Transcranial Focused Ultrasound Neuromodulation of Voluntary Movement-related Cortical Activity in Humans

Transcranial focused ultrasound (tFUS) is an emerging non-invasive brain stimulation tool for safely and reversibly modulating brain circuits. The effectiveness of tFUS on human brain has been demonstrated, but how tFUS influences the human voluntary motor processing in the brain remains unclear. We apply low-intensity tFUS to modulate the movement-related cortical potential (MRCP) originating from human subjects practicing a voluntary foot tapping task. 64-channel electroencephalograph (EEG) is recorded concurrently and further used to reconstruct the brain source activity specifically at the primary leg motor cortical area using the electrophysiological source imaging (ESI). The ESI illustrates the ultrasound modulated MRCP source dynamics with high spatiotemporal resolutions. The MRCP source is imaged and its source profile is further evaluated for assessing the tFUS neuromodulatory effects on the voluntary MRCP. Moreover, the effect of ultrasound pulse repetition frequency (UPRF) is further assessed in modulating the MRCP. ESI results show that tFUS significantly increases the MRCP source profile amplitude (MSPA) comparing to a sham ultrasound condition, and further, a high UPRF enhances the MSPA more than a low UPRF. This work provides the first evidence of tFUS enhancing the human voluntary movement-related cortical activity through excitatory modulation.

Social Media in Heart Failure: A Mixed Methods Systematic Review

Background: Among social media (SoMe) platforms, Twitter and YouTube have gained popularity, facilitating communication between cardiovascular professionals and patients. Objective: This mixed method systematic review aimed to assess the source profile and content of Twitter and YouTube posts about heart failure (HF). Methods: We searched PubMed, Embase and Medline using the terms “cardiology,” “social media,” and “heart failure.” We included full-text manuscripts published between January 1, 1999 and April 14, 2019. We searched Twitter and YouTube for posts using the hashtags “#heartfailure”, “#HF”, “#CHF” on May 15, 2019 and July 6, 2019. We performed a descriptive analysis of the data. Results:: Three publications met inclusion criteria, providing 677 tweets for source profile analysis; institutions (54.8%), health professionals (26.6%), and patients (19.4%) were the most common sources profiles. The publications provided 1194 tweets for content analysis: 83.3% were on education of professionals; 33.7% on patient empowerment; and 22.3% on research promotion. Our search of Twitter and YouTube generated 2,252 tweets and >400 videos, of which we analyzed 260 tweets and 260 videos. Sources included institutions (53.5% Twitter, 64.2% YouTube), health professionals (42.3%, 28.5%), and patients (4.2%, 7.3%). Content included education of professionals (39.2% Twitter, 62.3% YouTube), patient empowerment (20.4%, 21.9%), research promotion (28.8%, 13.1%), advocacy of professionals (5.8%, 2.7%), and research collaboration (5.8%, 0%). Conclusions: Twitter and YouTube are platforms for knowledge translation in HF, with contributions from institutions, health professionals, and less commonly, patients. Both focus largely on education of professionals and less commonly, on patient empowerment. Twitter includes more research promotion, research collaboration, and professional advocacy than YouTube.

Assessment of Source Profile of Nonmethane Hydrocarbon in the Ambient Air of Metro City Delhi, India

In this paper presents the assessment of source profile of nonmethane hydrocarbons (NMHCs) in the ambient air of Delhi. The samples were collected from five different urban sites using tedlar bags for aliphatic NMHCs and activated adsorption charcoal tubes for aromatic NMHCs during October 2014 to September 2015. Eleven aliphatic NMHCs propane, n-butane i-butene, i-butane, 1,3-butadiene, trans-2-butene, cis-2-pentene, n-pentane, n-hexane, heptane and four aromatic NMHCs benzene, toluene, o-xylene, p/m-xylene were identified in 112 urban ambient air samples. Samples were analysed using gas chromatography which is coupled with flame ionization detector (GC-FID). Pearson correlation coefficient (r) found to be = 0.5±0.2, shows significance level to have moderate among the NMHCs, indicates NMHCs in the urban ambient air have many sources profile mentioned in PCA result. Factor analysis(FA) and receptor model, i.e., Principal Component Analysis(PCA)/Absolute Principal Component Score (APCS) was used for identification of source profile distribution. PCA analysis after the varimax rotation have identified six possible source profile and explained about 70 % of the total dataset. The average % contribution of NMHCs emitted from vehicles was found to be 23%, whereas polymer manufacturing industries contributes 19% and from refinery operation/ gas station contribute 14%, and 13%, emitted from flare emissions and 10% from natural gas emissions. The secondary industrial process, including paints, body soaps and metal fabricator and processing was contributing 8%. Out of these remaining 13% was estimated as unidentified sources. These findings may be used by government authorities to formulate policies and strategies for improvement of urban air quality that can improve the health of urban communities.