Neuroscience
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Deficits in the anticipation and experience of affective events represent a key risky factor for a variety of mental disorders, such as anxiety and depression. Here, we examined temporal dynamics underlying the modulations of the aversive mood state on neural responses of anticipating and perceiving affective pictures. Participants were asked to perform an affective cueing paradigm in both threat and safe contexts. ⋯ Our findings revealed that threat context compared with the safe context attenuated the contingent negative variation (CNV) responses to the cues of positive expressions, and decreased differential late positive potential (LPP) responses to the perception of negative and positive events. These findings suggest that aversive mood dampens the anticipation of positive events and inhibits the elaboration of negative events. The current findings do not only advance our understanding on the temporal characteristics of affective anticipation and experience but also have implications on the emotional deficits across various mental disorders characterized by chronic mood disturbances.
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Reactive aldehydes are generated as a toxic end-product of lipid peroxidation under inflammatory oxidative stress condition which is a well-established phenomenon in the pathogenesis of multiple sclerosis (MS) and its animal model, experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE). Alda-1, a selective agonist of mitochondrial aldehyde dehydrogenase 2 (ALDH2), is known to detoxify the reactive aldehydes. In this study, we investigated the effect of Alda-1 on CNS myelin pathology associated with reactive aldehydes and mitochondrial/peroxisomal dysfunctions in a mouse model of EAE. ⋯ EAE mice had increased levels of reactive aldehyde species, such as 4-hydroxynonenal (4-HNE), malondialdehyde (MDA), and acrolein (ACL) in the spinal cords and these levels were significantly reduced in Alda-1-treated EAE mice. Furthermore, Alda-1 treatment improved the loss of mitochondrial (OXPHOS) and peroxisomal (PMP70 and catalase) proteins as well as mitochondrial/peroxisomal proliferation factors (PGC-1α and PPARs) in the spinal cords of EAE mice. Taken together, this study demonstrates the therapeutic efficacy of ALDH2-agonist Alda-1 in the abatement of EAE disease through the detoxification of reactive aldehydes, thus suggesting Alda-1 as a potential therapeutic intervention for MS.
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Increasing evidence has indicated that long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) play a vital role for adjusting RNA transcripts as competing endogenous RNAs (ceRNAs) for microRNAs (miRNAs). The present study was intended to explore the probable regulation of lncRNA TALNEC2 in ischemic stroke. In this study, we measured the up-regulation of TALNEC2 and down-regulation of miR-650 in mice brains after cerebral ischemia/reperfusion (I/R) operation and in cultured neuroblastoma cells of neuro-2A (N2a) treated with oxygen glucose deprivation/reoxygenation (OGD/R). ⋯ In result, overexpression of TALNEC2 antagonized the inhibition impact of miR-650 on APAF1 expression and N2a cell apoptosis induced by OGD/R, while TALNEC2 knockdown aggravated the impact. Furthermore, TALNEC2 knockdown reversed brain injury and neurological deficits induced by I/R in vivo. In conclusion, we verified a TALNEC2/miR-650/APAF1 signaling pathway as a key mechanism monitoring cerebral I/R injury.
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The human nervous system is one of the most complicated systems in nature. Complex nonlinear behaviours have been shown from the single neuron level to the system level. For decades, linear connectivity analysis methods, such as correlation, coherence and Granger causality, have been extensively used to assess the neural connectivities and input-output interconnections in neural systems. ⋯ We argue that nonlinear modelling and analysis are necessary to study neuronal processing and signal transfer in neural systems quantitatively. These approaches can hopefully provide new insights to advance our understanding of neurophysiological mechanisms underlying neural functions. These nonlinear approaches also have the potential to produce sensitive biomarkers to facilitate the development of precision diagnostic tools for evaluating neurological disorders and the effects of targeted intervention.
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The N170 is a large deflection of the human electroencephalogram (EEG), peaking at about 170 milliseconds over the occipito-temporal cortex after the sudden onset of a face stimulus. The N170 reflects perceptual awareness of a face and its onset corresponds to the emergence of reliable face-selectivity in the human brain. However, whether sensitivity to the long-term familiarity of a face identity emerges already at this early time-point remains debated. ⋯ This effect is especially present for personally familiar faces, learned in natural conditions. In the human brain, effects linked to familiarity with specific facial identities therefore appear to emerge between 150 and 200 ms in occipito-temporal brain regions, i.e., shortly after the onset of face-selectivity but at the same time as the earliest high-level effects of immediate unfamiliar face identity repetition. This observation challenges standard neurocognitive models with a clear-cut distinction between perceptual and memory stages in human face recognition.