Most stroke survivors recover some degree of lost function after an ischemic event. Recovery however, is negatively affected by comorbid conditions such as diabetes. Successful recovery is dependent on the ability of adjacent surviving cortical tissue and functionally related areas to take over functions lost by the stroke. Recently our lab has shown that diabetes interferes with the remapping of sensory function to peri-infarct areas after photothrombotic stroke. Given this result, it is crucial to understand how diabetes affects the structure of neurons following stroke, particularly at the level of dendritic spines, which receive the vast majority of excitatory synaptic inputs. Type I diabetes was pharmacologically induced in transgenic mice expressing yellow fluorescent protein (YFP) in a subset of cortical neurons 4 weeks prior to receiving unilateral photothrombotic stroke in the forelimb area of the primary somatosensory cortex (FLS1). Spine density measurements were made on the apical and basilar dendrites of layer-5 pyramidal neurons at 1 and 6 weeks after stroke. Our analysis indicated that diabetes was associated with fewer apical and basilar dendritic spines in the peri-infarct region 1 week after stroke. At 6 weeks of recovery, peri-infarct dendritic spine density in both control and diabetic animals returned to baseline levels. These changes were specific to the peri-infarct cortex, as spine density in distant cortical areas such as the forelimb sensorimotor region of the contralateral hemisphere, were not affected by stroke. In order to relate changes in spine density to the recovery of forepaw function, we re-analyzed data from a previous study that employed the forepaw adhesive-tape-removal test (Sweetnam et al 2012). This analysis revealed that diabetes significantly increased the latency of tape removal from the impaired forepaw (when normalized to the unaffected paw) at 1 but not 6 weeks of recovery. Collectively, these findings indicate that diabetes exacerbates forepaw impairments and basilar spine loss initially after stroke, but does not affect the ability of the brain to replace lost spines over weeks of recovery. / Graduate / 0317

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In this work an attempt is made to correlate polymer miscibility with diffusion and with molecular interactions. A system with lower critical solubility temperature has been selected, namely polystyrene (PS) and polyvinyl methyl ether (PVME). Most of the published work has been done on polymers in solutions or on solvent cast specimens and therefore on ternary systems. The role of solvent has not yet been fully evaluated and it was of interest to compare the results on solvent cast samples with those prepared by mechanical blending and by diffusion. Molecular interaction is dependent on functional groups present and for this reason experiments have been performed on PVME blends with PS of different levels of sulfonation (SPS). Selective deuteration (d-PS) was used to identify and assign some absorption peaks in the infrared spectra. DSC measurements have shown that only one Tg is present for all blends prepared by solvent casting. It was necessary to use an extreme quenching rate down to liquid nitrogen in order to preserve the high temperature (above 150°C) phase separated structure, represented by two Tg of homopolymers. The mechanically blended system, on the other hand, did not show a single T g of the blend, unless annealed for one day at 110°C. This confirms the results obtained by diffusion studies using light microscopy and neutron reflectivity, that the diffusion rates are extremely slow and therefore do not control the phase formation and separation processes. These experiments also indicate that the microstructures of solvent cast samples and samples prepared by mechanical blending are different. The Tg of mechanical blended polymers indicate, that the composition of diffusion swollen PS does not correspond to the phase diagram measured in solutions, confirming thus the above result. The FTIR studies at different temperatures have shown that changes in spectra of polymer blends, as reported in the literature can be explained by temperature changes in pure homopolymers. This indicates that molecular interactions, which are responsible for miscibility, are not detectable by infrared absorptions and are therefore of unspecified strength and location. The FTIR of SPSIPVME blends show that sulfonate groups on PS affect polymer miscibility through changes in configuration of molecules, rather than through direct interaction with the PVME, as suggested in the literature. An attempt has been made to study diffusion of SPS and polycarbonate (PC) system by neutron reflectivity. Preliminary results indicate that surface relaxation effects make the data interpretation difficult.

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