Effortless awareness: using real time neurofeedback to investigate correlates of posterior cingulate cortex activity in meditators' self-report

Neurophenomenological studies seek to utilize first-person self-report to elucidate cognitive processes related to physiological data. Grounded theory offers an approach to the qualitative analysis of self-report, whereby theoretical constructs are derived from empirical data. Here we used grounded theory methodology to assess how the first-person experience of meditation relates to neural activity in a core region of the default mode network –the posterior cingulate cortex. We analyzed first-person data consisting of meditators’ accounts of their subjective experience during runs of a real-time fMRI neurofeedback study of meditation, and third-person data consisting of corresponding feedback graphs of posterior cingulate cortex activity during the same runs. We found that for meditators, the subjective experiences of ‘undistracted awareness’ such as ‘concentration’ and ‘observing sensory experience’, and ‘effortless doing’ such as ‘observing sensory experience’, ‘not efforting’, and ‘contentment’, correspond with posterior cingulate cortex deactivation. Further, the subjective experiences of ‘distracted awareness’ such as ‘distraction’ and ‘interpreting’, and ‘controlling’ such as ‘efforting’ and ‘discontentment’, correspond with posterior cingulate cortex activation. Moreover, we derived several novel hypotheses about how specific qualities of cognitive processes during meditation relate to posterior cingulate cortex activity, such as the difference between meditation and ‘trying to meditate’. These findings offer novel insights into the relationship between meditation and self-related thinking and neural activity in the default mode network, driven by the first-person experience

Economic Values for Perennial Ryegrass Traits in New Zealand Dairy Farm Systems

Perennial ryegrass (Lolium perenne L.) is the main species used in dairy pastures throughout New Zealand. There are approximately 30 perennial ryegrass cultivars sold commercially in New Zealand, but currently there is no evaluation system which allows farmers to compare the potential impact of different cultivars on the profitability of their farm business. Such an economic evaluation system requires information on performance values (PV) for cultivars which quantifies their performance with respect to the major productivity traits (herbage accumulation (HA, kg DM/ha), nutritive value and persistence) relative to a genetic base, and economic values (EV, Doyle and Elliott 1983) which estimate the additional profit resulting from each unit change in the trait of interest (Equation 1). Economic value = Δ operating profit/Δ trait of interest (1) This paper describes a system modelling approach developed to estimate EV for seasonal HA of pasture in the major dairying regions of New Zealand. This information is used in the DairyNZ Forage Value Index system (www.dairynzfvi.co.nz) which is being developed to include information on all three productivity traits for commercially available ryegrass cultivars

Development of a Forage Evaluation System for Perennial Ryegrass Cultivar and Endophyte Combinations in New Zealand Dairy Systems

An economic index for perennial ryegrass (Lolium perenne L.) cultivars is a relatively new concept, although recently introduced in Ireland (McEvoy et al. 2011). By contrast, in dairy cattle breeding, the concept of an economic index rating animals and economic values underlying that index is well entrenched (Philipson et al. 1994; Veerkamp, 1998). Historically, forage evaluation data for individual cultivars were either displayed using absolute numbers for seasonal dry matter production within a season or across all seasons with a notation to indicate statistical differences, or percentage values where a reference cultivar is 100. The adoption of an economic index and routine evaluation approach for perennial ryegrass provides a method to identify traits of economic importance to focus plant breeding efforts better and to provide clarity for farmers around predicting cultivars that will maximise farm profit. It also allows for routine tracking of genetic gain of individual traits and the economic index. In this paper, the economic based forage evaluation techniques now used in New Zealand for perennial ryegrass cultivar/endophyte combinations are presented

Hydrogeomorphology of the Hyporheic Zone: Stream Solute and Fine Particle Interactions With a Dynamic Streambed

Hyporheic flow in streams has typically been studied separately from geomorphic processes. We investigated interactions between bed mobility and dynamic hyporheic storage of solutes and fine particles in a sand-bed stream before, during, and after a flood. A conservatively transported solute tracer (bromide) and a fine particles tracer (5 μm latex particles), a surrogate for fine particulate organic matter, were co-injected during base flow. The tracers were differentially stored, with fine particles penetrating more shallowly in hyporheic flow and retained more efficiently due to the high rate of particle filtration in bed sediment compared to solute. Tracer injections lasted 3.5 h after which we released a small flood from an upstream dam one hour later. Due to shallower storage in the bed, fine particles were rapidly entrained during the rising limb of the flood hydrograph. Rather than being flushed by the flood, we observed that solutes were stored longer due to expansion of hyporheic flow paths beneath the temporarily enlarged bedforms. Three important timescales determined the fate of solutes and fine particles: (1) flood duration, (2) relaxation time of flood-enlarged bedforms back to base flow dimensions, and (3) resulting adjustments and lag times of hyporheic flow. Recurrent transitions between these timescales explain why we observed a peak accumulation of natural particulate organic matter between 2 and 4 cm deep in the bed, i.e., below the scour layer of mobile bedforms but above the maximum depth of particle filtration in hyporheic flow paths. Thus, physical interactions between bed mobility and hyporheic transport influence how organic matter is stored in the bed and how long it is retained, which affects decomposition rate and metabolism of this southeastern Coastal Plain stream. In summary we found that dynamic interactions between hyporheic flow, bed mobility, and flow variation had strong but differential influences on base flow retention and flood mobilization of solutes and fine particulates. These hydrogeomorphic relationships have implications for microbial respiration of organic matter, carbon and nutrient cycling, and fate of contaminants in streams

Synthesis and Quantitative Structure–Activity Relationship of Imidazotetrazine Prodrugs with Activity Independent of O6-Methylguanine-DNA-methyltransferase, DNA Mismatch Repair and p53.

The antitumor prodrug Temozolomide is compromised by its dependence for activity on DNA mismatch repair (MMR) and the repair of the chemosensitive DNA lesion, O6-methylguanine (O6-MeG), by O6-methylguanine-DNA-methyltransferase (EC 2.1.1.63, MGMT). Tumor response is also dependent on wild-type p53. Novel 3-(2-anilinoethyl)-substituted imidazotetrazines are reported that have activity independent of MGMT, MMR and p53. This is achieved through a switch of mechanism so that bioactivity derives from imidazotetrazine-generated arylaziridinium ions that principally modify guanine-N7 sites on DNA. Mono- and bi-functional analogs are reported and a quantitative structure-activity relationship (QSAR) study identified the p-tolyl-substituted bi-functional congener as optimized for potency, MGMT-independence and MMR-independence. NCI60 data show the tumor cell response is distinct from other imidazotetrazines and DNA-guanine-N7 active agents such as nitrogen mustards and cisplatin. The new imidazotetrazine compounds are promising agents for further development and their improved in vitro activity validates the principles on which they were designed

Optimal Control of Molecular Motion Expressed Through Quantum Fluid Dynamics

A quantum fluid dynamic control formulation is presented for optimally manipulating atomic and molecular systems. In quantum fluid dynamic the control quantum system is expressed in terms of the probability density and the quantum current. This choice of variables is motivated by the generally expected slowly varying spatial-temporal dependence of the fluid dynamical variables. The quantum fluid dynamic approach is illustrated for manipulation of the ground electronic state dynamics of HCl induced by an external electric field.Comment: 18 pages, latex, 3 figure

Ernst Freund as Precursor of the Rational Study of Corporate Law

Gindis, David, Ernst Freund as Precursor of the Rational Study of Corporate Law (October 27, 2017). Journal of Institutional Economics, Forthcoming. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2905547, doi: https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2905547The rise of large business corporations in the late 19th century compelled many American observers to admit that the nature of the corporation had yet to be understood. Published in this context, Ernst Freund's little-known The Legal Nature of Corporations (1897) was an original attempt to come to terms with a new legal and economic reality. But it can also be described, to paraphrase Oliver Wendell Holmes, as the earliest example of the rational study of corporate law. The paper shows that Freund had the intuitions of an institutional economist, and engaged in what today would be called comparative institutional analysis. Remarkably, his argument that the corporate form secures property against insider defection and against outsiders anticipated recent work on entity shielding and capital lock-in, and can be read as an early contribution to what today would be called the theory of the firm.Peer reviewe

Reciprocity as a foundation of financial economics

This paper argues that the subsistence of the fundamental theorem of contemporary financial mathematics is the ethical concept ‘reciprocity’. The argument is based on identifying an equivalence between the contemporary, and ostensibly ‘value neutral’, Fundamental Theory of Asset Pricing with theories of mathematical probability that emerged in the seventeenth century in the context of the ethical assessment of commercial contracts in a framework of Aristotelian ethics. This observation, the main claim of the paper, is justified on the basis of results from the Ultimatum Game and is analysed within a framework of Pragmatic philosophy. The analysis leads to the explanatory hypothesis that markets are centres of communicative action with reciprocity as a rule of discourse. The purpose of the paper is to reorientate financial economics to emphasise the objectives of cooperation and social cohesion and to this end, we offer specific policy advice

Analyses of apoptotic regulators CASP9 and DFFA at 1P36.2, reveal rare allele variants in human neuroblastoma tumours

The genes encoding Caspase-9 and DFF45 have both recently been mapped to chromosome region 1p36.2, that is a region alleged to involve one or several tumour suppressor genes in neuroblastoma tumours. This study presents an update contig of the ‘Smallest Region of Overlap of deletions’ in Scandinavian neuroblastoma tumours and suggests that DFF45 is localized in the region. The genomic organization of the human DFF45 gene, deduced by in-silico comparisons of DNA sequences, is described for the first time in this paper. In the present study 44 primary tumours were screened for mutation by analysis of the genomic sequences of the genes. In two out of the 44 tumours this detected in the DFFA gene one rare allele variant that caused a non-polar to a polar amino acid exchange in a preserved hydrophobic patch of DFF45. One case was hemizygous due to deletion of the more common allele of this polymorphism. Out of 194 normal control alleles only one was found to carry this variant allele, so in respect of it, no healthy control individual out of 97 was homozygous. Moreover, our RT–PCR expression studies showed that DFF45 is preferably expressed in low-stage neuroblastoma tumours and to a lesser degree in high-stage neuroblastomas. We conclude that although coding mutations of Caspase-9 and DFF45 are infrequent in neuroblastoma tumours, our discovery of a rare allele in two neuroblastoma cases should be taken to warrant further studies of the role of DFF45 in neuroblastoma genetics