How Interesting Is This To You: Rating the Interestingness of Auditory Clips

Modern technological environments integrate multiple devices, competing for limited attentional resources of users. This study aimed to validate the auditory stimuli used in Horrey et al. (2017) with a college student population and examine the psychological structure of task engagement. Thirty-nine students listened to thirty-nine auditory stimuli used in Horrey et al. (2017) for their level of engagement. Participants rated how interesting they found the material on a slider from -7 (boring) to 7 (interesting) while listening to each clip. Participants also rated levels of difficulty, entertainment, and likelihood to attend to each clip. Participants who rated high on difficulty, entertainment, and attention also rated higher interestingness scores than those with low ratings, suggesting that these are important constituents of perceived interestingness of the auditory clips. Results indicate complexity of the psychological structure of task engagement and importance of controlling these factors in auditory stimuli to manipulate engagement

Long-term sediment decline causes ongoing shrinkage of the Mekong megadelta, Vietnam

Since the 1990s the Mekong River delta has suffered a large decline in sediment supply causing coastal erosion, following catchment disturbance through hydropower dam construction and sand extraction. However, our new geological reconstruction of 2500-years of delta shoreline changes show that serious coastal erosion actually started much earlier. Data shows the sandy coast bounding river mouths accreted consistently at a rate of +2 to +4 km2/year. In contrast, we identified a variable accretion rate of the muddy deltaic protrusion at Camau; it was < +1 km2/year before 1400 years ago but increased drastically around 600 years ago, forming the entire Camau Peninsula. This high level of mud supply had sharply declined by the early 20th century after a vast canal network was built on the delta. Since then the Peninsula has been eroding, promoted by the conjunction of mud sequestration in the delta plain driven by expansion of rice cultivation, and hysteresis of long-term muddy sedimentation that left the protrusion exposed to wave erosion. Natural mitigation would require substantial increases in sediment supply well above the pre-1990s levels

High expression levels of survivin protein does not abolish UV-induced apoptosis in SCL-II cells

Survivin is a member of the inhibitors of apoptosis and has been implicated in both the regulation of cell division and the suppression of apoptosis. Whereas over-expression of survivin correlates with an unfavourable prognosis in many malignant tumours, siRNA against survivin causes a reduction of cell proliferation, the induction of apoptosis and an enhanced radiosensitivity of squamous cell carcinoma cell lines and other tumour cell lines. The apoptotic response and the survivin protein expression levels in the squamous cell carcinoma derived SCL-II cell line were analyzed after exposure to ionizing radiation (IR) and UV radiation. Apoptosis was assessed by PARP cleavage and by flow cytometry (Annexin V-FITC/ PI assay). SCL-II showed a low induction of apoptosis after exposure to IR but a strong apoptotic response after exposure to UV (25% apoptotic cells 5 h after UV), which correlated with PARP cleavage and characteristic changes in cell morphology like membrane blebbing and formation of apoptotic bodies. Cell cycle analysis revealed that exposure to UV, but not IR, induced a G1 checkpoint arrest in SCL-II cells.There was no change in survivin protein expression after exposure to IR and UV compared to controls. One of the used survivin antibodies detected a subband (28 kDa) which correlated with the apoptotic state of SCL-II cells.Conclusions: Survivin expression does not interfere with apoptosis induction in SCL-II cells. UV triggeres apoptosis in SCL-II cells is not abolished by a high expression level of survivin. Apoptosis in SCL-II cells seems to be associated with cell cycle perturbations

Effect of nano-ZrO2 particulates reinforcement on microstructure and mechanical behavior of solidification processed elemental Mg

10.1177/0021998307074187Journal of Composite Materials41212533-2543JCOM