Incarceration represents an opportune moment to improve self-management of anger and aggression. A hatha yoga-based intervention (YBI) could serve as a useful adjunctive intervention for anger within prisons. We enrolled 40 people with elevated levels of anger who were incarcerated (20 in a women's facility, and 20 in a men's facility) in a 10-week pilot randomized controlled trial of a YBI versus.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFEarly-life social experiences shape adult phenotype, yet the underlying behavioral mechanisms remain poorly understood. We manipulated early-life social experience in the highly social African cichlid fish Astatotilapia burtoni to investigate the effects on behavior and stress axis function in juveniles. Juveniles experienced different numbers of social partners in stable pairs (1 partner), stable groups (6 fish; 5 partners), and socialized pairs (a novel fish was exchanged every 5 days; 5 partners).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntroduction: The Family Assessment Task (FAsTask) is an observer-rated parent-child interaction task used in adolescent substance use intervention. The parental monitoring component of the FAsTask is thought to provide an objective assessment of parental monitoring that can guide treatment planning and circumvent the potential limitations of self-report measures. Yet, the factor structure, measurement invariance, and concurrent validity of the parental monitoring FAsTask has not been evaluated; doing so is essential to effectively guide clinical care.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: We designed a process to increase tobacco cessation in an academic center and its widely distributed network community sites using clinical champions to overcome referral barriers.
Methods: In 2020 a needs assessment was performed across the City of Hope Medical Center and its 32 community treatment sites. We reviewed information science strategies to choose elements for our expanded tobacco control plan, focusing on distributed leadership with tobacco cessation champions.
Individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) exhibit an increased burden of de novo mutations (DNMs) in a broadening range of genes. While these studies have implicated hundreds of genes in ASD pathogenesis, which DNMs cause functional consequences in vivo remains unclear. We functionally test the effects of ASD missense DNMs using Drosophila through "humanization" rescue and overexpression-based strategies.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSeveral severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) variants have arisen that exhibit increased viral transmissibility and partial evasion of immunity induced by natural infection and vaccination. To address the specific antibody targets that were affected by recent viral variants, we generated 43 monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) from 10 convalescent donors that bound three distinct domains of the SARS-CoV-2 spike. Viral variants harboring mutations at K417, E484, and N501 could escape most of the highly potent antibodies against the receptor binding domain (RBD).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAdoptive cancer immunotherapy using chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) engineered T-cells holds great promise, although several obstacles hinder the efficient generation of cell products under good manufacturing practice (GMP). Patients are often immune compromised, rendering it challenging to produce sufficient numbers of gene-modified cells. Manufacturing protocols are labour intensive and frequently involve one or more open processing steps, leading to increased risk of contamination.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSeveral severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) variants have arisen that exhibit increased viral transmissibility and partial evasion of immunity induced by natural infection and vaccination. To address the specific antibody targets that were affected by recent viral variants, we generated 43 monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) from 10 convalescent donors that bound three distinct domains of the SARS-CoV-2 spike. Viral variants harboring mutations at K417, E484 and N501 could escape most of the highly potent antibodies against the receptor binding domain (RBD).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: The current study identifies predictors and moderators of substance use outcomes for 111 adolescents with co-occurring substance use and psychiatric disorders who participated in a randomized controlled trial that compared the effectiveness of two home-based treatments: an integrated cognitive behavioral therapy (I-CBT) protocol, in which masters-level clinic staff received intensive training and ongoing supervision in the use of this protocol versus a treatment-as-usual (TAU) comparison condition in which therapists received a continuing education-style CBT workshop in the same protocol.
Method: The study conducted exploratory predictor and moderator analyses of marijuana and heavy alcohol use outcomes using candidate variables across four domains of psychological characteristics: adolescent substance use, adolescent psychiatric symptoms, parent, and family.
Results: Regardless of treatment condition, low parental monitoring at baseline, as assessed by a videotaped interaction task, but not self-report, predicted greater percentage of marijuana use and heavy alcohol use days over the 6-month follow-up period.
The Polycomb group (PcG) gene RNF2 (RING2) encodes a catalytic subunit of the Polycomb repressive complex 1 (PRC1), an evolutionarily conserved machinery that post-translationally modifies chromatin to maintain epigenetic transcriptional repressive states of target genes including Hox genes. Here, we describe two individuals, each with rare de novo missense variants in RNF2. Their phenotypes include intrauterine growth retardation, severe intellectual disabilities, behavioral problems, seizures, feeding difficulties and dysmorphic features.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF: Adolescent cannabis misuse may be associated with serious academic, conduct, and health problems. Identifying factors associated with adolescent cannabis misuse over time may provide insight to address these factors in interventions. Parent-adolescent relationship characteristics (i.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe current study conducted a preliminary test of whether community mental health clinic staff could implement a multicomponent cognitive behavioral treatment, developed for adolescents with substance misuse (alcohol and/or marijuana) and comorbid psychiatric symptoms. We randomized a total of 111 families, with an adolescent 12-18 years old, referred to a home-based services program for youth with co-occurring substance use and mental health problems, to receive treatment from either masters-level therapists who received intensive cognitive behavioral therapy (I-CBT) training or from masters-level therapists who took part in a typical brief continuing education-style CBT workshop (treatment as usual, or TAU). Each family's therapist and insurance company determined the frequency and intensity of treatment.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPeroxisomes are subcellular organelles that are essential for proper function of eukaryotic cells. In addition to being the sites of a variety of oxidative reactions, they are crucial regulators of lipid metabolism. Peroxisome loss or dysfunction leads to multi-system diseases in humans that strongly affect the nervous system.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe clinical potential of DNA and RNA-targeting therapeutics for airways disease has been hampered by the poor translation of promising drug candidates from cell culture to in vivo models and the clinic. For example, classical preclinical approaches routinely report 20-60% target knockdown effects in the lung, where 1 or 2 log effects are observed in isolated cell cultures in vitro. Preparation of monocellular suspensions of tissues by mechanoenzymatic disruption followed by cell sorting (TDCS) after in vivo drug dosing, however, can offer pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic insights on the effects of drugs to precise cell subpopulations.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAdolescence is a time in development when many initiate problem behaviors, including alcohol use, marijuana use, and sexual intercourse. Although research has shown that these behaviors tend to co-occur, little is known about their daily co-occurrences, particularly among high-risk groups such as truant adolescents. This study investigated the influence of marijuana and alcohol use on the odds of engaging in sexual intercourse on a daily level among a sample of truant adolescents.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMitochondria are essential in long axons to provide metabolic support and sustain neuron integrity. A healthy mitochondrial pool is maintained by biogenesis, transport, mitophagy, fission, and fusion, but how these events are regulated in axons is not well defined. Here, we show that the Drosophila glutathione S-transferase (GST) Gfzf prevents mitochondrial hyperfusion in axons.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Suboptimal glycaemic control in type 2 diabetes (T2D) is common and associated with psychological barriers.
Aim: To investigate whether it was possible to train practice nurses in six psychological skills (Diabetes-6 [D6]) based on motivational interviewing (MI) and basic cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT), and whether integrating these with diabetes care was associated with improved glycaemic control over 18 months compared with standard care.
Design And Setting: Two-arm, single-blind, parallel cluster randomised controlled trial in primary care.
Background: Competencies in psychological techniques delivered by primary care nurses to support diabetes self-management were compared between the intervention and control arms of a cluster randomised controlled trial as part of a process evaluation. The trial was pragmatic and designed to assess effectiveness. This article addresses the question of whether the care that was delivered in the intervention and control trial arms represented high fidelity treatment and attention control, respectively.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe purpose of this article is to present the results of a treatment development study designed to examine the feasibility, acceptability, and preliminary efficacy of motivational enhancement therapy (MET) for substance using, truant adolescents plus the Family Check-Up (FCU) for parents. A randomized controlled trial was used to test the hypothesis that MET plus the FCU (MET/FCU) would lead to greater reductions in alcohol and marijuana use as well as truant behavior compared to a psychoeducation (PE) condition delivered to both adolescents and parents. Participants (n = 69; M age = 15.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBoth adolescent and parent psychiatric symptoms are well-established risk factors for adolescent substance use (SU), but the ways that these symptoms interact are not well understood. This study examined the interactive effects of parent and adolescent psychiatric symptoms on adolescent frequency of alcohol and marijuana use, over and above the effects of parental SU. Seventy adolescents presenting to a community mental health center (CMHC) participated.
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