BACKGROUND In this study, the magnitude and spatial distribution of theta power in the resting EEG were examined to explore the changes in the neurophysiological status of the alcoholic brain. Some state- and trait-related issues of theta power increases in the EEG of alcoholics were also examined. METHODS Absolute theta (3-7 Hz) power in eyes-closed EEGs of 307 alcohol-dependent subjects and...

In this thesis I develop a syntactic representation of control that is PRO-free. I implement a mechanism of theta-role assignment that uses theta-role percolation (Neeleman and Van de Koot (2002)), which enables the apparent subject properties of controlled infinitives to be reinterpreted as properties associated with an external theta-role, rather than a subject. I first analyse Obligatory Con...

Phase-amplitude coupling analysis shows that theta phase modulates oscillatory activity not only within the traditional gamma band (30-100 Hz) but also at faster frequencies, called high-frequency oscillations (HFOs; 120-160 Hz). To date, however, theta-associated HFOs have been reported by only a small number of laboratories. Here we characterized coupling patterns during active waking (aWk) a...

BACKGROUND The mammalian brain expresses a wide range of state-dependent network oscillations which vary in frequency and spatial extension. Such rhythms can entrain multiple neurons into coherent patterns of activity, consistent with a role in behaviour, cognition and memory formation. Recent evidence suggests that locally generated fast network oscillations can be systematically aligned to lo...

The rodent anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) is critical for visceral pain and pain-related aversive response in chronic visceral hypersensitive (VH) state. Long-term potentiation (LTP), induced by theta burst stimulation (TBS) in the medial thalamus (MT)-ACC pathway, is blocked in VH rats. However, the neuronal intrinsic firing characteristics and the MT-ACC connectivity have not been investigat...

Mammalian odorant receptors (ORs) are crucial for establishing the functional organization of the olfactory system, but the mechanisms controlling their expression remain largely unexplained. Here, we utilized a transgenic approach to explore OR gene regulation. We determined that although olfactory sensory neurons (OSNs) are capable of supporting expression of multiple functional ORs, several ...

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is an age-related neurodegenerative disorder characterized by impairment of memory function. The 5XFAD mouse model was analyzed and compared with wild-type (WT) controls for aberrant cortical excitability and hippocampal theta oscillations by using simultaneous video-electroencephalogram (EEG) monitoring. Seizure staging revealed that 5XFAD mice exhibited cortical hyper...

Rapid eye movement (REM) sleep onset is triggered by disinhibition of cholinergic neurons in the pons. During REM sleep, the brain exhibits prominent activity in the 5-8 Hz (theta) frequency range. How REM sleep onset and theta waves are regulated is poorly understood. Astrocytes, a non-neuronal cell type in the brain, respond to cholinergic signals by elevating their intracellular Ca2+ concent...

The hippocampus generates distinct neural codes to disambiguate similar experiences, a process thought to underlie episodic memory function. Entorhinal grid cells provide a prominent spatial signal to hippocampus, and changes in their firing pattern could thus generate a distinct spatial code in each context. We examined whether we would preclude the emergence of new spatial representations in ...

Protein kinase C (PKC) is a family of protein serine/threonine kinases consisting of multiple isoforms whose distinct physiological roles within cells are unknown. The message encoding the nPKC theta isoform, a member of the novel calcium-independent class of PKCs, has recently been shown to be abundant in mouse skeletal muscle. The message for cPKC alpha, a calcium-dependent isoform, was also ...