Performance breakdown effects dissociate from error detection effects in typing

Mistakes in skilled performance are often observed to be slower than correct actions. This error slowing has been associated with cognitive control processes involved in performance monitoring and error detection. A limited literature on skilled actions, however, suggests that preerror actions may also be slower than accurate actions. This contrasts with findings from unskilled, discrete trial tasks, where preerror performance is usually faster than accurate performance. We tested 3 predictions about error-related behavioural changes in continuous typing performance. We asked participants to type 100 sentences without visual feedback. We found that (a) performance before errors was no different in speed than that before correct key-presses, (b) error and posterror key-presses were slower than matched correct key-presses, and (c) errors were preceded by greater variability in speed than were matched correct key-presses. Our results suggest that errors are preceded by a behavioural signature, which may indicate breakdown of fluid cognition, and that the effects of error detection on performance (error and posterror slowing) can be dissociated from breakdown effects (preerror increase in variability). © 2013 © 2013 The Experimental Psychology Society

Long-Term climate change commitment and reversibility: An EMIC intercomparison

This is the final version of the article. Available from the American Meteorological Society via the DOI in this record.This paper summarizes the results of an intercomparison project with Earth System Models of Intermediate Complexity (EMICs) undertaken in support of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fifth Assessment Report (AR5). The focus is on long-term climate projections designed to 1) quantify the climate change commitment of different radiative forcing trajectories and 2) explore the extent to which climate change is reversible on human time scales. All commitment simulations follow the four representative concentration pathways (RCPs) and their extensions to year 2300. MostEMICs simulate substantial surface air temperature and thermosteric sea level rise commitment following stabilization of the atmospheric composition at year-2300 levels. The meridional overturning circulation (MOC) is weakened temporarily and recovers to near-preindustrial values in most models for RCPs 2.6-6.0. The MOC weakening is more persistent for RCP8.5. Elimination of anthropogenic CO2 emissions after 2300 results in slowly decreasing atmospheric CO2 concentrations. At year 3000 atmospheric CO2 is still at more than half its year-2300 level in all EMICs forRCPs 4.5-8.5. Surface air temperature remains constant or decreases slightly and thermosteric sea level rise continues for centuries after elimination ofCO2 emissions in allEMICs.Restoration of atmosphericCO2 fromRCPto preindustrial levels over 100-1000 years requires large artificial removal of CO2 from the atmosphere and does not result in the simultaneous return to preindustrial climate conditions, as surface air temperature and sea level response exhibit a substantial time lag relative to atmospheric CO2. © 2013 American Meteorological Society.KZ and AJW acknowledge support from the National Science and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) Discovery Grant Program. AJW acknowledges support from NSERC's G8 Research Councils Initiative on Multilateral Research Funding Program. AVE and IIM were supported by the President of Russia Grant 5467.2012.5, by the Russian Foundation for Basic Research, and by the programs of the Russian Academy of Sciences. EC, TF, HG, and GPB acknowledge support from the Belgian Federal Science Policy Office. FJ, RS, and MS acknowledge support by the Swiss National Science Foundation and by the European Project CARBOCHANGE (Grant 264879), which received funding from the European Commission's Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007–2013). PBH and NRE acknowledge support from EU FP7 Grant ERMITAGE 265170

Technology-Supported Storytelling (TSST) Strategy in Virtual World for Multicultural Education

Learning culture through stories is an effective way for multicultural education, since stories are one of the most powerful and personal ways that we learn about the world. Storytelling, the process of telling stories, is a form of communication and a universal expression of culture. With the development of technology, storytelling emerges out of diverse ways. This study explores the storytelling in virtual worlds for multicultural education, and devises a Technology-Supported storytelling (TSST) strategy by examining and considering the characteristics of virtual worlds which could be incorporated into the storytelling, and then uses this strategy to teach Korean culture to students with different culture background. With this innovative TSST strategy in virtual world, this study expects to provide a guide to practice for teaching multicultural in digital era

Measurement of the Top Quark Pair Production Cross Section in pbar-p Collisions Using Multijet Final States

We have studied tbar-t production using multijet final states in pbar-p collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 1.8 TeV, with an integrated luminosity of 110.3 pb(-1). Each of the top quarks with these final states decays exclusively to a bottom quark and a W boson, with the W bosons decaying into quark-antiquark pairs. The analysis has been optimized using neural networks to achieve the smallest expected fractional uncertainty on the tbar-t production cross section, and yields a cross section of 7.1 +/- 2.8(stat.) +/- 1.5(syst.) pb, assuming a top quark mass of 172.1 GeV/c^(2). Combining this result with previous D0 measurements, where one or both of the W bosons decay leptonically, gives a tbar t production cross section of 5.9 +/- 1.2(stat) +/- 1.1(syst) pb.Comment: 30 pages, 32 figures; no substative change in revisio

Measurement of the Top Quark Pair Production Cross Section in the All-jets Decay Channel

We present a measurement of tbar-t production using multijet final states in pbar-p collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 1.8 TeV, with an integrated luminosity of 110.3 pb(-1). The analysis has been optimized using neural networks to achieve the smallest expected fractional uncertainty on the tbar-t production cross section, and yields a cross section of 7.1 +/- 2.8(stat.) +/- 1.5(syst.) pb, assuming a top quark mass of 172.1 GeV/c^(2). Combining this result with previous D0 measurements, where one or both of the W bosons decay leptonically, gives a tbar-t production cross section of 5.9 +/- 1.2(stat) +/- 1.1(syst) pb.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures; no substative change in revisio

Search for Top Squark Pair Production in the Dielectron Channel

This report describes the first search for top squark pair production in the channel stop_1 stopbar_1 -> b bbar chargino_1 chargino_1 -> ee+jets+MEt using 74.9 +- 8.9 pb^-1 of data collected using the D0 detector. A 95% confidence level upper limit on sigma*B is presented. The limit is above the theoretical expectation for sigma*B for this process, but does show the sensitivity of the current D0 data set to a particular topology for new physics.Comment: Five pages, including three figures, submitted to PRD Brief Report

Second Generation Leptoquark Search in p\bar{p} Collisions at s\sqrt{s} = 1.8 TeV

We report on a search for second generation leptoquarks with the D\O\ detector at the Fermilab Tevatron $p\bar{p}$ collider at $\sqrt{s}$ = 1.8 TeV. This search is based on 12.7 pb$^{-1}$ of data. Second generation leptoquarks are assumed to be produced in pairs and to decay into a muon and quark with branching ratio $\beta$ or to neutrino and quark with branching ratio $(1-\beta)$. We obtain cross section times branching ratio limits as a function of leptoquark mass and set a lower limit on the leptoquark mass of 111 GeV/c$^{2}$ for $\beta = 1$ and 89 GeV/c$^{2}$ for $\beta = 0.5$ at the 95%\ confidence level.Comment: 18 pages, FERMILAB-PUB-95/185-

Search for Charge 1/3 Third Generation Leptoquarks in pbarp Collisions at sqrt(s)=1.8 TeV

We report on a search for charge 1/3 third generation leptoquarks (LQ) produced in pbarp collisions at sqrt(s) = 1.8 TeV using the D0 detector at Fermilab. Third generation leptoquarks are assumed to be produced in pairs and to decay to a tau neutrino and a b quark with branching fraction B. We place upper limits on sigma(pbarp to LQbarLQ)xB^2 as a function of the leptoquark mass M_LQ. Assuming B =1, we exclude at the 95% confidence level third generation scalar leptoquarks with M_LQ<94 GeV/c^2, and third generation vector leptoquarks with M_LQ<216 GeV/c^2 (M_LQ<148 GeV/c^2) assuming Yang-Mills (anomalous) coupling.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figure

Cluster K Mycobacteriophages: Insights into the Evolutionary Origins of Mycobacteriophage TM4

Five newly isolated mycobacteriophages –Angelica, CrimD, Adephagia, Anaya, and Pixie – have similar genomic architectures to mycobacteriophage TM4, a previously characterized phage that is widely used in mycobacterial genetics. The nucleotide sequence similarities warrant grouping these into Cluster K, with subdivision into three subclusters: K1, K2, and K3. Although the overall genome architectures of these phages are similar, TM4 appears to have lost at least two segments of its genome, a central region containing the integration apparatus, and a segment at the right end. This suggests that TM4 is a recent derivative of a temperate parent, resolving a long-standing conundrum about its biology, in that it was reportedly recovered from a lysogenic strain of Mycobacterium avium, but it is not capable of forming lysogens in any mycobacterial host. Like TM4, all of the Cluster K phages infect both fast- and slow-growing mycobacteria, and all of them – with the exception of TM4 – form stable lysogens in both Mycobacterium smegmatis and Mycobacterium tuberculosis; immunity assays show that all five of these phages share the same immune specificity. TM4 infects these lysogens suggesting that it was either derived from a heteroimmune temperate parent or that it has acquired a virulent phenotype. We have also characterized a widely-used conditionally replicating derivative of TM4 and identified mutations conferring the temperature-sensitive phenotype. All of the Cluster K phages contain a series of well conserved 13 bp repeats associated with the translation initiation sites of a subset of the genes; approximately one half of these contain an additional sequence feature composed of imperfectly conserved 17 bp inverted repeats separated by a variable spacer. The K1 phages integrate into the host tmRNA and the Cluster K phages represent potential new tools for the genetics of M. tuberculosis and related species