The non-inactivating potassium M-current exerts a strong influence on neuronal excitability. The channels responsible for this current are made up of KCNQ subunits, and mutations in most of these produce human pathologies. Notably, in terms of excitation, mutations in either KCNQ2 or KCNQ3 lead to benign neonatal familial convulsions. Although a mere reduction of 25% in KCNQ2/3 function can inc...

Clinical and experimental studies implicate most neuromodulatory systems in epileptogenesis. The dopaminergic system has a seizure-modulating effect that crucially depends on the different subtypes of dopamine (DA) receptors involved and the brain regions in which they are activated. Specifically, DA plays a major role in the control of seizures arising in the limbic system. Studies performed i...

The epileptogenic activities of several beta-lactam antibiotics were compared following their intracerebroventricular administration in rats. Different convulsant potencies were observed among the various beta-lactam antibiotics tested, but the epileptogenic patterns were similar. The patterns consisted of an initial phase characterized by wet-dog shakes followed by head tremor, nodding, and cl...

PURPOSE: Patients with refractory epilepsy in whom the epileptogenic zone cannot be precisely identified using the currently available presurgical evaluation tools are not likely to undergo resective surgery and remain prone to uncontrolled seizures. The aim of this study is to assess the added value of surface coil imaging at 3 Tesla (3T SCI) guided by magnetoencephalography (MEG) with regard ...

The epileptogenic potential of pefloxacin and norfloxacin, two quinolone antibiotics, was investigated in vivo in three different animal species by measuring drug concentrations in cerebrospinal fluid (CSF), which is part of the biophase, at the onset of convulsions. Interestingly, the pefloxacin-to-norfloxacin concentration ratios in CSF were virtually constant across the species (7.0, 6.6, an...

To the Editor: Meditation is a widely adopted stress-relieving mental exercise associated with altered cognition and behavior. Recently, there has been debate [1,2] over the influence of meditation, and transcendental meditation (TM) in particular, on epilepsy. This debate was seemingly triggered by a view suggesting a potential epileptogenic influence of meditation [3], implying that long-term...

EpiGauss is a method that combines single dipole model with dipole clustering to characterize active brain generators in space and time related to EEG events. EpiGauss was applied to study epileptogenic activity in 4 patients suffering of hypothalamic hamartoma related epilepsy, a rare syndrome with a unique epileptogenic source – the hamartoma lesion – and natural propagation hypothesis – from...

than 40 or less than -40 was defined as left or right hemisphere language dominancy, respectively. Otherwise, language dominancy was not determined (ambiguous). The relationship between the side of epileptogenic focus and language-dominant hemisphere was investigated.Results: Language dominancy was identified in the left hemisphere in 75% (9/12) of the cases with right hemisphere epilepsy, in 5...