Biomedical subjects

L M McShane

Publications and source records attributed to L M McShane.

26 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

PubMed1993

Dopaminergic neuronal sprouting and behavioral recovery in hemi-parkinsonian rats after implantation of amnion cells.

Cells obtained from human, monkey, or rat term amnion membrane produce an activity which, in vitro, increases process outgrowth from rat sympathetic neurons and from dopaminergic neurons of the rat ventral mesencephalon. To determine if these cells could induce sprouting of dopaminergic nerve fibers in vivo, the substantia nigra of rats was lesioned unilaterally with 6-hydroxydopamine and live-rat-term amnion cells, or killed-rat-term amnion cells were implanted into the denervated striata. A control group of rats received saline injections into the denervated striata. Rats implanted with live amnion cells had a significant decrease in turning in response to amphetamine. The lesioned and implanted striata of live-amnion-cell-implanted rats contained significantly greater areas of tyrosine hydroxylase-immunoreactive fibers than the lesioned and implanted striatum of rats in the killed-amnion-cell or saline groups. Differences in the area of tyrosine hydroxylase-immunoreactive fibers in the implanted striata or in amphetamine-induced rotation between killed amnion cell-implanted and saline-injected rats did not reach significance. Implants of live amnion cells into the striatum of a parkinsonian animal model can evoke the de novo appearance of dopaminergic fibers in the denervated striatum and behavioral recovery, most likely through a trophic mechanism.

Amnion↗

PubMed1992

Optimal checking procedures for monitoring laboratory analyses.

Many clinical, environmental, and epidemiologic studies rely heavily upon biochemical data, and the quality of these data is of paramount importance to the validity of study conclusions. Traditionally, far more attention has been given to the analysis of study data than has been given to monitoring the quality of the data. In this paper we draw an analogy between monitoring a laboratory system and an industrial production process and discuss the limitations of industrial quality control plans when applied in a laboratory setting. We derive methods for computing optimal checking schedules for laboratory analyses. These schedules formalize traditional laboratory practices of periodic checking and provide guidelines for the frequency and placement of checks within a finite batch of analyses. When laboratory system failure can be reasonably approximated by an exponential or geometric distribution, optimal checking schedules are relatively easy to compute. For more complex failure distributions, we present a dynamic programming approach. We describe an application to the measurement of selenium status in plasma samples using an electrothermal atomic absorption spectrophotometry procedure.

Algorithms↗

PubMed1992

Noninvasive mapping of muscle representations in human motor cortex.

We used transcranial magnetic stimulation to map the cortical representations of 4 upper extremity muscles (abductor pollicis brevis, flexor carpi radialis, biceps, and deltoid) of 10 normal subjects. Three stimuli were delivered to scalp positions 1 cm apart, and the amplitude and latency of the motor evoked potentials (MEPs) were averaged for each position. Maps were described in terms of number of excitable scalp positions, amplitude of MEPs, scalp positions for evoking largest amplitude MEPs, and threshold for producing MEPs. We compared different muscles across subjects and the same muscles on the left and right sides in individual subjects. Distal muscles had larger representations with higher amplitude MEPs and lower thresholds. Biceps and deltoid on the left had larger representations and higher MEP amplitudes than on the right. Maps showed a somatotopic progression on the scalp of proximal to distal muscles along a posteromedial to anterolateral axis.

Adult↗

PubMed1992

Topographic mapping of the human motor cortex with magnetic stimulation: factors affecting accuracy and reproducibility.

We recorded motor evoked potentials (MEPs) from deltoid, biceps brachii, abductor pollicis brevis and flexor carpi radialis muscles of 5 normal volunteers during transcranial magnetic stimulation. With the subjects at rest, an 8-shaped magnetic coil was used to deliver 30 stimuli to different scalp positions 0.5 or 1.0 cm apart. The variability in amplitude and latency of MEPs was studied as a function of the scalp position stimulated, the number of stimuli at each position, and the percentage of maximal peripheral M responses (%M) elicited. The results were used to estimate the optimal number of stimuli at each position and the optimal spacing of scalp positions for topographic mapping of the human motor cortex. The amplitude and latency variability of MEPs were higher when suboptimal scalp positions were stimulated. Consequently, a larger number of stimuli were required to determine representative MEP amplitudes at suboptimal positions. In addition, there was an inverse relationship between %M recruited by transcranial magnetic stimuli in different subjects and the variability in MEP amplitude and latency. Latency variability was less pronounced than amplitude variability. Optimal sampling conditions are required to produce the best topographic maps, particularly to show subtle reorganization patterns in the human motor cortex.

Brain Mapping↗

PubMed1991

Reporting the accuracy of biochemical measurements for epidemiologic and nutrition studies.

Procedures for reporting and monitoring the accuracy of biochemical measurements are presented. They are proposed as standard reporting procedures for laboratory assays for epidemiologic and clinical-nutrition studies. The recommended procedures require identification and estimation of all major sources of variability and explanations of laboratory quality control procedures employed. Variance-components techniques are used to model the total variability and calculate a maximum percent error that provides an easily understandable measure of laboratory precision accounting for all sources of variability. This avoids ambiguities encountered when reporting an SD that may taken into account only a few of the potential sources of variability. Other proposed uses of the total-variability model include estimating precision of laboratory methods for various replication schemes and developing effective quality control-checking schemes. These procedures are demonstrated with an example of the analysis of alpha-tocopherol in human plasma by using high-performance liquid chromatography.

Analysis of Variance↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Spatial distribution of neurons in tissue culture wells: implications for sampling methods to estimate population size.

Many laboratory procedures require the counting of cells in culture. While many cultured cells may be counted by automated methods, neuronal cultures often require manual cell counting methods that are prohibitively time-consuming. This paper examines methods of sampling from tissue culture wells for estimating total cell counts. Performance of sampling and estimation schemes will depend in part on how the cells distribute themselves within a well. Spatial statistical analysis techniques are applied to the known total number and distribution of neurons in two wells counted in a grid scheme to demonstrate some important features of the neuron distributional patterns. Based on these two wells and simulated realizations from other point processes, a new sampling and estimation technique using open wedge-shaped sampling regions radiating from the centre of the well is proposed. This method is shown to result in more accurate estimates of the total number of neurons in the well than standard methods.

Animals↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Further studies of blood infectivity in an experimental model of transmissible spongiform encephalopathy, with an explanation of why blood components do not transmit Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease in humans.

BACKGROUND: Solid evidence from experimentally infected animals and fragmentary evidence from naturally infected humans indicate that blood may contain low levels of the infectious agent of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD), yet blood components have never been identified as a cause of CJD in humans. STUDY DESIGN AND METHODS: Blood components and plasma fractions were prepared from the pooled blood of mice that had earlier been infected with a mouse-adapted strain of human transmissible spongiform encephalopathy (TSE). Infectivity bioassays were conducted in healthy mice, and the brains of all assay animals dying during the course of the experiments were examined for the presence of proteinase-resistant protein. RESULTS: Infectivity in the blood during the preclinical phase of disease occurred in the buffy coat at infectious unit (IU) levels between 6 and 12 per mL and was either absent or present in only trace amounts in plasma and plasma fractions. Infectivity rose sharply at the onset of clinical signs to levels of approximately 100 IU per mL of buffy coat, 20 IU per mL of plasma, 2 IU per mL of cryoprecipitate, and less than 1 IU per mL of fractions IV and V. Plasma infectivity was not eliminated by either white cell-reduction filtration or high-speed centrifugation. Approximately seven times more plasma and five times more buffy coat were needed to transmit disease by the intravenous route than by the intracerebral route. CONCLUSION: Epidemiologic evidence of the absence in humans of disease transmission from plasma components can probably be explained by 1) the absence of significant plasma infectivity until the onset of symptomatic disease, and comparatively low levels of infectivity during the symptomatic stage of disease; 2) the reduction of infectivity during plasma processing; and 3) the need for at least five to seven times more infectious agent to transmit disease by the intravenous than intracerebral route. These and other factors probably also account for the absence of transmission after the administration of whole blood or blood components.

Animals↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Questioning the utility of pooling samples in microarray experiments with cell lines.

We describe a microarray experiment using the MCF-7 breast cancer cell line in two different experimental conditions for which the same number of independent pools as the number of individual samples was hybridized on Affymetrix GeneChips. Unexpectedly, when using individual samples, the number of probe sets found to be differentially expressed between treated and untreated cells was about three times greater than that found using pools. These findings indicate that pooling samples in microarray experiments where the biological variability is expected to be small might not be helpful and could even decrease one's ability to identify differentially expressed genes.

Antineoplastic Agents, Hormonal↗