Long-term potentiation in the hippocampus: From magnesium to memory.

Long-term potentiation (LTP) is a widely studied phenomenon since the underlying molecular mechanisms are widely believed to be critical for learning and memory and their dysregulation has been implicated in many brain disorders affecting cognitive functions. Central to the induction of LTP, in most pathways that have been studied in the mammalian CNS, is the N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor (NMDAR). Philippe Ascher discovered that the NMDAR is subject to a rapid, highly voltage-dependent block by Mg.

Cardiac Performance in the First Year of Age Among Preterm Infants Fed Maternal Breast Milk.

Importance: There is a beneficial association between human breast milk exposure in the neonatal period and cardiac mechanics in adults who were born preterm. It is unknown whether this benefit is apparent in infants in the first year of age.

Objective: To test the hypothesis that higher consumption of mother's own milk in preterm infants is associated with enhanced cardiac performance during the first year of age.

Seeds of their own destruction: Dominant-negative peptide screening yields functional insight and therapeutic leads.

Systematic, high-throughput screening for "dominant-negative" protein fragments is an emerging method for mapping functional regions of the parental protein in vivo. In this issue of Cell Systems, Ford et al. apply this approach to 65 cancer drivers, providing functional insights and demonstrating therapeutic potential for several dominant-negative peptides.

Epithelioid hemangioendothelioma, an ultra-rare cancer: a consensus paper from the community of experts.

Epithelioid hemangioendothelioma (EHE) is an ultra-rare, translocated, vascular sarcoma. EHE clinical behavior is variable, ranging from that of a low-grade malignancy to that of a high-grade sarcoma and it is marked by a high propensity for systemic involvement. No active systemic agents are currently approved specifically for EHE, which is typically refractory to the antitumor drugs used in sarcomas.

Interrogation of kinase genetic interactions provides a global view of PAK1-mediated signal transduction pathways.

Kinases are critical components of intracellular signaling pathways and have been extensively investigated with regard to their roles in cancer. p21-activated kinase-1 (PAK1) is a serine/threonine kinase that has been previously implicated in numerous biological processes, such as cell migration, cell cycle progression, cell motility, invasion, and angiogenesis, in glioma and other cancers. However, the signaling network linked to PAK1 is not fully defined.

Yeast-Based Genetic Interaction Analysis of Human Kinome.

Kinases are critical intracellular signaling proteins. To better understand kinase-mediated signal transduction, a large-scale human-yeast genetic interaction screen was performed. Among 597 human kinase genes tested, 28 displayed strong toxicity in yeast when overexpressed.

Echocardiographic Assessment of Right Ventricular Afterload in Preterm Infants: Maturational Patterns of Pulmonary Artery Acceleration Time Over the First Year of Age and Implications for Pulmonary Hypertension.

Background: Assessment of pulmonary hemodynamics is critical in the diagnosis and management of cardiopulmonary disease of premature infants, but reliable noninvasive indices of pulmonary hemodynamics in preterm infants are lacking. Because pulmonary artery acceleration time (PAAT) is a validated noninvasive method to assess right ventricular (RV) afterload in infants and children, the aim of this study was to investigate the maturational changes of PAAT measures in preterm infants over the first year of age and to discern the impact of typical cardiopulmonary abnormalities on these measures.

Methods: In a prospective multicenter study of 239 preterm infants (<29 weeks at birth), PAAT was assessed at days 1, 2, and 5 to 7, at 32 and 36 weeks' postmenstrual age, and at 1-year corrected age.

Yeast genetic interaction screen of human genes associated with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis: identification of MAP2K5 kinase as a potential drug target.

To understand disease mechanisms, a large-scale analysis of human-yeast genetic interactions was performed. Of 1305 human disease genes assayed, 20 genes exhibited strong toxicity in yeast. Human-yeast genetic interactions were identified by en masse transformation of the human disease genes into a pool of 4653 homozygous diploid yeast deletion mutants with unique barcode sequences, followed by multiplexed barcode sequencing to identify yeast toxicity modifiers.

Extent of Early Clinical Response to Infliximab Predicts Long-term Treatment Success in Active Ulcerative Colitis.

Background: The long-term effectiveness of infliximab (IFX) in ulcerative colitis (UC) and predictors of treatment response remain poorly characterized.

Methods: A retrospective cohort study was conducted in 213 consecutive patients with active steroid-refractory or steroid-dependent UC treated with induction and scheduled maintenance IFX at an inflammatory bowel disease referral center. Outcomes included annual steroid-free remission (SFR), IFX failure with discontinuation, colectomy, and serious adverse events.