Left ventricular hypertrophy (LVH) is due to pressure overload or mechanical stretch and is thought to be associated with remodeling of gap-junctions. We investigated whether the expression of connexin 43 (Cx43) is altered in humans in response to different degrees of LVH. The expression of Cx43 was analyzed by quantitative polymerase chain reaction, Western blot analysis and immunohistochemistry on left ventricular biopsies from patients undergoing aortic or mitral valve replacement. Three groups were analyzed: patients with aortic stenosis with severe LVH (n=9) versus only mild LVH (n=7), and patients with LVH caused by mitral regurgitation (n=5). Cx43 mRNA expression and protein expression were similar in the three groups studied. Furthermore, immunohistochemistry revealed no change in Cx43 distribution. We can conclude that when compared with mild LVH or with LVH due to volume overload, severe LVH due to chronic pressure overload is not accompanied by detectable changes of Cx43 expression or spatial distribution., C. Vetter ... [et al.]., and Obsahuje bibliografii a bibliografické odkazy
We assessed the effect of the previously uncovered gap junctio n protein alpha 8 (Gja8) mutation present in spontaneously hypertensive rat - dominant cataract (SHR - Dca ) strain on blood pressure, metabolic profile, and heart and renal transcriptomes. Adult, standard chow-fed male rats of SHR and SHR - Dca strains were used. We found a significant, consistent 10-15 mmHg decrease in both systolic and diastolic blood pressures in SHR - Dca compared with SHR (P<0.01 and P<0.05 , respectively; repeated measures analysis of variance (ANOVA)). With immunohistochemistry, we were able to localize Gja8 in heart, kidney, aorta, liver, and lungs, mostly in endothelium; with no differences in expression between strains. SHR - Dca rats showed decreased body weight, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol concentrations and basa l insulin sensitivity in muscle. There were 21 transc ripts common to the sets of 303 transcripts in kidney and 487 in heart showing >1.2-fold difference in expression between SHR and SHR - Dca. Tumor necrosis factor was the most significant upstream regulato r and glial cell-derived neurotrophic factor family ligand-receptor interactions was the common enriched and downregulated canonical pathway both in heart and kidney of SHR - Dca. The connexin 50 mutation L7Q lowers blood pressure in the SHR - Dca strain, decr eases high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, and leads to substantial transcriptome changes in heart and kidney., O. Šeda, F. Liška, M. Pravenec, Z. Vernerová, L. Kazdová, D. Křenová, V. Zídek, L. Šedová, M. Krupková, V. Křen., and Obsahuje bibliografii
Mitochondrial retrograde signaling is a pathway of communication from mitochondria to the nucleus. Recently, natural mitochondrial genome (mtDNA) polymorphisms (haplogroups) received increasing attention in the pathophysiology of human common diseases. However, retrograde effects of mtDNA variants on such traits are difficult to study in humans. The conplastic strains represent key animal models to elucidate regulatory roles of mtDNA haplogroups on defined nuclear genome background. To analyze the relationship between mtDNA variants and cardiometabolic traits, we derived a set of rat conplastic strains (SHR-mtBN, SHR-mtF344 and SHR-mtLEW), harboring all major mtDNA haplotypes present in common inbred strains on the nuclear background of the spontaneously hypertensive rat (SHR). The BN, F344 and LEW mtDNA differ from the SHR in multiple amino acid substitutions in protein coding genes and also in variants of tRNA and rRNA genes. Different mtDNA haplotypes were found to predispose to various sets of cardiometabolic phenotypes which provided evidence for significant retrograde effects of mtDNA in the SHR. In the future, these animals could be used to decipher individual biochemical components involved in the retrograde signaling.
It has been argued that consciousness is not possible without peripheral self-consciousness; i.e., without an implicit awareness of oneself as the subject of one’s mental state. My purpose is to undermine this view. I contend that a subject’s first-personal access to her conscious mental states and an awareness of them as hers, along with a particular approach to consciousness according to which a subject cannot be unconsciously conscious of things motivate the view that consciousness is not possible without self-consciousness. In order to undermine this view I argue that not all conscious states are accompanied by a sense of mineness. I also reject the reasons for endorsing an approach to consciousness according to which a subject cannot be unconsciously conscious of things. Then I critically examine Kriegel’s arguments for the dependence of consciousness on self-consciousness based on the first-personal access a subject has to her conscious mental states and discuss the difficulties involved., To bylo argumentoval, že vědomí není možné bez periferního self-vědomí; tj. bez implicitní informovanosti o sobě jako o předmětu duševního stavu. Mým cílem je podkopat tento názor. Tvrdím, že první osobní přístup subjektu k jejím vědomým duševním stavům a jejich povědomí o nich, spolu s konkrétním přístupem k vědomí, podle něhož subjekt nemůže být podvědomě vědomi věcí, motivuje názor, že vědomí není možné bez sebe. -vědomí. Abych podcenil tento názor, argumentuji, že ne všechny vědomé stavy jsou doprovázeny smyslem pro jemnost. Odmítám také důvody pro podporu přístupu k vědomí, podle něhož subjekt nemůže nevědomě uvědomovat věci. Pak kriticky zkoumám Krieglovy argumenty pro závislost vědomí na sebevědomí založeném na prvním osobním přístupu subjektu k jejím vědomým duševním stavům a projednávaným problémům., and Sinem Elkatip Hatipoğlu
The fundamental democratic principles, among which we consider the principle of the State according to the Rule of Law as particularly significant, are being brought to life at present in the new democratic States of particularly Central Europe and in numerous developing countries. The implementation of these principles in the everyday life of society is the decisive indicator of the standard of political and legal culture which forms the framework of human rights. There is a plurality of theoretical concepts of human rights in the present day world, but the consensus in the fundamental concept of human rights is continuously increasing.
This paper focuses on the consensual security rights over the objects of intellectual property in the Czech Republic. The paper is based on the national report presented for the purpose of XX. Congress of the International Academy of Comparative Law (Japan, Fukuoka, 22-28 July 2018). In the first part of the paper, the authors describe the system of the intellectual property protection and explain the basic principles of the core sstems of IP protection: copyrights, patents, trademarks and industrial designs. in the next part the authors define three most common methods of the security rights over the intangible assets: a pledge, transfer of a right as a security, and a prohibition of the alienation or the encumbrance of assets. The paper subsequently deals with the following issues: typical structure of the security transaction, mechanisms of evaluating the IP rights used as collateral, and requirements needed for the effectiveness of security rights. With this regard the authors distinguish between the effects of the security rights over non-registered rights such as copyright or unregistered designs, and security rights over registered trademarks, granted patents or registered industrial designs. Special attention is paid to the security rights over the business enterprise. The final part of the paper is aimed at the statistical analysis. The authors describe how frequent is the use of the consensual security rights in Czech legal practice and what are the usual costs related to the secured transactions over the intellectual property., Pavel Koukal, Helena Pullmannová., and Obsahuje bibliografické odkazy
The simultaneous problem of consensus and trajectory tracking of linear multi-agent systems is considered in this paper, where the dynamics of each agent is represented by a single-input single-output linear system. In order to solve this problem, a distributed control strategy is proposed in this work, where the trajectory and the formation of the agents are achieved asymptotically even in the presence of switching communication topologies and smooth formation changes, and ensuring the closed-loop stability of the multi-agent system. Moreover, the structure and dimension of the representation of the agent dynamics are not restricted to be the same, as usually assumed in the literature. A simulation example is provided in order to illustrate the main results.