Patterns of Physical Activity and Associated Factors in Cubans Aged 15-69 Years.

INTRODUCTION Systematic measurement of population physical activity levels is an important component of public health surveillance. OBJECTIVES Describe patterns of physical activity in the Cuban population aged 15-69 years and identify factors associated with regular physical activity. METHODS A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted using a complex sampling design, representative of urban and rural areas, sex and age groups, including 7915 individuals.

Person-centred (deictic) expressions and autism.

We employed semi-structured tests to determine whether children with autism produce and comprehend deictic (person-centred) expressions such as 'this'/'that', 'here'/'there' and 'come'/'go', and whether they understand atypical non-verbal gestural deixis in the form of directed head-nods to indicate location. In Study 1, most participants spontaneously produced deictic terms, often in conjunction with pointing. Yet only among children with autism were there participants who referred to a location that was distal to themselves with the terms 'this' or 'here', or made atypical points with unusual precision, often lining-up with an eye.

Narrative role-taking in autism.

Are children with autism able to adopt, and shift among, the psychological perspectives of different people? Fifteen children with autism and 15 without autism, matched for chronological age and verbal ability, were given Feffer's (1970) role-taking task in which they were asked to tell and then re-tell stories from different protagonists' perspectives. The children with autism understood the task, adjusted narratives according to alternative viewpoints, and were similar to control participants in their use of mental state terms. Despite this, the children with autism achieved significantly lower scores for adopting different figures' perspectives, and for shifting among complementary viewpoints.

On intersubjective engagement in autism: a controlled study of nonverbal aspects of conversation.

Does autism involve a deficit in intersubjective engagement with other persons? We studied nonverbal communication in children and adolescents with and without autism (n = 12 per group), group-matched for chronological age and verbal mental age, during 3 min of a videotaped interview. In keeping with previous studies, there were only subtle but potentially revealing group differences on behavioral ratings. Participants with autism made fewer head-shakes/nods (but not smiles) when the interviewer was talking, and the interviewer made fewer head-shakes/nods when participants were talking.

Identification and functional characterization of EhClC-A, an Entamoeba histolytica ClC chloride channel located at plasma membrane.

ClC chloride channels perform a wide variety of physiological functions and they had been characterized in animals, yeast, plants and bacteria but not in protozoa. By blast search we found in Entamoeba histolytica, the protozoan responsible for human amoebiasis, two genes (Ehclc-A and Ehclc-B) encoding for putative polypeptides with 25-30% identity to ClC chloride channels of several organisms. Reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) experiments showed that both genes are transcribed in trophozoites.

Entamoeba histolytica: alterations in EhRabB protein in a phagocytosis deficient mutant correlate with the Entamoeba dispar RabB sequence.

We analyzed the expression and location of EhRabB in clone L-6, a phagocytosis-deficient mutant of Entamoeba histolytica, in comparison with the wild-type clone A. Intriguingly, trophozoites of clone L-6 express more EhRabB than those of clone A. However, the majority of EhRabB-containing vesicles remained in the cytoplasm of clone L-6 during phagocytosis.

EhCP112 is an Entamoeba histolytica secreted cysteine protease that may be involved in the parasite-virulence.

EhCP112 is an Entamoeba histolytica protease that together with the EhADH112 protein forms the EhCPADH complex involved in trophozoite virulence. Here, we produced the recombinant EhCP112 and studied its relationships with extracellular matrix components and with target cells. A DNA fragment containing the pro-peptide and the mature enzyme was expressed in bacteria as an active enzyme (rEhCP112), whereas the full gene containing the signal peptide, the pro-peptide and the mature enzyme expressed a non-active protein.

Maternal sensitivity and infant triadic communication.

Background And Method: The aim of this study was to examine whether a mother's sensitivity towards her one-year-old infant is related to the infant's propensity to engage in 'triadic' relations--that is, to orientate to an adult's engagement with objects and events in the world, for example in sharing experiences with an adult. In order to determine that any effects were specific to infants' behaviour in the interpersonal domain, we also tested their performance on tests of understanding means-ends relations and object permanence.

Results: The results were that high maternal sensitivity and low intrusiveness correlated with high levels of infant triadic interpersonal engagement with a stranger vis-a-vis performance on the non-social tasks.

The EhADH112 recombinant polypeptide inhibits cell destruction and liver abscess formation by Entamoeba histolytica trophozoites.

The Entamoeba histolytica EhCPADH complex, formed by a cysteine proteinase (EhCP112) and an adhesin (EhADH112), is involved in adherence, phagocytosis and cytolysis. This makes this complex an attractive candidate as a vaccine against amoebiasis. Here, we produced the recombinant polypeptide EhADH243, which includes the adherence epitope detected by a monoclonal antibody against the EhCPADH complex.