Long-term loss of paired-pulse inhibition following early-life seizures

It was hypothesized that dendritic paired-pulse inhibition in hippocampal CA1, in particular at a long-latency typical of GABAs-receptor mediated inhibition, is disrupted in rats following early-life seizures. To test this, homo- and hetero- synaptic paired-pulse responses in CA1, following CA3 and medial perforant path (MPP) stimulation that excited the proximal and distal apical-dendrites respectively, were recorded -30-65 days following early-life seizures. Two models of early-life seizures were used on male Long- Evans rats: (1) intraperitoneal injection of GABAb receptor antagonist CGP56999A on post-natal day (PND) 15 induced brief, repeated limbic seizures lasting 8-24 hr, and (2) 9 episodes of seizure activity induced by hyperthermia (3 times per day at 4 hr intervals) on PND 13-15. When recorded -30 or -65 days after CGP56999A-treatment, rats showed no long-term effect on paired-pulse responses as compared to age matched controls, except for a decrease in homosynaptic CA3-evoked paired-pulse facilitation recorded in the CA1 mid-apical dendritic layer at 20 ms interval pulse interval (IPI). In contrast, at -PND 65 rats treated with repeated hyperthermia seizures showed a decrease in heterosynaptic (CA3 then MPP stimulus-evoked) paired-pulse inhibition at the distal apical CA1 dendrites. Additionally, homosynaptic paired-pulse inhibition at 20-80 ms IPI recorded in the mid-apical dendritic layers of CA1 was decreased in hyperthermia-treated rats compared to control rats. These results suggest that long-term alterations in dendritic excitation and inhibition can occur following early-life seizure activity

Organ Transplant Crisis: Should the Deficit be Eliminated Through Inter Vivos Sales?

In response to what has been characterized as the last remaining obstacle to transplantation, Senator Warren Hatch introduced a bill on October 20, 1983 which would establish a task force to investigate and make recommendations to Congress about the problem. Hearings and debate on the bill are scheduled to resume with the next Congress. Its future is bleak with the administration opposing it and the budget-cutting axe being resharpened. Regardless of the bill\u27s outcome, the problem of supplying anatomical organs will continue to present a host of moral, political, and most importantly, legal issues which must be resolved if society is to realize the full benefit of transplant science. This article will attempt to address some of these questions, exploring possibilities and obstacles presented by each

Support for infants and young people with sight loss: a qualitative study of sight impairment certification and referral to education and social care services.

OBJECTIVES: To examine the experience of infants, children and their parents, the role of ophthalmologists and other health, social care and education professionals in the certification and registration processes and examine the relationship between certification and referrals and pathways to support. DESIGN: Qualitative study. SETTING: Telephone interviews with health and, social care professionals, qualified teachers of children and young people with vision impairment (QTVIs) and parents of infants/children in England. PARTICIPANTS: 52 health, social care and education professionals who are part of the certification or registration process. 26 parents of infants and children with vision impairment. RESULTS: Referrals to education do not require a Certificate of Vision Impairment (CVI); however, the majority of parents received support from education and social services only after an offer of the CVI, which was often dependent on having a formal diagnosis. Parents stated they wanted support sooner, particularly parents of children with additional complex needs who experienced longer delays. Areas with multidisciplinary teams and support roles such as eye clinic liaison officers (ECLOs) appeared to have more reliable referral pathways. CONCLUSIONS: For infants and children with vision impairment, there should be a consistent mechanism for triggering education and social care support even with uncertainty about diagnosis and/or prognosis. All professionals involved in the certification and registration processes (ophthalmologists, optometrists, ECLOs, orthoptists, social workers, QTVIs) can better communicate the value and benefits of certification and registration

An Approach to the Irreducible Representations of Finite Groups of Lie Type Through Block Theory and Special Conjugacy Classes

76 page

Service tough composite structures using the Z-direction reinforcement process

Foster-Miller has developed a new process to provide through thickness reinforcement of composite structures. The process reinforces laminates locally or globally on-tool during standard autoclave processing cycles. Initial test results indicate that the method has the potential to significantly reduce delamination in carbon-epoxy. Laminates reinforced with the z-fiber process have demonstrated significant improvements in mode 1 fracture toughness and compression strength after impact. Unlike alternative methods, in-plane properties are not adversely affected

Flux-Bubble Models and Mesonic Molecules

It has been shown that the string-flip potential model reproduces most of the bulk properties of nuclear matter, with the exception of nuclear binding. Furthermore, it was postulated that this model, with the inclusion of the colour-hyperfine interaction, should produce binding. In some recent work a modified version of the string-flip potential model was developed, called the flux-bubble model, which would allow for the addition of perturbative QCD interactions. In attempts to construct a simple $q\bar q$ nucleon system using the flux-bubble model (which only included colour-Coulomb interactions) difficulties arose with trying to construct a many-body variational wave function that would take into account the locality of the flux-bubble interactions. In this talk we consider a toy system, a mesonic molecule in order to understand these difficulties. En route, a new variational wave function is proposed that may have a significant enough impact on the old string-flip potential model results that the inclusion of perturbative effects may not be needed.Comment: 8 pages, Latex, avec 9 eps files, http://www.physics.carleton.ca/~boyce/papers/mrst97.p

Response of the Agile Antechinus to Habitat Edge, Configuration and Condition in Fragmented Forest

Habitat fragmentation and degradation seriously threaten native animal communities. We studied the response of a small marsupial, the agile antechinus Antechinus agilis, to several environmental variables in anthropogenically fragmented Eucalyptus forest in south-east Australia. Agile antechinus were captured more in microhabitats dominated by woody debris than in other microhabitats. Relative abundances of both sexes were positively correlated with fragment core area. Male and female mass-size residuals were smaller in larger fragments. A health status indicator, haemoglobin-haematocrit residuals (HHR), did not vary as a function of any environmental variable in females, but male HHR indicated better health where sites' microhabitats were dominated by shrubs, woody debris and trees other than Eucalyptus. Females were trapped less often in edge than interior fragment habitat and their physiological stress level, indicated by the neutrophil/lymphocyte ratio in peripheral blood, was higher where fragments had a greater proportion of edge habitat. The latter trend was potentially due to lymphopoenia resulting from stress hormone-mediated leukocyte trafficking. Using multiple indicators of population condition and health status facilitates a comprehensive examination of the effects of anthropogenic disturbances, such as habitat fragmentation and degradation, on native vertebrates. Male agile antechinus' health responded negatively to habitat degradation, whilst females responded negatively to the proportion of edge habitat. The health and condition indicators used could be employed to identify conservation strategies that would make habitat fragments less stressful for this or similar native, small mammals

Atlantic cod aquaculture: Boom, bust, and rebirth?

The commercialization of a new species through aquaculture is much more complex than the mastery of the production process, or closing the loop, as it is sometimes referred to. Commercial aquaculture is a layer within the global seafood industry, much as wild capture is; however, it places human control at a much earlier phase in the life cycle of the harvested product. As an important species on both sides of the Atlantic, the commercialization efforts for the culture of Atlantic cod are described for four locations, Norway, United Kingdom, New England, and Atlantic Canada that highlight many similar technical challenges and the progress made from the late 1980s through 2012. We also describe some of the marketing challenges faced and how they differ. Technically, the species has been commercialized. Hatcheries and farms in all four countries were successfully established. However, there are clear differences in access to capital for research and industrial expansion from both the private and public sector, social acceptance of farmed fish, as well as the impacts on sales when marketing farmed cod in the context of a global seafood supply. Lower cost species substitution, from either the farmed or wild catch, is also a factor that can have a significant impact on long-term successful commercialization.publishedVersio

Identification of Factors Associated with Subsequent Alzheimer's Disease Diagnosis Using Machine Learning Over Complex Large-scale Longitudinal Health Data

We seek a Pitt Momentum Teaming Grant to support the data extraction, analysis, and planning needed to secure large-scale research funding for a new Alzheimer’s disease (AD) research initiative among faculty and trainees who have never worked together, most of whom have never worked on AD but whose skill set will support a novel approach to understanding this intractable disease. Because AD pathogenesis begins a decade or more before the onset of clinical symptoms, we seek to identify in electronic health records (EHRs) antecedents of disease that warrant additional scrutiny as possible contributors to or protectors against disease onset. We have identified over 37,000 unique patients in the UPMC EHR with a diagnosis of AD or dementia since 2016, almost 15,000 of whom have EHR data from visits 10 or more years before this diagnosis. With IRB approval, we will apply both case-control and machine learning approaches to the EHR datasets extracted (diagnoses, medications, test results). The results of these initial analyses will be used to plan larger scale studies that incorporate neuroimaging, genetics, neuropathology, lifestyle, and other types of data (including longitudinal causal time series modeling) combined with natural language processing and literature-based discovery to develop causal models of disease predictors, onset, and progression. We will seek funding from the National Institute on Aging to conduct these follow-on larger scale analyses with the guidance of an AD program officer, Suzana Petanceska, who has indicated her enthusiasm for helping us plan projects focused on secondary data analyses and causal discovery. Toward this goal, in October, our team of faculty and trainees from the Schools of Medicine (Boyce, Silverstein, Aizenstein, Malec, Karim, Ly), Public Health (Albert, Shaaban), and Computing and Information (Munro, Taneja) began weekly meetings to work on IRB protocols, analysis strategies, data interpretation, and manuscript and grant preparation