Near-infrared Fourier transform room-temperature photoluminescence of erbium complexes

A modified Fourier transform (FT) Raman bench spectrometer designed for the detection of weak light emission in the 800–1700 nm wavelength region has been used to demonstrate the advantages of FT spectroscopy for measuring near-infrared photoluminescence spectra of lanthanide complexes with a good resolution and very good sensitivity. This apparatus has been tested with an ultraviolet laser source (325 nm) on three standard erbium complexes. The 4I13/24I15/2 emission of tris-(acetylacetonato) (1,10 phenanthroline) erbium [Er(acac)3(phen)], tris-(4,4,4,-trifluoro-1-(2 thenoyl)-1,3-butenedione) (1,10 phenanthroline) erbium [Er(TTFA)3(phen)] and tris(8-hydroxyquinolinato) erbium [Erq3] has thus been recorded in solution and in the solid state and compared with literature. ©2003 American Institute of Physics

Spatial Attention Interacts With Serial-Order Retrieval From Verbal Working Memory

The ability to maintain the serial order of events is recognized as a major function of working memory. Although general models of working memory postulate a close link between working memory and attention, such a link has so far not been proposed specifically for serial-order working memory. The present study provided the first empirical demonstration of a direct link between serial order in verbal working memory and spatial selective attention. We show that the retrieval of later items of a sequence stored in working memory-compared with that of earlier items-produces covert attentional shifts toward the right. This observation suggests the conceptually surprising notion that serial-order working memory, even for nonspatially defined verbal items, draws on spatial attention. © The Author(s) 2013.Peer reviewe

Implicit response-irrelevant number information triggers the SNARC effect : Evidence using a neural overlap paradigm

Peer reviewedPostprin

Physical activity to improve cognition in older adults: can physical activity programs enriched with cognitive challenges enhance the effects? A systematic review and meta-analysis

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Bringing the benefits of David to Goliath: special economic zones and institutional improvement

The theory behind special economic zones (SEZs) focuses on their role in overcoming broader policy failings in a country. This paper hypothesizes that the ability of smaller countries to reform more quickly provides a theoretical ‘missing link’ as to how SEZs can assist reform, developing the idea of SEZs as a ‘small country in a large country’. Using a new database, the paper tests this proposition by examining if SEZs have actually been able to spur on institutional improvement in large countries. Results show that SEZs do influence the institutional development of a country, contingent upon prevailing institutional trends

Mental Addition in Bilinguals: An fMRI Study of Task-Related and Performance-Related Activation

Behavioral studies show that bilinguals are slower and less accurate when performing mental calculation in their nondominant (second; L2) language than in their dominant (first; L1) language. However, little is known about the neural correlates associated with the performance differences observed between bilinguals' 2 languages during arithmetic processing. To address the cortical activation differences between languages, the current study examined task-related and performance-related brain activation during mental addition when problems were presented auditorily in participants' L1 and L2. Eleven Chinese–English bilinguals heard 2-digit addition problems that required exact or approximate calculations. Functional magnetic resonance imaging results showed that auditorily presented multidigit addition in bilinguals activates bilateral inferior parietal and inferior frontal regions in both L1 and L2. Language differences were observed in the form of greater activation for L2 exact addition in the left inferior frontal area. A negative correlation between brain activation and behavioral performance during mental addition in L2 was observed in the left inferior parietal area. Current results provide further evidence for the effects of language-specific experience on arithmetic processing in bilinguals at the cortical level