Neurofilament proteins in the postnatal rat hippocampus. Developmental expression and changes in experimental epilepsy

Neurofilament proteins (NFs) are the major components of the intermediate filaments of the neuronal cytoskeleton. The three different NF proteins; the low (NF-L), medium (NF-M),and dendrites.NF proteins play an important role in neuronal development, and plasticity,and seem to contribute to the pathophysiology of several diseases. However, the detailed expression patterns of NF proteins in the course of postnatal aturation, and in response to seizures in the rat have remained unknown. In this work, I have studied the developmental expression and cellular distribution of the three NF proteins in the rat hippocampus during the postnatal development. The reactivity of NF proteins in response to kainic acid (KA)-induced status epilepticus (SE)was studied in the hippocampus of 9-day-old rats, and using in vitro organotypic hippocampal slices cultures prepared from P6-7 rats. The results showed that NF-L and NF-M proteins are expressed already at the postnatal day 1, while the expression of NF-H mainly occurred during the second postnatal week. The immunoreactivity of NF proteins varied depending on the cell type and sub-cellular location in the hippocampus. In adult rats, KA-induced SE typically results in severe and permanent NF degradation. However, in our P9 rats KA-induced SE resulted in a transient increase in the expression of NF proteins during the first few hours but not degradation. No neuronal death or mossy fiber sprouting was observed at any time after SE. The in vitro studies with OHCs, which mimick the in vivo developing models where a local injection of KA is applied(e.g. intrahippocampal), indicated that NF proteins were rapidly degraded in response to KA treatment, this effect being effectively inhibited by the treatment with the AMPA receptor antagonist CNQX, and calpain inhibitor MDL-28170. These compounds also significantly ameliorated the KA-induced region-specific neuronal damage. The NMDA receptor antagonist and the L-type Ca2+ channel blocker did not have any significant effect. In conclusion, the results indicate that the developmental expression of NF in the rat hippocampus is differentially regulated and targeted in the different hippocampal cell types during the postnatal development. Furthermore, despite SE, the mechanisms leading to NF degradation and neuronal death are not activated in P9 rats unlike in adults. The reason for this remains unknown. The results in organotypic hippocampal cultures confirm the validity of this in vitro model to study development processes, and to perform pharmacological studies. The results also suggest that calpain proteases as interesting pharmacological targets to reduce neuronal damage after acute excitotoxic insults.Siirretty Doriast

Campo tensional en el entorno de una fisura. Determinación de KI y KII usando técnicas fotoelásticas

Trabajo reproducido y difundido en el repositorio idUS con permiso de la Asociación Española de Ingeniería Mecánica (AEIM)Tras introducir la forma general del campo de tensiones en un borde de grieta se hace una exposición detallada de los métodos para medir K I y K II, resaltando sus ventajas e inconvenientes. Por su generalldad, se ha implementado un método que desarrolla en serie las funciones de tensión. La introducción de las medidas fotoelásticas (que pueden ser de campo lejano) conduce a un sistema sobredetermlnado no lineal de ecuaclones, que es resuelto por un métooo de Neewton-Raphson y mínimos cuadrados. Sobre una aplicación experimental se comentan las caracterlstlcas de este métodoFirst of all, the general form of the crack-tip stress field is introduced. Then, a detailed review of K I-K II methods is pressented, showing thelr features. A stress-functions series expansion method has been implemented, due to its generality. Experimental far-fleld isochromatic polnts are used to fit the series expanslon coefflclents and the overdeterminlstlc non-linear equation system is solved with a Newton-Rapshon least-squares method. Finally the features of thls method are dlscussed uslng an experimental applicatio

Dipole spectrum structure of non-resonant non-pertubative driven two-level atoms

We analize the dipole spectrum of a two-level atom excited by a non-resonant intense monochromatic field, under the electric dipole approximation and beyond the rotating wave approximation. We show that the apparently complex spectral structure can be completely described by two families: harmonic frequencies of the driving field and field-induced nonlinear fluorescence. Our formulation of the problem provides quantitative laws for the most relevant spectral features: harmonic ratios and phases, non-perturbative Stark shift, and frequency limits of the harmonic plateau. In particular, we demonstrate the locking of the harmonic phases at the wings of the plateau opening the possibility of ultra-short pulse generation through harmonic filtering

Atomtronics with holes: Coherent transport of an empty site in a triple well potential

We investigate arrays of three traps with two fermionic or bosonic atoms. The tunneling interaction between neighboring sites is used to prepare multi-site dark states for the empty site, i.e., the hole, allowing for the coherent manipulation of its external degrees of freedom. By means of an ab initio integration of the Schr\"odinger equation, we investigate the adiabatic transport of a hole between the two extreme traps of a triple-well potential. Furthermore, a quantum-trajectory approach based on the de Broglie-Bohm formulation of quantum mechanics is used to get physical insight into the transport process. Finally, we discuss the use of the hole for the construction of a coherent single hole diode and a coherent single hole transistor.Comment: 9 pages, 6 figure

A new view of k-essence

K-essence models, relying on scalar fields with non-canonical kinetic terms, have been proposed as an alternative to quintessence in explaining the observed acceleration of the Universe. We consider the use of field redefinitions to cast k-essence in a more familiar form. While k-essence models cannot in general be rewritten in the form of quintessence models, we show that in certain dynamical regimes an equivalence can be made, which in particular can shed light on the tracking behaviour of k-essence. In several cases, k-essence cannot be observationally distinguished from quintessence using the homogeneous evolution, though there may be small effects on the perturbation spectrum. We make a detailed analysis of two k-essence models from the literature and comment on the nature of the fine tuning arising in the models.Comment: 7 pages RevTeX4 file with four figures incorporate

Dark matter to dark energy transition in k-essence cosmologies

We implement the transition from dark matter to dark energy in k-essence cosmologies for a very large set of kinetic functions $F$, in a way alternative to recent proposals which use generalized Chaplygin gas and transient models. Here we require that the pressure admits a power-law expansion around some value of the kinetic energy where the pressure vanishes. In addition, for suitable values of the parameters of the model, the speed of sound of the dark matter will be low. We first present the discussion in fairly general terms, and later consider for illustration two examples.Comment: 5 pages, revte

On Exchange of Orbital Angular Momentum Between Twisted Photons and Atomic Electrons

We obtain an expression for the matrix element for a twisted (Laguerre-Gaussian profile) photon scattering from a hydrogen atom. We consider photons incoming with an orbital angular momentum (OAM) of $\ell \hbar$, carried by a factor of $e^{i \ell \phi}$ not present in a plane-wave or pure Gaussian profile beam. The nature of the transfer of $+2\ell$ units of OAM from the photon to the azimuthal atomic quantum number of the atom is investigated. We obtain simple formulae for these OAM flip transitions for elastic forward scattering of twisted photons when the photon wavelength $\lambda$ is large compared with the atomic target size $a$, and small compared the Rayleigh range $z_R$, which characterizes the collimation length of the twisted photon beam.Comment: 16 page

Aspectos numéricos del cálculo fotoelástico de factores de intensidad de tensiones mediante desarrollos en serie

En un trabajo previo [ 1) se expuso la metodología general del cálculo fotoelástíco de los factores de intensidad de tensiones mediante desarrollos en serie del campo general de tensiones y posterior ajuste de los coeficientes de dichos desarrollos a los datos experimentales obtenidos del campo de isocromáticas. En dicho trabajo se estudió la influencia de un cierto número de factores en los resultados numéricos obtenidos. En este trabajo se completa el estudio numérico propuesto, analizándose la influencia en los resultados de una serie de factores, como son la solución inicial escogida, los errores de medida, la distribución y número de los puntos utilizados y la relación puntos-coeficientes. A partir de los resultados obtenidos se dan una serie de recomendaciones para el uso eficiente de este tipo de métodos.In a previous work [ 1]. the general methodology to obtain stress intensity factors photoelastically by the use of stressfunctions series expansions and subsequent fitting of the coefficients to the experimental isochromatic pattern was presented, analysing the influence of several parameters on the numerical results. In this paper. that numerical study is completed, taking into account a number of factors: initial estimations, error measures, distribution and number of points used and the ratio points-coefficients. From the results obtained, sorne recommendations for the efficient use of this type of methods are made.Junta de Andalucía Proyecto 585

Transferring orbital and spin angular momenta of light to atoms

Light beams carrying orbital angular momentum, such as Laguerre-Gaussian beams, give rise to the violation of the standard dipolar selection rules during the interaction with matter yielding, in general, an exchange of angular momentum larger than hbar per absorbed photon. By means of ab initio 3D numerical simulations, we investigate in detail the interaction of a hydrogen atom with intense Gaussian and Laguerre-Gaussian light pulses. We analyze the dependence of the angular momentum exchange with the polarization, the orbital angular momentum, and the carrier-envelope phase of light, as well as with the relative position between the atom and the light vortex. In addition, a quantum-trajectory approach based on the de Broglie-Bohm formulation of quantum mechanics is used to gain physical insight into the absorption of angular momentum by the hydrogen atom