ABSTRACT
Identification of arrhythmogenic right ventricular cardiomyopathy (ARVC) during childhood is challenging due to the lack of specific ECG manifestation. We report chronological ECG alteration before several years of the ARVC onset in two affected children. Their ECG at the age of 6 years was almost normal for their age, and their chronological ECGs exhibited inversion of T wave in inferior leads, which are typical for ARVC, developed at younger age than that in precordial leads. In addition, the leftmost T-wave inversion in the precordial lead shifted toward the left in our patients, which is a sharp contrast to its physiological transition.
Subject(s)
Arrhythmogenic Right Ventricular Dysplasia , Child , Humans , Arrhythmogenic Right Ventricular Dysplasia/diagnosis , Electrocardiography , Arrhythmias, CardiacABSTRACT
Ulcerative colitis (UC) is progressive and relapsing disease. To explore the therapeutic effects of naked gene therapy of hepatocyte growth factor (HGF) on UC, the SRalpha promoter driving HGF gene was intrarectally administered to the mice in which colitis was induced by dextran sulfate sodium (DSS). Expression of the transgene was seen in surface epithelium, lamina propria, and muscularis mucosae. The HGF-treated mice showed reduced colonic mucosal damage and increased body weights, compared with control mice (P < 0.01 and P < 0.05, respectively). The HGF-treated mice displayed increased number of PCNA-positive cells and decreased number of apoptotic cells than in control mice (P < 0.01, each). Phosphorylated AKT was dramatically increased after HGF gene administration, however, phosphorylated ERK1/2 was not altered. Microarray analysis revealed that HGF induced expression of proliferation- and apoptosis-associated genes. These data suggest that naked HGF gene delivery causes therapeutic effects through regulation of many downstream genes.
Subject(s)
Colitis/therapy , Genetic Therapy/methods , Hepatocyte Growth Factor/physiology , Animals , Apoptosis , Body Weight , Cell Proliferation , Colitis/chemically induced , Colitis/genetics , Colon/metabolism , Colon/pathology , Dextran Sulfate , Female , Gene Expression , Gene Expression Profiling , Hepatocyte Growth Factor/genetics , Immunoblotting , Mice , Mice, Inbred BALB C , Mitogen-Activated Protein Kinase 1/metabolism , Mitogen-Activated Protein Kinase 3/metabolism , Oligonucleotide Array Sequence Analysis , Phosphorylation , Proto-Oncogene Proteins c-akt/metabolismABSTRACT
As the neural substrates of second language (L2) acquisition are largely unknown, they may or may not be similar to those of first language (L1) representation. We used functional imaging to examine whether training in the conjugation of English verbs from present to past tense alters brain activations in 13-year-old twins. A novel experimental design contrasted past tense verb identification and verb matching, which were tested in either English (L2) or Japanese (L1). After 2 month classroom training in the past tense using bingo games, the two individuals in each pair exhibited significantly correlated performances. When pre- and post-scanning sessions were compared with each other for L2, the left dorsal inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) exhibited significantly correlated activation increases within each pair of twins and the increases were positively correlated with individual performance improvements. Moreover, the cortical plasticity for L2 acquisition was guided toward the L1 specialization of the left dorsal IFG, in spite of notable differences between L1 and L2 in the students' linguistic knowledge and in their performance in making past tense forms. These findings suggest a cortical mechanism underlying L2 acquisition, which critically depends on shared genetic and environmental factors for each twin in a surprisingly predictive manner.
