Roles Played by Enhancer of Split Transcription Factors in R7 Photoreceptor Specification.

When a cell receives multiple developmental signals simultaneously, the intracellular transduction pathways triggered by those signals are coincidentally active. How then, do the cells decode the information contained within those multiple active pathways to derive a precise developmental directive? The specification of the Drosophila R7 photoreceptor is classic model system for investigating such questions. The R7 fate is specified by the combined actions of the of the Notch (N) and receptor tyrosine kinase (RTK) signaling pathways.

Dissociable genetic influences on eye movements during abstract versus naturalistic social scene viewing in infancy.

Eye-movement metrics like fixation location and duration are increasingly being used in infancy research. We tested whether fixation durations during meaningful social stimulus viewing involve common or different familial influences than fixation durations during viewing of abstract stimulus. We analysed the duration of fixations, and the allocation of fixations to face and motion, from 536 dizygotic and monozygotic 5-month-old twins in: naturalistic scenes including low- and high-level social features, and abstract scenes only having low-level features.

Relative Age Effects on Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder Symptoms and Educational Achievement: A Longitudinal UK Cohort Study.

Objective: Being among the youngest in a school class increases the risk for worse educational outcomes and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) symptoms, but questions remain about the nature and persistence of such effects. We investigated this "relative age effect" on educational achievement at age 15 to 16 years and on ADHD symptoms from age 7 to age 21 years. Furthermore, we examined whether being young-in-class is linked to a greater reduction in ADHD symptoms from childhood to adulthood and a lower genetic propensity to ADHD.