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The human brain continuously integrates information across its two hemispheres to construct a coherent representation of the perceptual world. Characterizing how visual information is represented in each hemisphere over time is crucial for understanding how hemispheric transfer contributes to perception. Here, we investigated information processing within each hemisphere over time and the degree to which it is distinct or duplicated across hemispheres. We presented participants with object images lateralized to the left or right visual fields while measuring their brain activity with electroencephalography. Stimulus coding was more robust and emerged earlier in the contralateral than the ipsilateral hemisphere. Presentation of two stimuli, one to each hemifield, reduced the fidelity of representations in both hemispheres relative to one stimulus alone, signifying hemispheric interference. Last, we found that processing within the contralateral, but not ipsilateral, hemisphere was biased to image-related over concept-related information. Together, these results suggest that hemispheric transfer operates to filter irrelevant information and efficiently prioritize processing of meaning.

Lung cancer (LC) and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) are among the leading causes of mortality worldwide. Cigarette smoking is among the main aetiologic factors for both ailments. These diseases share common pathogenetic mechanisms including inflammation, oxidative stress, and tissue remodelling. Current therapeutic approaches are limited by low efficacy and adverse effects. Consequentially, LC has a 5-year survival of < 20%, while COPD is incurable, underlining the necessity for innovative treatment strategies. Two promising emerging classes of therapy against these diseases include plant-derived molecules (phytoceuticals) and nucleic acid-based therapies. The clinical application of both is limited by issues including poor solubility, poor permeability, and, in the case of nucleic acids, susceptibility to enzymatic degradation, large size, and electrostatic charge density. Nanoparticle-based advanced drug delivery systems are currently being explored as flexible systems allowing to overcome these limitations. In this review, an updated summary of the most recent studies using nanoparticle-based advanced drug delivery systems to improve the delivery of nucleic acids and phytoceuticals for the treatment of LC and COPD is provided. This review highlights the enormous relevance of these delivery systems as tools that are set to facilitate the clinical application of novel categories of therapeutics with poor pharmacokinetic properties., (© 2023. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.)

The basic computations performed in the human early visual cortex are the foundation for visual perception. While we know a lot about these computations, a key missing piece is how the coding of visual features relates to our perception of the environment. To investigate visual feature coding, interactions, and their relationship to human perception, we investigated neural responses and perceptual similarity judgements to a large set of visual stimuli that varied parametrically along four feature dimensions. We measured neural responses using electroencephalography (N = 16) to 256 grating stimuli that varied in orientation, spatial frequency, contrast, and colour. We then mapped the response profiles of the neural coding of each visual feature and their interactions, and related these to independently obtained behavioural judgements of stimulus similarity. The results confirmed fundamental principles of feature coding in the visual system, such that all four features were processed simultaneously but differed in their dynamics, and there was distinctive conjunction coding for different combinations of features in the neural responses. Importantly, modelling of the behaviour revealed that every stimulus feature contributed to perceptual judgements, despite the untargeted nature of the behavioural task. Further, the relationship between neural coding and behaviour was evident from initial processing stages, signifying that the fundamental features, not just their interactions, contribute to perception. This study highlights the importance of understanding how feature coding progresses through the visual hierarchy and the relationship between different stages of processing and perception., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist., (Copyright: © 2024 Grootswagers et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.)

Little is known about the perceptual characteristics of mental images nor how they vary across sensory modalities. We conducted an exhaustive survey into how mental images are experienced across modalities, mainly targeting visual and auditory imagery of a single stimulus, the letter "O", to facilitate direct comparisons. We investigated temporal properties of mental images (e.g. onset latency, duration), spatial properties (e.g. apparent location), effort (e.g. ease, spontaneity, control), movement requirements (e.g. eye movements), real-imagined interactions (e.g. inner speech while reading), beliefs about imagery norms and terminologies, as well as respondent confidence. Participants also reported on the five traditional senses and their prominence during thinking, imagining, and dreaming. Overall, visual and auditory experiences dominated mental events, although auditory mental images were superior to visual mental images on almost every metric tested except regarding spatial properties. Our findings suggest that modality-specific differences in mental imagery may parallel those of other sensory neural processes., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2023 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Mouse models that reflect human disorders provide invaluable tools for the translation of basic science discoveries to clinical therapies. However, many of these in vivo therapeutic studies are short term and do not accurately mimic patient conditions. In this study, we used a fully immunocompetent, transgenic mouse model, TGS, in which the spontaneous development of metastatic melanoma is driven by the ectopic expression of a normal neuronal receptor, mGluR1, as a model to assess longitudinal treatment response (up to 8 months) with an inhibitor of glutamatergic signaling, troriluzole, which is a prodrug of riluzole, plus an antibody against PD-1, an immune checkpoint inhibitor. Our results reveal a sex-biased treatment response that led to improved survival in troriluzole and/or anti-PD-1-treated male mice that correlated with differential CD8 + T cells and CD11b + myeloid cell populations in the tumor-stromal interface, supporting the notion that this model is a responsive and tractable system for evaluating therapeutic regimens for melanoma in an immunocompetent setting., (Copyright © 2023 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Patterns of brain activity contain meaningful information about the perceived world. Recent decades have welcomed a new era in neural analyses, with computational techniques from machine learning applied to neural data to decode information represented in the brain. In this article, we review how decoding approaches have advanced our understanding of visual representations and discuss efforts to characterize both the complexity and the behavioral relevance of these representations. We outline the current consensus regarding the spatiotemporal structure of visual representations and review recent findings that suggest that visual representations are at once robust to perturbations, yet sensitive to different mental states. Beyond representations of the physical world, recent decoding work has shone a light on how the brain instantiates internally generated states, for example, during imagery and prediction. Going forward, decoding has remarkable potential to assess the functional relevance of visual representations for human behavior, reveal how representations change across development and during aging, and uncover their presentation in various mental disorders.

Mental imagery is a process by which thoughts become experienced with sensory characteristics. Yet, it is not clear why mental images appear diminished compared to veridical images, nor how mental images are phenomenologically distinct from hallucinations, another type of non-veridical sensory experience. Current evidence suggests that imagination and veridical perception share neural resources. If so, we argue that considering how neural representations of externally generated stimuli (i.e. sensory input) and internally generated stimuli (i.e. thoughts) might interfere with one another can sufficiently differentiate between veridical, imaginary, and hallucinatory perception. We here use a simple computational model of a serially connected, hierarchical network with bidirectional information flow to emulate the primate visual system. We show that modelling even first approximations of neural competition can more coherently explain imagery phenomenology than non-competitive models. Our simulations predict that, without competing sensory input, imagined stimuli should ubiquitously dominate hierarchical representations. However, with competition, imagination should dominate high-level representations but largely fail to outcompete sensory inputs at lower processing levels. To interpret our findings, we assume that low-level stimulus information (e.g. in early visual cortices) contributes most to the sensory aspects of perceptual experience, while high-level stimulus information (e.g. towards temporal regions) contributes most to its abstract aspects. Our findings therefore suggest that ongoing bottom-up inputs during waking life may prevent imagination from overriding veridical sensory experience. In contrast, internally generated stimuli may be hallucinated when sensory input is dampened or eradicated. Our approach can explain individual differences in imagery, along with aspects of daydreaming, hallucinations, and non-visual mental imagery., Competing Interests: None declared., (© The Author(s) 2023. Published by Oxford University Press.)

This article examined the association between body satisfaction and sexual identification among lesbian and bisexual women, since these factors help to understand the cultural background of the objectification of female bodies in Latin cultures. Women who identify as lesbian (N = 239) and bisexual (N = 60) completed demographic data and measures of self-esteem, physical appearance perfectionism, lesbian and bisexual identity difficulties, and body satisfaction. We performed a three-stage hierarchical multiple regression to explore how variables relate to body satisfaction. The results suggest that self-esteem plays a key role, explaining 20.4% of the variance in body satisfaction. We discussed the psychosocial and cultural aspects involved in the relationship between the variables, and social and aesthetic pressures on women's bodies. This study contributes to discussions on psychosocial aspects associated with body satisfaction among Brazilian lesbian and bisexual women.

Objective: The purpose of this study was to provide a more comprehensive look into the demographics of the veteran student subpopulation while exploring the relationship between the mental health of student veterans and their academic performance. Methods: A nationwide anonymous survey was distributed to student veterans who were enrolled in postsecondary institutions. Results: A large number of participants reported distress with symptoms of PTSD, depression, sleep disturbances, and/or suicidal ideation and attempts, and screened likely for mental health problems in these areas. Participants also endorsed academic problems ranging from the ability to stay focused to failing tests and quizzes. Additional findings demonstrated a positive association between GPA and both PTSD and depression. Conclusion: These findings can be used as a platform upon which to begin the discussion on the implications for mental health professionals, administrators, and educators.

The ability to perceive moving objects is crucial for threat identification and survival. Recent neuroimaging evidence has shown that goal-directed movement is an important element of object processing in the brain. However, prior work has primarily used moving stimuli that are also animate, making it difficult to disentangle the effect of movement from aliveness or animacy in representational categorisation. In the current study, we investigated the relationship between how the brain processes movement and aliveness by including stimuli that are alive but still (e.g., plants), and stimuli that are not alive but move (e.g., waves). We examined electroencephalographic (EEG) data recorded while participants viewed static images of moving or non-moving objects that were either natural or artificial. Participants classified the images according to aliveness, or according to capacity for movement. Movement explained significant variance in the neural data over and above that of aliveness, showing that capacity for movement is an important dimension in the representation of visual objects in humans., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare no conflicts of interest., (Copyright © 2022. Published by Elsevier Inc.)

Can we trust our eyes? Until recently, we rarely had to question whether what we see is indeed what exists, but this is changing. Artificial neural networks can now generate realistic images that challenge our perception of what is real. This new reality can have significant implications for cybersecurity, counterfeiting, fake news, and border security. We investigated how the human brain encodes and interprets realistic artificially generated images using behaviour and brain imaging. We found that we could reliably decode AI generated faces using people's neural activity. However, while at a group level people performed near chance classifying real and realistic fakes, participants tended to interchange the labels, classifying real faces as realistic fakes and vice versa. Understanding this difference between brain and behavioural responses may be key in determining the 'real' in our new reality. Stimuli, code, and data for this study can be found at https://osf.io/n2z73/., (Copyright © 2022 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Selective attention prioritises relevant information amongst competing sensory input. Time-resolved electrophysiological studies have shown stronger representation of attended compared to unattended stimuli, which has been interpreted as an effect of attention on information coding. However, because attention is often manipulated by making only the attended stimulus a target to be remembered and/or responded to, many reported attention effects have been confounded with target-related processes such as visual short-term memory or decision-making. In addition, attention effects could be influenced by temporal expectation about when something is likely to happen. The aim of this study was to investigate the dynamic effect of attention on visual processing using multivariate pattern analysis of electroencephalography (EEG) data, while (1) controlling for target-related confounds, and (2) directly investigating the influence of temporal expectation. Participants viewed rapid sequences of overlaid oriented grating pairs while detecting a "target" grating of a particular orientation. We manipulated attention, one grating was attended and the other ignored (cued by colour), and temporal expectation, with stimulus onset timing either predictable or not. We controlled for target-related processing confounds by only analysing non-target trials. Both attended and ignored gratings were initially coded equally in the pattern of responses across EEG sensors. An effect of attention, with preferential coding of the attended stimulus, emerged approximately 230 ms after stimulus onset. This attention effect occurred even when controlling for target-related processing confounds, and regardless of stimulus onset expectation. These results provide insight into the effect of feature-based attention on the dynamic processing of competing visual information., (© 2022. The Author(s).)

The human brain is extremely flexible and capable of rapidly selecting relevant information in accordance with task goals. Regions of frontoparietal cortex flexibly represent relevant task information such as task rules and stimulus features when participants perform tasks successfully, but less is known about how information processing breaks down when participants make mistakes. This is important for understanding whether and when information coding recorded with neuroimaging is directly meaningful for behavior. Here, we used magnetoencephalography to assess the temporal dynamics of information processing and linked neural responses with goal-directed behavior by analyzing how they changed on behavioral error. Participants performed a difficult stimulus-response task using two stimulus-response mapping rules. We used time-resolved multivariate pattern analysis to characterize the progression of information coding from perceptual information about the stimulus, cue and rule coding, and finally, motor response. Response-aligned analyses revealed a ramping up of perceptual information before a correct response, suggestive of internal evidence accumulation. Strikingly, when participants made a stimulus-related error, and not when they made other types of errors, patterns of activity initially reflected the stimulus presented, but later reversed, and accumulated toward a representation of the "incorrect" stimulus. This suggests that the patterns recorded at later time points reflect an internally generated stimulus representation that was used to make the (incorrect) decision. These results illustrate the orderly and overlapping temporal dynamics of information coding in perceptual decision-making and show a clear link between neural patterns in the late stages of processing and behavior., (© 2022 Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Published under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) license.)

The neural basis of object recognition and semantic knowledge has been extensively studied but the high dimensionality of object space makes it challenging to develop overarching theories on how the brain organises object knowledge. To help understand how the brain allows us to recognise, categorise, and represent objects and object categories, there is a growing interest in using large-scale image databases for neuroimaging experiments. In the current paper, we present THINGS-EEG, a dataset containing human electroencephalography responses from 50 subjects to 1,854 object concepts and 22,248 images in the THINGS stimulus set, a manually curated and high-quality image database that was specifically designed for studying human vision. The THINGS-EEG dataset provides neuroimaging recordings to a systematic collection of objects and concepts and can therefore support a wide array of research to understand visual object processing in the human brain., (© 2022. The Author(s).)

A large number of papers in Computational Cognitive Neuroscience are developing and testing novel analysis methods using one specific neuroimaging dataset and problematic experimental stimuli. Publication bias and confirmatory exploration will result in overfitting to the limited available data. We highlight the problems with this specific dataset and argue for the need to collect more good quality open neuroimaging data using a variety of experimental stimuli, in order to test the generalisability of current published results, and allow for more robust results in future work., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2021 Grootswagers and Robinson.)

The ability to rapidly and accurately recognize complex objects is a crucial function of the human visual system. To recognize an object, we need to bind incoming visual features, such as color and form, together into cohesive neural representations and integrate these with our preexisting knowledge about the world. For some objects, typical color is a central feature for recognition; for example, a banana is typically yellow. Here, we applied multivariate pattern analysis on time-resolved neuroimaging (MEG) data to examine how object-color knowledge affects emerging object representations over time. Our results from 20 participants (11 female) show that the typicality of object-color combinations influences object representations, although not at the initial stages of object and color processing. We find evidence that color decoding peaks later for atypical object-color combinations compared with typical object-color combinations, illustrating the interplay between processing incoming object features and stored object knowledge. Together, these results provide new insights into the integration of incoming visual information with existing conceptual object knowledge. SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT To recognize objects, we have to be able to bind object features, such as color and shape, into one coherent representation and compare it with stored object knowledge. The MEG data presented here provide novel insights about the integration of incoming visual information with our knowledge about the world. Using color as a model to understand the interaction between seeing and knowing, we show that there is a unique pattern of brain activity for congruently colored objects (e.g., a yellow banana) relative to incongruently colored objects (e.g., a red banana). This effect of object-color knowledge only occurs after single object features are processed, demonstrating that conceptual knowledge is accessed relatively late in the visual processing hierarchy., (Copyright © 2020 the authors.)

How are visual inputs transformed into conceptual representations by the human visual system? The contents of human perception, such as objects presented on a visual display, can reliably be decoded from voxel activation patterns in fMRI, and in evoked sensor activations in MEG and EEG. A prevailing question is the extent to which brain activation associated with object categories is due to statistical regularities of visual features within object categories. Here, we assessed the contribution of mid-level features to conceptual category decoding using EEG and a novel fast periodic decoding paradigm. Our study used a stimulus set consisting of intact objects from the animate (e.g., fish) and inanimate categories (e.g., chair) and scrambled versions of the same objects that were unrecognizable and preserved their visual features (Long et al., 2018). By presenting the images at different periodic rates, we biased processing to different levels of the visual hierarchy. We found that scrambled objects and their intact counterparts elicited similar patterns of activation, which could be used to decode the conceptual category (animate or inanimate), even for the unrecognizable scrambled objects. Animacy decoding for the scrambled objects, however, was only possible at the slowest periodic presentation rate. Animacy decoding for intact objects was faster, more robust, and could be achieved at faster presentation rates. Our results confirm that the mid-level visual features preserved in the scrambled objects contribute to animacy decoding, but also demonstrate that the dynamics vary markedly for intact versus scrambled objects. Our findings suggest a complex interplay between visual feature coding and categorical representations that is mediated by the visual system's capacity to use image features to resolve a recognisable object., (Copyright © 2019. Published by Elsevier Inc.)

Mental imagery is the ability to generate images in the mind in the absence of sensory input. Both perceptual visual processing and internally generated imagery engage large, overlapping networks of brain regions. However, it is unclear whether they are characterized by similar temporal dynamics. Recent magnetoencephalography work has shown that object category information was decodable from brain activity during mental imagery, but the timing was delayed relative to perception. The current study builds on these findings, using electroencephalography to investigate the dynamics of mental imagery. Sixteen participants viewed two images of the Sydney Harbour Bridge and two images of Santa Claus. On each trial, they viewed a sequence of the four images and were asked to imagine one of them, which was cued retroactively by its temporal location in the sequence. Time-resolved multivariate pattern analysis was used to decode the viewed and imagined stimuli. Although category and exemplar information was decodable for viewed stimuli, there were no informative patterns of activity during mental imagery. The current findings suggest stimulus complexity, task design and individual differences may influence the ability to successfully decode imagined images. We discuss the implications of these results in the context of prior findings of mental imagery.

Rapid image presentations combined with time-resolved multivariate analysis methods of EEG or MEG (rapid-MVPA) offer unique potential in assessing the temporal limitations of the human visual system. Recent work has shown that multiple visual objects presented sequentially can be simultaneously decoded from M/EEG recordings. Interestingly, object representations reached higher stages of processing for slower image presentation rates compared to fast rates. This fast rate attenuation is probably caused by forward and backward masking from the other images in the stream. Two factors that are likely to influence masking during rapid streams are stimulus duration and stimulus onset asynchrony (SOA). Here, we disentangle these effects by studying the emerging neural representation of visual objects using rapid-MVPA while independently manipulating stimulus duration and SOA. Our results show that longer SOAs enhance the decodability of neural representations, regardless of stimulus presentation duration, suggesting that subsequent images act as effective backward masks. In contrast, image duration does not appear to have a graded influence on object representations. Interestingly, however, decodability was improved when there was a gap between subsequent images, indicating that an abrupt onset or offset of an image enhances its representation. Our study yields insight into the dynamics of object processing in rapid streams, paving the way for future work using this promising approach., (Copyright © 2019. Published by Elsevier Inc.)

In our daily lives, we are bombarded with a stream of rapidly changing visual input. Humans have the remarkable capacity to detect and identify objects in fast-changing scenes. Yet, when studying brain representations, stimuli are generally presented in isolation. Here, we studied the dynamics of human vision using a combination of fast stimulus presentation rates, electroencephalography and multivariate decoding analyses. Using a presentation rate of 5 images per second, we obtained the representational structure of a large number of stimuli, and showed the emerging abstract categorical organisation of this structure. Furthermore, we could separate the temporal dynamics of perceptual processing from higher-level target selection effects. In a second experiment, we used the same paradigm at 20Hz to show that shorter image presentation limits the categorical abstraction of object representations. Our results show that applying multivariate pattern analysis to every image in rapid serial visual processing streams has unprecedented potential for studying the temporal dynamics of the structure of representations in the human visual system., (Copyright © 2018. Published by Elsevier Inc.)

Visual recognition deficits are the hallmark symptom of visual agnosia, a neuropsychological disorder typically associated with damage to the visual system. Most research into visual agnosia focuses on characterizing the deficits through detailed behavioral testing, and structural and functional brain scans are used to determine the spatial extent of any cortical damage. Although the hierarchical nature of the visual system leads to clear predictions about the temporal dynamics of cortical deficits, there has been little research on the use of neuroimaging methods with high temporal resolution to characterize the temporal profile of agnosia deficits. Here, we employed high-density electroencephalography (EEG) to investigate alterations in the temporal dynamics of the visual system in two individuals with visual agnosia. In the context of a steady state visual evoked potential paradigm (SSVEP), individuals viewed pattern-reversing checkerboards of differing spatial frequency, and we assessed the responses of the visual system in the frequency and temporal domain. JW, a patient with early visual cortex damage, showed impaired SSVEP response relative to a control group and to the second patient (SM) who had right temporal lobe damage. JW also showed lower decoding accuracy for early visual responses (around 100 ms). SM, whose lesion is more anterior in the visual system, showed good decoding accuracy initially but low decoding after 500 ms. Overall, EEG and multivariate decoding methods can yield important insights into the temporal dynamics of visual responses in individuals with visual agnosia.

Humans recognize faces with ease, despite the complexity of the task and of the visual system which underlies it. Different spatial regions, including both the core and extended face processing networks, and distinct temporal stages of processing have been implicated in face recognition, but there is ongoing controversy regarding the extent to which the mechanisms for recognizing a familiar face differ from those for an unfamiliar face. Here, we used electroencephalogram (EEG) and flicker SSVEP, a high signal-to-noise approach, and searchlight decoding methods to elucidate the mechanisms mediating the processing of familiar and unfamiliar faces in the time domain. Familiar and unfamiliar faces were presented periodically at 15 Hz, 6 Hz and 3.75 Hz either upright or inverted in separate blocks, with the rationale that faster frequencies require shorter processing times per image and tap into fundamentally different levels of visual processing. The 15 Hz trials, likely to reflect early visual processing, exhibited enhanced neural responses for familiar over unfamiliar face trials, but only when the faces were upright. In contrast, decoding methods revealed similar classification accuracies for upright and inverted faces for both familiar and unfamiliar faces. For the 6 Hz frequency, familiar faces had lower amplitude responses than unfamiliar faces, and decoding familiarity was more accurate for upright compared with inverted faces. Finally, the 3.75 Hz frequency revealed no main effects of familiarity, but decoding showed significant correlations with behavioral ratings of face familiarity, suggesting that activity evoked by this slow presentation frequency reflected higher-level, cognitive aspects of familiarity processing. This three-way dissociation between frequencies reveals that fundamentally different stages of the visual hierarchy are modulated by face familiarity. The combination of experimental and analytical approaches used here represent a novel method for elucidating spatio-temporal characteristics within the visual system., (Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

An evolving view in cognitive neuroscience is that the dorsal visual pathway not only plays a key role in visuomotor behavior but that it also contributes functionally to the recognition of objects. To characterize the nature of the object representations derived by the dorsal pathway, we assessed perceptual performance in the context of the continuous flash suppression paradigm, which suppresses object processing in the ventral pathway while sparing computation in the dorsal pathway. In a series of experiments, prime stimuli, which were rendered imperceptible by the continuous flash suppression, still contributed to perceptual decisions related to the subsequent perceptible target stimuli. However, the contribution of the prime to perception was contingent on the prime's structural coherence, in that a perceptual advantage was observed only for targets primed by objects with legitimate 3-D structure. Finally, we obtained additional evidence to demonstrate that the processing of the suppressed objects was contingent on the magnocellular, rather than the parvocellular, system, further linking the processing of the suppressed stimuli to the dorsal pathway. Together, these results provide novel evidence that the dorsal pathway does not only support visuomotor control but, rather, that it also derives the structural description of 3-D objects and contributes to shape perception.

Mixing is the driver for the energy footprint of water resource recovery in lagoons. With the availability of solar-powered equipment, one potential measure to decrease the environmental impacts of treatment is to transition to an off-the-grid treatment. We studied the comparative scenarios of an existing grid-powered mixer and a solar-powered mixer. Testing was conducted to monitor the water quality, and to guarantee that the effluent concentrations were maintained equally between the two scenarios. Meanwhile, the energy consumption was recorded with the electrical energy monitor by the wastewater treatment utility, and the carbon emission changes were calculated using the emission intensity of the power utility. The results show that after the replacement, both energy usage and energy costs were significantly reduced, with the energy usage having decreased by 70% and its cost by 47%. Additionally, carbon-equivalent emission from electricity importation dropped by 64%, with an effect on the overall carbon emissions (i.e., including all other contributions from the process) decreasing from 3.8% to 1.5%., (Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Standard human EEG systems based on spatial Nyquist estimates suggest that 20-30 mm electrode spacing suffices to capture neural signals on the scalp, but recent studies posit that increasing sensor density can provide higher resolution neural information. Here, we compared "super-Nyquist" density EEG ("SND") with Nyquist density ("ND") arrays for assessing the spatiotemporal aspects of early visual processing. EEG was measured from 128 electrodes arranged over occipitotemporal brain regions (14 mm spacing) while participants viewed flickering checkerboard stimuli. Analyses compared SND with ND-equivalent subsets of the same electrodes. Frequency-tagged stimuli were classified more accurately with SND than ND arrays in both the time and the frequency domains. Representational similarity analysis revealed that a computational model of V1 correlated more highly with the SND than the ND array. Overall, SND EEG captured more neural information from visual cortex, arguing for increased development of this approach in basic and translational neuroscience.

Words and faces have vastly different visual properties, but increasing evidence suggests that word and face processing engage overlapping distributed networks. For instance, fMRI studies have shown overlapping activity for face and word processing in the fusiform gyrus despite well-characterized lateralization of these objects to the left and right hemispheres, respectively. To investigate whether face and word perception influences perception of the other stimulus class and elucidate the mechanisms underlying such interactions, we presented images using rapid serial visual presentations. Across 3 experiments, participants discriminated 2 face, word, and glasses targets (T1 and T2) embedded in a stream of images. As expected, T2 discrimination was impaired when it followed T1 by 200 to 300 ms relative to longer intertarget lags, the so-called attentional blink. Interestingly, T2 discrimination accuracy was significantly reduced at short intertarget lags when a face was followed by a word (face-word) compared with glasses-word and word-word combinations, indicating that face processing interfered with word perception. The reverse effect was not observed; that is, word-face performance was no different than the other object combinations. EEG results indicated the left N170 to T1 was correlated with the word decrement for face-word trials, but not for other object combinations. Taken together, the results suggest face processing interferes with word processing, providing evidence for overlapping neural mechanisms of these 2 object types. Furthermore, asymmetrical face-word interference points to greater overlap of face and word representations in the left than the right hemisphere. (PsycINFO Database Record, ((c) 2017 APA, all rights reserved).)

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reported that all carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) emissions generated by water resource recovery facilities (WRRFs) during treatment are modern, based on available literature. Therefore, such emissions were omitted from IPCC's greenhouse gas (GHG) accounting procedures. However, a fraction of wastewater's carbon is fossil in origin. We hypothesized that since the fossil carbon entering municipal WRRFs is mostly from soaps and detergents as dissolved organic matter, its fate can be selectively determined during the universally applied separation treatment processes. Analyzing radiocarbon at different treatment points within municipal WRRFs, we verified that the fossil content could amount to 28% in primary influent and showed varying distribution leaving different unit operations. We recorded the highest proportion of fossil carbon leaving the secondary treatment as off-gas and as solid sludge (averaged 2.08 kg fossil-CO 2 -emission-potential m -3 wastewater treated). By including fossil CO 2 , total GHG emission in municipal WRRFs increased 13%, and 23% if an on-site energy recovery system exists although much of the postdigestion fossil carbon remained in biosolids rather than in biogas, offering yet another carbon sequestration opportunity during biosolids handling. In comparison, fossil carbon contribution to GHG emission can span from negligible to substantial in different types of industrial WRRFs. With such a considerable impact, CO 2 should be analyzed for each WRRF and not omitted from GHG accounting.

KDM2B recruits H2A-ubiquitinating activity of a non-canonical Polycomb Repression Complex 1 (PRC1.1) to CpG islands, facilitating gene repression. We investigated the molecular basis of recruitment using in vitro assembly assays to identify minimal components, subcomplexes, and domains required for recruitment. A minimal four-component PRC1.1 complex can be assembled by combining two separately isolated subcomplexes: the DNA-binding KDM2B/SKP1 heterodimer and the heterodimer of BCORL1 and PCGF1, a core component of PRC1.1. The crystal structure of the KDM2B/SKP1/BCORL1/PCGF1 complex illustrates the crucial role played by the PCGF1/BCORL1 heterodimer. The BCORL1 PUFD domain positions residues preceding the RAWUL domain of PCGF1 to create an extended interface for interaction with KDM2B, which is unique to the PCGF1-containing PRC1.1 complex. The structure also suggests how KDM2B might simultaneously function in PRC1.1 and an SCF ubiquitin ligase complex and the possible molecular consequences of BCOR PUFD internal tandem duplications found in pediatric kidney and brain tumors., Competing Interests: The authors declare no conflicts of interest., (Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Recent evidence suggests that olfactory stimuli can influence early stages of visual processing, but there has been little focus on whether such olfactory-visual interactions convey an advantage in visual object identification. Moreover, despite evidence that some aspects of olfactory perception are superior in females than males, no study to date has examined whether olfactory influences on vision are gender-dependent. We asked whether inhalation of familiar odorants can modulate participants' ability to identify briefly flashed images of matching visual objects under conditions of object substitution masking (OSM). Across two experiments, we had male and female participants (N = 36 in each group) identify masked visual images of odour-related objects (e.g., orange, rose, mint) amongst nonodour-related distracters (e.g., box, watch). In each trial, participants inhaled a single odour that either matched or mismatched the masked, odour-related target. Target detection performance was analysed using a signal detection (d') approach. In females, but not males, matching odours significantly reduced OSM relative to mismatching odours, suggesting that familiar odours can enhance the salience of briefly presented visual objects. We conclude that olfactory cues exert a subtle influence on visual processes by transiently enhancing the salience of matching object representations. The results add to a growing body of literature that points towards consistent gender differences in olfactory perception.

This article describes the first government social franchise initiative in the world to deliver a 'brand' of quality primary healthcare (PHC) clinic services. Quality and standards of care are not uniformly and reliably delivered across government PHC clinics in North West Province, South Africa, despite government support, numerous policies, guidelines and in-service training sessions provided to staff. Currently the strongest predictor of good-quality service is the skill and dedication of the facility manager. A project utilising the social franchising business model, harvesting best practices, has been implemented with the aim of developing a system to ensure reliably excellent healthcare service provision in every facility in North West. The services of social franchising consultants have been procured to develop the business model to drive this initiative. Best practices have been benchmarked, and policies, guidelines and clinic support systems have been reviewed, evaluated and assessed, and incorporated into the business plan. A pilot clinic has been selected to refine and develop a working social franchise model. This will then be replicated in one clinic to confirm proof of concept before further scale-up. The social franchise business model can provide solutions to a reliable and recognisable 'brand' of quality universal coverage of healthcare services.

Sensory information is initially registered within anatomically and functionally segregated brain networks but is also integrated across modalities in higher cortical areas. Although considerable research has focused on uncovering the neural correlates of multisensory integration for the modalities of vision, audition, and touch, much less attention has been devoted to understanding interactions between vision and olfaction in humans. In this study, we asked how odors affect neural activity evoked by images of familiar visual objects associated with characteristic smells. We employed scalp-recorded EEG to measure visual ERPs evoked by briefly presented pictures of familiar objects, such as an orange, mint leaves, or a rose. During presentation of each visual stimulus, participants inhaled either a matching odor, a nonmatching odor, or plain air. The N1 component of the visual ERP was significantly enhanced for matching odors in women, but not in men. This is consistent with evidence that women are superior in detecting, discriminating, and identifying odors and that they have a higher gray matter concentration in olfactory areas of the OFC. We conclude that early visual processing is influenced by olfactory cues because of associations between odors and the objects that emit them, and that these associations are stronger in women than in men.

The aerodynamics of flapping flight for the smallest insects such as thrips is often characterized by a 'clap and fling' of the wings at the end of the upstroke and the beginning of the downstroke. These insects fly at Reynolds numbers (Re) of the order of 10 or less where viscous effects are significant. Although this wing motion is known to augment the lift generated during flight, the drag required to fling the wings apart at this scale is an order of magnitude larger than the corresponding force acting on a single wing. As the opposing forces acting normal to each wing nearly cancel during the fling, these large forces do not have a clear aerodynamic benefit. If flight efficiency is defined as the ratio of lift to drag, the clap and fling motion dramatically reduces efficiency relative to the case of wings that do not aerodynamically interact. In this paper, the effect of a bristled wing characteristic of many of these insects was investigated using computational fluid dynamics. We performed 2D numerical simulations using a porous version of the immersed boundary method. Given the computational complexity involved in modeling flow through exact descriptions of bristled wings, the wing was modeled as a homogeneous porous layer as a first approximation. High-speed video recordings of free-flying thrips in take-off flight were captured in the laboratory, and an analysis of the wing kinematics was performed. This information was used for the estimation of input parameters for the simulations. Compared with a solid wing (without bristles), the results of the study show that the porous nature of the wings contributes largely to drag reduction across the Re range explored. The aerodynamic efficiency, calculated as the ratio of lift to drag coefficients, was larger for some porosities when compared with solid wings., (© 2014. Published by The Company of Biologists Ltd.)

The self-association of sterile alpha motifs (SAMs) into a helical polymer architecture is a critical functional component of many different and diverse array of proteins. For the Drosophila Polycomb group (PcG) protein Polyhomeotic (Ph), its SAM polymerization serves as the structural foundation to cluster multiple PcG complexes, helping to maintain a silenced chromatin state. Ph SAM shares 64% sequence identity with its human ortholog, PHC3 SAM, and both SAMs polymerize. However, in the context of their larger protein regions, PHC3 SAM forms longer polymers compared with Ph SAM. Motivated to establish the precise structural basis for the differences, if any, between Ph and PHC3 SAM, we determined the crystal structure of the PHC3 SAM polymer. PHC3 SAM uses the same SAM-SAM interaction as the Ph SAM sixfold repeat polymer. Yet, PHC3 SAM polymerizes using just five SAMs per turn of the helical polymer rather than the typical six per turn observed for all SAM polymers reported to date. Structural analysis suggested that malleability of the PHC3 SAM would allow formation of not just the fivefold repeat structure but also possibly others. Indeed, a second PHC3 SAM polymer in a different crystal form forms a sixfold repeat polymer. These results suggest that the polymers formed by PHC3 SAM, and likely others, are dynamic. The functional consequence of the variable PHC3 SAM polymers may be to create different chromatin architectures., (© 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.)

This research investigates the influence of religious preference and practice on the use of contraception. Much of earlier research examines the level of religiosity on sexual activity. This research extends this reasoning by suggesting that peer group effects create a willingness to mask the level of sexuality through the use of contraception. While it is understood that certain religions, that is, Catholicism does not condone the use of contraceptives, this research finds that Catholics are more likely to use certain methods of contraception than other religious groups. With data on contraceptive use from the Center for Disease Control's Family Growth Survey, a likelihood probability model is employed to investigate the impact religious affiliation on contraception use. Findings suggest a preference for methods that ensure non-pregnancy while preventing feelings of shame and condemnation in their religious communities.

As any food critic knows, the visual presentation of a dish can enhance its aroma. Is the reverse also true? Here we investigated whether odors can enhance the salience of familiar visual objects at the limits of perceptual discrimination, using rapid serial visual presentations (RSVP) to induce an attentional blink (AB). We had participants view RSVP streams containing photographs of odor-related objects (lemon, orange, rose, and mint) amongst non-odor related distractors. In each trial, participants inhaled a single odor, which either matched the odor-related target within the stream (congruent trials), did not match the odor-related target (incongruent trials), or was irrelevant with respect to the target. Congruent odors significantly attenuated the AB for odor-related visual targets, compared with incongruent and irrelevant odors. The findings suggest that familiar odors can render matching visual objects more salient, thereby enhancing their competitive strength at the limits of temporal attention.

Laser flash photolysis (LFP) was used to characterize a triplet excited state species isolated from Black River and San Joaquin wetlands particulate organic matter (POM). The solubilized organic matter, isolated from POM by pH-independent diffusion in distilled water, was named PdOM. UV-visible absorption spectroscopy, excitation-emission matrix spectroscopy (EEMs), and (1)H NMR were used to characterize the PdOM. While LFP of dissolved organic matter (DOM) is known to generate the solvated electron, LFP of the PdOM transient in argon-, air-, and nitrous oxide-saturated solutions indicated that this was a triplet excited state species ((3)PdOM*). The lifetime and the reactivity of (3)PdOM* with sorbic acid, a triplet state quencher, were compared with that of the triplet excited state of benzophenone, a DOM proxy. A second excited state species (designated DOM*), with a longer lifetime, was reported in a number of previous studies but not characterized. The lifetime of DOM*, measured for seventeen organic matter isolates, lignin, tannic acid, and three wetlands plant extracts, was shown to differentiate allochthonous from autochthonous DOM. (3)POM* and DOM* were also observed in lake water and a constructed wetlands' water. Aqueous extracts of fresh and aged plant material from the same wetland were shown to be one source of these excited state species. This study provides evidence of a role for POM in the photochemistry of natural and constructed wetland waters., (Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Sterile alpha motifs (SAMs) are frequently found in eukaryotic genomes. An intriguing property of many SAMs is their ability to self-associate, forming an open-ended polymer structure whose formation has been shown to be essential for the function of the protein. What remains largely unresolved is how polymerization is controlled. Previously, we had determined that the stretch of unstructured residues N-terminal to the SAM of a Drosophila protein called polyhomeotic (Ph), a member of the polycomb group (PcG) of gene silencers, plays a key role in controlling Ph SAM polymerization. Ph SAM with its native linker created shorter polymers compared to Ph SAM attached to either a random linker or no linker. Here, we show that the SAM linker for the human Ph ortholog, polyhomeotic homolog 3 (PHC3), also controls PHC3 SAM polymerization but does so in the opposite fashion. PHC3 SAM with its native linker allows longer polymers to form compared to when attached to a random linker. Attaching the PHC3 SAM linker to Ph SAM also resulted in extending Ph SAM polymerization. Moreover, in the context of full-length Ph protein, replacing the SAM linker with PHC3 SAM linker, intended to create longer polymers, resulted in greater repressive ability for the chimera compared to wild-type Ph. These findings show that polymeric SAM linkers evolved to modulate a wide dynamic range of SAM polymerization abilities and suggest that rationally manipulating the function of SAM containing proteins through controlling their SAM polymerization may be possible.

Polyhomeotic (Ph), a member of the Polycomb Group (PcG), is a gene silencer critical for proper development. We present a previously unrecognized way of controlling Ph function through modulation of its sterile alpha motif (SAM) polymerization leading to the identification of a novel target for tuning the activities of proteins. SAM domain containing proteins have been shown to require SAM polymerization for proper function. However, the role of the Ph SAM polymer in PcG-mediated gene silencing was uncertain. Here, we first show that Ph SAM polymerization is indeed required for its gene silencing function. Interestingly, the unstructured linker sequence N-terminal to Ph SAM can shorten the length of polymers compared with when Ph SAM is individually isolated. Substituting the native linker with a random, unstructured sequence (RLink) can still limit polymerization, but not as well as the native linker. Consequently, the increased polymeric Ph RLink exhibits better gene silencing ability. In the Drosophila wing disc, Ph RLink expression suppresses growth compared with no effect for wild-type Ph, and opposite to the overgrowth phenotype observed for polymer-deficient Ph mutants. These data provide the first demonstration that the inherent activity of a protein containing a polymeric SAM can be enhanced by increasing SAM polymerization. Because the SAM linker had not been previously considered important for the function of SAM-containing proteins, our finding opens numerous opportunities to manipulate linker sequences of hundreds of polymeric SAM proteins to regulate a diverse array of intracellular functions.

Polycomb group (PcG) proteins maintain the silent state of developmentally important genes. Recent evidence indicates that noncoding RNAs also play an important role in targeting PcG proteins to chromatin and PcG-mediated chromatin organization, although the molecular basis for how PcG and RNA function in concert remains unclear. The Phe-Cys-Ser (FCS) domain, named for three consecutive residues conserved in this domain, is a 30-40-residue Zn(2+) binding motif found in a number of PcG proteins. The FCS domain has been shown to bind RNA in a non-sequence specific manner, but how it does so is not known. Here, we present the three-dimensional structure of the FCS domain from human Polyhomeotic homologue 1 (HPH1, also known as PHC1) determined using multidimensional nuclear magnetic resonance methods. Chemical shift perturbations upon addition of RNA and DNA resulted in the identification of Lys 816 as a potentially important residue required for nucleic acid binding. The role played by this residue in Polyhomeotic function was demonstrated in a transcription assay conducted in Drosophila S2 cells. Mutation of the Arg residue to Ala in the Drosophila Polyhomeotic (Ph) protein, which is equivalent to Lys 816 in HPH1, was unable to repress transcription of a reporter gene to the level of wild-type Ph. These results suggest that direct interaction between the Ph FCS domain and nucleic acids is required for Ph-mediated repression.

RING1B, a Polycomb Group (PcG) protein, binds methylated chromatin through its association with another PcG protein called Polycomb (Pc). However, RING1B can associate with nonmethylated chromatin suggesting an alternate mechanism for RING1B interaction with chromatin. Here, we demonstrate that two proteins with little sequence identity between them, the Pc cbox domain and RYBP, bind the same surface on the C-terminal domain of RING1B (C-RING1B). Pc cbox and RYBP each fold into a nearly identical, intermolecular beta sheet with C-RING1B and a loop structure which are completely different in the two proteins. Both the beta sheet and loop are required for stable binding and transcription repression. Further, a mutation engineered to disrupt binding on the Drosophila dRING1 protein prevents chromatin association and PcG function in vivo. These results suggest that PcG targeting to different chromatin locations relies, in part, on binding partners of C-RING1B that are diverse in sequence and structure., (Copyright 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Free-flight body dynamics and wing kinematics were collected from recordings of continuous, low-speed, multi-wingbeat yaw turns in hawkmoths (Manduca sexta) using stereo videography. These data were used to examine the effects of rotational damping arising from interactions between the body rotation and flapping motion (flapping counter-torque, FCT) on continuous turning. The moths were found to accelerate during downstroke, then decelerate during upstroke by an amount consistent with FCT damping. Wing kinematics related to turning were then analysed in a simulation of hawkmoth flight; results were consistent with the observed acceleration-deceleration pattern. However, an alternative wing kinematic which produced more continuous and less damped accelerations was found in the simulation. These findings demonstrate that (i) FCT damping is detectable in the dynamics of continuously turning animals and (ii) FCT-reducing kinematics do exist but were not employed by turning moths, possibly because within-wingbeat damping simplifies control of turning by allowing control systems to target angular velocity rather than acceleration.

Polycomb group (PcG) proteins are required for maintaining cell identity and stem cell self-renewal. RING1B and Polycomb (Pc) are two components of a multiprotein complex called polycomb repression complex 1 (PRC1) that is essential for establishing and maintaining long-term repressed gene states. Here we characterize the interaction between the C-terminal region of RING1B (C-RING1B) and the Pc cbox domain. The C-RING1B-cbox interaction displays a 1:1 stoichiometry with dissociation constants ranging from 9.2 to 180 nM for the different Pc orthologues. NMR analysis of C-RING1B alone reveals line broadening. However, when it is in complex with the cbox domain, there is a striking change to the NMR spectrum indicative of conformational tightening. This conformational change may arise from the organization of the C-RING1B subdomains. The C-terminal regions of all PcG RING1 proteins are composed of two stretches of conserved sequences separated by a variable linker sequence. While the entire C-RING1B region is required for cbox binding, the N- and C-terminal halves of C-RING1B can be separated and are able to interact, suggesting the presence of an intramolecular interaction within C-RING1B. The flexibility within the C-RING1B structure allowing transitions between the intramolecular bound and unbound states may cause the broadened peaks of the C-RING1B NMR spectrum. Binding the cbox domain stabilizes C-RING1B, whereby broadening is eliminated. The presence of flexible regions could allow C-RING1B to bind a variety of different factors, ultimately recruiting RING1B and its associated PcG proteins to different genomic loci.

The human tumor suppressor Fhit is a homodimeric histidine triad (HIT) protein of 147 amino acids which has Ap(3)A hydrolase activity. We have recently discovered that Fhit is phosphorylated in vivo and is phosphorylated in vitro by Src kinase [Pekarsky, Y., Garrison, P. N., Palamarchuk, A., Zanesi, N., Aqeilan, R. I., Huebner, K., Barnes, L. D., and Croce, C. M. (2004) Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 101, 3775-3779]. Now we have coexpressed Fhit with the elk tyrosine kinase in Escherichia coli to generate phosphorylated forms of Fhit. Unphosphorylated Fhit, Fhit phosphorylated on one subunit, and Fhit phosphorylated on both subunits were purified to apparent homogeneity by column chromatography on anion-exchange and gel filtration resins. MALDI-TOF and HPLC-ESI tandem mass spectrometry of intact Fhit and proteolytic peptides of Fhit demonstrated that Fhit is phosphorylated on Y(114) on either one or both subunits. Monophosphorylated Fhit exhibited monophasic kinetics with K(m) and k(cat) values approximately 2- and approximately 7-fold lower, respectively, than the corresponding values for unphosphorylated Fhit. Diphosphorylated Fhit exhibited biphasic kinetics. One site had K(m) and k(cat) values approximately 2- and approximately 140-fold lower, respectively, than the corresponding values for unphosphorylated Fhit. The second site had a K(m) approximately 60-fold higher and a k(cat) approximately 6-fold lower than the corresponding values for unphosphorylated Fhit. The unexpected kinetic patterns for the phosphorylated forms suggest the system may be enzymologically novel. The decreases in the values of K(m) and k(cat) for the phosphorylated forms in comparison to those of unphosphorylated Fhit favor the formation and lifetime of the Fhit-Ap(3)A complex, which may enhance the tumor suppressor activity of Fhit.

Iron is essential to virtually all organisms, but poses problems of toxicity and poor solubility. Bacteria have evolved various mechanisms to counter the problems imposed by their iron dependence, allowing them to achieve effective iron homeostasis under a range of iron regimes. Highly efficient iron acquisition systems are used to scavenge iron from the environment under iron-restricted conditions. In many cases, this involves the secretion and internalisation of extracellular ferric chelators called siderophores. Ferrous iron can also be directly imported by the G protein-like transporter, FeoB. For pathogens, host-iron complexes (transferrin, lactoferrin, haem, haemoglobin) are directly used as iron sources. Bacterial iron storage proteins (ferritin, bacterioferritin) provide intracellular iron reserves for use when external supplies are restricted, and iron detoxification proteins (Dps) are employed to protect the chromosome from iron-induced free radical damage. There is evidence that bacteria control their iron requirements in response to iron availability by down-regulating the expression of iron proteins during iron-restricted growth. And finally, the expression of the iron homeostatic machinery is subject to iron-dependent global control ensuring that iron acquisition, storage and consumption are geared to iron availability and that intracellular levels of free iron do not reach toxic levels.