Neuroscience and Neurobiology Commons^™

Pipecolic Acid And Novel Insights Into Cerebral Malaria, Akua E. Mensah

Theses and Dissertations

Cerebral malaria (CM), a severe manifestation of Plasmodium infection, prompts our investigation into the nuanced role of pipecolic acid in its pathophysiology. To unravel the molecular intricacies, we conducted in vitro lysine labeling techniques of mice infected with P. berghei ANKA parasites, and human P. falciparum grown in vitro, aiming to discern the impact of Plasmodium on pipecolic acid production. Previous observations indicated an elevation in pipecolic acid levels correlating with neurological decline in children with CM. In our study, confirming elevated pipecolic acid presence in the plasma and brain tissues of CM patients and the animal model of CM, …

Atlas-Based Analysis Of The Neural Projections From The Lateral Hypothalamic Area To The Lower Brainstem In The Adult Male Rat, Jessica Valeria Salcido Padilla

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Within the last decade, the number of diseases associated with dysregulation of the neural circuits responsible for energy balance, glucosensing, and feeding control has increased. One brain region containing these circuits is the lateral hypothalamic area (LHA), which plays an important role in the sleep/wake cycle, energy balance, and motivated behavior. Although the LHA has been termed a â??feeding centerâ??, other regions within the hindbrain are known for the regulation of similar functions including energy balance, glucosensing, and feeding control. While many studies have explored and reported projections from the LHA to the hindbrain, few have further investigated the interconnections …

The Role Of Oncomodulin In The Central Nervous System Inflammation, Evan Paltjon

Honors Theses

Acoustic overexposure in mice leads to an excess of calcium influx in outer hair cells (OHCs) and causes permanent hearing loss due to death of OHCs. Oncomodulin is a parvalbumin calcium buffering protein located in OHCs of the cochlea. Early pilot studies indicate that genetic deletion of OCM results in immune-related pathology throughout the cochlea. Why and how this occurs is unknown. Studies in wild type (WT) and OCM knockout (KO) mice demonstrate greater numbers of immune cells are associated with noise exposure in an OCM knockout than in WT. Expression of toll-like receptor 4 (TLR4) leads to the recruitment …

Use Of Cre-Lox Mice As A Model For Ependymogenesis, Poorva Bagchee

Honors Scholar Theses

Stem cells in the lateral ventricles of the brain undergo a process of development within the ventricular-subventricular zone. In early development neuroepithelial cells divide to form more neuroepithelial cells or convert to radial glial cells (RGCs). These RGCs, or stem cells, then divide to form neurons or other glial cells such as ependymal cells, which form a single-layered ependyma along the ventricular wall. These stem cells divide in two ways: symmetrically, producing two ependymal cells or asymmetrically, yielding one neural stem cell and ependymal cell. To further study this process the Cre-lox system in mice will be used. By breeding …

Perinatal Buprenorphine Effects On Offspring Growth, Opioid Withdrawal, And Brain Morphology In Rats, Parker Barnes

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Opioid use disorder (OUD) impacts 5.6 million people in the US. Buprenorphine (BUP) is a commonly prescribed opioid medication used to treat OUD, including in pregnant women. However, opioid use during pregnancy is associated with poorer infant outcomes including reduced fetal growth, neurodevelopmental deficits, and neonatal opioid withdrawal syndrome (NOWS). Recent clinical data suggests that providing mothers with a lower dose of BUP may result in fewer negative outcomes in infants. Here, a preclinical rodent model of low-dose perinatal BUP exposure was used to study offspring health outcomes in the neonate, juvenile, and adolescent offspring. Dams were given clinically relevant …

Doing Links: The Neuroscience Of Technology Addiction, Ali Hatfield

Scientific Kenyon: The Neuroscience Edition

What’s the difference between fentanyl and Facebook? Vicodin and video games? Whippits and WhatsApp? They all have the capacity to be addictive, and your kids are much more likely to experience one over the other. Addiction is an umbrella term describing the use of something in a dependent and problematic way, often referring to specific clinical afflictions such as substance abuse disorder or gambling [1]. Addictions and their symptoms derive from neurobiological changes that occur throughout the nervous system in response to a certain stimulus, such as a drug. Common behaviors associated with addiction include preoccupation with and increasing tolerance …

It’S Getting Hot In Here, So Maintain Situational Awareness, Abby Zavadil

Scientific Kenyon: The Neuroscience Edition

No abstract provided.

Everybody In The Club Gettin' Tipsy: Alcohol's Effects On Behavior And Cognition, Lauren Barrabee

Scientific Kenyon: The Neuroscience Edition

No abstract provided.

Letter From The Professor: Resilience, Hewlet G. Mcfarlane

Scientific Kenyon: The Neuroscience Edition

No abstract provided.

Scientific Kenyon: Neuroscience Edition (Full Issue)

Scientific Kenyon: The Neuroscience Edition

No abstract provided.

Ditching Magic For Memory: The New Mushroom In Town, Dani Buch

Scientific Kenyon: The Neuroscience Edition

No abstract provided.

What Does Aaron Hernandez Have In Common With Your High Schooler?, Sam Lee

Scientific Kenyon: The Neuroscience Edition

No abstract provided.

Cannibals, Chemicals, And A Trip Down Memory Lane: Unraveling Our Understanding Of Memory, Yana Honcharuk

Scientific Kenyon: The Neuroscience Edition

Have you ever wished to preserve a memory forever? Or perhaps share a treasured memory with someone? Instead of having to look for words that could describe how you felt at the concert of your favorite band or at that first date with a person you’ve been pining for, wouldn’t it be nice to have the ability to transmit those experiences to your friends? To make them feel how you felt? While this sounds like a plot for another rendition of Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind, or a chapter from Harry Potter, the scientific idea of memory transfer has …

Plastic Pollutants To The Brain: Wrong Kind Of Plastic For The Nervous System, Caleigh Wukitch

Scientific Kenyon: The Neuroscience Edition

The plastic revolution is here: we store our food in plastic containers, walk around with our coffee in plastic cups, and sit all day in our plastic chairs. We also know that our plastic waste floats around poisoning waters, cluttering streets, and choking wildlife. But it may be doing so much more than we realize - what if it is rewiring our nervous system?

Woop-Woop! That's The Sound Of Da Immune System: A Story Of Tricky Trypanosomes That Evade The Immune System To Get Into The Brain, Sophia Knaysi

Scientific Kenyon: The Neuroscience Edition

No abstract provided.

Brains Vs. Brawn- Why Not Have Both? The Cognitive Effects Of Creatine Supplementation, Riley Orth

Scientific Kenyon: The Neuroscience Edition

In books, movies, and TV shows, there is a common trope that associates large, muscular people with an impressive, and often comedic lack of brain power. Of course, we know that this is not exactly the case in the real world, but are the two somehow related? What if there was some magical substance that had the potential to not only increase muscular size and strength but also the potential to improve brain function? Fortunately for us, this supplement exists and it is known as creatine.

Friends To Lovers: It's More Than My Favorite Book Trope, Smrami Patel

Scientific Kenyon: The Neuroscience Edition

No abstract provided.

All You Need Is... Netflix And Chill? The Neuroscience Of Sexual Behavior And Hookup Culture, Megan Quinn

Scientific Kenyon: The Neuroscience Edition

No abstract provided.

Molecular Mechanisms Of Opioid Use Disorder In Human Brain Models, Emily Mendez

Dissertations and Theses (Open Access)

Opioid use disorder (OUD) is a national and global public health crisis with no end in sight. While studies from animal models hint at widespread epigenetic and transcriptomic alterations of opioid drugs, the molecular consequences of long-term exposure to opioid drugs in human brain is still unclear, and human-centered translational models are necessary to discern the human cell type-specific effects of OUD.

Using postmortem brain Brodmann area 9 (BA9) from the UTHealth Brain Collection for Research on Psychiatric Disorders, I identified angiogenic gene networks perturbed in the RNA and protein of OUD subjects, as well as downregulation of many neuron-correlated …

Novel Roles Of Microtubule-Associated Tau In Radiation-Induced Brain Injury, Riya Thomas, Riya Thomas

Dissertations and Theses (Open Access)

Injury responses in cells lacking proliferation capacity such as terminally differentiated neurons consists of complex mechanisms to ensure cellular homeostasis. Brain tumor patients undergoing radiation therapy experience cognitive impairments similar to those seen in patients suffering from neurodegenerative diseases. Despite the plethora of research into radiation effects on proliferating brain cells, the impact of radiation on differentiated, post-mitotic neurons, including their structural and functional alterations, remain largely elusive. However, microtubule-associated tau, an important partner of cytoskeletal structural stability emerges as a pivotal player in the radiation-induced neuronal injury response, demonstrating compartmentalized functions such as repair-centric mechanisms and synaptic homeostasis. This …

The Influence Of Bihemispheric Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation On Muscle Fatigue, Ananya Singh Chauhan

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Unilateral transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) using two electrodes placed over the primary motor cortex (M1) and the contralateral supraorbital (SO) region (M1-SO montage) has been shown to decrease the progression of muscle fatigue. The primary purpose was to determine the impact of bihemispheric tDCS (bi-tDCS) applied over the left and right M1s (bi-tDCS) on the time to task failure (TTF) of a precision-grip task. The study implemented a double-blind, randomized, SHAM-controlled, within-subjects design. A total of 20 participants performed two experimental sessions (bi-tDCS and SHAM conditions) separated by a one-week washout. During each experimental session, a fatiguing isometric contraction …

Exploring Resilience With Neuroimaging: Moderators Of The Impacts Of Childhood Traumatic Stress On Fear Processing., Karisa June Hunt

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Childhood trauma is an alarming public health crisis, and the field of trauma research is relatively underdeveloped given population rates of childhood trauma and post-trauma pathology. Even less studied than the impacts of trauma are the impacts of resilience, and the protective factors that foster it. It is widely acknowledged that an investigation of trauma is incomplete without an investigation of its impacts on fear processing. Understanding the neural underpinnings of resilience to childhood trauma during fear conditioning is vital to the development of therapeutic interventions able to moderate its devastating impacts. The present study investigated the complex neurobiological interplay …

Mapping The Neural Circuits That Underlie Metabolic Vs. Emotional Regulation Of Food-Seeking Behavior, Xu Zhang

Dissertations and Theses (Open Access)

Flexibly adjusting food-seeking behaviors based on metabolic needs and environmental threats is crucial for animal survival. In humans, maladaptive food-seeking behaviors that contravene energy homeostasis, which is often driven by food-associated cues with hedonic reward values, lead to obesity and eating disorders. However, the neural mechanisms underlying the modulation of cued food-seeking behaviors by distinct metabolic and threat states remain elusive. Using an approach-food vs. avoid-predator threat conflict test in rats, we identified a subpopulation of neurons in the anterior portion of the paraventricular thalamic nucleus (aPVT) which express corticotrophin-releasing factor (CRF) and are preferentially recruited to respond to food …

Biophysical Model Of Retraction Motor Neurons And Their Modification By Operant Conditioning, Maria Rasheed

Dissertations and Theses (Open Access)

Operant conditioning (OC) is a form of associative learning in which an animal modifies its behavior based on the consequences that follow that behavior. Despite its ubiquity, the underlying mechanisms of OC are poorly understood. Insights into the mechanisms of OC can be obtained by studying Aplysia feeding behavior as it can be modified by OC. This behavior is mediated by a central pattern generator (CPG) network in the buccal ganglia that contains a relatively small number of neurons. This CPG generates rhythmic motor patterns (BMPs) that move food into the gut by closing a tongue-like structure (i.e., radula) during …

P300 Event-Related Potential Responses To Self-Relevant Stimuli, Jordan Razzak

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Previous literature has suggested an apparent P300 sensitivity to self-relevant stimuli. To further explore this relationship, we asked participants to submit 10 photos, each of a particular category (e.g. footwear, plants), to be used as either targets or distractors in a given condition of an oddball task. Furthermore, we attempted to see whether the effect of self-relevance on the P300 could be induced in a participant by allowing them to study a set of unique photos which would then be used as targets. Our analysis suggested that P300 amplitude elicited in response to self-relevant stimuli used as targets was statistically …

Exploring Available Information On The Gut-Brain Axis And Alzheimer’S Disease For Clinicians Making Dietary Recommendations: A Scoping Review, Megan Gibson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Abstract: Alzheimer’s Disease (AD) is a complex neurodegenerative disease that requires interprofessional collaboration. Pharmacological options are currently ineffective, increasing the need for preventative strategies to combat the rise of AD. Considerations of gut-targeted interventions have increased as a key component in the prevention of AD, based on the understanding that the state of the gut microbiome can impact cognitive function through the pathway known as the gut-brain axis.

Methods: This scoping review explored information on the gut-brain axis in persons with AD. A comprehensive search was conducted in November 2023. Forty reviews and 13 human studies were analyzed.

Results: There …

Role Of Proneurotrophin-P75ntr Signaling In A Mouse Model Of Depression, Kirsten Hodgson

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Fall 2023 to Present

Major depressive disorder, or depression, is among the leading causes of disability globally. Despite being a large public health challenge, depression remains difficult to treat as the underlying biology is still unknown and the currently available treatments are limited in effectiveness. This experiment was to test the efficacy of the drug LM11A-31, which works on the signaling pathway of proneurotrophin-p75NTR, a pathway that is not targeted by any currently used antidepressants. Male mice underwent a repeated forced swim, with all the mice receiving saline the first two days and then half the mice receiving saline and half receiving LM11A-31 before …

A Low Dose Of Electro-Psychedelic Treatment Increases Neuronal Dendritic Arborization And Filopodic Spine Density, Elaine Aquino Vasquez

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Neuropsychiatric disorders remain a formidable challenge to the global healthcare system, necessitating innovative treatments to address their complex pathophysiology. Alternative therapeutic approaches, including electroconvulsive treatment (ECT) and psychedelics, have gained attention for their capacity to relieve a broad range of symptoms. ECT is a long-standing effective therapy for patients, especially treatment-resistant ones. Psychedelics, like psilocybin, can induce profound and sustained therapeutic effects. The limited understanding of their mechanisms of action, compounded by the negative stigma surrounding ECT and psilocybin, prevents them from being used as adjunct agents. ECT and psilocybin promote synaptic plasticity and modulate neural remodeling, yet their comparative …

The Influence Of Bilateral Dual Source Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation On The Progression Of Muscle Fatigue, Eliza Clinton

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) applied unilaterally to the primary motor cortex (M1) can significantly prolong the time to task failure (TTF) of a fatiguing contraction. The primary purpose of the study was to examine the influence of bilateral dual source tDCS (dstDCS) applied over the left and right M1s (ds-tDCS) on the TTF of a precision grip task. This was accomplished through the utilization of a double-blind, randomized, SHAM-controlled, within-subjects design. Fourteen participants completed two experiments (ds-tDCS and SHAM stimulation conditions) with a seven-day washout period between sessions. Each experiment involved the performance of a sustained isometric fatiguing contraction …

The Feasibility Of High-Intensity Training To Improve Self-Control And Occupational Participation In At-Risk Adolescents, Tashia Kaplan

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Purpose

Adolescence is a challenging time navigating self-control and decision-making, creating vulnerability to developing poor habits and unhealthy behaviors. This feasibility study aimed to determine if a high-intensity training program (HIT) would improve self-control, health-related behaviors, and healthy occupational participation in at-risk adolescents in the Real Talk Youth Impact Program (Real Talk), measured by the Occupational Experience Profile (OEP).

Methodology

Three at-risk adolescent were recruited via convenience sampling from Real Talk to participate in a twelve-session HIT intervention, one participant completed all sessions. Researchers used a quasi-experimental exploratory sequential mixed-methods design to examine self-control, health-related behaviors, and occupational participation measured …