The mycelia became free of viruses after 5 successive passages. Cultivation of the virus-cured mycelia on a mushroom compost medium
produced a normal harvest, whereas the spawn infected with viruses failed to produce any fruiting bodies. (C) 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.”
“According to an influential view of conceptual representation, action concepts are understood through motoric simulations, involving motor networks of the brain. A stronger Raf inhibitor version of this embodied account suggests that even figurative uses of action words (e.g., grasping the concept) are understood through motoric simulations. We investigated these claims by assessing whether Parkinson’s disease (PD), a disorder AZD9291 order affecting the motor system, is associated with selective deficits in comprehending action-related sentences. Twenty PD patients and 21 age-matched controls performed a sentence comprehension task, where sentences belonged to one of four conditions: literal action, non-idiomatic metaphoric action, idiomatic action, and abstract. The same verbs (referring to hand/arm actions)
were used in the three action-related conditions. Patients, but not controls, were slower to respond to literal and idiomatic action than to abstract sentences. These results indicate that sensory-motor systems play a functional role in semantic processing, including processing of figurative action language. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.”
“Background. Body dysmorphic disorder (BDD) is a poorly understood disorder that involves a preoccupation with imagined or minor bodily defects. Only a few studies of neuropsychological function have been conducted. Two previous studies have indicated executive dysfunction in BDD. The current study sought
to further define these executive deficits.
Method. Fourteen DSM-IV BDD patients and 14 age-and sex-matched control participants took part. Because of the high incidence of co-morbidity in BDD, patients with co-morbid Axis I disorders were not excluded. Control participants had no history of psychiatric illness. All participants completed the following executive function (EF) tests : Spatial Span (SS), Spatial Working Memory (SWM) and the GSK3326595 nmr Stockings of Cambridge (SOC) task. They also completed the Pattern Recognition (PR) test, a test of visual memory (VM).
Results. BDD participants made significantly more between-search errors on the SWM task, an effect that increased with task difficulty. Between-search errors are an example of poor maintenance and manipulation of information. SOC results indicated slower subsequent thinking times (i.e. the time taken to plan) in BDD participants. There were no group differences in SS or PR scores. The severity of BDD, depressive or anxiety symptoms was not correlated with performance on any of the cognitive tasks.
Conclusions.