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Biomedical subjects

M Reid

Publications and source records attributed to M Reid.

At least 199 records · Page 11Linked to original sources
PubMed1978

Variations in cerebral organization as a function of handedness, hand posture in writing, and sex.

During the past century, it has become increasingly apparent that there is a great deal of variation in the direction and degree of cerebral lateralization, a plurality of people having language and related functions strongly specialized to the left hemisphere and visuospatial functions strongly specialized to the right, with substantial minorities manifesting various deviations from this pattern. In particular, in 35%-50% of sinistrals and 1%-10% of dextrals, the right hemisphere is specialized for linguistic skills, and in some unknown fraction of the two handedness groups, verbal and/or spatial abilities are, to varying extents, bilateralized. Levy (1973) suggested that the hand posture adopted during writing might be an index of the lateral relationship between the dominant writing hand and the language hemisphere, a normal posture indicating contralateral language specialization, and an inverted posture indicating ipsilateral language specialization. In the present investigation, two tachistoscopic tests of cerebral lateralization, one measuring spatial functions and one measuring verbal function, were administered to 73 subjects classified by handedness, hand posture during writing, and sex. Among both dextral and sinistral subjects with a normal writing posture, language and spatial functions were specialized to the contralateral and ipsilateral hemispheres, respectively, and lateral differentiation of the brain was strong. The reverse was seen in subjects having an inverted writing posture. In all groups, females were less laterally differentiated than males. In 70 out of 73 subjects, the direction of cerebral laterization was accurately predicted by handedness and hand posture. The 3 subjects (2 females and 1 male) who failed to manifest the predicted relations were all left-handers having an inverted hand posture . In this group, lateral differentiation was so weak that the reliability of the tachistoscopic tests was reduced, and we attribute these three predictive failures to this cause. Thus, almost all of the variation in the lateral organization of the brain was accounted for by handedness, hand posture, and sex.

Cerebral Cortex↗
PubMed1978

Immunity to antigenically related salmonellae: effects of humoral factors on the bactericidal activity of normal and immune peritoneal exudate cells.

Immunity against Salmonella enteritidis and Listeria monocytogenes was studied by measuring in vitro the bactericidal activity of peritoneal exudate cells (PEC) of control (normal PEC) and S. typhi Ty2-immune (immune PEC) mice. Specific immune serum, anti-S. tyhphi Ty2, heat inactivated at 56 degrees C for 30 min, significantly inhibited the growth of S. enteritidis only with immune PEC. These opsonic factors had no effect upon the activity of normal PEC. That such inhibition could not be demonstrated in Listeria experiments, either with immune or normal PEC, suggests that S. enteritidis was specifically recognized, in vitro, by the thermostable opsonin anti-S. typhi Ty2 and that macrophages from immune PEC were more efficient in inhibiting bacterial growth than those from normal PEC. Thus, the interaction between macrophages and the microorganism seems to play an essential role in cell-mediated as well as humoral immunity.

Antibodies, Bacterial↗
PubMed1977

Effect of aflatoxin B1 on hepatic polyribosomes and protein synthesis in the rat.

This study was concerned with the effect of aflatoxin B1 on protein synthesis in rat liver. Specifically, the effect of the administration of aflatoxin B1 (6.0 mg/kg body weight) on hepatic polyribosomes (free and membranebound), protein synthesis in vitro, and initiation factors activity of rats within 3-12 h was investigated. The results revealed that aflatoxin B1 rapidly led to disaggregation of free and membrane-bound polyribosomes, to inhibition of in vitro protein synthesis by both populations of polyribosomes, to little or no effect on the activities of initiation factors, and to defective ribosomes, particularly the 60S ribosomal subnits, of both types of polyribosomes. Comparative studies on the effects of aflatoxin B1 and actinomycin D revealed progressive disaggregation by both hepatic free and membrane-bound polyribosomes after aflatoxin B1 but not only of the free polyribosomes after actinomycin D.

Aflatoxins↗
PubMed1976

Variations in writing posture and cerebral organization.

Two tachistoscopic tests of cerebral lateralization were administered to 73 subjects classified by handedness, sex, and hand orientation in writing. The results indicated that the direction of cerebral lateralization could be indexed from a subject's handedness and hand posture during writing. In subjects with a normal writing posture, the linguistically specialized hemisphere was contralateral to the dominant hand, and the visuospatially specialized hemisphere was ipsilateral; the reverse was true in subjects with an "inverted" hand position during writing. Females and subjects having an inverted hand posture manifested smaller degrees of lateral differentiation than males and subjects with a typical hand posture.

Adult↗
PubMed1976

Bilateral testicular torsion in the newborn.

A neonate with bilateral torsion of the testes is described. Torsion occurred in utero and was discovered only on routine examination after birth. The relevance of the comparatively silent torsion is discussed in relation to the age of the child, and the timing of routine examination of the newborn.

Humans↗
PubMed1976

Study of neonatal gastric aspirate related to amniotic fluid and to the occurrence of the idiopathic respiratory distress syndrome.

The lecithin/sphingomyelin ratio (L/S) has been shown to be of use in the prediction of the idiopathic respiratory distress syndrome (I.R.D.S) when performed on amniotic fluid. Gastric contents at birth consist mainly of amniotic fluid. Our study was designed to determine what the relationship was between the L/S ratios of amniotic fluid and gastric aspirate obtained at birth and to examine whether the L/S ratios of gastric aspirate was of any value in the prediction of I.R.D.S.

Amniotic Fluid↗
PubMed1974

Ionophore-mediated coupling between ion fluxes and amino acid absorption in mouse ascites-tumour cells. Restoration of the physiological gradients of methionine by valinomycin in the absence of adenosine triphosphate.

1. Preparations of mouse ascites-tumour cells depleted of ATP and Na(+) ions accumulated l-methionine, in the presence of cyanide and deoxyglucose, from a 1mm solution containing 80mequiv. of Na(+)/l and about 5mequiv. of K(+)/l. Valinomycin increased, from about 4 to 16, the maximum value of the ratio of the cellular to extracellular concentrations of methionine formed under these conditions without markedly affecting the distributions of Na(+) and of K(+). Similar observations were made with 2-aminoisobutyrate, glycine and l-leucine. Increasing the extracellular concentration of K(+) progressively decreased the accumulation of methionine in the presence of valinomycin. Over the physiological range of ionic gradients, the system behaved as though the absorption of methionine with Na(+) was closely coupled to the electrogenic efflux of K(+) through the ionophore. The process was insensitive to ouabain and so the sodium pump was probably not involved. 2. The amount of methionine accumulated during energy metabolism was similar to the optimal accumulation in the presence of valinomycin when ATP was lacking. It was also similarly affected by increasing the methionine concentration. 3. A mixture of nigericin and tetrachlorosalicylanilide mimicked the action of valinomycin. The anilide derivative inhibited the absorption of 2-aminoisobutyrate in the presence of valinomycin, but not in its absence. 4. Gramicidin inhibited methionine absorption and caused the preparations to absorb Na(+) and lose K(+). 5. The observations appear to verify the principle underlying the gradient hypothesis by showing that the tumour cells can efficiently couple the electrochemical gradient of Na(+) to the amino acid gradient.

Adenosine Triphosphate↗