Individuals with Parkinson’s disease (PD) suffer from motor and mental disturbances due to degeneration of dopaminergic and non-dopaminergic neuronal systems. Although they provide temporary symptom relief, current treatments fail to control motor and non-motor alterations or to arrest disease progression. Aiming to explore safety and possible motor and neuropsychological benefits of a novel strategy to improve the PD condition, a case series study was designed for brain grafting of human neural progenitor cells (NPCs) to a group of eight patients with moderate PD. A NPC line, expressing Oct-4 and Sox-2, was manufactured and characterized. Using stereotactic surgery, NPC suspensions were bilaterally injected into patients’ dorsal putamina. Cyclosporine A was given for 10 days prior to surgery and continued for 1 month thereafter. Neurological, neuropsychological, and brain imaging evaluations were performed pre-operatively, 1, 2, and 4 years post-surgery. Seven of eight patients have completed 4-year follow-up. The procedure proved to be safe, with no immune responses against the transplant, and no adverse effects. One year after cell grafting, all but one of the seven patients completing the study showed various degrees of motor improvement, and five of them showed better response to medication. PET imaging showed a trend toward enhanced midbrain dopaminergic activity. By their 4-year evaluation, improvements somewhat decreased but remained better than at baseline. Neuropsychological changes were minor, if at all. The intervention appears to be safe. At 4 years post-transplantation we report that undifferentiated NPCs can be delivered safely by stereotaxis to both putamina of patients with PD without causing adverse effects. In 6/7 patients in OFF condition improvement in UPDRS III was observed. PET functional scans suggest enhanced putaminal dopaminergic neurotransmission that could correlate with improved motor function, and better response to L-DOPA. Patients’ neuropsychological scores were unaffected by grafting. Trial Registration: Fetal derived stem cells for Parkinson’s disease https://doi.org/10.1186/ISRCTN39104513Reg#ISRCTN39104513

Amygdala structural and functional abnormalities have been associated to reactive aggression in previous studies. However, the possible linkage of these two types of anomalies has not been examined. We hypothesized that they would coincide in the same localizations, would be correlated in intensity and would be mediated by reactive aggression personality traits. Here violent (n = 25) and non-violent (n = 29) men were recruited on the basis of their reactive aggression. Callous-unemotional (CU) traits were also assessed. Gray matter concentration (gmC) and reactivity to fearful and neutral facial expressions were measured in dorsal and ventral amygdala partitions. The difference between responses to fearful and neutral facial expressions was calculated (F/N-difference). Violent individuals exhibited a smaller F/N-difference and gmC in the left dorsal amygdala, where a significant coincidence was found in a conjunction analysis. Moreover, the left amygdala F/N-difference and gmC were correlated to each other, an effect mediated by reactive aggression but not by CU. The F/N-difference was caused by increased reactivity to neutral faces. This suggests that anatomical anomalies within local circuitry (and not only altered input) may underlie the amygdala hyper-reactivity to social signals which is characteristic of reactive aggression.

Members of organized crime and drug traffic organization have developed a hierarchical model of association while participating in the production, distribution, and commercialization of drugs and defense of their territory. The nature of these organizations leads to extremely violent acts, similar to those performed by psychopathic delinquents. Eightytwo incarcerated male offenders-members of these organizations-were assessed and later classified according to the role they played in the organization: kingpins, money launderers, protectors, enforcers, and distributors/producers. These individuals were paired to a control group of 76 nonincarcerated healthy male volunteers from a community sample. We obtained their psychopathic profile and frontal lobe functioning using the Psychopathy Checklist, Revised (PCL-R), PCL-R score, and the Frontal Lobe and Executive Functions Battery. Kingpins and enforcers were considered as psychopaths across the entire range, while the money launderers fit in the description of successful psychopathy, and interesting contrasts were observed within the groups in the PCL-R factors. The orbitofrontal cortex was the functional area affected in the inmate sample, being more detrimentally affected in the most violent samples, thus providing a useful measure of psychopathy and violence of unimpaired criminals. An objective classification of incarcerated criminals will allow us to distinguish between neuronal and cultural psychopaths and sociopaths, which will help us establish adequate readaptation programs. Social issues were also determinants: it was found that in the environment where these criminals grew up, there is a broad acceptance and validation of lifestyles characterized by the accumulation and showing off of material values over intellectual and social values, which in addition to drug consumption trigger the development of aggressive and violent personalities. Readaptation programs must strengthen cognitive abilities, which are normally diminished in these individuals, and encourage a lifestyle with an "integral wealth perspective" that values not only economic but also personal, social, familial, labor, and cultural assets.

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