Background: Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) has been proven to be able to modulate motor cortical plasticity might have potential as an alternative, adjunctive therapy for Parkinson's disease (PD). However, the efficacy of tDCS in PD is still uncertain. A disease animal model may be useful to clarify the existence of a treatment effect and to explore an effective therapeutic strategy using tDCS protocols.Objective: The current study was designed to identify the comprehensive therapeutic effects of tDCS in 6-hydroxydopamine (6-OHDA)-lesioned PD rats.Methods: Following early and long-term tDCS application (starting 24 h after PD lesion, 300 mA anodal tDCS, 20 min/day, 5 days/week) in awake PD animals for a total of 4 weeks, the effects of tDCS on motor and non-motor behaviors as well as dopaminergic neuron degeneration levels, were identified. Results: We found that the 4-week tDCS intervention significantly alleviated 6-OHDA-induced motor deficits in locomotor activity, akinesia, gait pattern and anxiety-like behavior, but not in apomorphineinduced rotations, recognition memory and depression-like behavior. Immunohistochemically, tyrosine hydroxylase (TH)-positive neurons in the substantia nigra were significantly preserved in the tDCS intervention group. Conclusions: These results suggest that early and long-term tDCS could exert neuroprotective effects and reduce the aggravation of motor dysfunctions in a 6-OHDA-induced PD rat model. Furthermore, this preclinical model may enhance the promising possibility of the potential use of tDCS and serve as a

Caenorhabditis elegans (C. elegans) is a well-established model organism for investigating the correlations between behavioral and neuronal activities. Here, we demonstrated a microfluidic-based method that allowed stimulation-based neuronal analysis of immobilized C. elegans for identifying the neuronal effects of ethanol on the chemosensory responses of the right ASE (ASER) neuron. A one-piece microvalve was developed for the immobilization of C. elegans. Stimulations were realized by interface shifting of laminar flows. Well-fed transgenic worms expressing the calcium indicator G-CaMP in ASER neurons were used for in vivo fluorescence imaging. To evaluate the developed method, we first studied the effects of ethanol on the ASER neurons in response to a single NaCl stimulus. Results indicated that ethanol acutely suppressed the ON responses of ASER neurons to NaCl rather than the OFF response. Further studies of the adaptation of ASER neurons in response to NaCl and in the presence of ethanol suggested that ethanol interfered with the adaptation of neurons. The developed method exhibited the advantages of ease of operation and high throughput. We expect this new method to open up a new avenue for investigating the correlations between the behavioral and neuronal activities of C. elegans.

Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) is a noninvasive technique for modulating neural plasticity and is considered to have therapeutic potential in neurological disorders. For the purpose of translational neuroscience research, a suitable animal model can be ideal for providing a stable condition for identifying mechanisms that can help to explore therapeutic strategies. Here, we developed a tDCS protocol for modulating motor excitability in anesthetized rats. To examine the responses of tDCS-elicited plasticity, the motor evoked potential (MEP) and MEP input-output (IO) curve elicited by epidural motor cortical electrical stimulus were evaluated at baseline and after 30 min of anodal tDCS or cathodal tDCS. Furthermore, a paired-pulse cortical electrical stimulus was applied to assess changes in the inhibitory network by measuring long-interval intracortical inhibition (LICI) before and after tDCS. In the results, analogous to those observed in humans, the present study demonstrates long-term potentiation- (LTP-) and long-term depression- (LTD-) like plasticity can be induced by tDCS protocol in anesthetized rats. We found that the MEPs were significantly enhanced immediately after anodal tDCS at 0.1 mA and 0.8 mA and remained enhanced for 30 min. Similarly, MEPs were suppressed immediately after cathodal tDCS at 0.8 mA and lasted for 30 min. No effect was noted on the MEP magnitude under sham tDCS stimulation. Furthermore, the IO curve slope was elevated following anodal tDCS and presented a trend toward diminished slope after cathodal tDCS. No significant differences in the LICI ratio of pre- to post-tDCS were observed. These results indicated that developed tDCS schemes can produce consistent, rapid, and controllable electrophysiological changes in corticomotor excitability in rats. This newly developed tDCS animal model could be useful to further explore mechanical insights and may serve as a translational platform bridging human and animal studies, establishing new therapeutic strategies for neurological disorders.

BackgroundTo systematically evaluate the therapeutic effect of electrical stimulation (ES) on overactive bladder (OB).Method We retrieved information by searching databases from PubMed, CBM-disc, The Cochrane Library, ScienceDirect (from Elsevier publishers) and Springer publishers up to March 2016. We looked for randomized controlled trials that studied ES in OB treatment with subject headings and keywords using literature searches and manual retrieval. References of included studies were reviewed. Literature was screened independently by two investigators according to inclusion and exclusion criteria. After extracting data and evaluating their quality, meta-analysis was undertaken with RevMan v5.2.ResultsTen randomized controlled trials involving 719 patients were included. Meta-analysis results demonstrated ES to have better effects for improving bladder compliance, reducing residual urine, and decreasing the frequency of enuresis in OB patients compared with the control group. ES elicited significantly better effects for diminishing the maximum detrusor pressure in children than in controls, but there was no significant difference in the maximum detrusor pressure between adults and controls. The therapeutic effect of ES combined with other therapies for increasing the maximum bladder capacity was better compared with other therapies alone. No significant difference was noted between ES alone and other therapies alone.ConclusionsBased on current evidence, ES has certain effects on OBs. Severe adverse reactions are not observed. ES is safe, efficacious, and worthy of clinical use.