Medicine and Health Sciences Commons^™

The Contribution Of Executive Functions To Emergent Mathematic Skills In Preschool Children, Kimberly Espy, Melanie D. Mcdiarmid, Mary F. Cwik, Melissa Meade Stalets, Arlena Hamby, Theresa E. Senn

Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory: Faculty and Staff Publications

Mathematical ability is related to both activation of the prefrontal cortex in neuroimaging studies of adults and to executive functions in school-age children. The purpose of this study was to determine whether executive functions were related to emergent mathematical proficiency in preschool children. Preschool children (N= 96) were administered an executive function battery that was reduced empirically to working memory (WM), inhibitory control (IC), and shifting abilities by calculating composite scores derived from principal component analysis. Both WM and IC predicted early arithmetic competency, with the observed relations robust after controlling statistically for child age, maternal education, and child vocabulary. …

The Development Of A Trial Making Test In Young Children: The Trails-P, Kimberly Espy, Mary F. Cwik

Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory: Faculty and Staff Publications

Preschool children have a more limited verbal repertoire, less proficient manual skills, and more variable attention spans relative to those of school age, with comparatively few neuropsychological tasks available for use in this age range. A prototypic neuropsychological test, the Trail Making Test, was adapted for use with young children, the TRAILS-P, using a developmentally salient storybook format with colorful stimuli in differing conditions with varying executive demands. The TRAILS-P was administered to 103 normally developing preschoolers between 2 and 6 years of age; 30 of these children were retested within one month to determine test reliability. Correlations among latencies …

Executive Function In Preschool Children: Examination Through Everyday Behavior, P. K. Isquith, G. Gioia, K. A. Espy

Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory: Faculty and Staff Publications

Clinical assessment of executive function in preschool-age children is challenging given limited availability of standardized tasks and preschoolers' variable ability to participate in lengthy formal evaluation procedures. Given the benefits of ecological validity of measuring behavior by rating scales, the Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Function (Gioia, Isquith, Guy, & Kenworthy, 2000) was modified for use with children ages 2 through 5 years to assess executive functions in an everyday context. The scale development process, based on samples of 460 parents and 302 teachers, yielded a single 63-item measure with 5 related, but nonoverlapping, scales, with good internal consistency and …

Using Path Analysis To Understand Executive Function Organization In Preschool Children, T. E. Senn, K. A. Espy, P. M. Kaufmann

Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory: Faculty and Staff Publications

There continues to be no consensus definition of executive functions. One way to understand different executive function components is to study abilities at their emergence, that is, early in development, and use advanced statistical methods to understand the interrelations among executive processes. However, to fully determine the constructs of interest, these methods often require complete data on a large battery of tasks, which are difficult to obtain with young children. Path analysis is an alternative statistical technique that requires only a single measure of each construct, yet still allows researchers to investigate complex relations among measures, to compare nested models, …

Using Developmental, Cognitive, And Neuroscience Approaches To Understand Executive Control In Young Children, K. A. Espy

Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory: Faculty and Staff Publications

The 7 articles in this special issue address the nature of executive control in young children. Executive control is framed in a developmental context, where the unique aspects of cognition in this age range are considered. The set of articles demonstrates the multidisciplinary approaches to study cognition in young children that includes application of cognitive, neuroscience, and developmental paradigms in typically developing youngsters, as well as those affected by clinical conditions, such as traumatic brain injury, exposure to low levels of lead in the environment, and prematurity. Although much work remains to be done, these study results are illustrative of …

A Comparison Of Performance On The Towers Of London And Hanoi In Young Children, Rebecca Bull, Kimberly A. Espy, Theresa E. Senn

Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory: Faculty and Staff Publications

The Towers of London (TOL) and Hanoi (TOH) have been viewed as equivalent measures of planning and/or problem solving, although recent evidence in adults suggests that the underlying measurement characteristics of these two tasks may differ. As tower tasks are one of the few instruments that can be used to assess executive functioning in young children, the cognitive demands for both tasks merit further examination. Methods: The relation among tower tasks and those of short-term memory, inhibition, and shifting ability were examined in a sample of 118 typically developing young children (M age = 4 years, 9 months, SD = …

Development Of Auditory Event-Related Potentials In Young Children And Relations To Word-Level Reading Abilities At Age 8 Years, Kimberly Espy, Dennis L. Molfese, Victoria J. Molfese, Arlene Modglin

Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory: Faculty and Staff Publications

A relationship between brain responses at birth and later emerging language and reading skills have been shown, but questions remain whether changes in brain responses after birth continue to predict the mastery of language-related skills such as reading development. To determine whether developmental changes in the brain-based perceptual skills are systematically related to differences in word-level reading proficiency at age 8 years, brain event-related potentials (ERPs) to speech and nonspeech stimuli were recorded annually at the ages of 1 through 8 years in a sample of 109 typically developing children. Two measures of word-level reading (one that requires decoding of …

Myelin Proteolipid Protein-Specific Cd4+ Cd25+ Regulatory Cells Mediate Genetic Resistance To Experimental Autoimmune Encephalomyelitis, Jay Reddy, Zsolt Illés, Xingmin Zhang, Jeffrey Encinas, Jason Pyrdol, Lindsay Nicholson, Raymond A. Sobel, Kai W. Wucherpfennig, Vijay K. Kuchroo, James P. Allison

Jay Reddy Publications

SJL mice are highly susceptible to experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE) induced with myelin proteolipid protein (PLP) peptide 139–151, whereas H-2 congenic B10.S mice are resistant. Immunodominance and susceptibility to EAE are associated with a high precursor frequency of PLP 139–151-specific T cells in the naive repertoire of SJL mice. To understand the mechanism of EAE resistance in B10.S mice, we determined the precursor frequency of PLP 139–151-reactive T cells in both strains by using IA^s/PLP 139–151 tetramers. SJL and B10.S mice had similar frequencies of tetramer-reactive T cells in the naive peripheral repertoire. However, in SJL mice, the …

Waccnes Containing Bovine Herpe Svirus 1 Attenuated By Mutation In Latency-Related Gene, Clinton J. Jones

School of Veterinary and Biomedical Sciences: Faculty Publications

Vaccines for pathogenic Strains of bovine herpesvirus 1 (BHV-1) which are based on attenuated BHV-1 having a mutation in the latency-related gene are provided. Live, attenuated vaccines are also provided which express anti gens from other viral or bacterial pathogens and thus form the basis of a variety of vaccines.

Modified Amino Acid Copolymers Suppress Myelin Basic Protein 85–99-Induced Encephalomyelitis In Humanized Mice Through Different Effects On T Cells, Zsolt Illés, Joel N.H. Stern, Jay Reddy, Hanspeter Waldner, Marcin P. Mycko, Celia F. Brosnan, Stephan Ellmerich, Daniel M. Altmann, Laura Santambrogio, Jack L. Strominger, Vijay K. Kuchroo

Jay Reddy Publications

A humanized mouse bearing the HLA-DR2 (DRA/DRB1*1501) pro- tein associated with multiple sclerosis (MS) and the myelin basic protein (MBP) 85–99-specific HLA-DR2-restricted T cell receptor from an MS patient has been used to examine the effectiveness of modified amino acid copolymers poly(F,Y,A,K)n and poly- (V,W,A,K)n in therapy of MBP 85–99-induced experimental auto-immune encephalomyelitis (EAE) in comparison to Copolymer 1 [Copaxone, poly(Y,E,A,K)n]. The copolymers were designed to optimize binding to HLA-DR2. Vaccination, prevention, and treatment of MBP-induced EAE in the humanized mice with copolymers FYAK and VWAK ameliorated EAE more effectively than Copolymer 1, reduced the number of pathological lesions, and …

Phylogenetic Analyses Of Texas Isolates Indicate An Evolving Subtype Of The Clade B Feline Immunodeficiency Viruses, Eric A. Weaver, Ellen W. Collisson, Margaret Slater, Guan Zhu

Nebraska Center for Virology: Faculty Publications

Rigorous phylogenetic analyses were used to compare the nucleotide sequences of feline immunodeficiency virus strains isolated from Texas and throughout the world. The envelope V3-V4 sequences and capsid gene of the Texas isolates formed a cluster between subtypes B and E. Statistical comparisons with other published sequences confirmed that the Texas group is a unique cluster, possibly a new subtype, arising from subtype B.

Feline immunodeficiency virus (FIV) was initially isolated in 1987 from a cat in California with severe immunodeficiency and has been recognized as a common worldwide feline pathogen (11, 14, 19, 20, 33). FIV-infected cats exhibit a …

Amelioration Of Proteolipid Protein 139–151-Induced Encephalomyelitis In Sjl Mice By Modified Amino Acid Copolymers And Their Mechanisms, Joel N.H. Stern, Zsolt Illés, Jay Reddy, Derin B. Keskin, Eric Sheu, Masha Fridkis-Hareli, Hiroyuki Nishimura, Celia F. Brosnan, Laura Santambrogio, Vijay K. Kuchroo, Jack L. Strominger

Jay Reddy Publications

Copolymer 1 [Cop1, glatiramer acetate, Copaxone, poly(Y,E,A,K)n] is widely used in the treatment of relapsing/remitting multiple sclerosis in which it reduces the frequency of relapses by ≈30%. In the present study, copolymers with modified amino acid compositions (based on the binding motif of myelin basic protein 85–99 to HLA-DR2) have been developed with the aim of suppressing multiple sclerosis more effectively. The enhanced efficacy of these copolymers in experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE) induced in SJL/J mice with proteolipid protein 139–151 was demonstrated by using three protocols: (i) simultaneous administration of autoantigen and copolymer (termed prevention), (ii) …

Phosphorylation Of Vesicular Stomatitis Virus Phosphoprotein P Is Indispensable For Virus Growth†, Subash C. Das, Asit K. Pattnaik

School of Veterinary and Biomedical Sciences: Faculty Publications

The phosphoprotein (P) of vesicular stomatitis virus (VSV) is an essential subunit of the viral RNAdependent RNA polymerase (RdRp) complex. It is phosphorylated at two different domains. Using defective interfering (DI) RNA or minigenomic RNA templates, we previously demonstrated that phosphorylation within the amino-terminal domain I is essential for transcription, whereas phosphorylation within the carboxyterminal domain II is necessary for replication. For the present study, we examined the role of the phosphorylation of residues in these domains in the life cycle of VSV. Various mutant P coding sequences were inserted into a full-length cDNA clone of VSV, and the virus …

Cd46-Mediated Transduction Of A Species D Adenovirus Vaccine Improves Mucosal Vaccine Efficacy, Zenaido T. Camacho, Mallory A. Turner, Michael A. Barry, Eric A. Weaver

Nebraska Center for Virology: Faculty Publications

The high levels of preexisting immunity against Adenovirus type 5 (Ad5) have deemed Ad5 unusable for translation as a human vaccine vector. Low seroprevalent alternative viral vectors may be less impacted by preexisting immunity, but they may also have significantly different phenotypes from that of Ad5. In this study we compare species D Ads (26, 28, and 48) to the species C Ad5. In vitro transduction studies show striking differences between the species C and D viruses. Most notably, Ad26 transduced human dendritic cells much more effectively than Ad5. In vivo imaging studies showed strikingly different transgene expression profiles. The …

Phylogenetic Analyses Of Texas Isolates Indicate An Evolving Subtype Of The Clade B Feline Immunodeficiency Viruses, Eric A. Weaver, Ellen W. Collisson, Margaret Slater, Guan Zhu

Nebraska Center for Virology: Faculty Publications

Rigorous phylogenetic analyses were used to compare the nucleotide sequences of feline immunodeficiency virus strains isolated from Texas and throughout the world. The envelope V3-V4 sequences and capsid gene of the Texas isolates formed a cluster between subtypes B and E. Statistical comparisons with other published sequences confirmed that the Texas group is a unique cluster, possibly a new subtype, arising from subtype B.