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Splitting and Dissociation in Schizophrenia
Pěč, Ondřej ; Raboch, Jiří (advisor) ; Šípek, Jiří (referee) ; Kocourková, Jana (referee)
The term splitting is defined as a process of formation of mental aggregates linked incompatible experiences producing numerous divisions in mental apparatus. Current findings indicate that psychological splitting in schizophrenia is likely specifically presented on a neural level as disrupted organization in neural communication. This disrupted neural communication likely underlies deficits in mental processing described by various neuroscientific concepts such as theories of disturbed connectivity, corollary discharges and dynamic complexity. In this context, a purpose of the theoretical part of the dissertation is to describe basic neuroscience theories that complementarily reflect interrelated processes between mind and brain underlying disturbances of mental integration that likely present a neural representation of the splitting. A purpose of the first part of the empirical research was to examine relationships between psychological process of splitting and disturbed cognitive and affective functions in schizophrenia. A sample of patients with borderline personality disorder (BPD) was used as a control group in this study. Methods: In the clinical study, we have assessed 30 patients with schizophrenia and 35 patients with BPD. The symptoms of splitting were measured using self- reported...
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Study of disassembly/reassembly mechanisms of ferritin protein cages and their utilization in nanomedicine
Krausová, Kateřina ; Fohlerová, Zdenka (referee) ; Heger, Zbyněk (advisor)
Diploma thesis deals with the study of dissociation and reassociation of ferritin protein cages and their use in nanomedicine. Most studies that are focused on targeted transport of pharmaceuticals using ferritin cages work with horse spleen ferritin. It is, however, its origin, which leads to increasingly frequent questions about possible immunogenicity in the patient's organism, which also provides the main motivation to test the possibility of encapsulation of low-molecular drugs into ferritins originating from alternative organisms. In the practical part the method for the study of dissociation was experimentally designed. Native polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis was used to study dissociation of equine ferritin composed of different subunit, human ferritin, and archeal Pyrococcus furiosus ferritin. The obtained subunit dissociation results were used to encapsulate the low molecular chemotherapeutic drug doxorubicin and for further characterization of the ferritin-doxorubicin complex. The efficacy of the designed nanoformulations has been verified in the treatment of malignant breast cancer. Human ferritin proves to be the optimal one. Its composition of heavy subunits corresponds to a lower protein stability, thus a more efficient opening of the structure and consequent encapsulation of the cytostatics occurs. With its 60% encapsulation efficiency of doxorubicin, low polydispersity index, effective cytotoxicity of ferritin-doxorubicin complex and minimal risk of immune response to the patient's organism, human ferritin achieves better results than commonly used horse spleen ferritin.
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Interaction of weak polyelectrolytes with multivaltent ions
Staňo, Roman ; Košovan, Peter (advisor) ; Heyda, Jan (referee)
By means of molecular simulations, we study dissociative behavior of weak polyacids with added mutlivalent salt. Weak polyacids are macromolecules that bear weak acid groups, therefore, their ionization varies with pH. The titration curve of such an acid deviates from the ideal one - its ionization is suppressed because of the strong repulsion between charged groups on the polyacid contour. The presence of salt in solution of a polyacid enhances the ionzation due to the effects of electrostatic screening and counterion condensation. Up to now, the influence of the salt valency on the weak polyacid ionization has not been explored, although it plays an important role in biological processes. In this thesis, we examine weak polyacid solutions with added salt of various cation valencies (+1,+2,+3) at fixed charge ratio of salt cations to po- lymer segments. We show that increasing the salt valency promotes the polyelectrolyte ionization in a manner which is different from the effect of increasing ionic strength. A higher counterion valency leads to a lower value of the critical Manning parameter, initiating strong counterion condensation which results in additional ionization due to ion-ion correlations between the condensed counterions and charged groups of the polyelectrolytes.
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Synesthetic associations and psychopathological symtomps.
Neckář, Marcel ; Bob, Petr (advisor) ; Ptáček, Radek (referee) ; Světlák, Miroslav (referee)
1 Synesthetic associations and psychopathological symptoms Marcel Necká Abstract Synesthesia in general is a phenomenon of intersensory and intrasensory linkage that may be observed in various conditions including artistic creativity and also manifests in conditions of various brain dysfunctions and injuries. Synesthesia is a phenomenon represented by transmodal associative connections that may represent a continuum from strong synesthetic phenomena to its mild forms that may enable creation of "synesthetic" metaphors. This study is focused on projective assessments of word-color association and their relationship to psychopathological measures reflecting stress, depression, dissociation and other psychometric measures in 154 participants selected from general population. The results are in agreement with previous reported studies suggesting that lighter colors are more frequently associated with positive emotional meanings. In addition the results indicate significant relationships of color- word associations to some specific words with depression, anxiety, alexithymia and symptoms of traumatic stress. These results are in ac-cordance with existing findings in context of the so-called metaphorical synesthesia where significant role might be attributed to color intensity. In this context, results of this...
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Cognitive Disorganisation and Insight in Schizophrenia.
Toušková Petrásková, Tereza ; Bob, Petr (advisor) ; Ptáček, Radek (referee) ; Roman, Robert (referee)
Tereza Petrásková Toušková - Cognitive Disorganisation and Insight in Schizophrenia 1 SUMMARY Conscious awareness is related to brain activities represented as unita- ry, integrated and changeable processes reflecting binding of diverse modalities of basic neural informational processes and their subjective components. According to recent research disturbances of self- awareness and conscious experience have a critical role in pathophysi- ology of schizophrenia, which in early stages of the disease mainly in- clude overactivation of the HPA axis. Together these studies suggest that the processes of disrupted awareness and conscious disintegration in schizophrenia likely might be related and represented by similar dis- ruptions on the brain level, which in principle could be explained by various levels of disturbed connectivity and information disintegration that may negatively affect usual patterns of synchronous activity consti- tuting adaptive integrative functions of consciousness. In this context, a purpose of the theoretical part of the disertation is to describe basic neu- robiological mechanisms underlying integrative processes in the brain with its complementarily related mental activities including self- awareness and insight reflecting interrelated processes between mind and brain that implicate...
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Neuroimmune and endocrine correlates of stress response and dissociation in affective disorders
Bízik, Gustáv ; Bob, Petr (advisor) ; Horáček, Jiří (referee) ; Yamamotová, Anna (referee)
Depression and other mental disorders are the leading cause of disability worldwide and their burden has increased considerably over past decades. However, advances in psychopharmacology of psychiatric disorders are not in measure with this negativ trend. As a result, a large body of researchinpsychiatryandneurosciencestries to furtherourunderstanding of pathophysiologicalmechanismsunderlyingmooddisorders andothermentalillnesses in order to improve the efficacy of current treatments and to identify new therapeutic agents. According to current evidence, stress-related pathways and inflammation processes are directly involved in thedevelopment of depressive disorder andseveral other psychiatric conditions.Thestudy of the effects and consequences of stress exposure requires an interdisciplinary approach,taking into account specific aspects of the "inputs", such as chronic stress and traumatic experiences, and related psychological processes, with the crucial role of dissociation. Following these theoretical findings, the empirical research performed in two cohorts of inpatients with depressive disorder focused on immune and endocrine responses to stress and their relationship to psychopathological symptoms, specifically trauma-related symptoms, psychic and somatoform dissociation and depressive...
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Splitting and Dissociation in Schizophrenia
Pěč, Ondřej ; Raboch, Jiří (advisor) ; Šípek, Jiří (referee) ; Kocourková, Jana (referee)
The term splitting is defined as a process of formation of mental aggregates linked incompatible experiences producing numerous divisions in mental apparatus. Current findings indicate that psychological splitting in schizophrenia is likely specifically presented on a neural level as disrupted organization in neural communication. This disrupted neural communication likely underlies deficits in mental processing described by various neuroscientific concepts such as theories of disturbed connectivity, corollary discharges and dynamic complexity. In this context, a purpose of the theoretical part of the dissertation is to describe basic neuroscience theories that complementarily reflect interrelated processes between mind and brain underlying disturbances of mental integration that likely present a neural representation of the splitting. A purpose of the first part of the empirical research was to examine relationships between psychological process of splitting and disturbed cognitive and affective functions in schizophrenia. A sample of patients with borderline personality disorder (BPD) was used as a control group in this study. Methods: In the clinical study, we have assessed 30 patients with schizophrenia and 35 patients with BPD. The symptoms of splitting were measured using self- reported...
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Eating disorder
Loudová, Libuše ; Šotolová, Eva (advisor) ; Mlčková, Marie (referee)
This thesis summarizes the multifactorial causes of eating disorders in the context of current socio-cultural determinants, with a special focus on children and adolescents. The theoretical background for this thesis, as specified in the introduction, is a general overview of the possible causes, occurrence, course, prognosis, and diagnostic criteria of eating disorders, with an emphasis on younger school age and adolescent age. The central topic of my Bachelor's thesis is a questionnaire-based survey of the knowledge, recognition abilities, interventions, general attitudes towards the issue, and the implementation of primary prevention of eating disorders among members of the teaching staff in the sixth to ninth grades of normal elementary schools. The secondary objective of the thesis is to provide statistical data for the last five years due to the increase in the number and hospitalization rate of paediatric and adolescent patients with eating disorders at the Clinic of Paediatric Psychiatry and the incidence of these disorders in combination with a dual diagnosis. The comparative method and a questionnaire were used in this thesis.
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Dissociation behaviour of natural biocolloids
Karbanová, Kateřina ; Sedláček, Petr (referee) ; Klučáková, Martina (advisor)
This diploma thesis is focused on the study of dissociation behaviour of natural biocolloids, namely humic acids and fulvic acids. Humic and fulvic acids are natural, heterogeneous, high molecular weight substances which behave as weakly acidic polyelectrolytes and they have complex not exactly described structure. They are formed by biochemical transformations of organic residues (mainly plants). They are part of the soil, water, peat, sediments and coal. Solubility of humic acids is affected by pH value. The higher the pH value is the higher the solubility is. Fulvic acids are soluble in whole range of pH values. The aim of this diploma thesis is to determine the dissociation constant for the five kinds of humic acids and four kinds of fulvic acids, which have been isolated from various natural sources. These samples were purchased from IHSS. Dissociation constants were determined by the conductometric method and a combination of measurment pH and the content of acidic functional groups in Na2SO4. UV-VIS spectrophotometry method was used to characterize the quality of humic acids and fulvic acids.
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Determination of pKa of humic acids by means of UV/VIS spectrometry
Kratochvílová, Romana ; Maršálek,, Roman (referee) ; Klučáková, Martina (advisor)
The behaviour of humic acids in aqueous solutions is closely connected to the content of acid functional groups and their dissociation abilities. The titration methods are the most often used for the research of acid-base characteristics of humic acids, their results should lead to the determination of the content of functional groups and their pKa. However the determined values depend on many factors including the titration speed. The spectrophotometric determination of dissociation constant was used in this diploma thesis. Reliability of this method was confirmed in bachelor thesis where is mentioned that spectrophotometric determination of pKa corresponds with realistic dissociation behaviour of humic acids in the water much more better than values obtained from titration methods. The principle of newly used spectrophotometry method is the preparation of humic acids solutions in three different media with different pH values. Acid groups of humic acids are practically completely dissociated in intensely basic environment and the measured absorbance is caused by anion of „humate“. On the contrary their dissociation in acid environment is suppressed so much that we measure the absorbance of non-dissociated molecules of humic acids. Deionized water was used like neutral solvent. Water was replaced by acetic buffer in this thesis because of water’s properties which have significant influence on solutions' pH. Buffer was used for diluting or for solubilisation and in these both cases more stable pH values were occurred. The aim of this diploma thesis is investigate UV/VIS spectra of various solutions of humic acids with different values of pH and determinate mean value of pKa of humic acids which could be used like comparison of dissociation behaviours for vary samples. Values of acid dissociation constant were determined from measured dates and compared with values obtained by titration method. The UV/VIS spectra gained in combination with the results of pH measuring and the conductivity next showed the differences in the behaviour of differently prepared samples of humic acids.
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