The effect of visual dual-tasking interference on walking in healthy young adults

Background Visual dual-task skills are essential for stable ambulation in everyday life such as walking while reading text. Gait analysis in a virtual environment can provide insight into altered walking performance while visual dual-tasking. Research question How visual dual-tasking including cognitive load of reading text and altered optical flow influences walking speed and stability in healthy adults? Also, is there a relationship between the mediolateral centre of mass(CoM) displacement and mediolateral trunk movement? Methods Nineteen able-bodied young adults performed self-selected walking on a treadmill in a virtual environment under the following three conditions; single-task walking, walking while viewing scrolling lines, and walking while reading text scrolling on the screen. Three-dimensional motion analysis was used to measure the effect of dual-tasking on gait velocity, step length, mediolateral CoM displacement, and mediolateral thorax inclination. Results The effect of visual dual-tasking showed significantly increased walking speed and longer step length compared to single-tasking. The cognitive load of reading text while walking had a significant impact on reduced step length variability and greater mediolateral CoM displacement. This was related to the mediolateral thorax inclination. Significance A visual dual-task influences gait through altered optical flow and a cognitive load effect. Altered optical flow increased walking speed whilst the visual attention to read text affected foot placement and upright trunk posture, together with greater mediolateral CoM displacement. Thus, dual-tasking of reading text in a virtual environment substantially affected walking stability in healthy young people. This paradigm is therefore useful for assessment of walking stability in daily life and in the clinical setting

脳卒中後の歩行改善のための短下肢装具の使用は運動エネルギーに影響を与える：試験的研究

京都大学新制・課程博士博士(人間健康科学)甲第24095号人健博第102号新制||人健||7(附属図書館)京都大学大学院医学研究科人間健康科学系専攻(主査)教授 市橋 則明, 教授 稲富 宏之, 教授 松田 秀一学位規則第4条第1項該当Doctor of Human Health SciencesKyoto UniversityDFA

Consumption of barley ameliorates the diabetic steatohepatitis and reduces the high transforming growth factor β expression in mice grown in α-minimum essential medium in vitro as embryos

Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), which includes the subtype non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), is a major complication of type 2 diabetic mellitus (T2DM), even among non-obese patients. However, the exact cause of NAFLD/NASH in non-obese patients with T2DM is unclear. We studied a non-obese mouse model of T2DM created through the malnourishment of embryos by culture in vitro for 48 h in α-minimum essential medium (MEM) at the two-cell stage. We compared the development of steatohepatitis in these MEM mice with control mice that were similarly cultured in standard potassium simplex-optimized medium (KSOM). We also studied the effects of 10 weeks of consumption of barley, which contains large amounts of the soluble fiber β-glucan, on the steatohepatitis of the adult MEM mice. The size of lipid droplets, the area of fibrosis, and the mRNA expression of the transforming growth factor beta (Tgfb) gene in the liver were higher in adult MEM mice fed a rice-based diet than in KSOM mice fed the same diet. However, barley consumption reduced the area of fibrosis and TGFB expression in MEM mice. In conclusion, adult mice that are cultured in MEM at the two-cell embryo stage develop steatohepatitis and T2DM, accompanied by higher hepatic TGFB expression, than KSOM controls. Furthermore, the consumption of barley during adulthood ameliorates the steatohepatitis and reduces the TGFB expression