Biomedical subjects

M Tremaine

Publications and source records attributed to M Tremaine.

4 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2002

Virtual reality-based post-stroke hand rehabilitation.

A VR-based system using a CyberGlove and a Rutgers Master II-ND haptic glove was used to rehabilitate four post-stroke patients in the chronic phase. Each patient had to perform a variety of VR exercises to reduce impairments in their finger range of motion, speed, fractionation and strength. Patients exercised for about two hours per day, five days a week for three weeks. Results showed that three of the patients had gains in thumb range (50-140%) and finger speed (10-15%) over the three weeks trial. All four patients had significant improvement in finger fractionation (40-118%). Gains in finger strength were modest, due in part to an unexpected hardware malfunction. Two of the patients were measured against one-month post intervention and showed good retention. Evaluation using the Jebsen Test of Hand Function showed a reduction of 23-28% in time completion for two of the patients (the ones with the higher degrees of impairment). A prehension task was performed 9-40% faster for three of the patients after the intervention illustrating transfer of their improvement to a functional task.

Aged↗

PubMed2001

Virtual reality-enhanced stroke rehabilitation.

A personal computer (PC)-based desktop virtual reality (VR) system was developed for rehabilitating hand function in stroke patients. The system uses two input devices, a CyberGlove and a Rutgers Master II-ND (RMII) force feedback glove, allowing user interaction with a virtual environment. This consists of four rehabilitation routines, each designed to exercise one specific parameter of hand movement: range, speed, fractionation or strength. The use of performance-based target levels is designed to increase patient motivation and individualize exercise difficulty to a patient's current state. Pilot clinical trials have been performed using the above system combined with noncomputer tasks, such as pegboard insertion or tracing of two-dimensional (2-D) patterns. Three chronic stroke patients used this rehabilitation protocol daily for two weeks. Objective measurements showed that each patient showed improvement on most of the hand parameters over the course of the training. Subjective evaluation by the patients was also positive. This technical report focuses on this newly developed technology for VR rehabilitation.

Aged↗

PubMed1996

Biochemical and mutational analysis of the histidine residues of staphylococcal enterotoxin A.

The goal of this study was to examine the role of histidine residues in the biological activities of staphylococcal enterotoxin A (SEA). Carboxymethylated SEA was unable to stimulate murine T-cell proliferation but was resistant to monkey stomach lavage fluid degradation, suggesting that native conformation was intact. Site-directed mutagenesis of the histidine residues of SEA was subsequently performed. SEA-H44A (SEA with histidine 44 replaced with alanine), SEA-H44D, SEA-H50A, SEA-H50D, SEA-H114A, SEA-H114D, SEA-H187A, and SEA-H187D retained superantigen and emetic activities, whereas SEA-H225A and SEA-H225D were defective in the ability to stimulate T-cell proliferation. These mutants were unable to compete with SEA for binding to Raji cells, suggesting that the defect in SEA-H225A and SEA-H225D is due to impaired major histocompatibility complex class II binding. SEA-H225D provoked an emetic response in monkeys only if fed at high doses, while SEA-H225A did not provoke an emetic response at low or high doses. In comparison, SEA-H61A and SEA-H61D were defective in emetic activity but not in the ability to stimulate murine T-cell proliferation. Overall, these studies show that the carboxy-terminal histidine at residue position 225 of SEA is important for both the superantigen and emetic activities of this enterotoxin. Histidine 61 appears to be important for emetic activity but not for superantigen activity, consistent with the hypothesis that the two activities are separable in staphylococcal enterotoxins.

Animals↗

PubMed1990

Investigation of spontaneously aborted concepti for microbial DNA: investigation for cytomegalovirus DNA using polymerase chain reaction.

Karyotypic analysis of concepti spontaneously aborted in the first trimester shows approximately 50% of these concepti contain abnormal chromosomes. In order to determine whether cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection may play a role in the early loss of pregnancies with either normal or abnormal chromosomes, we have developed an assay to amplify CMV DNA in DNA extracts from spontaneously aborted concepti using the polymerase chain reaction (PCR). Using PCR, we were unable to detect CMV DNA in any of 350 spontaneously aborted concepti. Viral cultures were also negative when 36 of these were tested. Our results suggest that CMV infection is an unlikely cause of pregnancy loss in the first trimester of pregnancy.

Abortion, Spontaneous↗