@article{HeisselPietrekSchwefeletal.2020, author = {Heissel, Andreas and Pietrek, Anou F. and Schwefel, Melanie and Abula, Kahar and Wilbertz, Gregor and Heinzel, Stephan and Rapp, Michael A.}, title = {STEP.De study}, series = {BMJ open}, volume = {10}, journal = {BMJ open}, number = {4}, publisher = {BMJ Publishing Group}, address = {London}, issn = {2044-6055}, doi = {10.1136/bmjopen-2019-036287}, pages = {10}, year = {2020}, abstract = {Introduction Although exercise therapy has widely been shown to be an efficacious treatment modality for depression, evidence for its effectiveness and cost efficiency is lacking. The Sport/Exercise Therapy for Depression study is a multicentre cluster-randomised effectiveness trial that aims to compare the effectiveness and cost efficiency of exercise therapy and psychotherapy as antidepressant treatment.
Methods and analysis 480 patients (aged 18-65) with an International Classification of Diseases diagnosis associated with depressive symptoms are recruited. Up to 30 clusters (psychotherapists) are randomly assigned to allocate patients to either an exercise or a psychotherapy treatment as usual in a 2: 1 ratio. The primary outcome (depressive symptoms) and the secondary outcomes (work and social adjustment, quality of life) will be assessed at six measurement time points (t0: baseline, t1: 8 weeks after treatment initiation, t2: 16 weeks after treatment initiation, t3/ 4/5: 2, 6, 12 months after treatment). Linear regression analyses will be used for the primary endpoint data analysis. For the secondary endpoints, mixed linear and logistic regression models with fixed and random factors will be added. For the cost efficiency analysis, expenditures in the 12 months before and after the intervention and the outcome difference will be compared between groups in a multilevel model. Recruitment start date was 1 July 2018 and the planned recruitment end date is 31 December 2020.
Ethics and dissemination The study protocol was approved by the ethics committee of the University of Potsdam (No. 17/2018) and the Freie Universitat Berlin (No. 206/2018) and registered in the ISRCTN registry. Informed written consent will be obtained from all participants. The study will be reported in accordance with the Consolidated Standards of Reporting Trials and the Recommendations for Interventional Trials statements. The results will be published in peer-reviewed academic journals and disseminated to the public.}, language = {en} } @article{SchulzeMerzThieretal.2022, author = {Schulze, Susanne and Merz, Sibille and Thier, Anne and Tallarek, Marie and K{\"o}nig, Franziska and Uhlenbrock, Greta and N{\"u}bling, Matthias and Lincke, Hans-Joachim and Rapp, Michael A. and Spallek, Jacob and Holmberg, Christine}, title = {Psychosocial burden in nurses working in nursing homes during the Covid-19 pandemic}, series = {BMC health services research}, volume = {22}, journal = {BMC health services research}, number = {1}, publisher = {BMC}, address = {London}, issn = {1472-6963}, doi = {10.1186/s12913-022-08333-3}, pages = {13}, year = {2022}, abstract = {Background The Covid-19 pandemic led to increased work-related strain and psychosocial burden in nurses worldwide, resulting in high prevalences of mental health problems. Nurses in long-term care facilities seem to be especially affected by the pandemic. Nevertheless, there are few findings indicating possible positive changes for health care workers. Therefore, we investigated which psychosocial burdens and potential positive aspects nurses working in long-term care facilities experience during the Covid-19 pandemic. Methods We conducted a mixed-methods study among nurses and nursing assistants working in nursing homes in Germany. The survey contained the third German version of the Copenhagen Psychosocial Questionnaire (COPSOQ III). Using Welch's t-tests, we compared the COPSOQ results of our sample against a pre-pandemic reference group of geriatric nurses from Germany. Additionally, we conducted semi-structured interviews with geriatric nurses with a special focus on psychosocial stress, to reach a deeper understanding of their experiences on work-related changes and burdens during the pandemic. Data were analysed using thematic coding (Braun and Clarke). Results Our survey sample (n = 177) differed significantly from the pre-pandemic reference group in 14 out of 31 COPSOQ scales. Almost all of these differences indicated negative changes. Our sample scored significantly worse regarding the scales 'quantitative demands', 'hiding emotions', 'work-privacy conflicts', 'role conflicts', 'quality of leadership', 'support at work', 'recognition', 'physical demands', 'intention to leave profession', 'burnout', 'presenteeism' and 'inability to relax'. The interviews (n = 15) revealed six main themes related to nurses' psychosocial stress: 'overall working conditions', 'concern for residents', 'management of relatives', 'inability to provide terminal care', 'tensions between being infected and infecting others' and 'technicisation of care'. 'Enhanced community cohesion' (interviews), 'meaning of work' and 'quantity of social relations' (COPSOQ III) were identified as positive effects of the pandemic. Conclusions Results clearly illustrate an aggravation of geriatric nurses' situation and psychosocial burden and only few positive changes due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Pre-existing hardships seem to have further deteriorated and new stressors added to nurses' strain. The perceived erosion of care, due to an overemphasis of the technical in relation to the social and emotional dimensions of care, seems to be especially burdensome to geriatric nurses.}, language = {en} } @article{YeZhangWarbyetal.2022, author = {Ye, Fangyuan and Zhang, Shuo and Warby, Jonathan and Wu, Jiawei and Gutierrez-Partida, Emilio and Lang, Felix and Shah, Sahil and Saglamkaya, Elifnaz and Sun, Bowen and Zu, Fengshuo and Shoaee, Safa and Wang, Haifeng and Stiller, Burkhard and Neher, Dieter and Zhu, Wei-Hong and Stolterfoht, Martin and Wu, Yongzhen}, title = {Overcoming C-60-induced interfacial recombination in inverted perovskite solar cells by electron-transporting carborane}, series = {Nature Communications}, volume = {13}, journal = {Nature Communications}, number = {1}, publisher = {Nature Publishing Group}, address = {London}, issn = {2041-1723}, doi = {10.1038/s41467-022-34203-x}, pages = {12}, year = {2022}, abstract = {Inverted perovskite solar cells still suffer from significant non-radiative recombination losses at the perovskite surface and across the perovskite/C-60 interface, limiting the future development of perovskite-based single- and multi-junction photovoltaics. Therefore, more effective inter- or transport layers are urgently required. To tackle these recombination losses, we introduce ortho-carborane as an interlayer material that has a spherical molecular structure and a three-dimensional aromaticity. Based on a variety of experimental techniques, we show that ortho-carborane decorated with phenylamino groups effectively passivates the perovskite surface and essentially eliminates the non-radiative recombination loss across the perovskite/C-60 interface with high thermal stability. We further demonstrate the potential of carborane as an electron transport material, facilitating electron extraction while blocking holes from the interface. The resulting inverted perovskite solar cells deliver a power conversion efficiency of over 23\% with a low non-radiative voltage loss of 110mV, and retain >97\% of the initial efficiency after 400h of maximum power point tracking. Overall, the designed carborane based interlayer simultaneously enables passivation, electron-transport and hole-blocking and paves the way toward more efficient and stable perovskite solar cells. Effective transport layers are essential to suppress non-radiative recombination losses. Here, the authors introduce phenylamino-functionalized ortho-carborane as an interfacial layer, and realise inverted perovskite solar cells with efficiency of over 23\% and operational stability of T97=400h.}, language = {en} } @article{FoerstnerBoettgerMoldavskietal.2023, author = {F{\"o}rstner, Bernd Rainer and B{\"o}ttger, Sarah Jane and Moldavski, Alexander and Bajbouj, Malek and Pfennig, Andrea and Manook, Andre and Ising, Marcus and Pittig, Andre and Heinig, Ingmar and Heinz, Andreas and Mathiak, Klaus and Schulze, Thomas G. and Schneider, Frank and Kamp-Becker, Inge and Meyer-Lindenberg, Andreas and Padberg, Frank and Banaschewski, Tobias and Bauer, Michael and Rupprecht, Rainer and Wittchen, Hans-Ulrich and Rapp, Michael A. and Tschorn, Mira}, title = {The associations of positive and negative valence systems, cognitive systems and social processes on disease severity in anxiety and depressive disorders}, series = {Frontiers in psychiatry}, volume = {14}, journal = {Frontiers in psychiatry}, publisher = {Frontiers Research Foundation}, address = {Lausanne}, issn = {1664-0640}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyt.2023.1161097}, pages = {10}, year = {2023}, abstract = {Background Anxiety and depressive disorders share common features of mood dysfunctions. This has stimulated interest in transdiagnostic dimensional research as proposed by the Research Domain Criteria (RDoC) approach by the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) aiming to improve the understanding of underlying disease mechanisms. The purpose of this study was to investigate the processing of RDoC domains in relation to disease severity in order to identify latent disorder-specific as well as transdiagnostic indicators of disease severity in patients with anxiety and depressive disorders. Methods Within the German research network for mental disorders, 895 participants (n = 476 female, n = 602 anxiety disorder, n = 257 depressive disorder) were recruited for the Phenotypic, Diagnostic and Clinical Domain Assessment Network Germany (PD-CAN) and included in this cross-sectional study. We performed incremental regression models to investigate the association of four RDoC domains on disease severity in patients with affective disorders: Positive (PVS) and Negative Valance System (NVS), Cognitive Systems (CS) and Social Processes (SP). Results The results confirmed a transdiagnostic relationship for all four domains, as we found significant main effects on disease severity within domain-specific models (PVS: \& beta; = -0.35; NVS: \& beta; = 0.39; CS: \& beta; = -0.12; SP: \& beta; = -0.32). We also found three significant interaction effects with main diagnosis showing a disease-specific association. Limitations The cross-sectional study design prevents causal conclusions. Further limitations include possible outliers and heteroskedasticity in all regression models which we appropriately controlled for. Conclusion Our key results show that symptom burden in anxiety and depressive disorders is associated with latent RDoC indicators in transdiagnostic and disease-specific ways.}, language = {en} } @misc{SeboldGarbusowNebeetal.2018, author = {Sebold, Miriam and Garbusow, Maria and Nebe, S. and Sundmacher, L. and Kuitunen-Paul, S{\"o}ren and Wittchen, H. U. and Smolka, M. and Zimmermann, U. and Rapp, Michael A. and Huys, Q. and Schlagenhauf, Florian and Heinz, A.}, title = {From goals to habits in alcohol dependence}, series = {European psychiatry : the journal of the Association of European Psychiatrists}, volume = {48}, journal = {European psychiatry : the journal of the Association of European Psychiatrists}, publisher = {Elsevier}, address = {Paris}, issn = {0924-9338}, pages = {S274 -- S274}, year = {2018}, language = {en} } @article{GarbusowNebeSommeretal.2019, author = {Garbusow, Maria and Nebe, Stephan and Sommer, Christian and Kuitunen-Paul, S{\"o}ren and Sebold, Miriam and Schad, Daniel and Friedel, Eva and Veer, Ilya M. and Wittchen, Hans-Ulrich and Rapp, Michael A. and Ripke, Stephan and Walter, Henrik and Huys, Quentin J. M. and Schlagenhauf, Florian and Smolka, Michael N. and Heinz, Andreas}, title = {Pavlovian-To-Instrumental Transfer and Alcohol Consumption in Young Male Social Drinkers}, series = {Journal of Clinical Medicine}, volume = {8}, journal = {Journal of Clinical Medicine}, number = {8}, publisher = {MDPI}, address = {Basel}, issn = {2077-0383}, doi = {10.3390/jcm8081188}, pages = {14}, year = {2019}, abstract = {In animals and humans, behavior can be influenced by irrelevant stimuli, a phenomenon called Pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer (PIT). In subjects with substance use disorder, PIT is even enhanced with functional activation in the nucleus accumbens (NAcc) and amygdala. While we observed enhanced behavioral and neural PIT effects in alcohol-dependent subjects, we here aimed to determine whether behavioral PIT is enhanced in young men with high-risk compared to low-risk drinking and subsequently related functional activation in an a-priori region of interest encompassing the NAcc and amygdala and related to polygenic risk for alcohol consumption. A representative sample of 18-year old men (n = 1937) was contacted: 445 were screened, 209 assessed: resulting in 191 valid behavioral, 139 imaging and 157 genetic datasets. None of the subjects fulfilled criteria for alcohol dependence according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders-IV-TextRevision (DSM-IV-TR). We measured how instrumental responding for rewards was influenced by background Pavlovian conditioned stimuli predicting action-independent rewards and losses. Behavioral PIT was enhanced in high-compared to low-risk drinkers (b = 0.09, SE = 0.03, z = 2.7, p < 0.009). Across all subjects, we observed PIT-related neural blood oxygen level-dependent (BOLD) signal in the right amygdala (t = 3.25, p(SVC) = 0.04, x = 26, y = -6, z = -12), but not in NAcc. The strength of the behavioral PIT effect was positively correlated with polygenic risk for alcohol consumption (r(s) = 0.17, p = 0.032). We conclude that behavioral PIT and polygenic risk for alcohol consumption might be a biomarker for a subclinical phenotype of risky alcohol consumption, even if no drug-related stimulus is present. The association between behavioral PIT effects and the amygdala might point to habitual processes related to out PIT task. In non-dependent young social drinkers, the amygdala rather than the NAcc is activated during PIT; possible different involvement in association with disease trajectory should be investigated in future studies.}, language = {en} } @article{JacobRappKostev2017, author = {Jacob, Louis and Rapp, Michael A. and Kostev, Karel}, title = {Long-term use of benzodiazepines in older patients in Germany}, series = {Therapeutic Advances in Psychopharmacology}, volume = {7}, journal = {Therapeutic Advances in Psychopharmacology}, number = {6/7}, publisher = {Sage Publ.}, address = {London}, issn = {2045-1253}, doi = {10.1177/2045125317696454}, pages = {191 -- 200}, year = {2017}, abstract = {Background: The purpose of this study was to analyze the prevalence of long-term benzodiazepine use in older adults treated in general and neuropsychiatric practices in Germany. Methods: This study included 32,182 patients over the age of 65 years who received benzodiazepine prescriptions for the first time between January 2010 and December 2014 in general and neuropsychiatric practices in Germany. Follow up lasted until July 2016. The main outcome measure was the proportion of patients treated with benzodiazepines for >6 months. Results: The proportion of patients with benzodiazepine therapy for >6 months increased with age (65-70 years: 12.3\%; 71-80 years: 15.5\%; 81-90 years: 23.7\%; >90 years: 31.6\%) but did not differ significantly between men (15.5\%) and women (17.1\%). The proportion of patients who received benzodiazepines for >6 months was higher among those with sleep disorders (21.1\%), depression (20.8\%) and dementia (32.1\%) than among those with anxiety (15.5\%). By contrast, this proportion was lower among people diagnosed with adjustment disorders (7.7\%) and back pain (3.8\%). Conclusion: Overall, long-term use of benzodiazepines is common in older people, particularly in patients over the age of 80 and in those diagnosed with dementia, sleep disorders, or depression.}, language = {en} } @article{SeboldChenOenaletal.2022, author = {Sebold, Miriam and Chen, Hao and {\"O}nal, Aleyna and Kuitunen-Paul, S{\"o}ren and Mojtahedzadeh, Negin and Garbusow, Maria and Nebe, Stephan and Wittchen, Hans-Ulrich and Huys, Quentin J. M. and Schlagenhauf, Florian and Rapp, Michael A. and Smolka, Michael N. and Heinz, Andreas}, title = {Stronger prejudices are associated with decreased model-based control}, series = {Frontiers in psychology}, volume = {12}, journal = {Frontiers in psychology}, publisher = {Frontiers Research Foundation}, address = {Lausanne}, issn = {1664-1078}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2021.767022}, pages = {10}, year = {2022}, abstract = {Background: Prejudices against minorities can be understood as habitually negative evaluations that are kept in spite of evidence to the contrary. Therefore, individuals with strong prejudices might be dominated by habitual or "automatic" reactions at the expense of more controlled reactions. Computational theories suggest individual differences in the balance between habitual/model-free and deliberative/model-based decision-making. Methods: 127 subjects performed the two Step task and completed the blatant and subtle prejudice scale. Results: By using analyses of choices and reaction times in combination with computational modeling, subjects with stronger blatant prejudices showed a shift away from model-based control. There was no association between these decision-making processes and subtle prejudices. Conclusion: These results support the idea that blatant prejudices toward minorities are related to a relative dominance of habitual decision-making. This finding has important implications for developing interventions that target to change prejudices across societies.}, language = {en} } @article{JaraMunozMelnickLietal.2022, author = {Jara Mu{\~n}oz, Julius and Melnick, Daniel and Li, Shaoyang and Socquet, Anne and Cort{\´e}s-Aranda, Joaqu{\´i}n and Brill, Dominik and Strecker, Manfred}, title = {The cryptic seismic potential of the Pichilemu blind fault in Chile revealed by off-fault geomorphology}, series = {Nature Communications}, volume = {13}, journal = {Nature Communications}, publisher = {Springer Nature}, address = {London}, issn = {2041-1723}, doi = {10.1038/s41467-022-30754-1}, pages = {13}, year = {2022}, abstract = {The first step towards assessing hazards in seismically active regions involves mapping capable faults and estimating their recurrence times. While the mapping of active faults is commonly based on distinct geologic and geomorphic features evident at the surface, mapping blind seismogenic faults is complicated by the absence of on-fault diagnostic features. Here we investigated the Pichilemu Fault in coastal Chile, unknown until it generated a Mw 7.0 earthquake in 2010. The lack of evident surface faulting suggests activity along a partly-hidden blind fault. We used off-fault deformed marine terraces to estimate a fault-slip rate of 0.52 ± 0.04 m/ka, which, when integrated with satellite geodesy suggests a 2.12 ± 0.2 ka recurrence time for Mw~7.0 normal-faulting earthquakes. We propose that extension in the Pichilemu region is associated with stress changes during megathrust earthquakes and accommodated by sporadic slip during upper-plate earthquakes, which has implications for assessing the seismic potential of cryptic faults along convergent margins and elsewhere.}, language = {en} } @article{JoziNajafabadiHaberlandRybergetal.2021, author = {Jozi Najafabadi, Azam and Haberland, Christian and Ryberg, Trond and Verwater, Vincent F. and Breton, Eline le and Handy, Mark R. and Weber, Michael}, title = {Relocation of earthquakes in the southern and eastern Alps (Austria, Italy) recorded by the dense, temporary SWATH-D network using a Markov chain Monte Carlo inversion}, series = {Solid earth : SE ; an interaktive open access journal of the European Geosciences Union}, volume = {12}, journal = {Solid earth : SE ; an interaktive open access journal of the European Geosciences Union}, number = {5}, publisher = {Copernicus}, address = {G{\"o}ttingen}, organization = {AlpArray Working Grp, AlpArray SWATH-D Working Grp}, issn = {1869-9529}, doi = {10.5194/se-12-1087-2021}, pages = {1087 -- 1109}, year = {2021}, abstract = {In this study, we analyzed a large seismological dataset from temporary and permanent networks in the southern and eastern Alps to establish high-precision hypocenters and 1-D V-P and V-P/V-S models. The waveform data of a subset of local earthquakes with magnitudes in the range of 1-4.2 M-L were recorded by the dense, temporary SWATH-D network and selected stations of the AlpArray network between September 2017 and the end of 2018. The first arrival times of P and S waves of earthquakes are determined by a semi-automatic procedure. We applied a Markov chain Monte Carlo inversion method to simultaneously calculate robust hypocenters, a 1-D velocity model, and station corrections without prior assumptions, such as initial velocity models or earthquake locations. A further advantage of this method is the derivation of the model parameter uncertainties and noise levels of the data. The precision estimates of the localization procedure is checked by inverting a synthetic travel time dataset from a complex 3-D velocity model and by using the real stations and earthquakes geometry. The location accuracy is further investigated by a quarry blast test. The average uncertainties of the locations of the earthquakes are below 500m in their epicenter and similar to 1.7 km in depth. The earthquake distribution reveals seismicity in the upper crust (0-20 km), which is characterized by pronounced clusters along the Alpine frontal thrust, e.g., the Friuli-Venetia (FV) region, the Giudicarie-Lessini (GL) and Schio-Vicenza domains, the Austroalpine nappes, and the Inntal area. Some seismicity also occurs along the Periadriatic Fault. The general pattern of seismicity reflects head-on convergence of the Adriatic indenter with the Alpine orogenic crust. The seismicity in the FV and GL regions is deeper than the modeled frontal thrusts, which we interpret as indication for southward propagation of the southern Alpine deformation front (blind thrusts).}, language = {en} } @article{KlausMuellervanWickerenetal.2022, author = {Klaus, Benita and M{\"u}ller, Patrick and van Wickeren, Nora and Dordevic, Milos and Schmicker, Marlen and Zdunczyk, Yael and Brigadski, Tanja and Lessmann, Volkmar and Vielhaber, Stefan and Schreiber, Stefanie and M{\"u}ller, Notger Germar}, title = {Structural and functional brain alterations in patients with myasthenia gravis}, series = {Brain communications}, volume = {4}, journal = {Brain communications}, number = {1}, publisher = {Oxford Univ. Press}, address = {Oxford}, issn = {2632-1297}, doi = {10.1093/braincomms/fcac018}, pages = {12}, year = {2022}, abstract = {Myasthenia gravis is an autoimmune disease affecting neuromuscular transmission and causing skeletal muscle weakness. Additionally, systemic inflammation, cognitive deficits and autonomic dysfunction have been described. However, little is known about myasthenia gravis-related reorganization of the brain. In this study, we thus investigated the structural and functional brain changes in myasthenia gravis patients. Eleven myasthenia gravis patients (age: 70.64 +/- 9.27; 11 males) were compared to age-, sex- and education-matched healthy controls (age: 70.18 +/- 8.98; 11 males). Most of the patients (n = 10, 0.91\%) received cholinesterase inhibitors. Structural brain changes were determined by applying voxel-based morphometry using high-resolution T-1-weighted sequences. Functional brain changes were assessed with a neuropsychological test battery (including attention, memory and executive functions), a spatial orientation task and brain-derived neurotrophic factor blood levels. Myasthenia gravis patients showed significant grey matter volume reductions in the cingulate gyrus, in the inferior parietal lobe and in the fusiform gyrus. Furthermore, myasthenia gravis patients showed significantly lower performance in executive functions, working memory (Spatial Span, P = 0.034, d = 1.466), verbal episodic memory (P = 0.003, d = 1.468) and somatosensory-related spatial orientation (Triangle Completion Test, P = 0.003, d = 1.200). Additionally, serum brain-derived neurotrophic factor levels were significantly higher in myasthenia gravis patients (P = 0.001, d = 2.040). Our results indicate that myasthenia gravis is associated with structural and functional brain alterations. Especially the grey matter volume changes in the cingulate gyrus and the inferior parietal lobe could be associated with cognitive deficits in memory and executive functions. Furthermore, deficits in somatosensory-related spatial orientation could be associated with the lower volumes in the inferior parietal lobe. Future research is needed to replicate these findings independently in a larger sample and to investigate the underlying mechanisms in more detail. Klaus et al. compared myasthenia gravis patients to matched healthy control subjects and identified functional alterations in memory functions as well as structural alterations in the cingulate gyrus, in the inferior parietal lobe and in the fusiform gyrus.}, language = {en} } @article{MenzeMuellerZaehleetal.2023, author = {Menze, Inga and M{\"u}ller, Notger Germar and Z{\"a}hle, Tino and Schmicker, Marlen}, title = {Individual response to transcranial direct current stimulation as a function of working memory capacity and electrode montage}, series = {Frontiers in human neuroscience}, volume = {17}, journal = {Frontiers in human neuroscience}, publisher = {Frontiers Media}, address = {Lausanne}, issn = {1662-5161}, doi = {10.3389/fnhum.2023.1134632}, pages = {14}, year = {2023}, abstract = {Introduction Attempts to improve cognitive abilities via transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) have led to ambiguous results, likely due to the method's susceptibility to methodological and inter-individual factors. Conventional tDCS, i.e., using an active electrode over brain areas associated with the targeted cognitive function and a supposedly passive reference, neglects stimulation effects on entire neural networks. Methods We investigated the advantage of frontoparietal network stimulation (right prefrontal anode, left posterior parietal cathode) against conventional and sham tDCS in modulating working memory (WM) capacity dependent transfer effects of a single-session distractor inhibition (DIIN) training. Since previous results did not clarify whether electrode montage drives this individual transfer, we here compared conventional to frontoparietal and sham tDCS and reanalyzed data of 124 young, healthy participants in a more robust way using linear mixed effect modeling. Results The interaction of electrode montage and WM capacity resulted in systematic differences in transfer effects. While higher performance gains were observed with increasing WM capacity in the frontoparietal stimulation group, low WM capacity individuals benefited more in the sham condition. The conventional stimulation group showed subtle performance gains independent of WM capacity. Discussion Our results confirm our previous findings of WM capacity dependent transfer effects on WM by a single-session DIIN training combined with tDCS and additionally highlight the pivotal role of the specific electrode montage. WM capacity dependent differences in frontoparietal network recruitment, especially regarding the parietal involvement, are assumed to underlie this observation.}, language = {en} } @article{MenzeMuellerMuelleretal.2022, author = {Menze, Inga and M{\"u}ller, Patrick and M{\"u}ller, Notger Germar and Schmicker, Marlen}, title = {Age-related cognitive effects of the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions and associated mental health changes in Germans}, series = {Scientific reports}, volume = {12}, journal = {Scientific reports}, number = {1}, publisher = {Nature portfolio}, address = {Berlin}, issn = {2045-2322}, doi = {10.1038/s41598-022-11283-9}, pages = {16}, year = {2022}, abstract = {Restrictive means to reduce the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic have not only imposed broad challenges on mental health but might also affect cognitive health. Here we asked how restriction-related changes influence cognitive performance and how age, perceived loneliness, depressiveness and affectedness by restrictions contribute to these effects. 51 Germans completed three assessments of an online based study during the first lockdown in Germany (April 2020), a month later, and during the beginning of the second lockdown (November 2020). Participants completed nine online cognitive tasks of the MyBrainTraining and online questionnaires about their perceived strain and impact on lifestyle factors by the situation (affectedness), perceived loneliness, depressiveness as well as subjective cognitive performance. The results suggested a possible negative impact of depressiveness and affectedness on objective cognitive performance within the course of the lockdown. The younger the participants, the more pronounced these effects were. Loneliness and depressiveness moreover contributed to a worse evaluation of subjective cognition. In addition, especially younger individuals reported increased distress. As important educational and social input has partly been scarce during this pandemic and mental health problems have increased, future research should also assess cognitive long-term consequences.}, language = {en} } @article{ZielhoferSchmidtReicheetal.2022, author = {Zielhofer, Christoph and Schmidt, Johannes and Reiche, Niklas and Tautenhahn, Marie and Ballasus, Helen and Burkart, Michael and Linst{\"a}dter, Anja and Dietze, Elisabeth and Kaiser, Knut and Mehler, Natascha}, title = {The lower Havel River Region (Brandenburg, Germany)}, series = {Water}, volume = {14}, journal = {Water}, number = {3}, publisher = {MDPI}, address = {Basel}, issn = {2073-4441}, doi = {10.3390/w14030480}, pages = {23}, year = {2022}, abstract = {Instrumental data show that the groundwater and lake levels in Northeast Germany have decreased over the past decades, and this process has accelerated over the past few years. In addition to global warming, the direct influence of humans on the local water balance is suspected to be the cause. Since the instrumental data usually go back only a few decades, little is known about the multidecadal to centennial-scale trend, which also takes long-term climate variation and the long-term influence by humans on the water balance into account. This study aims to quantitatively reconstruct the surface water areas in the Lower Havel Inner Delta and of adjacent Lake Gulpe in Brandenburg. The analysis includes the calculation of surface water areas from historical and modern maps from 1797 to 2020. The major finding is that surface water areas have decreased by approximately 30\% since the pre-industrial period, with the decline being continuous. Our data show that the comprehensive measures in Lower Havel hydro-engineering correspond with groundwater lowering that started before recent global warming. Further, large-scale melioration measures with increasing water demands in the upstream wetlands beginning from the 1960s to the 1980s may have amplified the decline in downstream surface water areas.}, language = {en} } @article{RingEisenmannKandiletal.2022, author = {Ring, Raphaela M. and Eisenmann, Clemens and Kandil, Farid and Steckhan, Nico and Demmrich, Sarah and Klatte, Caroline and Kessler, Christian S. and Jeitler, Michael and Boschmann, Michael and Michalsen, Andreas and Blakeslee, Sarah B. and St{\"o}ckigt, Barbara and Stritter, Wiebke and Koppold-Liebscher, Daniela A.}, title = {Mental and behavioural responses to Bah{\´a}'{\´i} fasting: Looking behind the scenes of a religiously motivated intermittent fast using a mixed methods approach}, series = {Nutrients}, volume = {14}, journal = {Nutrients}, number = {5}, publisher = {MDPI}, address = {Basel}, issn = {2072-6643}, doi = {10.3390/nu14051038}, pages = {23}, year = {2022}, abstract = {Background/Objective: Historically, fasting has been practiced not only for medical but also for religious reasons. Baha'is follow an annual religious intermittent dry fast of 19 days. We inquired into motivation behind and subjective health impacts of Baha'i fasting. Methods: A convergent parallel mixed methods design was embedded in a clinical single arm observational study. Semi-structured individual interviews were conducted before (n = 7), during (n = 8), and after fasting (n = 8). Three months after the fasting period, two focus group interviews were conducted (n = 5/n = 3). A total of 146 Baha'i volunteers answered an online survey at five time points before, during, and after fasting. Results: Fasting was found to play a central role for the religiosity of interviewees, implying changes in daily structures, spending time alone, engaging in religious practices, and experiencing social belonging. Results show an increase in mindfulness and well-being, which were accompanied by behavioural changes and experiences of self-efficacy and inner freedom. Survey scores point to an increase in mindfulness and well-being during fasting, while stress, anxiety, and fatigue decreased. Mindfulness remained elevated even three months after the fast. Conclusion: Baha'i fasting seems to enhance participants' mindfulness and well-being, lowering stress levels and reducing fatigue. Some of these effects lasted more than three months after fasting.}, language = {en} } @article{DeFreitasJohnsonGoldenetal.2021, author = {De Freitas, Jessica K. and Johnson, Kipp W. and Golden, Eddye and Nadkarni, Girish N. and Dudley, Joel T. and B{\"o}ttinger, Erwin and Glicksberg, Benjamin S. and Miotto, Riccardo}, title = {Phe2vec}, series = {Patterns}, volume = {2}, journal = {Patterns}, number = {9}, publisher = {Elsevier}, address = {Amsterdam}, issn = {2666-3899}, doi = {10.1016/j.patter.2021.100337}, pages = {9}, year = {2021}, abstract = {Robust phenotyping of patients from electronic health records (EHRs) at scale is a challenge in clinical informatics. Here, we introduce Phe2vec, an automated framework for disease phenotyping from EHRs based on unsupervised learning and assess its effectiveness against standard rule-based algorithms from Phenotype KnowledgeBase (PheKB). Phe2vec is based on pre-computing embeddings of medical concepts and patients' clinical history. Disease phenotypes are then derived from a seed concept and its neighbors in the embedding space. Patients are linked to a disease if their embedded representation is close to the disease phenotype. Comparing Phe2vec and PheKB cohorts head-to-head using chart review, Phe2vec performed on par or better in nine out of ten diseases. Differently from other approaches, it can scale to any condition and was validated against widely adopted expert-based standards. Phe2vec aims to optimize clinical informatics research by augmenting current frameworks to characterize patients by condition and derive reliable disease cohorts.}, language = {en} } @article{GrdseloffBouldayRoedeletal.2023, author = {Grdseloff, Nastasja and Boulday, Gwenola and Roedel, Claudia J. and Otten, Cecile and Vannier, Daphne Raphaelle and Cardoso, Cecile and Faurobert, Eva and Dogra, Deepika and Tournier-Lasserve, Elisabeth and Abdelilah-Seyfried, Salim}, title = {Impaired retinoic acid signaling in cerebral cavernous malformations}, series = {Scientific reports}, volume = {13}, journal = {Scientific reports}, number = {1}, publisher = {Nature Portfolio}, address = {Berlin}, issn = {2045-2322}, doi = {10.1038/s41598-023-31905-0}, pages = {11}, year = {2023}, abstract = {The capillary-venous pathology cerebral cavernous malformation (CCM) is caused by loss of CCM1/Krev interaction trapped protein 1 (KRIT1), CCM2/MGC4607, or CCM3/PDCD10 in some endothelial cells. Mutations of CCM genes within the brain vasculature can lead to recurrent cerebral hemorrhages. Pharmacological treatment options are urgently needed when lesions are located in deeply-seated and in-operable regions of the central nervous system. Previous pharmacological suppression screens in disease models of CCM led to the discovery that treatment with retinoic acid improved CCM phenotypes. This finding raised a need to investigate the involvement of retinoic acid in CCM and test whether it has a curative effect in preclinical mouse models. Here, we show that components of the retinoic acid synthesis and degradation pathway are transcriptionally misregulated across disease models of CCM. We complemented this analysis by pharmacologically modifying retinoic acid levels in zebrafish and human endothelial cell models of CCM, and in acute and chronic mouse models of CCM. Our pharmacological intervention studies in CCM2-depleted human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs) and krit1 mutant zebrafish showed positive effects when retinoic acid levels were increased. However, therapeutic approaches to prevent the development of vascular lesions in adult chronic murine models of CCM were drug regiment-sensitive, possibly due to adverse developmental effects of this hormone. A treatment with high doses of retinoic acid even worsened CCM lesions in an adult chronic murine model of CCM. This study provides evidence that retinoic acid signaling is impaired in the CCM pathophysiology and suggests that modification of retinoic acid levels can alleviate CCM phenotypes.}, language = {en} } @article{SmithBoers2023, author = {Smith, Taylor and Boers, Niklas}, title = {Global vegetation resilience linked to water availability and variability}, series = {Nature Communications}, volume = {14}, journal = {Nature Communications}, number = {1}, publisher = {Springer Nature}, address = {London}, issn = {2041-1723}, doi = {10.1038/s41467-023-36207-7}, pages = {11}, year = {2023}, abstract = {Quantifying the resilience of vegetated ecosystems is key to constraining both present-day and future global impacts of anthropogenic climate change. Here we apply both empirical and theoretical resilience metrics to remotely-sensed vegetation data in order to examine the role of water availability and variability in controlling vegetation resilience at the global scale. We find a concise global relationship where vegetation resilience is greater in regions with higher water availability. We also reveal that resilience is lower in regions with more pronounced inter-annual precipitation variability, but find less concise relationships between vegetation resilience and intra-annual precipitation variability. Our results thus imply that the resilience of vegetation responds differently to water deficits at varying time scales. In view of projected increases in precipitation variability, our findings highlight the risk of ecosystem degradation under ongoing climate change. Vegetation dynamics depend on both the amount of precipitation and its variability over time. Here, the authors show that vegetation resilience is greater where water availability is higher and where precipitation is more stable from year to year.}, language = {en} } @article{FalkenhagenKnoechelKloftetal.2023, author = {Falkenhagen, Undine and Kn{\"o}chel, Jane and Kloft, Charlotte and Huisinga, Wilhelm}, title = {Deriving mechanism-based pharmacodynamic models by reducing quantitative systems pharmacology models}, series = {CPT: Pharmacometrics \& Systems Pharmacology}, volume = {12}, journal = {CPT: Pharmacometrics \& Systems Pharmacology}, number = {4}, publisher = {Wiley}, address = {Hoboken}, issn = {2163-8306}, doi = {10.1002/psp4.12903}, pages = {432 -- 443}, year = {2023}, abstract = {Quantitative systems pharmacology (QSP) models integrate comprehensive qualitative and quantitative knowledge about pharmacologically relevant processes. We previously proposed a first approach to leverage the knowledge in QSP models to derive simpler, mechanism-based pharmacodynamic (PD) models. Their complexity, however, is typically still too large to be used in the population analysis of clinical data. Here, we extend the approach beyond state reduction to also include the simplification of reaction rates, elimination of reactions, and analytic solutions. We additionally ensure that the reduced model maintains a prespecified approximation quality not only for a reference individual but also for a diverse virtual population. We illustrate the extended approach for the warfarin effect on blood coagulation. Using the model-reduction approach, we derive a novel small-scale warfarin/international normalized ratio model and demonstrate its suitability for biomarker identification. Due to the systematic nature of the approach in comparison with empirical model building, the proposed model-reduction algorithm provides an improved rationale to build PD models also from QSP models in other applications.}, language = {en} } @article{MorenoRomeroProbstTrindadeetal.2020, author = {Moreno-Romero, Jordi and Probst, Aline V. and Trindade, In{\^e}s and Kalyanikrishna, and Engelhorn, Julia and Farrona, Sara}, title = {Looking At the Past and Heading to the Future}, series = {Frontiers in Plant Science}, volume = {10}, journal = {Frontiers in Plant Science}, number = {1795}, publisher = {Frontiers Media}, address = {Lausanne}, issn = {1664-462X}, doi = {10.3389/fpls.2019.01795}, pages = {1 -- 12}, year = {2020}, abstract = {In June 2019, more than a hundred plant researchers met in Cologne, Germany, for the 6th European Workshop on Plant Chromatin (EWPC). This conference brought together a highly dynamic community of researchers with the common aim to understand how chromatin organization controls gene expression, development, and plant responses to the environment. New evidence showing how epigenetic states are set, perpetuated, and inherited were presented, and novel data related to the three-dimensional organization of chromatin within the nucleus were discussed. At the level of the nucleosome, its composition by different histone variants and their specialized histone deposition complexes were addressed as well as the mechanisms involved in histone post-translational modifications and their role in gene expression. The keynote lecture on plant DNA methylation by Julie Law (SALK Institute) and the tribute session to Lars Hennig, honoring the memory of one of the founders of the EWPC who contributed to promote the plant chromatin and epigenetic field in Europe, added a very special note to this gathering. In this perspective article we summarize some of the most outstanding data and advances on plant chromatin research presented at this workshop.}, language = {en} }