Single-shot carrier-envelope-phase measurement in ambient air

The ability to measure and control the carrier envelope phase (CEP) of few-cycle laser pulses is of paramount importance for both frequency metrology and attosecond science. Here, we present a phase meter relying on the CEP-dependent photocurrents induced by circularly polarized few-cycle pulses focused between electrodes in ambient air. The new device facilitates compact single-shot, CEP measurements under ambient conditions and promises CEP tagging at repetition rates orders of magnitude higher than most conventional CEP detection schemes as well as straightforward implementation at longer wavelengths

Physical and Cultural Activity for Life Skills Development - Comparative Report

Life skills are defined as psychosocial abilities for adaptive and positive behaviour that enable individuals to deal effectively with the demands and challenges of everyday life. Life skills can be fostered and are fundamental for a person’s progression in life, both personal and professional. Some of those skills are creativity, critical thinking, problem-solving, effective communication and collaboration skills, cultivation of responsibility, development of healthy relationships and decision- making. These skills can be acquired through life experience but can be further developed through constant training and engagement. Life skills are particularly important for adolescents and young people. Adolescents and young people leave behind the dependence and the safety that childhood is associated with and enter adulthood with all its opportunities and freedoms but also with all its insecurities and anxieties. Life skills can help adolescents and young people strengthen their self-confidence, interpersonal skills, learn how to use them in assessing knowledge, use resources for their benefit, and make the proper decisions in order to promote their wellbeing2. This way life skills can help young people anticipate with all the difficulties that might occur in adulthood and be involved in the society. In other words, life skills can equip young people with all the necessary qualities in order to become resilient individuals and active citizens. The University of Gloucestershire (UK), Play Gloucestershire (UK), Rogers Személyközpontú Oktatásért Alapítvány (HU), KENTRO MERIMNAS OIKOGENEIAS KAI PAIDIOU(GR), CESIE (IT) and CLAVIS sprog & competence (DK) are implementing the 2 year Erasmus+ project entitled: PAClife – Physical and Cultural Activity for Life Skills Development (2020-2021). The project aims to support disadvantaged and migrant young people in building resilience through acquiring and developing life skills and key competences by participating in a programme of physical and cultural activity. This report presents the findings of a desk-based comparison of domestic projects that will inform the future development of the PAClife training tool to low-skilled/low qualified migrant and disadvantaged young people

Electrophysiological correlates of high-level perception during spatial navigation

We studied the electrophysiological basis of object recognition by recording scalp\ud electroencephalograms while participants played a virtual-reality taxi driver game.\ud Participants searched for passengers and stores during virtual navigation in simulated\ud towns. We compared oscillatory brain activity in response to store views that were targets or\ud nontargets (during store search) or neutral (during passenger search). Even though store\ud category was solely defined by task context (rather than by sensory cues), frontal ...\ud \u

Recall termination in free recall

Although much is known about the dynamics of memory search in the free recall task, relatively little is known about the factors related to recall termination. Reanalyzing individual trial data from 14 prior studies (1,079 participants in 28,015 trials) and defining termination as occurring when a final response is followed by a long nonresponse interval, we observed that termination probability increased throughout the recall period and that retrieval was more likely to terminate following an error than following a correct response. Among errors, termination probability was higher following prior-list intrusions and repetitions than following extralist intrusions. To verify that this pattern of results can be seen in a single study, we report a new experiment in which 80 participants contributed recall data from a total of 9,122 trials. This experiment replicated the pattern observed in the aggregate analysis of the prior studies

Physical and Cultural Activity for Life Skills Development - Comparative Report

Life skills are defined as psychosocial abilities for adaptive and positive behaviour that enable individuals to deal effectively with the demands and challenges of everyday life. Life skills can be fostered and are fundamental for a person’s progression in life, both personal and professional. Some of those skills are creativity, critical thinking, problem-solving, effective communication and collaboration skills, cultivation of responsibility, development of healthy relationships and decision- making. These skills can be acquired through life experience but can be further developed through constant training and engagement. Life skills are particularly important for adolescents and young people. Adolescents and young people leave behind the dependence and the safety that childhood is associated with and enter adulthood with all its opportunities and freedoms but also with all its insecurities and anxieties. Life skills can help adolescents and young people strengthen their self-confidence, interpersonal skills, learn how to use them in assessing knowledge, use resources for their benefit, and make the proper decisions in order to promote their wellbeing2. This way life skills can help young people anticipate with all the difficulties that might occur in adulthood and be involved in the society. In other words, life skills can equip young people with all the necessary qualities in order to become resilient individuals and active citizens. The University of Gloucestershire (UK), Play Gloucestershire (UK), Rogers Személyközpontú Oktatásért Alapítvány (HU), KENTRO MERIMNAS OIKOGENEIAS KAI PAIDIOU(GR), CESIE (IT) and CLAVIS sprog & competence (DK) are implementing the 2 year Erasmus+ project entitled: PAClife – Physical and Cultural Activity for Life Skills Development (2020-2021). The project aims to support disadvantaged and migrant young people in building resilience through acquiring and developing life skills and key competences by participating in a programme of physical and cultural activity. This report presents the findings of a desk-based comparison of domestic projects that will inform the future development of the PAClife training tool to low-skilled/low qualified migrant and disadvantaged young people

Early Alterations in Hippocampal Circuitry and Theta Rhythm Generation in a Mouse Model of Prenatal Infection: Implications for Schizophrenia

Post-mortem studies suggest that GABAergic neurotransmission is impaired in schizophrenia. However, it remains unclear if these changes occur early during development and how they impact overall network activity. To investigate this, we used a mouse model of prenatal infection with the viral mimic, polyriboinosinic–polyribocytidilic acid (poly I∶C), a model based on epidemiological evidence that an immune challenge during pregnancy increases the prevalence of schizophrenia in the offspring. We found that prenatal infection reduced the density of parvalbumin- but not somatostatin-positive interneurons in the CA1 area of the hippocampus and strongly reduced the strength of inhibition early during postnatal development. Furthermore, using an intact hippocampal preparation in vitro, we found reduced theta oscillation generated in the CA1 area. Taken together, these results suggest that redistribution in excitatory and inhibitory transmission locally in the CA1 is associated with a significant alteration in network function. Furthermore, given the role of theta rhythm in memory, our results demonstrate how a risk factor for schizophrenia can affect network function early in development that could contribute to cognitive deficits observed later in the disease

Evidence for Human Fronto-Central Gamma Activity during Long-Term Memory Encoding of Word Sequences

Although human gamma activity (30–80 Hz) associated with visual processing is often reported, it is not clear to what extend gamma activity can be reliably detected non-invasively from frontal areas during complex cognitive tasks such as long term memory (LTM) formation. We conducted a memory experiment composed of 35 blocks each having three parts: LTM encoding, working memory (WM) maintenance and LTM retrieval. In the LTM encoding and WM maintenance parts, participants had to respectively encode or maintain the order of three sequentially presented words. During LTM retrieval subjects had to reproduce these sequences. Using magnetoencephalography (MEG) we identified significant differences in the gamma and beta activity. Robust gamma activity (55–65 Hz) in left BA6 (supplementary motor area (SMA)/pre-SMA) was stronger during LTM rehearsal than during WM maintenance. The gamma activity was sustained throughout the 3.4 s rehearsal period during which a fixation cross was presented. Importantly, the difference in gamma band activity correlated with memory performance over subjects. Further we observed a weak gamma power difference in left BA6 during the first half of the LTM rehearsal interval larger for successfully than unsuccessfully reproduced word triplets. In the beta band, we found a power decrease in left anterior regions during LTM rehearsal compared to WM maintenance. Also this suppression of beta power correlated with memory performance over subjects. Our findings show that an extended network of brain areas, characterized by oscillatory activity in different frequency bands, supports the encoding of word sequences in LTM. Gamma band activity in BA6 possibly reflects memory processes associated with language and timing, and suppression of beta activity at left frontal sensors is likely to reflect the release of inhibition directly associated with the engagement of language functions