Adaptive rewiring: a general principle for neural network development.

The nervous system, especially the human brain, is characterized by its highly complex network topology. The neurodevelopment of some of its features has been described in terms of dynamic optimization rules. We discuss the principle of adaptive rewiring, i.

A multidisciplinary approach to forensic biological profiling on a single tooth and nail sample.

Introduction: Analysis of a single tooth and nail can provide valuable forensic information, including year of birth, year of death, age, sex, DNA-profile, geographic residence during childhood and at time of death and drug exposure. The aim is to minimize the amount of used bodily material and to validate the applicability of a multidisciplinary sampling protocol.

Methods: A nail of the big toe, a tooth and blood of seven deceased individuals were collected postmortem.

Prior EEG marks focused and mind-wandering mental states across trials.

Whether spontaneous or induced by a tedious task, the transition from a focused mental state to mind wandering is a complex one, possibly involving adjacent mental states and extending over minutes or even hours. This complexity cannot be captured by relying solely on subjective reports of mind wandering. To characterize the transition in a mind-wandering-inducing tone counting task, in addition we collected subjective reports of thought generation along with task performance as a measure of cognitive control and EEG measures, namely auditory probe evoked potentials (AEP) and ongoing 8-12 Hz alpha-band amplitude.

Retinal waves in adaptive rewiring networks orchestrate convergence and divergence in the visual system.

Spontaneous retinal wave activity shaping the visual system is a complex neurodevelopmental phenomenon. Retinal ganglion cells are the hubs through which activity diverges throughout the visual system. We consider how these divergent hubs emerge, using an adaptively rewiring neural network model.

Active involvement in scientific research of persons living with dementia and long-term care users: a systematic review of existing methods with a specific focus on good practices, facilitators and barriers of involvement.

Background: Active involvement of persons living with dementia (PLWD) and long-term care (LTC) users in research is essential but less developed compared to other patient groups. However, their involvement in research is not only important but also feasible. This study aims to provide an overview of methods, facilitators, and barriers for involving PLWD and LTC users in scientific research.

Associations between personality traits and depressive and anxiety symptoms among persons with spinal cord injury in first inpatient rehabilitation.

Study Design: Retrospective analysis of medical records.

Objective: To assess personality traits in persons with spinal cord injury (SCI) and compare these with the general population group. Moreover, to explore associations between personality traits and depressive and anxiety symptoms among persons with SCI in first inpatient rehabilitation.

Effect of Training for an Athletic Challenge on Illness Cognition in Individuals with Chronic Disability: A Prospective Cohort Study.

Illness cognitions (IC) influence how a patient adapts to a chronic disease. The aim was (1) to determine if training for a handcycling mountain time trial (HandbikeBattle) improves IC and (2) to identify factors associated with IC change scores. Persons with a chronic disability (N = 220; including N = 151 with spinal cord disorder) trained 5 months and participated in the time trial.

Refixation behavior in naturalistic viewing: Methods, mechanisms, and neural correlates.

When freely viewing a scene, the eyes often return to previously visited locations. By tracking eye movements and coregistering eye movements and EEG, such refixations are shown to have multiple roles: repairing insufficient encoding from precursor fixations, supporting ongoing viewing by resampling relevant locations prioritized by precursor fixations, and aiding the construction of memory representations. All these functions of refixation behavior are understood to be underpinned by three oculomotor and cognitive systems and their associated brain structures.

The social dimension of quality of life following spinal cord injury or disease: an international ICF-linking study.

Study Design: International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF) linking study.

Objective: Analyze cognitive interview data using the ICF as an analytic framework, to examine aspects of social life relevant to quality of life (QoL) according to people with spinal cord injury or disease (SCI/D). This study builds upon results of an international study about the cross-cultural validity of the International SCI QoL Basic Data Set (QoL-BDS).

Does the disposition of passive coping mediate the association between illness perception and symptoms of anxiety and depression in patients with spinal cord injury during first inpatient rehabilitation?

Purpose: To examine associations between illness perception, also called illness cognitions or appraisals, disposition of passive coping, and symptoms of anxiety and depression, and to test whether passive coping mediates the associations between illness perception and symptoms of anxiety and depression.

Materials And Methods: Longitudinal, multicentre study. Participants were inpatients of spinal cord injury (SCI) rehabilitation.

Radiosensitization by Hyperthermia Critically Depends on the Time Interval.

Purpose: Hyperthermia is a potent sensitizer of radiation therapy that improves both tumor control and survival in women with locally advanced cervical cancer (LACC). The optimal sequence and interval between hyperthermia and radiation therapy are still under debate.

Methods And Materials: We investigated the interval and sequence in vitro in cervical cancer cell lines, patient-derived organoids, and SiHa cervical cancer hind leg xenografts in athymic nude mice and compared the results with retrospective results from 58 women with LACC treated with thermoradiotherapy.

Flexible array coil for cervical and extraspinal (FACE) MRI at 3.0 Tesla.

High-resolution MRI of the cervical spine (c-spine) and extraspinal neck region requires close-fitting receiver coils to maximize the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). Conventional, rigid C-spine receiver coils do not adequately contour to the neck to accommodate varying body shapes, resulting in suboptimal SNR. Recent innovations in flexible surface coil array designs may provide three-dimensional (3D) bendability and conformability to optimize SNR, while improving capabilities for higher acceleration factors.

The Effect of Mindset and Breathing Exercises on Physical and Mental Health in Persons with Spinal Cord Injury-A Pilot Feasibility Study.

This study investigated the feasibility and efficacy of mindset and breathing exercises (Wim Hof Method (WHM)) on physical and mental health in persons with spinal cord injury (SCI). Ten individuals with SCI participated in this pilot study. These ten participants followed a 4-week WHM intervention, with one weekly group session in the rehabilitation center and daily practice at home using the WHM app.

Creating new littoral zones in a shallow lake to forward-restore an aquatic food web.

Current rates of habitat loss require science-based predictions on how to restore or newly create lost habitat types. In aquatic ecosystems, littoral zones are key habitats for food web functioning, but they are often replaced by unnatural steep shorelines for water safety. To reverse this trend, knowledge is needed on how to successfully (re)create littoral zones.

Functional and spatial rewiring principles jointly regulate context-sensitive computation.

Adaptive rewiring provides a basic principle of self-organizing connectivity in evolving neural network topology. By selectively adding connections to regions with intense signal flow and deleting underutilized connections, adaptive rewiring generates optimized brain-like, i.e.

Multispecies fish tracking across newly created shallow and deep habitats in a forward-restored lake.

Background: Freshwater fish communities typically thrive in heterogenous ecosystems that offer various abiotic conditions. However, human impact increasingly leads to loss of this natural heterogeneity and its associated rich fish communities. To reverse this trend, we need guidelines on how to effectively restore or recreate habitats for multiple fish species.

The most important problems and needs of rasopathy patients with a noonan syndrome spectrum disorder.

Background: Noonan syndrome spectrum disorders (NSSDs) constitute a group within the Rasopathies, and are one of the largest groups of syndromes with impact on multi-organ involvement known. The extreme variability of the clinical phenotype is, among others, due to the numerous different genes that are involved, and the differences in clinical presentation over the life span. We have studied the needs of patients and their relatives aiming to develop, evaluate and choose focus in research, medical care and policy to better meet their perspectives.

Changes in body satisfaction during and after a 5-month handcycle training period and associations with physical capacity and body composition in individuals with a physical impairment.

Purpose: To investigate: (1) changes in body satisfaction during five months of handcycle training and one year after the training period; (2) whether longitudinal changes are dependent on sex, waist circumference and severity of the physical impairment; (3) associations between changes in physical capacity or body composition, and body satisfaction.

Materials And Methods: Individuals ( = 143) with health conditions such as spinal cord injury filled out the Adult Body Satisfaction Questionnaire: at the start of the training (T1), directly after the training period (T2); and four months (T3) and one year after the training period (T4). At T1 and T2, physical capacity was determined with an upper-body graded exercise test, and waist circumference was measured.

A phase 1/2 trial to assess safety and efficacy of a vaporized 5-methoxy-N,N-dimethyltryptamine formulation (GH001) in patients with treatment-resistant depression.

Background: Treatment-resistant depression (TRD) is a substantial public health burden, but current treatments have limited effectiveness. The aim was to investigate the safety and potential antidepressant effects of the serotonergic psychedelic drug 5-MeO-DMT in a vaporized formulation (GH001) in adult patients with TRD.

Methods: The Phase 1 part ( = 8) of the trial investigated two single dose levels of GH001 (12 mg, 18 mg) with a primary endpoint of safety, and the Phase 2 part ( = 8) investigated an individualized dosing regimen (IDR) with up to three increasing doses of GH001 (6 mg, 12 mg, and 18 mg) within a single day, with a primary endpoint of efficacy, as assessed by the proportion of patients in remission (MADRS ≤ 10) on day 7.

Planning to revisit: Neural activity in refixation precursors.

Eye tracking studies suggest that refixations-fixations to locations previously visited-serve to recover information lost or missed during earlier exploration of a visual scene. These studies have largely ignored the role of precursor fixations-previous fixations on locations the eyes return to later. We consider the possibility that preparations to return later are already made during precursor fixations.

GrapevineXL reliably predicts multi-annual dynamics of vine water status, berry growth, and sugar accumulation in vineyards.

Climate and water availability greatly affect each season's grape yield and quality. Using models to accurately predict environment impacts on fruit productivity and quality is a huge challenge. We calibrated and validated the functional-structural model, GrapevineXL, with a data set including grapevine seasonal midday stem water potential (Ψ), berry dry weight (DW), fresh weight (FW), and sugar concentration per volume ([Sugar]) for a wine grape cultivar ( cv.

A Bayesian classifier for fractal characterization of short behavioral series.

Serial tasks in behavioral research often lead to correlated responses, invalidating the application of generalized linear models and leaving the analysis of serial correlations as the only viable option. We present a Bayesian analysis method suitable for classifying even relatively short behavioral series according to their correlation structure. Our classifier consists of three phases.

Restoring gradual land-water transitions in a shallow lake improved phytoplankton quantity and quality with cascading effects on zooplankton production.

Land-water transition areas play a significant role in the functioning of aquatic ecosystems. However, anthropogenic pressures are posing severe threats on land-water transition areas, which leads to degradation of the ecological integrity of many lakes worldwide. Enhancing habitat complexity and heterogeneity by restoring land-water transition areas in lake systems is deemed a suitable method to restore lakes bottom-up by stimulating lower trophic levels.

Lessons identified from initiating a thalassaemia programme in a conflict setting: a case study from northeast Syria.

Background: Thalassaemia affects many families in Northeast Syria, an area devastated by over a decade of conflict which has significantly impacted their health system. People with thalassaemia require holistic multidisciplinary care for the clinical complications of thalassaemia. The risks of thalassaemia treatment include blood-borne viral infections secondary to unsafe transfusion, increased vulnerability to serious bacterial infection following splenectomy, and complications of both iron overload and iron chelation therapy.