Neuroscience
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An exceptional ability to accurately anticipate an opponent's action is paramount for competitive athletes and highlights their experiential mastery. Despite conventional associations of action observation with specific brain regions, neuroimaging discrepancies persist. To explore the brain regions and neural mechanisms undergirding action anticipation, we compared distinct brain activation patterns involved in table tennis serve anticipation of expert table tennis athletes vs. non-experts by using both univariate analysis and multivoxel pattern analysis (MVPA). ⋯ MVPA results indicated moderate accuracy (90.48%) for differentiating experts from non-experts. Brain regions contributing most to the differentiation included the left cerebellum, the vermis, the right middle temporal pole, the inferior parietal cortex, the bilateral paracentral lobule, and the left supplementary motor area. The findings suggest that brain regions associated with cognitive conflict monitoring and motor cognition contribute to the action anticipation ability of expert table tennis players.
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GABAergic interneurons and perineuronal nets (PNNs) are important regulators of plasticity throughout life and their dysfunction has been implicated in the pathogenesis of several neuropsychiatric conditions, including autism spectrum disorders (ASD). PNNs are condensed portions of the extracellular matrix (ECM) that are crucial for neural development and proper formation of synaptic connections. We previously showed a reduced expression of GABAergic interneuron markers in the hippocampus and somatosensory cortex of adult mice lacking the Engrailed2 gene (En2-/- mice), a mouse model of ASD. ⋯ Here, we show an increase in the PNN fluorescence intensity, evaluated by Wisteria floribunda agglutinin, in brain regions involved in social behavior and somatosensory processing. In addition, we found that En2-/- mice exhibit altered texture discrimination through whiskers and display a marked decrease in the preference for social novelty. Our results raise the possibility that altered expression of PNNs, together with defects of GABAergic interneurons, might contribute to the pathogenesis of social and sensory behavioral abnormalities.
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Volitional signals for gaze control are provided by multiple parallel pathways converging on the midbrain superior colliculus (SC), whose deeper layers output to the brainstem gaze circuits. In the first of two papers (Takahashi and Veale, 2023), we described the properties of gaze behavior of several species under both laboratory and natural conditions, as well as the current understanding of the brainstem and spinal cord circuits implementing gaze control in primate. ⋯ Models of attention such as saliency maps serve as convenient frameworks to organize our understanding of both the separate computations of each neural pathway, as well as the interaction between the multiple parallel pathways influencing gaze. While the spatial interactions between gaze's neural pathways are relatively well understood, the temporal interactions between and within pathways will be an important area of future study, requiring both improved technical methods for measurement and improvement of our understanding of how temporal dynamics results in the observed spatiotemporal allocation of gaze.
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Neuregulin receptor degradation protein 1 (Nrdp1) is a ring finger E3 ubiquitin ligase involved in some inflammation through ubiquitination, including macrophage polarization following cerebral hemorrhage. However, there is limited understanding regarding the mechanisms through which Nrdp1 modulates macrophage polarization and the potential impact of this modulation on neurological function. Using stereotactic injection and adenoviral transfection techniques, the corresponding animal models were constructed through injecting adenovirus, saline, or blood into the mouse striatum at different periods of time in this research. ⋯ Our results show that overexpression of Nrdp1 promotes the expression of a variety of M2 macrophage-associated markers and enhance transcriptional activity of arginase-1 (Arg1) protein through ubiquitination for early regulation M2 macrophage polarization. Additionally, Nrdp1 promotes hematoma absorption, increases IL-10 expression, inhibits inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS), IL-6, and TNF-α production, alleviates neurological impairment and brain edema, and accelerates functional recovery. These findings suggest that modulating macrophage polarization through Nrdp1 could be a therapeutic strategy for neurofunctional impairment in cerebral hemorrhage.
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Randomized Controlled Trial
Repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation combined with sling exercise modulates the motor cortex in patients with chronic low back pain.
The study aims to explore the effects of combining repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) with sling exercise (SE) intervention in patients with chronic low back pain (CLBP). This approach aims to directly stimulate brain circuits and indirectly activate trunk muscles to influence motor cortex plasticity. However, the impact of this combined intervention on motor cortex organization and clinical symptom improvement is still unclear, as well as whether it is more effective than either intervention alone. ⋯ However, there was no significant difference between the combined intervention and SE alone. Therefore, our research does not support the use of rTMS as a standalone treatment for CLBP. Our study contributed to optimizing treatment strategies for individuals suffering from CLBP.