TY  - JOUR
A1  - Ziegler, Mirjam
A1  - Kaiser, Anna
A1  - Igel, Christine
A1  - Geissler, Julia
A1  - Mechler, Konstantin
A1  - Holz, Nathalie E.
A1  - Becker, Katja
A1  - Döpfner, Manfred
A1  - Romanos, Marcel
A1  - Brandeis, Daniel
A1  - Hohmann, Sarah
A1  - Millenet, Sabina
A1  - Banaschewski, Tobias
T1  - Actigraphy-derived sleep profiles of children with and without attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) over two weeks — comparison, precursor symptoms, and the chronotype
JF  - Brain Sciences
N2  - Although sleep problems are common in children with ADHD, their extent, preceding risk factors, and the association between neurocognitive performance and neurobiological processes in sleep and ADHD, are still largely unknown. We examined sleep variables in school-aged children with ADHD, addressing their intra-individual variability (IIV) and considering potential precursor symptoms as well as the chronotype. Additionally, in a subgroup of our sample, we investigated associations with neurobehavioral functioning (n = 44). A total of 57 children (6–12 years) with (n = 24) and without ADHD (n = 33) were recruited in one center of the large ESCAlife study to wear actigraphs for two weeks. Actigraphy-derived dependent variables, including IIV, were analyzed using linear mixed models in order to find differences between the groups. A stepwise regression model was used to investigate neuropsychological function. Overall, children with ADHD showed longer sleep onset latency (SOL), higher IIV in SOL, more movements during sleep, lower sleep efficiency, and a slightly larger sleep deficit on school days compared with free days. No group differences were observed for chronotype or sleep onset time. Sleep problems in infancy predicted later SOL and the total number of movements during sleep in children with and without ADHD. No additional effect of sleep problems, beyond ADHD symptom severity, on neuropsychological functioning was found. This study highlights the importance of screening children with ADHD for current and early childhood sleep disturbances in order to prevent long-term sleep problems and offer individualized treatments. Future studies with larger sample sizes should examine possible biological markers to improve our understanding of the underlying mechanisms.
KW  - sleep
KW  - actigraphy
KW  - attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)
KW  - intra-individual variability (IIV)
KW  - chronotype
KW  - children
KW  - continuous performance task (CPT)
KW  - precursor symptoms
KW  - ESCAlife
Y1  - 2021
U6  - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-250084
SN  - 2076-3425
VL  - 11
IS  - 12
ER  - 
TY  - JOUR
A1  - Weiss, Esther
A1  - Ziegler, Sabrina
A1  - Fliesser, Mirjam
A1  - Schmitt, Anna-Lena
A1  - Hünniger, Kerstin
A1  - Kurzai, Oliver
A1  - Morton, Charles-Oliver
A1  - Einsele, Hermann
A1  - Loeffler, Juergen
T1  - First Insights in NK—DC Cross-Talk and the Importance of Soluble Factors During Infection With Aspergillus fumigatus
JF  - Frontiers in Cellular and Infection Microbiology
N2  - Invasive aspergillosis (IA) is an infectious disease caused by the fungal pathogen Aspergillus fumigatus that mainly affects immunocompromised hosts. To investigate immune cell cross-talk during infection with A. fumigatus, we co-cultured natural killer (NK) cells and dendritic cells (DC) after stimulation with whole fungal structures, components of the fungal cell wall, fungal lysate or ligands for distinct fungal receptors. Both cell types showed activation after stimulation with fungal components and were able to transfer activation signals to the counterpart not stimulated cell type. Interestingly, DCs recognized a broader spectrum of fungal components and thereby initiated NK cell activation when those did not recognize fungal structures. These experiments highlighted the supportive function of DCs in NK cell activation. Furthermore, we focused on soluble DC mediated NK cell activation and showed that DCs stimulated with the TLR2/Dectin-1 ligand zymosan could maximally stimulate the expression of CD69 on NK cells. Thus, we investigated the influence of both receptors for zymosan, Dectin-1 and TLR2, which are highly expressed on DCs but show only minimal expression on NK cells. Specific focus was laid on the question whether Dectin-1 or TLR2 signaling in DCs is important for the secretion of soluble factors leading to NK cell activation. Our results show that Dectin-1 and TLR2 are negligible for NK cell activation. We conclude that besides Dectin-1 and TLR2 other receptors on DCs are able to compensate for the missing signal.
KW  - natural killer cells
KW  - dendritic cells
KW  - NK-DC cross-talk
KW  - Aspergillus fumigatus
KW  - soluble factors
KW  - innate immunity
Y1  - 2018
U6  - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-233565
VL  - 8
ER  -