Journal of neurotrauma
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Journal of neurotrauma · Jun 2024
Lack of association of informant-reported traumatic brain injury and chronic traumatic encephalopathy.
Repetitive head impacts (RHIs) from football are associated with the neurodegenerative tauopathy chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). It is unclear whether a history of traumatic brain injury (TBI) is sufficient to precipitate CTE neuropathology. We examined the association between TBI and CTE neuropathology in 580 deceased individuals exposed to RHIs from football. ⋯ There was no association between CTE neuropathology status or severity and TBI with LOC (odds ratio [OR] = 0.95, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.64-1.41; OR = 1.22, 95% CI = 0.71-2.09) or msTBI (OR = 0.70, 95% CI = 0.33-1.50; OR = 1.01, 95% CI = 0.30-3.41). There were no associations with other neurodegenerative or cerebrovascular pathologies examined. TBI with LOC and msTBI were not associated with CTE neuropathology in this sample of brain donors exposed to RHIs from American football.
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Journal of neurotrauma · Jun 2024
Development of a Multimodal Machine Learning-Based Prognostication Model for Traumatic Brain Injury Using Clinical Data and Computed Tomography Scans: A CENTER-TBI and CINTER-TBI Study.
Computed tomography (CT) is an important imaging modality for guiding prognostication in patients with traumatic brain injury (TBI). However, because of the specialized expertise necessary, timely and dependable TBI prognostication based on CT imaging remains challenging. This study aimed to enhance the efficiency and reliability of TBI prognostication by employing machine learning (ML) techniques on CT images. ⋯ The developed model achieved superior performance without the necessity for manual CT assessments (AUC = 0.846 [95% CI: 0.843-0.849]) compared with the model based on the clinical and laboratory variables (AUC = 0.817 [95% CI: 0.814-0.820]) and established CT scoring systems requiring manual interpretations (AUC = 0.829 [95% CI: 0.826-0.832] for Marshall and 0.838 [95% CI: 0.835-0.841] for International Mission for Prognosis and Analysis of Clinical Trials in TBI [IMPACT]). The external validation demonstrated the prognostic capacity of the developed model to be significantly better (AUC = 0.859 [95% CI: 0.857-0.862]) than the model using clinical variables (AUC = 0.809 [95% CI: 0.798-0.820]). This study established an ML-based model that provides efficient and reliable TBI prognosis based on CT scans, with potential implications for earlier intervention and improved patient outcomes.
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Journal of neurotrauma · Jun 2024
MCC950 attenuates microglial NLRP3-mediated chronic neuroinflammation and memory impairment in a rat model of repeated low-level blast exposure.
Blast-induced traumatic brain injury is typically regarded as a signature medical concern for military personnel who are exposed to explosive devices in active combat zones. However, soldiers as well as law enforcement personnel may be repeatedly exposed to low-level blasts during training sessions with heavy weaponries as part of combat readiness. Service personnel who sustain neurotrauma from repeated low-level blast (rLLB) exposure do not display overt pathological symptoms immediately but rather develop mild symptoms including cognitive impairments, attention deficits, mood changes, irritability, and sleep disturbances over time. ⋯ Animals exposed to rLLB displayed acute and chronic short-term memory impairments and chronic anxiety-like symptoms accompanied by increased microglial activation, NLRP3 expression, and IL-1β release. Treatment with MCC950, an NLRP3 inflammasome complex inhibitor, suppressed microglial activation, reduced NLRP3 expression and IL-1β release, and improved short-term memory deficits after rLLB exposure. Collectively, this study demonstrates that rLLB induces chronic neurobehavioral and neuropathological changes by increasing NLRP3 inflammasome protein expression followed by cytokine IL-1β release.
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Journal of neurotrauma · May 2024
Construction of a searchable database for gene expression changes in spinal cord injury experiments.
Spinal cord injury (SCI) is a debilitating condition with an estimated 18,000 new cases annually in the United States. The field has accepted and adopted standardized databases such as the Open Data Commons for Spinal Cord Injury (ODC-SCI) to aid in broader analyses, but these currently lack high-throughput data despite the availability of nearly 6000 samples from over 90 studies available in the Sequence Read Archive. ⋯ We have processed 1196 publicly available RNA-Seq samples from 50 bulk RNA-Seq studies across nine different species, resulting in an SQLite database that can be used by the SCI research community for further discovery. We provide both the database as well as a web-based front-end that can be used to query the database for genes of interest, differential gene expression, genes with high variance, and gene set enrichments.
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Journal of neurotrauma · May 2024
Attenuated tissue damage with Mechanical Tissue Resuscitation in a pig model of spinal cord injury.
Our previous studies on the treatment of spinal cord injuries with Mechanical Tissue Resuscitation (MTR) in rats have demonstrated that it can significantly improve the locomotor recovery and Basso Beattie Bresnahan scores. MTR treatment also reduced fluid accumulations by T2-imaging and improved the mean neural fiber number and fiber length in injured sites by fiber tractography. Myelin volume was also significantly preserved by MTR treatment. ⋯ The fractional anisotropy (FA) values processed by DTI analysis are increased from 0.203 ± 0.027 in the untreated group to 0.238 ± 0.029 in MTR treatment group (p < 0.05). Fiber tractography showings the mean fiber numbers across the impacted area were increased over 112% from 327.0 ± 99.74 in the non-treated group to 694.83 ± 297.86 in the MTR treated group (p < 0.05). These results indicate local application of MTR for 7 days to spinal cord injury in a swine model decreased tissue injury, reduced tissue edema, and preserved more myelin fibers as well as nerve fibers in the injured spinal cord.