aftereffects of perceived numerosity. Experiment 2 was preregistered on AsPredicted.org. The pre-registration is available at the following link: https://aspredicted.org/PC7_2ZB The full raw data sets for the two experiments reported her are available on OSF at the following links: Experiment 1: https://osf.io/b9qwy/?view_only=73beb62d9c2046c3aa08cdeb96cd5cca Experiment 2: https://osf.io/6ax5j/?view_only=723ceb0b44da47dba99e56db12db02a9., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest I have no known conflict of interest to disclose., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Many individuals struggle to regulate their own consumption of food. Beginning with general theories of self-control, we review psychological factors that have been shown to influence the regulation of eating, including those related to particular personality variables, such as external eating, restrained eating, and reward sensitivity, as well as situational constraints, including normative influences, emotions, and calorie deprivation. Strategies for the self-control of eating, including reappraisal, effortful inhibition, and various automatic strategies are also reviewed, along with a discussion of the strengths and limitations of historical and contemporary psychological studies investigating food consumption. Whereas extensive examinations of food preferences and body weight have appeared in the psychological literature, we call for more robust research that prioritizes actual eating as the primary dependent measure.

Advanced batteries require advanced characterization techniques, and neutron scattering is one of the most powerful experimental methods available for studying next-generation battery materials. Neutron scattering offers a non-destructive method to probe the complex structural and chemical processes occurring in batteries during operation in truly in situ/in operando measurements with a high sensitivity to battery-relevant elements such as lithium. Neutrons have energies comparable to the energies of excitations in materials and wavelengths comparable to atomic distances in the solid state, thus giving access to study structural and dynamical properties of materials on an atomic scale. In this review, a broad overview of selected neutron scattering techniques is presented to illustrate how neutron scattering can be used to gain invaluable information of solid-state battery materials, with a focus on in situ/in operando methods. These techniques span multiple decades of length and time scales to uncover the complex processes taking place fundamentally on the atomic scale and to determine how these processes impact the macroscale properties and performance of functional battery systems. This review serves the solid-state battery research community by examining how the unique capabilities of neutron scattering can be applied to answer critical and unresolved questions of materials research in this field. A thorough and broad perspective is provided with numerous practical examples showing these techniques in action for battery research.

Social traits are expected to experience highly context-dependent selection, but we know little about the contextual factors that shape selection on social behaviours. We hypothesized that the fitness consequences of social interactions will depend on the age of social partners, and therefore that population age structure will shape evolutionary pressures on sociality. Here, we investigate the consequences of age variation at multiple levels of social organization for both individual fitness and sexual selection on social network traits. We experimentally manipulated the age composition of populations of the forked fungus beetle Bolitotherus cornutus , creating 12 replicate populations with either young or old age structures. We found that fitness is associated with variance in age at three different levels of organization: the individual, interacting social partners, and the population. Older individuals have higher reproductive success, males pay a fitness cost when they interact with old males and females achieve lower fitness in older populations. In addition to influencing fitness, population age structure also altered the selection acting on social network position in females. Female sociality is under positive selection only in old populations. Our results highlight age structure as an understudied demographic variable shaping the landscape of selection on social behaviour.This article is part of the discussion meeting issue 'Understanding age and society using natural populations'.

Trace metals are indispensable nutritional factors for all living organisms. During host-pathogen interactions, they serve as crucial resources that dictate infection outcomes. Accordingly, the host uses a defense strategy known as nutritional immunity, which relies on coordinated metal chelation to mitigate bacterial advances. In response, pathogens employ complex strategies to secure these resources at sites of infection. In the gastrointestinal (GI) tract, the microbiota must also acquire metals for survival, making metals a central line of competition in this complex ecosystem. In this minireview, we outline how bacteria secure iron, zinc, and manganese from the host with a focus on the GI tract. We also reflect on how host dietary changes impact disease outcomes and discuss therapeutic opportunities to target bacterial metal uptake systems. Ultimately, we find that recent discoveries on the dynamics of transition metals at the host-pathogen-microbiota interface have reshaped our understanding of enteric infections and provided insights into virulence strategies, microbial cooperation, and antibacterial strategies., (© The Author(s) 2024. Published by Oxford University Press.)

Competing Interests: We declare no competing interests.

Human satellitess(HSats) are pericentric, tandemly repeating satellite DNA sequences in the human genome. While silent in normal cells, a subset of HSat2 noncoding RNA is expressed and accumulates in the nucleus of cancer cells. We developed a FISH-based approach for identification of the distribution of three subfamilies of HSat2 (A1, A2, B) sequences on individual human chromosomes. Further, using the HSat subfamily annotations in the T2T completed centromere satellite (CenSat) sequence, we isolated, defined and mapped differentially expressed sequence variants of nuclear-restricted HSat2 and HSat3 RNA from cancer cell lines and heat-shocked cells. We identified chromosome-specific and subfamily-specific expression of HSat2 and HSat3 and established a computational pipeline for differential expression analysis of tandemly repeated satellite sequences. Results suggest the differential expression of chromosome-specific HSat2 arrays in the human genome may underlie their accumulation in cancer cells and that specific HSat3 loci are upregulated upon heat shock.

In polymorphic organisms, a single genome is deployed to program numerous, morphologically distinct body plans within a colony. This complex life history trait has evolved independently within a limited subset of animal taxa. Reconstructing the underlying genetic, cellular, and developmental changes that drove the emergence of polymorphic colonies represents a promising avenue for exploring diversifying selection and resulting impacts on developmental gene regulatory networks. Doliolids are the only polymorphic chordate, deploying a single genome to program distinct morphs specialized for locomotion, feeding, asexual, or sexual reproduction. In this review, we provide a detailed summary of doliolid anatomy, development, taxonomy, ecology, life history, and the cellular basis for doliolid polymorphism. In order to frame the potential evolutionary and developmental insights that could be gained by studying doliolids, we provide a broader overview of polymorphism. We then discuss how comparative studies of polymorphic cnidarians have begun to illuminate the genetic basis of this unusual and complex life history strategy. We then provide a summary of life history divergence in the chordates, particularly among doliolids and their polymorphic cousins, the salps and pyrosomes., (© The Author(s) 2024. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology.)

We deploy optical microscopy with and without an applied magnetic field to characterize the three-dimensional morphology and measure the line tension of twist disclinations in twisted nematic liquid crystal (LC) sample cells. Twist disclinations are generated by quenching the LC, 5CB (4-cyano-4'-pentylbiphenyl), into the nematic phase; 5CB is confined between substrates with in-plane anchoring directions perpendicular to one another. The disclinations form loops separating domains of opposite twist handedness. Many segments of these loops are pinned to the substrates, and the ends of some pinned segments connect to free disclination segments that penetrate into the bulk nematic. We use confocal microscopy to measure the profiles of these free disclinations and test theoretical predictions about their shape, yielding a lower bound of ∼32 nm for the disclination core radius. We then use an applied magnetic field to deform the free disclinations into circular arcs whose curvature increases with magnetic field strength and depends on the field-induced energy difference between opposite twist domains. The line tension of the disclinations is derived from an energy-balance equation that relates disclination curvature to magnetic field. The measured line tension increases logarithmically with sample cell thickness; it ranges from 75 to 200 pN in samples with thickness spanning from 6 to 27 μm. In total, the investigation introduces new non-invasive methodologies for studies of defects in LCs, and it provides new information about the line tension and character of isolated twist disclinations, thereby testing theory and laying experimental foundation for the study of ensembles of disclinations.

The Dobbs decision of the United States Supreme Court and the actions of several state legislatures have made it risky, if not outright dangerous, to teach factual material concerning human embryology. At some state universities, for instance, if a professor's lecture is felt to teach or discuss abortion (as it might when teaching about tubal pregnancies, hydatidiform moles, or eneuploidy), that instructor risks imprisonment for up to 14 years (Gyori, 2023). Some states' new censorship rules have thus caused professors to drop modules on abortion from numerous science and humanities courses. In most states, instructors can still teach about human embryonic development and not risk putting their careers or livelihoods in jeopardy. However, even in many of these institutions, students can bring a professor to a disciplinary hearing by claiming that the instructor failed to provide ample trigger warnings on such issues. This essay attempts to provide some strategies wherein human embryology and the ethical issues surrounding it might be taught and students may be given resources to counter unscientific falsehoods about fertilization and human development. This essay provides evidence for teaching the following propositions. Mis-information about human biology and medicine is rampant on the internet, and there are skills that can be taught to students that will help them determine which sites should trusted. This is a skill that needs to be taught as part of science courses., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

During early life, disruption of the parent-offspring bond can substantially impact development of offspring physiology and behavior. In rodents, it has been well-documented that parental separation, reduction in parental care, and cross-fostering can affect development of the endocrine stress response. For social species, however, several social factors may mitigate the stress of cross-fostering, such as remaining with other known adult caregivers or siblings. In this study, we cross-fostered a social rodent species (Octodon degus) with or without their siblings at postnatal day (PND) 8 and measured their endocrine stress response immediately after fostering (PND9) and at weaning (PND28). We found that female singly-fostered offspring displayed elevated baseline cortisol levels and reduced weight gain immediately after fostering. At weaning, female singly-fostered offspring continued to display elevated baseline cortisol levels compared to non-fostered female offspring, while singly-fostered males demonstrated weaker cortisol negative feedback strength compared to male offspring that were not fostered or were fostered with their siblings. These results suggest that sibling presence may help mitigate the stress of fostering, and that future studies should further examine other social conditions that may help reduce developmental consequences of long-term parental bond disruption., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Objective: To examine short-term (i.e., postintervention) outcomes from a randomized controlled trial comparing a school-based telehealth-delivered depression prevention program, Interpersonal Psychotherapy-Adolescent Skills Training (IPT-AST), to services as usual (SAU). We expected IPT-AST would be acceptable and feasible and that IPT-AST adolescents would experience greater reductions in depression symptoms, anxiety symptoms, and impairment compared with SAU., Method: Adolescents ( N = 242; M age = 14.80 years, SD = 0.70; 65% female; 21% Black; 13% Hispanic/Latinx) with elevated scores on the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (Radloff, 1977) at screening provided data at baseline, 2-month (midpoint of IPT-AST), and 3-month (postintervention) assessments. They reported depression symptoms on the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale, anxiety symptoms on the Screen for Child Anxiety Related Emotional Disorders (Birmaher et al., 1997), and impairment on the Columbia Impairment Scale (Bird et al., 1993). Baseline depression diagnosis was examined as a moderator., Results: Hierarchical linear models showed that adolescents reported significant reductions in depression symptoms and impairment across conditions. IPT-AST adolescents reported significantly greater reductions in anxiety symptoms than SAU adolescents, d = .39, 95% CI [.05, .72], p = .003. Depression diagnosis moderated outcomes ( d s = .33-.34, p s ≤ .05), such that IPT-AST adolescents without a diagnosis at baseline showed greater improvements in depression and anxiety symptoms than SAU adolescents. Adolescents in SAU with a depression diagnosis at baseline showed greater improvements in impairment compared with IPT-AST. Attendance and satisfaction data demonstrated the feasibility and acceptability of telehealth-delivered IPT-AST., Conclusions: Results support telehealth-delivered IPT-AST as a promising intervention for improving short-term outcomes among adolescents with depression symptoms but without a depression diagnosis. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Aggression involves both sexually monomorphic and dimorphic actions. How the brain implements these two types of actions is poorly understood. We found that in Drosophila melanogaster , a set of neurons, which we call CL062, previously shown to mediate male aggression also mediate female aggression. These neurons elicit aggression acutely and without the presence of a target. Although the same set of actions is elicited in males and females, the overall behavior is sexually dimorphic. The CL062 neurons do not express fruitless , a gene required for sexual dimorphism in flies, and expressed by most other neurons important for controlling fly aggression. Connectomic analysis in a female electron microscopy dataset suggests that these neurons have limited connections with fruitless expressing neurons that have been shown to be important for aggression and signal to different descending neurons. Thus, CL062 is part of a monomorphic circuit for aggression that functions parallel to the known dimorphic circuits., Competing Interests: The authors declare no competing financial interests., (Copyright © 2024 Tao et al.)

Objective: To assess racial and sex variances in second primary thyroid malignancy (SPTM) cumulative incidence and temporal trends and the radiation exposure effect in pediatric SPTM., Materials and Methods: A retrospective cohort study, a non-experimental epidemiologic design, was used to assess the cumulative incidence (CmI) and temporal trends as well as the exposure effect of radiation in SPTM among children, 0-19 years, in the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) registry, National Cancer Institute (NCI), USA. Percent change (PC) and annual percent change (APC) were used to examine CmI rates and temporal trends, while chi-square statistics and binomial regression models were used to examine variable distribution by race and to determine the exposure effect of radiation on SPTM as well as mortality, respectively., Results: The frequency of pediatric thyroid cancer was ( n = 3457) between 1973 and 2013/14, while the PC was 151.2 for all races but 99.8 among whites. Of all pediatric thyroid cancers diagnosed during this period, SPTM accounted for 3% ( n = 99). Compared to whites, blacks/AA were 60% less likely to present with SPTM, adjusted risk ratio, aRR = 0.40, 99% CI 0.06-2.47, while other races were 18% more likely to develop SPTM, aRR = 1.18, 99% CI 0.48-2.87. Additionally, females relative to males were 63% less likely to be diagnosed with SPTM, aRR = 0.37, 99% CI 0.22-0.61. With respect to urbanicity, compared to children in rural areas, those in urban areas were 21% less likely to develop SPTM, aRR = 0.79, 99% CI, 0.12-5.35, while children in metropolitan areas were 40% less likely to develop SPTM, aRR = 0.60, 99% CI, 0.10-3.59. Although imprecise, there was a 5% increased risk of SPTM, with radiation as an exposure effect, aRR = 1.05, 99% CI 1.01-1.75., Conclusions: There are increasing temporal trends in pediatric SPTM with blacks relative to whites having observed lower incidence, despite an increasing percent change among blacks/AA, indicative of the disproportionate burden of this malignant neoplasm. SPTM risk was higher among males and in rural areas, while radiation as a risk for SPTM was clinically and biologically meaningful, albeit an observed statistically insignificant inference due to sampling variability, requiring intervention mapping in radiation exposure margination among children.

Diets that are high in fat cause over-eating and weight gain in multiple species of animals, suggesting that high dietary fat is sufficient to cause obesity. However, high-fat diets are typically provided freely to animals in obesity experiments, so it remains unclear if high-fat diets would still cause obesity if they required more effort to obtain. We hypothesized that unrestricted and easy access is necessary for high-fat diet induced over-eating, and the corollary that requiring mice to perform small amounts of work to obtain high-fat diet would reduce high-fat diet intake and associated weight gain. To test this hypothesis, we developed a novel home-cage based feeding device that either provided high-fat diet freely, or after mice poked their noses into a port one time - a simple action that is easy for them to do. We tested the effect of this intervention for six weeks, with mice receiving all daily calories from high-fat diet, modifying only how they accessed it. Requiring mice to nose-poke to access high-fat diet reduced intake and nearly completely prevented the development of obesity. In follow up experiments, we observed a similar phenomenon in mice responding for low-fat grain-based pellets that do not induce obesity, suggesting a general mechanism whereby animals engage with and consume more food when it is freely available vs. when it requires a simple action to obtain. We conclude that unrestricted access to food promotes overeating, and that a simple action such as a nose-poke can reduce over-eating and weight gain in mice. This may have implications for why over-eating and obesity are common in modern food environments, which are often characterized by easy access to low-cost unhealthy foods., Competing Interests: Declaration of Interests The authors declare no competing interests

Visceral Leishmaniasis (VL) is a deadly, vector-borne, parasitic, neglected tropical disease, particularly prevalent on the Indian subcontinent. Sleeping under the long-lasting insecticide-treated nets (ITNs) was considered an effective VL prevention and control measures, until KalaNet, a large trial in Nepal and India, did not show enough supporting evidence. In this paper, we adapt a biologically accurate, yet relatively simple compartmental ordinary differential equations (ODE) model of VL transmission and explicitly model the use of ITNs and their role in VL prevention and elimination. We also include a game-theoretic analysis in order to determine an optimal use of ITNs from the individuals' perspective. In agreement with the previous more detailed and complex model, we show that the ITNs coverage amongst the susceptible population has to be unrealistically high (over 96%) in order for VL to be eliminated. However, we also show that if the whole population, including symptomatic and asymptomatic VL cases adopt about 90% ITN usage, then VL can be eliminated. Our model also suggests that ITN usage should be accompanied with other interventions such as vector control., Competing Interests: Jan Rychtar: I have read the journal’s policy and the authors of this manuscript have the following competing interests: I serve on the editorial board of PLOS ONE. This does not alter our adherence to PLOS ONE policies on sharing data and materials. Other authors declare no conflict of interest., (Copyright: © 2024 Davis et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.)

Four experimental studies are reported using a total of 712 participants to investigate the basis of a recently reported numerosity illusion called "weak-outnumber-strong" (WOS). In the weak-outnumber-strong illusion, when equal numbers of white and gray dots (e.g., 50 of each) are intermixed against a darker gray background, the gray dots seem much more numerous than the white. Two principles seem to be supported by these new results: 1) Subsets of mixtures are generally underestimated; thus, in mixtures of red and green dots, both sets are underestimated (using a matching task) just as the white dots are in the weak-outnumber-strong illusion, but 2) the gray dots seem to be filled in as if partially occluded by the brighter white dots. This second principle is supported by manipulations of depth perception both by pictorial cues (partial occlusion) and by binocular cues (stereopsis), such that the illusion is abolished when the gray dots are depicted as closer than the white dots, but remains strong when they are depicted as lying behind the white dots. Finally, an online investigation of a prior false-floor hypothesis concerning the effect suggests that manipulations of relative contrast may affect the segmentation process, which produces the visual bias known as subset underestimation.

Pseudomonas aeruginosa forms aggregates known as biofilms. Previous studies have shown that when P. aeruginosa is cultivated in space, thicker and structurally different biofilms are formed than from those grown on Earth. We investigated how microgravity, simulated in a laboratory setting, influenced the growth, colonization, and virulence potentials of a P. aeruginosa PA14 wild-type strain, as well as two surface attachment-defective ( sad ) mutants altered at crucial biofilm-forming steps: flgK and pelA . Using high-aspect ratio rotating-wall vessel (HARV) bioreactors, P. aeruginosa bacteria were grown to stationary phase under prolonged (6 days) exposure to simulated microgravity or normal gravity conditions. After the exposure, the capacity of the culture to form biofilms was measured. Additionally, pigment (pyocyanin) formed by each culture during the incubation was extracted and quantified. We demonstrate that the first prolonged exposure to low-shear modeled microgravity (LSMMG) and without nutrient replenishment significantly diminishes wild-type P. aeruginosa PA14 biofilm formation abilities after exposure and pyocyanin production during exposure, while the mutant strains exhibit differing outcomes for both properties., Importance: Given plans for humans to engage in prolonged space travel, we investigated biofilm and pigment/virulence factor formation in Pseudomonas aeruginosa when cultivated in microgravity. These bacteria are opportunistic pathogens in immunocompromised individuals. Previous studies of space travelers have shown some immune system diminutions. Hence, our studies shed some light on how prolonged cultivation of bacteria in simulated microgravity conditions affect their growth characteristics., Competing Interests: The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Deletions and malfunctions of the IgLON family of cell adhesion molecules are associated with anatomical, behavioral, and metabolic manifestations of neuropsychiatric disorders. We have previously shown that IgLON genes are expressed in sensory nuclei/pathways and that IgLON proteins modulate sensory processing. Here, we examined the expression of IgLON alternative promoter-specific isoforms during embryonic development and studied the sensory consequences of the anatomical changes when one of the IgLON genes, Negr1, is knocked out. At the embryonal age of E12.5 and E13.5, various IgLONs were distributed differentially and dynamically in the developing sensory areas within the central and peripheral nervous system, as well as in limbs and mammary glands. Sensory tests showed that Negr1 deficiency causes differences in vestibular function and temperature sensitivity in the knockout mice. Sex-specific differences were noted across olfaction, vestibular functioning, temperature regulation, and mechanical sensitivity. Our findings highlight the involvement of IgLON molecules during sensory circuit formation and suggest Negr1's critical role in somatosensory processing., (© 2024. The Author(s).)

Marine organisms have complex life histories. For broadcast spawners, successful continuation of the population requires their small gametes to make contact in the water column for sufficiently long periods for fertilization to occur. Anthropogenic climate change has been shown to impact fertilization success in various marine invertebrates, including sea urchins, which are key grazers in their habitats. Gamete performance of both sexes declined when exposed to elevated temperatures and/or pCO2 levels. Examples of reduced performance included slower sperm swimming speed and thinning egg jelly coat. However, such responses to climate change stress were not uniform between individuals. Such variations could serve as the basis for selection. Fertilization kinetics have long been modeled as a particle collision process. Here, we present a modified fertilization kinetics model that incorporates individual variations in performance in a more environmentally relevant regime, and which the performance of groups with different traits can be separately tracked in a mixture. Numerical simulations highlight that fertilization outcomes are influenced by changes in gamete traits as they age in sea water and the presence of competition groups (multiple dams or sires). These results highlight the importance of considering multiple individuals and at multiple time points during in vivo assays. We also applied our model to show that interspecific variation in climate stress vulnerabilities elevates the risk of hybridization. By making a numerical model open-source, we aim to help us better understand the fate of organisms in the face of climate change by enabling the community to consider the mean and variance of the response to capture adaptive potential., (© The Author(s) 2024. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology.)

People parse continuous experiences at natural breakpoints called event boundaries, which is important for understanding an environment's causal structure and for responding to uncertainty within it. However, it remains unclear how different forms of uncertainty affect the parsing of continuous experiences and how such uncertainty influences the brain's processing of ongoing events. We exposed human participants of both sexes ( N  = 34) to a continuous sequence of semantically meaningless images. We generated sequences from random walks through a graph that grouped images into temporal communities. After learning, we asked participants to segment another sequence at natural breakpoints (event boundaries). Participants segmented the sequence at learned transitions between communities, as well as at novel transitions, suggesting that people can segment temporally extended experiences into events based on learned structure as well as prediction error. Greater segmentation at novel boundaries was associated with enhanced parietal scalp electroencephalography (EEG) activity between 250 and 450 ms after the stimulus onset. Multivariate classification of EEG activity showed that novel and learned boundaries evoked distinct patterns of neural activity, particularly theta band power in posterior electrodes. Learning also led to distinct neural representations for stimuli within the temporal communities, while neural activity at learned boundary nodes showed predictive evidence for the adjacent community. The data show that people segment experiences at both learned and novel boundaries and suggest that learned event boundaries trigger retrieval of information about the upcoming community that could underlie anticipation of the next event in a sequence., Competing Interests: The authors declare no competing financial interests., (Copyright © 2024 Ezzyat and Clements.)

Phylogenetic and discrete-trait evolutionary inference depend heavily on an appropriate characterization of the underlying character substitution process. In this paper, we present random-effects substitution models that extend common continuous-time Markov chain models into a richer class of processes capable of capturing a wider variety of substitution dynamics. As these random-effects substitution models often require many more parameters than their usual counterparts, inference can be both statistically and computationally challenging. Thus, we also propose an efficient approach to compute an approximation to the gradient of the data likelihood with respect to all unknown substitution model parameters. We demonstrate that this approximate gradient enables scaling of sampling-based inference, namely Bayesian inference via Hamiltonian Monte Carlo, under random-effects substitution models across large trees and state-spaces. Applied to a dataset of 583 SARS-CoV-2 sequences, an HKY model with random-effects shows strong signals of nonreversibility in the substitution process, and posterior predictive model checks clearly show that it is a more adequate model than a reversible model. When analyzing the pattern of phylogeographic spread of 1441 influenza A virus (H3N2) sequences between 14 regions, a random-effects phylogeographic substitution model infers that air travel volume adequately predicts almost all dispersal rates. A random-effects state-dependent substitution model reveals no evidence for an effect of arboreality on the swimming mode in the tree frog subfamily Hylinae. Simulations reveal that random-effects substitution models can accommodate both negligible and radical departures from the underlying base substitution model. We show that our gradient-based inference approach is over an order of magnitude more time efficient than conventional approaches., (© The Author(s) 2024. Published by Oxford University Press, on behalf of the Society of Systematic Biologists.)

Background and Objectives: Rituals are common among healthy individuals and across cultures and often serve adaptive purposes. In individuals with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), rituals become compulsive, time-consuming and distressing, and may lead to functional impairment. Previous research has examined the functions and characteristics of compulsive rituals, but there is paucity of in-depth, first-person reports about this topic., Method: We used a qualitative approach to explore thoughts, feelings, and behavioral patterns that characterize OCD rituals. Ten individuals with OCD participated in a semi-structured interview that focused on their most prominent compulsive ritual. The interviews were subjected to a thematic analysis., Results: Eight themes emerged from the analysis and were organized in two main categories: Micro Level perspective, comprising triggers, attention, emotional changes, and stopping criteria; and Macro Level perspective, comprising feelings and perceptions, change over time, motives, and inhibitors. The findings shed light on the role of fixed rules and feelings of "completeness" in OCD rituals, the nature of emotional and attentional characteristics during rituals performance, and the evolution of compulsive rituals over time., Limitations: This study used a qualitative approach based on a small number of participants, which limits the generalizability of the findings., Conclusion: Our results, if replicated, may have clinical implications. The reported patterns of anxiety reduction during ritual performance may contribute to the fine-tuning of CBT for OCD. The findings concerning the nature of attention during ritual performance and the development of rituals over time may be important for understanding the mechanisms that maintain compulsive rituals., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Studies of non-linguistic statistical learning (SL) have often linked performance in SL tasks with differences in language outcomes. Most of these studies have focused on Western and high-income educational contexts, but children worldwide learn in radically different educational systems and communities, and often in a second language. In the west African nation of Côte d'Ivoire, children enter fifth grade (CM-1) with widely varying ages and literacy skills. Across three iteratively-developed experiments, 157 children, age 8-15 years, in rural communities in the greater-Adzópe region of Côte d'Ivoire watched sequences of cartoon images with embedded triplet patterns on touchscreen tablets, while performing a target-detection task. We assessed these tablet-based adaptations of non-linguistic visual SL and asked whether the children's individual differences in performance on the SL tasks were related to their first and second language and literacy skills. We found group-level evidence that children used the statistical regularities in the image sequence to gradually decrease their response times, but their responses on post-test discrimination did not reflect this learning. When evaluating the correlation between SL and language skills, individual differences related to other task demands predicted oral language skills shared by first and second languages, while SL better predicted second language print skills. These findings suggest that non-linguistic SL paradigms can measure similar skills in Ivorian children as previous samples, but they also echo recent calls for further cross-cultural validation, greater internal reliability, and tests for confounding variables (such as processing speed) in studies of individual differences in statistical learning. RESEARCH HIGHLIGHTS: We iteratively adapted three visual statistical learning studies for children in rural Côte d'Ivoire. Group-level analyses indicates that the children learn the underlying statistical regularities. Individual-differences analyses reveal some evidence that the statistical learning measure is also correlated with task demands that may be driven by cross-cultural differences. Like previous research, statistical learning is correlated with second language literacy, but we did not find a relationship between SL and oral language skills in first and second languages., (© 2023 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)

Background: Acoustically activated perfluoropropane droplets (PD) formulated from lipid encapsulated microbubble preparations produce a delayed myocardial contrast enhancement that preferentially highlights the infarct zones (IZ). Since activation of PDs may be temperature sensitive, it is unclear what effect body temperature (BT) has on acoustic activation (AA)., Objective: We sought to determine whether the microvascular retention and degree of myocardial contrast intensity (MCI) would be affected by BT at the time of intravenous injection., Methods: We administered intravenous (IV) PD in nine rats following 60 min of ischemia followed by reperfusion. Injections in these rats were given at temperatures above and below 36.5°C, with high MI activation in both groups at 3 or 6 min following IV injection (IVI). In six additional rats (three in each group), IV PDs were given only at one temperature (<36.5°C or ≥36.5°C), permitting a total of 12 comparisons of different BT. Differences in background subtracted MCI at 3-6 min post-injection were compared in the infarct zone (IZ) and remote zone (RZ). Post-mortem lung hematoxylin and eosin (H&E) staining was performed to assess the effect potential thermal activation on lung tissue., Results: Selective MCI within the IZ was observed in 8 of 12 rats who received IVI of PDs at <36.5°C, but none of the 12 rats who had IVI at the higher temperature (p < 0.0001). Absolute MCI following droplet activation was significantly higher in both the IZ and RZ when given at the lower BT. H&E indicated significant red blood extravasation in 5/7 rats who had had IV injections at higher BT, and 0/7 rats who had IV PDs at <36.5°C., Conclusions: Selective IZ enhancement with AA of intravenous PDs is possible, but temperature sensitive. Thermal activation appears to occur when PDs are given at higher temperatures, preventing AA, and increasing unwanted bioeffects., Competing Interests: Conflict of interest The authors declare no competing interests., (Copyright © 2024 World Federation for Ultrasound in Medicine & Biology. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Purpose: Empowering adolescents and young adult (AYA) patients to be involved in cancer responsibilities (e.g., remembering medications), as opposed to solely relying on caregivers, may have important short- and long-term benefits for development and disease management. This study explored perceptions of AYA engagement with cancer-related responsibilities and plans for transferring these responsibilities from caregivers to AYAs. Methods: A total of 30 AYA-caregiver dyads (including 11 early adolescents, 10 adolescents, and 9 young adults who were receiving chemotherapy and/or radiation) jointly completed a semi-structured interview. Interviews assessed the present allocation of cancer responsibilities within the family, how cancer responsibilities were divided this way, and prompted a dyadic discussion to draft a plan to transfer a responsibility to the AYA in the future. Directed content analysis techniques were used to identify and organize relevant themes. Results: Themes showed that (1) cancer responsibilities were initially assumed "naturally" by caregivers, without much formal discussion; (2) greater AYA involvement in cancer care reflected AYA (e.g., age, willingness) and caregiver factors (e.g., knowledge/skills, anxiety); (3) over time, dyads mutually prioritized AYA engagement with cancer care; and (4) the need for more proactive clinical support with transferring care tasks to AYAs. Discussion: Caregivers play a key role in managing cancer care with or for AYAs, with the allocation of these responsibilities being influenced by several factors that can shift over time. Dyads typically viewed the transfer process as important but desired more clinical support. This reflects a potential self-management care gap to address in future studies and dyadic interventions.

Respiratory motion phantoms can be used for evaluation of CT imaging technologies such as motion artifact reduction algorithms and deformable image registration. However, current respiratory motion phantoms do not exhibit detailed lung tissue structures and thus do not provide a realistic testing environment. This paper presents PixelPrint 4D , a method for 3D-printing deformable lung phantoms featuring highly realistic internal structures, suitable for a broad range of CT evaluations, optimizations, and research. The phantom in this study was designed with a patient 4DCT as a reference and 3D-printed using an extended version of the PixelPrint method for developing patient-specific CT phantoms. A flexible thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU) 3D-printing material was used, which produced regions with attenuation between -840 and -48 Hounsfield units (HU). A linear compression device was then designed and used to compress the phantom in the superior-inferior (SI) direction, and the phantom was scanned at different compression levels matched to the diaphragm displacements measured on the reference patient 4DCT. Deformable image registration (DIR) was performed, and motion vector fields were obtained for both patient and phantom images. SI displacements of selected features in the lung had mean errors of 0.5 mm difference from the patient, or less than the reconstructed slice thickness. In conclusion, the deformable lung phantom developed in this study exhibits realistic lung structures and deformation characteristics under compression, indicating potential for advancing more lifelike respiratory motion phantoms.

To mitigate limitations of self-reported mood assessments, we introduce a novel affective bias task. The task quantifies instantaneous emotional state by leveraging the phenomenon of affective bias, in which people interpret external emotional stimuli in a manner consistent with their current emotional state. This study establishes task stability in measuring and tracking depressive symptoms in clinical and nonclinical populations. Initial assessment in a large nonclinical sample established normative ratings. Depressive symptoms were measured and compared with task performance in a nonclinical sample, as well as in a clinical cohort of individuals who were undergoing surgical evaluation for severe epilepsy. In both cohorts, a stronger negative affective bias was associated with a higher Beck Depression Inventory-II score. The affective bias task exhibited high stability and interrater reliability as well as construct validity in predicting depression levels in both cohorts, suggesting that the task is a reliable proxy for mood and a diagnostic tool for detecting depressive symptoms., (Copyright © 2024 Society of Biological Psychiatry. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

What is the nature of lexical meanings such that they can both compose with others and also appear boundless? We investigate this question by examining the compositional properties of for-time adverbial as in "Ana jumped for an hour." At issue is the source of the associated iterative reading which lacks overt morphophonological support, yet, the iteration is not disconnected from the lexical meanings in the sentence. This suggests an analysis whereby the iterative reading is the result of the interaction between lexical meanings under a specific compositional configuration. We test the predictions of two competing accounts: Mismatch-and-Repair and Partition-Measure. They differ in their assumptions about lexical meanings: assumptions that have implications for the possible compositional mechanisms that each can invoke. Mismatch-and-Repair assumes that lexical meaning representations are discrete, separate from the conceptual system from which they originally emerged and brought into sentence meaning through syntactic composition. Partition-Measure assumes that lexical meanings are contextually salient conceptual structures substantially indistinguishable from the conceptual system that they inhabit. During comprehension, lexical meanings construe a conceptual representation, in parallel, morphosyntactic and morphophonological composition as determined by the lexical items involved in the sentence. Whereas both hypotheses capture the observed cost in the punctual predicate plus for-time adverbial composition (e.g., jump (vs. swim) for an hour), their predictions differ regarding iteration with durative predicates; for example, swim for a year (vs. for an hour). Mismatch-and-Repair predicts contrasting processing profiles and nonoverlapping activation patterns along punctuality differences. Partition-Measure predicts overlapping processing and cortical distribution profiles, along the presence of iterativity. Results from a self-paced reading and an functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) studies bear out the predictions of the Partition-Measure account, supporting a view of linguistic meaning composition in line with an architecture of language whereby combinatoriality and generativity are distributed, carried out in parallel across linguistic and nonlinguistic subsystems., (© 2024 Cognitive Science Society LLC.)

Organisms are now seen as holobionts, consortia of several species that interact metabolically such that they sustain and scaffold each other's existence and propagation. Sympoiesis, the development of the symbiotic relationships that form holobionts, is critical for our understanding the origins and maintenance of biodiversity. Rather than being the read-out of a single genome, development has been found to be sympoietic, based on multigenomic interactions between zygote-derived cells and symbiotic microbes. These symbiotic and sympoietic interactions are predicated on the ability of cells from different kingdoms of life (e.g., bacteria and animals) to communicate with one another and to have their chemical signals interpreted in a manner that facilitates development. Sympoiesis, the creation of an entity by the interactions of other entities, is commonly seen in embryogenesis (e.g., the creation of lenses and retinas through the interaction of brain and epidermal compartments). In holobiont sympoiesis, interactions between partners of different domains of life interact to form organs and biofilms, wherein each of these domains acts as the environment for the other. If evolution is forged by changes in development, and if symbionts are routinely involved in our development, then changes in sympoiesis can constitute an important factor in evolution., Competing Interests: The author declares that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2024 Gilbert.)

The matter of raising and educating deaf children has been caught up in percepts of development that are persistently inaccurate and at odds with scientific research. These percepts have negatively impacted the health and quality of life of deaf children and deaf people in general. The all too prevalent advice is to raise the child strictly orally and wait to see what happens. Only when the child is seriously behind is a completely accessible language - a sign language - introduced, and that is far too late for protecting cognitive health. The medical profession, along with others, needs to offer parents better advice and better supports so that neither the children nor their parents wait and watch as the oral-only method fails. All must take responsible action to assure an approach that succeeds., (© 2024. The Author(s).)

To dissociate aftereffects of size and density in the perception of relative numerosity, large or small adapter sizes were crossed with high or low adapter densities. A total of 48 participants were included in this preregistered design. To adapt the same retinotopic region as the large adapters, the small adapters were flashed in a sequence so as to "paint" the adapting density across the large region. Perceived numerosities and sizes in the adapted region were then compared to those in an unadapted region in separate blocks of trials, so that changes in density could be inferred. These density changes were found to be bidirectional and roughly symmetric, whereas the aftereffects of size and number were not symmetric. A simple account of these findings is that local adaptations to retinotopic density as well as global adaptations to size combine in producing numerosity aftereffects measured by assessing perceived relative number. Accounts based on number adaptation are contraindicated, in particular, by the result of adapting to a large, sparse adapter and testing with a stimulus with a double the density but half number of dots.

Lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, queer, intersex, asexual, and other diverse individuals (LGBTQIA+) people face lower healthcare utilization rates due to discrimination, poor experiences in healthcare, and barriers to accessing care. There is an increasing need to improve care and reduce health care disparities for the LGBTQIA+ population. The medical community can begin by educating themselves on LGBTQIA+ terminology, using inclusive language and developing cultural competence in clinical settings. In order to achieve this, it is first important to understand that sex and gender are distinct and that both sex and gender exist on continuums. This article will build on this understanding by introducing basic and widely accepted terminology that will provide a foundation for providing care to LGBTQIA+ populations. By thoughtfully incorporating this knowledge into our research and clinical practice, the radiology community will enhance the healthcare experiences of all patients., (© 2024. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.)

Objectives: During multisensory emotion perception, the attention devoted to the visual versus the auditory modality (i.e., modality dominance) varies depending on the cultural background of the perceiver. In the present study, we examined (a) how cultural familiarity influences multisensory emotion perception in Eastern and Western cultures and (b) the underlying processes accounting for the cultural difference in modality dominance., Method: Native Mandarin speakers from China and native English speakers from the United States were presented with audiovisual emotional stimuli from their own culture (i.e., familiar) and from a different culture (i.e., unfamiliar) and asked to evaluate the emotion from one of the two modalities. Across modalities, the emotions were either the same (i.e., congruent, happy face, and happy voice) or different (i.e., incongruent, happy face, and sad voice)., Results: When the input was in a familiar cultural context, American participants were more influenced by the visual modality, while Chinese participants were more influenced by the auditory modality. While both groups integrated the incongruent emotion from the irrelevant modality, only the American group integrated the congruent emotion from the irrelevant modality. When the input was in a less familiar cultural context, both groups showed increased visual dominance, but only the Chinese group simultaneously showed decreased auditory dominance., Conclusions: We conclude that cultural background and input familiarity interact to influence modality dominance during multisensory emotion perception. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Healthcare advocacy is the duty and privilege of all healthcare providers, but especially for those who care for children. Intersex and gender diverse youth face significant barriers across many aspects of life, with access to competent gender affirming healthcare chief among them. Understanding the importance of both institutional and individual efforts in healthcare advocacy is paramount to improving healthcare access and outcomes for this population., (© 2024. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.)

Although average body size in the U.S. has increased in recent decades, stigma directed at individuals with higher weight has not diminished. In this study, we explored this phenomenon by investigating the relationship between people's perceived social norms regarding higher weight and their reported levels of weight bias (i.e., anti-fat attitudes). Our predictions for perceived social norms drew on the concepts of intergroup contact and ingroup favoritism, which were also probed in this study. We hypothesized that both greater descriptive norms and more favorable injunctive norms regarding higher weight would be associated with lower reported weight bias. Individuals' quantity and quality of social contact with people with higher weight were also predicted to be associated with lower weight bias. Finally, we predicted that individuals who perceived themselves as heavier would display ingroup favoritism (i.e., report less weight bias). Participants (N = 272) from the United States completed a set of online questionnaires about their perceived social norms, social contact with people with higher weight, and explicit weight bias. We found support for each of these pre-registered predictions (ps < 0.03), and post hoc analyses revealed that quality, but not quantity, of social contact with individuals with higher weight was an important predictor of lower weight bias. Together, these findings provide insight into the social psychology of weight bias and help to lay a theoretical foundation for future efforts to reduce weight stigma., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist., (Copyright: © 2024 Standen et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.)

We examined the impact of exposure to a signed language (American Sign Language, or ASL) at different ages on the neural systems that support spoken language phonemic discrimination in deaf individuals with cochlear implants (CIs). Deaf CI users ( N = 18, age = 18-24 yrs) who were exposed to a signed language at different ages and hearing individuals ( N = 18, age = 18-21 yrs) completed a phonemic discrimination task in a spoken native (English) and non-native (Hindi) language while undergoing functional near-infrared spectroscopy neuroimaging. Behaviorally, deaf CI users who received a CI early versus later in life showed better English phonemic discrimination, albeit phonemic discrimination was poor relative to hearing individuals. Importantly, the age of exposure to ASL was not related to phonemic discrimination. Neurally, early-life language exposure, irrespective of modality, was associated with greater neural activation of left-hemisphere language areas critically involved in phonological processing during the phonemic discrimination task in deaf CI users. In particular, early exposure to ASL was associated with increased activation in the left hemisphere's classic language regions for native versus non-native language phonemic contrasts for deaf CI users who received a CI later in life. For deaf CI users who received a CI early in life, the age of exposure to ASL was not related to neural activation during phonemic discrimination. Together, the findings suggest that early signed language exposure does not negatively impact spoken language processing in deaf CI users, but may instead potentially offset the negative effects of language deprivation that deaf children without any signed language exposure experience prior to implantation. This empirical evidence aligns with and lends support to recent perspectives regarding the impact of ASL exposure in the context of CI usage., Competing Interests: Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist., (© 2024 Massachusetts Institute of Technology.)

Understanding the capacity of temperate trees to acclimate to limited soil water has become essential in the face of increasing drought risk due to climate change. We documented seasonal - or phenological - patterns in acclimation to water deficit stress in stems and leaves of tree species spanning the angiosperm phylogeny. Over 3 yr of field observations carried out in two US arboreta, we measured stem vulnerability to embolism (36 individuals of 7 Species) and turgor loss point (119 individuals of 27 species) over the growing season. We also conducted a growth chamber experiment on 20 individuals of one species to assess the mechanistic relationship between soil water restriction and acclimation. In three-quarters of species measured, plants became less vulnerable to embolism and/or loss of turgor over the growing season. We were able to stimulate this acclimatory effect by withholding water in the growth chamber experiment. Temperate angiosperms are capable of acclimation to soil water deficit stress, showing maximum vulnerability to soil water deficits following budbreak and becoming more resilient to damage over the course of the growing season or in response to simulated drought. The species-specific tempo and extent of this acclimatory potential constitutes preadaptive climate change resilience., (© 2024 The Authors. New Phytologist © 2024 New Phytologist Foundation.)

This study examines how the age of female survivors impacts public perceptions of rape in China. In our online survey experiment, participants consider rape as less serious when the survivor is a middle-aged woman compared to other groups of women (younger, older, or age unknown). Participants also request shorter sentencing when the survivor is a middle-aged woman than a younger woman. In China, moral codes surrounding chastity and respect for elders lead to greater emotional responses toward rape against younger and older survivors than middle-aged survivors. Our study expands studies of rape perception by theorizing public attitudes toward middle-aged survivors., Competing Interests: Declaration of Conflicting InterestsThe authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Background: Acoustically activatable perfluoropropane droplets (PD) can be formulated from commercially available microbubble preparations. Diagnostic transthoracic ultrasound frequencies have resulted in acoustic activation (AA) predominately within myocardial infarct zones (IZ)., Objective: We hypothesized that the AA area following acute coronary ischemia/reperfusion (I/R) would selectively enhance the developing scar zone, and target bioeffects specifically to this region., Methods: We administered intravenous PD in 36 rats and 20 pigs at various stages of myocardial scar formation (30 minutes, 1 day, and 7 days post I/R) to determine what effect infarct age had on the AA within the IZ. This was correlated with histology, myeloperoxidase activity, and tissue nitrite activity., Results: The degree of AA within the IZ in rats was not associated with collagen content, neutrophil infiltration, or infarct age. AA within 24 hours of I/R was associated with increased nitric oxide utilization selectively within the IZ (P < .05 compared with remote zone). The spatial extent of AA in pigs correlated with infarct size only when performed before sacrifice at 7 days (r = .74, P < .01)., Conclusions: Acoustic activation of intravenous PD enhances the developing scar zone following I/R, and results in selective tissue nitric oxide utilization., (© 2024 American Institute of Ultrasound in Medicine.)

The present molecular investigations of Organizer phenomena show a remarkable connection to the earlier classical embryological studies that used transplantation as a method for making mechanistic models of induction. One of the most prominent of these connections is the dual gradient model for anterior-posterior and dorsal-ventral polarity. This paper will discuss some of the history of how transplantation experiments provided data that could be interpreted in terms of two gradients of biologically active materials. It will highlight how the attempts to discover the elusive Induktionsstoffen gave rise to the double gradient model of Sulo Toivonen and Lauri Saxén in the 1950s and 1960s. This paper will also document how this research into the identity of these molecules gave rise to the developmental genetics that eventually would find the molecules responsible for primary embryonic induction., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Developmental neurotoxicity (DNT) is not routinely evaluated in chemical risk assessment because current test paradigms for DNT require the use of mammalian models which are ethically controversial, expensive, and resource demanding. Consequently, efforts have focused on revolutionizing DNT testing through affordable novel alternative methods for risk assessment. The goal is to develop a DNT in vitro test battery amenable to high-throughput screening (HTS). Currently, the DNT in vitro test battery consists primarily of human cell-based assays because of their immediate relevance to human health. However, such cell-based assays alone are unable to capture the complexity of a developing nervous system. Whole organismal systems that qualify as 3 R (Replace, Reduce and Refine) models are urgently needed to complement cell-based DNT testing. These models can provide the necessary organismal context and be used to explore the impact of chemicals on brain function by linking molecular and/or cellular changes to behavioural readouts. The nematode Caenorhabditis elegans, the planarian Dugesia japonica, and embryos of the zebrafish Danio rerio are all suited to low-cost HTS and each has unique strengths for DNT testing. Here, we review the strengths and the complementarity of these organisms in a novel, integrative context and highlight how they can augment current cell-based assays for more comprehensive and robust DNT screening of chemicals. Considering the limitations of all in vitro test systems, we discuss how a smart combinatory use of these systems will contribute to a better human relevant risk assessment of chemicals that considers the complexity of the developing brain., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare the following financial interests/personal relationships which may be considered as potential competing interests: Eva-Maria S. Collins reports financial support was provided by National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences of the National Institutes of Health. Ellen V. S. Hessel reports financial support was provided by Dutch Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sports. Eva-Maria S. Collins reports a relationship with Inveritek, LLC that includes: equity or stocks. Eva-Maria S. Collins has patent pending to unassigned. If there are other authors, they declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Hydractinia is a colonial marine hydroid that shows remarkable biological properties, including the capacity to regenerate its entire body throughout its lifetime, a process made possible by its adult migratory stem cells, known as i-cells. Here, we provide an in-depth characterization of the genomic structure and gene content of two Hydractinia species, Hydractinia symbiolongicarpus and Hydractinia echinata , placing them in a comparative evolutionary framework with other cnidarian genomes. We also generated and annotated a single-cell transcriptomic atlas for adult male H. symbiolongicarpus and identified cell-type markers for all major cell types, including key i-cell markers. Orthology analyses based on the markers revealed that Hydractinia 's i-cells are highly enriched in genes that are widely shared amongst animals, a striking finding given that Hydractinia has a higher proportion of phylum-specific genes than any of the other 41 animals in our orthology analysis. These results indicate that Hydractinia 's stem cells and early progenitor cells may use a toolkit shared with all animals, making it a promising model organism for future exploration of stem cell biology and regenerative medicine. The genomic and transcriptomic resources for Hydractinia presented here will enable further studies of their regenerative capacity, colonial morphology, and ability to distinguish self from nonself., (© 2024 Schnitzler et al.; Published by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press.)

Tandem-repetitive DNA (where two or more DNA bases are repeated numerous times) can adopt non-canonical secondary structures. Many of these structures are implicated in important biological processes. Human Satellite III (HSat3) is enriched for tandem repeats of the sequence ATGGA and is located in pericentromeric heterochromatin in many human chromosomes. Here, we investigate the secondary structure of the four-repeat HSat3 sequence 5'-ATGGA ATGGA ATGGA ATGGA-3' using X-ray crystallography, NMR, and biophysical methods. Circular dichroism spectroscopy, thermal stability, native PAGE, and analytical ultracentrifugation indicate that this sequence folds into a monomolecular hairpin with non-canonical base pairing and B-DNA characteristics at concentrations below 0.9 mM. NMR studies at 0.05-0.5 mM indicate that the hairpin is likely folded-over into a compact structure with high dynamics. Crystallographic studies at 2.5 mM reveal an antiparallel self-complementary duplex with the same base pairing as in the hairpin, extended into an infinite polymer. The non-canonical base pairing includes a G-G intercalation sandwiched by sheared A-G base pairs, leading to a cross-strand four guanine stack, so called guanine zipper. The guanine zippers are spaced throughout the structure by A-T/T-A base pairs. Our findings lend further insight into recurring structural motifs associated with the HSat3 and their potential biological functions., (© The Author(s) 2024. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Nucleic Acids Research.)