[Correlation between arousal threshold and occurrence of hypertension in patients with obstructive sleep apnea hypopnea syndrome].

Objective: To investigate the relationship between arousal threshold (ArTH) and hypertension in patients with obstructive sleep apnea hypopnea syndrome (OSA). Methods: This study recruited 648 patients diagnosed with OSA at the Sleep Center of the Second Affiliated Hospital of Soochow University from January 2020 to August 2021, including 569 males and 79 females, aged 42(35,52) years. The basic demographic information and clinical data of all patients were collected, including blood pressure measurement, and relevant questionnaire scores, and nocturnal polysomnography (PSG) parameters. A clinical predictive model based on sleep apnea hypopnea index (AHI), lowest pulse oxygen saturation (LSpaO2) and hypopnea ratio (FHypopneas) was used to access the arousal threshold of OSA patients. Patients were divided into OSA group and OSA with hypertension group according to whether they were combined with hypertension. The differences in the above indexes between the two groups were analyzed to explore the relationship between arousal threshold and hypertension in OSA patients, using a binary logistic stepwise regression analysis. Results: A total of 648 OSA patients were enrolled, including 415 in the OSA with hypertension group and 233 in the OSA group. Compared with OSA group, OSA with hypertension group had older age, higher body mass index (BMI), higher blood pressure at bedtime and at awakening, higher AHI and lower proportion of hypopnea (all P<0.05). There were no significant differences between other general data and PSG parameters (all P>0.05). The proportion of patients with low arousal threshold (AHI<30 events per hour, LSpO2>82.5%, Fhypopneas>58.3%) in OSA with hypertension group was lower, and the proportion of phenotypic patients with low arousal threshold was significantly lower (30.1% vs. 52.4% P<0.001). Binary logistic stepwise regression analysis showed that the high arousal threshold (OR=1.930, 95%CI:1.326-2.808, P=0.001) was an independent risk factor for OSA complicated with hypertension. Conclusion: The arousal threshold is associated with the development of hypertension in OSA patients, and OSA patients with a high arousal threshold have a higher risk of developing hypertension.

[Research Progress in the Role of the Ventral Tegmental Area-Medial Prefrontal Cortex Neural Circuit in the Regulation of Arousal].

There are mutual neural projections between the ventral tegmental area (VTA) and the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC),which form a circuit.Recent studies have shown that this circuit is vital in regulating arousal from sleep and general anesthesia.This paper introduces the anatomical structures of VTA and mPFC and the roles of various neurons and projection pathways in the regulation of arousal,aiming to provide new ideas for further research on the mechanism of arousal from sleep and general anesthesia.

Anticipation of sexually arousing visual event leads to overestimation of elapsed time.

Subjective estimates of duration are affected by emotional expectations about the future. For example, temporal intervals preceding a threatening event such as an electric shock are estimated as longer than intervals preceding a non-threatening event. However, it has not been unequivocally shown that such temporal overestimation occurs also when anticipating a similarly arousing but appealing event. In this study, we examined how anticipation of visual erotic material influenced perceived duration. Participants did a temporal bisection task, where they estimated durations of visual cues relative to previously learned short and long standard durations. The color of the to-be-timed visual cue signalled either a chance of seeing a preferred erotic picture at the end of the interval or certainty of seeing a neutral grey bar instead. The results showed that anticipating an appealing event increased the likelihood of estimating the cue duration as long as compared to the anticipation of a grey bar. Further analyses showed that this temporal overestimation effect was stronger for those who rated the anticipated erotic pictures as more sexually arousing. The results thus indicate that anticipation of appealing events has a similar dilating effect on perceived duration as does the anticipation of aversive events.

Pathogenic strategies of Pseudogymnoascus destructans during torpor and arousal of hibernating bats.

Millions of hibernating bats across North America have died from white-nose syndrome (WNS), an emerging disease caused by a psychrophilic (cold-loving) fungus, Pseudogymnoascus destructans, that invades their skin. Mechanisms of P. destructans invasion of bat epidermis remain obscure. Guided by our in vivo observations, we modeled hibernation with a newly generated little brown bat (Myotis lucifugus) keratinocyte cell line. We uncovered the stealth intracellular lifestyle of P. destructans, which inhibits apoptosis of keratinocytes and spreads through the cells by two epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR)-dependent mechanisms: active penetration during torpor and induced endocytosis during arousal. Melanin of endocytosed P. destructans blocks endolysosomal maturation, facilitating P. destructans survival and germination after return to torpor. Blockade of EGFR aborts P. destructans entry into keratinocytes.

Robots as Mental Health Coaches: A Study of Emotional Responses to Technology-Assisted Stress Management Tasks Using Physiological Signals.

The current study investigated the effectiveness of social robots in facilitating stress management interventions for university students by evaluating their physiological responses. We collected electroencephalogram (EEG) brain activity and Galvanic Skin Responses (GSRs) together with self-reported questionnaires from two groups of students who practiced a deep breathing exercise either with a social robot or a laptop. From GSR signals, we obtained the change in participants' arousal level throughout the intervention, and from the EEG signals, we extracted the change in their emotional valence using the neurometric of Frontal Alpha Asymmetry (FAA). While subjective perceptions of stress and user experience did not differ significantly between the two groups, the physiological signals revealed differences in their emotional responses as evaluated by the arousal-valence model. The Laptop group tended to show a decrease in arousal level which, in some cases, was accompanied by negative valence indicative of boredom or lack of interest. On the other hand, the Robot group displayed two patterns; some demonstrated a decrease in arousal with positive valence indicative of calmness and relaxation, and others showed an increase in arousal together with positive valence interpreted as excitement. These findings provide interesting insights into the impact of social robots as mental well-being coaches on students' emotions particularly in the presence of the novelty effect. Additionally, they provide evidence for the efficacy of physiological signals as an objective and reliable measure of user experience in HRI settings.

IAVRS-International Affective Virtual Reality System: Psychometric Assessment of 360° Images by Using Psychophysiological Data.

Virtual Reality is an effective technique for eliciting emotions. It provides immersive and ecologically valid emotional experiences while maintaining experimental control. Recently, novel VR forms like 360° videos have been used successfully for emotion elicitation. Some preliminary databases of 360° videos for emotion elicitation have been proposed, but they tapped mainly into an emotional dimensional approach and did not include a concurrent physiological assessment of an emotional profile. This study expands on these databases by combining dimensional and discrete approaches to validate a new set of 360° emotion-inducing images. Twenty-six participants viewed 46 immersive images, and their emotional reactions were measured using self-reporting, psychophysiological signals, and eye tracking. The IAVRS database can successfully elicit a wide range of emotional responses, including both positive and negative valence, as well as different levels of arousal. Results reveal an important correspondence between the discrete and dimensional models of emotions. Furthermore, the images that exhibit convergence between the dimensional and discrete emotional models are particularly impactful regarding arousal and valence values. The IAVRS database provides insights into potential relationships between physiological parameters and emotional responses. This preliminary investigation highlights the complexity of emotional elicitation processes and their physiological correlates, suggesting the need for further research to deepen our understanding.

Predicting the Arousal and Valence Values of Emotional States Using Learned, Predesigned, and Deep Visual Features.

The cognitive state of a person can be categorized using the circumplex model of emotional states, a continuous model of two dimensions: arousal and valence. The purpose of this research is to select a machine learning model(s) to be integrated into a virtual reality (VR) system that runs cognitive remediation exercises for people with mental health disorders. As such, the prediction of emotional states is essential to customize treatments for those individuals. We exploit the Remote Collaborative and Affective Interactions (RECOLA) database to predict arousal and valence values using machine learning techniques. RECOLA includes audio, video, and physiological recordings of interactions between human participants. To allow learners to focus on the most relevant data, features are extracted from raw data. Such features can be predesigned, learned, or extracted implicitly using deep learners. Our previous work on video recordings focused on predesigned and learned visual features. In this paper, we extend our work onto deep visual features. Our deep visual features are extracted using the MobileNet-v2 convolutional neural network (CNN) that we previously trained on RECOLA's video frames of full/half faces. As the final purpose of our work is to integrate our solution into a practical VR application using head-mounted displays, we experimented with half faces as a proof of concept. The extracted deep features were then used to predict arousal and valence values via optimizable ensemble regression. We also fused the extracted visual features with the predesigned visual features and predicted arousal and valence values using the combined feature set. In an attempt to enhance our prediction performance, we further fused the predictions of the optimizable ensemble model with the predictions of the MobileNet-v2 model. After decision fusion, we achieved a root mean squared error (RMSE) of 0.1140, a Pearson's correlation coefficient (PCC) of 0.8000, and a concordance correlation coefficient (CCC) of 0.7868 on arousal predictions. We achieved an RMSE of 0.0790, a PCC of 0.7904, and a CCC of 0.7645 on valence predictions.

Arousal and the modulation of sensory experience: evidence from food-related emotions.

Across sensory systems, several stimulus collative characteristics, including intensity, novelty, complexity and perceived dangerousness, are known to elicit high levels of physiological and psychological arousal. It has become apparent that food rejections by both children and adults are frequently linked to such arousal-inducing characteristics. This paper examines how arousal and arousability are important elements in responding to stimuli generally, but specifically to foods, ultimately influencing food preferences and choices. It is clear that responses to sensory properties are subject not just to variations in perceptual sensitivity due to genetics or experience-as in the case of widely rejected qualities such as bitterness or pungency-but also to the arousal potential of those stimuli. Moreover, this is linked to various enduring aspects of personality, suggesting that the impact of arousal on food choices is merely one aspect of a more general sensory sensitivity. The impact of diet on various health outcomes underlines the importance of understanding the relationship of arousal to food choices. This article is part of the theme issue 'Sensing and feeling: an integrative approach to sensory processing and emotional experience'.

Misophonia reactions in the general population are correlated with strong emotional reactions to other everyday sensory-emotional experiences.

Misophonic experiences are common in the general population, and they may shed light on everyday emotional reactions to multi-modal stimuli. We performed an online study of a non-clinical sample to understand the extent to which adults who have misophonic reactions are generally reactive to a range of audio-visual emotion-inducing stimuli. We also hypothesized that musicality might be predictive of one's emotional reactions to these stimuli because music is an activity that involves strong connections between sensory processing and meaningful emotional experiences. Participants completed self-report scales of misophonia and musicality. They also watched videos meant to induce misophonia, autonomous sensory meridian response (ASMR) and musical chills, and were asked to click a button whenever they had any emotional reaction to the video. They also rated the emotional valence and arousal of each video. Reactions to misophonia videos were predicted by reactions to ASMR and chills videos, which could indicate that the frequency with which individuals experience emotional responses varies similarly across both negative and positive emotional contexts. Musicality scores were not correlated with measures of misophonia. These findings could reflect a general phenotype of stronger emotional reactivity to meaningful sensory inputs. This article is part of the theme issue 'Sensing and feeling: an integrative approach to sensory processing and emotional experience'.

Occipital-temporal cortical tuning to semantic and affective features of natural images predicts associated behavioral responses.

In everyday life, people need to respond appropriately to many types of emotional stimuli. Here, we investigate whether human occipital-temporal cortex (OTC) shows co-representation of the semantic category and affective content of visual stimuli. We also explore whether OTC transformation of semantic and affective features extracts information of value for guiding behavior. Participants viewed 1620 emotional natural images while functional magnetic resonance imaging data were acquired. Using voxel-wise modeling we show widespread tuning to semantic and affective image features across OTC. The top three principal components underlying OTC voxel-wise responses to image features encoded stimulus animacy, stimulus arousal and interactions of animacy with stimulus valence and arousal. At low to moderate dimensionality, OTC tuning patterns predicted behavioral responses linked to each image better than regressors directly based on image features. This is consistent with OTC representing stimulus semantic category and affective content in a manner suited to guiding behavior.

Inter-individual variability in neural response to low doses of LSD.

The repeated use of small doses of psychedelics (also referred to as "microdosing") to facilitate benefits in mental health, cognition, and mood is a trending practice. Placebo-controlled studies however have largely failed to demonstrate strong benefits, possibly because of large inter-individual response variability. The current study tested the hypothesis that effects of low doses of LSD on arousal, attention and memory depend on an individual's cognitive state at baseline. Healthy participants (N = 53) were randomly assigned to receive repeated doses of LSD (15 mcg) or placebo on 4 occasions divided over 2 weeks. Each treatment condition also consisted of a baseline and a 1-week follow-up visit. Neurophysiological measures of arousal (resting state EEG), pre-attentive processing (auditory oddball task), and perceptual learning and memory (visual long-term potentiation (LTP) paradigm) were assessed at baseline, dosing session 1 and 4, and follow-up. LSD produced stimulatory effects as reflected by a reduction in resting state EEG delta, theta, and alpha power, and enhanced pre-attentive processing during the acute dosing sessions. LSD also blunted the induction of LTP on dosing session 4. Stimulatory effects of LSD were strongest in individuals with low arousal and attention at baseline, while inhibitory effects were strongest in high memory performers at baseline. Decrements in delta EEG power and enhanced pre-attentive processing in the LSD treatment condition were still present during the 1-week follow-up. The current study demonstrates across three cognitive domains, that acute responses to low doses of LSD depend on the baseline state and provides some support for LSD induced neuroadaptations that sustain beyond treatment.

Threat-induced prosocial behavior: enhanced exogenous attention to protect others from harm.

As social animals, humans tend to voluntarily engage in pro-social behavior to prevent harm to others. However, to what extent prosocial behavior can be reflected at the level of less voluntary cognitive processes remains unclear. Here, we examined how threat to others modulates exogenous attention. Fifty-four participants performed an exogenous spatial cueing task where the participant's performance determined whether electric shocks would be delivered either to themselves or to their anonymous co-participant. Threat of shock to the co-participant elicited orienting and reorienting responses that were faster than in the safe condition and did not differ from performance when participants avoided shocks to themselves. This attentional improvement was not due to speed-accuracy trade off and was associated with arousal, i.e., increased pupil dilation in both threat conditions. Together, these findings suggest that pro-social behavior triggers automatic attentional processes which may be relevant for providing immediate help without relying on reflexive processes.

Hypothalamic hormone deficiency enables physiological anorexia in ground squirrels during hibernation.

Mammalian hibernators survive prolonged periods of cold and resource scarcity by temporarily modulating normal physiological functions, but the mechanisms underlying these adaptations are poorly understood. The hibernation cycle of thirteen-lined ground squirrels (Ictidomys tridecemlineatus) lasts for 5-7 months and comprises weeks of hypometabolic, hypothermic torpor interspersed with 24-48-h periods of an active-like interbout arousal (IBA) state. We show that ground squirrels, who endure the entire hibernation season without food, have negligible hunger during IBAs. These squirrels exhibit reversible inhibition of the hypothalamic feeding center, such that hypothalamic arcuate nucleus neurons exhibit reduced sensitivity to the orexigenic and anorexigenic effects of ghrelin and leptin, respectively. However, hypothalamic infusion of thyroid hormone during an IBA is sufficient to rescue hibernation anorexia. Our results reveal that thyroid hormone deficiency underlies hibernation anorexia and demonstrate the functional flexibility of the hypothalamic feeding center.

State-of-the-art sleep arousal detection evaluated on a comprehensive clinical dataset.

Aiming to apply automatic arousal detection to support sleep laboratories, we evaluated an optimized, state-of-the-art approach using data from daily work in our university hospital sleep laboratory. Therefore, a machine learning algorithm was trained and evaluated on 3423 polysomnograms of people with various sleep disorders. The model architecture is a U-net that accepts 50 Hz signals as input. We compared this algorithm with models trained on publicly available datasets, and evaluated these models using our clinical dataset, particularly with regard to the effects of different sleep disorders. In an effort to evaluate clinical relevance, we designed a metric based on the error of the predicted arousal index. Our models achieve an area under the precision recall curve (AUPRC) of up to 0.83 and F1 scores of up to 0.81. The model trained on our data showed no age or gender bias and no significant negative effect regarding sleep disorders on model performance compared to healthy sleep. In contrast, models trained on public datasets showed a small to moderate negative effect (calculated using Cohen's d) of sleep disorders on model performance. Therefore, we conclude that state-of-the-art arousal detection on our clinical data is possible with our model architecture. Thus, our results support the general recommendation to use a clinical dataset for training if the model is to be applied to clinical data.

A brainstem maestro conducting the somatic and autonomic motor symphony.

Somatic and sympathetic tones fluctuate together seamlessly across daily behaviors. In this issue of Cell, Zhang et al. describe populations of spinal projecting neurons in the rostral ventromedial medulla (rVMM) that harmonize somatic motor function and sympathetic activation. The coordinated regulation plays a vital role in supporting behaviors associated with various arousal states.

[Posttraumatic stress disorder clinical guidelines and treatment standards: focus on the symptoms of the psychophysiological arousal]. / Klinicheskie rekomendatsii i standarty lecheniya posttravmaticheskogo stressovogo rasstroistva: fokus na simptomy psikhofiziologicheskogo vozbuzhdeniya.

The article describes the main diagnostic criteria and principles of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) diagnostic with the consideration of risk factors and specific clinical features. The main biomarkers search trends and existing limitations are considered. The role of the psychophysiological arousal symptoms claster is highlighted in the clinical picture of PTSD as well as in connection with the main cluster of re-experiencing symptoms activation and slowing of sanogenesis process. The necessity of PTSD detection in somatic medicine is thoroughly described. The article presents therapeutic algorithms of the latest international and Russian PTSD treatment clinical guidelines based on the individual combination of psychotherapy and psychopharmacotherapy treatment choice. Additionally the accumulated during the last decades national clinical experience of the anxiety disorders treatment, including the symptoms of psychophysiological arousal is highlighted that determined the list of the recommended drugs indicating the evidence level, in the PTSD treatment standards and guidelines. The treatment choices possibilities with the consideration of different PTSD symptoms cluster expression and comorbid states and individual case distress level specific are presented. Main evidence based psychotherapeutic methods are described.

TPRO-NET: an EEG-based emotion recognition method reflecting subtle changes in emotion.

Emotion recognition based on Electroencephalogram (EEG) has been applied in various fields, including human-computer interaction and healthcare. However, for the popular Valence-Arousal-Dominance emotion model, researchers often classify the dimensions into high and low categories, which cannot reflect subtle changes in emotion. Furthermore, there are issues with the design of EEG features and the efficiency of transformer. To address these issues, we have designed TPRO-NET, a neural network that takes differential entropy and enhanced differential entropy features as input and outputs emotion categories through convolutional layers and improved transformer encoders. For our experiments, we categorized the emotions in the DEAP dataset into 8 classes and those in the DREAMER dataset into 5 classes. On the DEAP and the DREAMER datasets, TPRO-NET achieved average accuracy rates of 97.63%/97.47%/97.88% and 98.18%/98.37%/98.40%, respectively, on the Valence/Arousal/Dominance dimension for the subject-dependent experiments. Compared to other advanced methods, TPRO-NET demonstrates superior performance.

Auditory vigilance task performance and cerebral hemodynamics: effects of spatial uncertainty.

The vigilance decrement, a temporal decline in detection performance, has been observed across multiple sensory modalities. Spatial uncertainty about the location of task-relevant stimuli has been demonstrated to increase the demands of vigilance and increase the severity of the vigilance decrement when attending to visual displays. The current study investigated whether spatial uncertainty also increases the severity of the vigilance decrement and task demands when an auditory display is used. Individuals monitored an auditory display to detect critical signals that were shorter in duration than non-target stimuli. These auditory stimuli were presented in either a consistent, predictable pattern that alternated sound presentation from left to right (spatial certainty) or an inconsistent, unpredictable pattern that randomly presented sounds from the left or right (spatial uncertainty). Cerebral blood flow velocity (CBFV) was measured to assess the neurophysiological demands of the task. A decline in performance and CBFV was observed in both the spatially certain and spatially uncertain conditions, suggesting that spatial auditory vigilance tasks are demanding and can result in a vigilance decrement. Spatial uncertainty resulted in a more severe vigilance decrement in correct detections compared to spatial certainty. Reduced right-hemispheric CBFV was also observed during spatial uncertainty compared to spatial certainty. Together, these results suggest that auditory spatial uncertainty hindered performance and required greater attentional demands compared to spatial certainty. These results concur with previous research showing the negative impact of spatial uncertainty in visual vigilance tasks, but the current results contrast recent research showing no effect of spatial uncertainty on tactile vigilance.

Neural markers of reduced arousal and consciousness in mild cognitive impairment.

OBJECTIVES: People with Alzheimer's Disease (AD) experience changes in their level and content of consciousness, but there is little research on biomarkers of consciousness in pre-clinical AD and Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI). This study investigated whether levels of consciousness are decreased in people with MCI. METHODS: A multi-site site magnetoencephalography (MEG) dataset, BIOFIND, comprising 83 people with MCI and 83 age matched controls, was analysed. Arousal (and drowsiness) was assessed by computing the theta-alpha ratio (TAR). The Lempel-Ziv algorithm (LZ) was used to quantify the information content of brain activity, with higher LZ values indicating greater complexity and potentially a higher level of consciousness. RESULTS: LZ was lower in the MCI group versus controls, indicating a reduced level of consciousness in MCI. TAR was higher in the MCI group versus controls, indicating a reduced level of arousal (i.e. increased drowsiness) in MCI. LZ was also found to be correlated with mini-mental state examination (MMSE) scores, suggesting an association between cognitive impairment and level of consciousness in people with MCI. CONCLUSIONS: A decline in consciousness and arousal can be seen in MCI. As cognitive impairment worsens, measured by MMSE scores, levels of consciousness and arousal decrease. These findings highlight how monitoring consciousness using biomarkers could help understand and manage impairments found at the preclinical stages of AD. Further research is needed to explore markers of consciousness between people who progress from MCI to dementia and those who do not, and in people with moderate and severe AD, to promote person-centred care.

Functional changes in sleep-related arousal after ketamine administration in individuals with treatment-resistant depression.

The glutamatergic modulator ketamine is associated with changes in sleep, depression, and suicidal ideation (SI). This study sought to evaluate differences in arousal-related sleep metrics between 36 individuals with treatment-resistant major depression (TRD) and 25 healthy volunteers (HVs). It also sought to determine whether ketamine normalizes arousal in individuals with TRD and whether ketamine's effects on arousal mediate its antidepressant and anti-SI effects. This was a secondary analysis of a biomarker-focused, randomized, double-blind, crossover trial of ketamine (0.5 mg/kg) compared to saline placebo. Polysomnography (PSG) studies were conducted one day before and one day after ketamine/placebo infusions. Sleep arousal was measured using spectral power functions over time including alpha (quiet wakefulness), beta (alert wakefulness), and delta (deep sleep) power, as well as macroarchitecture variables, including wakefulness after sleep onset (WASO), total sleep time (TST), rapid eye movement (REM) latency, and Post-Sleep Onset Sleep Efficiency (PSOSE). At baseline, diagnostic differences in sleep macroarchitecture included lower TST (p = 0.006) and shorter REM latency (p = 0.04) in the TRD versus HV group. Ketamine's temporal dynamic effects (relative to placebo) in TRD included increased delta power earlier in the night and increased alpha and delta power later in the night. However, there were no significant diagnostic differences in temporal patterns of alpha, beta, or delta power, no ketamine effects on sleep macroarchitecture arousal metrics, and no mediation effects of sleep variables on ketamine's antidepressant or anti-SI effects. These results highlight the role of sleep-related variables as part of the systemic neurobiological changes initiated after ketamine administration. Clinical Trials Identifier: NCT00088699.