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    GABA excites CA3 pyramidal cells through bicuculline sensitive and insensitive chloride-dependent receptors

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    Intracellular and patch clamp recording techniques were used to investigate the role of GABA in immature CA3 hippocampal neurons. During the first postnatal week spontaneous GABA release was detected as spontaneous ongoing synaptic potentials (SPSPs) or giant depolarizing potentials (GDPs). GDPs were generated at regular intervals and regulated by ionotropic glutamate receptors (GluRs), whereas SPSPs occurred randomly and were unaffected by ionotropic GluRs. Both GDPs and SPSPs were positively modulated by metabotropic GluRs through cyclic AMP-dependent protein kinase. Moreover GABA controlled its own release through GABAA and GABAB receptors, probably localized on GABAergic nerve terminals. At this developmental stage, GABA depolarized CA3 pyramidal cells through two distinct classes of chloride-permeable receptors: bicuculline sensitive and insensitive, respectively. The bicuculline-insensitive responses were blocked by picrotoxin in a noncompetitive way. Whole-cell GABA currents, recorded in the presence of bicuculline, had a slower desensitization rate and faster recovery from desensitization. In excised outside-out patches, in the presence of bicuculline, GABA activated single-channel currents with conductances of 14, 22, and 31 pS. These values were similar to those obtained when GABA was applied in the absence of bicuculline. Interestingly, GABA responses obtained in the absence of bicuculline, were sensitive to the blocking effect of zinc, whereas bicuculline-resistant responses were almost unaffected by this divalent cation. Expression of different subunits in native receptors (particularly of the alpha and rho type) may account for the functional differences observed in the present experiments. Activation of bicuculline-insensitive receptors would strengthen and prolong the depolarizing action of GABA, thus favoring the entry of calcium through voltage-dependent calcium channels. This calcium signal may be essential in promoting stabilization of synaptic contacts during a critical period of postnatal development

    GABAC receptors: a novel receptor family with unusual pharmacology

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    GABAC-receptor channels constitute a novel class of structurally defined receptors that are composed by the recently discovered r-subunits. They conduct chloride ions, are insensitive to both bicuculline and baclofen, and are blocked by picrotoxin. They are present in the hippocampus during development and in the retina where they play a crucial role in regulating visual processing. </jats:p

    Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis

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    The present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed

    Variations on the Author

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    “Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship

    Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis

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    We provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis

    Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts

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    We conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more sophisticated methods

    Author Index

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