Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences最新文献

Despite the ubiquity of musical activities, little is known about the specificity of their association with executive functions. In this cross-sectional study, we examined this relationship as a function of age. Our main hypotheses were that executive functions would decline in older age, that this relationship would be reduced in singers and instrumentalists compared to nonmusician active controls, and that the amount of musical experience would be more strongly associated with executive functions compared to the specific type of activity. A sample of 122 cognitively healthy adults aged 20–88 years was recruited, consisting of 39 amateur singers, 43 amateur instrumentalists, and 40 nonmusician controls. Tests of auditory processing speed, auditory selective attention, auditory and visual inhibitory control, and auditory working memory were administered. The results confirm a negative relationship between age and executive functions. While musicians’ advantages were found in selective attention, inhibitory control, and auditory working memory, these advantages were specific rather than global. Furthermore, most of these advantages were independent of age and experience. Finally, there were only limited differences between instrumentalists and singers, suggesting that the relationship between music-making activities and executive functions may be, at least in part, general as opposed to activity-specific.

Bats (order Chiroptera) are emerging as instructive animal models for aging studies. Unlike some common laboratory species, they meet a central criterion for aging studies: they live for a long time in the wild or in captivity, for 20, 30, and even >40 years. Healthy aging (i.e., healthspan) in bats has drawn attention to their potential to improve the lives of aging humans due to bat imperviousness to viral infections, apparent low rate of tumorigenesis, and unique ability to repair DNA. At the same time, bat longevity also permits the accumulation of age-associated systemic pathologies that can be examined in detail and manipulated, especially in captive animals. Research has uncovered additional and critical advantages of bats. In multiple ways, bats are better analogs to humans than are rodents. In this review, we highlight eight diverse areas of bat research with relevance to aging: genome sequencing, telomeres, and DNA repair; immunity and inflammation; hearing; menstruation and menopause; skeletal system and fragility; neurobiology and neurodegeneration; stem cells; and senescence and mortality. These examples demonstrate the broad relevance of the bat as an animal model and point to directions that are particularly important for human aging studies.

Current evidence suggests moderate heritability of music phenotypes, such as music listening and achievement. However, other fundamental traits underlying people's interest in music and its relevance for their lives have been largely neglected, and little is known about the genetic and environmental etiology of what we refer to as musical sensibility—the tendency to be emotionally and aesthetically engaged by music. This study investigated the latent structure, as well as the genetic and environmental factors influencing individual variability in multiple domains of musical sensibility, and the etiological architecture of the relationship between the dimensions. To this end, we used phenotypic confirmatory factor analytic and biometric twin modeling to analyze self-reported ratings on four dimensions of musical sensibility in a sample of Norwegian twins (N = 2600). The results indicate a phenotypic higher-order structure, whereby both the resulting general musical sensibility factor and the conceptually narrower domains were strongly heritable (49–65%). Multivariate analyses of the genetic and environmental covariance further revealed substantial overlap in genetic variance across domains.

Thompson, L., Becher, E., Adams, K. P., Haile, D., Walker, N., Tong, H., Vosti, S. A., & Engle-Stone, R. (2024). Modeled impacts of bouillon fortification with micronutrients on child mortality in Senegal, Burkina Faso, and Nigeria. Ann NY Acad Sci., 1537, 82–97. https://doi.org/10.1111/nyas.15174

In the originally-published article, in Table 2, the average child population 0–6 months in Nigeria should be 37,274,427 instead of 246,367,332 (the number for the total population was mistakenly included).

We apologize for this error.

Founded in 1947 as the Institute of Industrial Medicine, the Nelson Institute and Department of Environmental Medicine at New York University (NYU) Grossman School of Medicine (NYUGSOM) was supported by a National Institute of Environmental Health Science (NIEHS) Center Grant for over 56 years. Nelson Institute researchers generated 75 years of impactful research in environmental and occupational health, radiation effects, toxicology, and cancer. Environmental health research is continuing at NYUGSOM in its departments of medicine and population health. The objective of this historical commentary is to highlight the major achievements of the Nelson Institute and the department in the context of its history at facilities in Sterling Forest, Tuxedo, NY and Manhattan, NY. Aspects of our discussion include leadership, physical facilities, and research in many areas, including air pollution, health effects of environmental radiation exposures, inhalation toxicology methodology, carcinogenesis by chemicals, metals, and hormones, cancer chemoprevention, human microbiome, ecotoxicology, epidemiology, biostatistics, and community health concerns. The research of the institute and department benefited from unique facilities, strong leadership focused on team-based science, and outstanding investigators, students, and staff. A major lasting contribution has been the training of hundreds of graduate students and postdoctoral fellows, many of whom have been and are training the next generation of environmental and occupational health researchers at various institutions.

Developmental coordination disorder (DCD) presents challenges in motor control. DCD affects tasks such as walking and running and is characterized by poor interlimb coordination and increased spatiotemporal variability compared to typically developing children (TDC). While auditory rhythm synchronization has shown to have benefits for gait performance in adults, its impact on children with DCD during walking and running remains unclear. This study investigated auditory–motor synchronization and interlimb coordination during walking and running in children with and without DCD. Twenty-one DCD and 23 TDC participants aged 8−12 years walked and ran to two different auditory metronomes (discrete and continuous). Synchronization consistency was the primary outcome, with interlimb coordination and spatiotemporal variability as secondary outcomes. Results showed that children with DCD exhibited significantly lower synchronization consistency than TDC, particularly during running. The metronome structure did not influence synchronization ability. Additionally, interlimb coordination differed significantly between DCD and TDC during running and was not impacted by auditory–motor synchronization. Spatiotemporal variability was higher in DCD during both walking and running than in TDC, and accentuated during running. Variability of cadence was influenced by the use of continuous metronomes, which may offer potential benefits in reducing cadence variability.

Social isolation and loneliness are associated with poor health and higher health care costs among older adults. Our objective was to determine if older adults identified as at risk for loneliness by a Medicare Advantage health plan could benefit from a proactive telephone support program. We conducted a mixed-methods pilot efficacy study of outbound calls from an established community-based telephone program to support older adults identified as at risk for loneliness. One hundred and twenty-one older adults were enrolled and completed surveys at baseline, 3 months, and 6 months. Outcomes included loneliness (3-item UCLA loneliness scale), depression (PHQ-2 screen), anxiety (GAD-2 screen), and unhealthy physical and mental health days (CDC Healthy Days Measure). Quantitative data were analyzed using multivariable mixed-effects logistic regression, and open-ended responses were analyzed thematically. Over 6 months, participants had reductions in loneliness (46% to 28%, p<0.001), depression (36% to 25%, p = 0.07), anxiety (63% to 43%, p = 0.004), unhealthy mental days (14 to 8, p<0.001), and unhealthy physical days (15 to 11, p<0.001). Participants reported high satisfaction with calls, and many felt the calls improved overall mood or health. Findings can inform trials to address loneliness through telephone support and partnerships between community-based organizations and payors.

Recent research on healthy individuals suggests that the valence of emotional stimuli influences behavioral reactions only when relevant to ongoing tasks, as they impact reaching arm movements and gait only when the emotional content cued the responses. However, it has been suggested that emotional expressions elicit automatic gaze shifting, indicating that oculomotor behavior might differ from that of the upper and lower limbs. To investigate, 40 participants underwent two Go/No-go tasks, an emotion discrimination task (EDT) and a gender discrimination task (GDT). In the EDT, participants had to perform a saccade to a peripheral target upon the presentation of angry or happy faces and refrain from moving with neutral ones. In the GDT, the same images were shown, but participants responded based on the posers’ gender. Participants displayed two behavioral strategies: a single saccade to the target (92.7%) or two saccades (7.3%), with the first directed at a task-salient feature, that is, the mouth in the EDT and the nose-eyes regions in the GDT. In both cases, the valence of facial expression impacted the saccades only when relevant to the response. Such evidence indicates the same principles govern the interplay between emotional stimuli and motor reactions despite the effectors employed.

Artificial intelligence (AI) and psychedelic medicines are among the most high-profile evolving disruptive innovations within mental healthcare in recent years. Although AI and psychedelics may not have historically shared any common ground, there exists the potential for these subjects to combine in generating innovative mental health treatment approaches. In order to inform our perspective, we conducted a scoping review of relevant literature up to late August 2024 via PubMed intersecting AI with psychomedical use of psychedelics. Our perspective covers the potential application of AI in psychedelic medicine for: drug discovery and clinical trial optimization (including pharmacodynamics); study design; understanding psychedelic experiences; personalization of treatments; clinical screening, delivery, and follow-up (potentially delivered via chatbots/apps); application of psychological preparation, integration, and general mental health support; its role in enhancing treatment via brain modulatory devices (including virtual reality and haptic suits); and the consideration of ethical and security safeguards. Challenges include the need for sufficient data protection and security, and a range of necessary ethical protections. Future avenues of exploration could involve directly administering psychedelics (or providing algorithm-generated effects) to inorganic AI-interfaced neural networks that may exceed human brain activity (i.e., cognitive capacity) and intelligence.

Studies of the human microbiome are progressing rapidly but have largely focused on populations living in high-income countries. With increasing evidence that the microbiome contributes to the pathogenesis of diseases that affect infants, children, and adults in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), and with profound and rapid ongoing changes occurring in our lifestyles and biosphere, understanding the origins of and developing microbiome-directed therapeutics for treating a number of global health challenges requires the development of programs for studying human microbial ecology in LMICs. Here, we discuss how the establishment of long-term human microbial observatory programs in selected LMICs could provide one timely approach.