EEG spectral abnormalities and psychosis as predictors of cognitive and functional decline in probable Alzheimer's disease

We examined whether either psychotic features (e.g., delusions and hallucinations) or EEG abnormalities are associated with more rapid progression of Alzheimer's disease (AD). AD patients with psychosis have exhibited more EEG abnormalities than those without psychosis, and both abnormal EEG and psychosis have been noted to be predictors of functional and cognitive decline in AD. Ninety-five probable AD patients participating in a longitudinal study of dementia had an EEG and a semistructured psychiatric interview at baseline. Using EEG spectral analysis, we classified records as normal/abnormal based on the parasagittal mean frequency. Patients with abnormal EEGs were more functionally (e.g., Blessed Rating Scale for activities of daily living) and cognitively (e.g., Mini-Mental State) impaired than patients with normal EEG. AD patients with psychosis were only more functionally impaired than patients without psychosis. A two-factor analysis showed no interaction between abnormal EEG and psychosis. In addition, using a Cox proportional hazard model adjusted for age and education, the presence of an abnormal EEG or psychotic symptom at study entry was associated with higher risk of reaching severe cognitive and functional impairment during follow-up. Neither abnormal EEG nor the presence of psychosis predicted death. These results indicate that both abnormal EEG and psychosis are independent predictors of disease progression but not of physical survival.     

The effect of aluminium coating on elemental standards in X-ray microanalysis

The standardisation of frozen hydrated bulk biological specimens using gelatin standards is described. The relationship between corrected elemental X-ray counts and ionic concentration was found to be linear, and minimum detectable limits for each element are stated. Variations in uncorrected standard curves were found to be due to changes in aluminium coating thickness. There was an inverse relationship between coating thickness and elemental X-ray counts. The factors causing this are discussed. To avoid errors arising from inconsistent aluminium thickness, experimental material should only be compared with standards of similar aluminium net counts. This can be achieved most easily by mounting and analysing specimen and standard together.     

Development of early expressive and communicative action: Reinterpreting the evidence from a dynamic systems perspective.

A systems approach is introduced and applied to the development of expressive and communicative action of infants in the first year of life. In this approach, expressive and communicative actions are organized, as part of cooperative systems with other elements of the infants' physiology, cognition, behavior, and social environment. A systems approach presumes that order arises dynamically as a result of the interaction between the cooperating elements that are changing asynchronously, rather than as the result of centrally coordinated developmental change that is synchronous across domains. The systems approach further assumes that the control parameter responsible for eliciting developmental change may be different depending on age, context, and task. It offers a means to understand previously unexplained developmental phenomena: the appearance of mature forms of expression before mature functon has been achieved, the asynchronous rates of development of communicative-action components, discontinuous developmental shifts arising from continuous processes, and the process by which adults influence communicative development. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Reduction of Radiation-Induced Hair Loss by Topical Application of Radioprotectors

ABSTRACT

Our transdermal permeation studies of radioprotectors in permeation-enhancing vehicles led us to hypothesize that radiation-induced hair loss could be reduced by topical application of radioprotectors. In the present study we used a hair regrowth assay in “plucked” mice to measure the radioprotective effectiveness of WR-1065, cysteine and TEMPOL when they were dissolved in a variety of vehicles, i.e., saline, dimethyl formamide (DMF), propylene glycol (PG), dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO), ethanol. Protector effectiveness varied with radiation dose and vehicles. At 600 R, WR-1065 or cysteine, in any vehicle, reduced radiation-induced baldness scores; at 800 R, only WR-1065 in DMF and cysteine in saline, produced some protection. TEMPOL in ethanol produced protection at both the 600 and 800 R. Results suggest that suitably chosen topical application of protector/vehicle combinations can reduce radiation-induced hair loss.     

Blind MPEG-2 video watermarking robust against geometric attacks: a set of approaches in DCT domain.

A set of robust MPEG-2 video watermarking techniques is proposed, focusing on commonly used typical geometric processing for bit-rate reduction, cropping, removal of any rows, arbitrary-ratio downscaling, and frame dropping. Both the embedding and the extraction of watermarks are done in the compressed domain, so the computational cost is low. Moreover, the watermark extraction is blind, i.e., no original unwatermarked MPEG-2 video is needed for watermark extraction. The presented technique is applicable not only to MPEG-2 video, but also to other DCT-based coding videos. Selected experimental results validate our techniques.