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The human brain scaffolds social cognitive functions, including Theory of Mind, empathy and compassion, through its functional and microstructural organization. However, it remains unclear how the learning and refinement of these skills may, in turn, shape brain function and structure. Here we studied if different types of social mental training can lead to plastic changes in brain function and microstructure. We studied a group of 332 healthy adults (197 women, 20-55 years) with repeated multimodal neuroimaging and behavioral testing. Our neuroimaging approach capitalized on the quantification of cortical functional gradients and myelin-sensitive T1 relaxometry, two emerging measures of cortical functional organization and microstructure. Longitudinal analysis indicated marked changes in intrinsic cortical function and microstructure, which varied as a function of social training content. In particular, we observed consistent differential change in function and microstructure between attention-mindfulness and socio-cognitive training in regions functionally associated with attention and interoception, including insular and parietal cortices. Conversely, socio-affective and socio-cognitive training resulted in differential microstructural changes in regions classically implicated in interoceptive and emotional processing, including insular and orbitofrontal areas, but did not result in functional reorganization. Notably, longitudinal changes in cortical function and microstructure were predictive of behavioral change in attention, compassion and perspective-taking, suggesting behavioral relevance. In sum, our work provides evidence for functional and microstructural plasticity after the training of social-interoceptive functions, and provides a causal perspective on the neural basis of behavioral adaptation in human adults.

Dementia causes a substantial global economic burden, but effective treatment is lacking. Recently, studies have revealed that gamma-band waves of electrical brain activity, particularly 40 Hz oscillations, are closely associated with high-order cognitive functions and can activate microglia to clear amyloid-β deposition. Here, we found that compared with sham stimulation, applying 40-Hz high-frequency repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) over the bilateral angular gyrus in patients with probable Alzheimer’s disease (AD; n = 37) resulted in up to 8 weeks of significantly improved cognitive function. Power spectral density analysis of the resting-state electroencephalography (EEG) demonstrated that 40-Hz rTMS modulated gamma-band oscillations in the left posterior temporoparietal region. Further testing with magnetic resonance imaging and TMS-EEG revealed the following: 40-Hz rTMS 1) prevented gray matter volume loss, 2) enhanced local functional integration within bilateral angular gyrus, as well as global functional integration in bilateral angular gyrus and the left middle frontal gyrus, 3) strengthened information flow from the left posterior temporoparietal region to the frontal areas and strengthened the dynamic connectivity between anterior and posterior brain regions. These findings demonstrate that modulating gamma-band oscillations effectively improves cognitive function in patients with probable AD by promoting local, long-range, and dynamic connectivity within the brain.

Objective Drug-resistant temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) is typically associated with hippocampal pathology. However, widespread network alterations are increasingly recognized and suggested to perturb cognitive function in multiple domains. Here we tested (1) whether TLE shows atypical cortical hierarchical organization, differentiating sensory and higher order systems; and (2) whether atypical hierarchy predicts cognitive impairment. Methods We studied 72 well-characterized drug-resistant TLE patients and 41 healthy controls, statistically matched for age and sex, using multimodal magnetic resonance imaging analysis and cognitive testing. To model cortical hierarchical organization in vivo, we used a bidirectional stepwise functional connectivity analysis tapping into the differentiation between sensory/unimodal and paralimbic/transmodal cortices. Linear models compared patients to controls. Finally, we assessed associations of functional anomalies to cortical atrophy and microstructural anomalies, as well as clinical and cognitive parameters. Results Compared to controls, TLE presented with bidirectional disruptions of sensory-paralimbic functional organization. Stepwise connectivity remained segregated within paralimbic and salience networks at the top of the hierarchy, and sensorimotor and dorsal attention at the bottom. Whereas paralimbic segregation was associated with atypical cortical myeloarchitecture and hippocampal atrophy, dysconnectivity of sensorimotor cortices reflected diffuse cortical thinning. The degree of abnormal hierarchical organization in sensory-petal streams covaried, with broad cognitive impairments spanning sensorimotor, attention, fluency, and visuoconstructional ability and memory, and was more marked in patients with longer disease duration and Engel I outcome. Significance Our findings show atypical functional integration between paralimbic/transmodal and sensory/unimodal systems in TLE. Differential associations with paralimbic microstructure and sensorimotor atrophy suggest that system-level imbalance likely reflects complementary structural processes, but ultimately accounts for a broad spectrum of cognitive impairments. Hierarchical contextualization of cognitive deficits promises to open new avenues for personalized counseling in TLE.

Unilateral temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) is the most common type of focal epilepsy characterized by foci in the unilateral temporal lobe grey matters of regions such as the hippocampus. However, it remains unclear how the functional features of white matter are altered in TLE. In the current study, resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was performed on 71 left TLE (LTLE) patients, 79 right TLE (RTLE) patients and 47 healthy controls (HC). Clustering analysis was used to identify fourteen white matter networks (WMN). The functional connectivity (FC) was calculated among WMNs and between WMNs and grey matter. Furthermore, the FC laterality of hemispheric WMNs was assessed. First, both patient groups showed decreased FCs among WMNs. Specifically, cerebellar white matter illustrated decreased FCs with the cerebral superficial WMNs, implying a dysfunctional interaction between the cerebellum and the cerebral cortex in TLE. Second, the FCs between WMNs and the ipsilateral hippocampus (grey matter foci) were also reduced in patient groups, which may suggest insufficient functional integration in unilateral TLE. Interestingly, RTLE showed more severe abnormalities of white matter FCs, including links to the bilateral hippocampi and temporal white matter, than LTLE. Taken together, these findings provide functional evidence of white matter abnormalities, extending the understanding of the pathological mechanism of white matter impairments in unilateral TLE.

Schizophrenia (SZ) and autism spectrum disorder (ASD) share considerable clinical features and intertwined historical roots. It is greatly needed to explore their similarities and differences in pathophysiologic mechanisms. We assembled a large sample size of neuroimaging data (about 600 SZ patients, 1000 ASD patients, and 1700 healthy controls) to study the shared and unique brain abnormality of the two illnesses. We analyzed multi-scale brain functional connectivity among functional networks and brain regions, intra-network connectivity, and cerebral gray matter density and volume. Both SZ and ASD showed lower functional integration within default mode and sensorimotor domains, but increased interaction between cognitive control and default mode domains. The shared abnormalties in intra-network connectivity involved default mode, sensorimotor, and cognitive control networks. Reduced gray matter volume and density in the occipital gyrus and cerebellum were observed in both illnesses. Interestingly, ASD had overall weaker changes than SZ in the shared abnormalities. Interaction between visual and cognitive regions showed disorder-unique deficits. In summary, we provide strong neuroimaging evidence of the convergent and divergent changes in SZ and ASD that correlated with clinical features., Du et al used fMRI data from patients with schizophrenia (SZ) and autism spectrum disorder (ASD) to analyze multi-scale brain functional connectivity and cerebral grey matter density and volume. They demonstrated the presence of convergent and divergent changes in SZ and ASD that correlated with clinical features.

Schizophrenia is a complex psychiatric disorder that displays an outstanding interindividual variability in clinical manifestation and neurobiological substrates. A better characterization and quantification of this heterogeneity could guide the search for both common abnormalities (linked to lower intersubject variability) and the presence of biological subtypes (leading to a greater heterogeneity across subjects). In the current study, we address interindividual variability in functional connectome by means of resting-state fMRI in a large sample of patients with schizophrenia and healthy controls. Among the different metrics of distance/dissimilarity used to assess variability, geodesic distance showed robust results to head motion. The main findings of the current study point to (i) a higher between subject heterogeneity in the functional connectome of patients, (ii) variable levels of heterogeneity throughout the cortex, with greater variability in frontoparietal and default mode networks, and lower variability in the salience network, and (iii) an association of whole-brain variability with levels of clinical symptom severity and with topological properties of brain networks, suggesting that the average functional connectome overrepresents those patients with lower functional integration and with more severe clinical symptoms. Moreover, after performing a graph theoretical analysis of brain networks, we found that patients with more severe clinical symptoms had decreased connectivity at both whole-brain level and within the salience network, and that patients with higher negative symptoms had large-scale functional integration deficits.

The dopamine D4 receptor gene (DRD4) has been consistently reported to be associated with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Recent studies have linked DRD4 to functional connectivity among specific brain regions. The current study aimed to compare the effects of the DRD4 genotype on functional integrity in drug-naïve ADHD children and healthy children. Resting-state functional MRI images were acquired from 49 children with ADHD and 37 healthy controls (HCs). We investigated the effects of the 2-repeat allele of DRD4 on brain network connectivity in both groups using a parameter called the degree of centrality (DC), which indexes local functional relationships across the entire brain connectome. A voxel-wise two-way ANCOVA was performed to examine the diagnosis-by-genotype interactions on DC maps. Significant diagnosis-by-genotype interactions with DC were found in the temporal lobe, including the left inferior temporal gyrus (ITG) and bilateral middle temporal gyrus (MTG) (GRF corrected at voxel level p

The approach of functional integration has the potential to solve challenges regarding lightweight design and resource efficiency since the number of parts and therefore the weight and needed installation space can be reduced. One important step in developing integrative concepts is the pre-selection of suitable functions or components. Previous methods of pre-selection take various aspects into account. However, pre-selection based on these methods usually requires additional tables and forms, whose preparation and editing quickly becomes time-consuming. At the same time, most of the development engineers are working on CAD models. However, their use in the selection of suitable integration partners is not yet supported sufficiently. The development of more than 80 concepts on five different vehicles has shown that the consideration of geometric properties (position, orientation, size) is effective, as they can be identified with minimal analysis effort while working on CAD. In this paper a four-step procedure is presented how integration partners can be identified directly on the basis of CAD models. A following evaluation with development engineers in practice completes the research.

Traumatic brain injury (TBI) often results in balance impairment, increasing the risk of falls, and the chances of further injuries. However, the underlying neural mechanisms of postural control after TBI are not well understood. To this end, we conducted a pilot study to explore the neural mechanisms of unpredictable balance perturbations in 17 chronic TBI participants and 15 matched healthy controls (HC) using the EEG, MRI, and diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) data. As quantitative measures of the functional integration and segregation of the brain networks during the postural task, we computed the global graph‐theoretic network measures (global efficiency and modularity) of brain functional connectivity derived from source‐space EEG in different frequency bands. We observed that the TBI group showed a lower balance performance as measured by the center of pressure displacement during the task, and the Berg Balance Scale (BBS). They also showed reduced brain activation and connectivity during the balance task. Furthermore, the decrease in brain network segregation in alpha‐band from baseline to task was smaller in TBI than HC. The DTI findings revealed widespread structural damage. In terms of the neural correlates, we observed a distinct role played by different frequency bands: theta‐band modularity during the task was negatively correlated with the BBS in the TBI group; lower beta‐band network connectivity was associated with the reduction in white matter structural integrity. Our future studies will focus on how postural training will modulate the functional brain networks in TBI., EEG connectivity graph measures were studied in traumatic brain injury (TBI) during the balance perturbation task. TBI group showed altered brain activation and connectivity during the balance task. Graph‐theoretic measures showed that the task modulation of brain network segregation in alpha‐band was reduced in TBI and the network segregation in theta‐band was associated with postural instability in TBI.

Visual expertise refers to proficiency in visual recognition. It is attributed to accumulated visual experience in a specific domain and manifests in widespread neural activities that extend well beyond the visual cortex to multiple high‐level brain areas. An extensive body of studies has centered on the neural mechanisms underlying a distinctive domain of visual expertise, while few studies elucidated how visual experience modulates resting‐state whole‐brain connectivity dynamics. The current study bridged this gap by modeling the subtle alterations in interregional spontaneous connectivity patterns with a group of superior radiological interns. Functional connectivity analysis was based on functional brain segmentation, which was derived from a data‐driven clustering approach to discriminate subtle changes in connectivity dynamics. Our results showed there was radiographic visual experience accompanied with integration within brain circuits supporting visual processing and decision making, integration across brain circuits supporting high‐order functions, and segregation between high‐order and low‐order brain functions. Also, most of these alterations were significantly correlated with individual nodule identification performance. Our results implied that visual expertise is a controlled, interactive process that develops from reciprocal interactions between the visual system and multiple top‐down factors, including semantic knowledge, top‐down attentional control, and task relevance, which may enhance participants' local brain functional integration to promote their acquisition of specific visual information and modulate the activity of some regions for lower‐order visual feature processing to filter out nonrelevant visual details. The current findings may provide new ideas for understanding the central mechanism underlying the formation of visual expertise., The current study investigated whole‐brain connectivity dynamics modulated by visual expertise using functional connectivity analysis and the model of radiologists consisted of 20 trained superior intern radiologists and well‐matched normal controls. Our results showed there was radiographic visual experience accompanied with integration within brain circuits supporting visual processing and decision making, integration across brain circuits supporting high‐order functions, and segregation between high‐order and low‐order brain functions. The results implied that visual expertise may enhance subjects' local brain functional integration to promote their acquisition of specific visual information and modulate the activity of some regions for lower‐order visual feature processing to filter out non‐relevant visual details.

At the inception of human brain mapping, two principles of functional anatomy underwrote most conceptions—and analyses—of distributed brain responses: namely, functional segregation and integration. There are currently two main approaches to characterizing functional integration. The first is a mechanistic modeling of connectomics in terms of directed effective connectivity that mediates neuronal message passing and dynamics on neuronal circuits. The second phenomenological approach usually characterizes undirected functional connectivity (i.e., measurable correlations), in terms of intrinsic brain networks, self-organized criticality, dynamical instability, and so on. This paper describes a treatment of effective connectivity that speaks to the emergence of intrinsic brain networks and critical dynamics. It is predicated on the notion of Markov blankets that play a fundamental role in the self-organization of far from equilibrium systems. Using the apparatus of the renormalization group, we show that much of the phenomenology found in network neuroscience is an emergent property of a particular partition of neuronal states, over progressively coarser scales. As such, it offers a way of linking dynamics on directed graphs to the phenomenology of intrinsic brain networks., Author Summary This paper describes a treatment of effective connectivity that speaks to the emergence of intrinsic brain networks and critical dynamics. It is predicated on the notion of Markov blankets that play a fundamental role in the self-organization of far from equilibrium systems. Using the apparatus of the renormalization group, we show that much of the phenomenology found in network neuroscience is an emergent property of a particular partition of neuronal states, over progressively coarser scales. As such, it offers a way of linking dynamics on directed graphs to the phenomenology of intrinsic brain networks.

In extant studies regarding value stream mapping (VSM) and cross-functional integration in Western journals, there is a deviation from the essence of lean production and flow management, which aim at overall optimization by focusing on the flow of the entire value chain as well as material and information flow, and empirical studies based on the actual state of material and information flow have not been sufficiently conducted. To proceed with the overall optimization of the material and information flow in the supply and value chain—with progress in globalization and digitalization as seen in recent Japanese manufacturing companies—it is necessary to return to basics to grasp the “actual state of the flow” by focusing on the entire material and information flow and to conduct empirical studies on factors contributing to these flows.

Contains fulltext : 238874.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Open Access) OBJECTIVE: to synthesise a framework of barriers and facilitators in the normative integration of oral health care (OHC) into general health care for frail older adults at macro (system), meso (organisation and interprofessional integration) and micro (clinical practice) levels. BACKGROUND: Identification of these barriers and facilitators is expected to promote better and more appropriate care. METHODS: For this qualitative study, comprising 41 participants, representatives of 10 different groups of (professional) care providers, and OHC receivers (home-dwelling, and nursing home patients) in East Netherlands were interviewed. Transcripts of the in-depth, topic-guided interviews were thematically analysed. In a subsequent workshop with 52 stakeholders, results and interpretations were discussed and refined. RESULTS: Two main themes were identified: (1) a compartmentalised care culture in which OHC and general health care are seen as two separate realms, and (2) prioritisation, awareness and attitude regarding OHC integration. Subthemes such as low political attention (macro level); unclear responsibilities, hierarchical relations and the lack of vision of organisations (meso level); and poor awareness and low prioritisation by care providers and patients (micro level) were identified as potential barriers. Subthemes such as leadership (meso level), and the supportive personality of individual caregivers and ownership of patients (micro level) were identified as facilitators. CONCLUSION: Barriers and facilitators in normative OHC integration in The Netherlands are interrelated and apparent at macro-, meso- and micro levels. They are mainly related to (a) a compartmentalised care culture, and (b) related low prioritisation, and poor awareness of and attitude towards (integration of) oral health (care).

Purpose. Patients with a hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection frequently exhibit various neuropsychiatric complications such as cognitive decline. This study is aimed at investigating alterations in regional and network-level neural function in patients with HCV infection and examining the association between these alterations and patients’ cognition dysfunction. Methods. The study included 17 patients with HCV infection and 17 healthy controls. These individuals had undergone resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging as well as cognitive assessment using a battery of tests that were collectively called the “psychometric hepatic encephalopathy score (PHES)” examination. Analyses of amplitude of low-frequency fluctuation (ALFF) and seed-based functional connectivity (FC) were conducted to assess, respectively, regional neural function and functional integration. Results. HCV-infected patients performed significantly worse in cognitive tests. In the HCV group, ALFF decreased in Region 1 (left medial frontal gyrus and bilateral anterior cingulate gyrus) and Region 2 (right middle and superior frontal gyrus). The HCV group showed lower FC between Region 1 and right middle frontal gyrus, whereas they presented an increase in FC between Region 2 and the left supramarginal gyrus/superior temporal gyrus and right supramarginal gyrus. No significant correlation was observed between ALFF/FC measurements and PHES result. Conclusion. This preliminary study presents additional evidence that HCV infection affects brain function, including local intrinsic neural activity and global functional integration.

This magnetoencephalography study aimed at characterizing age-related changes in resting-state functional brain organization from mid-childhood to late adulthood. We investigated neuromagnetic brain activity at rest in 105 participants divided into three age groups: children (6–9 years), young adults (18–34 years) and healthy elders (53–78 years). The effects of age on static resting-state functional brain integration were assessed using band-limited power envelope correlation, whereas those on transient functional brain dynamics were disclosed using hidden Markov modeling of power envelope activity. Brain development from childhood to adulthood came with (1) a strengthening of functional integration within and between resting-state networks and (2) an increased temporal stability of transient (100–300 ms lifetime) and recurrent states of network activation or deactivation mainly encompassing lateral or medial associative neocortical areas. Healthy aging was characterized by decreased static resting-state functional integration and dynamic stability within the primary visual network. These results based on electrophysiological measurements free of neurovascular biases suggest that functional brain integration mainly evolves during brain development, with limited changes in healthy aging. These novel electrophysiological insights into human brain functional architecture across the lifespan pave the way for future clinical studies investigating how brain disorders affect brain development or healthy aging., info:eu-repo/semantics/published

Air pollution has a negative impact on one's health and on the central nervous system. We decided to assess studies that evaluated the relationship between air pollution and cognitive functions in children and adolescents by reviewing studies that had been published between January 2009 and May 2019. We searched three major databases for original works (26 studies) and for studies using brain imaging methods based on MRI (six studies). Adverse effects of air pollutants on selected cognitive or psychomotor functions were found in all of the studies. Exposure to nitrogen dioxide, for example, was linked to impaired working memory, general cognitive functions, and psychomotor functions; particulate matter 2.5 was linked to difficulties in working memory, short-term memory, attention, processing speed, and fine motor function; black carbon was linked to poor verbal intelligence, nonverbal intelligence, and working memory; airborne copper was linked to impaired attentiveness and fine motor skills; isophorone was linked to lower mathematical skills; and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in fetal life were linked to lower intelligence scores. The studies using MRI showed that high concentrations of air pollutants were linked to changes in the brain's white matter or lower functional integration and segregation in children's brain networks. In view of the global increase in air pollution, there is a need for further research to elucidate the relationship between air pollution and cognitive and motor development in children. According to some studies, neuroinflammation, the e4 allele of the apolipoprotein E gene, and gutathione-S-transferase gene polymorphism processes may play a role.

Research in primates and rodents ascribes the striatum a critical role in integrating elementary movements into unitary action sequences through reinforcement-based learning. Yet it remains to be shown whether the human striatum represents action sequence-specific information. Young right-handed volunteers underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging while they performed four discrete finger sequences with their right hand, consisting of five button presses. Specific finger sequences could be discriminated based on the distributed activity patterns in left and right striatum, but not by average differences in single-voxel activity. Multiple bilateral clusters in putamen and caudate nucleus belonging to motor, associative, parietal and limbic territories contributed to classification sensitivity. The results show that individual finger movement sequences are widely represented in human striatum, supporting functional integration rather than segregation. The findings are compatible with the idea that the basal ganglia simultaneously integrate motor, associative and limbic aspects in the control of complex overlearned behaviour.

While functional integration has been suggested to reflect brain health, non-standardized network thresholding methods complicate network interpretation. We propose a new method to analyze functional near-infrared spectroscopy-based functional connectivity (fNIRS-FC). In this study, we employed wavelet analysis for motion correction and orthogonal minimal spanning trees (OMSTs) to derive the brain connectivity. The proposed method was applied to an Alzheimer's disease (AD) dataset and was compared with a number of well-known thresholding techniques. The results demonstrated that the proposed method outperformed the benchmarks in filtering cost-effective networks and in differentiation between patients with mild AD and healthy controls. The results also supported the proposed method as a feasible technique to analyze fNIRS-FC, especially with cost-efficiency, assortativity and laterality as a set of effective features for the diagnosis of AD.

PurposeStructural and technological changes are driving functional reorganization in many organizations. To date, there are very few articles that explicitly, consistently and cumulatively focus on cross-functional integration. This paper aims to review and explore the literature that does directly address cross-functional integration.Design/methodology/approachThe authors conducted a literature review within the general management domain for the time frame 2010 to 2020 and identified 71 relevant articles that provide an overview of current practices and trends.FindingsThis conceptual paper reviews this identified literature and outlines key trends, noteworthy articles and a summary of relevant theories, and provides an overview of outcomes linked to cross-functional integration in the literature. The paper concludes with a set of recommendations for practitioners and an outline of potential research areas for academic researchers, including a call for more theory integration, building and testing in the area of cross-functionality.Originality/valueThis paper is the first of its kind to attempt to summarize the literature on cross-functionality (published between 2010 and 2020), a currently very fragmented field of study spread out across different management disciplines.

The article discusses the features of the officer’s integration into the educational and information environment, which processes (in a special way) information and describes the processes in it. It was also determined that it is better to consider the educational information environment not as a mechanical system into which an officer is integrated, but as a system with functional integration “officer - ЕІЕ ”. In addition, the technology of training, which consists of a set of methods and means for implementing the relevant content of training in the educational and informational environment, is considered. The machine analyzed that with a developed information base, new concepts can be remembered, mainly by analogs with the knowledge that was known, and the main problem is the inclusion of new knowledge in the existing structure : as soon as the correct correlation is determined, then all the material of the past is automatically involved in the presentation and understanding of new events, develops through the interaction of external experience and internal mechanisms, the information that comes in and is reorganized is operated on.

Visual dual-stream theory posits that two distinct neural pathways of specific functional significance originate from primary visual areas and reach the inferior temporal (ventral) and posterior parietal areas (dorsal). However, there are several unresolved questions concerning the fundamental aspects of this theory. For example, is the functional dissociation between ventral and dorsal stream driven by features in input stimuli or is it driven by categorical differences between visuoperceptual and visuomotor functions? Is the dual stream rigid or flexible? What is the nature of the interactions between the two streams? We addressed these questions using fMRI recordings on healthy human volunteers and employing stimuli and tasks that can tease out the divergence between visuoperceptual and visuomotor variants of dual-stream theory. fMRI scans were repeated after seven practice sessions that were conducted in a non-MRI environment to investigate the effects of neuroplasticity. Brain activation analysis supports an input-based functional dissociation and existence of context-dependent neuroplasticity in dual-stream areas. Intriguingly, premotor cortex activation was observed in the position perception task and distributed deactivated regions were observed in all perception tasks, thus warranting a network-level analysis. Dynamic causal modeling analysis incorporating activated and deactivated brain areas during perception tasks indicates that the brain dynamics during visual perception and actions could be interpreted within the framework of predictive coding. Effectively, the network-level findings point toward the existence of more intricate context-driven functional networks selective of “what” and “where” information rather than segregated streams of processing along ventral and dorsal brain regions.

Recently, the discussion regarding the consequences of cutting the corpus callosum (“split-brain”) has regained momentum (Corballis, Corballis, Berlucchi, & Marzi, Brain, 141(6), e46, 2018; Pinto et al., Brain, 140(5), 1231–1237, 2017a; Pinto, Lamme, & de Haan, Brain, 140(11), e68, 2017; Volz & Gazzaniga, Brain, 140(7), 2051–2060, 2017; Volz, Hillyard, Miller, & Gazzaniga, Brain, 141(3), e15, 2018). This collective review paper aims to summarize the empirical common ground, to delineate the different interpretations, and to identify the remaining questions. In short, callosotomy leads to a broad breakdown of functional integration ranging from perception to attention. However, the breakdown is not absolute as several processes, such as action control, seem to remain unified. Disagreement exists about the responsible mechanisms for this remaining unity. The main issue concerns the first-person perspective of a split-brain patient. Does a split-brain harbor a split consciousness or is consciousness unified? The current consensus is that the body of evidence is insufficient to answer this question, and different suggestions are made with respect to how future studies might address this paucity. In addition, it is suggested that the answers might not be a simple yes or no but that intermediate conceptualizations need to be considered.

The integration–performance link created during post‐acquisition integration has defied satisfactory theoretical explanation. To address this gap, we conduct a functional analysis to explore the intermediating mechanisms between the level of integration—which represents the extent of the target firm’s integration with the acquirer—and acquisition performance. We use six in‐depth acquisition case studies in the medical technology industry to develop an integrated model with which to untangle the integration–performance link. First, our model connects the level of integration to specific functional integration strategies, which refer to the approaches acquirers employ to manage functional resources. Second, we identify value creation and value leakage as the two routes through which functional integration strategies impact acquisition performance. Finally, we propose two qualitative measures of acquisition performance: value gap and time delay. Our study suggests that a functional analysis of the integration–performance link may help resolve long‐standing conflicts within the literature.

The purpose of this study is to explore how cross-functional integration (CFI) influences external partner involvement and subsequently promotes new product development (NPD) project success. On th...

BACKGROUND: The search strategies approach (SSA) to skill acquisition has its roots in the dynamical systems approach and has demonstrated a number of theoretical advances to the area. We argue that its advances can and are already linked to practical applications when we consider the method of Moshe Feldenkrais. The Feldenkrais Method (FM) considers skill acquisition (from rehabilitation to daily life activities improvement) in terms of exploration of new possibilities to achieve efficiency in movement. In this paper, we discuss how the SSA encompasses Feldenkrais method (FM) illustrating its applicability. Furthermore, we point to new possibilities in both FM and SSA if these are to be formally linked. ispartof: Brazilian Journal of Motor Behavior vol:13 issue:5 pages:155-165 status: published

The development of integrated care initiatives to overcome service delivery fragmentation has become a global concern. Yet, the lack of guidance in their design and delivery has led to a high risk of project failure. Several authors have proposed driving ideas and strategies to foster care integration but a comprehensive conceptual framework building on the evidence and different perspectives of scientific contributions is still needed. The objective of this article is to explain the process of development and validation of a comprehensive framework that could be used either to standardize descriptions of existing care integration initiatives or as a conceptual basis for reflecting on the effective design of new programs or projects. In an initial phase, we used a comprehensive list of 175 items resulting from a literature review in order to identify a 'core set' of relevant framework items. subsequent phases, we validated the newly developed framework. External experts supported the validation phases. The iteration process resulted in a framework of 40 items grouped into seven dimensions: Person-centered care, Clinical integration, Professional integration, Organizational integration, Systemic integration, Functional integration, and Normative integration. The validated framework proved to be understandable and relevant to identify analytical aspects fostering care integration. It could be adapted as a useful tool to inform the design and implementation of new integrated care interventions as well as to generate standardized description of initiatives to perform insightful comparisons.

Many researchers using many different approaches have attempted to find features discriminating between autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and typically control (TC) subjects. In this study, this attempt has been continued by analyzing global metrics of functional graphs and metrics of functional triadic interactions of the brain in the low, middle, and high-frequency bands (LFB, MFB, and HFB) of the structural graph. The graph signal processing (GSP) provided the combinatorial usage of the functional graph of resting-state fMRI and structural graph of DTI. In comparison to TCs, ASDs had significantly higher clustering coefficients in the MFB, higher efficiencies and strengths in the MFB and HFB, and lower small-world propensity in the HFB. These results show over-connectivity, more global integration, and probably decreased local specialization in ASDs compared to TCs. Triadic analysis showed that the numbers of unbalanced triads were significantly lower for ASDs in the MFB. This finding may show the reason for restricted and repetitive behavior in ASDs. Also, in the MFB and HFB, the numbers of balanced triads and the energies of triadic interactions were significantly higher and lower for ASDs, respectively. These findings may reflect the disruption of the optimum balance between functional integration and specialization. All of these results demonstrated that the significant differences between ASDs and TCs existed in the MFB and HFB of the structural graph when analyzing the global metrics of the functional graph and triadic interaction metrics. In conclusion, the results demonstrate the promising perspective of GSP for attaining discriminative features and new knowledge, especially in the case of ASD. Graphical Abstract

Accurate characterization of the time courses of blood-oxygen-level–dependent (BOLD) signal changes is crucial for the analysis and interpretation of functional MRI data. While several studies have shown that white matter (WM) exhibits distinct BOLD responses evoked by tasks, there have been no comprehensive investigations into the time courses of spontaneous signal fluctuations in WM. We measured the power spectra of the resting-state time courses in a set of regions within WM identified as showing synchronous signals using independent components analysis. In each component, a clear separation between voxels into two categories was evident, based on their power spectra: one group exhibited a single peak, and the other had an additional peak at a higher frequency. Their groupings are location specific, and their distributions reflect unique neurovascular and anatomical configurations. Importantly, the two categories of voxels differed in their engagement in functional integration, revealed by differences in the number of interregional connections based on the two categories separately. Taken together, these findings suggest WM signals are heterogeneous in nature and depend on local structural-vascular-functional associations.

We propose that preservation of functional integration, estimated from measures of neural synchrony, is a key neurocompensatory mechanism associated with healthy human ageing. To support this proposal, we demonstrate how phase-locking at peak alpha frequency from Magnetoencephalography (MEG) data is invariant over lifespan in a large cohort of human participants, aged 18-88 years. Using empirically derived connection topologies from diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) data, we create an in-silico model of whole-brain alpha dynamics. We show that enhancing inter-areal coupling can cancel the effect of increased axonal transmission delay associated with age-related degeneration of white matter tracts and thus, preserve neural synchrony. Together with analytical solutions for non-biological all-to-all connection scenarios, our model establishes the theoretical principles by which frequency slowing with age, frequently observed in the alpha band in diverse populations, can be viewed as an epiphenomenon of the underlying neurocompensatory mechanisms.

Rationale: The effects of atomoxetine (ATO) on response inhibition have been typically examined using the stop signal task (SST) which is however confounded by attentional capture. The right inferior frontal cortex (rIFC) has been implicated in the modulation of ATO on inhibitory control, but a precise characterisation of its role is complicated by its functional inhomogeneity. Objectives: The current study aimed to directly investigate the effect of ATO in the SST using the imaging contrast unconfounded by attentional capture, to test the specific drug actions in functionally dissociable rIFC subregions, and to explore the role of locus coeruleus (LC), the main source of cortical noradrenaline, in mediating the drug effects. Methods: This imaging study investigated the effect of ATO (40 mg) in 18 human participants during a modified SST that unconfounds attention from inhibition. Functional definitions for rIFC subdivisions were adopted in the analyses to isolate attention and inhibition during action cancellation. The LC integrity was measured in vivo using a neuromelanin-sensitive sequence. Results: We identified one mechanism of ATO modulation specific to inhibitory control: ATO enhanced activity in pre-supplementary area (pre-SMA) for motor inhibition, and the recruitment of temporoparietal junction (TPJ) and inferior frontal junction (IFJ) for functional integration during response inhibition. Moreover, drug-related behavioural and neural responses correlated with variations in LC integrity. Conclusions: These findings provide a more nuanced and precise understanding of the effects of ATO on specific and domain general aspects of stopping.

The neural underpinning of human fluid intelligence (Gf) has gathered a large interest in the scientific community. Nonetheless, previous research did not provide a full understanding of such intriguing topic. Here, we studied the structural (from diffusion tensor imaging, DTI) and functional (from magnetoencephalography (MEG) resting state) connectivity in individuals with high versus average Gf scores. Our findings showed greater values in the brain areas degree distribution and higher proportion of long-range anatomical connections for high versus average Gfs. Further, the two groups presented different community structures, highlighting the structural and functional integration of the cingulate within frontal subnetworks of the brain in high Gfs. These results were consistently observed for structural connectivity and functional connectivity of delta, theta and alpha. Notably, gamma presented an opposite pattern, showing more segregation and lower degree distribution and connectivity in high versus average Gfs. Our study confirmed and expanded previous perspectives and knowledge on the “small-worldness” of the brain. Further, it complemented the widely investigated structural brain network of highly intelligent individuals with analyses on fast-scale functional networks in five frequency bands, highlighting key differences in the integration and segregation of information flow between slow and fast oscillations in groups with different Gf.

Adult-born neurons in the dentate gyrus (DG) make important contributions to learning as they integrate into neuronal networks. Neurogenesis is dramatically reduced by a number of conditions associated with cognitive impairment, including type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). Increasing neurogenesis may thus provide a therapeutic target for ameliorating diabetes-associated cognitive impairments, but only if new neurons remain capable of normal function. To address the capacity for adult-generated neurons to incorporate into functional circuits in the hyperglycemic DG, we measured Egr1 expression in granule cells (GCs), BrdU labeled four weeks prior, in Goto-Kakizaki (GK) rats, an established model of T2DM, and age-matched Wistars. The results indicate that while fewer GCs are generated in the DG of GK rats, GCs that survive readily express Egr1 in response to spatial information. These data demonstrate that adult-generated GCs in the hyperglycemic DG remain functionally competent and support neurogenesis as a viable therapeutic target.

Highlights • Functional brain connectivity (FC) patterns vary with changes in the environment. • Adult FC variability is linked to age-specific network communication profiles. • Across adulthood, the younger network interaction profile predicts higher fluid IQ. • Yoked FC-concrete environmental changes predict poorer fluid IQ and anxiety. • Brain areas linked to episodic memory underpin FC changes at multiple timescales., BOLD fMRI studies have provided compelling evidence that the human brain demonstrates substantial moment-to-moment fluctuations in both activity and functional connectivity (FC) patterns. While the role of brain signal variability in fostering cognitive adaptation to ongoing environmental demands is well-documented, the relevance of moment-to-moment changes in FC patterns is still debated. Here, we adopt a graph theoretical approach in order to shed light on the cognitive-affective implications of FC variability and associated profiles of functional network communication in adulthood. Our goal is to identify brain communication pathways underlying FC reconfiguration at multiple timescales, thereby improving understanding of how faster perceptually bound versus slower conceptual processes shape neural tuning to the dynamics of the external world and, thus, indirectly, mold affective and cognitive responding to the environment. To this end, we used neuroimaging and behavioural data collected during movie watching by the Cambridge Center for Ageing and Neuroscience (N = 642, 326 women) and the Human Connectome Project (N = 176, 106 women). FC variability evoked by changes to both the concrete perceptual and the more abstract conceptual representation of an ongoing situation increased from young to older adulthood. However, coupling between variability in FC patterns and concrete environmental features was stronger at younger ages. FC variability (both moment-to-moment/concrete featural and abstract conceptual boundary-evoked) was associated with age-distinct profiles of network communication, specifically, greater functional integration of the default mode network in older adulthood, but greater informational flow across neural networks implicated in environmentally driven attention and control (cingulo-opercular, salience, ventral attention) in younger adulthood. Whole-brain communication pathways anchored in default mode regions relevant to episodic and semantic context creation (i.e., angular and middle temporal gyri) supported FC reconfiguration in response to changes in the conceptual representation of an ongoing situation (i.e., narrative event boundaries), as well as stronger coupling between moment-to-moment fluctuations in FC and concrete environmental features. Fluid intelligence/abstract reasoning was directly linked to levels of brain-environment alignment, but only indirectly associated with levels of FC variability. Specifically, stronger coupling between moment-to-moment FC variability and concrete environmental features predicted poorer fluid intelligence and greater affectively driven environmental vigilance. Complementarily, across the adult lifespan, higher fluid (but not crystallised) intelligence was related to stronger expression of the network communication profile underlying momentary and event boundary-based FC variability during youth. Our results indicate that the adaptiveness of dynamic FC reconfiguration during naturalistic information processing changes across the lifespan due to the associated network communication profiles. Moreover, our findings on brain-environment alignment complement the existing literature on the beneficial consequences of modulating brain signal variability in response to environmental complexity. Specifically, they imply that coupling between moment-to-moment FC variability and concrete environmental features may index a bias towards perceptually-bound, rather than conceptual processing, which hinders affective functioning and strategic cognitive engagement with the external environment.

Increasing diversity, including diverse perspectives in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) classrooms and teaching practices, is recognized as a current higher education priority. Resources to assist institutions and instructors are growing; however, many STEM instructors still hesitate to implement diverse teaching practices and discussions of diversity issues in their courses for a variety of reasons. This paper describes an example of the incorporation and discussion of diversity and social justice issues as part of an upper level physiology of aging course. The general approach was to examine the functional intersection of the sociology and physiology using social determinants of health as mechanistic influencers of physiology and examining how they affect healthy aging and etiology of age-associated diseases. Activities included in-class and virtual discussion, collaboration with the university diversity department, and a written assignment where the students explored in depth how a social determinant of health affected molecular physiology of aging. Students were also provided with strategies they can use in careers as health practitioners to be more inclusive in their practices. Student participation and feedback indicated that this approach and activities were engaging, enlightening and useful and should be continued. They specifically appreciated the social issues discussed in their sociology courses being included in their physiology major course and thinking about how those issues are mechanistically linked to physiology. This was the first attempt at this approach, and strategies for future activity improvement and tips for successful implementation are also addressed.

The functional integration of environmental education as an important sustainability and health factor fully integrated into the education system cannot be achieved without a significant paradigm shift beyond the normal boundaries of educational institutions. During the explaining process, the teacher explains any misconceptions using interactive Power Point, anchor diagram, and interactive notebook activities.

Methamphetamine (MA) can cause brain structural and functional impairment, but there are few studies on whether this difference will sustain on MA abstainers. The purpose of this study is to investigate the correlation of brain networks in MA abstainers. In this study, 47 people detoxified for at least 14 months and 44 normal people took a resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (RS-fMRI) scan. A dynamic (i.e., time-varying) functional connectivity (FC) is obtained by applying sliding windows in the time courses on the independent components (ICs). The windowed correlation data for each IC were then clustered by k-means. The number of subjects in each cluster was used as a new feature for individual identification. The results show that the classifier achieved satisfactory performance (82.3% accuracy, 77.7% specificity, and 85.7% sensitivity). We find that there are significant differences in the brain networks of MA abstainers and normal people in the time domain, but the spatial differences are not obvious. Most of the altered functional connections (time-varying) are identified to be located at dorsal default mode network. These results have shown that changes in the correlation of the time domain may play an important role in identifying MA abstainers. Therefore, our findings provide valuable insights in the identification of MA and elucidate the pathological mechanism of MA from a resting-state functional integration point of view.

Brief abstractSchizophrenia is hypothesized to be caused by impaired functional integration in the brain, and this could hypothetically be caused by white matter disruptions, synaptic dysfunction, or both. Neuroimaging studies consistently show reduced fractional anisotropy, a measure of white matter integrity, in patients with schizophrenia. Using Mendelian randomization, we show that these white matter changes are likely to be the consequence of a primary synaptopathy in schizophrenia.

The brain structural and functional basis of lateralization in handedness is largely unclear. This study aimed to explore this issue by using voxel-mirrored homotopic connectivity (VMHC) measured by resting-state functional MRI (R-fMRI) and gray matter asymmetry index (AI) by high-resolution anatomical images. A total of 50 healthy subjects were included, among them were 13 left-handers, 24 right-handers, and 13 mixed-handers. Structural and R-fMRI data of all subjects were collected. There were significant differences in VMHC among the three groups in lateral temporal-occipital, orbitofrontal, and primary hand motor regions. Meanwhile, there were significant differences in AI that existed in medial prefrontal, superior frontal, and superior temporal regions. Besides, the correlation analysis showed that the closer the handedness score to the extreme of the left-handedness (LH), the stronger the interhemispheric functional connectivity, as well as more leftward gray matter. In general, left/mixed-handedness (MH) showed stronger functional homotopy in the transmodal association regions that depend on the integrity of the corpus callosum, but more variable in primary sensorimotor cortices. Furthermore, the group differences in VMHC largely align with that in AI. We located the specific regions for LH/MH from the perspective of structural specification and functional integration, suggesting the plasticity of hand movement and different patterns of emotional processing.

Cerebral palsy (CP) is the most prevalent pediatric neurologic impairment and is associated with major mobility deficiencies. This has led to extensive investigations of the sensorimotor network, with far less research focusing on other major networks. The aim of this study was to investigate the functional connectivity (FC) of the main sensory networks (i.e., visual and auditory) and the sensorimotor network, and to link FC to the gait biomechanics of youth with CP. Using resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging, we first identified the sensorimotor, visual and auditory networks in youth with CP and neurotypical controls. Our analysis revealed reduced FC among the networks in the youth with CP relative to the controls. Notably, the visual network showed lower FC with both the sensorimotor and auditory networks. Furthermore, higher FC between the visual and sensorimotor cortices was associated with larger step length (r = 0.74, pFDR = 0.04) in youth with CP. These results confirm that CP is associated with functional brain abnormalities beyond the sensorimotor network, suggesting abnormal functional integration of the brain’s motor and primary sensory systems. The significant association between abnormal visuo-motor FC and gait could indicate a link with visuomotor disorders in this patient population.

Childhood is marked by profound changes in prosocial behaviour. The underlying motivational mechanisms remain poorly understood. We investigated the development of altruistically motivated helping in middle childhood and the neurocognitive and -affective mechanisms driving this development. One-hundred and twenty seven 6-12 year-old children performed a novel gustatory costly helping task designed to measure altruistic motivations of helping behaviour. Neurocognitive and -affective mechanisms including emotion regulation, emotional clarity and attentional reorienting were assessed experimentally through an extensive task-battery while functional brain activity and connectivity were measured during an empathy for taste paradigm and during rest. Altruistically motivated helping increased with age. Out of all mechanisms probed for, only emotional clarity increased with age and accounted for altruistically motivated helping. This was associated with greater functional integration of the empathy-related network with fronto-parietal brain regions at rest. We isolate a highly specific neuroaffective mechanism as the crucial driver of altruistically motivated helping during child development.

Brain signal variability has been consistently linked to functional integration; however, whether this coupling is associated with cognitive functions and/or psychiatric diseases has not been clarified. Using multiple multimodality datasets, including resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rsfMRI) data from the Human Connectome Project (HCP: N = 927) and a Beijing sample (N = 416) and cerebral blood flow (CBF) and rsfMRI data from a Hangzhou sample (N = 29), we found that, compared with the existing variability measure (i.e., SDBOLD), the mean-scaled (standardized) fractional standard deviation of the BOLD signal (mfSDBOLD) maintained very high test-retest reliability, showed greater cross-site reliability and was less affected by head motion. We also found strong reproducible couplings between the mfSDBOLD and functional integration measured by the degree centrality (DC), both cross-voxel and cross-subject, which were robust to scanning and preprocessing parameters. Moreover, both mfSDBOLD and DC were correlated with CBF, suggesting a common physiological basis for both measures. Critically, the degree of coupling between mfSDBOLD and long-range DC was positively correlated with individuals’ cognitive total composite scores. Brain regions with greater mismatches between mfSDBOLD and long-range DC were more vulnerable to brain diseases. Our results suggest that BOLD signal variability could serve as a meaningful index of local function that underlies functional integration in the human brain and that a strong coupling between BOLD signal variability and functional integration may serve as a hallmark of balanced brain networks that are associated with optimal brain functions.

To understand the architecture of human language, it is critical to examine diverse languages; yet most cognitive neuroscience research has focused on a handful of primarily Indo-European languages. Here, we report an investigation of the fronto-temporo-parietal language network across 45 languages and establish the robustness to cross-linguistic variation of its topography and key functional properties, including left-lateralization, strong functional integration among its brain regions, and functional selectivity for language processing.

People with subjective cognitive decline (SCD) and amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI) are both at high risk for Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Behaviorally, both SCD and aMCI have subjective reports of cognitive decline, but the latter suffers a more severe objective cognitive impairment than the former. However, it remains unclear how the brain develops from SCD to aMCI. In the current study, we aimed to investigate the topological characteristics of the white matter (WM) network that can successfully identify individuals with SCD or aMCI from healthy control (HC) and to describe the relationship of pathological changes between these two stages. To this end, three groups were recruited, including 22 SCD, 22 aMCI, and 22 healthy control (HC) subjects. We constructed WM network for each subject and compared large-scale topological organization between groups at both network and nodal levels. At the network level, the combined network indexes had the best performance in discriminating aMCI from HC. However, no indexes at the network level can significantly identify SCD from HC. These results suggested that aMCI but not SCD was associated with anatomical impairments at the network level. At the nodal level, we found that the short-path length can best differentiate between aMCI and HC subjects, whereas the global efficiency has the best performance in differentiating between SCD and HC subjects, suggesting that both SCD and aMCI had significant functional integration alteration compared to HC subjects. These results converged on the idea that the neural degeneration from SCD to aMCI follows a gradual process, from abnormalities at the nodal level to those at both nodal and network levels.

Human pluripotent stem cells (hPSCs) are sources of several somatic cell types for human developmental studies, in vitro disease modeling, and cell transplantation therapy. Improving strategies of derivation of high-purity specific neural and glial lineages from hPSCs is critical for application to the study and therapy of the nervous system. Here, we will focus on the principles behind establishment of neuron and glia differentiation methods according to developmental studies. We will also highlight the limitations and challenges associated with the differentiation of several “difficult” neural lineages and delay in neuronal maturation and functional integration. To overcome these challenges, we will introduce strategies and novel technologies aimed at improving the differentiation of various neural lineages to expand the application potential of hPSCs to the study of the nervous system.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to develop a model to predict the antecedents of the integration level among marketing, logistics and production, considering the influence of formal and informal factors that generate integration and the existence of conflicts. Design/methodology/approach A survey of 179 participants from all regions of Brazil was conducted. A parsimonious model including four dimensions and 34 variables was developed through confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling. Findings The field data corroborate studies dealing with the impact of various formal and informal integration factors on the cross-functional integration level as a construct. Furthermore, this paper concludes that the level of cross-functional can be defined as: the intensity of the relationship among internal functions which can be measured by the mutual existence of formal and informal factors and the absence of manifest conflicts. Research limitations/implications The findings of this paper cannot be generalized because of the convenience sampling. Future research could apply a probabilistic sampling and try to explore other geographical settings in both national and international contexts. Practical implications The proposed model can generate important information for managers by pointing out variables that can predict the integration level and their impacts on the organizational performance. The paper concludes with examples about how the model could be useful in several practical situations. Originality/value This paper proposes a model with reasonable accuracy to predict the integration level and overcomes prior research limitations with respect to models to predict the antecedents of the integration level, particularly the role of conflicts in the integration processes.