Biomedical subjects
Publications and source records attributed to G L Allen.
Adult onset Still's disease (AOSD) is an uncommon, systemic, inflammatory disorder of unknown etiology characterized by the triad of fever, arthritis and rash. We describe 2 cases of cardiac tamponade in patients with AOSD, review reported cases, and describe the features, and therapy of AOSD.
We conducted two experiments to evaluate a multiple-code model for sentence memory that posits both propositional and visual representational systems. Both sentences involved recognition memory. The results of Experiment 1 indicated that subjects' recognition memory for concrete sentences was superior to their recognition memory for abstract sentences. Instructions to use visual imagery to enhance recognition performance yielded no effects. Experiment 2 tested the prediction that interference by a visual task would differentially affect recognition memory for concrete sentences. Results showed the interference task to have had a detrimental effect on recognition memory for both concrete and abstract sentences. Overall, the evidence provided partial support for both a multiple-code model and a semantic integration model of sentence memory.
Tumor necrosis factor (TNF) is a protein hormone implicated in the development of septic shock and other pathologic states. However, complexities inherent in detecting TNF synthesis by individual tissues have left the precise origins of this protein undefined. In addition, the possibility that localized TNF production may contribute to the pathogenesis of organ-specific diseases such as type I diabetes has not been explored in vivo. We have developed a transgenic mouse line bearing a reporter gene construct in which the TNF coding sequence and introns are replaced by a chloramphenicol acetyltransferase (CAT) coding sequence. In normal transgenic animals, CAT activity is expressed only in the thymus. When endotoxin is administered to the animals, CAT activity is also evident in kidney, heart, islets of Langerhans, spleen, lung, fallopian tubes, and uterus, but not in other organs. The biosynthesis of CAT in vivo correlated with tissue capacity to secrete TNF in vitro. Thus, TNF was secreted by all the tissues that expressed CAT, including lung, spleen, thymus, uterus/fallopian tubes, pancreatic islets, renal glomeruli, and cultured cardiac cells after exposure to endotoxin.
Different expressions of spatial knowledge were examined by having groups of first-, fourth-, and sixth-grade children perform model construction, verbal description, and route reversal tasks after they learned the correct path through a pedestrian maze. Age-related improvement was found in the rate of learning the maze and in the accuracy of verbal descriptions, suggesting that maze learning may be verbally mediated. All children performed well in sequencing intersections in the model but performed poorly in choosing path options in the model. Route reversal after learning was accurate and equivalent across groups. Overall, results suggest that both general and task-specific skills are involved in different products of spatial knowledge.
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Inexperienced beer-drinkers who could not pass a beer-flavor discrimination test were divided into a taste group, which received additional perceptual experience with beer flavors; a verbal group, which received instruction in beer flavor terminology; a taste/verbal group, which received both additional experience and instruction; and a control group. Before and after training, all subjects participated in a similarity rating task involving beer flavors and flavor-related adjectives. Additional taste experience--but not increased experience with beer-flavor terminology--improved novices' ability to detect identical beer flavors. Results are discussed in terms of the trainability of flavor discrimination and the role of cognitive factors (both flavor-related and flavor-independent) in marketing beverages.
The histories of 113 patients with Reiter's syndrome were reviewed to obtain information regarding the sequence of the clinical signs and symptoms, laboratory findings, and progression of disease. Rheumatologic manifestations occurred in 98% of the patients, genitourinary manifestations in 74%, ophthalmic manifestations in 58%, and mucocutaneous manifestations in 42%. Four major criteria and six categories of minor criteria for the diagnosis of Reiter's syndrome, based on the frequency and specificity of the various manifestations of the disease, are proposed. The ophthalmic and nonophthalmic features are important to appreciate because the ophthalmologist is frequently at the pivotal point in suggesting or supporting the diagnosis.
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Kindergartners, second, and fifth graders made repeated trips through a large- or small-scale model town, and then constructed from memory the layout of buildings in either a large- or small-scale space. Accuracy of construction increased as a function of developmental level and repeated trips through the town. Children's constructions were most accurate when they were tested in the same-scale environment as that in which they developed their spatial knowledge; accuracy was impaired significantly only when children were exposed to a small space and then reconstructed in a large space. Results were interpreted in terms of a "competence-load trade-off."
2 studies were conducted to investigate developmental differences in the ability to select and use environmental landmarks for cognitively organizing distance information from a walk. In experiment 1, second-grade, fifth-grade, and college subjects viewed a simulated walk and selected scenes that were high in potential landmark value. In experiment 2, children from the same grade levels first viewed the walk and then ranked distances among either the test scenes most frequently selected by their peers or those selected most frequently by adults. Results indicated that (a) adults and children may not spontaneously select the same features as real-world landmarks; (b) children are less capable than adults in judging the value of potential landmarks as distance cues; and (c) the ability to use environmental landmarks as cues for distance information developmentally precedes the ability to assess this potential information value.
Alternate-day corticosteroid therapy was compared with two daily corticosteroid regimens for the treatment of giant cell arteritis. In a prospective study 60 patients with this disease were randomly assigned to three treatment groups: group A, 15 mg of prednisone every 8 hours; group B, 45 mg of prednisone every morning; and group C, 90 mgof prednisone every other morning. After 1 month of treatment, the arteritis seemed to be completely suppressed in 18 patients in group A and 16 in group B but in only 6 in group C. In the 14 other patients in group C, the continuing symptoms were cyclic and developed during the day steroids were not given. By changing to a daily regimen, the arteritis was controlled in most patients in group C. Adverse reactions to prednisone were noted frequently in groups A and B but rarely in group C.
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Young and elderly adults' performance was compared on the Landmark Selection Task, designed to assess perceptual selection, and the Scrambled Route Task, designed to assess temporospatial integration. Age-related performance decrements were found on both tasks. Subjects' scores on psychometric tests hypothesized as involving some of the same processes as these experimental tasks yielded positive correlations to measures of task performance. Unexpectedly, self-estimates of wayfinding and distance estimation skills were negatively correlated to experimental task performance for elderly adults. Results were discussed in the context of declines in the effectiveness of selective attention, which is considered critical to perceptual selection, and in the proficiency of working memory, which is considered central to temporospatial integration.