Brookdale Senior Living Inc. is presently looking of Therapy Coordinator on Sat, 30 Mar 2013 12:30:42 GMT. Seeking a Full Time SLP-CCC/Therapy Coordinator for our upscale retirement community at Pacific Inn in Torrance! Innovative Senior Care/Brookdale Senior Living uses therapy and wellness techniques to provide lifestyle enhancements to residents of senior living communities. Our services enable residents to live better by helping them to be safer, healthier, more mobile and more vibrant at any age...
Location:Torrance, California
Description:Brookdale Senior Living Inc. is presently looking of Therapy Coordinator right now, this position will be settled in California. For detail informations about this position opportunity please read the description below. Seeking a Full Time SLP-CCC/Therapy Coordinator for our upscale retirement community at Pacific Inn in Torrance!
Innovative Senior Care/Brookdale Senior Living uses ther! apy and wellness techniques to provide lifestyle enhancements to residents of senior living communities. Our services enable residents to live better by helping them to be safer, healthier, more mobile and more vibrant at any age or level of health and fitness. Our comprehensive rehabilitation, wellness and education services include Medicare-certified outpatient physical, occupational and speech therapy. AS AN ISC THERAPIST … You will enjoy a good work environment, a fulfilling experience, the opportunity to build a career with a forward thinking, innovative therapy company and a substantial client base with which to work. You will also receive a portfolio of impressive benefits designed to help you maintain a comfortable lifestyle for your family.
These include:
6 paid Holidays a year
Flexible Spending Account
Long & Short-term Disability
401 (k) with Company Match
Company Sponsored Life Insurance
!
Continuing Education through ISC University
Lice! nse Reimbursement
Paid Vacation
Medical, Dental and Vision begin the 1st day you do so there is no need for COBRA!
To apply - contact: Donna Winterhaler, ISC Talent Solution Manager 877-282-2521 Fax: 414-292-4786 dwinterhaler1@brookdaleliving.comFor more information about career opportunities and to view our communities visit our website at www.Brookdaleliving.com “Innovative Senior Care, a trademark of American Retirement Corporation, a subsidiary of Brookdale Senior Living.”Key Words: Independent Living, Assisted Living, Skilled Nursing, Retirement Community, Torrance, full time, SLP, SLP-CCC, Speech, Speech and Language Pathologist, Speech and Language Pathology, CA, California Must have a Masters in Speech and Language Pathology, have active CCCs, and an active license to practice in the state . Employment Standards: EOE, Pre-employment drug testing Special Postings Requirements: Innovative Senior Ca! re, a trademark of American Retirement Corporation, a subsidiary of Brookdale Senior Living. To Apply or for more information contact: Donna WinterhalerISC Talent Solution Manager877-282-2521414-292-4786 Faxdwinterhaler1@brookdaleliving.com - . If you were eligible to this position, please email us your resume, with salary requirements and a resume to Brookdale Senior Living Inc..
Interested on this position, just click on the Apply button, you will be redirected to the official website
This position will be started on: Sat, 30 Mar 2013 12:30:42 GMT
NEW YORK (AP) ? Health officials say at least 24 people have become sick from an outbreak of E. coli infections linked to frozen snack foods marketed to children.
No one has died, but eight people, mostly kids or teens, were hospitalized.
An investigation detected E. coli in an open package of Farm Rich brand frozen chicken quesadillas at an ill person's home.
On Friday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported illnesses in Alabama, Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Mississippi, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin.
The Buffalo, N.Y.-based Rich Products Corp. has recalled quesadillas, mozzarella bites and other frozen products made in November.
ENCINITAS, Calif. (AP) ? A documentary filmmaker known for helping rescue children from squalid Romanian orphanages in the early 1990s was fatally shot following an apparent dispute over the trimming of shrubbery outside his Southern California home, officials said Friday.
John Charles Upton Jr., 56, was found dead Thursday on a dirt path in the yard of his Encinitas home. The San Diego County Sheriff's Department said detectives arrested Michael Vilkin, 61, on suspicion of murder. He was being held without bail, pending arraignment Tuesday.
Upton, after learning of the plight of Romanian orphans, publicized the brutal conditions and was instrumental in bringing an estimated two dozen orphans to America for medical care and adoption.
Vilkin, in an interview conducted in county jail, told KGTV in San Diego he fired gunshots in self-defense after Upton menaced him with a gun during a dispute over foliage.
Vilkin said he owns vacant property next to Upton's home, and the two men had a disagreement over trimming shrubs.
"I did not go to him," Vilkin told the station. "He came to me threatening and pulled a gun (on) me."
A statement from the department said a dispute between the two men led to the shooting, which was under investigation.
Upton's brother, Michael Upton, told U-T San Diego that his brother and Vilkin previously argued about trees.
Upton's work in Romania also gained the attention of influential activists, inspiring billionaire philanthropist Richard Branson and actress Jessica Lange to help rescue youngsters from Romania.
Upton went on to create an online network of films about charitable causes.
Live from GDC Simon and I went hands-on with Chillingo's latest tile, Tiny Troopers 2. If you're familiar with the first game, the sequel brings you more of the same great stuff -- more gear, more guns, more machines, more mayhem. We're talking Humvee's with .50 caliber machine guns.
Tiny Troopers 2 is free-to-play, like most of EA's titles these days, but they appear to be well balanced and don't seem to get in the way of the game.
Check out the video up top and if you like what you see, Tiny Troopers 2 has just hit the App Store so go grab it now.
Sometimes, wishes are quickly granted.? Sometimes, they already were.
Steelers safety Troy Polamalu wants player input in rule changes.? But the players already have input.
?I do wish . . . that the NFL did have a voice from the players? side, whether it?s our players? union president, or team captains, or our executive committee on the players? side,? Polamalu said earlier today on ESPN.? ?Because we?re the guys that realize the risk, we?re the guys on the field.?
As MDS pointed out, the players have a voice in the rule-revising process.? Specifically, this year?s the rule changes were discussed with NFLPA president Domonique Foxworth, who worked with Lester Archambeaux, Charlie Batch, Ernie Conwell, Matt Hasselbeck, Brandon Moore, Jeff Saturday, Ben Watson, and Eric Winston in providing input to the Competition Committee.
Also, Will Montgomery of the Redskins presented video to the Competition Committee in connection with the rule that makes the snapper a defenseless player.
Former players also had a voice with the Player Safety Advisory panel, which includes John Madden, Ronnie Lott, Ernie Accorsi, Antonio Freeman, Patrick Kerney, Willie Lanier, Oliver Luck, Steve Mariucci, Anthony Munoz.
So, basically, Polamalu already got what he wanted, without finding a lamp or losing an eyelash.
NEW YORK (AP) ? Marilyn Monroe's letter of despair to mentor Lee Strasberg and Dwight D. Eisenhower's heartfelt missives to his wife during World War II are among hundreds of historical documents being offered in an online auction.
Monroe's handwritten, undated letter to the famed acting teacher is expected to fetch $30,000 to $50,000 in the May 30 sale.
"My will is weak but I can't stand anything. I sound crazy but I think I'm going crazy," Monroe wrote on Hotel Bel-Air letterhead stationery. "It's just that I get before a camera and my concentration and everything I'm trying to learn leaves me. Then I feel like I'm not existing in the human race at all."
The 58 Eisenhower letters, handwritten between 1942 and 1945, range from news of the war to the Allied commander's devotion to his wife, Mamie. They are believed to be among the largest group of Eisenhower letters to survive intact and could bring up to $120,000, said Joseph Maddalena, whose Profiles in History is auctioning the items.
They are among 250 letters and documents being sold by an anonymous American collector. Selected items will be exhibited April 8-16 at Douglas Elliman's Madison Avenue art gallery.
Also included is a typed, undated draft letter from John Lennon to Linda and Paul McCartney that reflects the deep animosity between the two Beatles around the time of the foursome's formal 1971 breakup. The two-page letter is unsigned and contains corrections. A photographic logo on the stationery shows Lennon and his wife Yoko Ono within a circle with their lips almost touching.
"Do you really think most of today's art came about because of the Beatles? I don't believe you're that insane ? Paul ? do you believe that? When you stop believing it you might wake up!" Lennon writes. It's expected to fetch $40,000 to $60,000.
Other highlights include two large photo albums that Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini exchanged prior to World War II.
"When Mussolini and Hitler visited each other before the war, they would each have their photographers document their trips," Maddalena said. "They really documented the regalia, the flags, the uniforms, tanks and all the pomp and circumstance, and them speaking and reviewing the troops."
The leather-bound albums, containing hundreds of images, have a pre-sale estimate of up to $50,000.
The sale is the second of several planned online auctions of the anonymous collector's artifacts. The entire collection contains 3,000 items.
CAIRO (AP) ? The leader of Egypt's ruling Islamists has lashed out at the opposition, accusing it of teaming up with remnants of Hosni Mubarak's regime to sow unrest and violence.
Thursday's remarks by Muslim Brotherhood leader Mohammed Badie came in his weekly message to followers.
He says that some unnamed Egyptian politicians now are bankrolled by foreign funds to instigate violence and that they have joined forces with Mubarak loyalists to do so.
Badie also offered a version of the tumultuous events since the uprising in January 2011 against Mubarak that is favorable to his group, saying the Brotherhood was the engine and protector of that revolt.
Badie echoed President Mohammed Morsi's message, articulated several times this week ? that recent unrest was the work of paid thugs, not real "revolutionaries."
DETROIT/NEW YORK (Reuters) - Fisker Automotive, the green-car company that has not built a car since July, hired restructuring lawyers from Kirkland & Ellis to prepare for a possible bankruptcy filing, The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday, citing people familiar with the matter.
The cash-strapped automaker, which furloughed its more than 200 U.S. workers this week to conserve cash, has been exploring bankruptcy as an option, while it continues to look for a strategic partner, two people briefed on the matter said.
A Fisker spokesman declined to comment on the possibility of a bankruptcy restructuring.
On April 22, Fisker must make a payment on a U.S. Department of Energy loan.
In 2009, Fisker won a $529 million federal loan as part of an Obama administration program to spur advanced vehicle development. Fisker drew down $193 million before the Department of Energy barred the company from accessing further funds, citing delays in the launch of its flagship car, the Karma plug-in hybrid.
Fisker had been in strategic talks with two Chinese automakers, Dongfeng Motor Group and Zhejiang Geely Holding Group, but those talks fell apart. Fisker's chief executive, Tony Posawatz, visited China this week to try to rekindle those deals, sources previously said.
(Reporting by Deepa Seetharaman in Detroit and Paul Lienert in New York; Editing by Leslie Adler)
Thinking positively about your situation is a form of personal development and will allow you to have a more fulfilling lifestyle. The following article offers many useful tips that you can use to begin your self improvement journey.
It?s a good personal guideline to treat everyone with respect even if they don?t necessarily have anything you might need from them. Your treatment of others is a direct reflection of you character.
TIP! Leadership is necessary for personal development. There are many different facets of leadership, but the one people talk about most is the ability to win friends and influence people.
Self-discipline is a key element of any self improvement program. You should strive to control your temptations and increase your self control. Learn to resist the desires to overindulge yourself in food, drink, and other physical desires. Being able to control your desires and restrain your urges will keep you from harming your mind and your body.
Paying attention to your body is a good personal development practice. When your body tells you that it needs something, such as food, drink, or medical care, then it should be a priority to give it what it is asking for. If you listen to your body, you will be in better shape. If you neglect your body now, you will pay for it down the line.
Get organized. Organizing things will give you the feeling that you?ve accomplished something, and increase your confidence levels as well. This also helps relieve you from stress caused by disorganization. When things have a place and are organized, you will feel calmer in your surroundings.
TIP! It is important that you feel comfortable using the abilities that you have. Employ your skills, talents and abilities to make your personal development program successful.
If you are never able to meet the goals you set, then it?s time to figure out your problem areas and make some changes. One way to check yourself is to go online and read what others have experienced when aiming for the same kind of achievements. You can compare your experience with theirs, and perhaps learn a better approach. You may realize you have been unrealistic, not having given yourself the means necessary to achieve your goal, or that perhaps you have set too high a mark.
Accomplish the things in life you want to accomplish. If you sit around wishing for a certain kind of life and don?t act toward making that life reality, then you will obviously never have that life. You need to do everything in your power to make your dreams come true.
One important aspect of personal development is deciding what you want out of life. Having long-term goals is great, because you could have a big change in your perspective.
TIP! When dealing with depression, a diet that includes more complex carbohydrates is better. A lack of complex carbs can lead to a shortage of serotonin, a significant factor in depression.
You can?t make everyone happy, but you can make yourself happy. This doesn?t mean that you should only think of yourself, but in some cases, you really need to put yourself first. When you live your life always staying true to your beliefs, morals and ethics, happiness should naturally follow you down the path of self improvement.
You need a good attitude for personal development. Living your life with a poor attitude will only attract more of the same to your life. To reach your goals, keep your eye on the prize and don?t let a negative, defeatist attitude hold you back.
Your self improvement goals should be specific enough to lead the way to success. Having a specific end result to work towards gives you more precise ways to get to the goal, and gives you a better chance at success. This will help you go over obstacles and enjoy your successes.
TIP! Incorporate your belief system into daily living. Everyone has beliefs that are central to their sense of self.
This article?s intention has been to provide you with an opportunity to reflect on your personality and thought process and to use this reflection to improve your overall lifestyle. Following these simple tips can get you started on self improvement, changing yourself for the better, and living a new life.
LONDON (AP) ? A record-breaking cyberattack targeting an anti-spam watchdog group has sent ripples of disruption coursing across the Web, experts said Wednesday.
Spamhaus, a site responsible for keeping ads for counterfeit Viagra and bogus weight-loss pills out of the world's inboxes, said it had been buffeted by the monster denial-of-service attack since mid-March, apparently from groups angry at being blacklisted by the Swiss-British group.
"It is a small miracle that we're still online," Spamhaus researcher Vincent Hanna said.
Denial-of-service attacks overwhelm a server with traffic ? like hundreds of letters being jammed through a mail slot at the same time. Security experts measure those attacks in bits of data per second. Recent cyberattacks ? like the ones that caused persistent outages at U.S. banking sites late last year ? have tended to peak at 100 billion bits per second.
But the furious assault on Spamhaus has shattered the charts, clocking in at 300 billion bits per second, according to San Francisco-based CloudFlare Inc., which Spamhaus has enlisted to help it weather the attack.
"It was likely quite a bit more, but at some point measurement systems can't keep up," CloudFlare chief executive Matthew Prince wrote in an email.
Patrick Gilmore of Akamai Technologies said that was no understatement.
"This attack is the largest that has been publicly disclosed ? ever ? in the history of the Internet," he said.
It's unclear who exactly was behind the attack, although a man who identified himself as Sven Olaf Kamphuis said he was in touch with the attackers and described them as mainly consisting of disgruntled Russian Internet service providers who had found themselves on Spamhaus' blacklists. There was no immediate way to verify his claim.
He accused the watchdog of arbitrarily blocking content that it did not like. Spamhaus has widely used and constantly updated blacklists of sites that send spam.
"They abuse their position not to stop spam but to exercise censorship without a court order," Kamphuis said.
Gilmore and Prince said the attack's perpetrators had taken advantage of weaknesses in the Internet's infrastructure to trick thousands of servers into routing a torrent of junk traffic to Spamhaus every second.
The trick, called "DNS reflection," works a little bit like mailing requests for information to thousands of different organizations with a target's return address written across the back of the envelopes. When all the organizations reply at once, they send a landslide of useless data to the unwitting addressee.
Both experts said the attack's sheer size has sent ripples of disruptions across the Internet as servers moved mountains of junk traffic back and forth across the Web.
"At a minimum there would have been slowness," Prince said, adding in a blog post that "if the Internet felt a bit more sluggish for you over the last few days in Europe, this may be part of the reason why."
At the London Internet Exchange, where service providers exchange traffic across the globe, spokesman Malcolm Hutty said his organization had seen "a minor degree of congestion in a small portion of the network."
But he said it was unlikely that any ordinary users had been affected by the attack.
Hanna said his site had so far managed to stay online, but warned that being knocked off the Internet could give spammers an opening to step up their mailings ? which may mean more fake lottery announcements and pitches for penny stocks heading to people's inboxes.
Hanna denied claims that his organization had behaved arbitrarily, noting that his group would lose its credibility if it started flagging benign content as spam.
"We have 1.7 billion people who watch over our shoulder," he said. "If we start blocking emails that they want, they will obviously stop using us."
Gilmore of Akamai was also dismissive of the claim that Spamhaus was biased.
Moscow, Russia-based online hotel booking service provider Ostrovok has raised $25 million in Series B funding, a mere two weeks after one of its main local rivals, Internet travel agency Oktogo.ru, raised $11 million.
Ostrovok?s capital injection comes from a mix of prior and new backers, including General Catalyst Partners ? which led the round ? Frontier Ventures, Accel Partners, global tech investor extraordinaire Yuri Milner, prolific Silicon Valley investor Shervin Pishevar, ex-Expedia CEO Eric Blachford and the former head of UBS Russia, Edward Kaufman.
The round, which Ostrovok claims makes it the best-capitalized online travel company in Russia, will likely not be the last for the startup.
Going all-in
In a phone conversation with co-founder and CEO Serge Faguet earlier this week, I learned that there?s no cashing out involved in this fundraising round and that every penny went straight into the fledgling company.
In fact, both co-founders, Faguet and Kirill Makharinsky, contributed $2 million of their own money to the Series B round.
Makharinsky previously co-founded YouNoodle and worked at Slide.com, while Faguet had a stint working for Google and co-founded TokBox.
?We?re in it for the long haul,? Faguet told me, ?and we will likely close more funding rounds, potentially even raise hundreds of millions of dollars in the next few years. We?re really serious about turning Ostrovok into a multi-billion dollar company over time.?
A capital-intensive business
The above is quite an unorthodox thing for any startup founder to say when raising money (at least out loud), especially relatively big rounds like this one, but Faguet explains:
?Online hotel booking is actually more of a capital-intensive business than most people think, especially when you consider the way we work and taking into account the specifics of the Russian market.?
Faguet points out that part of its 200-strong workforce travels to all corners of Russia to build direct, long-term relationships with hotels country-wide, and that a lot of resources also goes into making sure all of its product, both for the Web and mobile devices, are top-notch.
The third reason why the Russian online hotel booking market is an expensive space to operate in, Faguet argues, is that consumers don?t (yet) generally trust Internet service providers with their money.
?Ostrovok is on a mission to build a true, trustworthy mainstream consumer brand in Russia?, Faguet adds, ?which means a lot of money goes into marketing the company.?
Ostrovok is currently running television advertising campaigns on a major public TV network for that very reason.
Raising for growth
Ostrovok says the $25 million will help the company to continue developing its existing as well as new products, such as a third-party API to integrate its inventory and accelerate sales across partner networks.
Ostrovok?s API is currently used by a range of partners, including MegaFon, Tripadvisor, Kayak, Sheremetyevo airport and others.
Last year, Ostrovok launched mobile apps for iOS and Android, and a steady stream of revenue is now coming from on-the-go customers.
Faguet tells me approximately 10 percent of all bookings through Ostrovok are currently made using a mobile device, whether it?s a smartphone or tablet app or a portable connected device owner using the company?s website.
In addition to product development, Ostrovok also plans to use the funds for business expansion, in particular growing its sales and customer service teams.
The company?s aim is to become the leading online booking service based on the number of bookable hotels across the former USSR, challenging leader Booking.com in particular.
Founded in late 2010, Ostrovok?s Web and mobile properties today receive more than two million visits every month.
The fledgling company offers its users a selection of more than 135,000 hotels in 200 countries around the world. In the past eighteen months, Ostrovok signed direct agreements with over 4,800 hotels in Russia and the CIS, trumping all existing local players in terms of numbers.
In 2013, Ostrovok plans to establish direct connections with hotels in Europe, Asia, and the United States.
Smart money
Faguet asserts that all of the investors in the Series B round were carefully chosen, some because they?ve funded the company in earlier stages (General Catalyst), others because they should be helpful in terms of supporting growth with local and international business expertise (former Expedia CEO Eric Blachford), and others because they can open doors for larger funding rounds down the road (another new backer of Ostrovok is Steve Hellman, country CEO for Credit Suisse Russia).
Yuri Milner?s involvement is notable too: according to Faguet, this is the first investment he?s made in a Russian company in three years. In a statement, Milner notes that the ?persistence, commitment and strategic vision of the team? contributed to his decision to invest.
Dmitry Alimov, managing partner of Frontier Ventures, which is itself backed by the co-founders of Digital Sky Technologies and Mail.ru, says:
?Online hotel booking services is one of the largest, fastest-growing and most profitable parts of the online travel business. We are happy to support Ostrovok, and will help the team build the best product for the Russian consumers.?
Philadelphia, PA, March 26, 2013 Like it or not and despite the surrounding debate of its merits, 3-D is the technology du jour for movie-making in Hollywood. It now turns out that even our brains use 3 dimensions to communicate emotions.
According to a new study published in Biological Psychiatry, the human report of emotion relies on three distinct systems: one system that directs attention to affective states ("I feel"), a second system that categorizes these states into words ("good", "bad", etc.); and a third system that relates the intensity of affective responses ("bad" or "awful"?).
Emotions are central to the human experience. Whether we are feeling happy, sad, afraid, or angry, we are often asked to identify and report on these feelings. This happens when friends ask us how we are doing, when we talk about professional or personal relationships, when we meditate, and so on. In fact, the very commonness and ease of reporting what we are feeling can lead us to overlook just how important such reports are - and how devastating the impairment of this ability may be for individuals with clinical disorders ranging from major depression to schizophrenia to autism spectrum disorders.
Progress in brain science has steadily been shedding light on the circuits and processes that underlie mood states. One of the leaders in this effort, Dr. Kevin Ochsner, Director of the Social Cognitive Neuroscience Lab at Columbia University, studies the neural bases of social, cognitive and affective processes. In this new study, he and his team set out to study the processes involved in constructing self-reports of emotion, rather than the effects of the self-reports or the emotional states themselves for which there is already much research.
To accomplish this, they recruited healthy participants who underwent brain scans while completing an experimental task that generated a self-report of emotion. This effort allowed the researchers to examine the neural architecture underlying the emotional reports.
"We find that the seemingly simple ability is supported by three different kinds of brain systems: largely subcortical regions that trigger an initial affective response, parts of medial prefrontal cortex that focus our awareness on the response and help generate possible ways of describing what we are feeling, and a part of the lateral prefrontal cortex that helps pick the best words for the feelings at hand," said Ochsner.
"These findings suggest that self-reports of emotion - while seemingly simple - are supported by a network of brain regions that together take us from an affecting event to the words that make our feelings known to ourselves and others," he added. "As such, these results have important implications for understanding both the nature of everyday emotional life - and how the ability to understand and talk about our emotions can break down in clinical populations."
Dr. John Krystal, Editor of Biological Psychiatry, said, "It is critical that we understand the mechanisms underlying the absorption in emotion, the valence of emotion, and the intensity of emotion. In the short run, appreciation of the distinct circuits mediating these dimensions of emotional experience helps us to understand how brain injury, stroke, and tumors produce different types of mood changes. In the long run, it may help us to better treat mood disorders."
###
The article is "The Functional Neural Architecture of Self-Reports of Affective Experience" by Ajay B. Satpute, Jocelyn Shu, Jochen Weber, Mathieu Roy, and Kevin N. Ochsner (doi: 10.1016/j.biopsych.2012.10.001). The article appears in Biological Psychiatry, Volume 73, Issue 7 (April 1, 2013), published by Elsevier.
Notes for Editors
Full text of the article is available to credentialed journalists upon request; contact Rhiannon Bugno at +1 214 648 0880 or Biol.Psych@utsouthwestern.edu. Journalists wishing to interview the authors may contact Kevin Ochsner at +1 212 854 1860 or ochsner@psych.columbia.edu.
The authors' affiliations, and disclosures of financial and conflicts of interests are available in the article.
John H. Krystal, M.D., is Chairman of the Department of Psychiatry at the Yale University School of Medicine and a research psychiatrist at the VA Connecticut Healthcare System. His disclosures of financial and conflicts of interests are available here.
About Biological Psychiatry
Biological Psychiatry is the official journal of the Society of Biological Psychiatry, whose purpose is to promote excellence in scientific research and education in fields that investigate the nature, causes, mechanisms and treatments of disorders of thought, emotion, or behavior. In accord with this mission, this peer-reviewed, rapid-publication, international journal publishes both basic and clinical contributions from all disciplines and research areas relevant to the pathophysiology and treatment of major psychiatric disorders.
The journal publishes novel results of original research which represent an important new lead or significant impact on the field, particularly those addressing genetic and environmental risk factors, neural circuitry and neurochemistry, and important new therapeutic approaches. Reviews and commentaries that focus on topics of current research and interest are also encouraged.
Biological Psychiatry is one of the most selective and highly cited journals in the field of psychiatric neuroscience. It is ranked 5th out of 129 Psychiatry titles and 16th out of 243 Neurosciences titles in the Journal Citations Reports published by Thomson Reuters. The 2011 Impact Factor score for Biological Psychiatry is 8.283.
About Elsevier
Elsevier is a world-leading provider of scientific, technical and medical information products and services. The company works in partnership with the global science and health communities to publish more than 2,000 journals, including The Lancet and Cell, and close to 20,000 book titles, including major reference works from Mosby and Saunders. Elsevier's online solutions include ScienceDirect, Scopus, Reaxys, ClinicalKey and Mosby's Suite, which enhance the productivity of science and health professionals, and the SciVal suite and MEDai's Pinpoint Review, which help research and health care institutions deliver better outcomes more cost-effectively.
A global business headquartered in Amsterdam, Elsevier employs 7,000 people worldwide. The company is part of Reed Elsevier Group PLC, a world leading provider of professional information solutions in the Science, Medical, Legal and Risk and Business sectors, which is jointly owned by Reed Elsevier PLC and Reed Elsevier NV. The ticker symbols are REN (Euronext Amsterdam), REL (London Stock Exchange), RUK and ENL (New York Stock Exchange).
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Human emotion: We report our feelings in 3-DPublic release date: 27-Mar-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Philadelphia, PA, March 26, 2013 Like it or not and despite the surrounding debate of its merits, 3-D is the technology du jour for movie-making in Hollywood. It now turns out that even our brains use 3 dimensions to communicate emotions.
According to a new study published in Biological Psychiatry, the human report of emotion relies on three distinct systems: one system that directs attention to affective states ("I feel"), a second system that categorizes these states into words ("good", "bad", etc.); and a third system that relates the intensity of affective responses ("bad" or "awful"?).
Emotions are central to the human experience. Whether we are feeling happy, sad, afraid, or angry, we are often asked to identify and report on these feelings. This happens when friends ask us how we are doing, when we talk about professional or personal relationships, when we meditate, and so on. In fact, the very commonness and ease of reporting what we are feeling can lead us to overlook just how important such reports are - and how devastating the impairment of this ability may be for individuals with clinical disorders ranging from major depression to schizophrenia to autism spectrum disorders.
Progress in brain science has steadily been shedding light on the circuits and processes that underlie mood states. One of the leaders in this effort, Dr. Kevin Ochsner, Director of the Social Cognitive Neuroscience Lab at Columbia University, studies the neural bases of social, cognitive and affective processes. In this new study, he and his team set out to study the processes involved in constructing self-reports of emotion, rather than the effects of the self-reports or the emotional states themselves for which there is already much research.
To accomplish this, they recruited healthy participants who underwent brain scans while completing an experimental task that generated a self-report of emotion. This effort allowed the researchers to examine the neural architecture underlying the emotional reports.
"We find that the seemingly simple ability is supported by three different kinds of brain systems: largely subcortical regions that trigger an initial affective response, parts of medial prefrontal cortex that focus our awareness on the response and help generate possible ways of describing what we are feeling, and a part of the lateral prefrontal cortex that helps pick the best words for the feelings at hand," said Ochsner.
"These findings suggest that self-reports of emotion - while seemingly simple - are supported by a network of brain regions that together take us from an affecting event to the words that make our feelings known to ourselves and others," he added. "As such, these results have important implications for understanding both the nature of everyday emotional life - and how the ability to understand and talk about our emotions can break down in clinical populations."
Dr. John Krystal, Editor of Biological Psychiatry, said, "It is critical that we understand the mechanisms underlying the absorption in emotion, the valence of emotion, and the intensity of emotion. In the short run, appreciation of the distinct circuits mediating these dimensions of emotional experience helps us to understand how brain injury, stroke, and tumors produce different types of mood changes. In the long run, it may help us to better treat mood disorders."
###
The article is "The Functional Neural Architecture of Self-Reports of Affective Experience" by Ajay B. Satpute, Jocelyn Shu, Jochen Weber, Mathieu Roy, and Kevin N. Ochsner (doi: 10.1016/j.biopsych.2012.10.001). The article appears in Biological Psychiatry, Volume 73, Issue 7 (April 1, 2013), published by Elsevier.
Notes for Editors
Full text of the article is available to credentialed journalists upon request; contact Rhiannon Bugno at +1 214 648 0880 or Biol.Psych@utsouthwestern.edu. Journalists wishing to interview the authors may contact Kevin Ochsner at +1 212 854 1860 or ochsner@psych.columbia.edu.
The authors' affiliations, and disclosures of financial and conflicts of interests are available in the article.
John H. Krystal, M.D., is Chairman of the Department of Psychiatry at the Yale University School of Medicine and a research psychiatrist at the VA Connecticut Healthcare System. His disclosures of financial and conflicts of interests are available here.
About Biological Psychiatry
Biological Psychiatry is the official journal of the Society of Biological Psychiatry, whose purpose is to promote excellence in scientific research and education in fields that investigate the nature, causes, mechanisms and treatments of disorders of thought, emotion, or behavior. In accord with this mission, this peer-reviewed, rapid-publication, international journal publishes both basic and clinical contributions from all disciplines and research areas relevant to the pathophysiology and treatment of major psychiatric disorders.
The journal publishes novel results of original research which represent an important new lead or significant impact on the field, particularly those addressing genetic and environmental risk factors, neural circuitry and neurochemistry, and important new therapeutic approaches. Reviews and commentaries that focus on topics of current research and interest are also encouraged.
Biological Psychiatry is one of the most selective and highly cited journals in the field of psychiatric neuroscience. It is ranked 5th out of 129 Psychiatry titles and 16th out of 243 Neurosciences titles in the Journal Citations Reports published by Thomson Reuters. The 2011 Impact Factor score for Biological Psychiatry is 8.283.
About Elsevier
Elsevier is a world-leading provider of scientific, technical and medical information products and services. The company works in partnership with the global science and health communities to publish more than 2,000 journals, including The Lancet and Cell, and close to 20,000 book titles, including major reference works from Mosby and Saunders. Elsevier's online solutions include ScienceDirect, Scopus, Reaxys, ClinicalKey and Mosby's Suite, which enhance the productivity of science and health professionals, and the SciVal suite and MEDai's Pinpoint Review, which help research and health care institutions deliver better outcomes more cost-effectively.
A global business headquartered in Amsterdam, Elsevier employs 7,000 people worldwide. The company is part of Reed Elsevier Group PLC, a world leading provider of professional information solutions in the Science, Medical, Legal and Risk and Business sectors, which is jointly owned by Reed Elsevier PLC and Reed Elsevier NV. The ticker symbols are REN (Euronext Amsterdam), REL (London Stock Exchange), RUK and ENL (New York Stock Exchange).
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T-Mobile has started to roll out 4G services in the Phoenix and San Jose ahead of a press gathering today, according to our tipsters. Screen grabs show the service alive and kicking out speeds in the 20-30Mbps range, though we've yet to verify it for ourselves. The company already outed its "UnCarrier" plans on its site earlier featuring non-subsidized smartphones -- including LTE models -- along with unlimited voice, text and basic data plans. We should be able to color in the rest of the details later this morning.
Mar. 25, 2013 ? In an animal study, researchers at the University of Washington show that it was possible to use gene therapy to boost heart muscle function. The finding suggests that it might be possible to use this approach to treat patients whose hearts have been weakened by heart attacks and other heart conditions.
Led by University of Washington (UW) Professor and Vice Chair of Bioengineering Michael Regnier and Dr. Chuck Murry, director of the Center for Cardiovascular Biology and co-director of the Institute for Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine at UW, the study appears online today in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).
Normally, muscle contraction is powered by a molecule, the nucleotide called Adenosine-5'-triphosphate (ATP). Other naturally occurring nucleotides can also power muscle contraction, but, in most cases, they have proven to be less effective than ATP.
In an earlier study of isolated muscle, however, Regnier, Murry and colleagues had found that one naturally occurring molecule, called 2 deoxy-ATP (dATP), was actually more effective than ATP in powering muscle contraction, increasing both the speed and force of the contraction, at least over the short-term.
In the new PNAS study, the researchers wanted to see whether this effect could be sustained. To do this, they used genetic engineering to create a strain of mice whose cells produced higher-than-normal levels of an enzyme called Ribonucleotide Reductase, which converts the precursor of ATP, adenosine-5'-diphosphate or ADP, to dADP, which, in turn, is rapidly converted to dATP.
"This fundamental discovery, that dATP can act as a 'super-fuel' for the contractile machinery of the heart, or myofilaments, opens up the possibility to treat a variety of heart failure conditions," Regnier said. "An exciting aspect of this study and our ongoing work is that a relatively small increase in dATP in the heart cells has a big effect on heart performance."
The researchers found that increased production of the enzyme Ribonucleotide Reductase increased the concentration of dATP within heart cells approximately tenfold, and even though this level was still less than one to two percent of the cell's total pool of ATP, the increase led to a sustained improvement in heart muscle function, with the genetically engineered hearts contracting more quickly and with greater force.
"It looks as though we may have stumbled on an important pathway that nature uses to regulate heart contractility," Murry added. "The same pathway that heart cells use to make the building blocks for DNA during embryonic growth makes dATP to supercharge contraction when the adult heart is mechanically stressed."
Importantly, the elevated dATP effect was achieved without imposing additional metabolic demands on the cells, suggesting the modification would not harm the cell's functioning over the long-term.
The finding, the authors write, suggest that treatments that elevate dATP levels in heart cells may prove to be an effective treatment for heart failure.
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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by University of Washington - Health Sciences, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.
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Journal Reference:
Sarah G. Nowakowski, Stephen C. Kolwicz, Frederick Steven Korte, Zhaoxiong Luo, Jacqueline N. Robinson-Hamm, Jennifer L. Page, Frank Brozovich, Robert S. Weiss, Rong Tian, Charles E. Murry, and Michael Regnier. Transgenic overexpression of ribonucleotide reductase improves cardiac performance. PNAS, March 25, 2013 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1220693110
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Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.
Microsoft would certainly argue that its Surface tablet design is iconic. The company is doing more than simply extolling the virtues of kickstands and VaporMg casings, however. It just obtained a trio of design patents that cover both the Touch Cover keyboard and the magnetic coupling on the tablet that so often gives Microsoft something to dance about. You won't find any deep insights into the technological workings here -- still, this might give some would-be Surface KIRF creators a reason to hesitate.
The military has restricted access to the Bradley Manning trial. So much so that no recording devices were allowed into the court room, and many journalists have been forced to take notes by hand! Further no transcripts were released.
Thankfully audio of Bradley Manning's recent testimony at a pre-trial hearing was released by unknown persons and it has since been published by the Freedom of the Press Foundation. In the testimony Bradley Manning expresses in his own words the importance of his actions, and he has shown that he is indeed a heroic whistle-blower.
It's supposed to be an hour when everyone conserves energy by turning off the lights and other superfluous power drains. But apparently Paramount is still not up-to-speed on what Earth Hour is all about since over the weekend it celebrated the event by sending 30 quadrotor drones into the air, forming the Starfleet insignia to promote the upcoming release of Star Trek Into Darkness. More »
Mar. 25, 2013 ? A flame retardant removed from children's pajamas 30 years ago but now used in polyurethane foam is prevalent in office environments, especially in older buildings, where urine testing of workers turned up widespread evidence of its biomarker, a new study led by Boston University School of Public Health researchers has found.
The study, published in the journal Environment International, found that the chemical known as TDCPP -- chlorinated tris(1,3-dichloro-2-propyl) phosphate, or 'chlorinated tris' -- was present in 99 percent of dust samples taken from participants' homes, vehicles and offices, "demonstrating the widespread presence of this flame retardant in the indoor environment." The research team recruited 31 adults who worked and lived in the Boston area for the testing.
The study found that the office environment was the strongest predictor of metabolized TDCPP in urine, with significantly lower concentrations of the chemical among workers in a new office building than in older buildings. Similarly, the average concentration of TDCPP in dust was significantly lower in the new office building than in the older office buildings.
Urine samples were collected during the workday, which may explain why an association was found between the quickly metabolized chemical and characteristics of the office, rather than the vehicle or home.
"Overall, our findings suggest that exposure to TDCPP in the work environment is one of the contributors to the personal exposure for office workers. Further research is needed to confirm specific exposure sources (e.g., polyurethane foam), determine the importance of exposure in other microenvironments such as homes and vehicles, and address the inhalation and dermal exposure pathways," the research team concluded.
TDCPP, an additive to polyurethane foam used in upholstered furniture, is found in dust, where it can likely lead to human exposure. Potential health effects remain a concern. In 2011, TDCPP was added to the Proposition 65 list of chemicals known by the State of California to cause cancer.
In vitro studies suggest TDCPP may be neurotoxic, and one study found that increased concentrations in dust were associated with decreased semen quality and reduced free thyroxine in men, suggesting possible effects on fertility and thyroid function. Animal studies show TDCPP is readily absorbed through both the skin and gastrointestinal tract.
The researchers said the high concentrations observed in dust from offices could reflect requirements by the City of Boston that office furniture meet California fire retardant standards, a rule that is not required of residential furniture in Boston. The state of California has proposed a draft furniture flammability standard that could reduce the need for flame retardant chemicals in polyurethane foam. However, the standard used for office furniture has yet to be revised.
"It is currently very difficult to avoid flame retardants. Hopefully, better options will become available in the near future," said Courtney Carignan, a doctoral candidate in environmental health who co-authored the study. "Currently, the best advice we have for people is to wash your hands, especially before eating. Dust control, good ventilation and air purifiers may also be useful for reducing personal exposure."
The low concentrations of TDCPP in the newer office building suggest that its newer furniture did not contain TDCPP, or that it had not yet had sufficient time to migrate out of the products, the researchers said. If the new furniture did not contain TDCPP, it likely contained a different flame retardant such as the controversial FireMaster 550. Other differences between exposures include the possibility of more efficient ventilation or HVAC systems or cleaning methods in the newer building.
The authors urged that "more research is needed to determine factors that influence TDCPP concentrations in dust, in relation to building contents and characteristics."
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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Boston University Medical Center, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.
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Journal Reference:
Courtney C. Carignan, Michael D. McClean, Ellen M. Cooper, Deborah J. Watkins, Alicia J. Fraser, Wendy Heiger-Bernays, Heather M. Stapleton, Thomas F. Webster. Predictors of tris(1,3-dichloro-2-propyl) phosphate metabolite in the urine of office workers. Environment International, 2013; 55: 56 DOI: 10.1016/j.envint.2013.02.004
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Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.
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Public release date: 27-Mar-2013
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