Deriving a joint risk estimate from dynamic data collected at motorcycle rides.

Making motorcycle rides safer by advanced technology is an ongoing challenge in the context of developing driving assistant systems and safety infrastructure. Determining which section of a road and which driving behaviour is "safe" or "unsafe" is rarely possible due to the individual differences in driving experience, driving style, fitness and potentially available assistant systems. This study investigates the feasibility of a new approach to quantify motorcycle riding risk for an experimental sample of bikers by collecting motorcycle-specific dynamic data of several riders on selected road sections.

Regional brain abnormalities in 22q11.2 deletion syndrome: association with cognitive abilities and behavioral symptoms.

Children with 22q11.2 microdeletions (Velocardiofacial Syndrome; VCFS) have previously been shown to exhibit learning deficits and elevated rates of psychopathology. The aim of this study was to assess regional brain abnormalities in children with 22q11DS, and to determine the relationship of these measures to neurocognitive and behavioral function.

Hippocampal volumes in schizophrenic twins.

Context: The effects of genes and environment on brain abnormalities in schizophrenia remain unclear.

Objective: To examine the contributions of genes and environment to hippocampal volume reduction in schizophrenia.

Design: Population-based twin cohort study.

Contributions of genetic risk and fetal hypoxia to hippocampal volume in patients with schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder, their unaffected siblings, and healthy unrelated volunteers.

Objective: The authors examined in an epidemiologic sample the contributions of genetic predisposition and history of fetal hypoxia to hippocampal volume in patients with psychosis.

Method: High-resolution magnetic resonance imaging was used to measure hippocampal volumes in 72 psychotic probands (60 with schizophrenia and 12 with schizoaffective disorder, ascertained so as to be representative of all such probands in a Helsinki birth cohort), 58 nonpsychotic full siblings of the probands, and 53 demographically similar healthy comparison subjects with no family history of psychosis.

Results: Hippocampal volume differences occurred in a stepwise fashion with each increase in genetic load for schizophrenia.