scholarly journals The Enigmatic Reissner’s Fiber and the Origin of Chordates

2021 ◽  
Vol 15 ◽  
Author(s):  
Francisco Aboitiz ◽  
Juan F. Montiel

Reissner’s fiber (RF) is a secreted filament that floats in the neural canal of chordates. Since its discovery in 1860, there has been no agreement on its primary function, and its strong conservation across chordate species has remained a mystery for comparative neuroanatomists. Several findings, including the chemical composition and the phylogenetic history of RF, clinical observations associating RF with the development of the neural canal, and more recent studies suggesting that RF is needed to develop a straight vertebral column, may shed light on the functions of this structure across chordates. In this article, we will briefly review the evidence mentioned above to suggest a role of RF in the origin of fundamental innovations of the chordate body plan, especially the elongation of the neural tube and maintenance of the body axis. We will also mention the relevance of RF for medical conditions like hydrocephalus, scoliosis of the vertebral spine and possibly regeneration of the spinal cord.

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (6) ◽  
Author(s):  
Katy Barrett ◽  
Geoffrey Belknap

This article considers the history of medical image-making to shed light on an aspect of the COVID-19 pandemic. Starting from a contemporary art commission in the Science Museum's ‘Medicine: The Wellcome Galleries’, we look at the role of image production and presentation in understanding the spread of disease. From the intertwined histories of art and scientific image-making, we explore five examples of iconic medical images, by John Snow, Florence Nightingale, Arthur Schuster, Donald Caspar and Aaron Klug, ending with a model of the coronavirus by the Cambridge University Laboratory of Molecular Biology. We trace how images have provided the means for discovery, for description and for diagnosis and outline the different ways in which diseases have been located in the history of the medical image: in the community, in the body, in the cell and on the image itself.


Somatechnics ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 288-303
Author(s):  
Michael Connors Jackman

This article investigates the ways in which the work of The Body Politic (TBP), the first major lesbian and gay newspaper in Canada, comes to be commemorated in queer publics and how it figures in the memories of those who were involved in producing the paper. In revisiting a critical point in the history of TBP from 1985 when controversy erupted over race and racism within the editorial collective, this discussion considers the role of memory in the reproduction of whiteness and in the rupture of standard narratives about the past. As the controversy continues to haunt contemporary queer activism in Canada, the productive work of memory must be considered an essential aspect of how, when and for what reasons the work of TBP comes to be commemorated. By revisiting the events of 1985 and by sifting through interviews with individuals who contributed to the work of TBP, this article complicates the narrative of TBP as a bluntly racist endeavour whilst questioning the white privilege and racially-charged demands that undergird its commemoration. The work of producing and preserving queer history is a vital means of challenging the intentional and strategic erasure of queer existence, but those who engage in such efforts must remain attentive to the unequal terrain of social relations within which remembering forms its objects.


2021 ◽  
pp. 251660852098428
Author(s):  
Vikas Bhatia ◽  
Chirag Jain ◽  
Sucharita Ray ◽  
jay Kumar

Objective: To report a case of young male with stroke and bilateral internal carotid artery (ICA) dissection. Background: Cervical Artery Dissection in Stroke Study trial has provided some insight on management of patients with ICA dissection. However, there is a need to modify the management strategies as per specific clinical scenario. Design/Methods: Case report and literature review. Results: A 45-year-old male presented with 1 month old history of acute onset numbness of right half of the body with slurring of speech. Computed tomography angiography showed complete occlusion of left cervical ICA just beyond origin with presence of fusiform dilatation and spiral flap in right extracranial cervical ICA. The patient was started on antiplatelets and taken for endovascular procedure using 2-mesh-based carotid stents. Patient was discharged after 3 days on antiplatelet therapy. At 1-year follow-up, there were no fresh symptoms. Conclusion: This case emphasizes the role of successful endovascular management of carotid dissection in a young male. These clinical situations may not be fully represented in trials, and a case-based approach is required.


Religions ◽  
2022 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 77
Author(s):  
Ahmed Abou El Zalaf

Existing scholarship has largely focused on the role of Sayyid Qutb’s ideas when analyzing the Muslim Brotherhood’s violent history. Perceiving Qutb’s ideas as paving the way for radical interpretations of jihad, many studies linked the Brotherhood’s violent history with this key ideologue. Yet, in so doing, many studies overlooked the importance of the Special Apparatus in shaping this violent history of the Brotherhood, long before Qutb joined the organization. Through an in-depth study of memoires and accounts penned by Brotherhood members and leaders, and a systematic study of British and American intelligence sources, I attempt to shed light on this understudied formation of the Brotherhood, the Special Apparatus. This paper looks at the development of anti-colonial militancy in Egypt, particularly the part played by the Brotherhood until 1954. It contends that political violence, in the context of British colonization, antedated the Brotherhood’s foundation, and was in some instances considered as a legitimate and even distinguished duty among anti-colonial factions. The application of violence was on no account a part of the Brotherhood’s core strategy, but the organization, nevertheless, established an armed and secret wing tasked with the fulfillment of what a segment of its members perceived as the duty of anti-colonial jihad.


This book presents a collection of critically appraised neurosurgical papers that shed light on some of the most impactful studies in the history of neurosurgery. Papers that have shaped the practice of neurosurgery as we know it today have been selected for review. Each paper is reviewed by a panel of experts who evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of the paper as well as the impact it had on their personal practice of neurosurgery. The book is suited for residents and practicing neurosurgeons. The body of literature covered in this book has in many ways defined the gold standards of neurosurgical practice and is a must-know for every student of neurosurgery.


1998 ◽  
Vol 27 ◽  
pp. 209-232 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katherine O'Brien O'Keeffe

This article explores some textual dimensions of what I argue is a crucial moment in the history of the Anglo-Saxon subject. For purposes of temporal triangulation, I would locate this moment between roughly 970 and 1035, though these dates function merely as crude, if potent, signposts: the years 970×973 mark the adoption of the Regularis concordia, the ecclesiastical agreement on the practice of a reformed (and markedly continental) monasticism, and 1035 marks the death of Cnut, the Danish king of England, whose laws encode a change in the understanding of the individual before the law. These dates bracket a rich and chaotic time in England: the apex of the project of reform, a flourishing monastic culture, efflorescence of both Latin and vernacular literatures, remarkable manuscript production, but also the renewal of the Viking wars that seemed at times to be signs of the apocalypse and that ultimately would put a Dane on the throne of England. These dates point to two powerful and continuing sets of interests in late Anglo-Saxon England, ecclesiastical and secular, monastic and royal, whose relationships were never simple. This exploration of the subject in Anglo-Saxon England as it is illuminated by the law draws on texts associated with each of these interests and argues their interconnection. Its point of departure will be the body – the way it is configured, regarded, regulated and read in late Anglo-Saxon England. It focuses in particular on the use to which the body is put in juridical discourse: both the increasing role of the body in schemes of inquiry and of punishment and the ways in which the body comes to be used to know and control the subject.


2013 ◽  
Vol 18 (4-5) ◽  
pp. 339-359 ◽  
Author(s):  
Claire Crignon

Following a recent trend in the field of the history of philosophy and medicine, this paper stresses the necessity of recognizing empiricism’s patent indebtedness to the sciences of the body. While the tribute paid to the Hippocratic method of observation in the work of Thomas Sydenham is well known, it seems necessary to take into account a trend more critical of ancient medicine developed by followers of chemical medicine who considered the doctrine of elements and humours to be a typical example of the idols that hinder the improvement of medical knowledge and defend the necessity of experimentation (comparative anatomy, dissection, autopsy, chemical analysis of bodies). In light of the fact that modern discoveries (blood circulation, the lymphatic system, theory of fevers) resulted in a “new frame of human nature,” they developed a critical reading of ancient empiricism. As a consequence, we can distinguish between two distinct anti-speculative traditions in the genesis of philosophical empiricism. The first (which includes Bacon, Boyle and Willis) recommends an active investigation into nature and refers to the figure of Democritus, the ancient philosopher who devoted himself to the dissection of beasts. Defenders of this first tradition refuse point-blank to be called ‘empiricists’, a label which had a very negative meaning during the seventeenth century, when it was used to dismiss charlatans and quacks. The other tradition (including Sydenham and Locke), stressing as it does the role of description and observation, is more sceptical of the ability of dissection or anatomy to give us access to causes of diseases. This later tradition comes closer to the definition of ancient empiricism and to the figure of Hippocrates.



2003 ◽  
Vol 27 (2) ◽  
pp. 116-131 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maribeth Clark

This article explores changing attitudes toward actors' bodies at the Paris Opera through the performance history of D. F. E. Auber's opera La Muette de Portici from 1828 to 1879. Because a mime performed the role of Fenella and the chorus played an active role in the mise en scene, the opera placed unusual emphasis on the physical. Over this period, however, emphasis shifted from appreciation of acting to emphasis on singing. For example, during the tenor Adolphe Nourrit's tenure at the Opera critics admired his skill as an actor in the role of Masaniello. When replaced by Gilbert Duprez in 1837, critics praised the tenor's vocal power and lack of emphasis on the histrionic. During this same time, critics began to interpret the gestures of the mime playing Fenella as semantically empty, and her body as filling a space that a singer should occupy. The important role that the barcarolle plays in the opera allows in part for these transitions. Viewed as a chanson napolitaine, it accentuates the rocking of a boat and the physical body at work; however, interpreted as the song of a Venetian gondolier, the song emphasizes the enunciation of a singing voice at the expense of the body. Reviews of La Muette reflect this ambivalence toward performance styles that call attention to the body, particularly those that might be interpreted as belonging to the working classes.


2007 ◽  
Vol 122 (1) ◽  
pp. 105-107 ◽  
Author(s):  
J M Hilton ◽  
P Tassone ◽  
J Hanif ◽  
B Blagnys

AbstractWe present an unusual cause of rhinolalia clausa secondary to an oropharyngeal mass. A 69-year-old male presented to the otorhinolaryngology clinic with a one year history of a ‘plummy’ voice. He had a longstanding history of severe ankylosing spondylitis. Examination revealed an obvious hyponasal voice and a smooth hard mass in the midline of the posterior nasopharyngeal and oropharyngeal walls. Subsequent computed tomography scans and lateral plain neck X-ray showed a fracture dislocation of the odontoid peg, secondary to ankylosing spondylitis, which had eroded through the body of the C1 vertebra to lie anteriorly, resulting in the aforementioned impression into the pharyngeal mucosa. The radiological images, the role of the nasal airways in phonation and the causes of hyponasal speech are discussed.


2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 265-287
Author(s):  
Feras Krimsti ◽  
John-Paul Ghobrial

Abstract This introduction to the special issue “The Past and its Possibilities in Nahḍa Scholarship” reflects on the role of the past in nineteenth- and early twentieth-century nahḍa discourse. It argues that historical reflection played a pivotal role in a number of scholarly disciplines besides the discipline of history, notably philosophy and logic, grammar and lexicography, linguistics, philology, and adab. Nahḍawīs reflected on continuities with the past, the genealogies of their present, and the role of history in determining their future. The introduction of print gave new impulses to the engagement with the historical heritage. We argue for a history of the nahḍa as a de-centred history of possibilities that recovers a wider circle of scholars and intellectuals and their multiple and overlapping local and global audiences. Such a history can also shed light on the many ways in which historical reflection, record-keeping practices, and confessional, sectarian, or communalist agendas are entwined.


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