579 research outputs found
Asymmetries in Accessing Vowel Representations Are Driven by Phonological and Acoustic Properties: Neural and Behavioral Evidence From Natural German Minimal Pairs
In vowel discrimination, commonly found discrimination patterns are directional asymmetries where discrimination is faster (or easier) if differing vowels are presented in a certain sequence compared to the reversed sequence. Different models of speech sound processing try to account for these asymmetries based on either phonetic or phonological properties. In this study, we tested and compared two of those often-discussed models, namely the Featurally Underspecified Lexicon (FUL) model (Lahiri and Reetz, 2002) and the Natural Referent Vowel (NRV) framework (Polka and Bohn, 2011). While most studies presented isolated vowels, we investigated a large stimulus set of German vowels in a more naturalistic setting within minimal pairs. We conducted an mismatch negativity (MMN) study in a passive and a reaction time study in an active oddball paradigm. In both data sets, we found directional asymmetries that can be explained by either phonological or phonetic theories. While behaviorally, the vowel discrimination was based on phonological properties, both tested models failed to explain the found neural patterns comprehensively. Therefore, we additionally examined the influence of a variety of articulatory, acoustical, and lexical factors (e.g., formant structure, intensity, duration, and frequency of occurrence) but also the influence of factors beyond the well-known (perceived loudness of vowels, degree of openness) in depth via multiple regression analyses. The analyses revealed that the perceptual factor of perceived loudness has a greater impact than considered in the literature and should be taken stronger into consideration when analyzing preattentive natural vowel processing
Coherent control of enrichment and conversion of molecular spin isomers
A theoretical model of nuclear spin conversion in molecules controlled by an
external electromagnetic radiation resonant to rotational transition has been
developed. It has been shown that one can produce an enrichment of spin isomers
and influence their conversion rates in two ways, through coherences and
through level population change induced by radiation. Influence of conversion
is ranged from significant speed up to almost complete inhibition of the
process by proper choice of frequency and intensity of the external field.Comment: REVTEX, 13 pages + 6 eps figure
Comment on Neutron-Proton Spin-Correlation Parameter A_{ZZ} at 68 Mev
We present two arguments indicating that the large value for the
mixing parameter at 50 MeV, which the Basel group extracted from their recent
measurement, may be incorrect. First, there are nucleon-nucleon (NN)
potentials which predict the at 50 MeV substantially below the
Basel value and reproduce the Basel data accurately. Second, the large
value for at 50 MeV proposed by the Basel group can only be
explained by a model for the NN interaction which is very unrealistic (no
-meson and essentially a point-like vertex) and overpredicts the
in the energy range where it is well determined (150--500 MeV) by
a factor of two.Comment: 6 pages text (LaTex) and 2 figures (paper, will be faxed upon
request), UI-NTH-930
Recent advances in the theory of nuclear forces
After a brief historical review, we present recent progress in our
understanding of nuclear forces in terms of chiral effective field theory.Comment: 6 pages, 2 figures; talk at International Symposium on Correlations
Dynamics in Nuclei, University of Tokyo, Japan, 31 January-4 February, 200
Lambda-proton correlations in relativistic heavy ion collisions
The prospect of using lambda-proton correlations to extract source sizes in
relativistic heavy ion collisions is investigated. It is found that the strong
interaction induces a large peak in the correlation function that provides more
sensitive source size measurements than two-proton correlations under some
circumstances. The prospect of using lambda-proton correlations to measure the
time lag between lambda and proton emissions is also studied.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure, revtex style. Two short paragraphs are added at
referees' recommendations. Phys. Rev. Lett. in pres
Brueckner Rearrangement Effects in He and He
Rearrangement effects in light hypernuclei are investigated in the framework
of the Brueckner theory. We can estimate without detailed numerical
calculations that the energy of the -core is reduced by more than 2.5
MeV when the adheres to He to form He. Similar
assessment of rearrangement contributions is essential to deduce the strength
of interaction from experimentally observed . The recently observed experimental value of 1 MeV
for the of \hll suggests that the matrix element of
in \hll is around -2 MeV.Comment: 7 pages, to appear in Phys. Rev.
Self-Referential Noise and the Synthesis of Three-Dimensional Space
Generalising results from Godel and Chaitin in mathematics suggests that
self-referential systems contain intrinsic randomness. We argue that this is
relevant to modelling the universe and show how three-dimensional space may
arise from a non-geometric order-disorder model driven by self-referential
noise.Comment: Figure labels correcte
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