Function generator eliminates necessity of series summation

Diode generator using four building-block circuits produces complex waveforms without the necessity of series summation. This highly specialized method of producing complex waveforms requires less power than present methods and uses simpler circuitry

Electrode material release during high voltage breakdown Final technical report

Electrode material release during high voltage breakdow

Fatigue behavior of materials for the sst - electron fractographic studies final report

Electron microscopic fractography to determine fatigue behavior of materials for supersonic transport - titanium, aluminum, molybdenum, and vanadiu

Chimpanzees Extract Social Information from Agonistic Screams

Chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes) agonistic screams are graded vocal signals that are produced in a context-specific manner. Screams given by aggressors and victims can be discriminated based on their acoustic structure but the mechanisms of listener comprehension of these calls are currently unknown. In this study, we show that chimpanzees extract social information from these vocal signals that, combined with their more general social knowledge, enables them to understand the nature of out-of-sight social interactions. In playback experiments, we broadcast congruent and incongruent sequences of agonistic calls and monitored the response of bystanders. Congruent sequences were in accordance with existing social dominance relations; incongruent ones violated them. Subjects looked significantly longer at incongruent sequences, despite them being acoustically less salient (fewer call types from fewer individuals) than congruent ones. We concluded that chimpanzees categorised an apparently simple acoustic signal into victim and aggressor screams and used pragmatics to form inferences about third-party interactions they could not see

Gaze following in an asocial reptile (Eublepharis macularius)

Gaze following is the ability to utilise information from another's gaze. It is most often seen in a social context or as a reflexive response to interesting external stimuli. Social species can potentially reveal utilisable knowledge about another's future intentions by attending to the target of their gaze. However, in even more fundamental situations, being sensitive to another's gaze can also be useful such as when it can facilitate greater foraging efficiency or lead to earlier predator detection. While gaze sensitivity has been shown to be prevalent in a number of social species, little is currently known about the potential for gaze following in asocial species. The current study investigated whether an asocial reptile, the leopard gecko (Eublepharis macularius), could reliably use the visual indicators of attention to follow the gaze of a conspecific around a barrier. We operated three trial conditions and found subjects (N = 6) responded significantly more to the conspecific demonstrator looking up at a laser stimulus projected onto an occluder during the experimental condition compared to either of two control conditions. The study's findings point toward growing evidence for gaze-following ability in reptiles, who are typically categorised as asocial. Furthermore, our findings support developing comparative social cognition research showing the origins of gaze following and other cognitive behaviours that may be more widely distributed across taxonomic groups than hitherto thought

Differential response to right unilateral ECT in depressed patients: impact of comorbidity and severity of illness [ISRCTN39974945]

BACKGROUND: Recent electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) efficacy studies of right unilateral (RUL) ECT may not apply to real life clinics with a wide range of patients with major depressive episodes. METHODS: The study included two groups of patients. In addition to a homogeneous group of patients with major depression according to DSM-IV criteria with severity of the major depressive episode > 16 scores on 17-item Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression (HDRS) (Group 1, n = 16), we included a heterogeneous group of patients with less severe major depressive episodes or with a variety of comorbid conditions (Group 2, n = 24). We randomly assigned the patients to an RUL ECT treatment dosed at 5 or 2.5 times seizure threshold with an intent-to-treat design. The outcomes measured blindly were HDRS, number of treatments, and Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE). The patients were considered to have responded to treatment if the improvement in HDRS score was at least 60% and they had a total score of less than ten. RESULTS: The Group 2 patients responded poorer (8% vs. 63%), and had more often simultaneous worsening in their MMSE scores than Group 1 patients. The differences in the outcomes between the two different doses of RUL ECT treatment were not statistically significant. CONCLUSIONS: ECT effectiveness seems to be lower in real-life heterogeneous patient groups than in homogeneous patient samples used in experimental efficacy trials

Relationships between Levels of Serum IgE, Cell-Bound IgE, and IgE-Receptors on Peripheral Blood Cells in a Pediatric Population

Background: Elevated serum immunoglobulin (Ig) E is a diagnostic marker of immediate-type allergic reactions. We hypothesize that serum IgE does not necessarily reflect total body IgE because in vivo IgE can be bound to cell surface receptors such as FcεRI and FcεRII (CD23). The aim of this study was to analyze the relationships between levels of serum IgE, cell-bound IgE, and IgE-receptors on peripheral blood cells in a pediatric population. Methodology: Whole blood samples from 48 children (26 boys, 22 girls, mean age 10,3±5,4 years) were analyzed by flow cytometry for FcεRI, CD23, and cell-bound IgE on dendritic cells (CD11c+MHC class II+), monocytes (CD14+), basophils (CD123+MHC class II-) and neutrophils (myeloperoxidase+). Total serum IgE was measured by ELISA and converted into z-units to account for age-dependent normal ranges. Correlations were calculated using Spearman rank correlation test. Principal Findings: Dendritic cells, monocytes, basophils, and neutrophils expressed the high affinity IgE-receptor FcεRI. Dendritic cells and monocytes also expressed the low affinity receptor CD23. The majority of IgE-receptor positive cells carried IgE on their surface. Expression of both IgE receptors was tightly correlated with cell-bound IgE. In general, cell-bound IgE on FcεRI+ cells correlated well with serum IgE. However, some patients carried high amounts of cell-bound IgE despite low total serum IgE levels. Conclusion/Significance: In pediatric patients, levels of age-adjusted serum IgE, cell-bound IgE, and FcεRI correlate. Even in the absence of elevated levels of serum IgE, cell-bound IgE can be detected on peripheral blood cells in a subgroup of patients

Development of Gaze Following Abilities in Wolves (Canis Lupus)

The ability to coordinate with others' head and eye orientation to look in the same direction is considered a key step towards an understanding of others mental states like attention and intention. Here, we investigated the ontogeny and habituation patterns of gaze following into distant space and behind barriers in nine hand-raised wolves. We found that these wolves could use conspecific as well as human gaze cues even in the barrier task, which is thought to be more cognitively advanced than gazing into distant space. Moreover, while gaze following into distant space was already present at the age of 14 weeks and subjects did not habituate to repeated cues, gazing around a barrier developed considerably later and animals quickly habituated, supporting the hypothesis that different cognitive mechanisms may underlie the two gaze following modalities. More importantly, this study demonstrated that following another individuals' gaze around a barrier is not restricted to primates and corvids but is also present in canines, with remarkable between-group similarities in the ontogeny of this behaviour. This sheds new light on the evolutionary origins of and selective pressures on gaze following abilities as well as on the sensitivity of domestic dogs towards human communicative cues

Chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) Fail a What-Where-When Task but Find Rewards by Using a Location-Based Association Strategy

Recollecting the what-where-when of an episode, or episodic-like memory, has been established in corvids and rodents. In humans, a linkage between remembering the past and imagining the future has been recognised. While chimpanzees can plan for the future, their episodic-like memory has hardly been investigated. We tested chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) with an adapted food-caching paradigm. They observed the baiting of two locations amongst four and chose one after a given delay (15 min, 1 h or 5 h). We used two combinations of food types, a preferred and a less preferred food that disappeared at different rates. The subjects had to base their choices on the time elapsed since baiting, and on their memory of which food was where. They could recover either their preferred food or the one that remained present. All animals failed to obtain the preferred or present foods above chance levels. They were like-wise unsuccessful at choosing baited cups above chance levels. The subjects, thus, failed to use any feature of the baiting events to guide their choices. Nonetheless, their choices were not random, but the result of a developed location-based association strategy. Choices in the second half of the study correlated with the rewards obtained at each location in the first half of the study, independent from the choices made for each location in the first half of the study. This simple location-based strategy yielded a fair amount of food. The animals' failure to remember the what-where-when in the presented set-up may be due to the complexity of the task, rather than an inability to form episodic-like memories, as they even failed to remember what was where after 15 minutes

Field Effectiveness of Pandemic and 2009-2010 Seasonal Vaccines against 2009-2010 A(H1N1) Influenza: Estimations from Surveillance Data in France

BACKGROUND: In this study, we assess how effective pandemic and trivalent 2009-2010 seasonal vaccines were in preventing influenza-like illness (ILI) during the 2009 A(H1N1) pandemic in France. We also compare vaccine effectiveness against ILI versus laboratory-confirmed pandemic A(H1N1) influenza, and assess the possible bias caused by using non-specific endpoints and observational data. METHODOLOGY AND PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: We estimated vaccine effectiveness by using the following formula: VE  =  (PPV-PCV)/(PPV(1-PCV)) × 100%, where PPV is the proportion vaccinated in the population and PCV the proportion of vaccinated influenza cases. People were considered vaccinated three weeks after receiving a dose of vaccine. ILI and pandemic A(H1N1) laboratory-confirmed cases were obtained from two surveillance networks of general practitioners. During the epidemic, 99.7% of influenza isolates were pandemic A(H1N1). Pandemic and seasonal vaccine uptakes in the population were obtained from the National Health Insurance database and by telephonic surveys, respectively. Effectiveness estimates were adjusted by age and week. The presence of residual biases was explored by calculating vaccine effectiveness after the influenza period. The effectiveness of pandemic vaccines in preventing ILI was 52% (95% confidence interval: 30-69) during the pandemic and 33% (4-55) after. It was 86% (56-98) against confirmed influenza. The effectiveness of seasonal vaccines against ILI was 61% (56-66) during the pandemic and 19% (-10-41) after. It was 60% (41-74) against confirmed influenza. CONCLUSIONS: The effectiveness of pandemic vaccines in preventing confirmed pandemic A(H1N1) influenza on the field was high, consistently with published findings. It was significantly lower against ILI. This is unsurprising since not all ILI cases are caused by influenza. Trivalent 2009-2010 seasonal vaccines had a statistically significant effectiveness in preventing ILI and confirmed pandemic influenza, but were not better in preventing confirmed pandemic influenza than in preventing ILI. This lack of difference might be indicative of selection bias