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Tourette syndrome (TS) is a common disorder which typically occurs during childhood or early adolescence. There is no definitive diagnostic test for TS. The objective of this study was to demonstrate whether neurophysiological abnormalities of the blink reflex can be observed in children with TS. We enrolled 15 children with TS, diagnosed according to DSM IV Diagnostic Criteria, and 15 controls. The blink reflex was elicited by stimulating the supraorbital nerve in order to measure the early response (R1), homolateral and contralateral R2 (late) responses, amplitude of R1 and duration of R2. The mean duration of R2 was significantly longer in TS patients than in the controls ( P < 0.001, Student's t-test). An abnormal pattern of the blink reflex can be, even in childhood, an early neurophysiologic marker of TS, which is not related to the duration of TS or to the age of onset. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the spinocerebellar locations of Purkinje cells that responded to passive foot rotations at the ankle joint in anaesthetized cats. Using a novel approach for mapping the locations of recorded cells from several animals onto an unfolded two-dimensional representation of the cortex, we found that cells distributed throughout the anterior-posterior extent of the spinocerebellar cortex, except in the most medial parts corresponding to zones a and b, were responsive to ankle joint rotation. The cell distributions revealed a clustering according to their response amplitudes, which showed evidence for both parasagittal and transverse banding. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Problem: Chronic endometritis (CE) is usually asymptomatic and different studies demonstrated the relation with infertility and recurrent pregnancy loss. Altered regulation of protein-encoding genes in CE has been demonstrated, but no evidence about the involvement of microRNAs in the pathology is present in literature., Method of Study: In the endometrium from 15 women with CE and 15 healthy women, by RT-qPCR single assays, we investigated some microRNAs targeting IL11, CCL4, IGF1, and IGFBP1, which mRNAs had been found differentially expressed in endometrium of women affected by CE. The expression of IGF1 and IL11, targets of the deregulated microRNAs, has been analyzed in the same endometrium samples. We assessed the expression profiles of the deregulated microRNAs in the serum of the same patients validating their ability as biomarkers by statistical analysis., Results: We demonstrated the upregulation of miR-27a-3p and miR-124-3p in the endometrium and serum from women with CE and found an anticorrelation relationship between miR-27a-3p and IGF1 in endometrium. ROC curve analysis suggested that miRNA investigation in endometrium and serum could discriminate women with CE., Conclusion: MiR-27a-3p and miR-124-3p could represent non-invasive markers of CE and, in a near future, could be used to assess the endometrial quality in IVF., (© 2018 John Wiley & Sons A/S. Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)

Recent studies have attempted to repair the damaged spinal cord (SC) by stimulating neurogenesis or neuroplasticity. Sonic hedgehog (Shh), Notch-1 and Numb are involved in the stem cell functioning. Additionally, Notch-1 has a role as modulator of synaptic plasticity. However, little is known about the role of these proteins in the adult SC after removal of motoneurons. In this study, we have injected cholera toxin-B saporin into the gastrocnemius muscle to induce a depletion of motoneurons within the lumbar SC of adult mice, and analysed the expression of choline acetyltransferase (ChAT), Synapsin-I, Shh, Notch-1 and Numb proteins. The functional outcome of the lesion was monitored by grid walk and rotarod tasks. The neurotoxin lesion determined a motoneuron depletion and a transient decrease of ChAT, Synapsin-I, Shh and Numb levels in the lumbar SC. ChAT was associated with Synapsin-I expression and motor performance at 1 week but not 1 month after lesion, suggesting that the recovery of locomotion could depend on synaptic plasticity, at least in an early phase. Shh and Notch-1 were associated with Synapsin-I levels, suggesting a role in modulating synaptic plasticity. Numb expression also appeared reduced after lesion and linked to motor performance. Moreover, unlike other lesion models, we observed glial reaction but no evidence of cell proliferation within the depleted SC. Given the mentioned roles of Shh, Notch-1 and Numb, we believe that an in vivo manipulation of their signalling after lesion could represent a suitable way to improve functional recovery by modulating synaptic plasticity and/or neurogenesis.

We recorded Purkinje cell activity throughout the spinocerebellum of anaesthetized rats while imposing circular passive movements to the unrestrained forelimb. The aim was to understand the type of processing of sensory information occurring at the level of the cerebellar cortex, on the basis that precerebellar sensory neurons have been shown to represent whole limb movement parameters better than single joint movements. We observed that neurons representing sensory aspects of arm movements were scattered throughout the spinocerebellar cortex without a distinct segregation from those that did not respond, albeit the relative density of responsive and unresponsive neurons was quite variable and depended on the area of the cortex. Furthermore, Purkinje cells that responded significantly to the arm movement cycles all showed the same response pattern consisting of a firing rate increase during the downward extension of the arm. These results are discussed as suggesting a coordinate framework for the representation of proprioceptive information in the cerebellum congruent to that observed for encoding motor parameters.