The role of the human amygdala in real social interactions remains essentially unknown, although studies in nonhuman primates and studies using photographs and video in humans have shown it to be critical for emotional processing and suggest its importance for social cognition. We show here that complete amygdala lesions result in a severe reduction in direct eye contact during conversations with real people, together with an abnormal increase in gaze to the mouth. These novel findings from real social interactions are consistent with an hypothesized role for the amygdala in autism and the approach taken here opens up new directions for quantifying social behavior in humans.

Susceptibility weighted imaging (SWI) is a newly developed magnetic resonance (MR) protocol. Recent studies have found that SWI may be useful in the field of cerebrovascular diseases, especially for detecting the presence of prominent veins, microbleeds and the susceptibility vessel sign (SVS). Some authors have even suggested that SWI can be used to predict outcome. We conducted a prospective study of patients hospitalized with middle cerebral artery territory infarction receiving MRI within 2 days of stroke onset. The presence of prominent veins, microbleeds and SVS in SWI was analyzed along with hospital characteristics of the patients. A total of 44 patients were enrolled. Among the 44 patients, 15 (34.1%) patients showed prominent veins, 19 (43.2%) showed SVS, and 14 (31.8%) showed microbleeds. The presence of SVS and prominent veins was not associated with prognosis. Though not statistically significant (p = 0.06), patients with SVS were more likely to develop later brain edema. SVS was significantly associated with arterial occlusion (p = 0.008) based on the MR angiogram, and microbleeds were significantly associated with later hemorrhagic transformation (p = 0.018). In our study, SWI could not be used to predict outcome as previously suggested. However, the presence of microbleeds may predict further hemorrhagic transformation, and the presence of SVS could be used to detect intra-arterial thrombus. Patients with SVS were also more likely to develop later brain edema. Including SWI in routine MR protocols for major acute ischemic stroke would be worthwhile.

PURPOSE To describe the incidence, relative risk, and risk factors for chronic comorbidities in survivors of adolescent and young adult (AYA) cancer. METHODS This retrospective cohort study included 2-year survivors of AYA cancer diagnosed between age 15 and 39 years at Kaiser Permanente Southern California from 2000 to 2012. A comparison cohort without cancer was individually matched (13:1) to survivors of cancer on age, sex, and calendar year. Using electronic medical records, all participants were followed through December 31, 2014, for chronic comorbidity diagnoses. Poisson regression was used to evaluate the association between cancer survivor status and risk of developing each comorbidity. The associations between cumulative exposure to chemotherapy and radiation therapy and selected comorbidities were examined for survivors of cancer. RESULTS The cohort included 6,778 survivors of AYA cancer and 87,737 persons without a history of cancer. The incidence rate ratio (IRR) for survivors of cancer was significantly increased for nearly all comorbidities examined. IRR ranged from 1.3 (95% CI, 1.2 to 1.4) for dyslipidemia to 8.3 (95% CI, 4.6 to 14.9) for avascular necrosis. Survivors of AYA cancer had a 2- to 3-fold increased risk for cardiomyopathy, stroke, premature ovarian failure, chronic liver disease, and renal failure. Among survivors of cancer, significant associations between chemotherapy and radiation therapy exposures and late effects of cardiomyopathy, hearing loss, stroke, thyroid disorders, and diabetes were observed from the multivariable analyses. Forty percent of survivors of AYA cancer had multiple (≥ 2) comorbidities at 10 years after index date, compared with 20% of those without cancer. CONCLUSION Risk of developing comorbidities is increased in survivors of AYA cancer compared with the general population. Specific cancer treatment exposures were associated with risk of developing different comorbidities. These findings have important implications for survivorship care planning and patient education.