831 research outputs found
Attention deficit disorder in adults, nutritional deficiencies, and the treatments available: a literature review
The prevalence of attention deficit hyperactive disorder (ADHD) in adults has steadily increased within the past decade. However, very few people are aware they have this disorder. Those with ADHD have higher divorce rates, school dropout rates, job termination, car accidents, and higher rates of substance abuse and alcohol dependence (Kates, 2005; Tcheremissine & Lieving, 2009). A high comorbidity rate with ADHD, anxiety, and depression has been found. This literature review includes the significant nutritional deficiencies such as neurotransmitters, trace minerals, omega-3 fatty acids, and several B vitamins which are found in people with ADHD, and a description of the four main medications most commonly prescribed along with their side effects, and a list of the natural foods and supplements that can be used to assist with the symptoms of ADHD and the most common mental disorders that accompany it
Premotor cortex in observing erroneous action: An fMRI study
The lateral premotor cortex (PMC) is involved during action observation in monkeys and humans, reflecting a matching process between observed actions and their corresponding motor schemata. In the present study, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was used to investigate if paying attention to the two observable action components, objects and movements, modulates premotor activation during the observation of actions. Participants were asked to classify presented movies as showing correct actions, erroneous actions, or senseless movements. Erroneous actions were incorrect either with regard to employed objects, or to performed movements. The experiment yielded two major results: (1) The ventrolateral premotor cortex (vPMC) and the anterior part of the intraparietal sulcus (aIPS) are strongly activated during the observation of actions in humans. Premotor activation was dominantly located within Brodmann Area (BA) 6, and sometimes extended into BA 44. (2) The presentation of object errors and movements errors allowed to disentangle brain activations corresponding to the analysis of movements and objects in observed actions. Left premotor areas were more involved in the analysis of objects, whereas right premotor areas were dominant in the analysis of movements. It is suggested that the analysis of categorical information, like objects, and that of coordinate information, like movements, are pronounced in different hemispheres
Wireless recording of the calls of Rousettus aegyptiacus and their reproduction using electrostatic transducers
Bats are capable of imaging their surroundings in great detail using echolocation. To apply similar methods to human engineering systems requires the capability to measure and recreate the signals used, and to understand the processing applied to returning echoes. In this work, the emitted and reflected echolocation signals of Rousettus aegyptiacus are recorded while the bat is in flight, using a wireless sensor mounted on the bat. The sensor is designed to replicate the acoustic gain control which bats are known to use, applying a gain to returning echoes that is dependent on the incurred time delay. Employing this technique allows emitted and reflected echolocation calls, which have a wide dynamic range, to be recorded. The recorded echoes demonstrate the complexity of environment reconstruction using echolocation. The sensor is also used to make accurate recordings of the emitted calls, and these calls are recreated in the laboratory using custom-built wideband electrostatic transducers, allied with a spectral equalization technique. This technique is further demonstrated by recreating multi-harmonic bioinspired FM chirps. The ability to record and accurately synthesize echolocation calls enables the exploitation of biological signals in human engineering systems for sonar, materials characterization and imaging
Multiple sequence alignment based on set covers
We introduce a new heuristic for the multiple alignment of a set of
sequences. The heuristic is based on a set cover of the residue alphabet of the
sequences, and also on the determination of a significant set of blocks
comprising subsequences of the sequences to be aligned. These blocks are
obtained with the aid of a new data structure, called a suffix-set tree, which
is constructed from the input sequences with the guidance of the
residue-alphabet set cover and generalizes the well-known suffix tree of the
sequence set. We provide performance results on selected BAliBASE amino-acid
sequences and compare them with those yielded by some prominent approaches
Elevated endogenous expression of the dominant negative basic helix-loop-helix protein ID1 correlates with significant centrosome abnormalities in human tumor cells
<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>ID proteins are dominant negative inhibitors of basic helix-loop-helix transcription factors that have multiple functions during development and cellular differentiation. Ectopic (over-)expression of ID1 extends the lifespan of primary human epithelial cells. High expression levels of ID1 have been detected in multiple human malignancies, and in some have been correlated with unfavorable clinical prognosis. ID1 protein is localized at the centrosomes and forced (over-)expression of ID1 results in errors during centrosome duplication.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Here we analyzed the steady state expression levels of the four ID-proteins in 18 tumor cell lines and assessed the number of centrosome abnormalities. While expression of ID1, ID2, and ID3 was detected, we failed to detect protein expression of ID4. Expression of ID1 correlated with increased supernumerary centrosomes in most cell lines analyzed.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>This is the first report that shows that not only ectopic expression in tissue culture but endogenous levels of ID1 modulate centrosome numbers. Thus, our findings support the hypothesis that ID1 interferes with centrosome homeostasis, most likely contributing to genomic instability and associated tumor aggressiveness.</p
Improving alcohol health literacy and reducing alcohol consumption: recommendations for Germany
Background: Although the detrimental health effects of alcohol are well established, consumption levels are high in many high-income countries such as Germany. Improving alcohol health literacy presents an integrated approach to alcohol prevention and an important complement to alcohol policy. Our aim was to identify and prioritize measures to enhance alcohol health literacy and hence to reduce alcohol consumption, using Germany as an example.Methods: A series of recommendations for improving alcohol health literacy were derived from a review of the literature and subsequently rated by five experts. Recommendations were rated according to their likely impact on enhancing (a) alcohol health literacy and (b) reducing alcohol consumption. Inter-rater agreement was assessed using a two-way intra-class correlation coefficient (ICC).Results: Eleven recommendations were established for three areas of action: (1) education and information, (2) health care system, and (3) alcohol control policy. Education and information measures were rated high to increase alcohol health literacy but low to their impact on alcohol consumption, while this pattern was reversed for alcohol control policies. The ratings showed good agreement (ICC: 0.85-0.88).Conclusions: Improving alcohol health literacy and reducing alcohol consumption should be considered complementary and become part of a comprehensive alcohol strategy to curb the health, social, and economic burden of alcohol
Generalized Totalizer Encoding for Pseudo-Boolean Constraints
Pseudo-Boolean constraints, also known as 0-1 Integer Linear Constraints, are
used to model many real-world problems. A common approach to solve these
constraints is to encode them into a SAT formula. The runtime of the SAT solver
on such formula is sensitive to the manner in which the given pseudo-Boolean
constraints are encoded. In this paper, we propose generalized Totalizer
encoding (GTE), which is an arc-consistency preserving extension of the
Totalizer encoding to pseudo-Boolean constraints. Unlike some other encodings,
the number of auxiliary variables required for GTE does not depend on the
magnitudes of the coefficients. Instead, it depends on the number of distinct
combinations of these coefficients. We show the superiority of GTE with respect
to other encodings when large pseudo-Boolean constraints have low number of
distinct coefficients. Our experimental results also show that GTE remains
competitive even when the pseudo-Boolean constraints do not have this
characteristic.Comment: 10 pages, 2 figures, 2 tables. To be published in 21st International
Conference on Principles and Practice of Constraint Programming 201
Electronic properties of LaOFFeAs in the normal state probed by NMR/NQR
We report 139La, 57Fe and 75As nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and nuclear
quadrupole resonance (NQR) measurements on powders of the new LaO1-xFxFeAs
superconductor for x = 0 and x = 0.1 at temperatures up to 480 K, and compare
our measured NQR spectra with local density approximation (LDA) calculations.
For all three nuclei in the x = 0.1 material, it is found that the local Knight
shift increases monotonically with an increase in temperature, and scales with
the macroscopic susceptibility, suggesting a single magnetic degree of freedom.
Surprisingly, the spin lattice relaxation rates for all nuclei also scale with
one another, despite the fact that the form factors for each site sample
different regions of q-space. This result suggests a lack of any q-space
structure in the dynamical spin susceptibility that might be expected in the
presence of antiferromagnetic correlations. Rather, our results are more
compatible with simple quasi-particle scattering. Furthermore, we find that the
increase in the electric field gradient at the As cannot be accounted for by
LDA calculations, suggesting that structural changes, in particular the
position of the As in the unit cell, dominate the NQR response.Comment: 17 pages, 6 figure
Stars and gas in the Medusa merger
The Medusa (NGC 4194) is a well-studied nearby galaxy with the disturbed
appearance of a merger and evidence for ongoing star formation. In order to
test whether it could be the result of an interaction between a gas-rich
disk-like galaxy and a larger elliptical, we have carried out optical and radio
observations of the stars and the gas in the Medusa, and performed -body
numerical simulations of the evolution of such a system. We used the Nordic
Optical Telescope to obtain a deep V-band image and the Westerbork Radio
Synthesis Telescope to map the large-scale distribution and kinematics of
atomic hydrogen. A single HI tail was found to the South of the Medusa with a
projected length of 56 kpc (5') and a gas mass of 7* 10^8 M_sun, thus
harbouring about one third of the total HI mass of the system. HI was also
detected in absorption toward the continuum in the center. HI was detected in a
small nearby galaxy to the North-West of the Medusa at a projected distance of
91 kpc. It is, however, unlikely that this galaxy has had a significant
influence on the evolution of the Medusa. The simulations of the slightly
prograde infall of a gas-rich disk galaxy on an larger, four time more massive
elliptical (spherical) galaxy reproduce most of the observed features of the
Medusa.Thus, the Medusa is an ideal object to study the merger-induced star
formation contribution from the small galaxy of a minor merger.Comment: accepted by A&A, 16 pages, movies of the simulations can be found at
http://www.bjerkeli.se
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