Sexual Orientation Affects Neural Responses to Subtle Social Aggression Signals.

The current series of studies are the first to examine brain responses to social aggression signals as a function of male and female sexual orientation. For the first set of studies (1a, 1b), axillary sweat had been collected from 17 heterosexual men and 17 heterosexual women aggressively responding to frustrating opponents (aggression condition) and while playing a construction game (control condition). Sweat samples were pooled according to sex and condition, and presented via a constant flow olfactometer to 17 gay and 23 heterosexual men (Study 1a), and 19 lesbian and 25 heterosexual women (Study 1b).

Temporal context modulates sensory attenuation magnitude.

In studies with self-produced sensory events, sensitivity for these events has been found to be reduced. This phenomenon is called sensory attenuation, and it has been assumed that the crucial factor is the self-production of the event. However, this factor may be confounded with the temporal predictability of the event, as well as with attentional focus on the event.

Chemosensory communication of aggression: women's fine-tuned neural processing of male aggression signals.

The current study is the first to examine the central nervous processing of aggression chemosignals within men and women by means of chemosensory event-related potential (CSERP) analysis. Axillary sweat was collected from 17 men and 17 women participating in a competitive computer game (aggression condition) and playing a construction game (control condition). Sweat samples were pooled with reference to donor gender and condition, and presented to 23 men and 25 women via a constant flow olfactometer.

The effect of space on subjective time is mediated by apparent velocity.

In contrast to the intuitive and traditional assumption of a centralized and universal neural clock, many recent studies have provided evidence against this idea. Here, we investigated whether subjective duration is estimated by a mechanism that tracks the trajectory of a moving object. Such a mechanism would integrate over the velocity and the spatial distance the object traveled to derive its duration.

The Effect of Cognitive Control on Different Types of Auditory Distraction.

Deviant as well as changing auditory distractors interfere with short-term memory. According to the duplex model of auditory distraction, the deviation effect is caused by a shift of attention while the changing-state effect is due to obligatory order processing. This theory predicts that foreknowledge should reduce the deviation effect, but should have no effect on the changing-state effect.

Hepatic macrophage migration and differentiation critical for liver fibrosis is mediated by the chemokine receptor C-C motif chemokine receptor 8 in mice.

Unlabelled: Chemokines critically control the infiltration of immune cells upon liver injury, thereby promoting hepatic inflammation and fibrosis. The chemokine receptor CCR8 can affect trafficking of monocytes/macrophages, monocyte-derived dendritic cells (DCs) and T-helper cell (Th) subsets, but its role in liver diseases is currently unknown. To investigate the functional role of CCR8 in liver diseases, ccr8(-/-) and wild-type (WT) mice were subjected to chronic experimental injury models of carbon tetrachloride (CCl(4) ) administration and surgical bile duct ligation (BDL).