Publications

Journal Article Injections of human corticotropin releasing factor (hCRF) – a rapidly metabolised peptide – cause elevations of plasma ACTH and cortisol that mimic endogenous secretory episodes in man Get access T H Schürmeyer, T H Schürmeyer Develop. Endocr. Branch, NICHD, NIH, Bethesda, MD, USAAbt. Klinische Endokrinologie, Medizinische Hochschule Hannover Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar P C Avgerinos, P C Avgerinos Develop. Endocr. Branch, NICHD, NIH, Bethesda, MD, USAAbt. Klinische Endokrinologie, Medizinische Hochschule Hannover Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar J D Booth, J D Booth Develop. Endocr. Branch, NICHD, NIH, Bethesda, MD, USAAbt. Klinische Endokrinologie, Medizinische Hochschule Hannover Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar P W Gold, P W Gold Develop. Endocr. Branch, NICHD, NIH, Bethesda, MD, USAAbt. Klinische Endokrinologie, Medizinische Hochschule Hannover Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar T P Tomai, T P Tomai Develop. Endocr. Branch, NICHD, NIH, Bethesda, MD, USAAbt. Klinische Endokrinologie, Medizinische Hochschule Hannover Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar D L Loriaux, D L Loriaux Develop. Endocr. Branch, NICHD, NIH, Bethesda, MD, USAAbt. Klinische Endokrinologie, Medizinische Hochschule Hannover Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar G P Chrousos G P Chrousos Develop. Endocr. Branch, NICHD, NIH, Bethesda, MD, USAAbt. Klinische Endokrinologie, Medizinische Hochschule Hannover Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Acta Endocrinologica (Norway), Volume 110, Issue 1_Supplement_a, Apr 1979, Pages S177–S178, https://doi.org/10.1530/acta.0.109S177 Published: 01 April 1985

Sugar intake has been associated with increased prevalence of childhood overweight/obesity; however, results remain controversial. The aim of this study was to examine the probability of overweight/obesity with higher sugar intakes, accounting for other dietary intakes. Data from 1165 children and adolescents aged ≥2–18 years (66.8% males) enrolled in the Hellenic National Nutrition and Health Survey (HNNHS) were used; specifically, 781 children aged 2–11 years and 384 adolescents 12–18 years. Total and added sugar intake were assessed using two 24 h recalls (24 hR). Foods were categorized into specific food groups to evaluate the main foods contributing to intakes. A significant proportion of children (18.7%) and adolescents (24.5%) exceeded the recommended cut-off of 10% of total energy intake from added sugars. Sweets (29.8%) and processed/refined grains and cereals (19.1%) were the main sources of added sugars in both age groups, while in adolescents, the third main contributor was sugar-sweetened beverages (20.6%). Being overweight or obese was 2.57 (p = 0.002) and 1.77 (p = 0.047) times more likely for intakes ≥10% of total energy from added sugars compared to less <10%, when accounting for food groups and macronutrient intakes, respectively. The predicted probability of becoming obese was also significant with higher total and added-sugar consumption. We conclude that high consumption of added sugars increased the probability for overweight/obesity among youth, irrespectively of other dietary or macronutrient intakes.

IntroductionBreast cancer patients undergo extended treatments that affect their psychological state and quality of life. There is a lack of studies examining the effects of holistic stress management interventions (that combine stress perception, cognitive and lifestyle interventions) on mental health and biological indices (e.g. cortisol concentrations) of breast cancer patients.Materials and methodsThis pilot randomized controlled trial provided the first assessment of the effects of a novel, cognitive-based intervention, the Pythagorean Self-Awareness Intervention (PSAI), on psychological symptoms, quality of life, sleep quality and lifestyle as well as on stress-related biological measures of breast cancer patients undergoing adjuvant therapy. Standardized questionnaires were administered at baseline and 8-weeksafter the intervention to evaluate quality of life, stress, depression, and anxiety (primary outcomes). Sleep quality, lifestyle and hair cortisol concentrations were also assessed (secondary outcomes).ResultsForty-five breast cancer patients undergoing adjuvant therapy were randomly assigned to the PSAI group (n = 25) or the control group (n = 20).Women in the PSAI group reported significant improvements post-intervention in total Quality of Life, specific aspects of Quality of Life [Physical well-being, Social well-being, Emotional well-being, Functional well-being, Breast cancer concerns] as well as Perceived stress, depression, anxiety and stress. Improvements in secondary outcomes included increase in sleep quality, empowerment for healthy lifestyle and reduction of hair cortisol concentrations.ConclusionsThe PSAI was beneficial as complementary therapy in the women studied. Larger randomized controlled trials with longer follow-up are needed to ascertain these findings.

Supplementary Material 4. Figure S4: Workflow for the integration of scRNA patients’ data from the two melanoma studies. Schematic illustration of data preprocessing (Box 1), quality control (Box 2), normalization (Box 3), and cell annotation for the integration of the scRNA data of the Rs and NRs melanoma patients following immunotherapy from the GSE115978 (n=30) and GSE120575 (n=18) datasets.

Resistance to stress is a feature of cancer cells. Cellular stress includes oxidative, metabolic and genotoxic stress conditions, which under normal conditions lead to cell death. However, in contrast to normal cells, cancer cells overcome the checkpoints that normally restrict growth, and are able to resist cellular stress and subsequent cell death through a variety of mechanisms, which include several non‑coding RNAs (ncRNAs). Within this context, long ncRNAs (lncRNAs) and microRNAs (miRNAs/miRs) are the main categories of ncRNAs that have been shown in the literature to function as regulators of stress resistance pathways in cancer. miRNAs play a key role in the majority of biological pathways, as they regulate the expression of hundreds of target genes, including genes involved in stress response and cell death, oncogenes, or tumor suppressor genes, by inhibiting protein translation or promoting the degradation of mRNAs. Respectively, lncRNAs are epigenetic regulators, which are also involved in cancer progression, stress response and metabolic pathways by promoting or inhibiting the transcription, splicing, translation and modulation of protein function. Thus, the present review summarizes recent knowledge related to the role of these molecules in the cancer response to stress, highlighting the ability of these non‑coding molecules to be effective drug targets and biomarkers in cancer treatment.

The hypothalamic neuropeptide corticotrophin-releasing hormone (CRH) is also produced by human endometrial cells and is directly involved in the decidualization process as a paracrine inducer. The aim of the present work was to examine the effect of progesterone, the main decidualizing factor, on endometrial CRH, in primary cultures of human endometrial stromal cells. The effect of progesterone was examined by measuring the effects of medroxyprogesterone acetate (MPA) on (i) the concentration of immunoreactive CRH in isolated human endometrial stromal cells and (ii) the activity of the CRH promoter in human endometrial stromal cells transfected with a 0.9 kb fragment of the 5'-flanking region of the human CRH gene coupled to luciferase reporter. The data show that MPA increased the production and secretion of immunoreactive CRH from stromal cells and induced the activity of the CRH promoter, both in a dose-dependent manner. These effects were partially reversed by a molar excess of the antiprogestin RU 486 and were completely abolished in the presence of 100 nmol/l of the cAMP inhibitor, Rp-cAMP. The effect of progesterone on the CRH promoter requires the existence of an intact CRH sequence since experiments carried out with a deleted palindromic cAMP response element (CRE: 5'-TGACGTCA) at -224 bp of the CRH promoter resulted in a complete loss of MPA effect. In conclusion, these data provide evidence that progesterone induces the transcription of CRH gene in human endometrial stroma. This effect coupled with the decidualizing properties of progesterone and CRH may indicate that progesterone and CRH form a decidualizing local pathway within the human endometrium.

The present article provides an overview of the key messages of the plenary lectures on severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus type 2 (SARS‑CoV‑2) infection in children, which were presented at the ‘6th Workshop on Paediatric Virology’ organised by the Institute of Paediatric Virology on October 24, 2020. SARS‑CoV‑2 is a novel human coronavirus with a positive‑sense, monopartite mRNA genome, 26‑32 kilobases in length, causing mild to severe respiratory infection in humans, including children. The spike (S) protein of SARS‑CoV‑2 is the key determinant of host/cell tropism and capacity for transmission, mediating receptor binding and membrane fusion. SARS‑CoV‑2 is predominately transmitted via the respiratory route. The effects of SARS‑CoV‑2 infection occurring early during pregnancy remain unknown. Newborns rarely experience significant morbidity and mortality. In children, SARS‑CoV‑2 severe symptomatic respiratory infection has been reported much less frequently than in adults. In addition, there have been rare cases of the newly reported multisystemic inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS‑C), which has similarities with Kawasaki disease. Several therapeutic agents have been evaluated for the treatment of SARS‑CoV‑2 infection; however, few have been shown to be truly efficacious. On the whole, further research, both basic and clinical, on SARS‑CoV‑2 is essential, as without a thorough knowledge of the molecular virology of SARS‑CoV‑2, effective preventive and treatment modalities, which are so urgently required, cannot be designed and implemented.

Objective: To compare the incidence of brain lesions detected on cranial ultrasonography (US) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) at early post-term age in a group of preterm infants. Subjects and methods: In this prospective study, entry criteria were very preterm infants with birth weight ≤1250 g or gestational age ≤30 weeks, or brain lesions on early US scan. 73 neonates were included in the study. All infants underwent sequential cranial US scans and an US and MRI scan at early post-term age. Results: Abnormal US and MR findings were detected in 53.4% and 84.9% of neonates respectively. US underestimated the diffuse white matter damage shown in 6.9% and on MRI in 26.4% of neonates, the increase of the subarachnoid space shown on US in 19.2% and on MRI in 43.1% of neonates and thinning of the corpus callosum detected on US in only 5.5% and on MRI in 27.4% of neonates. MRI was the only method to detect abnormalities in the posterior fossa, basal ganglia, cortex and the posterior limb of the internal capsule. US detected with high sensitivity the presence of cystic periventricular leukomalacia, ventricular enlargement, persistent germinal matrix/intraventricular hemorrhage and porencephalic cyst as a result of periventricular hemorrhagic infraction. Conclusion: MRI offers more complete visualization of brain lesions in preterm neonates and is more informative in regard to diagnosis. Follow up assessment of these neonates is needed to show the relationship to neurodevelopment outcome.

Myopathies are heterogeneous neuromuscular diseases of genetic and/or inflammatory etiology that affect both cardiac and skeletal muscle. We investigated the prevalence of cardiac inflammation in patients with myopathies, cardiovascular symptoms, and normal echocardiography using cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR). We prospectively evaluated 51 patients with various genetic (n = 23) and inflammatory (n = 28) myopathies (median age, IQR: 12 (11-15) years, 22% girls; 61 (55-65) years, 46% women, respectively) and compared their CMR findings to corresponding age- and sex-matched controls (n = 21 and 20, respectively) and to each other. Patients with genetic myopathy had similar biventricular morphology and function to healthy controls but showed higher late gadolinium enhancement (LGE), native T1 mapping, extracellular volume fraction (ECV), and T2 mapping values. Collectively, 22 (95.7%) patients with genetic myopathy had a positive T1-criterion and 3 (13.0%) had a positive T2-criterion according to the updated Lake Louise criteria. Compared with healthy controls, patients with inflammatory myopathy showed preserved left ventricular (LV) function and reduced LV mass, while all CMR-derived tissue characterization indices were significantly higher (p < 0.001 for all). All patients had a positive T1-criterion, and 27 (96.4%) had a positive T2-criterion. A positive T2-criterion or T2-mapping > 50 ms could discriminate between patients with genetic and inflammatory myopathies with a sensitivity of 96.4% and a specificity of 91.3% (AUC = 0.9557). The vast majority of symptomatic patients with inflammatory myopathies and normal echocardiography show evidence of acute myocardial inflammation. In contrast, acute inflammation is rare in patients with genetic myopathies, who show evidence of chronic low-grade inflammation.