Trajectories of the Hippocampal Subfields Atrophy in the Alzheimer’s Disease: A Structural Imaging Study

BackgroundThe hippocampus and hippocampal subfields have been found to be diversely affected in Alzheimer’s Disease (AD) and early stages of Alzheimer’s disease by neuroimaging studies. However, our knowledge is still lacking about the trajectories of the hippocampus and hippocampal subfields atrophy with the progression of Alzheimer’s disease.ObjectiveTo identify which subfields of the hippocampus differ in the trajectories of Alzheimer’s disease by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and to determine whether individual differences on memory could be explained by structural volumes of hippocampal subfields.MethodsFour groups of participants including 41 AD patients, 43 amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI) patients, 35 subjective cognitive decline (SCD) patients and 42 normal controls (NC) received their structural MRI brain scans. Structural MR images were processed by the FreeSurfer 6.0 image analysis suite to extract the hippocampus and its subfields. Furthermore, we investigated relationships between hippocampal subfield volumes and memory test variables (AVLT-immediate recall, AVLT-delayed recall, AVLT-recognition) and the regression model analyses were controlled for age, gender, education and eTIV.ResultsCA1, subiculum, presubiculum, molecular layer and fimbria showed the trend toward significant volume reduction among four groups with the progression of Alzheimer’s disease. Volume of left subiculum was most strongly and actively correlated with performance across AVLT measures.ConclusionThe trend changes in the hippocampus subfields and further illustrates that SCD is the preclinical stage of AD earlier than aMCI. Future studies should aim to associate the atrophy of the hippocampal subfields in SCD with possible conversion to aMCI or AD with longitudinal design

State Control and the Effects of Foreign Relations on Bilateral Trade

Do states use trade to reward and punish partners? WTO rules and the pressures of globalization restrict states’ capacity to manipulate trade policies, but we argue that governments can link political goals with economic outcomes using less direct avenues of influence over firm behavior. Where governments intervene in markets, politicization of trade is likely to occur. In this paper, we examine one important form of government control: state ownership of firms. Taking China and India as examples, we use bilateral trade data by firm ownership type, as well as measures of bilateral political relations based on diplomatic events and UN voting to estimate the effect of political relations on import and export flows. Our results support the hypothesis that imports controlled by state-owned enterprises (SOEs) exhibit stronger responsiveness to political relations than imports controlled by private enterprises. A more nuanced picture emerges for exports; while India’s exports through SOEs are more responsive to political tensions than its flows through private entities, the opposite is true for China. This research holds broader implications for how we should think about the relationship between political and economic relations going forward, especially as a number of countries with partially state-controlled economies gain strength in the global economy

Altered Whole-Brain Structural Covariance of the Hippocampal Subfields in Subcortical Vascular Mild Cognitive Impairment and Amnestic Mild Cognitive Impairment Patients

The hippocampus plays important roles in memory processing. However, the hippocampus is not a homogeneous structure, which consists of several subfields. The hippocampal subfields are differently affected by many neurodegenerative diseases, especially mild cognitive impairment (MCI). Amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI) and subcortical vascular mild cognitive impairment (svMCI) are the two subtypes of MCI. aMCI is characterized by episodic memory loss, and svMCI is characterized by extensive white matter hyperintensities and multiple lacunar infarctions on magnetic resonance imaging. The primary cognitive impairment in svMCI is executive function, attention, and semantic memory. Some variations or disconnections within specific large-scale brain networks have been observed in aMCI and svMCI patients. The aim of this study was to investigate abnormalities in structural covariance networks (SCNs) between hippocampal subfields and the whole cerebral cortex in aMCI and svMCI patients, and whether these abnormalities are different between the two groups. Automated segmentation of hippocampal subfields was performed with FreeSurfer 5.3, and we selected five hippocampal subfields as the seeds of SCN analysis: CA1, CA2/3, CA4/dentate gyrus (DG), subiculum, and presubiculum. SCNs were constructed based on these hippocampal subfield seeds for each group. Significant correlations between hippocampal subfields, fusiform gyrus (FFG), and entorhinal cortex (ERC) in gray matter volume were found in each group. We also compared the differences in the strength of structural covariance between any two groups. In the aMCI group, compared to the normal controls (NC) group, we observed an increased association between the left CA1/CA4/DG/subiculum and the left temporal pole. Additionally, the hippocampal subfields (bilateral CA1, left CA2/3) significantly covaried with the orbitofrontal cortex in the svMCI group compared to the NC group. In the aMCI group compared to the svMCI group, we observed decreased association between hippocampal subfields and the right FFG, while we also observed an increased association between the bilateral subiculum/presubiculum and bilateral ERC. These findings provide new evidence that there is altered whole-brain structural covariance of the hippocampal subfields in svMCI and aMCI patients and provide insights to the pathological mechanisms of different MCI subtypes

Topological Properties of Large-Scale Cortical Networks Based on Multiple Morphological Features in Amnestic Mild Cognitive Impairment

Previous studies have demonstrated that amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI) has disrupted properties of large-scale cortical networks based on cortical thickness and gray matter volume. However, it is largely unknown whether the topological properties of cortical networks based on geometric measures (i.e., sulcal depth, curvature, and metric distortion) change in aMCI patients compared with normal controls because these geometric features of cerebral cortex may be related to its intrinsic connectivity. Here, we compare properties in cortical networks constructed by six different morphological features in 36 aMCI participants and 36 normal controls. Six cortical features (3 volumetric and 3 geometric features) were extracted for each participant, and brain abnormities in aMCI were identified by cortical network based on graph theory method. All the cortical networks showed small-world properties. Regions showing significant differences mainly located in the medial temporal lobe and supramarginal and right inferior parietal lobe. In addition, we also found that the cortical networks constructed by cortical thickness and sulcal depth showed significant differences between the two groups. Our results indicated that geometric measure (i.e., sulcal depth) can be used to construct network to discriminate individuals with aMCI from controls besides volumetric measures

Cascade CO/CC/C–N Bond Formation: Metal-Free Reactions of 1,4-Diynes and 1‑En-4-yn-3-ones with Isoquinoline and Quinoline <i>N</i>‑Oxides

The metal-free reactions of 1,4-diynes and 1-en-4-yn-3-ones with isoquinoline and quinoline <i>N</i>-oxides are developed, resulting in the formation of 3,4-dihydro-<i>2H</i>-pyrido­[2,1-<i>a</i>]­isoquinolines and 2,3-dihydro-<i>1H</i>-pyrido­[1,2-<i>a</i>]­quinolines via cascade CO/CC/C–N bond formation. It is the first report in which in the alkyne oxidation by <i>N</i>-oxides both the oxygen atom of <i>N</i>-oxides and the nitrogen atom are involved in a second C–heteroatom bond formation. The reactions showed a broad substrate scope and functional group tolerance. Furthermore, the products were found to display green-blue fluorescence in DMSO with fluorescence quantum yields up to 0.59

Proteomic analysis reveals key differences between squamous cell carcinomas and adenocarcinomas across multiple tissues

Squamous cell carcinomas are an aggressive cancer type which can occur in multiple organ systems. Here, the authors analyse the proteome of SCC cancers from 17 organs and show commonly dysregulated proteins independent of location