The reliability of two prospective cortical biomarkers for pain: EEG peak alpha frequency and TMS corticomotor excitability.

Background: Many pain biomarkers fail to move from discovery to clinical application, attributed to poor reliability and an inability to accurately classify at-risk individuals. Preliminary evidence has shown that high pain sensitivity is associated with slow peak alpha frequency (PAF), and depression of corticomotor excitability (CME), potentially due to impairments in ascending sensory and descending motor pathway signalling respectively NEW METHOD: The present study evaluated the reliability of PAF and CME responses during sustained pain. Specifically, we determined whether, over several days of pain, a) PAF remains stable and b) individuals show two stable and distinct CME responses: facilitation and depression.

The influence of sensory potentials on transcranial magnetic stimulation - Electroencephalography recordings.

Objective: It remains unclear to what extent Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation-evoked potentials (TEPs) reflect sensory (auditory and somatosensory) potentials as opposed to cortical excitability. The present study aimed to determine; a) the extent to which sensory potentials contaminate TEPs using a spatially-matched sham condition, and b) whether sensory potentials reflect auditory or somatosensory potentials alone, or a combination of the two.

Methods: Twenty healthy participants received active or sham stimulation, with the latter consisting a sham coil click combined with scalp electrical stimulation.

Author Correction: Selective, high-contrast detection of syngeneic glioblastoma in vivo.

An amendment to this paper has been published and can be accessed via a link at the top of the paper.

Selective, high-contrast detection of syngeneic glioblastoma in vivo.

Glioblastoma is a highly malignant, largely therapy-resistant brain tumour. Deep infiltration of brain tissue by neoplastic cells represents the key problem of diffuse glioma. Much current research focuses on the molecular makeup of the visible tumour mass rather than the cellular interactions in the surrounding brain tissue infiltrated by the invasive glioma cells that cause the tumour's ultimately lethal outcome.

Ibudilast reduces oxaliplatin-induced tactile allodynia and cognitive impairments in rats.

Chemotherapy can cause serious neurotoxic side effects, such as painful peripheral neuropathies and disabling cognitive impairments. Four experiments examined whether Ibudilast, a clinically approved neuroimmune therapy, would reduce tactile allodynia and memory impairments caused by oxaliplatin in laboratory rats. Rats received an intraperitoneal injection of oxaliplatin (6mg/kg i.