Subclinical recurrent neck pain and its treatment impacts motor training-induced plasticity of the cerebellum and motor cortex

The cerebellum processes pain inputs and is important for motor learning. Yet, how the cerebellum interacts with the motor cortex in individuals with recurrent pain is not clear. Functional connectivity between the cerebellum and motor cortex can be measured by a twin coil transcranial magnetic stimulation technique in which stimulation is applied to the cerebellum prior to stimulation over the motor cortex, which inhibits motor evoked potentials (MEPs) produced by motor cortex stimulation alone, called cerebellar inhibition (CBI). Healthy individuals without pain have been shown to demonstrate reduced CBI following motor acquisition. We hypothesized that CBI would not reduce to the same extent in those with mild-recurrent neck pain following the same motor acquisition task. We further hypothesized that a common treatment for neck pain (spinal manipulation) would restore reduced CBI following motor acquisition. Motor acquisition involved typing an eight-letter sequence of the letters Z,P,D,F with the right index finger. Twenty-seven neck pain participants received spinal manipulation (14 participants, 18-27 years) or sham control (13 participants, 19-24 years). Twelve healthy controls (20-27 years) also participated. Participants had CBI measured; they completed manipulation or sham control followed by motor acquisition; and then had CBI re-measured. Following motor acquisition, neck pain sham controls remained inhibited (58 ± 33% of test MEP) vs. healthy controls who disinhibited (98 ± 49% of test MEP, P<0.001), while the spinal manipulation group facilitated (146 ± 95% of test MEP, P<0.001). Greater inhibition in neck pain sham vs. healthy control groups suggests that neck pain may change cerebellar-motor cortex interaction. The change to facilitation suggests that spinal manipulation may reverse inhibitory effects of neck pain

Upregulation of cortico-cerebellar functional connectivity after motor learning

Interactions between the cerebellum and primary motor cortex are crucial for the acquisition of new motor skills. Recent neuroimaging studies indicate that learning motor skills is associated with subsequent modulation of resting-state functional connectivity in the cerebellar and cerebral cortices. The neuronal processes underlying the motor-learning-induced plasticity are not well understood. Here, we investigate changes in functional connectivity in source-reconstructed electroencephalography (EEG) following the performance of a single session of a dynamic force task in twenty young adults. Source activity was reconstructed in 112 regions of interest (ROIs) and the functional connectivity between all ROIs was estimated using the imaginary part of coherence. Significant changes in resting-state connectivity were assessed using partial least squares (PLS). We found that subjects adapted their motor performance during the training session and showed improved accuracy but with slower movement times. A number of connections were significantly upregulated after motor training, principally involving connections within the cerebellum and between the cerebellum and motor cortex. Increased connectivity was confined to specific frequency ranges in the mu- and beta-bands. Post hoc analysis of the phase spectra of these cerebellar and cortico-cerebellar connections revealed an increased phase lag between motor cortical and cerebellar activity following motor practice. These findings show a reorganization of intrinsic cortico-cerebellar connectivity related to motor adaptation and demonstrate the potential of EEG connectivity analysis in source space to reveal the neuronal processes that underpin neural plasticity

Demographic and clinical determinants of neck pain in idiopathic cervical dystonia.

Cervical dystonia is associated with neck pain in a significant proportion of cases, but the mechanisms underlying pain are largely unknown. In this exploratory study, we compared demographic and clinical variables in cervical dystonia patients with and without neck pain from the Italian Dystonia Registry. Univariable and multivariable logistic regression analysis indicated a higher frequency of sensory trick and a lower educational level among patients with pain

Interhemispheric interactions between the right angular gyrus and the left motor cortex: a transcranial magnetic stimulation study

This folder contains data for the manuscript: Baarbé, J.K., Vesia, M., Brown, M.J.N., Lizarraga, K.J., Gunraj, C., Jegatheeswaran, G., Drummond, N.M., Rinchon, C., Weissbach, A., Saravanamuttu, J., Chen, R. Interhemispheric interactions between the right posterior parietal cortex and the left motor cortex: a transcranial magnetic stimulation study

Role of Inferior Frontoparietal Structures in Motor Control and Freezing of Gait in Parkinson’s Disease

Freezing of gait (FOG) is a disabling symptom of Parkinson’s disease (PD) in which patients are unable to step forward when desired. Abnormal brain circuits responsible for FOG in PD patients are unclear and experimental paradigms are needed to address this disabling symptom. We hypothesized that motor interruptions of lower limb movements while seated may be related to FOG and may indicate abnormal brain activities. In Study 1, we tested 19 PD patients and 20 healthy controls and showed that motor interruption or cessation of bilateral stepping while sitting correlated with the presence and severity of FOG and this effect persisted in the “on” dopaminergic medication state. In Study 2, we tested how these “lower limb motor blocks” or LLMB are related to changes in 4-30 Hz cortical activities recorded from 64-channel scalp electroencephalography. In 17 PD patients, we found that sporadic LLMB differed from typical steps in the right angular gyrus (RAG, F=154.6, P=0.0185, before and during LLMB>typical steps). LLMB also differed from cued stops in the right inferior frontal gyrus (F=32.0, P=0.0005, before LLMB>cued stops; F=42.0, P=0.0005, during LLMBPh.D

Status of IP Treaties in Africa

This open access dataset is described and analysed in the following article: De Beer, J., Baarbé, J., & Ncube, C. (2018). Evolution of Africa’s intellectual property treaty ratification landscape. The African Journal of Information and Communication (AJIC), 22, 53-82. https://doi.org/10.23962/10539/26173 . The data is a subset of the Open AIR network’s research project data holding via a working paper entitled The Intellectual Property Treaty Landscape in Africa, 1885 to 2015 by Jeremy de Beer, Jeremiah Baarbé, Caroline Ncube, working paper 4, published online 5 May 2017, http://www.openair.org.za/publications/the-intellectual-property-treaty-landscape-in-africa-1885-to-2015/ . Open Air is a network of African researchers in the University of Ottawa in Canada, the University of Cape Town in South Africa, Strathmore University in Kenya, the Nigerian Institute for Advanced Legal Studies, and the American University in Cairo, Egypt. Its purpose is to answer two major research questions in order to ensure that African knowledge and innovation is not lost in the knowledge economy. The major research questions are: 1 How can open collaborative innovation help businesses scale up and seize the new opportunities of a global knowledge economy? And 2. Which knowledge governance policies will best ensure that the social and economic benefits of innovation are shared inclusively? (Openair Network , 10 Dec 11:12 am http://www.openair.org.za/about-us/ ) Under this overarching framework: the specific research question is whether it is correct that local Intellectual policy making was “constrained to some extent by the powerful global IP governance schemata.”( De Beer, J., Baarbé, J., & Ncube, C. 2018) To answer this question a historical systematic review of IP treaties along with the extents and dates of ratification via electronic scraping. Specifically, researchers wished to explore whether the tension that they saw between countries who’s “International commitments harmonized in intellectual property treaties exist in tension with local needs for flexibility”. (De Beer et al., 2018) could be supported quantitatively. This project created simple quantitative data out of qualitative lists of policies along with the presence or absence of ratification by African countries. The source of the data is the UN Convention on World Intellectual Property Organization( WIPO) database which has tables listing parties to the treaty, as well as the date of signature, filling of legal instrument used to ratify the treaty and entry into force. These terms are defined in the Glossary attached. Data collected by hand is from the Nagoya Protocol, the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources, and International Convention for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV). UPOV data is defined in the explanatory note attached. The data contains Six major variables: Country name, Treaty name, Date of Treaty, ratification by country, IP Regime defined in legal terms i.e. copyright, Colonising state. The minor variables is the Official Language. The main independent variable was 36 treaties of which two were excluded as not yet being in force at the time of data collection. The major dependent variable was the date of ratification by country present in WIPO database. Total data was 485 ratifications by the 34 countries thus creating 16 490 geographical- time data points.Open African Innovation Research (Open AIR) network,Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) of Canada,International Development Research Centre (IDRC),UK Department for International Development (DFID)National Research Foundation (NRF) of South Africahttps://www.wits.ac.za/linkcentre/ajic/ajic-issue-22-2018/http://www.openair.org.za/publications/the-intellectual-property-treaty-landscape-in-africa-1885-to-2015/https://doi.org/10.23962/10539/2619nina lewi

A Proposed "Agricultural Data Commons" in Support of Food Security

This article identifies a data governance model that could help reduce dataset access inequities currently experienced by smallholder farmers in both developed-world and developing-world settings. Agricultural data is globally recognised for its importance in addressing food insecurity, with such data generated and used by a value chain of contributors, collectors, and users. Guided by the modified institutional analysis and development (IAD) framework, our study considered the features of agricultural data as a "knowledge commons" resource. The study also looked at existing data collection modalities practiced by John Deere, Plantwise and Abalobi, and at the open data distribution modalities available under the Creative Commons and the Open Data Commons licensing frameworks. The study found that an "agricultural data commons" model could give greater agency to the smallholder farmers who contribute data. A model open data licence could be used by data collectors, supported by a certification mark and a dedicated public interest organisation. These features could engender an agricultural data commons that would be advantageous to the three key stakeholders in agricultural data: data contributors, who need engagement, privacy, control, and benefit-sharing; small and medium-sized-enterprise (SME) data collectors, who need sophisticated legal tools and an ability to brand their participation in opening data; and data users, who need open access

international law, Africa, intellectual property (IP), treaty ratification, development, data visualisation, WIPO, WTO, trade, harmonisation

Intellectual property (IP) policy is an important contributor to economic growth and human development. However, international commitments harmonised in IP treaties often exist in tension with local needs for flexibility. This article tracks the adoption of IP treaties in Africa over a 131-year span, from 1884 to 2015, through breaking it down into four periods demarcated by points in time coinciding with key events in African and international IP law: the periods 1884-1935, 1936-1965, 1966-1995, and 1996-2015. The article explores relevant historical and legal aspects of each of these four periods, in order to assess and contextualise the evolutions of the IP treaty landscape on the continent. The findings show that treaties now saturate the IP policy space throughout the continent, limiting the ability to locally tailor approaches to knowledge governance

Options for practical in-use compliance testing of HD vehicles

In 1994 TNO Automotive started its HD vehicle In-use Compliance programme on request of the Dutch Ministry of Spatial Planning, Housing and the Environment. Until now, it has been possible to simulate the homologation test procedure with acceptable accuracy on the vehicle (using a chassis dynamometer), rather than testing the engine on an engine dynamomter as prescribed by the type approval procedure. Advantages of this methodology developed by TNO, are the cost-effectiveness and the possibility to use the homologation test results as a reference. With the Euro 3 legislation coming into effect, new testcycles with transient elements are added to the homologation procedure, where previously it was only a stationary testcycle. As a result of this, the test methodology used so far no longer applies to the whole procedure. Because it is anticipated that emissions from HD vehicles in the near future are increasingly related to transient engine behaviour, a transient testcycle is also important for IUC purposes. This paper will identify and assess alternative options for future practical IUC testing on the basis of the aims and demands for the Dutch IUC programme. Apart from this assessment, a brief overview is presented of the results obtained so far by this programme