[Results of the ocular hypertension treatment study and the confocal scanning laser ophthalmoscopy ancillary study and evaluation of the heidelberg retina tomograph]. / Konsequenzen der "Ocular Hypertension Treatment Study" und der "Confocal Scanning Laser Ophthalmoscopy Ancillary Study" auf die Befundauswertung des Heidelberg Retina Tomographen.

The Ocular Hypertension Treatment Study (OHTS) has shown that analyzing changes of the optic disc configuration is superior to evaluating visual field findings for the early detection of primary open angle glaucoma. The Confocal Scanning Laser Ophthalmoscopy Ancillary Study (CSLO) is the first study to reveal that certain topographic baseline measurements of the optic disc are significantly associated with the development of primary open angle glaucoma in patients with ocular hypertension. An abnormally increased "mean height contour" value proved to be the individual parameter connected with the highest risk. The reliability of the Moorfields Regression Analysis of certain individual sectors during early detection of a primary angle glaucoma is higher than that of the global measurement. The temporal superior and inferior as well as the nasal inferior sectors have the highest positive predictive values and the largest risks in both univariate and multivariate analysis.

[Accommodation ability under the aspect of refractive, demographic, and biometric parameters]. / Akkommodationsfähigkeit unter Einbeziehung refraktiver, biometrischer und demographischer Parameter.

PURPOSE: The aim of this study was to evaluate the accommodation ability in healthy phakic eyes in relation to refraction and biometric parameters in order to get comparable results for patients with the accommodative 1 CU posterior chamber lens. METHODS: The study included 120 normal eyes of 120 patients (77 males, 43 females, mean age: 40+/-18, range: 11-70 years). The inclusion criteria were spherical equivalent for distance refraction <2 D, astigmatism <1.5 D, and a best-corrected visual acuity > or =0.8. Exclusion criteria were diabetes, glaucoma, cataract, traumas, or previous surgery. Subjects were divided into six age groups at increments of 10 years. Each group consisted of 20 subjects. Measurements included subjective and objective refraction (D), the accommodation ability (D) assessed with an accommodometer, and biometric parameters using the IOLMaster. In addition, the relation of anterior chamber depth and length of the eye was calculated for analyzing the relationship of anterior eye segment and accommodation. RESULTS: The spherical equivalent for distance refraction was 0.04+/-0.6 D with a range of -1.5 to 2.0 D. There was no sex-related significant difference of accommodation range. The accommodation range (D) decreased significantly with increasing age (p<0.0001, r=-0.895). The highest decrease could be found between the ages of 30 and 50 years. In subsequent years, the decline in accommodation ability was comparatively less. In association with the anterior chamber depth and the relation of anterior chamber depth and length of the eye, the accommodation ability fell with increasing age (p<0.001). The length of the eye did not correlate with the accommodation ability (p=0.8). CONCLUSION: There is a strong relationship between accommodation ability and age. Accommodation ability decreases strongly from the 3rd to the 5th decade; after that the loss of accommodation ability is relatively lower. The increase in lens thickness during the life span can implicate a correlation between the change of anterior chamber depth in relation to the length of the eye and a decrease of accommodation ability. Our results confirm Duane's hypothesis of accommodation and age.

The premack principle, response deprivation, and establishing operations.

This paper describes response deprivation as an establishing operation. In this context, we review the concept of establishing operation, in particular, its reinforcer-establishing and evocative effects; we place response deprivation in the literature on the reinforcing effects of behavioral activity, wherein response deprivation subsumes the Premack principle; we describe the reinforcer-altering and evocative effects of response deprivation; and we address a methodological concern about the evocative effect. In closing, we discuss some conceptual and empirical implications of the foregoing analyses.

Effects of deprivation on engagement in preferred activities by persons with developmental disabilities.

This study examined the effects of deprivation on engagement in activities for 3 adult men with developmental disabilities. First, an assessment was conducted to identify a high- and a low-preference activity for each participant. Second, the high-preference activity was made available following three amounts of deprivation of the activity (15 min, 2 hr, and 1 to 4 days); the low-preference activity was made available following the schedule of deprivation that produced the highest level of engagement by each participant in the high-preference activity. The results were that 1 to 4 days of deprivation produced the highest average amounts of engagement in the high-preference activity for each participant; this amount of deprivation did not produce high engagement in the low-preference activities. Third, the deprivation procedures and results were replicated when high-preference activities were presented by teachers during the participants' daily activities when their engagement had been quite low.

Monoclonal antibody MT2 identifies the urodele alpha 1 chain of type XII collagen, a developmentally regulated extracellular matrix protein in regenerating newt limbs.

We previously described the upregulation of the MT2 antigen during urodele limb regeneration and characterized the MT2 antigen as a 310- to 325-kDa chondroitin-sulfated glycoprotein with a core protein of 285-300 kDa. In this study, we screened a newt blastema cDNA library using monoclonal antibody (mAb) MT2 and obtained a 1-kb cDNA fragment, designated Isolate (IS)-1. Subsequent screening of the same library using IS-1 cDNA as a probe provided IS-2, a 2.8-kb cDNA. IS-2 overlaps IS-1 at its 5' end, is highly homologous to a portion of the alpha 1 chain of the chicken type XII collagen cDNA (alpha 1[XII]), and spans a third of the chicken alpha 1[XII] cDNA, from the last 62 amino acids of the second A domain of von Willebrand factor to the first two repeats of the fourth fibronectin type III domain. The peptide sequence deduced from cDNA IS-2 demonstrates invariable tryptophan, leucine, threonine, and tyrosine residues that are highly conserved among all the fibronectin type III domains within IS-2 and between corresponding sequences of IS-2 and chicken alpha 1[XII]. A Northern blot showed a 10-kb band that corresponds to the size of the chicken alpha 1[XII] mRNA. A fusion gene was constructed by inserting the IS-2 cDNA downstream from the malE gene of Escherichia coli, which encodes maltose-binding protein (MBP). The isopropyl beta-D-thiogalactoside-induced fusion protein had the expected molecular weight and reacted to both mAb MT2 and rabbit anti-MBP serum. We conclude that mAb MT2 identifies the urodele alpha 1[XII]. The expression pattern of the type XII collagen gene in newt limb regenerates was examined by in situ hybridization. Type XII collagen transcripts first appeared at 3 days after amputation in cells of the basal layer of the wound epithelium. At Day 10, both the basal wound epithelial cells and the distal mesenchyme cells were highly transcriptionally active. At mid-bud and late-bud blastema stages, wound epithelium expression had decreased, whereas the mesenchyme remained strongly active in transcription and showed a tendency toward distal regionalization. Condensing cartilage showed no signal. Finally, at the late digit stage, hybridization became largely restricted to the perichondrium. The in situ results suggest a developmental role for type XII collagen in regeneration.

Monoclonal antibody MT2 identifies an extracellular matrix glycoprotein that is co-localized with tenascin during adult newt limb regeneration.

Using immunohistochemical techniques and mAb MT2, we describe here a novel extracellular matrix (ECM) molecule that is developmentally regulated during limb regeneration in adult newts. The MT2 antigen appears during preblastema stages, is most abundant during blastema stages, and persists, near undifferentiated cells, until digit stages. The MT2 antigen is located in an acellular layer under the wound epithelium and throughout the ECM of the undifferentiated mesenchyme as a thick, cord-like component. In unamputated limbs mAb MT2 reactivity is restricted to tendons, myotendinous junctions, periosteum and to a layer of material beneath the epidermis. In both unamputated limbs and regenerating limbs, the reactivity to mAb MT2 colocalizes closely with urodele tenascin. Immunoblot analysis of blastema extracts showed that the unreduced form of the MT2 antigen is a large, polydispersed protein of approximately the same size as tenascin. However, based upon (a) molecular weights of reduced subunits, (b) competition experiments on tissue sections, and (c) analysis of molecules immunoprecipitated by mAb MT2, we conclude that the MT2 substance is unrelated biochemically to tenascin. The results from immunoblots, enzyme digestions and DEAE-Sephacell binding studies suggest that the unreduced MT2 antigen is a large protein composed of subunits which are connected by disulfide bonds. Reduction of the MT2 antigen results in three components recognized by mAb MT2. The largest of these reduced components is a chondroitin sulfate-like glycoprotein with a molecular weight (Mr) of 310-325 x 10(3). A second component (Mr, 285-300 x 10(3)) is the core protein of the 310-325 x 10(3) glycoprotein.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Effects of community-based, videotape, and flash card instruction of community-referenced sight words on students with mental retardation.

Community-referenced sight words and phrases were taught to adolescents with mild and moderate mental retardation using three instructional methods in two locations. Words were presented on flash cards in a school setting, on videotape recordings in a school setting, and on naturally occurring signs in the community. During each session, participants were taught one third of the words in each of these conditions and were then tested at the community sites. A constant prompt delay procedure was used to promote stimulus control to the experimenter's cue initially and then to transfer control to the textual stimuli used for training. A multiple baseline across participants design was employed. Results showed rapid acquisition of the community-referenced sight words in all three training conditions and generalization from the flash card and videotape conditions to the community sites.

Combined behavioral and pharmacological treatment of essential hypertension.

Fifty-two pharmacologically treated hypertensive patients were randomized to one of four treatment groups: (1) diastolic blood pressure biofeedback, (2) progressive deep muscle relaxation training, (3) self-directed relaxation training, or (4) medication alone. Data collection occurred during baseline, treatment, and 1-year follow-up phases in a laboratory, a medical clinic, and the patient's own home. Patients from all four groups combined showed mean blood pressure reductions of -10.2/-5.5 mm Hg on clinic recordings and -2.4/-.7 mm Hg on home recordings, which were maintained throughout the follow-up period. There were no significant differences among the four groups in terms of blood pressure reduction. Patients given adjunctive behavioral treatment showed significantly larger reductions in medication usage compared to patients treated with medication alone, but there were no significant differences among the three behaviorally treated groups. Patients who showed medication reductions did not show subsequent blood pressure elevation. The results suggest that combined behavioral and pharmacological therapy may be superior to pharmacological therapy alone in the treatment of essential hypertension.

Cognitive and physiologic responses to EMG biofeedback and three types of pseudofeedback during a muscular relaxation task.

Four groups of normal human subjects were tested for their ability to reduce frontal muscle tension levels during presentation of veridical auditory biofeedback or auditory pseudofeedback. A double-blind methodology was used. Three groups of subjects assigned to the pseudofeedback conditions received a feedback signal that was not contingent on EMG activity but that followed one of three different patterns. One group received a truly random signal, the second received a signal that gradually increased in frequency (apparent failure), and the third received a signal that gradually decreased in frequency (apparent success). Dependent measures included both physiologic (frontal and neck EMG) and subjective reactions to the relaxation task. The different patterns of pseudofeedback did produce reliably different subjective responses, suggesting that the manipulations succeeded in producing unequal nonspecific effects that were unrelated to the feedback contingency specifically. However, these differential subjective effects were not strongly reflected in the physiologic responses since the differences in EMG levels among the four groups did not differ significantly at any stage of training. An analysis of the integrity of the double-blind procedure showed that although experimenters were effectively kept blind to group assignment, subjects' responding suggested a response bias as well as the possibility that the double-blind was breached. The utility of the double-blind methodology in biofeedback experiments is discussed and suggestions for future research are offered.

Effect of iodoacetate on T lymphocytes of young AKR mice.

The influence of sulphydryl inhibitor iodoacetate on properties characteristically associated with T-lymphocytes was examined in young AKR mice. Thymocytes from mice receiving 100 microgram of iodoacetate showed a decrease in cortisone sensitivity, and responded more vigorously to phytohemagglutinin (PHA). Spleen cells from treated mice also exhibited greater reactivity to both PHA and concanavalin A (Con A). The uptake of 14C-iodoacetate by the thymus, spleen, lymph nodes, bone marrow, liver and kidneys also was investigated. One hour, 2 h and 18 h after the intraperiotoneal injection of 10-3 M iodoacetate, the thymus demonstrated a higher incorporation of the labelled compound than did the spleen, lymph nodes or other organs examined. These findings provide further evidence to indicate that the immuno-enhancement observed following iodoacetate treatment is related to its effect on T lymphocytes.