Variations on the Pear Tree Experiment : different variables, new results?

Inspired by the Pear Stories Project, the Pear Tree Project has investigated how different cultures and languages describe the same film in order to apply its findings to audio description (AD). Participants from different countries were asked to "write down what they saw" in a controlled setting. This article proposes an alternative experiment, also based on the original Pear Stories Project, which aims to shed light on two issues: how different describer profiles (translation students with AD training/without AD training) and different instructions concerning the target audience profiles (blind/non-blind) could alter the final production. The results are analysed in this paper, taking into account the elements covered in the original Pear Stories Project as well as some additional elements proposed by the authors

Differentiating lower motor neuron syndromes

Lower motor neuron (LMN) syndromes typically present with muscle wasting and weakness and may arise from pathology affecting the distal motor nerve up to the level of the anterior horn cell. A variety of hereditary causes are recognised, including spinal muscular atrophy, distal hereditary motor neuropathy and LMN variants of familial motor neuron disease. Recent genetic advances have resulted in the identification of a variety of disease-causing mutations. Immune-mediated disorders, including multifocal motor neuropathy and variants of chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy, account for a proportion of LMN presentations and are important to recognise, as effective treatments are available. The present review will outline the spectrum of LMN syndromes that may develop in adulthood and provide a framework for the clinician assessing a patient presenting with predominantly LMN features

Deriving metallicities from calcium triplet spectroscopy in combination with near-infrared photometry

Context. When they are established with sufficient precision, the ages, metallicities and kinematics of Galactic globular clusters (GGCs) can shed much light on the dynamical and chemical evolution of the Galactic halo and bulge. While the most fundamental way of determining GC abundances is by means of high-resolution spectroscopy, in practice this method is limited to only the brighter stars in the nearest and less reddened objects. This restriction has, over the years, led to the development of a large number of techniques that measure the overall abundance indirectly from parameters that correlate with overall metallicity. One of the most efficient methods is measuring the equivalent width (EW) of the calcium II triplet (CaT) at λ ≈ 8500 Å in red giants, which are corrected for the luminosity and temperature effects using the V magnitude differences from the horizontal branch (HB). Aims. We establish a similar method in the near-infrared (NIR), by combining the power of the differential magnitudes technique with the advantages of NIR photometry to minimize differential reddening effects. Methods. We used the Ks magnitude difference between the star and the reddest part of the HB (RHB) or of the red clump (RC) to generate reduced equivalent widths (rEW) from previously presented datasets. Then we calibrated these rEW against three previously reported different metallicity scales; one of which we corrected using high-resolution spectroscopic metallicities. Results. We calculated the calibration relations for the two datasets and the three metallicity scales and found that they are approximately equivalent, with almost negligible differences. We compared our NIR calibrations with the corresponding optical ones, and found them to be equivalent, which shows that the luminosity-corrected rEW using the Ks magnitude is compatible with the one obtained from the V magnitude. We then used the metallicities obtained from the calibration to investigate the internal metallicity distributions of the GCs. Conclusions. We have established that the ([Fe/H]:rEW) relation is independent of the magnitude used for the luminosity correction and find that the calibration relations change only slightly for different metallicity scales. The CaT technique using NIR photometry is thus a powerful tool to derive metallicities. In particular, it can be used to study the internal metallicity spread of a GC. We confirm the presence of at least two metallicity populations in NGC 6656 and find that several other GCs present peculiar metallicity distributions

Automatic quantification of cardiomyocyte dimensions and connexin 43 lateralization in fluorescence images

Cardiomyocytes’ geometry and connexin 43 (CX43) amount and distribution are structural features that play a pivotal role in electrical conduction. Their quantitative assessment is of high interest in the study of arrhythmias, but it is usually hampered by the lack of automatic tools. In this work, we propose a software algorithm (Myocyte Automatic Retrieval and Tissue Analyzer, MARTA) to automatically detect myocytes from fluorescent microscopy images of cardiac tissue, measure their morphological features and evaluate the expression of CX43 and its degree of lateralization. The proposed software is based on the generation of cell masks, contouring of individual cells, enclosing of cells in minimum area rectangles and splitting of these rectangles into end-to-end and middle compartments to estimate CX43 lateral-to-total ratio. Application to human ventricular tissue images shows that mean differences between automatic and manual methods in terms of cardiomyocyte length and width are below 4 µm. The percentage of lateral CX43 also agrees between automatic and manual evaluation, with the interquartile range approximately covering from 3% to 30% in both cases. MARTA is not limited by fiber orientation and has an optimized speed by using contour filtering, which makes it run hundreds of times faster than a trained expert. Developed for CX43 studies in the left ventricle, MARTA is a flexible tool applicable to morphometric and lateralization studies of other markers in any heart chamber or even skeletal muscle. This open-access software is available online

Investigating potential planetary nebula/cluster pairs

Fundamental parameters characterizing the end-state of intermediate-mass stars may be constrained by discovering planetary nebulae (PNe) in open clusters (OCs). Cluster membership may be exploited to establish the distance, luminosity, age, and physical size for PNe, and the intrinsic luminosity and mass of its central star. Four potential PN-OC associations were investigated, to assess the cluster membership for the PNe. Radial velocities were measured from intermediate-resolution optical spectra, complemented with previous estimates in the literature. When the radial velocity study supported the PN/OC association, we analyzed if other parameters (e.g., age, distance, reddening, central star brightness) were consistent with this conclusion. Our measurements imply that the PNe VBe3 and HeFa1 are not members of the OCs NGC5999 and NGC6067, respectively, and likely belong to the background bulge population. Conversely, consistent radial velocities indicate that NGC2452/NGC2453 could be associated, but our results are not conclusive and additional observations are warranted. Finally, we demonstrate that all the available information point to He2-86 being a young, highly internally obscured PN member of NGC4463. New near-infrared photometry acquired via the Vista Variables in the Via Lactea ESO public survey was used in tandem with existing UBV photometry to measure the distance, reddening, and age of NGC4463, finding d=1.55+-0.10 kpc, E(B-V)=0.41+-0.02, and tau=65+-10 Myr, respectively. The same values should be adopted for the PN if the proposed cluster membership will be confirmed.Comment: Accepted for publication in A&

Audio-description reloaded : an analysis of visual scenes in 2012 and Hero

This article explores whether the so-called new "cinema of attractions", with its supposed focus on visual effects to the detriment of storytelling, requires a specific approach to audio-description (AD). After some thoughts on film narrative in this type of cinema and the way in which it incorporates special effects, selected scenes with AD from two feature films, 2012 (directed by Emmerich) and Hero (directed by Zhang Yimou), are analysed. 2012 is a disaster movie aiming to thrill the audience with action. Hero is an equally visual movie but its imagery has an aesthetic purpose. The analysis investigates how space, time and action are treated in the films and the ADs, and how the information is presented in terms of focalization, timing and phrasing. The results suggest that effect-driven narratives require carefully timed and phrased ADs that devote much attention to the prosody of the AD script, its interaction with sounds and the use of metapho

Investigating potential planetary nebula/cluster pairs

Publisher's Version/PDFContext. Fundamental parameters characterizing the end-state of intermediate-mass stars may be constrained by discovering planetary nebulae (PNe) in open clusters (OCs). Cluster membership may be exploited to establish the distance, luminosity, age, and physical size for PNe, and the intrinsic luminosity and mass of its central star. Aims. Four potential PN-OC associations were investigated to assess the cluster membership for the PNe. Methods. Radial velocities were measured from intermediate-resolution optical spectra, complemented with previous estimates in the literature.When the radial velocity study supported the PN/OC association, we analyzed whether other parameters (e.g., age, distance, reddening, central star brightness) were consistent with this conclusion. Results. Our measurements imply that the PNe VBe 3 and HeFa 1 are not members of the OCs NGC5999 and NGC6067, respectively, and that they very likely belong to the background bulge population. Conversely, consistent radial velocities indicate that NGC2452/NGC 2453 could be associated, but our results are not conclusive so additional observations are warranted. Finally, we demonstrate that all the available information point to He 2-86 being a young, highly internally obscured PN member of NGC4463. New near-infrared photometry acquired via the Vista Variables in the Via Lactea ESO public survey was used in tandem with existing UBV photometry to measure the distance, reddening, and age of NGC4463, finding d = 1.55 ± 0.10 kpc, E(B − V) = 0.41 ± 0.02, and τ = 65 ± 10 Myr, respectively. The same values should be adopted for the PN if the proposed cluster membership is confirme

Analysis of age-related left ventricular collagen remodeling in living donors: Implications in arrhythmogenesis

Age-related fibrosis in the left ventricle (LV) has been mainly studied in animals by assessing collagen content. Using second-harmonic generation microscopy and image processing, we evaluated amount, aggregation and spatial distribution of LV collagen in young to old pigs, and middle-age and elder living donors. All collagen features increased when comparing adult and old pigs with young ones, but not when comparing adult with old pigs or middle-age with elder individuals. Remarkably, all collagen parameters strongly correlated with lipofuscin, a biological age marker, in humans. By building patient-specific models of human ventricular tissue electrophysiology, we confirmed that amount and organization of fibrosis modulated arrhythmia vulnerability, and that distribution should be accounted for arrhythmia risk assessment. In conclusion, we characterize the age-associated changes in LV collagen and its potential implications for ventricular arrhythmia development. Consistency between pig and human results substantiate the pig as a relevant model of age-related LV collagen dynamics. © 2022 The Author(s

Deriving metallicities from calcium triplet spectroscopy\ud in combination with near-infrared photometry

Context. When they are established with sufficient precision, the ages, metallicities and kinematics of Galactic globular clusters\ud (GGCs) can shed much light on the dynamical and chemical evolution of the Galactic halo and bulge.While the most fundamental\ud way of determining GC abundances is by means of high-resolution spectroscopy, in practice this method is limited to only the brighter\ud stars in the nearest and less reddened objects. This restriction has, over the years, led to the development of a large number of techniques\ud that measure the overall abundance indirectly from parameters that correlate with overall metallicity. One of the most efficient\ud methods is measuring the equivalent width (EW) of the calcium II triplet (CaT) at λ ≈ 8500 Å in red giants, which are corrected for\ud the luminosity and temperature effects using the V magnitude differences from the horizontal branch (HB).\ud Aims. We establish a similar method in the near-infrared (NIR), by combining the power of the differential magnitudes technique with\ud the advantages of NIR photometry to minimize differential reddening effects.\ud Methods. We used the Ks magnitude difference between the star and the reddest part of the HB (RHB) or of the red clump (RC) to\ud generate reduced equivalent widths (rEW) from previously presented datasets. Then we calibrated these rEWagainst three previously\ud reported different metallicity scales; one of which we corrected using high-resolution spectroscopic metallicities.\ud Results. We calculated the calibration relations for the two datasets and the three metallicity scales and found that they are approximately\ud equivalent, with almost negligible differences. We compared our NIR calibrations with the corresponding optical ones, and\ud found them to be equivalent, which shows that the luminosity-corrected rEW using the Ks magnitude is compatible with the one\ud obtained from the V magnitude. We then used the metallicities obtained from the calibration to investigate the internal metallicity\ud distributions of the GCs.\ud Conclusions. We have established that the ([Fe/H]:rEW) relation is independent of the magnitude used for the luminosity correction\ud and find that the calibration relations change only slightly for different metallicity scales. The CaT technique using NIR photometry is\ud thus a powerful tool to derive metallicities. In particular, it can be used to study the internal metallicity spread of a GC.We confirm the\ud presence of at least two metallicity populations in NGC6656 and find that several other GCs present peculiar metallicity distributionsFONDECYT - project 3140177GEMINI-CONICYT 3210008GEMINI-CONICYT 32110005Chilean BASAL Centro de Excelencia en Astrofísica y Tecnologías Afines (CATA) - PFB 06/200