445 research outputs found

    The Management Exercises: A Way Forward with Purpose

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    This paper outlines the Management Exercises, a co-curricular program that reflects the more — the magis — to better prepare students as future leaders and citizens. The Management Exercises seek to further orient students toward a life of questioning and engagement as students learn to exercise discernment, to build character, and to enact citizenship. The four modules that comprise the Management Exercises are outlined in conjunction with the implementation of the Management Exercises into the school’s MBA program

    Old House

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    Advancing the Scholarship of Teaching Through Collaborative Self-Study

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    Self-study research is a mode of scholarly inquiry in which teachers examine their beliefs and actions as educators and explore pedagogical questions. A three-phase model of collaborative self-study research is offered as a framework for university faculty to engage in self-study for the purpose of improving teaching and creating new knowledge

    Hippocampal Place Cell Instability after Lesions of the Head Direction Cell Network

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    The occurrence of cells that encode spatial location (place cells) or head direction (HD cells) in the rat limbic system suggests that these cell types are important for spatial navigation. We sought to determine whether place fields of hippocampal CA1 place cells would be altered in animals receiving lesions of brain areas containing HD cells. Rats received bilateral lesions of anterodorsal thalamic nuclei (ADN), postsubiculum (PoS), or sham lesions, before place cell recording. Although place cells from lesioned animals did not differ from controls on many place-field characteristics, such as place-field size and infield firing rate, the signal was significantly degraded with respect to measures of outfield firing rate, spatial coherence, and information content. Surprisingly, place cells from lesioned animals were more likely modulated by the directional heading of the animal. Rotation of the landmark cue showed that place fields from PoS-lesioned animals were not controlled by the cue and shifted unpredictably between sessions. Although fields from ADN-lesioned animals tended to have less landmark control than fields from control animals, this impairment was mild compared with cells recorded from PoS-lesioned animals. Removal of the prominent visual cue also led to instability of place-field representations in PoS-lesioned, but not ADN-lesioned, animals. Together, these findings suggest that an intact HD system is not necessary for the maintenance of place fields, but lesions of brain areas that convey the HD signal can degrade this signal, and lesions of the PoS might lead to perceptual or mnemonic deficits, leading to place-field instability between sessions

    Behavioral and Transcriptome Profiling of Heterozygous Rab10 Knock-Out Mice

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    This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license, which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium provided that the original work is properly attributed.A central question in the field of aging research is to identify the cellular and molecular basis of neuroresilience. One potential candidate is the small GTPase, Rab10. Here, we used Rab101/ mice to investigate the molecular mecha-nisms underlying Rab10-mediated neuroresilience. Brain expression analysis of 880 genes involved in neurodegener-ation showed that Rab101/ mice have increased activation of pathways associated with neuronal metabolism, structural integrity, neurotransmission, and neuroplasticity compared with their Rab101/1 littermates. Lower activation was observed for pathways involved in neuroinflammation and aging. We identified and validated several differentially expressed genes (DEGs), including Stx2, Stx1b, Vegfa, and Lrrc25 (downregulated) and Prkaa2, Syt4, and Grin2d (upregulated). Behavioral testing showed that Rab101/ mice perform better in a hippocampal-dependent spatial task (object in place test), while their performance in a classical conditioning task (trace eyeblink classical condition-ing, TECC) was significantly impaired. Therefore, our findings indicate that Rab10 differentially controls the brain cir-cuitry of hippocampal-dependent spatial memory and higher-order behavior that requires intact cortex-hippocampal circuitry. Transcriptome and biochemical characterization of these mice suggest that glutamate ionotropic receptor NMDA type subunit 2D (GRIN2D or GluN2D) is affected by Rab10 signaling. Further work is needed to evaluate whether GRIN2D mediates the behavioral phenotypes of the Rab101/ mice. We conclude that Rab101/ mice de-scribed here can be a valuable tool to study the mechanisms of resilience in Alzheimer’s disease (AD) model mice and to identify novel therapeutical targets to prevent cognitive decline associated with normal and pathologic aging.ECU Open Access Publishing Support Fun

    Neural mechanisms of social learning in the female mouse

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    Social interactions are often powerful drivers of learning. In female mice, mating creates a long-lasting sensory memory for the pheromones of the stud male that alters neuroendocrine responses to his chemosignals for many weeks. The cellular and synaptic correlates of pheromonal learning, however, remain unclear. We examined local circuit changes in the accessory olfactory bulb (AOB) using targeted ex vivo recordings of mating-activated neurons tagged with a fluorescent reporter. Imprinting led to striking plasticity in the intrinsic membrane excitability of projection neurons (mitral cells, MCs) that dramatically curtailed their responsiveness, suggesting a novel cellular substrate for pheromonal learning. Plasticity was selectively expressed in the MC ensembles activated by the stud male, consistent with formation of memories for specific individuals. Finally, MC excitability gained atypical activity-dependence whose slow dynamics strongly attenuated firing on timescales of several minutes. This unusual form of AOB plasticity may act to filter sustained or repetitive sensory signals.R21 DC013894 - NIDCD NIH HH

    Boosting of Synaptic Potentials and Spine Ca Transients by the Peptide Toxin SNX-482 Requires Alpha-1E-Encoded Voltage-Gated Ca Channels

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    The majority of glutamatergic synapses formed onto principal neurons of the mammalian central nervous system are associated with dendritic spines. Spines are tiny protuberances that house the proteins that mediate the response of the postsynaptic cell to the presynaptic release of glutamate. Postsynaptic signals are regulated by an ion channel signaling cascade that is active in individual dendritic spines and involves voltage-gated calcium (Ca) channels, small conductance (SK)-type Ca-activated potassium channels, and NMDA-type glutamate receptors. Pharmacological studies using the toxin SNX-482 indicated that the voltage-gated Ca channels that signal within spines to open SK channels belong to the class CaV2.3, which is encoded by the Alpha-1E pore-forming subunit. In order to specifically test this conclusion, we examined the effects of SNX-482 on synaptic signals in acute hippocampal slices from knock-out mice lacking the Alpha-1E gene. We find that in these mice, application of SNX-482 has no effect on glutamate-uncaging evoked synaptic potentials and Ca influx, indicating that that SNX-482 indeed acts via the Alpha-1E-encoded CaV2.3 channel

    Ensemble encoding of nociceptive stimulus intensity in the rat medial and lateral pain systems

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    <p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The ability to encode noxious stimulus intensity is essential for the neural processing of pain perception. It is well accepted that the intensity information is transmitted within both sensory and affective pathways. However, it remains unclear what the encoding patterns are in the thalamocortical brain regions, and whether the dual pain systems share similar responsibility in intensity coding.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Multichannel single-unit recordings were used to investigate the activity of individual neurons and neuronal ensembles in the rat brain following the application of noxious laser stimuli of increasing intensity to the hindpaw. Four brain regions were monitored, including two within the lateral sensory pain pathway, namely, the ventral posterior lateral thalamic nuclei and the primary somatosensory cortex, and two in the medial pathway, namely, the medial dorsal thalamic nuclei and the anterior cingulate cortex. Neuron number, firing rate, and ensemble spike count codings were examined in this study. Our results showed that the noxious laser stimulation evoked double-peak responses in all recorded brain regions. Significant correlations were found between the laser intensity and the number of responsive neurons, the firing rates, as well as the mass spike counts (MSCs). MSC coding was generally more efficient than the other two methods. Moreover, the coding capacities of neurons in the two pathways were comparable.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>This study demonstrated the collective contribution of medial and lateral pathway neurons to the noxious intensity coding. Additionally, we provide evidence that ensemble spike count may be the most reliable method for coding pain intensity in the brain.</p

    Mapping the public sector diaspora: towards a model of inter-sectoral cultural hybridity using evidence from the English healthcare reforms

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    Public service reforms increasingly blur the boundaries between public and private sectors, involving hybrid modes of service organization. With growing numbers of public services being transferred to private or mutual ownership, the article interprets reform as a public sector diaspora. Drawing upon the diaspora studies literature, the article proposes a model of hybridization that centres on the possibilities for cultural dislocation, adaptation, and hybridity. Focusing on reforms within the English National Health Service, the article presents an ethnographic study of the transfer or diaspora of doctors, nurses, clinical practitioners, and healthcare assistants from a public hospital to a private healthcare provider, exploring their experiences of migration, resettlement, and cultural hybridity. The model addresses a conceptual gap within the public policy and management literature by elaborating the antecedents, processes, and forms of cultural hybridization
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