Synthesis of novel organocycloborates and organoborate based ionic liquids

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The Last Harvest of Anthony Basoli: trip and landing of a visionary artist

In the sketches “panoramatici” of the Last Harvest, undertaken conclusive of a long and versatile career, Anthony Basoli pours again the themes that more they impassioned him during his human and artistic adventure putting itself to the peak of an intense and vibrating intellectual life

Dimensionality of joint torques and muscle patterns for reaching

Muscle activities underlying many motor behaviors can be generated by a small number of basic activation patterns with specific features shared across movement conditions. Such low-dimensionality suggests that the central nervous system (CNS) relies on a modular organization to simplify control. However, the relationship between the dimensionality of muscle patterns and that of joint torques is not fixed, because of redundancy and non-linearity in mapping the former into the latter, and needs to be investigated. We compared the torques acting at four arm joints during fast reaching movements in different directions in the frontal and sagittal planes and the underlying muscle patterns. The dimensionality of the non-gravitational components of torques and muscle patterns in the spatial, temporal, and spatiotemporal domains was estimated by multidimensional decomposition techniques. The spatial organization of torques was captured by two or three generators, indicating that not all the available coordination patterns are employed by the CNS. A single temporal generator with a biphasic profile was identified, generalizing previous observations on a single plane. The number of spatiotemporal generators was equal to the product of the spatial and temporal dimensionalities and their organization was essentially synchronous. Muscle pattern dimensionalities were higher than torques dimensionalities but also higher than the minimum imposed by the inherent non-negativity of muscle activations. The spatiotemporal dimensionality of the muscle patterns was lower than the product of their spatial and temporal dimensionality, indicating the existence of specific asynchronous coordination patterns. Thus, the larger dimensionalities of the muscle patterns may be required for CNS to overcome the non-linearities of the musculoskeletal system and to flexibly generate endpoint trajectories with simple kinematic features using a limited number of building blocks

A closed-loop stimulation system to modulate slow oscillations frequency of in vitro acute cortical slices

We present a closed-loop system able to set the frequency of slow oscillations dynamics observed in acute preparation of ferret cortical slices. The biological activity is recorded through a single electrode, is analyzed on-line and steered through the injection of a DC current of variable intensity. The system guarantees artifacts removal, minimal gaps in the data acquisition and proved to be robust to slice heterogeneities. To achieve such a control we designed a custom programmable stimulator ensuring low-noise and accurate tuning over low current levels. For data recording and analysis we rely on commercial acquisition and software tools. The result is a flexible and reliable system that ensures control over in vitro slow oscillation frequency. Our tool opens new possibilities for the investigation of slow-wave dynamics which have been associated with memory consolidation and whose alteration are observed in different pathologies such as neurodegenerative diseases