Search results for " Cognitive Neuroscience"
showing 10 items of 36 documents
Subclinical executive function impairment in children with asymptomatic, treated phenylketonuria: A comparison with children with immunodeficiency vi…
2018
In this study we compared the neuropsychological profile of phenylketonuria (PKU) and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) to examine the specificity of the executive function (EF) impairment reported in these two patologies. A total of 55 age-matched children and adolescents were assessed, including 11 patients with PKU, 16 patients with HIV and 28 healthy controls, underwent a neuropsychological assessment. Although neither the PKU nor the HIV group scored below the normative ranges, both groups showed lower scores in neuropsychological tests engaging EFs than controls. In addition, compared to patients with PKU the HIV group performed significantly worse in the Trail-Making Test A, Corsi S…
Motor cortical plasticity induced by motor learning through mental practice
2015
Several investigations suggest that actual and mental actions trigger similar neural substrates. Motor learning via physical practice results in long-term potentiation (LTP)-like plasticity processes, namely potentiation of M1 and a temporary occlusion of additional LTP-like plasticity. However, whether this neuroplasticity process contributes to improve motor performance through mental practice remains to be determined. Here, we tested skill learning-dependent changes in primary motor cortex (M1) excitability and plasticity by means of transcranial magnetic stimulation in subjects trained to physically execute or mentally perform a sequence of finger opposition movements. Before and after …
Meta-analysis of real-time fMRI neurofeedback studies using individual participant data: How is brain regulation mediated?
2015
An increasing number of studies using real-time fMRI neurofeedback have demonstrated that successful regulation of neural activity is possible in various brain regions. Since these studies focused on the regulated region(s), little is known about the target-independent mechanisms associated with neurofeedback-guided control of brain activation, i.e. the regulating network. While the specificity of the activation during self-regulation is an important factor, no study has effectively determined the network involved in self-regulation in general. In an effort to detect regions that are responsible for the act of brain regulation, we performed a post-hoc analysis of data involving different ta…
The relationship between genetic risk variants with brain structure and function in bipolar disorder: A systematic review of genetic-neuroimaging stu…
2017
Genetic-neuroimaging paradigms could provide insights regarding the pathophysiology of bipolar disorder (BD). Nevertheless, findings have been inconsistent across studies. A systematic review of gene-imaging studies involving individuals with BD was conducted across electronic major databases from inception until January 9th, 2017. Forty-four studies met eligibility criteria (N = 2122 BD participants). Twenty-six gene variants were investigated across candidate gene studies and 4 studies used a genome-wide association approach. Replicated evidence (i.e. in >2 studies) suggests that individuals with BD carrying the BDNF Val66Met risk allele could have reduced hippocampal volumes compared …
Reading for meaning in dyslexic and young children : distinct neural pathways but common endpoints
2009
Developmental dyslexia is a highly prevalent and specific disorder of reading acquisition characterised by impaired reading fluency and comprehension. We have previously identified fMRI- and ERP-based neural markers of impaired sentence reading in dyslexia that indicated both deviant basic word processing and deviant semantic incongruency processing. However, it remained unclear how specific these impairments are for dyslexia, as they occurred when children with dyslexia (DYS) were compared to chronological age-matched controls (CA) who also differ in the amount of reading experience. Adding a younger control group at a similar reading level (RL) as the dyslexic group, we examined here whic…
Biopoetica
2022
Siri Hustvedt, una scrittrice che ha saputo sempre coniugare l’analisi del proprio bíos – della pro- pria “fragilità” psichica e fisica – con la teoria della narrativa, con particolare attenzione per le articolazioni della “mente narrativa”: le emozioni, l’immaginazione, la memoria. Siri Hustvedt nelle sue opere alterna profonde analisi psicologiche di carattere narrativo, in particolare autobiografico, e riflessioni saggistiche in cui centrale è il confronto con la più recente e agguerrita letteratura neuroscientifica. Siri Hustvedt, a writer who has always known how to combine the analysis of her own bios - of her psychic and physical "fragility" - with the theory of fiction, with particu…
Haptoglobin interacts with apolipoprotein E and beta-amyloid and influences their crosstalk.
2014
Beta-amyloid accumulation in brain is a driving force for Alzheimer's disease pathogenesis. Apolipoprotein E (ApoE) represents a critical player in beta-amyloid homeostasis, but its role in disease progression is controversial. We previously reported that the acute-phase protein haptoglobin binds ApoE and impairs its function in cholesterol homeostasis. The major aims of this study were to characterize the binding of haptoglobin to beta-amyloid, and to evaluate whether haptoglobin affects ApoE binding to beta-amyloid. Haptoglobin is here reported to form a complex with beta-amyloid as shown by immunoblotting experiments with purified proteins, or by its immunoprecipitation in brain tissues …
Continuous and Intermittent Alcohol Free-Choice from Pre-gestational Time to Lactation: Focus on Drinking Trajectories and Maternal Behavior
2016
Background: Alcohol consumption during pregnancy and lactation induces detrimental consequences, that are not limited to the direct in utero effects of the drug on fetuses, but extend to maternal care. However, the occurrence and severity of alcohol toxicity are related to the drinking pattern and the time of exposure. The present study investigated in female rats long-term alcohol drinking trajectories, by a continuous and intermittent free-choice paradigm, during pre-gestational time, pregnancy, and lactation; moreover, the consequences of long-term alcohol consumption on the response to natural reward and maternal behavior were evaluated. Methods: Virgin female rats were exposed to home-…
Stability and l1-gain analysis for positive 2D T–S fuzzy state-delayed systems in the second FM model
2014
This paper considers the problems of delay-dependent stability and l"1-gain analysis for a class of positive two-dimensional (2D) Takagi-Sugeno (T-S) fuzzy linear systems with state delays described by the second FM model. Firstly, the co-positive type Lyapunov function method is applied to establish sufficient conditions of asymptotical stability for the addressed positive 2D T-S fuzzy system. Then, the l"1-gain performance analysis for the positive 2D T-S fuzzy delayed system is studied. All the obtained results are formulated in the form of linear matrix inequalities (LMIs) which are computationally tractable. Finally, an illustrative example is given to verify the effectiveness of the p…
Visual mismatch negativity (vMMN): A review and meta-analysis of studies in psychiatric and neurological disorders
2016
The visual mismatch negativity (vMMN) response is an event-related potential (ERP) component, which is automatically elicited by events that violate predictions based on prior events. VMMN experiments use visual stimulus repetition to induce predictions, and vMMN is obtained by subtracting the response to rare unpredicted stimuli from those to frequent stimuli. One increasingly popular interpretation of the mismatch response postulates that vMMN, similar to its auditory counterpart (aMMN), represents a prediction error response generated by cortical mechanisms forming probabilistic representations of sensory signals. Here we discuss the physiological and theoretical basis of vMMN and review…