Visual Vertigo, Motion Sickness and Disorientation in vehicles

The normal vestibular system may be adversely affected by environmental challenges which have characteristics that are unfamiliar or ambiguous in the patterns of sensory stimulation they provide. A disordered vestibular system lends susceptibility even to quotidian environmental experiences as the sufferer becomes dependent on potentially misleading, non-vestibular sensory stimuli. In both cases the sequela may be dizziness, incoordination, imbalance and unpleasant autonomic responses. Many forms of visual environmental motion, particularly busy places such as supermarkets, readily induce inappropriate sensations of sway or motion and imbalance referred to as visual vertigo. All people with intact vestibular function can become motion sick although individual susceptibility varies widely and is partially determined by inheritance. Motorists learn to interpret sensory stimuli in the context of the car stabilised by its suspension and guided by steering. A type of motorist disorientation occurs in some individuals that develop a heightened awareness of false perceptions of car orientation, readily experiencing stereotypical symptoms of threatened rolling over on corners and veering on open highways or in streaming traffic. This article discusses the putative mechanisms, consequences and approach to managing patients with visual vertigo, motion sickness and motorist disorientation syndrome in the context of chronic dizziness and motion sensitivity

Electrocortical therapy for motion sickness

Given a sufficiently provocative stimulus, almost everyone can be made motion sick, with approximately one-third experiencing significant symptoms on long bus trips, on ships, or in light aircraft.1–4 Current countermeasures are either behavioral or pharmacologic. Behavioral measures include habituation/desensitization treatment protocols5 as well as positioning the head in alignment with the direction of the gravito-inertial force and maintaining a stable horizontal reference frame.5 Pharmacologic measures include antimuscarinics, H1 antihistamines, and sympathomimetics, which all detrimentally impact upon cognitive function, rendering them inappropriate for occupational use.5 All current therapies are only partially effective

Application of Pulsed Field Gel Electrophoresis to Determine γ-ray-induced Double-strand Breaks in Yeast Chromosomal Molecules

The frequency of DNA double-strand breaks (dsb) was determined in yeast cells exposed to γ-rays under anoxic conditions. Genomic DNA of treated cells was separated by pulsed field gel electrophoresis, and two different approaches for the evaluation of the gels were employed: (1) The DNA mass distribution profile obtained by electrophoresis was compared to computed profiles, and the number of DSB per unit length was then derived in terms of a fitting procedure; (2) hybridization of selected chromosomes was performed, and a comparison of the hybridization signals in treated and untreated samples was then used to derive the frequency of dsb

Basic Module Theory over Non-Commutative Rings with Computational Aspects of Operator Algebras

The present text surveys some relevant situations and results where basic Module Theory interacts with computational aspects of operator algebras. We tried to keep a balance between constructive and algebraic aspects.Comment: To appear in the Proceedings of the AADIOS 2012 conference, to be published in Lecture Notes in Computer Scienc

Vertigo and dizziness from environmental motion: visual vertigo, motion sickness, and drivers' disorientation

The normal vestibular system may be adversely affected by environmental challenges which have characteristics that are unfamiliar or ambiguous in the patterns of sensory stimulation they provide. A disordered vestibular system lends susceptibility even to quotidian environmental experiences as the sufferer becomes dependent on potentially misleading, nonvestibular sensory stimuli. In both cases, the sequelae may be vertigo, incoordination, imbalance, and unpleasant autonomic responses. Common environmental motion conditions include visual vertigo, motion sickness, and motorists' disorientation. The core therapy for visual vertigo, motion sickness, and drivers' disorientation is progressive desensitization within a cognitive framework of reassurance and explanation, plus anxiolytic tactics and autogenic control of autonomic symptoms

Nauseogenicity of off-vertical axis rotation vs. equivalent visual motion

Introduction: Off-vertical axis rotation (OVAR) provokes motion sickness. The visual motion equivalent to OVAR in simulators is also nauseogenic. Our experiment compared the nauseogenicity of OVAR vs. visual motion. Methods: There were 12 subjects who undertook the following conditions: A) OVAR in darkness at 0.2 Hz, 18° tilt; B) same OVAR with eyes open in the light; and C) stationary, seated upright, watching a video of the visual motion experienced in B. The conditions were counterbalanced and performed at the same time of day with a minimum 5-d separation between conditions. Stimulation was stopped at moderate nausea with a 20-min maximum cut-off. Motion sickness susceptibility was rated on a standardized questionnaire (MSSQ). Results: Time (mean ± SD minutes) to moderate nausea was significantly shorter for real OVAR conditions (A: 7.1 ± 5.5; B: 7.7 ± 6.7) vs. video (C: 15.7 ± 6.4). Subjects with relatively low susceptibilities to motion sickness developed nausea more slowly with vision (B-A time difference correlated with MSSQ scores r = −0.7, P < 0.05). Headache was more prominent with visual field motion (C). Conclusions: OVAR was twice as nauseogenic as visual motion. Headache during visual motion suggests mechanisms in common with migraine. We hypothesize that subjects who fared better in the light used visual cues to resolve sensory conflict, whereas subjects who were equally susceptible in light and dark made poor use of visual cues; perhaps a form of `field dependency'. This may explain why some people prefer `a view of the road ahead' to help against motion sickness whereas others shut their eyes

Foot rotation contribution to trunk and gaze stability during whole-body mediated gaze shifts: a principal component analysis study

Large gaze displacements are mediated by combined motion of the eye, head, trunk, and foot. We applied principal component analysis (PCA) to examine the degree of variability and linearity in the angular velocity pattern of the various segments involved that participate in this task. Ten normal subjects stood up and had to visually fixate and realign their bodies with LED targets separated 45° apart, ranging from ±45 to 360°. The outbound movement in this paradigm is unpredictable whereas the return (inbound) movement occurs under spatially predictable conditions. Under such predictable conditions, subjects generate in approximately 15% of the trials gaze shifts, with periods of fairly constant high gaze velocity (single-step gaze shifts). PCA showed that gaze velocity variability did not change if the feet were rotating or not. Foot velocity was variable and showed additional PCs suggestive of non-linear motion components. Trunk and head-in-space velocity showed intermediate levels of variability but its variability decreased during the foot stepping movements. The results suggest that the feet, trunk, and head are less tightly controlled by the central nervous system than gaze velocity. Movements of the feet seem to aid trunk stability and motion rather than gaze control. © 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved