Developing customized NIRS-EEG for infant sleep research: methodological considerations.

Significance: Studies using simultaneous functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS)-electroencephalography (EEG) during natural sleep in infancy are rare. Developments for combined fNIRS-EEG for sleep research that ensure optimal comfort as well as good coupling and data quality are needed. Aim: We describe the steps toward developing a comfortable, wearable NIRS-EEG headgear adapted specifically for sleeping infants ages 5 to 9 months and present the experimental procedures and data quality to conduct infant sleep research using combined fNIRS-EEG. Approach: N=49 5- to 9-month-old infants participated. In phase 1, N=26 (10 = slept) participated using the non-wearable version of the NIRS-EEG headgear with 13-channel-wearable EEG and 39-channel fiber-based NIRS. In phase 2, N=23 infants (21 = slept) participated with the wireless version of the headgear with 20-channel-wearable EEG and 47-channel wearable NIRS. We used QT-NIRS to assess the NIRS data quality based on the good time window percentage, included channels, nap duration, and valid EEG percentage. Results: The infant nap rate during phase 1 was ∼40% (45% valid EEG data) and increased to 90% during phase 2 (100% valid EEG data). Infants slept significantly longer with the wearable system than the non-wearable system. However, there were more included good channels based on QT-NIRS in study phase 1 (61%) than phase 2 (50%), though this difference was not statistically significant. Conclusions: We demonstrated the usability of an integrated NIRS-EEG headgear during natural infant sleep with both non-wearable and wearable NIRS systems. The wearable NIRS-EEG headgear represents a good compromise between data quality, opportunities of applications (home visits and toddlers), and experiment success (infants' comfort, longer sleep duration, and opportunities for caregiver-child interaction).

Habitual night waking associates with dynamics of waking cortical theta power in infancy.

The implications of the substantial individual differences in infant sleep for early brain development remain unclear. Here, we examined whether night sleep quality relates to daytime brain activity, operationalized through measures of EEG theta power and its dynamic modulation, which have been previously linked to later cognitive development. For this longitudinal study, 76 typically developing infants were studied (age: 4-14 months, 166 individual study visits) over the course of 6 months with one, two, three, or four lab visits. Habitual sleep was measured with a 7-day sleep diary and actigraphy, and the Brief Infant Sleep Questionnaire. Twenty-channel EEG was recorded while infants watched multiple rounds of videos of women singing nursery rhymes; oscillatory power in the theta band was extracted. Key metrics were average theta across stimuli and the slope of change in theta within the first novel movie. Both objective and subjective sleep assessment methods showed a relationship between more night waking and higher overall theta power and reduced dynamic modulation of theta over the course of the novel video stimuli. These results may indicate altered learning and consolidation in infants with more disrupted night sleep, which may have implications for cognitive development.

Oxytocin but not naturally occurring variation in caregiver touch associates with infant social orienting.

Caregiver touch is crucial for infants' healthy development, but its role in shaping infant cognition has been relatively understudied. In particular, despite strong premises to hypothesize its function in directing infant attention to social information, little empirical evidence exists on the topic. In this study, we investigated the associations between naturally occurring variation in caregiver touch and infant social attention in a group of 6- to 13-month-old infants (n = 71). Additionally, we measured infant salivary oxytocin as a possible mediator of the effects of touch on infant social attention. The hypothesized effects were investigated both short term, with respect to touch observed during parent-infant interactions in the lab, and long term, with respect to parent-reported patterns of everyday touching behaviors. We did not find evidence that caregiver touch predicts infant social attention or salivary oxytocin levels, short term or long term. However, we found that salivary oxytocin predicted infant preferential attention to faces relative to nonsocial objects, measured in an eye-tracking task. Our findings confirm the involvement of oxytocin in social orienting in infancy, but raise questions regarding the possible environmental factors influencing the infant oxytocin system.

Capturing touch in parent-infant interaction: A comparison of methods.

Naturally occurring high levels of caregiver touch promote offspring development in many animal species. Yet, caregiver touch remains a relatively understudied topic in human development, possibly due to challenges of measuring this means of interaction. While parental reports (e.g., questionnaires, diaries) are easy to collect, they may be subject to biases and memory limitations. In contrast, observing touch in a short session of parent-child interaction in the lab may not be representative of touch interaction in daily life. In the present study, we compared parent reports (one-off questionnaires and diary) and observation-based methods in a sample of German 6- to 13-month-olds and their primary caregivers (n = 71). In an attempt to characterize touching behaviors across a broad range of contexts, we measured touch both during play and while the parent was engaged in another activity. We found that context affected both the quantity and types of touch used in interaction. Parent-reported touch was moderately associated with touch observed in parent-child interactions and more strongly with touch used during play. We conclude that brief one-off questionnaires are a good indicator of touch in parent-child interaction, yet they may be biased toward representing particular daily activities and particular types of touch.

Infant wake after sleep onset serves as a marker for different trajectories in cognitive development.

BACKGROUND: Sleep variables have been linked to improved functioning of learning and memory throughout life, with most studies focusing on older children and adults. Since infancy is a time of outstanding plasticity, sleep variables could be particularly important for cognitive development in that age group. METHODS: This is a longitudinal study collecting data from 40 infants at four different time points of 4, 6, 8 and 10 months. Sleep variables were assessed using actigraphy for a week, as well as a sleep questionnaire. Eye-tracking was employed to examine developmental cognitive trajectories. Infants had to remember the location of a toy that had previously been linked to a sound and an eye-tracker recorded whether they were searching the correct location upon hearing the sound. RESULTS: Based on their trajectories between 4 and 10 months, infants were divided into two groups who shifted their response strategies at different time points. Those two groups also differed in other aspects of their looking patterns and scored increasingly differently in the Ages & Stages Questionnaire over time. Time spent awake in the night early in life was reduced in the group who changed their strategy earlier. CONCLUSIONS: While previous research examined the relation of infant sleep and cognitive functioning measured once, this paper provides first evidence that night wake time can serve as a marker for different cognitive trajectories.

Validation of the VapoMeter, a closed unventilated chamber system to assess transepidermal water loss vs. the open chamber Tewameter.

BACKGROUND/AIM: Transepidermal water loss (TEWL) is one of the most important biophysical parameters for evaluating the efficiency of the human skin water barrier. Different approaches exist to measure TEWL. The most commonly used methodology consists of the open chamber diffusion technique in which the water vapor pressure gradient is measured in g/h m2 according to Fick's law. A typical apparatus is the Tewameter. Recently, a portable device--the VapoMeter--became available with a humidity sensor in a closed chamber. METHODS: In the present work, the closed chamber VapoMeter is compared with the open chamber Tewameter for its applicability to assess TEWL. A comparative study--including parallel in vivo measurements with both devices--was carried out on human forearm skin. RESULTS: It could be concluded that both instruments are reliable tools. A good correlation between recordings (r=0.503-0.966) was found with a consistent feature of measuring higher TEWL values for the Tewameter than for the VapoMeter. Probe pressure, probe temperature and relative humidity were revealed to be important parameters inducing significant differences in data outcome. CONCLUSIONS: From skin barrier damage experiments it became clear that the Tewameter is able to detect significantly smaller differences than the VapoMeter. In addition, the closed chamber device is currently not sensitive enough to discriminate for the effects induced by diurnal rhythm and fluctuations as a function of time. On the other hand, the small and handy VapoMeter allows more flexibility in measuring protocols and in in-use performance.

Multifunctional Ligands. Phosphinimine-Substituted Cyanofluoroaromatics Including X-ray Molecular Structures of Three Representative Ligands 4,6-(CN)(2)C(6)F(2)-1,3-(N=PPh(3))(2), 4,6-(CN)(2)C(6)F(2)-1,3-(N=PPh(2)Me)(2) and 4,6-(CN)(2)C(6)F(2)-1-(N=PPh(3))-3-(N=PPh(2)Me). Formation of Rhodium(I) Complexes.

Reaction of 1,3-dicyanotetrafluorobenzene with 2 equiv of (trimethylsilyl)iminophosphoranes gave the disubstituted derivatives 4,6-(CN)(2)C(6)F(2)-1,3-AB: 1, A = B = (N=PPh(3)); 2, A = B = (N=PPh(2)Me); and 3, A = (N=PPh(3)), B = (N=PPh(2)Me). Monosubstituted compounds of the type 2,4-(CN)(2)C(6)F(3)-1-A; notably 4, A = (N=PPh(3)), and 5, A = (N=PPh(2)Me), were readily obtained by reaction of 1 molar equiv of the silylated iminophosphorane with the cyanofluoro aromatic. Substitution of the fluorine para to the CN group(s) occurs in all cases. Reactions of 1,2- and 1,4-dicyanotetrafluorobenzene with (trimethylsilyl)iminophosphoranes gave only monosubstituted derivatives 3,4-(CN)(2)C(6)F(3)-1-A (6, A = (N=PPh(3)), and 7, A = (N=PPh(2)Me)) and 2,5-(CN)(2)C(6)F(3)-1-A (8, A = (N=PPh(3)), and 9, A = (N=PPh(2)Me)), respectively, as the result of electronic deactivation of the second substitutional point. 1, 4,6-(CN)(2)C(6)F(2)-1,3-(N=PPh(3)), 2, 4,6-(CN)(2)C(6)F(2)-1,3-(N=PPh(2)Me)(2), and 3, 4,6-(CN)(2)C(6)F(2)-1-(N=PPh(3))-3-(N=PPh(2)Me) have been structurally characterized. For 1 (at 21 degrees C), monoclinic, C2/(c) (No. 15), a = 15.289(2) Å, b = 10.196(1) Å, c = 23.491(6) Å, beta = 91.63(2) degrees, V = 3660(2) Å(3), and Z = 4. The P=N bond length is 1.579(2) Å and the P(V)-N-C(phenyl) angle is 134.0(2) degrees. For 2, (at 21 degrees C) monoclinic, C2/(c) (No. 15), a = 18.694(2) Å, b = 8.576(1) Å, c = 40.084(4) Å, beta = 94.00(1) degrees, V = 6411(2) Å(3), and Z = 8. The P(1)=N(1) bond length is 1.570(4) Å, the P(2)=N(2) bond length is 1.589(3) Å, the P(1)-N(1)-C(14) angle is 131.6(3) degrees, and the P(2)-N(2)-C(16) angle is 131.3(3) degrees. For 3, (at -80 degrees C) monoclinic, P2(1)/c (No. 14), a = 9.210(1) Å, b = 18.113(2) Å, c = 20.015(2) Å, beta = 100.07(1) degrees, V = 3287(2) Å(3), and Z = 4. The P(1)=N(1) bond length (PPh(3) group) is 1.567(4) Å, the P(2)=N(2) bond length (PPh(2)Me group) is 1.581(5) Å, the P(1)-N(1)-C(1) angle is 140.4(4) degrees, and the P(2)-N(2)-C(3) angle is 129.4(4) degrees. These new multifunctional chelating ligands readily react with [Rh(cod)Cl](2) and AgClO(4) to give cationic Rh(I) complexes in which the imine and/or the nitrile groups are coordinated to the Rh center.