Cortical fMRI activation to opponents' body kinematics in sport-related anticipation: Expert-novice differences with normal and point-light video

This is the post-print version of the final paper published in Neuroscience Letters. The published article is available from the link below. Changes resulting from the publishing process, such as peer review, editing, corrections, structural formatting, and other quality control mechanisms may not be reflected in this document. Changes may have been made to this work since it was submitted for publication. Copyright @ 2011 Elsevier B.V.Badminton players of varying skill levels viewed normal and point-light video clips of opponents striking the shuttle towards the viewer; their task was to predict in which quadrant of the court the shuttle would land. In a whole-brain fMRI analysis we identified bilateral cortical networks sensitive to the anticipation task relative to control stimuli. This network is more extensive and localised than previously reported. Voxel clusters responding more strongly in experts than novices were associated with all task-sensitive areas, whereas voxels responding more strongly in novices were found outside these areas. Task-sensitive areas for normal and point-light video were very similar, whereas early visual areas responded differentially, indicating the primacy of kinematic information for sport-related anticipation.Research Grants Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, Chin

Functional imaging of cortical responses in expert and novice badminton players while predicting the direction of a badminton stroke

This journal suppl. entitled: Special Issue: 15th Annual Meeting of the Organization for Human Brain MappingINTRODUCTION: Abernethy et al. (2008) showed that expert badminton players can use the kinematic information of the opponent's body movement to predict the direction of a stroke. The purpose of the present study was to compare the brain activity of expert and novice badminton players while carrying out a similar anticipation task. METHODS: In a block design fMRI study, participants viewed 2 s video displays of an opposing player, and pressed a button to indicate which of four possible court positions a stroke was directed. Individual trials were occluded either 80 ms before or 80ms after the ...postprin

Depth Estimation Through a Generative Model of Light Field Synthesis

Light field photography captures rich structural information that may facilitate a number of traditional image processing and computer vision tasks. A crucial ingredient in such endeavors is accurate depth recovery. We present a novel framework that allows the recovery of a high quality continuous depth map from light field data. To this end we propose a generative model of a light field that is fully parametrized by its corresponding depth map. The model allows for the integration of powerful regularization techniques such as a non-local means prior, facilitating accurate depth map estimation.Comment: German Conference on Pattern Recognition (GCPR) 201

DNA demethylation and histone deacetylation inhibition co-operate to re-express estrogen receptor beta and induce apoptosis in prostate cancer cell-lines

Epigenetic silencing mechanisms are increasingly thought to play a major role in the development of human cancers, including prostate cancer. The two major epigenetic regulatory mechanisms involve alterations in DNA methylation and histone acetylation status. Promoter CpG island hypermethylation and histone hypoacetylation, catalysed by DNA methyltransferase (DNMT) and histone deacetylase (HDAC) respectively, are associated with transcriptional repression. Evidence in other cancers suggests the two mechanisms are dynamically linked, yet few studies have examined the potential interaction of the two pathways in prostate cancer. Here we report a synergistic, apoptotic effect of treatment with a demethylating agent and a histone deacetylase inhibitor on cultured prostate cancer cells, with associated re-expression of the putative anti-proliferative agent oestrogen receptor beta

Nutritional strategies for post-exercise recovery: a review

Finding the optimal nutrition regimen for enhanced recovery is fundamental in enhancing exercise training and performance. Therefore, research has aimed to examine post-exercise nutritional strategies for optimal recovery. Because muscle glycogen is the primary substrate utilised during high-intensity exercise, it must be replenished. Recent research has examined the effectiveness on recovery of adding protein to a post-exercise carbohydrate beverage. This review summarises and analyses the literature on nutritional strategies aimed at enhancing various indicators of post-exercise recovery: glycogen resynthesis, muscle damage and performance. Furthermore, the literature on Medline and Pubmed comparing the effectiveness of carbohydrate-only (CHO) beverage with a carbohydrate:protein (CHO:PRO) beverage on maximising recovery was reviewed. The methods and results of studies regarding post-exercise nutritional strategies for recovery were analysed. primary results of this review suggest that the optimal timing in regard to post-exercise nutritional strategies for maximal glycogen resynthesis is within the first 30 minutes after exercise. The literature suggests that 1.0 - 1.5 g.kg-1h-1 of carbohydrate ingested at 2-hour intervals after exercise for up to 6 hours may be optimal for recovery. The addition of protein to a post-exercise meal may supply additional amino acids necessary for muscle repair creating an anabolic condition

Heat storage in upper and lower body during high-intensity exercise in athletes with spinal cord injuries

Background: The thermophysiology of athletes with spinal cord injuries (SCI) is not well understood. Spinal cord lesions impact muscle mass, thermoregulatory neural signals and circulatory function. Understanding SCI thermoregulation physiology would benefit exercise function. Therefore, this study was designed to describe heat storage in the upper and lower bodies of SCI and able-bodied (AB) athletes. Procedure: Seven SCI and 8 AB athletes (matched for arm-crank VO2 peak) performed a ramp protocol in an environment similar to an indoor competitive environment (21˚C±1.5˚C, 55±3% relative humidity).Results: SCI athletes experienced similar upper-body heat storage of 0.82±0.59 J.g-1 and lower-body heat storage of 0.47±0.33 J.g-1 compared with that of AB athletes at 0.80±0.61 J.g-1 and 0.27±0.22 J.g-1 for upper and lower body, respectively. There were no significant differences between groups for rectal temperature (Trec) or oesophageal temperature (Tes). However, mean skin temperature (Msk) was significantly higher for SCI throughout the exercise bout (p=0.006). Conclusions: The results of this study suggest that SCI and AB athletes appear to thermoregulate in a similar manner, though SCI tend to store slightly more heat

Colorectal cancer linkage on chromosomes 4q21, 8q13, 12q24, and 15q22

A substantial proportion of familial colorectal cancer (CRC) is not a consequence of known susceptibility loci, such as mismatch repair (MMR) genes, supporting the existence of additional loci. To identify novel CRC loci, we conducted a genome-wide linkage scan in 356 white families with no evidence of defective MMR (i.e., no loss of tumor expression of MMR proteins, no microsatellite instability (MSI)-high tumors, or no evidence of linkage to MMR genes). Families were ascertained via the Colon Cancer Family Registry multi-site NCI-supported consortium (Colon CFR), the City of Hope Comprehensive Cancer Center, and Memorial University of Newfoundland. A total of 1,612 individuals (average 5.0 per family including 2.2 affected) were genotyped using genome-wide single nucleotide polymorphism linkage arrays; parametric and non-parametric linkage analysis used MERLIN in a priori-defined family groups. Five lod scores greater than 3.0 were observed assuming heterogeneity. The greatest were among families with mean age of diagnosis less than 50 years at 4q21.1 (dominant HLOD = 4.51, α = 0.84, 145.40 cM, rs10518142) and among all families at 12q24.32 (dominant HLOD = 3.60, α = 0.48, 285.15 cM, rs952093). Among families with four or more affected individuals and among clinic-based families, a common peak was observed at 15q22.31 (101.40 cM, rs1477798; dominant HLOD = 3.07, α = 0.29; dominant HLOD = 3.03, α = 0.32, respectively). Analysis of families with only two affected individuals yielded a peak at 8q13.2 (recessive HLOD = 3.02, α = 0.51, 132.52 cM, rs1319036). These previously unreported linkage peaks demonstrate the continued utility of family-based data in complex traits and suggest that new CRC risk alleles remain to be elucidated. © 2012 Cicek et al

Bayesian estimates of linkage disequilibrium

[Background] The maximum likelihood estimator of D' – a standard measure of linkage disequilibrium – is biased toward disequilibrium, and the bias is particularly evident in small samples and rare haplotypes. [Results] This paper proposes a Bayesian estimation of D' to address this problem. The reduction of the bias is achieved by using a prior distribution on the pair-wise associations between single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP)s that increases the likelihood of equilibrium with increasing physical distances between pairs of SNPs. We show how to compute the Bayesian estimate using a stochastic estimation based on MCMC methods, and also propose a numerical approximation to the Bayesian estimates that can be used to estimate patterns of LD in large datasets of SNPs. [Conclusion] Our Bayesian estimator of D' corrects the bias toward disequilibrium that affects the maximum likelihood estimator. A consequence of this feature is a more objective view about the extent of linkage disequilibrium in the human genome, and a more realistic number of tagging SNPs to fully exploit the power of genome wide association studies.Research supported by NIH/NHLBI grant R21 HL080463-01, NIH/NIDDK 1R01DK069646-01A1 and the Spanish research program [projects TIN2004-06204-C03-02 and TIN2005-02516]