During differentiation, oligodendrocyte precursor cells (OPCs) extend a network of processes that make contact with axons and initiate myelination. Recent studies revealed that actin polymerization is required for initiation of myelination whereas actin depolymerization promotes myelin wrapping. Here, we used primary OPCs in culture isolated from neonatal rat cortices of both sexes and young male and female mice with oligodendrocyte-specific deletion of mechanistic target of rapamycin (mTOR) to demonstrate that mTOR regulates expression of specific cytoskeletal targets and actin reorganization in oligodendrocytes during developmental myelination. Loss or inhibition of mTOR reduced expression of profilin2 and ARPC3, actin polymerizing factors, and elevated levels of active cofilin, which mediates actin depolymerization. The deficits in actin polymerization were revealed in reduced phalloidin and deficits in oligodendrocyte cellular branching complexity at the peak of morphologic differentiation and a delay in initiation of myelination. We further show a critical role for mTOR in expression and localization of myelin basic protein (Mbp) mRNA and MBP protein to the cellular processes where it is necessary at the myelin membrane for axon wrapping. Mbp mRNA transport deficits were confirmed by single molecule RNA FISH. Moreover, expression of the kinesin family member 1B, an Mbp mRNA transport protein, was reduced in CC1+ cells in the mTOR cKO and in mTOR inhibited oligodendrocytes undergoing differentiation in vitro. These data support the conclusion that mTOR regulates both initiation of myelination and axon wrapping by targeting cytoskeletal reorganization and MBP localization to oligodendrocyte processes.

SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Myelination is essential for normal CNS development and adult axon preservation and function. The mechanistic target of rapamycin (mTOR) signaling pathway has been implicated in promoting CNS myelination; however, there is a gap in our understanding of the mechanisms by which mTOR promotes developmental myelination through regulating specific downstream targets. Here, we present evidence that mTOR promotes the initiation of myelination through regulating specific cytoskeletal targets and cellular process expansion by oligodendrocyte precursor cells as well as expression and cellular localization of myelin basic protein.

FAO will attend the fourth Annual Strategic Consultation with the Government of Japan on Tuesday 21 January 2020, in Tokyo, Japan. The objective is to review the progress of [...]

Bombing ground targets from the air is tricky and not always accurate. But a new type of bomb creates an unimaginable level of destruction

The USS Barb had an unusual target in its sights in 1945 - one that wasn't even in the water. It was a Japanese supply train on the island of Karafuto

The exact molecule behind the Minamata mercury disaster, caused by a chemical plant’s wastewater, remains a point of disagreement

The spacecraft Hayabusa2 hurled a four-pound copper ball toward the asteroid's surface at about 4,500 miles an hour to create an artificial crater

Illustrators are sharing artwork of Amabie, a spirit first popularized during the Edo period, on social media

A planned exhibition at the Portland Art Museum highlights the boldness of their work

In the late 1300s, tea was introduced to Japan from mainland China, transported in delicate jars. Over the years, as drinking tea became a prized activity in Japan, so too did the jars in which it was stored

Press release "Governors and Heads of Supervision announce deferral of Basel III implementation to increase operational capacity of banks and supervisors to respond to Covid-19", 27 March 2020

FACE it – we are going nowhere. Even if we had a particular place to venture the regulations would not permit. For the foreseeable we shall have to contract out our travelling to others. On the upside, no airport hassle. On the downside, no giant Toblerone.

OM Japan Tsunami April Update

Since it was announced publicly that OM Japan were ready to receive volunteers, many people wrote to express interest and requested for more information. This past week (23 - 27 May), OM Japan took their first volunteer group, consisting of 3 foreigners and 4 Japanese to Miyagi prefecture to help with clearing up rubble and bringing encouragement.

OM Japan feels honoured to have played a small part in helping bring hope and relief to tsunami survivors.

Extreme preterm birth is associated with developmental shortcomings that may reduce exercise capacity and participation in physical activities in later life. The number of studies addressing these issues in adolescent populations is limited, test methods differ, and results are diverging.

Exercise capacity after preterm birth was in the same range as in term-born control subjects. Participation in physical activity was lower in preterm subjects compared with control subjects; however, the response to exercise in terms of increased aerobic capacity was similar. (Read the full article)

Previous observational studies and randomized trials have reported an association between the use of epidural analgesia for pain relief in labor and intrapartum maternal fever. Studies have also reported an increase in adverse neonatal outcomes with intrapartum maternal fever.

Among low-risk women receiving epidural analgesia, intrapartum maternal temperature >99.5°F was associated with adverse neonatal outcomes, with the rate of adverse outcomes increasing directly with maximum maternal temperature. Without temperature elevation, epidural use was not associated with adverse neonatal outcomes. (Read the full article)

Preterm infants from 33 gestational weeks can detect specific shape features (prism and cylinder) by touch (without visual control), and remember them; however, nothing is known about such abilities earlier in development.

The preterm infant, even when very immature (from 28 gestational weeks), is endowed with tactile sensory abilities: the exploration and memorization of an object by touch, the discrimination of a novel object, and the recognition of a familiar object after interference. (Read the full article)

Mortality of very low birth weight infants varies widely between regions and countries; however, the variation in morbidities after adjusting for confounders has not been adequately studied.

Composite outcome of mortality or short-term morbidity for very low birth weight infants was lower in Japan than in Canada. However, marked variations in mortality and individual morbidity exist, revealing areas for improvement in each country. (Read the full article)

Etiology and timing of onset of neonatal hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy continue to be controversial. Previous studies suggest antepartum events are the main contributing factors, but have used a broad definition of encephalopathy and included infants with genetic, congenital, and developmental abnormalities.

Our study suggests that when strict criteria defining hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy are applied with supporting neuroimaging evidence of an acute hypoxic-ischemic insult, intrapartum events are the final and necessary pathway leading to this condition. (Read the full article)

Resistance exercise is known to have a robust effect on glycemic control and cardiometabolic health among children and adolescents, even in the absence of weight loss.

Normalized strength capacity is associated with lower cardiometabolic risk clustering in boys and girls, even after adjustment for cardiorespiratory fitness, level of physical activity, and BMI. (Read the full article)

The population of youth with chronic medical conditions is growing and many attend college. Yet we know little about US colleges’ capacity to identify and care for these youth, nor how transition guidelines and financing models should incorporate college health.

This is the first study to find that although many colleges can provide some clinical care for youth with chronic conditions, few colleges have systems to identify and track these students, elucidating gaps that pediatricians and institutions need to address. (Read the full article)

Permanently-drawn curtains on the city’s empty luxury high-rises and dust gathering over shuttered storefronts in the Beirut Souks mall offer a glimpse of the economic gloom gathering over one of the world’s most indebted countries.

Report of the Ad Hoc Working Group on the Paris Agreement on the fourth part of its first session, held in Bonn from 7 to 18 November 2017.

Agenda and annotations. Note by the Executive Secretary.

Two non-amidated host defence peptides named Pin2[G] and FA1 were evaluated against three types of pathogenic bacteria; two isolated from diabetic foot ulcer patients, Staphylococcus aureus UPD13 and Pseudomonas aeruginosa UPD3, and another from a commercial collection, Salmonella enterica serovar Typhimurium (ATCC 14028). In vitro experiments showed that the antimicrobial performance of the synthetic peptides, Pin2[G] and FA1, was modest, although FA1 was more effective than Pin2[G]. In contrast Pin2[G] had superior in vivo anti-infective activity to FA1 in rabbit wound infections by the diabetic foot ulcer pathogens S. aureus UPD13 and P. aeruginosa UPD3. Indeed, Pin2[G] reduced bacterial colony counts of both S. aureus UPD13 and P. aeruginosa UPD3 by >100,000-fold after 48-72 h on skin wounds of infected rabbits, while in similar infected wounds, FA1 had no major effects at 72-96 h of treatment. Ceftriaxone was equally effective vs. Pseudomonas but less effective vs. S. aureus infections. Additionally, the two peptides were evaluated in mice against intragastrically inoculated S. enterica ser. Typhimurium (ATCC 14028). Only Pin2[G], at 0.56 mg/kg, was effective in reducing systemic (liver) infection by >67-fold, equivalent to the effect of treatment with levofloxacin. Pin2[G] showed superior immunomodulatory activity in increasing chemokine production by a human bronchial cell line and suppressing poly(IC)-induced pro-inflammatory IL6 production. These data showed that the in vitro antimicrobial activity of these peptides was not correlated with their in vivo anti-infective activity, and suggest that other factors such as immunomodulatory activity were more important.

The off-label use of third generation cephalosporin (3GC) during in ovo vaccination or vaccination of newly hatched chicks, was a common practice worldwide. CMY-2-producing Escherichia coli have been disseminated among broiler production. The objectives of this study were to determine the epidemiological linkage of bla_CMY-2-positive plasmids among broilers both within and outside Japan because grandparent stock and parent stock were imported in Japan. We examined the whole genome sequences of 132 3GC-resistant E. coli isolates collected from healthy broilers during 2002-2014. The predominant 3GC-resistance gene was bla_CMY-2, which was detected in the plasmids of 87 (65.9%) isolates. The main plasmid replicon types were IncI1-I (n=21; 24.1%), IncI (n=12; 13.8%), IncB/O/K/Z (n=28; 32.2%), and IncC (n=22; 25.3%). Those plasmids were subjected to gene clustering and network analyses and plasmid multi-locus sequence typing (pMLST). The chromosomal DNA of isolates was subjected to MLST and single nucleotide variant (SNV)-based phylogenetic analysis.

MLST and SNV-based phylogenetic analysis revealed high diversity of E. coli isolates. ST429 harboring bla_CMY-2-positive IncB/O/K/Z was closely related to isolates from broiler in Germany harboring bla_CMY-2-positive IncB/O/K/Z. pST55-IncI and pST12-IncI1-I and pST3-IncC were prevalent in western Japan. pST12-IncI1-I and pST3-IncC were closely related to those detected in E. coli isolates from chicken in American continent, whereas 26 IncB/O/K/Z were related to those in Europe. These data will be useful to reveal the whole picture of transmission of CMY-2-producing bacteria in and out of Japan.

If you love Metal Gear Solid, have some money to burn, and live in Japan, Sony has something special for you.

Royole is known for being the first to show off a flexible phone, and at CES 2020, it has an Alexa-based smart speaker with a wraparound touch-screen display and a smart notebook that translates your handwriting into typed text.

A new supercapacitor based on manganese oxide could combine the storage capacity of batteries with the high power and fast charging of other supercapacitors, according to researchers at Penn State and two universities in China.

By Bishop Arthur Serratelli

In February 1915, only six months after the beginning of World War I, Lancet, a British medical journal, used for the first time the expression “shell shock.” This newly coined expression was used to describe the feeling of helplessness that soldiers felt after exposure to constant bombardment. The term was new, but not the reality. After every war, soldiers return from combat, suffering “shell shock.” 

Watching their comrades mowed down by enemy fire or left maimed and strewn on the battlefield, combatants become immune to feelings of connectedness and concern. Today, this phenomenon is becoming an epidemic. We are constantly being bombarded by bad news. The catastrophic and inhumane events that interrupt our everyday life are causing many people to escape from the brutality by becoming shell shocked. 

Terrorist attacks in Belgium, Syria, Africa, and in England; daily violence on the streets of Chicago, New York, Paterson; the massacre of our children in their schools and of believers in their churches, synagogues and mosques; the interminable disputes and rancor over immigration; allegations of racism and sexism; the incessant reporting of scandals, present and past!  Moment by moment these evils confront us. So fast does news travel that one story stumbles over the other with images of the dead, the wounded, the homeless imprinted on our minds. These problems do not admit of simple solutions. And, since we are more aware of them today than in the past and yet less able to find solutions, many, left numb and disillusioned, drift into apathy.  

In addition, newspapers, blogs and TV commentaries flash before us cause after cause, such as global poverty and climate change. “Every cause seems urgent, but nobody has the time, the energy, or the information necessary to make an impact. Knowing all the ways in which the world is flawed in a very real, raw, up-close kind of way without the ability to make any sort of important change is perhaps the most unwelcome symptom of the digital age” (Jamie Varon, “Generation apathy: How internet outrage is making us all numb and hopeless,” August 20, 2015).

Some Christians have drunk the hemlock of apathy. They are becoming more and more indifferent to evil in the world and, sadly, more and more detached from religion. Unconnected. Not invested. Religion may be good; but, when it comes to God, they have hung up a “Do Not Disturb Sign.” For them, weddings, funerals, First Communions, Confirmations, if even celebrated, are mostly social occasions. 

Apathy within the Church is far more devastating than outside the Church. The Church is the sign and sacrament of salvation for the world. It is an instrument in God’s hands. But if the instrument is dull and listless, it hinders God’s activity. When people become apathetic, something more is needed than telling them to be kind and compassionate. Such preaching falls on deaf ears and hardened hearts. What is needed today is the bold proclamation of the kerygma, that is, the love of God given us in the death and resurrection of Jesus.  

God is not apathetic. He is intensely passionate about his relationship with us and his world. He is the lover who pursues his beloved. He never gives up on us, despite our sins. He woos us back to himself (cf. Hosea 2:11). He did not turn his back on the evil of our world, but sent his Son to be our Redeemer.

 “God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son” (Jn 3:16). In the death and resurrection of Jesus, God’s love is a fact. In Jesus, God has begun the work of forgiving sins and recreating the world. And, he gifts us with the Holy Spirit so that, together with him, we make all things new. We are not helpless. We are not alone. Apathy makes people murmur a half-silent “No” to the world in which we live. But, faith in Jesus Crucified and Risen makes us shout a resounding “Yes” to God’s work of the New Creation. Faith is the antidote to apathy.


 

Governor Markell will attend the ribbon cutting ceremony at Heron Run Apartments in Smyrna.

Governor Jack Markell joined Delaware State Housing Authority (DSHA) Director Anas Ben Addi, Representative Stephanie Bolden, in addition to representatives from the City of Wilmington, The Michaels Development Company, Bank of America and Architectural Alliance, for a tour of Jazz Court Apartments, a new affordable 44-unit three-story apartment building located in Wilmington. This project is part of a master plan created by Banc of America Community Development Corporation and its development partners, utilizing a former Brownfield site remediated and donated by Bank of America to its partners. The project will also include 17 homeownership townhomes to be built by Inter-Neighborhood Foundation and Habitat for Humanity of New Castle County.

The DJI Mavic Mini weighs just 249 grams, so you can fly it in the US—and many other regions—without having to register it with the government. It has very capable specifications, but also some artificial limitations we're not happy to see.

Geometry Global, WPP group’s shopper marketing and brand activation agency, is working towards devising communication that fits the non-linear, omnichannel shopping behaviour of consumers.

Highlighting two paths to the future for Delaware agriculture, Governor Jack Markell and Secretary of Agriculture Ed Kee welcomed a group of young Wilmington urban farmers and an international trade delegation to the Delaware State Fair.

NEW CASTLE (Sept. 26, 2019) – The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) recently awarded the Delaware Department of Health and Social Services a $3.58 million planning grant to increase the treatment capacity of Medicaid providers to deliver substance use disorder treatment and recovery services to Delawareans in need. Delaware was one of 15 […]

Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister YS Jaganmohan Reddy has announced Rs one crore as compensation to the families of those who died because of exposure to a toxic gas that leaked overnight at a chemical...

DOVER, Del. – The Polly Drummond Hill yard waste drop-off site near Newark, which opened for the season on Saturday, April 18, was closed to further drop-offs about noon on Sunday because of material capacity and traffic issues. DNREC will work this week to have its contractor shred and remove all the material that was dropped off until the closure, and create a traffic plan with the goal of reopening the site on Saturday, April 25. The site operates Saturdays and Sundays.

Earlier in April, Ferrari had started to produce respirator valves and fittings for protective masks at its Maranello plant as one of its initiatives in support of health workers treating coronavirus patients.

The Vizag plant manufactures polystyrene (PS) that finds wide utility in the food-service industry as rigid trays and containers, disposable utensils, and foamed cups, plates and bowls.

2020 TVS Apache RR 310 Track Ride Review: After some laps of the MMRT in Chennai, we’re convinced that the 2020 edition RR 310 has come forth with a new personality. Sure, the ride dynamics remain the same but it is now definitely more refined than ever before transforming the ride experience for the better. […]

The Japanese policy makers are looking to frame a policy for bringing foreign workers to counter the rapidly growing – aging population, without naming it as an actual immigration policy. Japanese Conservatives give high importance to the cultural…

Dennis Prager, right-wing writer, and radio talk host have drawn a lot of ire from most of the people in the press a couple of times. The most recent of which occurred when Dennis, who is a devoted Jew has repeatedly stated that there is a battle on…

Japan might be a unique study abroad option for Indian students as most prefer studying in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, and Germany. The educational system is very different in Japan, and you’d be divided into choosing…

Guleria said inhalation and ingestion of styrene can cause effect the skin and the eyes.

Originally, hospital ships were designed for military use to treat the wounded during wartime. The ships also provide relief to the hospitals on land, and they may dock near natural disasters.

The central nervous system is affected by exposure to styrene smoke. It is the mucous membrane, which is primarily affected by styrene gas exposure. The styrene gas leak in Visakhapatnam triggered acute breathlessness among many men, some of whom were asphyxiated to death.