Brain regions with abnormal network properties in severe epilepsy of Lennox-Gastaut phenotype: Multivariate analysis of task-free fMRI

OBJECTIVE: Lennox-Gastaut syndrome, and the similar but less tightly defined Lennox-Gastaut phenotype, describe patients with severe epilepsy, generalized epileptic discharges, and variable intellectual disability. Our previous functional neuroimaging studies suggest that abnormal diffuse association network activity underlies the epileptic discharges of this clinical phenotype. Herein we use a data-driven multivariate approach to determine the spatial changes in local and global networks of patients with severe epilepsy of the Lennox-Gastaut phenotype. METHODS: We studied 9 adult patients and 14 controls. In 20 min of task-free blood oxygen level-dependent functional magnetic resonance imaging data, two metrics of functional connectivity were studied: Regional homogeneity or local connectivity, a measure of concordance between each voxel to a focal cluster of adjacent voxels; and eigenvector centrality, a global connectivity estimate designed to detect important neural hubs. Multivariate pattern analysis of these data in a machine-learning framework was used to identify spatial features that classified disease subjects. RESULTS: Multivariate pattern analysis was 95.7% accurate in classifying subjects for both local and global connectivity measures (22/23 subjects correctly classified). Maximal discriminating features were the following: increased local connectivity in frontoinsular and intraparietal areas; increased global connectivity in posterior association areas; decreased local connectivity in sensory (visual and auditory) and medial frontal cortices; and decreased global connectivity in the cingulate cortex, striatum, hippocampus, and pons. SIGNIFICANCE: Using a data-driven analysis method in task-free functional magnetic resonance imaging, we show increased connectivity in critical areas of association cortex and decreased connectivity in primary cortex. This supports previous findings of a critical role for these association cortical regions as a final common pathway in generating the Lennox-Gastaut phenotype. Abnormal function of these areas is likely to be important in explaining the intellectual problems characteristic of this disorder

Leaders fostering teachers' learning environments for technology integration

This chapter addresses how school leaders can support teachers’ professional learning and technology integration through a learning design perspective. Through this perspective, teachers engage in sense making to enact policy through teaching and learning. This can afford an authentic and contextualized approach to teachers’ professional learning. To do this it is necessary for school leaders to create a culture of learning and experimentation. School leaders can do this through fostering teachers’ engagement in contemporary professional learning,such as developing personal learning networks and communities. These can be online or face-to-face in local schools, or a mixture of the two, formal or informal,and structured or unstructured. The chapter highlights that professional learning should be flexible and personalized to teachers’ contexts. This is increasingly possible as teachers have access to diverse networks and communities, which support engagement with a wide range of professionals, resources, and experiences that may not be available in local schools. The chapter concludes with recommendations on how school leaders can employ a learning design perspective to create this includes opportunities for teachers to make sense of technology integration and experiment and continuously learn to support digital technology use in their school context