In line with our prediction, the vmPFC group showed the least amount of change in moral judgments, and interestingly, the HC group showed the most amount of change. These results suggest that the vmPFC and hippocampus play critical but complementary roles in updating moral character judgments about others: the

vmPFC may attribute emotional salience to moral information, whereas the hippocampus may provide necessary contextual information from which to make appropriate character judgments. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.”
“Within the motor system, cortical areas such as the primary motor cortex (M1) and the ventral premotor cortex (PMv), are thought to be activated during the observation of actions performed by

others. However, Cl-amidine nmr it is not known how the connections between these areas become active during action observation or whether these connections are modulated by the volitional component induced by the action observed. In this study, using a paired pulse transcranial magnetic stimulation (ppTMS) method, we evaluated the excitability of PMv-M1 connections during the observation of videos showing a human hand reaching to grasp a ball (naturalistic grasping video) or a switched on soldering iron (noxious grasping video). The results show that the observation of the naturalistic grasping action increased the M1 excitability and changed the strength of the PMv-M1 connections. check details The observation of the noxious grasping action did not induce any change in the excitability of the PMv-M1 connections throughout the video, Phospholipase D1 but the strength of PMv-M1 connectivity was reduced.

These results demonstrate that the PMv-M1 connections are modulated differently depending on whether the action observed would or would not be performed in real life. Crown Copyright (C) 2010 Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.”
“Investigation of the entry pathways of hepatitis B virus (HBV), a member of the family Hepadnaviridae, has been hampered by the lack of versatile in vitro infectivity models. Most concepts of hepadnaviral infection come from the more robust duck HBV system; however, whether the two viruses use the same mechanisms to invade target cells is still a matter of controversy. In this study, we investigate the role of an important plasma membrane component, caveolin-1 (Cav-1), in HBV infection. Caveolins are the main structural components of caveolae, plasma membrane microdomains enriched in cholesterol and sphingolipids, which are involved in the endocytosis of numerous ligands and complex signaling pathways within the cell. We used the HepaRG cell line permissive for HBV infection to stably express dominant-negative Cav-1 and dynamin-2, a GTPase involved in vesicle formation at the plasma membrane and other organelles.