Medically Speaking Team

According to a new study, non-invasive brain stimulation can restore normal motor skill acquisition in persons with decreased learning capacities, such as those caused by age.

Unsurprisingly, there is a lot of study being done to figure out how humans develop sequential motor abilities, with the majority of studies being conducted on healthy young people. Studies on older people (and common experience) reveal that the older we become, the more difficult and time-consuming it is to learn new motor abilities, implying an age-related decline in learning ability.

“As learning is crucial for continuously adapting and staying integrated in daily life, improving these impaired functions will help to maintain the quality of life as we age, especially in view of the constant increase in life expectancy seen worldwide,” says Professor Friedhelm Hummel who holds the Defitech Chair of Clinical Neuroengineering at EPFL’s School of Life Sciences.

Hummel and his PhD student Pablo Maceira-Elvira discovered that transcranial brain stimulation can enhance age-related deficits in acquiring new motor skills in a recent research.

The “finger-tapping task” was employed in the study to assess how well a person learns new motor abilities. It entails inputting a series of numbers as quickly and precisely as possible. The task is useful in research because it resembles occupations requiring great dexterity, such as playing the piano or typing on a keyboard, while also offering an objective measure of “progress,” defined as a person increasing their speed without losing accuracy.

This is referred to by scientists as a “shift in the speed-accuracy tradeoff,” and it is a critical element of learning. One method the brain accomplishes this transition is by combining individual motor movements into what are known as “motor chunks”: spontaneously forming brain structures that lower a person’s mental burden while maximising the mechanical execution of the motor sequence. “Motor chunks emerge reliably when young adults train on the finger-tapping task, but previous studies show either lacking or deficient motor chunks in older adults,” says Pablo Maceira-Elvira.

The early bird gets the motor skill

The study initially taught and assessed groups of younger and older individuals on a novel finger-tapping activity, revealing significant differences between the two. Young adults acquired the finger-tapping activity most effectively by emphasising accuracy improvement during their first training session and focused on speed improvement thereafter. As a result, the speed-accuracy tradeoff shifted, allowing efficient motor pieces to form early on.

Brain stimulation improvements

Extensive research has been carried out on novel neurotechnologies that may restore learning impairment in older people. “Recent studies have shown we can enhance motor skill acquisition by applying non-invasive brain stimulation to the motor cortex, with anodal transcranial direct current stimulation (atDCS) attracting both academic and commercial interest in recent years due to its unobtrusiveness, portability and affordability,” says Hummel.

In the current study, the researchers applied atDCS to the participants and found that it helped older adults to improve their accuracy sharply earlier on in training and in a pattern similar to that seen in young adults. “Stimulation accelerated the shift in the speed-accuracy tradeoff and enabled an earlier emergence of efficient motor chunks, with 50% of older adults generating these structures during the first training session,” says Maceira-Elvira.

He adds: “The study suggests that atDCS can at least partially restore motor skill acquisition in individuals with diminished learning mechanisms, by facilitating the storage of task-relevant information, quickly reducing mental load and allowing the optimization of the mechanical execution of the sequence.”

“These studies add to the better understanding of age-related deficits in motor skill acquisition and offer a novel strategy to non-invasively restore these deficits,” says Hummel. “These findings open novel opportunities of interventional strategies adjusted to the specific learning phase to restore deficits due to healthy aging or neurological disorder such as stroke.”

Characteristics and processes that may underpin the mental health repercussions of these encounters were investigated in a recent study using service dogs employed by American troops suffering from posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

Clare Jensen of Purdue University in Indiana, USA, and colleagues led the study, which was published in the open-access journal PLOS ONE. Previous study indicates that partnering a veteran with a service dog reduces the severity of PTSD. The processes behind these possible advantages, however, remain unknown.

Jensen and colleagues evaluated 82 military members or veterans and their service dogs, all of which had been trained to treat PTSD symptoms. The veterans completed a variety of different surveys before and after the three-month period together, allowing the researchers to collect additional observations to capture a full perspective of veteran-dog relationships.

The researchers initially examined survey and record findings pertaining to personal traits of service dogs and veterans, as well as the closeness of their relationship.

Except for decreased dog excitability, which was connected to lower severity of PTSD symptoms and a deeper veteran-dog interaction, they discovered that most of the dog attributes studied were not associated with better or worse veteran mental health outcomes.

The researchers next investigated probable pathways behind mental health symptom relief by assessing the findings of questionnaires and observations that recorded dog behaviour, training techniques, and the usage of specific learned activities.

Better mental health was linked to a variety of things, including a positive view of the dog’s care and a better veteran-dog bond.

The study also discovered a correlation between severe sadness and requesting support dogs to initiate social greetings more frequently. Veterans who often requested their dogs to alert them to a human approaching from behind had higher anxiety but less severe PTSD symptoms.

More study will be required to build on these findings, which might lead to a greater knowledge of how to identify veterans who could benefit from service dogs, as well as how to effectively choose and train canines.

Clare Jensen adds: “This study provides new information about how and why service dogs may improve mental health for some veterans with PTSD. We are especially grateful to the military veterans who made this possible by sharing their time and experiences with us.”

India recorded 20,557 new Covid-19 cases in the last 24 hours, 12.3 per cent higher than yesterday. The total number of cases now stands at 4,39,59,321 according to the Union Health Ministry data.

The death toll climbed to 5,26,212 with 45 new fatalities reported in the country during the same duration.

As per the data, the country’s active caseload stood at 1,46,322. In the last 24 hours, active cases increased by 1,296.

A total of 19,216 patients recovered in the last 24 hours, which brought the total recoveries to 4,32,86,787 across the country. India’s recovery rate stood at 98.47 per cent.

The Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) in Maharashtra reported 16 instances of influenza A (H1N1) or swine flu on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, the Thane Municipal Corporation (TMC) has announced that swine flu tests would be provided free of charge throughout the city.

As swine flu cases continue to climb in the city, testing will be undertaken at all TMC health centres in Thane, according to a notice from the civic body.

People getting tested for swine flu, however, will require a doctor’s recommendation, according to the Thane civic council.

This month, 20 persons in Thane have tested positive for swine flu, with 15 recovering. According to the announcement, two people perished.

According to the press statement, the civic authority finished a survey of residences in the area where swine flu victims were discovered, and no additional instances were discovered.

A total of 62 swine flu cases were found this year in the Mumbai circle, which includes Thane, Palghar, and Raigad districts, according to a health official.

According to a study from Maharashtra’s Public Health Department, as many as seven persons died in the state owing to swine flu infection up to July.

Meanwhile, the Mizoram government has asked the Central government for help in compensating pig farmers whose pigs were slaughtered during the outbreak of African Swine Fever (ASF), according to a minister on Tuesday.

Since March of last year, the extremely contagious illness has killed almost 42,300 pigs and piglets worth crores of rupees in Mizoram piggeries.

He also stated that the state administration is working to compensate farmers who lost pigs due to African swine disease.

According to data issued on Tuesday by the state animal husbandry and veterinary department, 8,907 pigs and piglets have perished since February owing to a new epidemic of African swine disease.

After weeks of delays, approximately 8,00,000 doses of the monkeypox vaccine will be available for distribution soon, according to US health officials on Wednesday.

The revelation comes amid mounting criticism that officials have been too tardy in delivering the vaccine, potentially missing a window of opportunity to manage what might soon become a well-established infectious illness.

Nearly two weeks ago, the Food and Drug Administration said it had finished the necessary inspections at Bavarian Nordic’s facility in Denmark, where the company fills vials of the vaccine. The FDA said via Twitter on Wednesday that the certification had been finalized. The doses are already in the U.S. “so that they would be ready to be distributed once the manufacturing changes were approved,” the agency said.

The United States has now sent over 310,000 doses of the two-shot Jynneos vaccine to state and local health authorities. However, clinics in San Francisco, New York, and other big cities report that they still do not have enough vaccines to fulfil demand.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, there were over 4,600 recorded monkeypox cases in the United States as of late Wednesday. The Secretary of Health and Human Services stated Wednesday that further vaccination allocations would be announced on Thursday.

Officials at the San Francisco Department of Health welcomed the news, saying they need many thousands more vaccine doses than the 7,800 they have received to date. “Without enough vaccine supply, we would have trouble fulfilling our basic duty of keeping our communities safe,” the agency said in a statement.

According to the findings of the biggest prospective study of its type, persons encountering potentially risky scenarios who had less activity in their hippocampus experienced more severe posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms in the days and weeks after trauma.

This link between decreased hippocampal activity and the incidence of PTSD was more evident in people who had more automatic defence reflexes when shocked. This study, published in the journal JNeurosci, reveals that those who have stronger defensive reactions to potentially hazardous events may have a more difficult time determining whether an experience is harmful or safe.

They are also more prone to suffer from severe types of PTSD, which include symptoms such as being constantly on the lookout for danger, self-destructive behaviour such as binge drinking or driving too fast, difficulty sleeping and focusing, irritability, furious outbursts, and nightmares.

“These findings are important both to identify specific brain responses associated with vulnerability to develop PTSD, and to identify potential treatments focused on memory processes for these individuals to prevent or treat PTSD,” said senior author Vishnu Murty, PhD, assistant professor of psychology and neuroscience at Temple University.

This study is part of the nationwide Advancing Understanding of RecOvery afteR traumA (AURORA) Study, a multi-institution effort sponsored by the National Institutes of Health, non-profit funding groups like One Mind, and collaborations with leading technology firms. Samuel McLean, MD, MPH, professor of psychiatry and emergency medicine at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine and head of the UNC Institute for Trauma Recovery, is the organising primary investigator.

AURORA enables researchers to access data from patient volunteers who present to emergency departments at hospitals across the country after being involved in a vehicle accident or other significant occurrence. AURORA’s ultimate purpose is to encourage the creation and testing of prevention and therapy treatments for people who have been through traumatic situations.

Only a minority of trauma survivors develop PTSD, and PTSD is connected with greater susceptibility to dangers and a diminished capacity to engage brain regions storing emotional memories, according to AURORA scientists. However, it is unclear how these two processes combine to enhance the chance of developing PTSD. Murty and colleagues studied brain and behavioural responses in people two weeks after trauma to better understand these processes.

Researchers discovered that those with the least activity in their hippocampus and the largest defensive responses to shocking events following trauma had the most severe symptoms, using brain-imaging techniques in conjunction with laboratory and survey-based testing for trauma.

“In these individuals, greater defensive reactions to threats may bias them against learning information about what is happening so that they can discern what is safe and what is dangerous,” said Busra Tanriverdi, the lead researcher on the study and graduate student at Temple. “These findings highlight an important PTSD biomarker focused on how people form and retrieve memories after trauma.”

“These latest findings add to our list of AURORA discoveries that are helping us understand the differences between individuals who go on to develop posttraumatic stress disorder and those who do not,” said McLean, an author on the paper. “Studies focusing on the early aftermath of trauma are critical because we need a better understanding of how PTSD develops so we can prevent PTSD and best treat PTSD.”

“Since initiating our financial support of the AURORA Study in 2016, we remain steadfast in our commitment to helping AURORA investigators make important discoveries and to bridge the gaps that exist in mental health research funding and patient support,” said Brandon Staglin, president of One Mind.

Napping regularly, according to recent research, is associated with an elevated risk of high blood pressure and stroke.

The study’s findings were published in Hypertension, an American Heart Association magazine. Researchers in China investigated whether taking frequent naps may be a risk factor for high blood pressure and/or stroke. This is the first research to look at whether frequent napping was linked to high blood pressure and ischemic stroke using both observational analysis of subjects over time and Mendelian randomization – a genetic risk validation method.

“These results are especially interesting since millions of people might enjoy a regular, or even daily nap,” says E Wang, Ph.D., M.D., a professor and chair of the Department of Anesthesiology at Xiangya Hospital Central South University, and the study’s corresponding author.

The researchers used data from UK Biobank, a significant biological database and research resource that contains anonymised genetic, lifestyle, and health data from half a million UK individuals. Between 2006 and 2010, the UK Biobank recruited over 500,000 people aged 40 to 69 who lived in the United Kingdom. They supplied blood, urine, and saliva samples on a regular basis, as well as extensive information about their lifestyle. The daytime napping frequency study was conducted four times in a small subset of UK Biobank members between 2006 and 2019.

Wang’s group excluded records of people who had already had a stroke or had high blood pressure before the start of the study. This left about 360,000 participants to analyze the association between napping and first-time reports of stroke or high blood pressure, with an average follow-up of about 11 years. Participants were divided into groups based on self-reported napping frequency: “never/rarely,” “sometimes,” or “usually.”

The study found:

* A higher percentage of usual-nappers were men, had lower education and income levels, and reported cigarette smoking, daily drinking, insomnia, snoring and being an evening person compared to never- or sometimes-nappers;

* When compared to people who reported never taking a nap, people who usually nap had a 12% higher likelihood of developing high blood pressure and 24% higher likelihood of having a stroke;

* Participants younger than age 60 who usually napped had a 20% higher risk of developing high blood pressure compared to people the same age who never napped. After age 60, usual napping was associated with 10% higher risk of high blood pressure compared to those who reported never napping;

*About three-fourths of participants remained in the same napping category throughout the study;

*The Mendelian randomization result showed that If napping frequency increased by one category (from never to sometimes or sometimes to usually) high blood pressure risk increased 40%. Higher napping frequency was related to the genetic propensity for high blood pressure risk.

“This may be because, although taking a nap itself is not harmful, many people who take naps may do so because of poor sleep at night. Poor sleep at night is associated with poorer health, and naps are not enough to make up for that,” said Michael A. Grandner, Ph.D., MTR, a sleep expert and co-author of the American Heart Association’s new Life’s Essential 8 cardiovascular health score, which added sleep duration in June 2022 as the 8th metric for measuring optimal heart and brain health. “This study echoes other findings that generally show that taking more naps seems to reflect increased risk for problems with heart health and other issues.” Grander is director of the Sleep Health Research Program and the Behavioral Sleep Medicine Clinic and associate professor of psychiatry at the University of Arizona in Tucson.

The authors recommend further examination of the associations between a healthy sleep pattern, including daytime napping, and heart health.

Four million medical personnel in Indonesia will receive a fourth dosage of the COVID-19 vaccination due to increased transmissions caused by the virus’s subvariants, according to Health Minister Budi Gunadi Sadikin on Wednesday.

Sadikin informed local media that the third dosage of the COVID-19 vaccination was administered in August, and that it is now time for a fresh immunity injection. “As a result, they require a fourth dose to rebuild their immune system. We emphasise medical personnel “Sadikin stated.

Sadikin stated that the present vaccination stock is sufficient for all medical staff to utilise.

The spread of the Omicron sub-variants BA.4 and BA.5 has lately caused a resurgence in cases in the Southeast Asian country.

Authorities have also discovered several instances with the BA.2.75 sub-variant, which the World Health Organization has classified as a Variant of Concern Lineage Under Monitoring.

Mycobacterium tuberculosis is still responsible for the world’s biggest infectious illness, TB, which affects around 25% of the world’s population. Drug-resistant strains have made infections difficult to cure, but University of Oklahoma professor Helen Zgurskaya is leading research into new, possibly beneficial treatment approaches to the illness.

The study’s findings were published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The research looked into how recently identified novel inhibitors destroy the disease. The corresponding author of the publication “Proton transfer activity of the reconstituted MmpL3 is controlled by substrate mimics and inhibitors” is Zgurskaya, a George Lynn Cross Research Professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry in the Dodge Family College of Arts and Sciences.

“This is one of the scariest infectious diseases affecting billions of people worldwide,” said Zgurskaya. “Like many other bacterial infections, it is becoming more resistant to antibiotics. Currently, the treatment requires a combination of antibiotics taken by patients for six months, but now imagine that the disease does not respond to the treatment. We are out of therapeutic options for this infection, and we need new drugs.”

Casey Stevens, Ph.D., postdoctoral research associate Svitlana Babii, and research assistant professor Jitender Mehla led the study of the MmpL3 transporter and its analogues, which are crucial in the physiology of Mycobacterium TB and antimycobacterial drug development. These transporters are essential for the formation of the bacterial outer membrane, which is required for bacterial growth and drug resistance. Researchers effectively isolated and reconstituted MmpL3 and its analogues into artificial membranes in this investigation. They also created a set of substrate mimics and inhibitors that are particular to these transporters and studied their activities and characteristics.

Researchers discovered that all reconstituted proteins promote proton translocation across membranes, however MmpL3 analogues varied significantly in their reactions to pH and interactions with substrate mimics and indole-2-carboxamide inhibitors.