Predicting three-month functional outcomes after an ED visit for acute low back pain.

Background: Nearly 30% of patients who present to an ED with acute, new onset, low back pain (LBP) report LBP-related functional impairment three months later. These patients are at risk of chronic LBP, a highly debilitating condition. It has been reported previously that functional impairment, depression, and psychosomatic symptomatology at the index visit are associated with poor LBP outcomes.

Early atherogenesis and visceral fat in obese adolescents.

Background/objectives: Little information is available as to the cause of increased thickening of the intima-media of the carotid artery (cIMT) in the pediatric population. Therefore, cIMT was compared in obese adolescents and normal-weight controls, and associations between cIMT and lipid and non-lipid cardiovascular risk factors were assessed.

Subjects/methods: Subjects included 61 obese non-diabetic male and female volunteers aged 12-18 years inclusive with a body mass index (BMI) >95th percentile for age and 2-h blood glucose <200 mg dl(-1) matched to 25 normal-weight control volunteers with normal glucose levels.

AChR channel conversion and AChR-adjusted neuronal survival during embryonic development.

We generated knock-in mice that express GFP-labeled embryonic-type acetylcholine receptors (AChR) to follow postsynaptic differentiation and innervation during embryonic development and to visualize the postnatally occurring channel conversion from embryonic- to adult-type AChR. The dynamics of AChRgamma/AChRepsilon conversion at the neuromuscular junction indicates that muscle-specific programs of receptor subunit gene transcription control AChR replacement. While conversion proceeds from peripheral to central regions for individual endplates, it does not occur simultaneously for all endplates.

Mechanism of mammalian mitochondrial DNA replication: import of mitochondrial transcription factor A into isolated mitochondria stimulates 7S DNA synthesis.

The light strand promoter of mammalian mitochondrial DNA gives rise to a primary transcript, but also to the RNA primer necessary for initiation of replication and 7S DNA synthesis as well as 7S RNA. Here we have studied the turnover of 7S DNA in isolated rat liver mitochondria and whether import of mitochondrial transcription factor A (mtTFA), which is necessary for transcription initiation, increases its rate of synthesis. 7S DNA was present as two species, probably due to two different sites of RNA-DNA transition.