Identifying the steps involved in striatal development is important both for understanding the striatum in health and disease, and for generating protocols to differentiate striatal neurons for regenerative medicine. The most prominent neuronal subtype in the adult striatum is the medium spiny projection neuron (MSN), which constitutes more than 85% of all striatal neurons and classically expre...

Several mesoporous silica nanoparticle (MSN) contrast agents have been synthesized using a co-condensation method to incorporate two different Gd3+ complexes at very high loadings (15.5-28.8 wt %). These MSN contrast agents, with an MCM-41 type pore structure, were characterized using a variety of methods including SEM and TEM, nitrogen adsorption measurements, thermogravimetric analysis (TGA),...

Approximately 94 million American adults use the internet on a typical day [24]. The number one internet activity is reading and writing email. Search engine use is next in line and continues to increase in popularity. In fact, survey findings indicate that nearly 60 million American adults use search engines on a given day. Even though there are many internet search engines, Google, Yahoo!, an...

Oscillations in the β-band (8-30 Hz) that emerge in the output nuclei of the basal ganglia during Parkinson's disease, along with an imbalanced activation of the direct and indirect pathways, have been linked to the hypokinetic motor output associated with the disease. Although dopamine depletion causes a change in cellular and network properties in the striatum, it is unclear whether abnormal ...

A pH-responsive drug delivery system based on mesoporous silica nanoparticles (MSN) has been prepared for the of three drugs with different modes action (phthalocyanine (Pc) camptothecin (CPT) and doxorubicin (DOX)). The pores MSN were loaded a photoactive conjugate formed from Pc CPT joined by glutathione-sensitive linker. DOX was covalently bound to outer surface through dihydrazone poly(ethy...

A new general route for siRNA delivery is presented combining porous core-shell silica nanocarriers with a modularly designed multifunctional block copolymer. Specifically, the internal storage and release of siRNA from mesoporous silica nanoparticles (MSN) with orthogonal core-shell surface chemistry was investigated as a function of pore-size, pore morphology, surface properties and pH. Very ...

The striatum is populated by a single projection neuron group, the medium spiny neurons (MSNs), and several groups of interneurons. Two of the electrophysiologically well-characterized striatal interneuron groups are the tonically active neurons (TANs), which are presumably cholinergic interneurons, and the fast spiking interneurons (FSIs), presumably parvalbumin (PV) expressing GABAergic inter...

The most predictable components of the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) evolution in real-time multi-model predictions are identified by applying an empirical orthogonal function analysis of the model data that maximizes the signal-to-noise ratio (MSN EOF). The normalized Niño3.4 index is analyzed for nine 3-month overlapping seasons. In this sense, the first most predictable component (MSN ...

Huntington's disease is caused by polyglutamine expansion (exp) in huntingtin (Htt). Htt-associated protein-1 (HAP1) was the first identified Htt-binding partner. The type 1 inositol (1,4,5)-trisphosphate receptor (InsP3R1) is an intracellular Ca2+ release channel that plays an important role in neuronal function. Recently, we identified a InsP3R1-HAP1A-Htt ternary complex in the brain and demo...