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Biomedical subjects

J J Carroll

Publications and source records attributed to J J Carroll.

18 recordsLinked to original sources

The use of pronoun anaphora and speaker mood in the interpretation of conversational utterances by right hemisphere brain-damaged patients.

Understanding utterances in conversations requires a listener to weigh the disparate pieces of information present in a discourse. In this study, we examined how right hemisphere brain-damaged (RHD) patients and non-brain-damaged control subjects interpreted responses to questions concerning the location of a person (e.g., "Where's Dad?"). Stimulus vignettes included variation on three factors relevant to discourse comprehension: the mood of a speaker, the plausibility of the answer to a question, and whether the answer contained an anaphoric pronoun linking the response to the preceding question. Relative to the control subjects, the RHD patients made greater than normal use of the presence/absence of an anaphoric pronoun in their utterance interpretations, less than normal use of the speaker's mood, and marginally less than normal use of a response's plausibility. These data show how RHD patients rely on their largely intact linguistic abilities when understanding discourse and how their comprehension goes awry due to their reduced appreciation of other essential aspects of natural communication. The discussion focuses on the variable roles of speaker mood, plausibility, and pronoun anaphora in supporting inferences about a speaker's intended meaning and on the selective nature of RHD patients' impairment in this domain.

Affect

Impact of biotechnology on the diagnostics of thrombotic disorders.

The use of monoclonal antibodies, genetic engineering, and recombinant molecules have greatly affected the diagnostics and therapeutics of thrombotic disorders. Future diagnostics and therapeutics will use chimeric or bifunctional antibodies, DNA probes, and perhaps liposomes in order to improve sensitivity and therapeutic efficacy. These highly sensitive and specific immunochemical tools also allow us to quantitate the activities of the various steps of the hemostatic mechanism in vivo at subnamolar levels.

Antibodies, Monoclonal

Organoastatine chemistry. Astatination via electrophilic destannylation.

Substantial interest is currently focused on the alpha-emitting radiohalogen 211At, principally because of its potential use in the radiation therapy of cancer. Knowledge of organoastatine chemistry is incomplete and existing methods for its incorporation restrict the range of compounds which may be labeled. Aryl and vinyl Sn(IV) compounds are notably susceptible to substitution of tin by a variety of electrophiles. We have investigated the reaction of aryltrialkylstannanes with astatine and report here the first examples of astatodestannylation. Formation of aryl astatides proceeds rapidly, cleanly and under mild conditions. The data further elucidate aspects of astatine reactivity and suggest a general route to synthesize astatinated compounds.

Astatine

Management of pheochromocytoma during pregnancy.

To reduce the high maternal and fetal mortality in pheochromocytoma of pregnancy, therapy is advocated with phenoxybenzamine and propranolol to obtain adequate alpha- and beta-adrenergic receptor blockade. In early pregnancy control of symptoms may be difficult, but the patient may be carried to term with such medical therapy. Delivery should be by cesarean section before the onset of labour, with, if possible, simultaneous removal of the tumour. Additional preoperative preparation with phenoxybenzamine and propranolol and careful intraoperative management are essential. During her third pregnancy a 29-year-old woman was found to have a pheochromocytoma of the left adrenal gland. After the medical therapy and preparation described, the infant was delivered by cesarean section and the mother's left adrenal gland excised. Eight-year follow-up, including during a fourth pregnancy, showed no recurrence of tumour in the mother and only mild hypertension. The infant developed normally.

Adrenal Gland Neoplasms