Effect of the period of EEG signals on the decoding of motor information.

Decoding movement information from electroencephalogram to construct brain-computer interface has promising applications. The EEG data during the entire motor imagery (MI) period or movement execution (ME) period is generally decoded, and calculation of numerous information and massive dataset is time-consuming. In order to improve decoding efficiency, the joint topographic maps of the brain activation state of 15 subjects were studied during different periods. The results showed that the activation intensity of the preparation period in the motor imagery experiment was higher than during the exercise period, while during the exercise period, the activation intensity was higher than in the preparation period in the movement execution experiment. Hence, the wavelet neural network was used to decode the six-class movements including elbow flexion/extension, forearm pronation/supination and hand open/close in periods of MI/ME. The experimental results show that the accuracy obtained in the preparation period is the highest in the motor imagery experiment, which is 80.77%. On the other hand, the highest accuracy obtained in the exercise period of the movement execution experiment is 79.26%. It further proves that the optimized period is a key decoding factor to reduce the cost of calculation, and this new decoding method is effective to build a more intelligent brain-computer interface system.

Preparation, characterization of clonidine hydrochloride resinates and investigation of the kinetics and thermodynamics of the ion exchange process.

Clonidine Hydrochloride (CH) resinates were prepared by plating solution with strong acid cationic-exchange resin as the carrier. The drug resinate's combination mode was characterized by SEM, DSC and X-ray diffraction. The reaction at different temperatures and the influence of different ion exchange resins on the ion exchange process were studied, The kinetics and thermodynamics of ion exchange resins under different temperatures were studied. The In vitro drug liberate from the drug-resinates was investigated in different mediums. The study proved that the combination of CH and resin was not a simple physical mixture but ionic bonded. With the increase of temperature and ion exchange and Amberlite⌖IRP69 had a higher affinity for ionic drugs. The results of In vitro release experiment showed that temperature, medium volume, stirring speed, the ionic strength and type. The In vitro release of CH resin was fitted with Viswanathan equation, it conformed to the process of particle diffusion. Also, the results showed that further coating of CH resin is necessary to achieve a significant continued release effect.

Preparation and in vitro/in vivo evaluation of a clonidine hydrochloride drug-resin suspension as a sustained-release formulation.

OBJECTIVE: The purpose of the present study was to prepare a clonidine hydrochloride (CH) sustained-release suspension. METHODS: The processes involved in the drug formulation included drug loading, impregnating, and suspension preparation. Clonidine hydrochloride drug-resin complexes (CH-DRC) were prepared using the bath method and the CH-DRC impregnated before the microencapsulation process. Based on the bottom spray fluidized bed coating method, the CH microencapsulated drug-resin complexes (CH-MC) were also prepared using Surelease® (the suspension of ethyl cellulose aqueous dispersion) as the coating material. The effects of coating (process/formulation) on the in vitro release of coating microcapsule were evaluated via single factor investigation and orthogonal design optimization. The CH-MC with optimized formulation was further dispersed in a suitable medium to obtain a sustained-release suspension. Rats were given commercial CH ordinary tablets and the CH sustained-release suspension via intragastric administration. The plasma concentration-time curve and related pharmacokinetic parameters were investigated using the non-compartment model. RESULTS: The Tmax of the CH sustained-release suspension was delayed from 2 h to 5 h compared with the CH ordinary tablets. Similarly, the Cmax was reduced from 32.138 µg·mL-1 to 18.150 µg·mL-1 with the concentration-time curve being more gentle compared with the commercially CH ordinary tablets. After oral administration, the relative bioavailability of CH sustained-release suspension (AUC0-24 of 137.703 µg·h·mL-1) to its CH ordinary tablets (AUC0-24 of 123.337 µg·h·mL-1) was 111.65%. CONCLUSIONS: The findings showed that the CH sustained-release suspension for oral administration was successfully formulated.

A Novel Micron-Size Particulate Formulation of Felodipine with Improved Release and Enhanced Oral Bioavailability Fabricated by Coaxial Electrospray.

The antihypertensive drug felodipine (FD) is a typical biopharmaceutics classification system (BCS) II drug; thus, improving the dissolution rate of FD is very important to enhance its bioavailability. Besides, according to the in situ "close loop" perfusion assay, we found that the jejunum is the main absorptive site, then the duodenum and ileum. Consequently, a novel micron-size particulate of FD in a core-shell structure was fabricated by a coaxial electrospray technique; within the drug delivery system, Hypromellose K4M (HPMC K4M) was selected as a sheath material to prolong the retention time in the upper GI tract, while povidone K30 (PVP K30) was mixed with FD in the inner layer. The dissolution study in three different media (0.02% Tween-80 solution; phosphate buffer containing 0.02% Tween-80, pH 6.8; and HCl solution containing 0.02% Tween-80, pH 1.2) demonstrated that FD-loaded coaxial electrospray particles (F-COES) could greatly improve the dissolution of FD. Furthermore, in vivo pharmacokinetics revealed that F-COES emerged no changes in the half-life but significantly prolonged the tmax and increased the oral bioavailability. Collectively, this work supplies a promising drug release system that will improve the dissolution and enhance the bioavailability simultaneously for those poorly water-soluble drugs mainly absorbed in the upper GI tract.

Itraconazole solid dispersion prepared by a supercritical fluid technique: preparation, in vitro characterization, and bioavailability in beagle dogs.

This research aimed to develop a supercritical fluid (SCF) technique for preparing a particulate form of itraconazole (ITZ) with good dissolution and bioavailability characteristics. The ITZ particulate solid dispersion was formulated with hydroxypropyl methylcellulose, Pluronic F-127, and L-ascorbic acid. Aggregated particles showed porous structure when examined by scanning electron microscopy. Powder X-ray diffraction and Fourier transform infrared spectra indicated an interaction between ITZ and excipients and showed that ITZ existed in an amorphous state in the composite solid dispersion particles. The solid dispersion obtained by the SCF process improved the dissolution of ITZ in media of pH 1.0, pH 4.5, and pH 6.8, compared with a commercial product (Sporanox(®)), which could be ascribed to the porous aggregated particle shape and amorphous solid state of ITZ. While the solid dispersion did not show a statistical improvement (P=0.50) in terms of oral bioavailability of ITZ compared with Sporanox(®), the C max (the maximum plasma concentration of ITZ in a pharmacokinetic curve) of ITZ was raised significantly (P=0.03) after oral administration. Thus, the SCF process has been shown to be an efficient, single step process to form ITZ-containing solid dispersion particles with good dissolution and oral bioavailability characteristics.

[Study on diagnostic methods of breathing disorders based on fuzzy logic inference and the neural network].

This paper descries a new non-invasive method for diagnosis of breathing disorders based on adaptive-network-based fuzzy inference system (ANFIS). In this method, PetCO2, SpO2 and HR are chosen as inputs, and the breathing condition is selected as output ofANFIS. The inputs and output are then classified into fuzzy subsets by experts' knowledge. After, the fuzzy IF-THEN rules are built up according to the corresponding membership functions by set up of fuzzy subsets. The neural network was finally established and the membership functions and fuzzy rules were optimized by training. The results of experiment shows that ANFIS is more effective than BP Network regarding the diagnosis of breathing disorders.