Teleologiczne neurony, czyli o możliwej przydatności filozofii dla kognitywistyki

Teza zawarta w rozwinięciu tematu niniejszej konferencji, według której neuronauki stanowią, a przynajmniej mogą sobie rościć prawo do stanowienia pewnego rodzaju rdzenia kognitywistyki, wydaje się prawdziwa. Na szczegółowe jej dowodzenie nie ma tutaj miejsca, niech wystarczy proste stwierdzenie, że jeśli wierzymy, iż jest jedno ludzkie poznanie, a więc nauki je badające odnoszą się do tych samych zjawisk, na przykład psychologia poznawcza opisuje te same zjawiska, które opisuje neuropsychologia, to ta druga powinna być w pełni redukowalna do tej pierwszej; nauka na wyższym poziomie musi być redukowalna do nauki na poziomie niższym, w stosunku do której praw prawa tej pierwszej stanowić będą szczególne przypadki. Jak pisze Charles Taylor, na którego będę się jeszcze powoływał, "Niższa oznacza w tym miejscu bardziej podstawową, a wszystkie nauki muszą dać się zredukować do fizyki i chemii"

The Effects of Reduced-Gravity on Planetary Rover Mobility

One of the major challenges faced by planetary exploration rovers today is the negotiation of difficult terrain, such as fine granular regolith commonly found on the Moon and Mars. Current testing methods on Earth fail to account for the effect of reduced-gravity on the soil itself. This work characterizes the effects of reduced-gravity on wheel-soil interactions between an ExoMars rover wheel prototype and a martian soil simulant aboard parabolic flights producing effective martian and lunar gravitational accelerations. These experiments are the first to collect wheel-soil interaction imagery and Force/Torque sensor data alongside wheel sinkage data. Results from reduced-gravity flights are compared to on-ground experiments with all parameters equal, including wheel load, such that the only difference between the experiments is the effect of gravity on the soil itself. In lunar-g, a statistically significant average reduction in traction of 20% is observed compared to 1-g, and in martian-g an average traction reduction of 5-10% is observed. Subsurface soil imaging shows that soil mobilization increases as gravity decreases, suggesting a deterioration in soil strength which could be the cause of the reduction in traction. Statistically significant increases in wheel sinkage in both martian-g and lunar-g provide additional evidence for decreased soil strength. All of these observations -- decreased traction, increased soil mobilization, and increased sinkage -- hinder a rover's ability to drive, and should be taken into consideration when interpreting results from reduced-load mobility tests conducted on Earth

Push-Pull Locomotion for Vehicle Extrication

For applications in which unmanned vehicles must traverse unfamiliar terrain, there often exists the risk of vehicle entrapment. Typically, this risk can be reduced by using feedback from on-board sensors that assess the terrain. This work addressed the situations where a vehicle has already become immobilized or the desired route cannot be traversed using conventional rolling. Specifically, the focus was on using push-pull locomotion in high sinkage granular material. Push-pull locomotion is an alternative mode of travel that generates thrust through articulated motion, using vehicle components as anchors to push or pull against. It has been revealed through previous research that push-pull locomotion has the capacity for generating higher net traction forces than rolling, and a unique optical flow technique indicated that this is the result of a more efficient soil shearing method. It has now been found that pushpull locomotion results in less sinkage, lower travel reduction, and better power efficiency in high sinkage material as compared to rolling. Even when starting from an "entrapped" condition, push-pull locomotion was able to extricate the test vehicle. It is the authors' recommendation that push-pull locomotion be considered as a reliable back-up mode of travel for applications where terrain entrapment is a possibility

Effect of gravity in wheel/terrain interaction models

[Abstract] Predicting the motion of wheeled robots in unstructured environments is an important and challenging problem. The study of planetary exploration rovers on soft terrain introduces the additional need to consider the effect of non-terrestrial gravitational fields on the forces and torques developed at the wheel/terrain interface. Simply reducing the wheel load under earth gravity overestimates the travelled distance and predicts better performance than is actually observed in reduced-gravity measurements. In this paper, we study the effect of gravity on wheel/terrain interaction. Experiments were conducted to assess the effect of reduced gravity on the velocity profile of the soil under the wheel, as well as on the traction force and sinkage developed by the wheel. It was shown that in the velocity field of the soil, the decay of the tangential velocity component becomes gradual with reducing gravity, and the decay of the normal to rim velocity is slower in Lunar gravity. It was also found that wheel flexibility can have an important effect on the dynamics as the contact patch and effective radius varies periodically. These results were then used together with traditional semi-empirical terramechanics models to determine and validate the simulated drawbar pull values. The developed simulation model includes the effect of wheel flexibility, dynamic sinkage and gravity.MINECO; RYC-2016-2022

Comparison of temperature measurements in esophagus and urinary bladder in comatose patients after cardiac arrest undergoing mild therapeutic hypothermia

Background: Mild therapeutic hypothermia (MTH) is a recommended method of treatment for comatose out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) survivors. However, the proper site of temperature measurement in MTH is still not defined. The aim of this study was to compare temperature measurements in the esophagus and urinary bladder in comatose post-OHCA patients treated with MTH.Methods: This temperature comparison protocol was a part of a prospective, observational, multicenter cohort study. The study population included 36 unconscious patients after resuscitation for OHCA. The patient’s core temperature was independently measured every hour during MTH in the urinary bladder and in the esophagus.Results: The mean temperature was lower in the esophagus (differences during induction phase: 1.04 ± 0.92°C, p < 0.0001; stabilization phase: 0.54 ± 0.39°C, p < 0.0001; rewarming phase: 0.40 ± 0.47°C, p < 0.0001). Nevertheless, a strong correlation between both sites was found (R2 = 0.83, p < 0.001). The decrease in temperature observed in the esophagus during the induction phase was faster when compared with the urinary bladder (1.09 ± 0.71°C/h vs. 0.83 ± 0.41°C/h; p = 0.002). As a consequence, time to reach temperature < 34.0°C was longer when temperature was measured in the urinary bladder (the difference between medians of the time 1.0 [0–1.5] h, p < 0.001).Conclusions: Urinary bladder temperature measurements may lag behind temperature changes measured in the esophagus. Monitoring temperature simultaneously in the esophagus and in the urinary bladder is an accessible and reliable combination, although esophageal measurements seem to better reflect the dynamics of temperature changes, thus it seems to be more appropriate for MTH control. ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT0261193

Prothrombotic fibrin clot properties associated with NETs formation characterize acute pulmonary embolism patients with higher mortality risk

Abstract Venous thromboembolism is associated with formation of denser fibrin clots resistant to lysis. We investigated whether prothrombotic plasma clot properties are associated with the severity of acute pulmonary embolism (PE). We enrolled 126 normotensive acute PE patients (aged 58 ± 14 years) and 25 age- and sex-matched healthy controls. Plasma fibrin clot permeability (Ks), clot lysis time (CLT), endogenous thrombin potential (ETP), plasminogen activator inhibitor-1 (PAI-1), and citrullinated histone H3 (citH3) were evaluated on admission. PE patients compared to controls had 370% higher citH3 levels, 41% higher ETP, 16.5% reduced Ks, and 25.6% prolonged CLT. Patients with intermediate-high (n = 29) and intermediate-low (n = 77) PE mortality risk had reduced Ks and prolonged CLT, increased PAI-1 and ETP as compared to low-risk PE (n = 20) patients. Prolonged CLT was predicted by PAI-1 and citH3, while low Ks by C-reactive protein. During a 12-month follow-up 9 (7.1%) patients who had 24% higher ETP, 45% higher citH3 levels, and 18% prolonged CLT at baseline died. High ETP combined with elevated citH3 levels and prolonged CLT was associated with eightfold increased risk of PE-related death. Prothrombotic fibrin clot properties and enhanced neutrophil extracellular traps formation are associated with higher early mortality risk in acute PE patients, which suggests a prognostic role of these biomarkers

Omecamtiv mecarbil in chronic heart failure with reduced ejection fraction, GALACTIC‐HF: baseline characteristics and comparison with contemporary clinical trials

Aims: The safety and efficacy of the novel selective cardiac myosin activator, omecamtiv mecarbil, in patients with heart failure with reduced ejection fraction (HFrEF) is tested in the Global Approach to Lowering Adverse Cardiac outcomes Through Improving Contractility in Heart Failure (GALACTIC‐HF) trial. Here we describe the baseline characteristics of participants in GALACTIC‐HF and how these compare with other contemporary trials. Methods and Results: Adults with established HFrEF, New York Heart Association functional class (NYHA) ≥ II, EF ≤35%, elevated natriuretic peptides and either current hospitalization for HF or history of hospitalization/ emergency department visit for HF within a year were randomized to either placebo or omecamtiv mecarbil (pharmacokinetic‐guided dosing: 25, 37.5 or 50 mg bid). 8256 patients [male (79%), non‐white (22%), mean age 65 years] were enrolled with a mean EF 27%, ischemic etiology in 54%, NYHA II 53% and III/IV 47%, and median NT‐proBNP 1971 pg/mL. HF therapies at baseline were among the most effectively employed in contemporary HF trials. GALACTIC‐HF randomized patients representative of recent HF registries and trials with substantial numbers of patients also having characteristics understudied in previous trials including more from North America (n = 1386), enrolled as inpatients (n = 2084), systolic blood pressure < 100 mmHg (n = 1127), estimated glomerular filtration rate < 30 mL/min/1.73 m2 (n = 528), and treated with sacubitril‐valsartan at baseline (n = 1594). Conclusions: GALACTIC‐HF enrolled a well‐treated, high‐risk population from both inpatient and outpatient settings, which will provide a definitive evaluation of the efficacy and safety of this novel therapy, as well as informing its potential future implementation

Three Spheres of Catatonia in the Works of Gilles Deleuze

The text traces the development of the notion of catatonia in the work of Gilles Deleuze across three spheres – the individual (subjectivity), social and literary. The need for an analysis is based on (1) the author’s perception that Deleuze (and Guattari’s) thought on catatonia and slowness has been undervalued in many interpretations (particularly those linking the philosophers with accelerationism); (2) the recognition, in works of sociologists such as Hartmut Rosa, of the adverse effects of social acceleration. In the individual sphere, catatonia is the effect of a radical withdrawal into anti-production or the body without organs. In the social sphere, catatonia is also linked to anti-production, but since in capitalism most anti-production (or the socius) is included in the sphere of production (as capital), catatonia represents a special case of resistance to this tendency. Deleuze shows how these two spheres intertwine in his analyses of Herman Melville’s works, especially Billy Budd and Bartleby; the title characters of these two texts are interpreted as embodiments of the catatonic as a political-revolutionary figure