Katri Holm

Tampere University Hospital (TAUH) · Behavioral Neurology Research Unit

Vagus nerve stimulation is used for treating refractory epilepsy and major depression. This method has been shown to have a positive outcome in treatment on seizures in epilepsy, but its impact on human cognition remains unclear. The goal of this study was to study the immediate effects of vagus nerve stimulation on attention, cognition and emotion...

Vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) is used for treating refractory epilepsy and major depression. While the impact of this treatment on seizures has been established, its impact on human cognition remains equivocal. The goal of this study is to elucidate the immediate effects of vagus nerve stimulation on attention, cognition, and emotional reactivity i...

Inositol 1,4,5-trisphosphate receptor (IP3R) is a ubiquitous intracellular calcium (Ca2+) channel which has a major role in controlling Ca2+ levels in neurons. A variety of computational models have been developed to describe the kinetic function of IP3R under different conditions. In the field of computational neuroscience, it is of great interest...

Modeling the mechanisms of astrocytic calcium signals is important, as astrocytes have an essential role in regulating the neuronal microenvironment of the central nervous system [1,2]. The results of the wet-lab and clinical studies can be complemented by mathematical models to gain better understanding of the complex molecular level interactions...

An essential phenomenon of the functional brain is synaptic plasticity which is associated with changes in the strength of synapses between neurons. These changes are affected by both extracellular and intracellular mechanisms. For example, intracellular phosphorylation-dephosphorylation cycles have been shown to possess a special role in synaptic...

The time evolution of chemical systems is traditionally modeled using deterministic ordinary differential equa- tions. Chemical reactions, however, are random in na- ture, and the deterministic approach is valid only for a restricted class of systems. Stochastic models take ran- dom fluctuations into account and are thus more realistic. In this wor...

More than a hundred biochemical species, activated by neurotransmitters binding to transmembrane receptors, are important in long-term potentiation (LTP) and long-term depression (LTD). To investigate which species and interactions are critical for synaptic plasticity, many computational postsynaptic signal transduction models have been developed....

Long-term activity-dependent strengthening (LTP) and weakening (LTD) of synapses are two forms of synaptic plasticity. Both LTP and LTD participate in storing information and inducing processes that ultimately lead to learning and memory (e.g., [1]). Several mechanisms have been shown to be the reason for changes in synaptic strength, for example c...

Transient rises in cytosolic calcium concentration play a crucial role in initiating long-term depression (LTD) of synapticactivity. Calciumrelease fromendoplasmicretic- ulum is particularly important in LTD. In Purkinje cells, thereleaseis mediatedbyinositol-1,4,5-trisphosphate(IP3) receptors (IP3Rs) that are highly expressed in dendritic spines....

Several stochastic simulation tools have been developed recently for studying cellular signaling systems. These systems consist of reactions involving minute quantities of molecules. Therefore, the dynamic time-series behavior of these signaling systems needs to be studied by stochastic means. We evaluate and compare simulation tools which utilize...