Search results for "VECTOR"
showing 10 items of 2660 documents
A new method to calculate external mechanical work using force-platform data in ecological situations in humans: Application to Parkinson's disease
2016
Abstract Background and aim To accurately quantify the cost of physical activity and to evaluate the different components of energy expenditure in humans, it is necessary to evaluate external mechanical work ( W EXT ). Large platform systems surpass other currently used techniques. Here, we describe a calculation method for force-platforms to calculate long-term W EXT . Methods Each force-platform (2.46 × 1.60 m and 3.80 × 2.48 m) rests on 4 piezoelectric sensors. During long periods of recording, a drift in the speed of displacement of the center of mass (necessary to calculate W EXT ) is generated. To suppress this drift, wavelet decomposition is used to low-pass filter the source signal.…
Cytochrome P450 regulation by hepatocyte nuclear factor 4 in human hepatocytes: A study using adenovirus-mediated antisense targeting
2001
Abstract Hepatocyte nuclear factor 4 (HNF4) is a member of the nuclear receptor super-family that has shown activating effects on particular cytochrome P450 (CYP) promoters from several species. However, its role in the regulation of human CYPs in the liver is still poorly understood, as no comprehensive studies in human-relevant models have been performed. In the present study, we have investigated whether HNF4 plays a general role in the expression of 7 major CYP genes in primary cultured human hepatocytes. To this end, we developed an adenoviral vector for efficient expression of HNF4 antisense RNA. Transduction of human hepatocytes with the recombinant adenovirus resulted in a time-depe…
Vestibular Stimulation Interferes with the Dynamics of An Internal Representation of Gravity
2016
The remembered vanishing location of a moving target has been found to be displaced downward in the direction of gravity ( representational gravity) and more so with increasing retention intervals, suggesting that the visual spatial updating recruits an internal model of gravity. Despite being consistently linked with gravity, few inquiries have been made about the role of vestibular information in these trends. Previous experiments with static tilting of observers’ bodies suggest that under conflicting cues between the idiotropic vector and vestibular signals, the dynamic drift in memory is reduced to a constant displacement along the body's main axis. The present experiment aims to replic…
Intrastromal corneal ring segment implantation in paracentral keratoconus with coincident topographic and coma axis.
2012
To evaluate the efficacy, predictability, and safety of implantation of Ferrara-type intrastromal corneal ring segments (ICRS) for refractive correction of paracentral keratoconus.Fernández-Vega Ophthalmological Institute, Oviedo, Spain.Cohort study.Snellen uncorrected (UDVA) and corrected (CDVA) distance visual acuities and residual refractive errors were recorded before and 6 months after ICRS implantation for keratoconus. The tunnels for ICRS implantation were created with a femtosecond laser. The power vector and the Alpins method were used to analyze postoperative refractive outcomes.The study evaluated 56 eyes of 49 patients. The mean UDVA was 0.17 ± 0.14 (SD) preoperatively and 0.41 …
Modular Control of Pointing beyond Arm's Length
2009
Hand reaching and bipedal equilibrium are two important functions of the human motor behavior. However, how the brain plans goal-oriented actions combining target reaching with equilibrium regulation is not yet clearly understood. An important question is whether postural control and reaching are integrated in one single module or controlled separately. Here, we show that postural control and reaching motor commands are processed by means of a modular and flexible organization. Principal component and correlation analyses between pairs of angles were used to extract global and local coupling during a whole-body pointing beyond arm's length. A low-dimensional organization of the redundant ki…
Muscle kinematics during isometric contraction: Development of phase contrast and spin tag techniques to study healthy and atrophied muscles
2004
Purpose To develop and compare phase-contrast (PC) and spin-tag (ST) MR imaging techniques for accurate quantification of velocity and displacement distribution in the muscle tendon complex of the lower leg during isometric contractions under in vivo conditions, in healthy subjects and subjects with atrophy. Materials and Methods Techniques were developed to acquire PC and ST dynamic images, gated to the force exerted by a subject during isometric contraction. Algorithms were optimized for correction of phase shading errors. Flow velocity quantification was validated in phantoms and ex vivo rabbit muscles. Trajectories of pixels calculated from PC images were compared with those in ST image…
Israeli Spotted Fever in Sicily. Description of two cases and minireview
2017
Mediterranean spotted fever (MSF) is endemic in Italy, where Rickettsia conorii subsp. conorii was thought to be the only pathogenic rickettsia and Rhipicephalus sanguineus the vector and main reservoir. R. conorii subsp. israelensis, which belongs to the R. conorii complex, is the agent of Israeli spotted fever (ISF); apart from Israel, it has also been found in Italy (Sicily and Sardinia) and in different regions of Portugal. We describe here two severe cases of ISF which occurred in otherwise healthy Italian adults. Their characteristics are analyzed and discussed in the light of other 91 cases found through a systematic review of international literature.
Visual inference of arm movement is constrained by motor representations
2015
International audience; Several studies support the idea that motion inference is strongly motor dependent. In the present study, we address the role of biomechanical constraints in motion prediction and how this implicit knowledge can interfere in a spatial prediction task. Right-handed (RHS) and left-handed subjects (LHS) had to estimate the final position of a horizontal arm movement in which the final part of the trajectory was hidden. Our study highlighted a direction effect: end point prediction accuracy was better to infer the final position of horizontal motion directed toward the median line of human body. This finding suggests that the spatial prediction of end point is mapped ont…
CT-guided intratumoral gene therapy in non-small-cell lung cancer.
1999
The objective of this study was to prove the principle of CT-guided gene therapy by intratumoral injection of a tumor suppressor gene as an alternative treatment approach of incurable non-small-cell lung cancer. In a prospective clinical phase I trial six patients with non-small-cell lung cancer and a mutation of the tumor suppressor gene p53 were treated by CT-guided intratumoral gene therapy. Ten milliliters of a vector solution (replication-defective adenovirus with complete wild-type p53 cDNA) were injected under CT guidance. In four cases the vector solution was completely applied to the tumor center, whereas in two cases 2 ml aliquots were injected into different tumor areas. For the …
A phase I study of adenovirus-mediated wild-type p53 gene transfer in patients with advanced non-small cell lung cancer.
1998
Mutations of the tumor suppressor gene p53 are the most common genetic alterations observed in human cancer. Loss of wild-type p53 function impairs cell cycle arrest as well as repair mechanisms involved in response to DNA damage. Further, apoptotic pathways as induced by radio- or chemotherapy are also abrogated. Gene transfer of wild-type p53 was shown to reverse these deficiencies and to induce apoptosis in vitro and in preclinical in vivo tumor models. A phase I dose escalation study of a single intratumoral injection of a replication-defective adenoviral expression vector encoding wild-type p53 was carried out in patients with incurable non-small cell lung cancer. All patients enrolled…