97 research outputs found
High school music classes enhance the neural processing of speech
Should music be a priority in public education? One argument for teaching music in school is that private music instruction relates to enhanced language abilities and neural function. However, the directionality of this relationship is unclear and it is unknown whether school-based music training can produce these enhancements. Here we show that 2 years of group music classes in high school enhance the neural encoding of speech. To tease apart the relationships between music and neural function, we tested high school students participating in either music or fitness-based training. These groups were matched at the onset of training on neural timing, reading ability, and IQ. Auditory brainstem responses were collected to a synthesized speech sound presented in background noise. After 2 years of training, the neural responses of the music training group were earlier than at pre-training, while the neural timing of students in the fitness training group was unchanged. These results represent the strongest evidence to date that in-school music education can cause enhanced speech encoding. The neural benefits of musical training are, therefore, not limited to expensive private instruction early in childhood but can be elicited by cost-effective group instruction during adolescence
Listening in the moment: how bilingualism interacts with task demands to shape active listening
While there is evidence for bilingual enhancements of inhibitory control and auditory
processing, two processes that are fundamental to daily communication, it is not
known how bilinguals utilize these cognitive and sensory enhancements during realworld listening. To test our hypothesis that bilinguals engage their enhanced cognitive
and sensory processing in real-world listening situations, bilinguals and monolinguals
performed a selective attention task involving competing talkers, a common demand of
everyday listening, and then later passively listened to the same competing sentences.
During the active and passive listening periods, evoked responses to the competing
talkers were collected to understand how online auditory processing facilitates active
listening and if this processing differs between bilinguals and monolinguals. Additionally,
participants were tested on a separate measure of inhibitory control to see if inhibitory
control abilities related with performance on the selective attention task. We found
that although monolinguals and bilinguals performed similarly on the selective attention
task, the groups differed in the neural and cognitive processes engaged to perform
this task, compared to when they were passively listening to the talkers. Specifically,
during active listening monolinguals had enhanced cortical phase consistency while
bilinguals demonstrated enhanced subcortical phase consistency in the response to
the pitch contours of the sentences, particularly during passive listening. Moreover,
bilinguals’ performance on the inhibitory control test related with performance on the
selective attention test, a relationship that was not seen for monolinguals. These results
are consistent with the hypothesis that bilinguals utilize inhibitory control and enhanced
subcortical auditory processing in everyday listening situations to engage with sound in
ways that are different than monolinguals
Observation of Weyl and Dirac fermions at smooth topological Volkov-Pankratov heterojunctions
Weyl and Dirac relativistic fermions are ubiquitous in topological matter.
Their relativistic character enables high energy physics phenomena like the
chiral anomaly to occur in solid state, which allows to experimentally probe
and explore fundamental relativistic theories. Here we show that on smooth
interfaces between a trivial and a topological material, massless Weyl and
massive Dirac fermions intrinsically coexist. The emergence of the latter,
known as Volkov-Pankratov states, is directly revealed by magneto-optical
spectroscopy, evidencing that their energy spectrum is perfectly controlled by
the smoothness of topological interface. Simultaneously, we reveal the optical
absorption of the zero-energy chiral Weyl state, whose wavefunction is
drastically transformed when the topological interface is smooth. Artificial
engineering of the topology profile thus provides a novel textbook system to
explore the rich relativistic energy spectra in condensed matter
heterostructures.Comment: 21 pages 10 figure
Persistence of structural distortion and bulk band Rashba splitting in SnTe above its ferroelectric critical temperature
The ferroelectric semiconductor -SnTe has been regarded as a
topological crystalline insulator and the dispersion of its surface states has
been intensively measured with angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy
(ARPES) over the last decade. However, much less attention has been given to
the impact of the ferroelectric transition on its electronic structure, and in
particular on its bulk states. Here, we investigate the low-energy electronic
structure of -SnTe with ARPES and follow the evolution of the
bulk-state Rashba splitting as a function of temperature, across its
ferroelectric critical temperature of about K. Unexpectedly, we
observe a persistent band splitting up to room temperature, which is consistent
with an order-disorder contribution to the phase transition that requires the
presence of fluctuating local dipoles above . We conclude that no
topological surface state can occur at the (111) surface of SnTe, at odds with
recent literature.Comment: 26 pages, 8 figure
Multi-year interlaboratory exercises for the analysis of illicit drugs and metabolites in wastewater:development of a quality control system
Thirty-seven laboratories from 25 countries present the development of an inter-laboratory testing scheme for the analysis of seven illicit drug residues in standard solutions, tap- and wastewater. Almost 10 000 concentration values were evaluated: triplicates of up to five samples and 26 laboratories per year. The setup was substantially improved with experiences gained across the six repetitions (e.g. matrix type, sample conditions, spiking levels). From this, (pre-)analytical issues (e.g. pH adjustment, filtration) were revealed for specific analytes which resulted in formulation of best-practice protocols for inter-laboratory setup and analytical procedures. The results illustrate the effectiveness of the inter-laboratory setup to assess laboratory performance in the framework of wastewater-based epidemiology. The exercise proved that measurements of laboratories were of high quality (>80% satisfactory results for six out of seven analytes) and that analytical follow-up is important to assist laboratories in improving robustness of wastewater-based epidemiology results
Transcript identification in the BRCA1 candidate region
Chromosome 17q12-21 is known to contain a gene (or genes) which confers susceptibility to early-onset breast cancer and ovarian cancer (BRCA1). Identification and isolation of BRCA1 will likely provide the basis for increased understanding of the pathogenesis of breast and ovarian cancer, the development of targeted diagnostic and therapeutic approaches, and a means of screening women at risk of being BRCA1 mutation carriers. Genetic and physical maps of the BRCA1 candidate region have been largely completed and efforts are being directed at identification of candidate genes from within this region. We have begun the task of identifying transcripts from this region employing three complementary strategies. These include: 1) direct cDNA screening with cosmids derived from the BRCA1 region; 2) exon amplification; and 3) magnetic bead capture. Transcripts identified using these approaches are being characterized for: 1) tissue expression pattern; 2) the presence of genomic rearrangement in DNA derived from affected members of families believed to show linkage between breast cancer and genetic markers in the BRCA1 candidate interval; 3) altered size and/or expression pattern in RNA prepared from such individuals; and 4) homology to known genes or functional motifs. Germline mutations in affected individuals from these families will serve as presumptive evidence of BRCA1 identity.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/44201/1/10549_2004_Article_BF00682719.pd
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