changedaccountname

[changedaccountname]

I bought the box sets and thoroughly enjoyed the appendices. The way things just grew in size and scope is astounding; it was already a large production to begin with and just got bigger.

The level of detail was amazing from the beginning- Hobbiton was built a year before filming so that it would look properly lived in- and due to a conjunction of people, places and things only rarely seen the movie(s) became a thing of beauty that will endure.

The box sets of the DVDs share that level of detail and love, from the construction of the boxes to the contents of the behind the scenes DVDs.

It seemed like Peter Jackson was trying to recreate that magic with The Hobbit. Unfortunately, he fell short and just came across as trying too hard. They were still fun to watch, though.

I know that Peter’s Jackson Lord of the Rings trilogy technically has flaws but also….it doesn’t. It’s perfect.

[changedaccountname]

Crocodiles swim way faster than you think.

(Footage taken from Queensland Australia)

[changedaccountname]



Amazing art by @enstatia on Instagram or the same handle @enstatia on Tumblr!

[changedaccountname]

suzhou embroidery by 倾卿苏绣 | based on art 千里江山图 ten thousand miles of mountains and rivers by 王希孟wang ximeng(1096—？）

[changedaccountname]

[x]

[changedaccountname]

Four horsemen of the apocalypsenatural

[changedaccountname]

8.08 - Hunteri Heroici

[changedaccountname]

Here comes Ackles with a rebar (x)

[changedaccountname]

Freelancing in technical theater means you’re on a lot of different email lists. People need a crew, they send out an email, you respond with your availability. Now, most people start these with things like “hey folks” or “hi everyone”. Neal is not most people.

His openers started off innocent enough.

Then, he started to push boundaries.

And as you can see, it has spiraled out of control since then.

[changedaccountname]

Just Pedro's voice. His amazing voice.

[changedaccountname]

(via File Photo)

[changedaccountname]

It’s still very funny (or rather stupid) to me that Sam and Bucky were seen in the fadom as this sort of antagonistic duo who has issues working with each other, because they can’t get anything done in the middle of all the arguing.

I mean… they still hardly do anything useful and make a ton of stupid decisions, but 99% of that is the result of caring way too much. Bucky literally ruined Sam’s plan to talk to Karli, because Walker said “well, Sam might get hurt if you don’t do what I want” and apparently it was enough for Bucky to throw the entire plan out of the window. And it’s the same for Sam who’s almost blown their cover in Madripoor, because Bucky looked distressed and who agreed to play along the stupid Zemo-freeing plan simply because Bucky asked nicely. Meanwhile Bucky destroyed his relationship with Wakanda to help with mission that was specifically Sam’s… and “wasted” the last favour from them to get a gift that wasn’t even for himself.

You can see this pattern going back to their fight on the airport in Civil War when Sam immediately attacked a person obviously ten times stronger than him to help Bucky or when Bucky jumped in front of Spider-Man to cover Sam and you could see on his face that he had regrets about this protective impulse before anything painful even happened.

Hateful rivals my ass. These two were ride of die even when they still couldn’t go five minutes without verbally attacking their parner.

[changedaccountname]

Lmao you’re an adult, you shouldn’t be using the word squick. Use trigger. Use your grown up adult words to explain how you feel instead of leaning on a cutesy uwu term that no one outside of tumblr uses. It’s embarrassing.

Idek if this is serious or ironic honestly

[changedaccountname]

(Image caption: A genetic condition known as 22q.11.2 deletion syndrome is associated with an increased risk of schizophrenia. A Penn Vet-led team found that a leaky blood-brain barrier, allowing inappropriate immune involvement in the central nervous system, may contribute to this or perhaps other neuropsychiatric conditions. Credit: Courtesy of Jorge Iván Alvarez)

The immune link between a leaky blood-brain barrier and schizophrenia

Like a stern bodyguard for the central nervous sytem, the blood-brain barrier keeps out anything that could lead to disease and dangerous inflammation—at least when all is functioning normally.

That may not be the case in people with schizophrenia and other mental disorders, suggest new findings from a team led by researchers from the School of Veterinary Medicine, Perelman School of Medicine, and Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP). In these individuals, a more permissive barrier appears to allow the immune system to get improperly involved in the central nervous system, the researchers showed. The inflammation that arises likely contributes to the clinical manifestations of neuropsychiatric conditions.

“Our hypothesis was that, if the immune function of the blood-brain barrier is compromised, the resulting inflammation will have an impact on the central nervous system,” says Jorge Iván Alvarez, an assistant professor at Penn Vet and senior author on the work, published in the journal Brain. “With that in mind, we think these findings could also be used to understand how the blood-brain barrier and neurological processes impact not only schizophrenia but mental disorders at large.”

The research team pursued the study focused on a rare condition called 22q11.2 deletion syndrome (22qDS), in which people are born missing a small portion of DNA from chromosome 22. Roughly a quarter of people with this syndrome go on to develop schizophrenia. Penn and CHOP have a community of researchers who study the condition, often as a way of probing deeper into the mysteries of schizophrenia.

This disorder had not been a focus for the Alvarez lab, however, until he gave a talk at CHOP on his area of expertise—the blood-brain barrier—and was approached by an attendee afterward.

“We started talking about the fact that, in this deletion syndrome, one of the missing genes is very important for blood-brain barrier function,” Alvarez says.

That attendee, Stewart Anderson of CHOP, had been studying 22qDS, and together he and Alvarez began collaborating to evaluate whether the blood-brain barrier and its effect on the immune system were playing a role in the condition.

As a first step, the group used a technique whereby stem cells from 22qDS patients diagnosed with schizophrenia, as well as healthy controls, are coaxed to develop into blood-brain barrier endothelial cells, the cells that form a tightly regulated “wall.” In experiments led by Vet School doctoral student Alexis Crockett, they found that the barrier function in cells derived from 22qDS patients was more impaired than those derived from the healthy controls, which were more restrictive. They confirmed these findings in mice bred to have a version of 22qDS, finding that their blood-brain barrier was likewise leaky compared to normal mice.

The brain is typically considered “immune privileged,” meaning that the surveillance carried out by immune cells and immune mediators on the central nervous system is not only regulated by the physical blockade of the blood-brain barrier but also by endothelial cells making the barrier express lower levels of immune signaling molecules.

To see if 22qDS compromised this immune privilege, the researchers again looked to patient stem cells induced to grow into blood-brain barrier cells and to their mouse model. In both cases, they observed impairments in the immune privilege properties of the barrier, with more immune cells and pro-inflammatory molecules able to cross it.

As a final validation of their findings, the researchers examined post-mortem brain tissue from three 22qDS patients and three controls. Similar to their work in cultured cells and the mouse model, they found evidence of impairment in the blood-brain barrier’s physical and immune protective functions.

“This was the corroboration process, replicating all of these observations in human tissues,” Alvarez says.

The work adds to a growing body of evidence suggesting that schizophrenia and certain other neuropsychiatric conditions may be in part neuroinflammatory disorders. It’s also the first study to assess blood-brain barrier function in 22qDS, making an important link between neuroinflammation due to barrier dysfunction and neuropsychiatric disorders.

“Because 25% of 22q patients develop schizophrenia, it may be possible that these mechanisms taking place in 22q are applicable to idiopathic schizophrenia,” Alvarez says. “And when 22q patients are studied in detail, up to 80% are found to have some form of mental disorder, so these findings may well extend to other disorders as well,” including perhaps depression or autism, he says.

In future work, Alvarez and colleagues will be exploring the role of the blood-brain barrier further, narrowing in on what processes are involved in the barrier’s increased permeability, including a look at astrocytes, cells that normally enhance barrier function.

Further insights into the connection between inflammation and neuropsychiatric disease, Alvarez says, may one day lead to therapies that address inflammation by manipulating the immune response.

[changedaccountname]

Excuse me, what

[changedaccountname]

.