Premotor biomarkers for Parkinson's disease - a promising direction of research.

The second most serious neurodegenerative disease is Parkinson's disease (PD). Over the past several decades, a strong body of evidence suggests that PD can begin years before the hallmark clinical motor symptoms appear. Biomarkers for PD are urgently needed to differentiate between neurodegenerative disorders, screen novel therapeutics, and predict eventual clinical PD before the onset of symptoms.

Antiepileptic and antiepileptogenic performance of carisbamate after head injury in the rat: blind and randomized studies.

Carisbamate (CRS) exhibits broad acute anticonvulsant activity in conventional anticonvulsant screens, genetic models of absence epilepsy and audiogenic seizures, and chronic spontaneous motor seizures arising after chemoconvulsant-induced status epilepticus. In add-on phase III trials with pharmacoresistant patients CRS induced < 30% average decreases in partial-onset seizure frequency. We assessed the antiepileptogenic and antiepileptic performance of subchronic CRS administration on posttraumatic epilepsy (PTE) induced by rostral parasaggital fluid percussion injury (rpFPI), which closely replicates human contusive closed head injury.

Chronic dysfunction of astrocytic inwardly rectifying K+ channels specific to the neocortical epileptic focus after fluid percussion injury in the rat.

Astrocytic inwardly rectifying K(+) currents (I(KIR)) have an important role in extracellular K(+) homeostasis, which influences neuronal excitability, and serum extravasation has been linked to impaired K(IR)-mediated K(+) buffering and chronic hyperexcitability. Head injury induces acute impairment in astroglial membrane I(KIR) and impaired K(+) buffering in the rat hippocampus, but chronic spontaneous seizures appear in the perilesional neocortex--not the hippocampus--in the early weeks to months after injury. Thus we examined astrocytic K(IR) channel pathophysiology in both neocortex and hippocampus after rostral parasaggital fluid percussion injury (rpFPI).