Monitoring vegetation- and geodiversity with remote sensing and traits.

Geodiversity has shaped and structured the Earth's surface at all spatio-temporal scales, not only through long-term processes but also through medium- and short-term processes. Geodiversity is, therefore, a key control and regulating variable in the overall development of landscapes and biodiversity. However, climate change and land use intensity are leading to major changes and disturbances in bio- and geodiversity.

Non-specific manipulation of gammarid behaviour by P. minutus parasite enhances their predation by definitive bird hosts.

Trophically-transmitted parasites often change the phenotype of their intermediate hosts in ways that increase their vulnerability to definitive hosts, hence favouring transmission. As a "collateral damage", manipulated hosts can also become easy prey for non-host predators that are dead ends for the parasite, and which are supposed to play no role in transmission strategies. Interestingly, infection with the acanthocephalan parasite Polymorphus minutus has been shown to reduce the vulnerability of its gammarid intermediate hosts to non-host predators, whose presence triggered the behavioural alterations expected to favour trophic transmission to bird definitive hosts.

Monitoring and assessing of landscape heterogeneity at different scales.

In numerous studies, spatial and spectral aggregations of pixel information using average values from imaging spectrometer data are suggested to derive spectral indices and the subsequent vegetation parameters that are derived from these. Currently, there are very few empirical studies that use hyperspectral data, to support the hypothesis for deriving land surface variables from different spectral and spatial scales. In the study at hand, for the first time ever, investigations were carried out on fundamental scaling issues using specific experimental test flights with a hyperspectral sensor to investigate how vegetation patterns change as an effect of (1) different spatial resolutions, (2) different spectral resolutions, (3) different spatial and spectral resolutions as well as (4) different spatial and spectral resolutions of originally recorded hyperspectral image data compared to spatial and spectral up- and downscaled image data.

A new multiscale approach for monitoring vegetation using remote sensing-based indicators in laboratory, field, and landscape.

Remote sensing is an important tool for studying patterns in surface processes on different spatiotemporal scales. However, differences in the spatiospectral and temporal resolution of remote sensing data as well as sensor-specific surveying characteristics very often hinder comparative analyses and effective up- and downscaling analyses. This paper presents a new methodical framework for combining hyperspectral remote sensing data on different spatial and temporal scales.

[Long-term course of patients in neurological rehabilitation Phase B. Results of the 6-year follow-up in a multicenter study].

Background: After conclusion of emergency care for severe neurological diseases patients in Germany are admitted at an early stage to so-called Phase B rehabilitation. No studies have been carried out on the long-term course of these patients.

Patients And Methods: In a prospective study in 2002 patients in Phase B from 9 centers were included and follow-up investigations were carried out after 5 and 6 years.

Impairment-oriented training or Bobath therapy for severe arm paresis after stroke: a single-blind, multicentre randomized controlled trial.

Objective: To study the effects of augmented exercise therapy time for arm rehabilitation as either Bobath therapy or the impairment-oriented training (Arm BASIS training) in stroke patients with arm severe paresis.

Design: Single blind, multicentre randomized control trial.

Setting: Three inpatient neurorehabilitation centres.

Time course of the effect of a bolus dose of intrathecal baclofen on severe cerebral spasticity.

Continuous intrathecal administration of baclofen with implanted programmable pump systems is recommended in the treatment of severe spasticity of cerebral origin. Prior to pump implantation, a baclofen bolus test (BBT) is used to assess the effectiveness of intrathecal baclofen using clinical scales such as the Modified Ashworth Scale (MAS). In the literature, the time and period of maximum effect of a bolus dose of intrathecally administered baclofen in patients with cerebral spasticity is variously reported.

Measurement of the effect of a bolus dose of intrathecal baclofen by continuous measurement of force under fibreglass casts.

Continuous intrathecal administration of baclofen with implanted programmable pump systems is recommended in the treatment of severe spasticity of cerebral origin. Prior to pump implantation, a baclofen bolus test (BBT) is used to assess the effectiveness of intrathecal baclofen using the modified Ashworth Scale (MAS) and Penn Spasm Frequency Scales (SFS). The result of a BBT may be difficult to interpret in patients with reduced joint mobility caused by contractures.

Effectiveness of serial casting in patients with severe cerebral spasticity: a comparison study.

Objective: To compare the improvement and complication rate between a technique using a short casting interval and a more conventional changing interval.

Design: A retrospective case-comparison study.

Setting: A rehabilitation center for adults with neurologic disorders.

Treatment of pressure ulcers by serial casting in patients with severe spasticity of cerebral origin.

Objective: To assess the effectiveness of serial casting in the treatment of pressure ulcers caused by severe spasticity.

Design: Case series.

Setting: A clinic for the rehabilitation of persons with neurologic disorders.

[Spinal meningioma as differential diagnosis of diabetic polyneuropathy].

History And Admission Findings: A 70 year old woman had suffered from diabetes mellitus type 2 since she was 52. Three years before the surgery she had begun to experience weakness together with altered sensitivity in the right leg, which was regarded as having been caused by diabetic polyneuropathy. During the admission examination the level for algesia on the right-hand side was at about D 11, a distal paraparesis of the leg (3-4 degrees, Janda's classification), more intense on the right, hyperactive deep tendon reflexes, Babinski's reflex on both sides, and depressed abdominal cutaneous reflexes.

Early cerebral functional outcome after coronary artery bypass surgery using different acid-base management during hypothermic cardiopulmonary bypass.

Background: Cerebral injury can render meaningless an otherwise successful cardiac operation. As carbon dioxide management during hypothermic cardiopulmonary bypass has a major impact on cerebral blood flow during bypass, it may also influence postoperative cerebral function. The objective of this prospective, controlled, double-blind study was to compare the effect of pH-stat (temperature correction of blood gas analyses) or alpha-stat (no temperature correction) on brain function.

P300-mapping--a neurophysiological tool to quantify cerebral dysfunction after coronary artery bypass grafting.

Objective parameters are needed to quantify cerebral dysfunction following cardiac surgery in outcome and comparative studies. In this investigation we assessed the value of the late auditory evoked potentials N100 and P300 to measure the neuropsychological deficit after coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG). N100, an exogenous potential is influenced by the stimulus pattern (frequency, intensity and stimulus presentation rate).

Vestibular neurones in the parieto-insular cortex of monkeys (Macaca fascicularis): visual and neck receptor responses.

1. One hundred and fifty-two vestibularly activated neurones were recorded in the parieto-insular vestibular cortex (PIVC) of four awake Java monkeys (Macaca fascicularis): sixty-two were tested systematically with visual stimulation and seventy-nine were tested with various somatosensory stimuli. With very few exceptions all vestibular neurones tested responded to visual and somatosensory stimulation, therefore being classified as polymodal vestibular units.

Localization and responses of neurones in the parieto-insular vestibular cortex of awake monkeys (Macaca fascicularis).

1. In four Java monkeys (Macaca fascicularis) 152 vestibular neurones were recorded in the parietal cortex located in the upper bank of the lateral sulcus near the posterior end of the insula. We called this region parieto-insular vestibular cortex (PIVC).

Sensorimotor disturbances in patients with lesions of the parietal cortex.

Somatosensory and motor disturbances of hand function were examined in 9 patients with parietal lobe lesions. A quantitative score was used for the elaboration of sensorimotor profiles displaying the relative degree of functional impairment. In patients with anterior parietal lobe lesions somaesthesis was clearly more disturbed than motor function.

Role of the parietal cortex for sensorimotor transformation. Evidence from clinical observations.

Somatosensory and motor functions of both hands were examined in 10 patients with unilateral parietal cortex lesions as revealed by computerized tomography. Tests of elementary somatosensory functions comprised surface sensibility, vibration, and position sense. For evaluation of complex somatosensory functions, the recognition of surface textures and object forms was tested.

Raphe nucleus of the pons containing omnipause neurons of the oculomotor system in the monkey, and its homologue in man.

Omnipause neurons take part in the generation of saccadic eye movements. They lie around the midline in the caudal pontine reticular formation, in an area usually ascribed to the nucleus raphe pontis (rp). In this study of the monkey (Macaca fascicularis and M.

Responses of single neurons in the parietoinsular vestibular cortex of primates.

1. Neurons activated by stimulation of the horizontal and/or vertical vestibular semicircular canals were recorded in the parietoinsular vestibular cortex in four awake Java monkeys (Macaca fascicularis) and three squirrel monkeys (Saimiri sciureus). Steady tilt in darkness or during illumination of a vertically striped cylinder or of the normal laboratory surroundings did not lead to a significant change in PIVC neuron activity.

Discharge properties of primary auditory fibres in Caiman crocodilus: comparisons and contrasts to the mammalian auditory nerve.

Single fibre recordings were performed from the auditory nerve of the caiman, Caiman crocodilus. All neurones were spontaneously active (1-80 imp/s). Clicks evoked multiple peaks in the post stimulus time histogram spaced at 1/CF.

Three methods to elicit sigma-optokinetic nystagmus in Java monkeys.

Sigma-optokinetic nystagmus (sigma-OKN) can be elicited in awake Java monkeys (Macaca fascicularis) when stationary periodic visual patterns (grid of black white stripes, row of equally spaced dots) are illuminated stroboscopically. Three methods were found to be useful in inducing the sigma-OKN: postrotatory nystagmus, optokinetic afternystagmus (OKAN) following normal OKN and a gradual transition from phi-movement (phi-OKN) to sigma-OKN. The properties found for sigma-OKN in man are also present in monkeys with the one exception that monkeys have a long-lasting sigma-OKAN in darkness which is not present in man.