Neonatal cranial ultrasound lesions and developmental delays at 2 years of age among extremely low gestational age children.

Background: Studies of the relationship between ultrasound images from preterm newborns and developmental delay most often are based on small samples defined by birth weight and exclude infants not testable with standardized assessments.

Methods: We evaluated associations between ultrasound-defined lesions of the brain and developmental delays at 24 months' corrected age in 1017 children born before the 28th postmenstrual week. Brain ultrasound scans were read for concordance on 4 lesions: intraventricular hemorrhage, moderate/severe ventriculomegaly, white matter echodense/hyperechoic lesions, and white matter echodense/hypoechoic lesions and 2 diagnoses-periventricular leukomalacia and periventricular hemorrhagic infarction.

Identification of ubiquitination sites on the X-linked inhibitor of apoptosis protein.

The execution phase of apoptosis is under the control of members of the inhibitor of apoptosis (IAP) family of zinc finger proteins. Several of these proteins contain a C-terminal RING (really interesting new gene) domain that has been postulated to regulate ubiquitination of themselves or their target proteins, thereby modulating thresholds for apoptosis. We demonstrate that the auto-ubiquitination sites of the X-linked IAP (XIAP) are Lys(322) and Lys(328), located in the third baculovirus IAP repeat domain of the protein.