Navigating the Rough Waters of Change : The New OhioLINK ETD Service

On January 14, 2013, the OhioLINK community was informed that the Electronic Theses & Dissertations (ETD) service was down for emergency maintenance. Few in the community could have predicted that single event would trigger a tidal wave of changes that ultimately resulted in a complete system rebuild. Panel participants will discuss the situation from their perspectives as OhioLINK ETD stakeholders. Implementing a new consortial system is a tricky undertaking even with adequate time to plan for the development. What additional pressures come into play when an emergency necessitates rapid development and implementation? What is the impact of changing to a new system in the middle of the academic year during the weeks leading up to the community’s busiest ETD season? How will the hundreds of papers submitted but not approved before the system went down be handled? What adjustments will stakeholders need to make in the short term to realize the long term benefit of an improved consortial ETD submission and approval system? What improvements have been realized with the new system? Communication is vitally important during times of transition. What successes and/or failures of communication can be identified in hindsight? How would the situation be different if the Ohio ETD community had not gathered in the summer of 2012 to discuss their needs and desires for a better system that provided a foundation for functional requirements? What are these new functions and how are they working so far? What future enhancements are on the horizon for the new system? The panelists will discuss these and other issues in a session designed for active audience participation

Rhythms of Consciousness: Binocular Rivalry Reveals Large-Scale Oscillatory Network Dynamics Mediating Visual Perception

Consciousness has been proposed to emerge from functionally integrated large-scale ensembles of gamma-synchronous neural populations that form and dissolve at a frequency in the theta band. We propose that discrete moments of perceptual experience are implemented by transient gamma-band synchronization of relevant cortical regions, and that disintegration and reintegration of these assemblies is time-locked to ongoing theta oscillations. In support of this hypothesis we provide evidence that (1) perceptual switching during binocular rivalry is time-locked to gamma-band synchronizations which recur at a theta rate, indicating that the onset of new conscious percepts coincides with the emergence of a new gamma-synchronous assembly that is locked to an ongoing theta rhythm; (2) localization of the generators of these gamma rhythms reveals recurrent prefrontal and parietal sources; (3) theta modulation of gamma-band synchronization is observed between and within the activated brain regions. These results suggest that ongoing theta-modulated-gamma mechanisms periodically reintegrate a large-scale prefrontal-parietal network critical for perceptual experience. Moreover, activation and network inclusion of inferior temporal cortex and motor cortex uniquely occurs on the cycle immediately preceding responses signaling perceptual switching. This suggests that the essential prefrontal-parietal oscillatory network is expanded to include additional cortical regions relevant to tasks and perceptions furnishing consciousness at that moment, in this case image processing and response initiation, and that these activations occur within a time frame consistent with the notion that conscious processes directly affect behaviour

New & Noteworthy, June 2018

Contents include: Letters from the past and current presidents; ECD Travel Grant Recipients: Responses from their first conference; Conference Spotlights: Dramaturgs & #METOO: A Conference Report; Call for translators.https://soundideas.pugetsound.edu/lmdanewsletter/1001/thumbnail.jp

Examining the Delivery Mode of Mental Practice in Reducing Hemiparesis: A Randomized Controlled Trial

Background: Mental Practice (MP) is an effective intervention to address upper extremity (UE) hemiparesis post-stroke. However, parameters for the delivery mode of MP have not been defined. Therefore, this study\u27s purpose was to define delivery mode parameters by comparing the effectiveness of audio-guided and video-guided MP. Method: Eighteen participants, \u3c 1-month post-stroke, with UE hemiparesis were randomized to a MP, repetitive task practice (RTP) or control group. The MP groups performed audio-guided or video-guided MP, 5x/week. The RTP group physically performed the functional tasks. The control group received traditional stroke rehabilitation. The Fugl-Meyer Assessment (FMA-UE) and Wolf Motor Function Test (WMFT) were used to assess change in UE hemiparesis. Results: Wilcoxon signed-rank test demonstrated audio MP increased FMA-UE scores from pretest (Mdn = 34.0, Mean = 34.0, SD =9.56) to posttest (Mdn = 49.0, Mean = 49.6, SD =7.5), p = .042, r = .64. Similar improvement in FMA-UE scores was found with traditional therapy. Audio MP decreased WMFT time, pretest (Mdn = 10.5, Mean = 49.9, SD = 59.1) to posttest (Mdn = 4.1, Mean = 3.5, SD = 1.4), p =.043, r =.63. Conclusion: Audio MP and traditional therapy appear to decrease impairment and increase the functional abilities of the UE following stroke. Video MP and RTP does not have this effect

Food Packaging and Bisphenol A and Bis(2-Ethyhexyl) Phthalate Exposure: Findings from a Dietary Intervention

Background: Bisphenol A (BPA) and bis(2-ethylhexyl) phthalate (DEHP) are high-production-volume chemicals used in plastics and resins for food packaging. They have been associated with endocrine disruption in animals and in some human studies. Human exposure sources have been estimated, but the relative contribution of dietary exposure to total intake has not been studied empirically

Glutathione de Novo Synthesis but Not Recycling Process Coordinates with Glutamine Catabolism to Control Redox Homeostasis and Directs Murine T Cell Differentiation

Upon antigen stimulation, T lymphocytes undergo dramatic changes in metabolism to fulfill the bioenergetic, biosynthetic and redox demands of proliferation and differentiation. Glutathione (GSH) plays an essential role in controlling redox balance and cell fate. While GSH can be recycled from Glutathione disulfide (GSSG), the inhibition of this recycling pathway does not impact GSH content and murine T cell fate. By contrast, the inhibition of the de novo synthesis of GSH, by deleting either the catalytic (Gclc) or the modifier (Gclm) subunit of glutamate–cysteine ligase (Gcl), dampens intracellular GSH, increases ROS, and impact T cell differentiation. Moreover, the inhibition of GSH de novo synthesis dampened the pathological progression of experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE). We further reveal that glutamine provides essential precursors for GSH biosynthesis. Our findings suggest that glutamine catabolism fuels de novo synthesis of GSH and directs the lineage choice in T cells

Iodine-123 metaiodobenzylguanidine scintigraphic assessment of the transplanted human heart: Evidence for late reinnervation

Objectives.This study attempted to determine whether cardiac sympathetic reinnervation occurs late after orthotopic heart transplantation.Background.Metaiodobenzylguanidine (MIBG) is taken up by myocardial sympathetic nerves. Iodine-123 (I-123) MIBG cardiac uptake reflects intact myocardial sympathetic innervation of the heart. Cardiac transplant recipients do not demonstrate I-123 MIBG cardiac uptake when studied <6 months from transplantation. However, physiologic and biochemical studies suggest that sympathetic reinnervation of the heart can occur >1 year after transplantation.Methods.We performed serial cardiac I-123 MIBG imaging in 23 cardiac transplant recipients early (<-1 year) and late (>1 year) after operation. In 16 subjects transmyocardial norepinephrine release was measured late after transplantation.Results.No subject had visible I-123 MIBG uptake on imaging <1 year after transplantation. However, 11 (48%) of 23 subjects developed visible cardiac I-123 MIBG uptake 1 to 2 years after transplantation. Only 3 (25%) of 12 subjects with a pretransplantation diagnosis of idiopathic cardiomyopathy demonstrated I-123 MIBG uptake compared with 8 (73%) of 11 with a pretransplantation diagnosis of ischemic or rheumatic heart disease (p = 0.04). All 10 subjects with a net myocardial release of norepinephrine had cardiac I-123 MIBG uptake; all 6 subjects without a net release of norepinephrine had no cardiac I-123 MIBG uptake.Conclusions.Sympathetic reinnervation of the transplanted human heart can occur >1 year after operation, as assessed by I-123 MIBG imaging and the transmyocardial release of norepinephrine. Reinnervation is less likely to occur in patients with a pretransplantation diagnosis of idiopathic cardiomyopathy than in those with other etiologies of congestive heart failure

White matter connectome correlates of auditory over-responsivity: edge density imaging and machine-learning classifiers

Sensory over-responsivity (SOR) commonly involves auditory and/or tactile domains, and can affect children with or without additional neurodevelopmental challenges. In this study, we examined white matter microstructural and connectome correlates of auditory over-responsivity (AOR), analyzing prospectively collected data from 39 boys, aged 8–12 years. In addition to conventional diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) maps – including fractional anisotropy (FA), mean diffusivity (MD), radial diffusivity (RD), and axial diffusivity (AD); we used DTI and high-resolution T1 scans to develop connectome Edge Density (ED) maps. The tract-based spatial statistics was used for voxel-wise comparison of diffusion and ED maps. Then, stepwise penalized logistic regression was applied to identify independent variable (s) predicting AOR, as potential imaging biomarker (s) for AOR. Finally, we compared different combinations of machine learning algorithms (i.e., naïve Bayes, random forest, and support vector machine (SVM) and tract-based DTI/connectome metrics for classification of children with AOR. In direct sensory phenotype assessment, 15 (out of 39) boys exhibited AOR (with or without neurodevelopmental concerns). Voxel-wise analysis demonstrates extensive impairment of white matter microstructural integrity in children with AOR on DTI maps – evidenced by lower FA and higher MD and RD; moreover, there was lower connectome ED in anterior-superior corona radiata, genu and body of corpus callosum. In stepwise logistic regression, the average FA of left superior longitudinal fasciculus (SLF) was the single independent variable distinguishing children with AOR (p = 0.007). Subsequently, the left SLF average FA yielded an area under the curve of 0.756 in receiver operating characteristic analysis for prediction of AOR (p = 0.008) as a region-of-interest (ROI)-based imaging biomarker. In comparative study of different combinations of machine-learning models and DTI/ED metrics, random forest algorithms using ED had higher accuracy for AOR classification. Our results demonstrate extensive white matter microstructural impairment in children with AOR, with specifically lower connectomic ED in anterior-superior tracts and associated commissural pathways. Also, average FA of left SLF can be applied as ROI-based imaging biomarker for prediction of SOR. Finally, machine-learning models can provide accurate and objective image-based classifiers for identification of children with AOR based on white matter tracts connectome ED