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Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/135604/1/hep28794.pdfhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/135604/2/hep28794_am.pd

Hepatitis E virus ORF2 protein over-expressed by baculovirus in hepatoma cells, efficiently encapsidates and transmits the viral RNA to naïve cells

A recombinant baculovirus(vBacORF2) that expressed the full-length ORF2 capsid protein of a genotype 1 strain of hepatitis E virus(HEV) was constructed. Transduction of S10-3 human hepatoma cells with this baculovirus led to large amounts of ORF2 protein production in ~50% of the cells as determined by immune fluorescence microscopy. The majority of the ORF2 protein detected by Western blot was 72 kDa, the size expected for the full-length protein. To determine if the exogenously-supplied ORF2 protein could transencapsidate viral genomes, S10-3 cell cultures that had been transfected the previous day with an HEV replicon of genotype 1 that contained the gene for green fluorescent protein(GFP), in place of that for ORF2 protein, were transduced with the vBacORF2 virus. Cell lysates were prepared 5 days later and tested for the ability to deliver the GFP gene to HepG2/C3A cells, another human hepatoma cell line. FACS analysis indicated that lysates from cell cultures receiving only the GFP replicon were incapable of introducing the replicon into the HepG2/C3A cells whereas ~2% of the HepG2/C3A cells that received lysate from cultures that had received both the replicon and the baculovirus produced GFP. Therefore, the baculovirus-expressed ORF2 protein was able to trans-encapsidate the viral replicon and form a particle that could infect naïve HepG2/C3A cells. This ex vivo RNA packaging system should be useful for studying many aspects of HEV molecular biology

AI Modelling and Time-series Forecasting Systems for Trading Energy Flexibility in Distribution Grids

We demonstrate progress on the deployment of two sets of technologies to support distribution grid operators integrating high shares of renewable energy sources, based on a market for trading local energy flexibilities. An artificial-intelligence (AI) grid modelling tool, based on probabilistic graphs, predicts congestions and estimates the amount and location of energy flexibility required to avoid such events. A scalable time-series forecasting system delivers large numbers of short-term predictions of distributed energy demand and generation. We discuss the deployment of the technologies at three trial demonstration sites across Europe, in the context of a research project carried out in a consortium with energy utilities, technology providers and research institutions

Single-Mindedness and Self-Reflectiveness: Laboratory Studies

Rechtschaffen (1978) has suggested that dreams are categorically single-minded and isolated. The phenomenon of lucid dreaming, however, suggests that his conclusion is overstated. Furthermore, the empirical status of Rechtschaffen’s claim is uncertain. The data on which his claim is based are personal and impressionistic. We view single-mindedness and lucidity as related along a continuum of self-reflectiveness, as suggested by Rossi (1972) and as operationalized in a scale of self-reflectiveness we derived from his work. In order to examine his assertion we conducted two laboratory experimental studies to examine the distribution of self-reflectiveness and singlemindedness in the dream reports of high and low frequency dream recallers awakened from Stages REM, 2 and 4. Self-reflectiveness of dream reports was quantified using the nine-step scale presented below

Single-Mindedness and Self-Reflectiveness: Laboratory Studies

Rechtschaffen (1978) has suggested that dreams are categorically single-minded and isolated. The phenomenon of lucid dreaming, however, suggests that his conclusion is overstated. Furthermore, the empirical status of Rechtschaffen’s claim is uncertain. The data on which his claim is based are personal and impressionistic. We view single-mindedness and lucidity as related along a continuum of self-reflectiveness, as suggested by Rossi (1972) and as operationalized in a scale of self-reflectiveness we derived from his work. In order to examine his assertion we conducted two laboratory experimental studies to examine the distribution of self-reflectiveness and single-mindedness in the dream reports of high and low frequency dream recallers awakened from stages REM, 2 and 4 Self-reflectiveness of dream reports was quantified using the 9-step scale presented below

Dream Psychology: Operating in the Dark

The questions I want to address today concern the scientific significance of lucid dreaming, especially for our understanding of the function of dreaming. There is an emerging consensus that scientific dream psychology has not lived up to the potential which motivated much of the research following the discovery of REM sleep in 1953 (see Antrobus, 1978). For example, Foulkes (1976; 1982; 1983a; 1983b) has claimed that the three foundation disciplines of dream psychology, specifically psychoanalysis, psychophysiology and evolutionary biology, in fact have contributed very little to our scientific understanding of dreaming. Similarly, Fiss (1983) has argued that we desperately need a clinically relevant theory of dreaming. One important reason for this apparent lack of fruitfulness is the exclusion of lucid dreaming from the central concerns of dream psychology. Ogilvie (1982) has aptly observed that until recently lucid dreaming has been consigned to the “wasteland of parapsychology”. This exclusion of lucid dreaming from scientific dream psychology finally has been rendered untenable by the dramatic demonstration by a number of researchers that lucid dreaming is a scientifically real phenomenon (Covello, 1984; Dane, 1984; Fenwick, Schatzman, Worsley & Adam, 1984: Hearne, 1981, 1983; LaBerge, 1980a, 1980b, 1981; LaBerge, Nagel, Dement & Zarcone, 1980; Ogilvie, Hunt, Tyson, Lucescu & Jeakins, 1982; Tholey, 1983; Tyson, Ogilvie & Hunt, 1984). ‘Scientifically real’ in this context means that researchers such as LaBerge were able to show, among other things, that prearranged signaling was possible from lucid dreaming during stage REM sleep without the intervention of an electrographic transition to the waking state. In effect, the dreamer was simultaneously awake and asleep. The significance of this finding has yet to be fully appreciated within dream psychology in particular or cognitive psychology more generally

The adult perceptual limen of syllable segregation in typically developing paediatric speech

Inappropriate gaps between syllables are one of the core diagnostic features of both childhood apraxia of speech and acquired apraxia of speech. However, little is known about how listeners perceive and identify inappropriate pauses between syllables (gap detection). Only one previous study has investigated the perception of inappropriate pauses between syllables in typical adult speakers and no investigations of gap detection in children's speech have been undertaken. The purpose of this research was to explore the boundaries of listener gap detection to determine at which gap length (duration) a listener can perceive that an inappropriate pause is present in child speech. Listener perception of between-syllable gaps was explored in an experimental design study using the online survey platform Qualtrics. Speech samples were collected from two typically developing children and digitally manipulated to insert gaps between syllables. Adult listeners (n = 84) were recruited and could accurately detect segregation on 80% of presentations at a duration between 100 and 125 ms and could accurately detect segregation on 90% of presentations at a duration between 125 and 150 ms. Listener musical training, gender and age were not correlated with accuracy of detection, but speech pathology training was, albeit weakly. Male speaker gender, and strong onset syllable stress were correlated with increased accuracy compared to female speaker gender and weak onset syllable stress in some gap conditions. The results contribute to our understanding of speech acceptability in CAS and other prosodic disorders and moves towards developing standardised criteria for rating syllable segregation. There may also be implications for computer and artificial intelligence understanding of child speech and automatic detection of disordered speech based on between syllable segregation