Psychological Correlates of Health anxiety in Response to the Coronavirus (COVID-19) Pandemic: a Cross-Sectional Online Study in Iran.

Current models suggest health anxiety as a fundamental variable associated with fear and anxiety related to COVID-19. The investigation was carried out in separate two studies on the Iranian population. The first study aims to test the COVID-19 Anxiety Inventory (N = 202). The findings indicate a two-factor structure of the scale. Participants (N = 1638) completed the online survey anonymously in the second study, including the COVID-19 Anxiety Inventory, Short Health Anxiety Inventory, The Intolerance of Uncertainty Scale, Anxiety Sensitivity Index-3, Body Vigilance Scale, Depression Anxiety Stress Scales 21, and Contamination Cognitions Scale. Results showed that health anxiety, anxiety sensitivity, and body vigilance would significantly contribute to fears of contracting COVID-19. Moreover, the findings support a central role of intolerance of uncertainty in predicting COVID-19 anxiety. The study results provided both theoretical and practical implications for understanding psychosocial predictors during the COVID-19 pandemic.

A multimodal imaging-guided software for access to primate brains.

Background: Imaging-guided access to the brain has become a routine procedure for various research and clinical applications, including drug administration, neurophysiological recording, and sampling tissue. Therefore, open-source software is required to handle such datasets in these specific applications. New methods: Here, we proposed an open-source tool utilizing different imaging modalities for automating the steps to access the brain. This tool provides means for easily calculating the coordination of the area of interest concerning a specific point of entry. The source and documentation are available at this link. Results: We have used this software for three different applications: electrophysiological recording, drug infusion in the nonhuman primate brain, and guided biopsy procedure in the human brain. We performed a neural recording of two monkeys' prefrontal cortex and inferior temporal cortex using this software in submillimeter resolution. We also applied our procedure for infusion in the putamen and caudate nuclei in both hemispheres of another group of rhesus monkeys with histological proof in one animal. More so, we validated this software in the human subjects that underwent biopsy surgery with the commercial software used in human biopsy surgery. Comparison with existing methods: Our software uses different imaging modalities by co-registering them. This will provide structural details of the skull and brain tissue. We can calculate each brain region's coordination at the point of entry by re-slicing the images. Atlas-based image segmentation were implemented in our software. Three mentioned applications of our software in neuroscience will be further discussed in this paper. Conclusion: In our procedure, working with different imaging modalities provides a precise estimation of the specific region in the brain related to the location of implants or stereotaxic frames. There is no limitation to using metal implants in this procedure.

Intranasal insulin improves the structure-function of the brain mitochondrial ATP-sensitive Ca2+ activated potassium channel and respiratory chain activities under diabetic conditions.

Although it is well established that diabetes impairs mitochondrial respiratory chain activity, little is known of the effects of intranasal insulin (INI) on the mitochondrial respiratory chain and structure-function of mitoBKCa channel in diabetes. We have investigated this mechanism in an STZ-induced early type 2 diabetic model. Single ATP-sensitive mitoBKCa channel activity was considered in diabetic and INI-treated rats using a channel incorporated into the bilayer lipid membrane. Because mitoBKCa channels have been involved in mitochondrial respiratory chain activity, a study was undertaken to investigate whether the NADH, complexes I and IV, mitochondrial ROS production, and ΔΨm are altered in an early diabetic model. In this work, we provide evidence for a significant decrease in channel open probability and conductance in diabetic rats. Evidence has been shown that BKCa channel ß2 subunits induce a left shift in the BKCa channel voltage dependent curve in low Ca2+ conditions,; our results indicated a significant decrease in mitoBKCa ß2 subunits using Western blot analysis. Importantly, INI treatment improved mitoBKCa channel behaviors and ß2 subunits expression up to ~70%. We found that early diabetes decreased activities of complex I and IV and increased NADH, ROS production, and ΔΨm. Surprisingly, INI modified the mitochondrial respiratory chain, ROS production, and ΔΨm up to ~70%. Our results thus demonstrate an INI improvement in respiratory chain activity and ROS production in brain mitochondrial preparations coming from the STZ early diabetic rat model, an effect potentially linked to INI improvement in mitoBKCa channel activity and channel ß2 subunit expression.

Electro-pharmacological profiles of two brain mitoplast anion channels: Inferences from single channel recording.

We have characterized the conduction and blocking properties of two different chloride channels from brain mitochondrial inner membranes after incorporation into planar lipid bilayers. Our experiments revealed the existence of channels with a mean conductance of 158 ± 7 and 301 ± 8 pS in asymmetrical 200 mM cis/50 mM trans KCl solutions. We determined that the channels were ten times more permeable for Cl- than for K+, calculated from the reversal potential using the Goldman-Hodgkin-Katz equation. The channels were bell-shaped voltage dependent, with maximum open probability 0.9 at ± 20 mV. Two mitochondrial chloride channels were blocked after the addition of 10 µM DIDS. In addition, 158 pS chloride channel was blocked by 300 nM NPPB, acidic pH and 2.5 mM ATP, whereas the 301 pS chloride channel was blocked by 600 µM NPPB but not by acidic pH or ATP. Gating and conducting behaviors of these channels were unaffected by Ca2+. These results demonstrate that the 158 pS anion channel present in brain mitochondrial inner membrane, is probably identical to IMAC and 301 pS Cl channel displays different properties than those classically described for mitochondrial anion channels.