Hasil untuk "Neurosciences. Biological psychiatry. Neuropsychiatry"

Mohammad Reza Shegarf Nakhaei, Parastoo Amiri, Esmat Davoudi Monfared et al.

Abstract Background Psychiatric comorbidities are frequent among hospitalized patients and can adversely affect treatment outcomes, yet referral rates for psychiatric consultation remain low. The COVID-19 pandemic created unique psychosocial and healthcare challenges that may have influenced consultation patterns, particularly in Iran, where cultural stigma often limits mental health care. This study investigated the causes and frequency of psychiatric consultation requests for hospitalized patients before and after the COVID-19 pandemic in Iran. Methods This study was a cross-sectional study of patients hospitalized during the summers of 2019 and 2020 at Vasei Hospital, Sabzevar, Iran. Eligible cases included patients with at least one documented psychiatric consultation. Demographics, referral reasons, DSM-5 diagnoses, and substance use history were extracted. Data were analyzed with chi-square, t-tests, and logistic regression in SPSS 22. Results Psychiatric consultations were requested for 161 out of 3,622 admissions in 2019 (4.4%) and for 147 out of 2,694 admissions in 2020 (5.4%, p = 0.083). Suicide attempts were the primary reason for referrals, but their proportion declined during the COVID-19 pandemic, while incidents of agitation and anxiety increased. Logistic regression analysis revealed that a history of substance use (odds ratio [OR] = 1.9, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 1.2–2.8, P = 0.004) and the presence of delirium (OR = 2.4, 95% CI = 1.1–5.3, P = 0.031) were independent predictors of psychiatric consultation during the pandemic period. Conclusion Overall consultation rates remained stable, but diagnostic changes reflected the indirect mental health burden of COVID-19. Strengthening consultation-liaison psychiatry, routine screening, and culturally tailored interventions are essential for future pandemic preparedness. Clinical trial number Not applicable.

Huaqi Zhao, Songnan Zhang, Xiang Peng et al.

Object detection is a critical component in the development of autonomous driving technology and has demonstrated significant growth potential. To address the limitations of current techniques, this paper presents an improved object detection method for autonomous driving based on a detection transformer (DETR). First, we introduce a multi-scale feature and location information extraction method, which solves the inadequacy of the model for multi-scale object localization and detection. In addition, we developed a transformer encoder based on the group axial attention mechanism. This allows for efficient attention range control in the horizontal and vertical directions while reducing computation, ultimately enhancing the inference speed. Furthermore, we propose a novel dynamic hyperparameter tuning training method based on Pareto efficiency, which coordinates the training state of the loss functions through dynamic weights, overcoming issues associated with manually setting fixed weights and enhancing model convergence speed and accuracy. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method surpasses others, with improvements of 3.3%, 4.5%, and 3% in average precision on the COCO, PASCAL VOC, and KITTI datasets, respectively, and an 84% increase in FPS.

Lawrence T. Lam, Lawrence T. Lam, Lawrence T. Lam et al.

BackgroundThis study aims to validate the Chinese version of the Short Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Well-being Scale (SWEMWBS) by employing both Classical Test Theory (CTT) and Item Response Theory (IRT) approaches.MethodsData were gathered through a population-based, cross-sectional health survey using an online self-reported questionnaire. The scale underwent Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) and Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA). Measurement invariance by gender was assessed using standard procedures. The Grade Response Model (GRM) of the IRT analysis was applied to the data, estimating the discrimination and difficulty parameters at different thresholds. The results were analyzed both graphically and through parameter values.ResultsFactor analyses confirmed that a single-factor model of the scale fit the data well, with an overall Eigenvalue of 4.55, explaining 65.0% of the total variance. Model fit statistics were slightly better for males than for females. Measurement invariance examinations also yielded satisfactory Goodness-of-Fit statistics (CFI = 0.940, TFI = 0.910, RMSEA < 0.001) with minimal changes in item loadings and indicator threshold patterns across groups. The IRT results demonstrated high discrimination parameters, ranging from 2.17 to 3.67, and nearly evenly distributed difficulty parameters, ranging from -2.23 to 1.77. Graphical examinations indicated good performance of the scale across the latent trait continuum.ConclusionsThe results indicated that, as a single-factor scale, the instrument exhibits good quality at both the scale and item levels. It has high discriminative power and an adequate response set for assessing a full range of the latent trait, namely mental well-being.

Michael Courtney, Michael Courtney, Daniel Carey et al.

This study investigates the relationship between white matter hyperintensities (WMHs) and longitudinal cognitive decline in older adults. Using data from The Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing (TILDA), we examined WMH characteristics, including volume, location, and microstructural integrity, in a community-dwelling population of 497 individuals over a six-year period. WMHs were categorised into phenotypes based on their size, fractional anisotropy (FA), and mean diffusivity (MD), with subtypes for periventricular and deep white matter lesions. We hypothesised that larger, microstructurally compromised lesions would be associated with accelerated cognitive decline. We isolated 11,933 WMHs, with an average of 24 WMHs per individual. Of these lesions, 6,056 (51%) were classified as Low Volume – High FA, 3193 (27%) were classified as Low Volume – Low FA and 2684 (22%) were classified as High Volume, Low FA. Our findings demonstrate that high-volume, low FA deep (p = 0.05) and periventricular (p = 0.004) lesions were significantly linked to cognitive decline (X = 12.9, p = 0.004), whereas small periventricular lesions with near normal microstructural properties do not predict cognitive decline. These results suggest that distinct WMH phenotypes may serve as markers for differential risks of cognitive impairment, providing potential targets for early intervention in at-risk populations.

YeongKyu Lee, Changbong Hyeon

Circadian rhythms in living organisms are temporal orders emerging from biochemical circuits driven out of equilibrium. Here, considering the KaiABC system, a minimal model in the synthetic biology, we study how the oscillation emerges from the circuit made of three Kai proteins and ATP alone. The phase diagram constructed in terms of KaiC and KaiA concentrations reveals a narrowly bounded oscillatory phase, which naturally explains arrhythmia upon protein over-expression. As dictated by the cost-precision trade-offs of the thermodynamic uncertainty relations, the presence of intrinsic noise, amplified in small systems, demands higher free energy cost to achieve greater rhythmic precision. The cost-minimizing condition within the oscillatory phase is found to generate $\sim$21-hr rhythm, which is entrained to 24-hr environmental signals as long as the forcing amplitude is greater than $\sim 10$ \% of the metabolic rate. An optimal level of intrinsic noise can also induce oscillations even beyond the Hopf bifurcation, effectively expanding the oscillatory phase. Our study clarifies how the physical factors, such as regulatory mechanism, energy cost, and stochastic noise contribute to the operation of biological clocks.

Igor Branchi

Notwithstanding the huge progress in molecular and cellular neuroscience, our ability to understand the brain and develop effective treatments promoting mental health is still limited. This can be partially ascribed to the reductionist, deterministic and mechanistic approaches in neuroscience that struggle with the complexity of the central nervous system. Here, I introduce the Context theory of constrained systems proposing a novel role of contextual factors and genetic, molecular and neural substrates in determining brain functioning and behavior. This theory entails key conceptual implications. First, context is the main driver of behavior and mental states. Second, substrates, from genes to brain areas, have no direct causal link to complex behavioral responses as they can be combined in multiple ways to produce the same response and different responses can impinge on the same substrates. Third, context and biological substrates play distinct roles in determining behavior: context drives behavior, substrates constrain the behavioral repertoire that can be implemented. Fourth, since behavior is the interface between the central nervous system and the environment, it is a privileged level of control and orchestration of brain functioning. Such implications are illustrated through the Kitchen metaphor of the brain. This theoretical framework calls for the revision of key concepts in neuroscience and psychiatry, including causality, specificity and individuality. Moreover, at the clinical level, it proposes treatments inducing behavioral changes through contextual interventions as having the highest impact to reorganize the complexity of the human mind and to achieve a long‐lasting improvement in mental health.

Chongyun Wu, Tao Wu, Luodan Yang

Lancelot Da Costa

This thesis focuses on three fundamental aspects of biological systems; namely, entropy production, Bayesian mechanics, and the free-energy principle. The contributions are threefold: 1) We compute the entropy production for a greater class of systems than before, including almost any stationary diffusion process, such as degenerate diffusions where the driving noise does not act on all coordinates of the system. Importantly, this class of systems encompasses Markovian approximations of stochastic differential equations driven by colored noise, which is significant since biological systems at the macro- and meso-scale are generally subject to colored fluctuations. 2) We develop a Bayesian mechanics for biological and physical entities that interact with their environment in which we give sufficient and necessary conditions for the internal states of something to infer its external states, consistently with variational Bayesian inference in statistics and theoretical neuroscience. 3) We refine the constraints on Bayesian mechanics to obtain a description that is more specific to biological systems, called the free-energy principle. This says that active and internal states of biological systems unfold as minimising a quantity known as free energy. The mathematical foundation to the free-energy principle, presented here, unlocks a first principles approach to modeling and simulating behavior in neurobiology and artificial intelligence, by minimising free energy given a generative model of external and sensory states.

Anand Mathew, Yashashree Kulkarni

Interaction of electric fields with biological cells is indispensable for many physiological processes. Thermal electrical noise in the cellular environment has long been considered as the minimum threshold for detection of electrical signals by cells. However, there is compelling experimental evidence that the minimum electric field sensed by certain cells and organisms is many orders of magnitude weaker than the thermal electrical noise limit estimated purely under equilibrium considerations. We resolve this discrepancy by proposing a non-equilibrium statistical mechanics model for active electromechanical membranes and hypothesize the role of activity in modulating the minimum electrical field that can be detected by a biological membrane. Active membranes contain proteins that use external energy sources to carry out specific functions and drive the membrane away from equilibrium. The central idea behind our model is that active mechanisms, attributed to different sources, endow the membrane with the ability to sense and respond to electric fields that are deemed undetectable based on equilibrium statistical mechanics. Our model for active membranes is capable of reproducing different experimental data available in the literature by varying the activity. Elucidating how active matter can modulate the sensitivity of cells to electric signals can open avenues for a deeper understanding of physiological and pathological processes.

S. Palit

The world of challenges in the field of medical science, biomedical science, health sciences and engineering are in the path of newer scientific and technological regeneration. In the similar vision, the science of psychology and psychiatry are also in the avenues of deep scientific ingenuity and scientific prowess. This is a case study of the author who is suffering from schizophrenia from November, 1993. Since October, 2012, he is diagnosed with glaucoma in his both eyes. Long years of agony, ardor, trials and tribulations have passed since then. This treatise deeply elucidates the strong ardor and mental health challenges faced by the author since November, 1993. Medical science, health science and technology needs to be revamped and re-envisioned as regards treatment and cure of this difficult mental health illness. The author deeply pronounces the needs of psychotherapy and counselling in the treatment and well-being of the patient. This article reiterates the revamping of the science of paranoid schizophrenia since this is an incurable ailment. Scientific rejuvenation and deep technological vision are the utmost needs of the hour. The field of biomedical sciences and biological engineering will truly open newer windows of scientific innovation and scientific triumph in decades to come. This article is a message to all sufferers of the ailment of schizophrenia and other bi-polar disorders. Surely a newer day and a newer dawn in medical science will emerge if discoveries and innovations moves towards positive directions in treatment and cure. Civilization and science will surely usher in a newer dawn in the science of psychiatry if there is an effective support system from doctors and psychologists across the globe. In the similar vision the domain of healthcare system across the world will witness newer scientific regeneration if researchers, scientists, students and policy makers takes affirmative steps and affirmative vision in the scientific research pursuit in psychological science in decades to come. Recent breakthroughs in cognitive science and neuroscience will surely usher in newer dimensions in treatment and cure of schizophrenia.

S. B. Rao, F. Brundu, Yannan Chen et al.

Hannes Gahnfelt, Per F. G. Carlsson, Christina Blomdahl

Intensive treatments for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) are gaining increased research support. Treatment models targeting Complex PTSD and previously treatment-resistant PTSD have shown a good effect. A pilot study was performed to assess the feasibility of an 8-day intensive treatment program for severe PTSD in a Swedish public healthcare setting. Eleven participants completed treatment, and overall, the reduction in PTSD symptoms was considerable. Also, loss of diagnosis at 3-month follow-up was 100%. No adverse events occurred, and no elevation of suicidal intentions was reported. Symptom exacerbation could not be observed in the data and dropout due to the intensity of the treatment format did not occur. Based on these positive results, it is recommended that further research with larger samples is conducted. If found safe and effective, the 8-day treatment program could be an important addition to psychiatric healthcare.

Luca Paun, Alexandre Lavé, Gianpaolo Jannelli et al.

Posterior fossa atypical teratoid rhabdoid tumor (ATRT) is a rare childhood tumor usually associated with a dismal prognosis. Although upfront surgical gross total resection (GTR) has classically been the first line of treatment, new multimodal treatments, including two-stage surgery, are showing promising results in terms of overall survival (OS) and complication rate. We present a case of a 9-month-old child treated with two-staged surgery and chemotherapy. When deemed risky, multimodal treatments, including staged surgeries, can be a safe alternative to reduce surgical mortality and morbidity. At 23 months old, the patient had normal global development and no major impact on quality of life. We, therefore, discuss the most recent advancements from a treatment perspective, including molecular targeting.

Ye Yuan, Yongtong Zhu, Jiaqi Wang et al.

IntroductionSpiking neural networks (SNNs), inspired by biological neural networks, have received a surge of interest due to its temporal encoding. Biological neural networks are driven by multiple plasticities, including spike timing-dependent plasticity (STDP), structural plasticity, and homeostatic plasticity, making network connection patterns and weights to change continuously during the lifecycle. However, it is unclear how these plasticities interact to shape neural networks and affect neural signal processing.MethodHere, we propose a reward-modulated self-organization recurrent network with structural plasticity (RSRN-SP) to investigate this issue. Specifically, RSRN-SP uses spikes to encode information, and incorporate multiple plasticities including reward-modulated spike timing-dependent plasticity (R-STDP), homeostatic plasticity, and structural plasticity. On the one hand, combined with homeostatic plasticity, R-STDP is presented to guide the updating of synaptic weights. On the other hand, structural plasticity is utilized to simulate the growth and pruning of synaptic connections.Results and discussionExtensive experiments for sequential learning tasks are conducted to demonstrate the representational ability of the RSRN-SP, including counting task, motion prediction, and motion generation. Furthermore, the simulations also indicate that the characteristics arose from the RSRN-SP are consistent with biological observations.

A. Raballo, M. Poletti, A. Preti

1 Section of Psychiatry, Clinical Psychology and Rehabilitation, Department of Medicine, University of Perugia, Perugia, Italy, Center for Translational, Phenomenological and Developmental Psychopathology (CTPDP), Perugia University Hospital, Perugia, Italy, Department of Mental Health and Pathological Addiction, Child and Adolescent Neuropsychiatry Service, Azienda USL-IRCCS di Reggio Emilia, Reggio Emilia, Italy, Department of Neuroscience, University of Turin, Turin, Italy

Collin M. Price, Allison A. Feduccia, Katrina DeBonis

Abstract Background Among the renewed applications of psychedelic medicines in psychiatry, 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA)–assisted therapy for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) has demonstrated the most promise in early small-scale studies. Recent exploratory analyses from prior clinical trials of MDMA-assisted therapy for PTSD have suggested that recent use of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs)—the only medication class with United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval to treat PTSD—can significantly dampen the efficacy of this novel therapy. Although psychedelic medicines are not yet FDA approved, MDMA is very likely to be the first to achieve FDA approval—perhaps within the next 2 years. Given this timeline, the field would benefit from more knowledge about potential interactions between this novel therapy and our current treatments. Methods This brief report reviews selected literature in the basic and clinical neurosciences relevant to the interaction of SSRIs and MDMA. Findings The possibility that SSRI use could dampen future responses to MDMA-assisted therapy for PTSD raises many important questions about the biological mechanisms as well as ethical implications around the most appropriate way to counsel patients. In this brief report, we compare the evidence for SSRIs and MDMA-assisted therapy in the treatment of PTSD and discuss what is known about the neurobiological interactions between these 2 medicines. Conclusions There is strong neurobiological plausibility for the hypothesis that chronic SSRI use dampens response to MDMA-assisted therapy, although current knowledge in the field is limited and primarily relates to acute pharmacodynamic interactions. Our commentary highlights the urgent need for future work dedicated to addressing this important clinical topic.

Justin M. Campbell, Jim Ballard, Kevin Duff et al.

Introduction: Essential tremor (ET) was long considered a monosymptomatic disorder, but this view has given way to a more comprehensive clinical picture that involves consideration of non-tremor symptoms (e.g., balance impairment, cognitive impairment). Recently, the novel designation of “ET-plus” was proposed to reclassify ET patients who demonstrate these non-tremor clinical features, but the prevalence of ET-plus remains poorly defined. The primary aim of our study was to estimate the prevalence of ET-plus among presurgical patients with ET by applying this reclassification scheme. Methods: We performed a retrospective review of patients with ET being considered for deep brain stimulation or focused ultrasound thalamotomy. Patient demographics and data from their clinical workups were collected. As part of their clinical workup, patients were screened for preexisting balance and cognitive impairment. Patients with ET were designated as ET-plus if they had balance impairment, cognitive impairment, or tremor at rest. We performed a series of Pearson correlations to examine how individual clinical and demographic variables were related. Results: We identified 92 patients who met the study criteria. Our results indicate that 87% of the presurgical patients in our cohort met the criteria for reclassification as ET-plus. In addition, we observed robust correlations between patient age and balance impairment, cognitive impairment, history of falls, family history of tremor, and ET-plus reclassification. Conclusion: We propose that balance and gait impairment should be assessed preoperatively alongside neuropsychological evaluation to improve the counseling and treatment of patients with ET-plus.

Engie Prifti, Eleni N. Tsakiri, Ergina Vourkou et al.

Abstract Tau accumulation is clearly linked to pathogenesis in Alzheimer’s disease and other Tauopathies. However, processes leading to Tau fibrillization and reasons for its pathogenicity remain largely elusive. Mical emerged as a novel interacting protein of human Tau expressed in Drosophila brains. Mical is characterized by the presence of a flavoprotein monooxygenase domain that generates redox potential with which it can oxidize target proteins. In the well-established Drosophila Tauopathy model, we use genetic interactions to show that Mical alters Tau interactions with microtubules and the Actin cytoskeleton and greatly affects Tau aggregation propensity and Tau-associated toxicity and dysfunction. Exploration of the mechanism was pursued using a Mical inhibitor, a mutation in Mical that selectively disrupts its monooxygenase domain, Tau transgenes mutated at cysteine residues targeted by Mical and mass spectrometry analysis to quantify cysteine oxidation. The collective evidence strongly indicates that Mical’s redox activity mediates the effects on Tau via oxidation of Cys322. Importantly, we also validate results from the fly model in human Tauopathy samples by showing that MICAL1 is up-regulated in patient brains and co-localizes with Tau in Pick bodies. Our work provides mechanistic insights into the role of the Tau cysteine residues as redox-switches regulating the process of Tau self-assembly into inclusions in vivo, its function as a cytoskeletal protein and its effect on neuronal toxicity and dysfunction.

Yuji Naya, Yuji Naya, Yuji Naya et al.

P. Courtet

Suicide prevention remains very difficult to achieve for many reasons, notably because we do not have any indicator of risk prediction, short-term risk factors being little explored, and evaluations being retrospective they are biased. Furthermore, patients at risk are not followed up, because of their lack of confidence in care, stigma, shame. On the other hand, the gap observed during the covid19 pandemic between distress and less occurrence of suicides could be linked to more virtual contacts. Then, the smartphone might be a good tool to stay connected to a protective network. We will discuss the opportunity offered by the smartphone to monitor patients with ecological momentary assessment, allowing to better characterize their acute states and detect an increased risk in real time, and thanks to the ecological momentary intervention 24/7 availability, improve access to care and better coordinate resources, and encourage self-care. These tools while offering new solutions for an efficient real time suicide prevention, may also raise some ethical issues that should be addressed.