Deception in context: coding nonverbal cues, situational variables and risk of detection

There are many situations in which deception may arise and understanding the behaviors associated with it are compounded by various contexts in which it may occur. This paper sets out a coding protocol for identifying cues to deception and reports on three studies, in which deception was studied in different contexts. The contexts involved manipulating risks (i.e., probability) of being detected and reconnaissance, both of which are related to terrorist activities. Two of the studies examined the impact of changing the risks of deception detection, whilst the third investigated increased cognitive demand of duplex deception tasks including reconnaissance and deception. In all three studies, cues to deception were analyzed in relation to observable body movements and subjective impressions given by participants. In general, the results indicate a pattern of hand movement reduction by deceivers, and suggest the notion that raising the risk of detection influences deceivers? behaviors. Participants in the higher risk condition displayed increased negative affect (found in deceivers) and tension (found in both deceivers and truth-tellers) than those in lower risk conditions

Defining Feasibility and Pilot Studies in Preparation for Randomised Controlled Trials: Development of a Conceptual Framework

We describe a framework for defining pilot and feasibility studies focusing on studies conducted in preparation for a randomised controlled trial. To develop the framework, we undertook a Delphi survey; ran an open meeting at a trial methodology conference; conducted a review of definitions outside the health research context; consulted experts at an international consensus meeting; and reviewed 27 empirical pilot or feasibility studies. We initially adopted mutually exclusive definitions of pilot and feasibility studies. However, some Delphi survey respondents and the majority of open meeting attendees disagreed with the idea of mutually exclusive definitions. Their viewpoint was supported by definitions outside the health research context, the use of the terms ‘pilot’ and ‘feasibility’ in the literature, and participants at the international consensus meeting. In our framework, pilot studies are a subset of feasibility studies, rather than the two being mutually exclusive. A feasibility study asks whether something can be done, should we proceed with it, and if so, how. A pilot study asks the same questions but also has a specific design feature: in a pilot study a future study, or part of a future study, is conducted on a smaller scale. We suggest that to facilitate their identification, these studies should be clearly identified using the terms ‘feasibility’ or ‘pilot’ as appropriate. This should include feasibility studies that are largely qualitative; we found these difficult to identify in electronic searches because researchers rarely used the term ‘feasibility’ in the title or abstract of such studies. Investigators should also report appropriate objectives and methods related to feasibility; and give clear confirmation that their study is in preparation for a future randomised controlled trial designed to assess the effect of an intervention

Altered networks in bothersome tinnitus: a functional connectivity study

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The objective was to examine functional connectivity linked to the auditory system in patients with bothersome tinnitus. Activity was low frequency (< 0.1 Hz), spontaneous blood oxygenation level-dependent (BOLD) responses at rest. The question was whether the experience of chronic bothersome tinnitus induced changes in synaptic efficacy between co-activated components. Functional connectivity for seed regions in auditory, visual, attention, and control networks was computed across all 2 mm³brain volumes in 17 patients with moderate-severe bothersome tinnitus (<it>Tinnitus Handicap Index: average </it>53.5 ± 3.6 (range 38-76)) and 17 age-matched controls.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>In bothersome tinnitus, negative correlations reciprocally characterized functional connectivity between auditory and occipital/visual cortex. Negative correlations indicate that when BOLD response magnitudes increased in auditory or visual cortex they decreased in the linked visual or auditory cortex, suggesting reciprocally phase reversed activity between functionally connected locations in tinnitus. Both groups showed similar connectivity with positive correlations within the auditory network. Connectivity for primary visual cortex in tinnitus included extensive negative correlations in the ventral attention temporoparietal junction and in the inferior frontal gyrus and rostral insula - executive control network components. Rostral insula and inferior frontal gyrus connectivity in tinnitus also showed greater negative correlations in occipital cortex.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>These results imply that in bothersome tinnitus there is dissociation between activity in auditory cortex and visual, attention and control networks. The reciprocal negative correlations in connectivity between these networks might be maladaptive or reflect adaptations to reduce phantom noise salience and conflict with attention to non-auditory tasks.</p

Tissue-specific expression of Cas9 has no impact on whole-body metabolism in four transgenic mouse lines

Objective:CRISPR/Cas9 technology has revolutionized gene editing and fast tracked our capacity to manipulate genes of interest for the benefit of both research and therapeutic applications. Whilst many advances have, and continue to be made in this area, perhaps the most utilized technology to date has been the generation of knockout cells, tissues and animals. The advantages of this technology are many fold, however some questions still remain regarding the effects that long term expression of foreign proteins such as Cas9, have on mammalian cell function. Several studies have proposed that chronic overexpression of Cas9, with or without its accompanying guide RNAs, may have deleterious effects on cell function and health. This is of particular concern when applying this technology in vivo, where chronic expression of Cas9 in tissues of interest may promote disease-like phenotypes and thus confound the investigation of the effects of the gene of interest. Although these concerns remain valid, no study to our knowledge has yet to demonstrate this directly.Methods:In this study we used the lox-stop-lox (LSL) spCas9 ROSA26 transgenic (Tg) mouse line to generate four tissue-specific Cas9-Tg models that express Cas9 in the heart, liver, skeletal muscle or adipose tissue. We performed comprehensive phenotyping of these mice up to 20-weeks of age and subsequently performed molecular analysis of their organs.Results:We demonstrate that Cas9 expression in these tissues had no detrimental effect on whole body health of the animals, nor did it induce any tissue-specific effects on whole body energy metabolism, liver health, inflammation, fibrosis, heart function or muscle mass.Conclusions:Our data suggests that these models are suitable for studying the tissue specific effects of gene deletion using the LSL-Cas9-Tg model, and that phenotypes observed utilizing these models can be confidently interpreted as being gene specific, and not confounded by the chronic overexpression of Cas9

Diffractive Dijet Production at sqrt(s)=630 and 1800 GeV at the Fermilab Tevatron

We report a measurement of the diffractive structure function $F_{jj}^D$ of the antiproton obtained from a study of dijet events produced in association with a leading antiproton in $\bar pp$ collisions at $\sqrt s=630$ GeV at the Fermilab Tevatron. The ratio of $F_{jj}^D$ at $\sqrt s=630$ GeV to $F_{jj}^D$ obtained from a similar measurement at $\sqrt s=1800$ GeV is compared with expectations from QCD factorization and with theoretical predictions. We also report a measurement of the $\xi$ ($x$-Pomeron) and $\beta$ ($x$ of parton in Pomeron) dependence of $F_{jj}^D$ at $\sqrt s=1800$ GeV. In the region $0.035<\xi<0.095$, $|t|<1$ GeV$^2$ and $\beta<0.5$, $F_{jj}^D(\beta,\xi)$ is found to be of the form $\beta^{-1.0\pm 0.1} \xi^{-0.9\pm 0.1}$, which obeys $\beta$-$\xi$ factorization.Comment: LaTeX, 9 pages, Submitted to Phys. Rev. Letter

Studying the Underlying Event in Drell-Yan and High Transverse Momentum Jet Production at the Tevatron

We study the underlying event in proton-antiproton collisions by examining the behavior of charged particles (transverse momentum pT > 0.5 GeV/c, pseudorapidity |\eta| < 1) produced in association with large transverse momentum jets (~2.2 fb-1) or with Drell-Yan lepton-pairs (~2.7 fb-1) in the Z-boson mass region (70 < M(pair) < 110 GeV/c2) as measured by CDF at 1.96 TeV center-of-mass energy. We use the direction of the lepton-pair (in Drell-Yan production) or the leading jet (in high-pT jet production) in each event to define three regions of \eta-\phi space; toward, away, and transverse, where \phi is the azimuthal scattering angle. For Drell-Yan production (excluding the leptons) both the toward and transverse regions are very sensitive to the underlying event. In high-pT jet production the transverse region is very sensitive to the underlying event and is separated into a MAX and MIN transverse region, which helps separate the hard component (initial and final-state radiation) from the beam-beam remnant and multiple parton interaction components of the scattering. The data are corrected to the particle level to remove detector effects and are then compared with several QCD Monte-Carlo models. The goal of this analysis is to provide data that can be used to test and improve the QCD Monte-Carlo models of the underlying event that are used to simulate hadron-hadron collisions.Comment: Submitted to Phys.Rev.

Observation of the Baryonic Flavor-Changing Neutral Current Decay Lambda_b -> Lambda mu+ mu-

We report the first observation of the baryonic flavor-changing neutral current decay Lambda_b -> Lambda mu+ mu- with 24 signal events and a statistical significance of 5.8 Gaussian standard deviations. This measurement uses ppbar collisions data sample corresponding to 6.8fb-1 at sqrt{s}=1.96TeV collected by the CDF II detector at the Tevatron collider. The total and differential branching ratios for Lambda_b -> Lambda mu+ mu- are measured. We find B(Lambda_b -> Lambda mu+ mu-) = [1.73+-0.42(stat)+-0.55(syst)] x 10^{-6}. We also report the first measurement of the differential branching ratio of B_s -> phi mu+ mu- using 49 signal events. In addition, we report branching ratios for B+ -> K+ mu+ mu-, B0 -> K0 mu+ mu-, and B -> K*(892) mu+ mu- decays.Comment: 8 pages, 2 figures, 4 tables. Submitted to Phys. Rev. Let

Measurement of the W+W−W^+W^- Production Cross Section and Search for Anomalous WWγWW\gamma and WWZWWZ Couplings in ppˉp \bar p Collisions at s=1.96\sqrt{s} = 1.96 TeV

This Letter describes the current most precise measurement of the $W$ boson pair production cross section and most sensitive test of anomalous $WW\gamma$ and $WWZ$ couplings in $p \bar p$ collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 1.96 TeV. The $WW$ candidates are reconstructed from decays containing two charged leptons and two neutrinos, where the charged leptons are either electrons or muons. Using data collected by the CDF II detector from 3.6 fb$^{-1}$ of integrated luminosity, a total of 654 candidate events are observed with an expected background contribution of $320 \pm 47$ events. The measured total cross section is $\sigma (p \bar p \to W^+ W^- + X) = 12.1 \pm 0.9 \textrm{(stat)} ^{+1.6}_{-1.4} \textrm{(syst)}$ pb, which is in good agreement with the standard model prediction. The same data sample is used to place constraints on anomalous $WW\gamma$ and $WWZ$ couplings.Comment: submitted to Phys. Rev. Let

Measurement of CP-violation asymmetries in D0 to Ks pi+ pi-

We report a measurement of time-integrated CP-violation asymmetries in the resonant substructure of the three-body decay D0 to Ks pi+ pi- using CDF II data corresponding to 6.0 invfb of integrated luminosity from Tevatron ppbar collisions at sqrt(s) = 1.96 TeV. The charm mesons used in this analysis come from D*+(2010) to D0 pi+ and D*-(2010) to D0bar pi-, where the production flavor of the charm meson is determined by the charge of the accompanying pion. We apply a Dalitz-amplitude analysis for the description of the dynamic decay structure and use two complementary approaches, namely a full Dalitz-plot fit employing the isobar model for the contributing resonances and a model-independent bin-by-bin comparison of the D0 and D0bar Dalitz plots. We find no CP-violation effects and measure an asymmetry of ACP = (-0.05 +- 0.57 (stat) +- 0.54 (syst))% for the overall integrated CP-violation asymmetry, consistent with the standard model prediction.Comment: 15 page

Specific mediator inhibition by the NO donors SNP and NCX 2057 in the peripheral lung: implications for allergen-induced bronchoconstriction

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The aim of this study was to examine potential therapeutic effect of the two NO donors NCX 2057 (3-(4-hydroxy-3-methoxyphenyl)-2-propenoic acid) 4-(nitrooxy)butyl ester) and SNP (sodium nitroprusside) on the early allergic airway response in the peripheral lung.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>The experiments were performed in guinea pig lung parenchyma (GPLP) derived from ovalbumin (OVA) sensitized guinea pigs. The effects of NCX 2057 and SNP were evaluated by contractile responses and mediator release during OVA challenge. The generation of nitrite and nitrate was assessed by chemiluminescence. Statistical analysis was evaluated by ANOVA.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Cumulatively increasing concentrations of OVA (1–10,000 ng/ml) induced concentration-dependent contractions of the GPLP that were reduced by NCX 2057 (100 μM, p < 0.001) and SNP (100 μM, p < 0.05). Antigen-induced eicosanoid release was decreased by NCX 2057 (100 μM, p < 0.001) but not by SNP (100 μM), whereas the release of histamine was reduced by SNP (100 μM, p < 0.001) but not by NCX 2057 (100 μM). In addition, NCX 2057 (0.1–100 μM), but not SNP (0.1–100 μM), relaxed leukotriene D₄(10 nM) precontracted GPLP (p < 0.01). The guanylyl cyclase inhibitor ODQ had no effect on the NCX 2057 mediated relaxation. SNP released significantly less nitrite than NCX 2057.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Although both SNP and NCX 2057 reduced the release of pro-inflammatory mediators, their profiles were distinctly different. Furthermore, NCX 2057 also induced smooth muscle dilation in the GPLP. The findings point to specific anti-inflammatory effects of different NO donors in the peripheral lung tissue.</p