Journal of neuroscience methods
-
J. Neurosci. Methods · Mar 2017
A standardized method to measure brain shifts with decompressive hemicraniectomy.
A standardized, reliable, and practical method for measuring decompressive hemicraniectomy (DHC) defects and brain shifts in malignant middle cerebral artery (MCA) territory infarction is needed for reliable comparisons between computed tomography (CT) scans. Such a method could facilitate further studies on the effects of DHC. ⋯ A practical method for measuring DHC size and brain shifts designed to be consistent between scans is proposed. This method should facilitate comparisons of measurements between serial scans, between patients, and perhaps between studies. This method could be useful in medical and surgical studies of brain herniations in malignant MCA territory infarction, and possibly other conditions.
-
J. Neurosci. Methods · Mar 2017
Development of a simple, rapid, and robust intrathecal catheterization method in the rat.
The blood brain barrier (BBB) is an impediment to the development of large and highly charged molecules as therapeutics for diseases and injuries of the central nervous system (CNS). Antisense oligonucleotides (ASOs) are large (6000-8000MW) and highly charged and therefore do not cross the BBB. A method of circumventing the blood brain barrier to test ASOs, and other non-BBB penetrant molecules, as CNS therapeutics is the direct administration of these molecules to the CNS tissue or cerebral spinal fluid. ⋯ This method is easy to learn and has been taught to multiple in house surgeons, collaborators and contract laboratories. Greater than 90% catheterization success is routinely achieved with this method and as many as 100 catheters can be placed and test substance administered in one 6-h period. This method has allowed the pre-clinical testing of hundreds of ASOs as therapeutics for CNS indications.
-
J. Neurosci. Methods · Dec 2016
Fast and robust segmentation of the striatum using deep convolutional neural networks.
Automated segmentation of brain structures is an important task in structural and functional image analysis. We developed a fast and accurate method for the striatum segmentation using deep convolutional neural networks (CNN). ⋯ We suggested a fast and accurate deep CNN-based segmentation for small brain structures which can be widely applied to brain image analysis.
-
Traumatic brain injury is an increasingly prevalent injury seen in both civilian and military populations. Regardless of the mechanisms of injury, the most common sub-type of injury continues to be mild traumatic brain injury. Within the last decade, there has been tremendous growth in the literature regarding this disease entity. ⋯ There have been few mild traumatic brain injury clinical trials in the literature with treatments/interventions that have been able to overcome many of these described obstacles. We look forward to the results of current and ongoing clinical mild traumatic brain injury studies providing the tools necessary for the next generation of basic science projects.
-
J. Neurosci. Methods · Oct 2016
Intracranial venous injury, thrombosis and repair as hallmarks of mild blast traumatic brain injury in rats: Lessons from histological and immunohistochemical studies of decalcified sectioned heads and correlative microarray analysis.
Many previous experimental studies of blast wave effects have reported vascular and parenchymal injury in brains extracted from the skulls prior to histopathological assessment. Brain removal disrupts vasculature and structural features of the meninges that may be sources of signs and symptoms of mild traumatic brain injury, particular at lower blast overpressures (<5psi peak). ⋯ The isolated regions of intravascular coagulation in small veins and the isolated, very small venous hemorrhages in the subarachnoid space are worthy of consideration as factors in both healing and chronic sequelae of mild blast concussion. Although small, remnants persisted in the subarachnoid space even 42 days after a single blast exposure. The high prevalence of very mild subdural and subarachnoid hemorrhage may be a target for clinical management.