3,103 research outputs found
Psychophysical and physiological evidence for fast binaural processing
The mammalian auditory system is the temporally most precise sensory modality: To localize low-frequency sounds in space, the binaural system can resolve time differences between the ears with microsecond precision. In contrast, the binaural system appears sluggish in tracking changing interaural time differences as they arise from a low-frequency sound source moving along the horizontal plane. For a combined psychophysical and electrophysiological approach, we created a binaural stimulus, called "Phasewarp," that can transmit rapid changes in interaural timing. Using this stimulus, the binaural performance in humans is significantly better than reported previously and comparable with the monaural performance revealed with amplitude-modulated stimuli. Parallel, electrophysiological recordings of binaural brainstem neurons in the gerbil show fast temporal processing of monaural and different types of binaural modulations. In a refined electrophysiological approach that was matched to the psychophysics, the seemingly faster binaural processing of the Phasewarp was confirmed. The current data provide both psychophysical and physiological evidence against a general, hard-wired binaural sluggishness and reconcile previous contradictions of electrophysiological and psychophysical estimates of temporal binaural performance
Four quotient set gems
Our aim in this note is to present four remarkable facts about quotient sets.
These observations seem to have been overlooked by the Monthly, despite its
intense coverage of quotient sets over the years.Comment: 9 pages, to appear in the American Mathematical Monthl
Detection, spectroscopy and state preparation of a single praseodymium ion in a crystal
Solid-state emitters with atom-like optical and magnetic transitions are
highly desirable for efficient and scalable quantum state engineering and
information processing. Quantum dots, color centers and impurities embedded in
inorganic hosts have attracted a great deal of attention in this context, but
influences from the matrix continue to pose challenges on the degree of
attainable coherence in each system. We report on a new solid-state platform
based on the optical detection of single praseodymium ions via 4f intrashell
transitions, which are well shielded from their surroundings. By combining
cryogenic high-resolution laser spectroscopy with fluorescence microscopy, we
were able to spectrally select and spatially resolve individual ions. In
addition to elaborating on the essential experimental steps for achieving this
long-sought goal, we demonstrate state preparation and read out of the three
ground-state hyperfine levels, which are known to have lifetimes of the order
of hundred seconds
Two remarks about nilpotent operators of order two
We present two novel results about Hilbert space operators which are
nilpotent of order two. First, we prove that such operators are indestructible
complex symmetric operators, in the sense that tensoring them with any operator
yields a complex symmetric operator. In fact, we prove that this property
characterizes nilpotents of order two among all nonzero bounded operators.
Second, we establish that every nilpotent of order two is unitarily equivalent
to a truncated Toeplitz operator.Comment: 7 pages. To appear in Proceedings of the AM
Testate amoebae record from the Laptev Sea coast and its implication for the reconstruction of Late Pleistocene and Holocene environments in the Arctic Siberia
Migdal's short range correlations in a covariant model
We construct a covariant model for short range correlations of a pion emerged
in nuclear matter. Once the delta-hole contribution is considered an additional
and so far neglected channel opens that leads to significant modifications in
the vicinity of the kinematical region defined by \omega \sim |\vec q |. We
speculate that this novel effect should be important for the quantitative
interpretation of charge exchange reactions like C(He,t).Comment: correction of minor misprint
Towards a Taxonomy of Platforms for Conversational Agent Design
Software that interacts with its users through natural language, so-called conversational agents (CAs), is permeating our lives with improving capabilities driven by advances in machine learning and natural language processing. For organizations, CAs have the potential to innovate and automate a variety of tasks and processes, for example in customer service or marketing and sales, yet successful design remains a major challenge. Over the last few years, a variety of platforms that offer different approaches and functionality for designing CAs have emerged. In this paper, we analyze 51 CA platforms to develop a taxonomy and empirically identify archetypes of platforms by means of a cluster analysis. Based on our analysis, we propose an extended taxonomy with eleven dimensions and three archetypes that contribute to existing work on CA design and can guide practitioners in the design of CA for their organizations
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