Validation of the Integrative Hope Scale in people with psychosis.

Hope is an important variable in mental health, particularly in the emergent field of research focused on recovery and well-being. This study validates the "Integrative Hope Scale" (IHS) for use in people with severe mental illness. Two hundred participants diagnosed with schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder were assessed using the IHS, the Centre for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale, and the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale.

Development and validation of an integrative scale to assess hope.

Background: Hope includes the dimensions of time, goals, control, relations and personal characteristics. Existing tools that measure it vary in length and psychometric properties and cover different parts of its overall concept.

Objectives: This study aimed to develop an instrument that integrates all relevant aspects of hope is concise, easy to use and shows good psychometric properties.

The impact of the social network, stigma and empowerment on the quality of life in patients with schizophrenia.

Objective: The quality of life (QOL) of patients with schizophrenia has been found to be positively correlated with the social network and empowerment, and negatively correlated with stigma and depression. However, little is known about the way these variables impact on the QOL. The study aims to test the hypothesis that the social network, stigma and empowerment directly and indirectly by contributing to depression influence the QOL in patients with schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorders.

Stigma resistance in patients with schizophrenia.

Background: An individual's capacity to counteract the stigma of mental illness, stigma resistance (SR), is considered as playing a crucial role in fighting stigma. However, little is known about SR and its correlates in patients with schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder.

Aim: Exploring SR in patients with schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder.

Pharmacologically distinct presynaptic calcium channels in cerebellar excitatory and inhibitory synapses.

We have used whole-cell patch clamp recordings and pharmacological blockers of Ca channels to compare the pharmacology of Ca channels that mediate synaptic transmission at the three types of synapses innervating Purkinje cells in rat cerebellar slices. Both parallel fiber and climbing fiber excitatory synapses were sensitive to the P-type Ca channel blocker, omega-AgaIVA and the P/Q/N-type channel blocker, omega-conotoxin MVIIC. Transmission at inhibitory interneuronal synapses was not suppressed by these toxins, or by the N-type (omega-conotoxins GVIA and MVIIA) or L-type (nimodipine) channel blockers.

Immunochemical identification and differential phosphorylation of alternatively spliced forms of the alpha 1A subunit of brain calcium channels.

Biochemical properties of the alpha 1 subunits of class A brain calcium channels (alpha 1A) were examined in adult rat brain membrane fractions using a site-directed anti-peptide antibody (anti-CNA3) specific for alpha 1A. Anti-CNA3 specifically immunoprecipitated high affinity receptor sites for omega-conotoxin MVIIC (Kd approximately 100 pM), but not receptor sites for the dihydropyridine isradipine or for omega-conotoxin GVIA. In immunoblotting and immunoprecipitation experiments, anti-CNA3 recognized at least two distinct immunoreactive alpha 1A polypeptides, a major form with an apparent molecular mass of 190 kDa and a minor, full-length form with an apparent molecular mass of 220 kDa.

Calcium-channel antibodies in the Lambert-Eaton syndrome and other paraneoplastic syndromes.

Background: Voltage-gated calcium channels in small-cell lung carcinomas may initiate autoimmunity in the paraneoplastic neuromuscular disorder Lambert-Eaton syndrome. The calcium-channel subtype that is responsible is not known.

Methods: We compared the effects of antagonists of L-type, N-type, and P/Q-type neuronal calcium channels on the depolarization-dependent influx of calcium-45 in cultured carcinoma cells.

A novel omega-conopeptide for the presynaptic localization of calcium channels at the mammalian neuromuscular junction.

Voltage-sensitive Ca2+ channels are essential to transmitter release at the chemical synapse. To demonstrate the localization of voltage-sensitive Ca2+ channels in relation to the site of transmitter release, mouse neuromuscular junctions were double labelled with alpha-bungarotoxin and a novel voltage-sensitive Ca2+ channel probe, SNX-260, a synthetic analog of omega-conopeptide MVIIC. Similar to omega-conopeptide MVIIC, biotinylated SNX-260 blocked nerve-stimulated transmitter release at the mouse neuromuscular junction.

Calcium channel subtypes in rat brain: biochemical characterization of the high-affinity receptors for omega-conopeptides SNX-230 (synthetic MVIIC), SNX-183 (SVIB), and SNX-111 (MVIIA).

High-threshold voltage-sensitive calcium channels of the N-type, L-type, and P-type have been distinguished in the mammalian CNS predominantly on the basis of their sensitivity to selective antagonists. Matching them with genes identified by molecular cloning is an ongoing undertaking. Whereas L-type channels are characterized by their sensitivity to dihydropyridines and P-type channels by sensitivity to the funnel-web spider toxin AgaIVA, the N-type channel has been shown to be recognized by the omega-conopeptides GVIA and MVIIA.

Identification of an snRNP-associated kinase activity that phosphorylates arginine/serine rich domains typical of splicing factors.

The U1 snRNP-specific 70K protein is one of the few snRNP proteins from higher eukaryotic cells that is phosphorylated in vivo (1,2). Immunoaffinity purified spliceosomal snRNPs (U1, U2, U5, and U4/U6) were tested for their ability to phosphorylate in vitro the U1-specific 70K protein. An snRNP-associated kinase activity which phosphorylates all U1-70K isoelectric variants was identified.

Characterisation of human and murine snRNP proteins by two-dimensional gel electrophoresis and phosphopeptide analysis of U1-specific 70K protein variants.

The proteins of the major human snRNPs U1, U2, U4/U6 and U5 were characterised by two-dimensional electrophoresis, with isoelectric focussing in the first dimension and SDS-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis in the second. With the exception of protein F, which exhibits an acidic pl value (pl = 3.3), the snRNP proteins are basic.

Direct cross-linking of snRNP proteins F and 70K to snRNAs by ultra-violet radiation in situ.

Protein-RNA interactions in small nuclear ribonucleoproteins (UsnRNPs) from HeLa cells were investigated by irradiation of purified nucleoplasmic snRNPs U1 to U6 with UV light at 254 nm. The cross-linked proteins were analyzed on one- and two-dimensional gel electrophoresis systems, and the existence of a stable cross-linkage was demonstrated by isolating protein-oligonucleotide complexes from snRNPs containing 32P-labelled snRNAs after exhaustive digestion with a mixture of RNases of different specificities. The primary target of the UV-light induced cross-linking reaction between protein and RNA was protein F.