The ritual as a psychotherapeutic intervention.

Examines ritual as a tool for psychotherapeutic application with clients experiencing grief, trauma, anxiety, and family dysfunction. Case vignettes are provided to illustrate the therapeutic properties and creative power of rituals as interventions. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Intraradicular and intradural lumbar disc herniation: experiences with nine cases

BACKGROUND: Intraradicular or intradural disc herniation is a very rare complication of spinal degenerative processes. The aim of our study is to analyze the clinical spectrum, the mechanism, and the treatment of this acute spinal pathology. METHODS: Retrospective clinical examination was performed in nine personal cases of intradural disc herniation: among these, six were associated with lateral perforation, the remaining three with intradural herniation and ventral perforation. A review of the literature concerning mainly the frequency pathogenesis and diagnosis of intradural disc herniation has also been done. RESULTS: Nine cases of intradural herniations comprise 1.51% of the 593 cases of ruptured lumbar disc that underwent surgery from 1980 to 1992. The site most frequently involved is at level L4-L5, and 30% of patients have previously undergone surgery for lumbar disc herniation. Most patients reported in literature and in our present series have been complaining of a chronic history of sciatica, complicated later by bilateral neurologic signs. In the present series, diagnosis was obtained by means of myelography and computerized tomography; magnetic resonance imaging was performed in one case. All patients underwent surgery, reporting excellent results in five cases and good results in the other four. Surgery was performed either with an interlaminar approach or with a bilateral laminectomy in cases of ventral perforation. CONCLUSIONS: There is no typical neuroradiologic picture of intraradicular herniation, while a total or subtotal block is frequently observed in intradural ventral perforations. Dural perforation is often an unexpected intraoperative finding. Surgical treatment is always necessary. Favorable results are obtained if surgical treatment is carried out before the neurologic deficit becomes too pronounced.     

Complementary Tasks to Measure Working Memory in Distinct Prefrontal Cortex Subregions in Rats.

Acquisition of odor-guided or visually-guided delayed win-shift behavior was evaluated in rats after lidocaine-induced inactivation within the agranular insular area of the prefrontal cortex (PFC) or the prelimbic area of the PFC. Additional sites and tasks were used to control for neuroanatomical and behavioral specificity of lidocaine inactivation of the agranular insular and prelimbic areas. Results showed that acquisition of the odor-guided delayed win-shift task was dependent on the agranular insular area, whereas acquisition of the visually-guided version was dependent on the prelimbic area. This dissociation suggests that the stimulus modality used is critical for revealing working memory functions of different PFC subregions. The described methods provide a complementary means to study working memory in PFC subregions using a radial-arm maze. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effectiveness of error management training: A meta-analysis.

Error management training (EMT) is a training method that involves active exploration as well as explicit encouragement for learners to make errors during training and to learn from them. Past evaluation studies, which compared skill-based training outcomes of EMT with those of proceduralized erroravoidant training or of exploratory training without error encouragement, have yielded considerable variation in effect sizes. The present meta-analysis compiles the results of the existing studies and seeks to explain this variation. Although the mean effect of EMT across all 24 identified studies (N = 2,183) was positive and significant (Cohen's d = 0.44), there were several moderators. Moderator analyses showed effect sizes to be larger (a) for posttraining transfer (d = 0.56) than for within-training performance and (b) for performance tasks that were structurally distinct (adaptive transfer; d = 0.80) than for tasks that were similar to training (analogical transfer). In addition, both active exploration and error encouragement were identified as effective elements in EMT. Results suggest that EMT may be better suited than error-avoidant training methods for promotion of transfer to novel tasks. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Variation in the serotonin transporter gene modulates selective attention to threat.

The 5-HTTLPR is an insertion/deletion polymorphism in the promoter region of the serotonin transporter gene. Prior research has revealed associations between the short-allele variant of this polymorphism, enhanced self-reported negative emotionality, and hypersensitivity of fear relevant neural circuits. In a sample of 50 healthy women we examined the role of 5-HTTLPR for cognitive-affective processing of phylogenetical fear-relevant stimuli (spiders) in a dot probe task. In contrast to homozygote long-allele carriers (ll), participants carrying at least 1 short allele (ss and sl) selectively shifted attention toward pictures of spiders, when these were presented for a duration of 2,000 ms. These results argue for an involvement of 5-HTTLPR in cognitive processing of threatening stimuli and thus, underpin its general role for individual differences in negative affect. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Analysis of local composition gradients in the hard-phase grains of cermets using a combination of X-ray diffraction and electron microscopy

Combination of X-ray diffraction (XRD) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) was used for investigation of local composition gradients in the hard-phases of cermets. XRD revealed distribution of lattice parameters in hard-phase grains, from which the composition gradients in the hard-phases were estimated using an appropriate microstructure model. This microstructure model was build with the aid of SEM micrographs, which were taken with back-scattered electrons (BSE) and completed by the registration of the electron back-scatter diffraction (EBSD) patterns and characteristic X-ray spectra. SEM/BSE yielded the first information about the spatial distribution of elements in individual hard-phase grains, SEM/EBSD about the morphology, the size and the size distribution of these grains. The final interpretation of the distribution of lattice parameters, which was obtained from the X-ray line profile analysis, was done with the aid of the local elemental analysis that was performed using SEM with the energy dispersive analysis of the characteristic X-ray spectra (EDX) and the known dependence of the lattice parameters on concentration.     

Adsorption of Positively-Charged β-Lactoglobulin Derivatives to Casein Micelles

Positively-charged β-lactoglobulin derivatives prepared by amidation or esterification of available carboxyl groups of the native protein were bound strongly by casein micelles. Increasing amounts of these additives progressively decreased rennet coagulation time of casein micelles. Higher concentrations of positively-charged proteins coagulated casein micelles without addition of rennet extract. Of the modified proteins tested, approximately 1.0 g amidated β-lactoglobulin, 2.0 g ethyl-esterified β-lactoglobulin, or 1.0 g methyl-esterified β-lactoglobulin would be required to coagulate 100 ml of casein micelles at concentrations in milk.     

Mechanochemistry of copper sulphides: phase interchanges during milling

Covellite, CuS and chalcocite, Cu₂S nanoparticles prepared in the explosive manner from elemental precursors were further ball-milled in order to observe additional changes caused by mechanical action. Three phases of chalcocite were interchanging during milling, monoclinic one being major at the equilibrium after 30 min. In the case of covellite synthesis, milling for 15 min brought about a significant diminishment in the content of digenite, Cu_1.8S, impurity. Covellite powder exhibited finer character than chalcocite, as documented by crystallite size, grain size and specific surface area analysis. Finally, the effect of milling speed on the explosive character of the reaction and phase composition of chalcocite was investigated. The most drastic conditions favored the formation of the monoclinic phase with the lowest symmetry and the time and intensity of the explosion was found to depend on the milling speed. The whole process is mechanically driven.     

Carbon based conductive photoresist

A conductive photoresist for photolithographic application was studied here. The negative near-UV sensitive epoxy-based photoresist was used as a polymer matrix and conductive carbon black was used as functional filler. DC electrical resistivity of composite as a function of filler concentration has a well-known S-shape. After UV-exposure the resistivity of the composite decreases for almost five orders of magnitude, mostly at percolation threshold (approx. 0.6 vol.%). This effect can be attributed to the fully cross-linked polymer structure formed during UV-exposure of the composite. The resistivity of prepared samples also depend on the state of dispersion of the functional filler obtained using different dispersing additives. Composites with better dispersed particles have lower resistivities. This effect remained below one order of magnitude and decreased after UV-exposure. The composites with carbon black concentration of up to 1.1 vol.% are suitable for spin-coating and photolithography.