A 20-year-old man was on a fishing trip in a boat on Delaware Bay. At one point during an ensuing storm, he rai sed his head above the rigging and was immediately stru ck by a lightning bolt that also momentaril y stunned his companions. They recovered to find him unconscious on th e bottom of the boat with blood-tinged fluid emanating from his left ear . After a brief examination at a nearby h...

The basal ganglia are a group of interconnected subcortical nuclei that represent one of the brain's fundamental processing units. In humans basal ganglia dysfunctions have been associated with numerous debilitating conditions, including Parkinson's disease. To appreciate fully how complicated systems can malfunction, it may first be necessary to understand how such networks work normally. The ...

Basal ganglia-thalamocortical circuits are critical for motor control and motor learning. Classically, basal ganglia nuclei are thought to regulate motor behavior by increasing or decreasing cortical firing rates, and basal ganglia diseases are assumed to reflect abnormal overall activity levels. More recent studies suggest instead that motor disorders derive from abnormal firing patterns, and ...

The basal ganglia are more highly interconnected with the pedunculopontine tegmental nucleus (PPN) than with any other brain region. Regulation and relay of basal ganglia activity are two key functions of the PPN. The PPN provides an interface for the basal ganglia to influence sleep and waking, and the two structures are similarly implicated in learning, reward and other cognitive functions. P...

BACKGROUND Cerebral hemorrhage is common in patients with cancer, but the clinical features and pathogenesis of liver cancer patients with cerebral hemorrhage are not well known. MATERIAL AND METHODS Liver cancer patients who developed cerebral hemorrhage were recruited from the First Affiliated Hospital of Guangxi Medical University between January 2003 and December 2014. We retrospectively an...