The Emergence of Emotions

Emotion is conscious experience. It is the affective aspect of consciousness. Emotion arises from sensory stimulation and is typically accompanied by physiological and behavioral changes in the body. Hence an emotion is a complex reaction pattern consisting of three components: a physiological component, a behavioral component, and an experiential (conscious) component. The reactions making up an emotion determine what the emotion will be recognized as. Three processes are involved in generating an emotion: (1) identification of the emotional significance of a sensory stimulus, (2) production of an affective state (emotion), and (3) regulation of the affective state. Two opposing systems in the brain (the reward and punishment systems) establish an affective value or valence (stimulus-reinforcement association) for sensory stimulation. This is process (1), the first step in the generation of an emotion. Development of stimulus-reinforcement associations (affective valence) serves as the basis for emotion expression (process 2), conditioned emotion learning acquisition and expression, memory consolidation, reinforcement-expectations, decision-making, coping responses, and social behavior. The amygdala is critical for the representation of stimulus-reinforcement associations (both reward and punishment-based) for these functions. Three distinct and separate architectural and functional areas of the prefrontal cortex (dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, orbitofrontal cortex, anterior cingulate cortex) are involved in the regulation of emotion (process 3). The regulation of emotion by the prefrontal cortex consists of a positive feedback interaction between the prefrontal cortex and the inferior parietal cortex resulting in the nonlinear emergence of emotion. This positive feedback and nonlinear emergence represents a type of working memory (focal attention) by which perception is reorganized and rerepresented, becoming explicit, functional, and conscious. The explicit emotion states arising may be involved in the production of voluntary new or novel intentional (adaptive) behavior, especially social behavior

Fluorinated cotelomers based on vinylidene fluoride (VDF) and hexafluoropropene (HFP): Synthesis, dehydrofluorination and grafting by amine containing an aromatic ring

12 pagesThe synthesis of C6F13CH2C(CF CFCF3) N–C2H4–C6H5 (11) from the addition of H2N–C2H4–C6H5 onto C6F13CH2CF2CF2CFHCF3 (3) is presented. C6F13CH2CF2CF2CFHCF3 (3) and C6F13CH2CF2CF(CF3)CF2H (30) isomers were obtained from the thermal stepwise cotelomerization of vinylidene fluoride and hexafluoropropene with C6F13I, followed by the selective reduction of the iodine end atom. At 200 8C, the 3/30 molar ratio reached 9.0. In contrast to selective reduction, dehydrofluorination led to various derivatives, which were characterized by 1H NMR and 19F NMR spectroscopy, and hence a reaction pathway could be suggested. The grafting of an amine containing an aromatic ring onto the cotelomers based on VDF and HFP occurred selectively on VDF/HFP diad and, in some instances a further step involving the formation of an imine was observed. The addition of 2-phenylethylamine onto the dehydrofluorinated intermediates was found to be quantitative

Mise en place et évaluation d'un projet de restauration à grande échelle: exemple de la réhabilitation d'une steppe dans le Sud Est de la France

International audienceRestoring ecosystems at large scale is challenging: the technics are mainly developed at small scales and the projects usually involve many stakeholders with different expectations. Our objective is to show how these constraints may be transformed into opportunities and how to assess the success of a whole large scale project. We used as an example the rehabilitation of a former intensive orchard to a Mediterranean steppe in the La Crau area (south-eastern France). Because the 357ha project involved several stakeholders, multiple objectives co-existed: creating biodiversity units for a mitigation bank, restoring traditional sheep grazing management, rehabilitating a suitable habitat for endangered steppe birds, and restoring the steppe plant community and the Coleoptera and Orthoptera community diversity, composition and structure. Several restoration methods were experimented at different scales and the overall project design was a trade-of between objectives, costs and opportunities. In order to have a global overview after 7 years, we will present the results within a new framework for ecological restoration project assessment. It has three hierarchical levels: 1-the project: it is composed with weighted objectives, the weight are given by stakeholders and a project score can be calculated for each stakeholder; 2-the objectives: they are composed with weighted variables; and 3-the variables which are standardized in order to be comparable to each other’s

Mise en place et évaluation d'un projet de restauration à grande échelle: exemple de la réhabilitation d'une steppe dans le Sud Est de la France

International audienceRestoring ecosystems at large scale is challenging: the technics are mainly developed at small scales and the projects usually involve many stakeholders with different expectations. Our objective is to show how these constraints may be transformed into opportunities and how to assess the success of a whole large scale project. We used as an example the rehabilitation of a former intensive orchard to a Mediterranean steppe in the La Crau area (south-eastern France). Because the 357ha project involved several stakeholders, multiple objectives co-existed: creating biodiversity units for a mitigation bank, restoring traditional sheep grazing management, rehabilitating a suitable habitat for endangered steppe birds, and restoring the steppe plant community and the Coleoptera and Orthoptera community diversity, composition and structure. Several restoration methods were experimented at different scales and the overall project design was a trade-of between objectives, costs and opportunities. In order to have a global overview after 7 years, we will present the results within a new framework for ecological restoration project assessment. It has three hierarchical levels: 1-the project: it is composed with weighted objectives, the weight are given by stakeholders and a project score can be calculated for each stakeholder; 2-the objectives: they are composed with weighted variables; and 3-the variables which are standardized in order to be comparable to each other’s

Mise en place et évaluation d'un projet de restauration à grande échelle: exemple de la réhabilitation d'une steppe dans le Sud Est de la France

International audienceRestoring ecosystems at large scale is challenging: the technics are mainly developed at small scales and the projects usually involve many stakeholders with different expectations. Our objective is to show how these constraints may be transformed into opportunities and how to assess the success of a whole large scale project. We used as an example the rehabilitation of a former intensive orchard to a Mediterranean steppe in the La Crau area (south-eastern France). Because the 357ha project involved several stakeholders, multiple objectives co-existed: creating biodiversity units for a mitigation bank, restoring traditional sheep grazing management, rehabilitating a suitable habitat for endangered steppe birds, and restoring the steppe plant community and the Coleoptera and Orthoptera community diversity, composition and structure. Several restoration methods were experimented at different scales and the overall project design was a trade-of between objectives, costs and opportunities. In order to have a global overview after 7 years, we will present the results within a new framework for ecological restoration project assessment. It has three hierarchical levels: 1-the project: it is composed with weighted objectives, the weight are given by stakeholders and a project score can be calculated for each stakeholder; 2-the objectives: they are composed with weighted variables; and 3-the variables which are standardized in order to be comparable to each other’s

Structural Basis for a Bimodal Allosteric Mechanism of General Anesthetic Modulation in Pentameric Ligand-Gated Ion Channels

Summary: Ion channel modulation by general anesthetics is a vital pharmacological process with implications for receptor biophysics and drug development. Functional studies have implicated conserved sites of both potentiation and inhibition in pentameric ligand-gated ion channels, but a detailed structural mechanism for these bimodal effects is lacking. The prokaryotic model protein GLIC recapitulates anesthetic modulation of human ion channels, and it is accessible to structure determination in both apparent open and closed states. Here, we report ten X-ray structures and electrophysiological characterization of GLIC variants in the presence and absence of general anesthetics, including the surgical agent propofol. We show that general anesthetics can allosterically favor closed channels by binding in the pore or favor open channels via various subsites in the transmembrane domain. Our results support an integrated, multi-site mechanism for allosteric modulation, and they provide atomic details of both potentiation and inhibition by one of the most common general anesthetics. : General anesthetics can both potentiate and inhibit pentameric ligand-gated ion channels, yet the structural basis for their effects remains unclear. Ten crystal structures and associated electrophysiology data by Fourati et al. point to a unified allosteric model for positive and negative modulation, providing a framework for structure-inspired drug design. Keywords: ion channels, general anesthetics, x-ray crystallography, electrophysiology, alloster