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Biomedical subjects

J Bhattacharya

Publications and source records attributed to J Bhattacharya.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

Angiogenesis in myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) in Indian patients.

Angiogenesis plays an important role in the pathogenesis of haematological neoplasms and may be correlated with the prognosis. We recently evaluated the microvessel densities in trephine biopsy sections of seventeen patients of myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS). Of the 17 cases, 2 were RAEB-t, 3 were RAEB, one was RARS and 11 were of the subtype RA (FAB subtyping). The microvessel counts were measured in the bone marrow biopsy sections by immunohistochemical staining, using CD34 reactive monoclonal antibodies. MVD was significantly higher in the cases of RAEB and RAEB-t as compared to the cases of RA. The average MVD per x400 in the cases of RA was 5.7 +/- 4.7 with a median value of 4.65 (range 19) whereas it was 45.4 +/- 10.0 and 44.0 (range 27.3) respectively in RAEB and RAEB-t (p <.001), the 95% confidence interval being (2.94, 8.5) and (36.6, 54.3), for the two groups respectively. This finding may imply that subtypes of MDS with a higher tendency for converting to acute leukaemia are associated with increased angiogenesis as compared to other subtypes where the risk of progression to acute leukaemia is much lower.

Adolescent↗

Long-range temporal correlations in the spontaneous spiking of neurons in the hippocampal-amygdala complex of humans.

The spontaneous or background discharge patterns of in vivo single neuron is mostly considered as neuronal noise, which is assumed to be devoid of any correlation between successive inter-spike-intervals (ISI). Such random fluctuations are modeled only statistically by stochastic point process, lacking any temporal correlation. In this study, we have investigated the nature of spontaneous irregular fluctuations of single neurons from human hippocampus-amygdala complex by three different methods: (i) detrended fluctuation analysis (DFA), (ii) multiscale entropy (MSE), (iii) rate estimate convergence. Both the DFA and MSE analysis showed the presence of long-range power-law correlation over time in the ISI sequences. Moreover, we observed that the individual spike trains presented non-random structure on longer time-scales and showed slow convergence of rate estimates with increasing counting time. This power-law correlation and the slow convergence of statistical moments were eliminated by randomly shuffling the ISIs even though the distributions of ISIs were preserved. Thus the power-law relationship arose from long-term correlations among ISIs that were destroyed by shuffling the data. Further, we found that neurons which showed long-range correlations also showed statistically significant correlated firing as measured by correlation coefficient or mutual information function. The presence of long-range correlations indicates the history-effect or memory in the firing pattern by the associative formation of a neuronal assembly.

Action Potentials↗

Primary myelodysplastic syndrome in children--clinical, hematological and histomorphological profile from a tertiary care centre in India.

We describe the clinical, hematological and histomorphological features in children of primary myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) seen at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences over three years (Jan 2001-Jan 2004). Twenty-one patients of primary MDS aged 17 year or less were classified using the latest proposed WHO classification for Pediatric MDS. The median age was 9 years with male predominance (80%). Pallor was present in all the cases while fever and bleeding diathesis was present in more than 50% of the cases. Morphological assessment of the peripheral blood showed macrocytosis in 50%, pancytopenia in 15% and blast cells in 45% of cases. A complete analysis of clinical features in conjunction with the bone marrow profile revealed 8 cases of refractory cytopenia (RC), 3 cases of refractory anemia with excess blasts (RAEB), 5 cases of refractory anemia with excess blasts in transformation (RAEB-T), 4 cases of Juvenile myelomonocytic leukemia (JMML) and a solitary cases of acute myeloid leukemia (AML) in Downs syndrome. These children were followed up from 1-36 months (mean 15 months). Three patients of RAEB-T progressed to AML within 3-4 months. RC had the best prognosis and all are alive and under regular follow up. The solitary case of AML of Downs syndrome died 1.5 months after initial diagnosis. All 3 cases of RAEB are under regular follow-up and doing well. Three cases of RAEB-T died (all had progressed to AML); the remaining 2 cases were lost to follow up. Of the 4 cases of JMML 1 died within 6 months of diagnosis; the other 3 cases are under regular follow up of whom 1 has a progressively increasing blast count. We conclude that the latest proposed WHO classification for Pediatric MDS can be successfully applied to all cases of primary MDS.

Adolescent↗

Synchronous occurrence of breast carcinoma and acute myeloid leukemia: case report and review of the literature.

We present a case of breast carcinoma, which was followed by acute leukemia within 1 month of diagnosis of the former. She had undergone a modified radical mastectomy for her breast cancer and had not received chemotherapy or radiotherapy. Acute leukemia as a result of chemotherapy for breast carcinoma is well known. However, patients developing synchronous breast carcinoma and acute leukemia, in the absence of any chemotherapy or radiotherapy, are rare.

Acute Disease↗

Myelopathy from intracranial dural arteriovenous fistula.

Dural arteriovenous fistulas arising intracranially are an uncommon cause of progressive myelopathy. This report is of a patient in whom the diagnosis of the condition was confounded by coexisting small vessel cerebrovascular disease.

Aged↗

Vascular regulation of type II cell exocytosis.

To determine whether lung capillary pressure regulates surfactant secretion, we viewed alveoli of the constantly inflated, isolated blood-perfused rat lung by fluorescence microscopy. By alveolar micropuncture we infused fura 2 and lamellar body (LB)-localizing dyes for fluorescence detection of, respectively, the alveolar cytosolic Ca(2+) concentration ([Ca(2+)](i)) and type II cell exocytosis. Increasing left atrial pressure (Pla) from 5 to 10 cmH(2)O increased septal capillary diameter by 26% and induced marked alveolar [Ca(2+)](i) oscillations that abated on relief of pressure elevation. The rate of loss of LB fluorescence that reflects the LB exocytosis rate increased fourfold after the pressure elevation and continued at the same rate even after pressure and [Ca(2+)](i) oscillations had returned to baseline. In alveoli pretreated with either 1,2-bis(2-aminophenoxy)ethane-N,N,N',N'-tetraacetic acid-AM, the intracellular Ca(2+) chelator, or heptanol, the gap junctional blocker, the pressure-induced exocytosis was completely inhibited. We conclude that capillary pressure and surfactant secretion are mechanically coupled. The secretion initiates in a Ca(2+)-dependent manner but is sustained by Ca(2+)-independent mechanisms.

Animals↗

Somatic embryogenesis and plant regeneration from immature embryo explant of papaya (Carica papaya L. cv. washington and honey dew).

Immature zygotic embryo explants of Carica papaya were cultured on MS medium supplemented with 2,4-D (2.0 mg/l) and formed globular embryos on explants without callus formation in 4-6 weeks. Maturation and conversion of somatic embryos was also achieved on the same medium. Cotyledonary stage embryos germinated to 63.66 and 68.33% in cv. honey dew and washington respectively in MS basal medium supplemented ABA (0.5 microm/l). Robust development and proliferation of plantlet roots in vitro was obtained on MS basal medium. Hardened plantlets have 60% survival rate.

Carica↗

Universality in the brain while listening to music.

The human brain, which is one of the most complex organic systems, involves billions of interacting physiological and chemical processes that give rise to experimentally observed neuroelectrical activity, which is called an electroencephalogram (EEG). The presence of non-stationarity and intermittency render standard available methods unsuitable for detecting hidden dynamical patterns in the EEG. In this paper, a method that is suitable for non-stationary signals and preserving the phase characteristics and that combines wavelet and Hilbert transforms was applied to multivariate EEG signals from human subjects at rest as well as in different cognitive states: listening to music, listening to text and performing spatial imagination. It was found that, if suitably rescaled, the gamma band EEG over distributed brain areas while listening to music can be described by a universal and homogeneous scaling, whereas this homogeneity in scale is reduced at resting conditions and also during listening to text and performing spatial imagination. The degree of universality is characterized by a Kullback-Leibler divergence measure. By statistical surrogate analysis, nonlinear phase interaction was found to play an important role in exhibiting universality among multiple cortical regions.

Auditory Perception↗

EEG gamma-band phase synchronization between posterior and frontal cortex during mental rotation in humans.

The main purpose of the present paper was: (1) to study the phase synchronization pattern in the gamma-band while performing the classical Shepard-Metzler task of mental rotation; (2) to investigate the role of musical training; and (3) to study hemispheric differences in the degree of synchronization during mental rotation. Multivariate electroencephalograph signals from 20 male subjects (ten musicians and ten non-musicians) were recorded while performing the mental rotation task and also at resting condition. Phase synchronization was measured by a recent index, mean phase coherence. It was found that synchronization between frontal cortex and right parietal cortex was significantly increased during mental rotation with respect to rest, whereby musicians showed significantly higher degrees of synchronization than non-musicians. Left hemispheric dominance in the degree of phase synchronization, stronger in the posterior right parietal and occipital regions, was observed in musicians. Right hemispheric dominance was generally observed in non-musicians.

Brain Mapping↗

Long-range synchrony in the gamma band: role in music perception.

Synchronization seems to be a central mechanism for neuronal information processing within and between multiple brain areas. Furthermore, synchronization in the gamma band has been shown to play an important role in higher cognitive functions, especially by binding the necessary spatial and temporal information in different cortical areas to build a coherent perception. Specific task-induced (evoked) gamma oscillations have often been taken as an indication of synchrony, but the presence of long-range synchrony cannot be inferred from spectral power in the gamma range. We studied the usefulness of a relatively new measure, called similarity index to detect asymmetric interdependency between two brain regions. Spontaneous EEG from two groups-musicians and non-musicians-were recorded during several states: listening to music, listening to text, and at rest (eyes closed and eyes open). While listening to music, degrees of the gamma band synchrony over distributed cortical areas were found to be significantly higher in musicians than non-musicians. Yet no differences between these two groups were found at resting conditions and while listening to a neutral text. In contrast to the degree of long-range synchrony, spectral power in the gamma band was higher in non-musicians. The degree of spatial synchrony, a measure of signal complexity based on eigen-decomposition method, was also significantly increased in musicians while listening to music. As compared with non-musicians, the finding of increased long-range synchrony in musicians independent of spectral power is interpreted as a manifestation of a more advanced musical memory of musicians in binding together several features of the intrinsic complexity of music in a dynamical way.

Acoustic Stimulation↗

Enhanced phase synchrony in the electroencephalograph gamma band for musicians while listening to music.

Multichannel electroencephalograph signals from two broad groups, 10 musicians and 10 nonmusicians, recorded in different states (in resting states or no task condition, with eyes opened and eyes closed, and with two musical tasks, listening to two different pieces of music) were studied. Degrees of phase synchrony in various frequency bands were assessed. No differences in the degree of synchronization in any frequency band were found between the two groups in resting conditions. Yet, while listening to music, significant increases of synchronization were found only in the gamma-frequency range (>30 Hz) over large cortical areas for the group of musicians. This high degree of synchronization elicited by music in the group of musicians might be due to their ability to host long-term memory representations of music and mediate access to these stored representations.

Acoustic Stimulation↗

Musicians and the gamma band: a secret affair?

While listening to music, a significant high degree of phase synchrony in the gamma frequency range globally distributed over the brain was found in subjects with musical training (musicians) compared with subjects with no such training (non-musicians). No significant differences were found in other EEG frequency bands. Listening to neutral text did not produce any significant differences in the degree of synchronization between these two groups. For musicians, left-hemispheric dominance was found during listening to music. The right hemisphere was found to be dominant for non-musicians in text listening. The high degree of synchronization in musicians could be due to their high ability to retrieve musical patterns from their acoustic memory, which is a cogent condition for both listening to and anticipating musical sounds.

Adult↗

New methods and data sources for measuring economic consequences of workplace injuries.

BACKGROUND: Evaluation of programs and policies to reduce the incidence of workplace injuries require that the consequences of injury are estimated correctly. Because workplace injuries are complex events, the availability of data that reflects this complexity is the largest obstacle to this estimation. METHODS: We review the literature on the consequences of workplace injuries for both workers and employers, focusing on data sources, particularly linked administrative data from different public agencies. We also review other approaches to obtaining data to examine workplace injuries, including public-use longitudinal survey data, primary data collection, and linked employee-employer databases. We make suggestions for future research. RESULTS: Recent advances in the literature on the economic consequences of workplace injuries for workers have been driven to a great extent by the availability of new data sources. Much remains unexplored. We find longitudinal survey databases including the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, and the Health and Retirement Survey, to be very promising though largely untapped sources of data on workplace injuries. We also find that linked employee-employer databases are well suited for the study of consequences for employers. CONCLUSIONS: We expect that new data sources should lead to rapid advances in our understanding of the economic consequences of workplace injuries for both workers and employers.

Accidents, Occupational↗

Divry-Van Bogaert syndrome in a female: relationship to Sneddon's syndrome and radiographic appearances.

A 28-year-old woman presented with generalised livedo reticularis, dementia, epilepsy, and pyramidal and extrapyramidal signs. Multiple focal infarcts were seen on MRI. Angiography demonstrated widespread cerebromeningeal angiomatosis with multiple small and medium size arterial occlusions. A lifelong personal and family history of mental handicap in the absence of anticardiolipin antibodies suggests Divry-Van Bogaert syndrome, not previously been reported in a female. Similarities to Sneddon's syndrome are discussed.

Adult↗

Interdependencies in the spontaneous EEG while listening to music.

We studied the patterns of interdependency between different brain regions during the performance of higher cognitive functions. Our goal was to check the existence in these patterns of both task-related differences (e.g. listening to music vs. rest) and training-related differences (musicians vs. non-musicians). For this purpose, a non-linear measure, called similarity index (S.I.), was used to detect asymmetric interdependencies between different brain regions by means of EEG signals. Relatively active and passive regions of the brain were found where the degree of activity was represented by excited degrees of freedom. The S.I. obtained during listening to different kinds of music was compared statistically with the S.I. with eyes closed, and significant changes (P< or = 0.05) were entered into schematic brain maps. A topographical representation of the S.I. yielded differences in the interdependency while performing different cognitive tasks. The results demonstrate the occurrence of task-related differences in both groups of subjects. Furthermore, subjects with musical training possessed significantly higher degrees of interdependencies than such without musical training while listening to music but not to text. We conclude that the new measure can be successfully applied for studying the dynamical co-operation between cortical areas during higher cognitive functioning.

Adult↗

Analysis and characterization of photo-plethysmographic signal.

Qualitative assessment of the overall clinical status of the subject and characterization of complex cardiovascular dynamics from digital blood volume pulsations measured noninvasively using a photo-plethysmographic device is addressed. A novel concept is employed to detect the dominant nonsinusoidal periodicity embedded in the data series and to extract the associated periodic component. The detection and the extraction of periodic component is performed with moving window to accommodate the variations of the physiological oscillations. The covariance matrix formed by the gradually varying pattern is used as a simple measure of qualitative assessment. Further, the characterization of the underlying system in the light of nonlinear dynamical analysis is also presented. The stable subjects are shown to behave as a low-dimensional system whereas the diseased subjects exhibit comparatively high dimensional activity.

Adult↗

Dual signaling by the alpha(v)beta(3)-integrin activates cytosolic PLA(2) in bovine pulmonary artery endothelial cells.

Vitronectin, which ligates the alpha(v)beta(3)-integrin, increases both lung capillary permeability and lung endothelial Ca(2+). In stable monolayers of bovine pulmonary artery endothelial cells (BPAECs) viewed with confocal microscopy, multimeric vitronectin aggregated the apically located alpha(v)beta(3)-integrin. This caused arachidonate release that was inhibited by pretreating the monolayers with the anti-alpha(v)beta(3) monoclonal antibody (MAb) LM609. No inhibition occurred in the presence of the isotypic MAb PIF6, which recognizes the integrin alpha(v)beta(5). Vitronectin also caused membrane translocation and phosphorylation of cytosolic phospholipase A(2) (cPLA(2)) as well as tyrosine phosphorylation of the mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK) 2. The cPLA(2) inhibitor arachidonyl trifluoromethylketone, the tyrosine kinase inhibitor genistein, and the MAPK kinase inhibitor PD-98059 all blocked the induced arachidonate release. PD-98059 did not inhibit the increase of cytosolic Ca(2+) or cPLA(2) translocation, although it blocked tyrosine phosphorylation of ERK2. Moreover, although the intracellular Ca(2+) chelator MAPTAM also inhibited arachidonate release, it did not inhibit tyrosine phosphorylation of ERK2. These findings indicate that ligation of apical alpha(v)beta(3) in BPAECs caused ERK2 activation and an increase of intracellular Ca(2+), both conjointly required for cPLA(2) activation and arachidonate release. This is the first instance of a tyrosine phosphorylation-initiated "two-hit" signaling pathway that regulates an integrin-induced proinflammatory response.

Animals↗