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“In daily life, not stressful events themselves but their sustained cognitive representation is likely to cause prolonged physiological activity, which is believed to lead to a pathogenic state and finally somatic disease. The typically human ability to make cognitive representations of past stressful events (rumination) or feared events in the future (worry) is called perseverative cognition (PC). PC is associated with

increased activity in various bodily systems, and there is emerging evidence that it mediates the prolonged effects of stressors on physiology and on disease. Yet, there are strong reasons to believe that people may not be aware of the greater part of their selleck chemicals stress-related cognitive processes, while several studies suggest that these processes may still cause increased physiological activity, during sleep as well as during waking. This may imply that unconscious PC is an even more important source

of prolonged stress-related activity than conscious PC. Thus, ‘unconscious stress’ research has the potential to become a new important area and may yield new important markers of chronic stress. (C) 2010 MX69 concentration Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.”
“Workplace stressors are associated with greater coronary heart disease risk, although there is debate over the psychophysiological consequences of work stress. This study builds on recent reviews and examines the literature linking work stress with

sympatho-adrenal biomarkers (plasma catecholamines and heart rate variability) and HPA axis biomarkers Lonafarnib solubility dmso – the post-morning profile of cortisol.

Methods: Relevant studies using appropriate search terms were searched using the bibliographic databases PubMed, Embase, Biosys and Toxline. Four studies on plasma catecholamines, 10 studies on heart rate variability, and 16 studies on post-morning cortisol were reviewed.

Results: In the majority of studies that examined the association of HRV and work stress, greater reports of work stress is associated with lower heart rate variability. The findings for plasma catecholamines and cortisol secretion are less clear cut and suffer from poorer quality of studies in general. Conclusion: There is evidence that work stress is related to elevated stress responses in terms of sympatho-adrenal and HPA axis biomarkers. (C) 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.”
“To elucidate the role of sparrows as intermediate hosts of highly pathogenic avian influenza H5N1 viruses, we assessed shedding and interspecies waterborne transmission of A/duck/Laos/25/06 in sparrows and chickens. Inoculated birds shed virus at high titers from the oropharynx and cloaca, and infection was fatal.