Can Machines Think in Radio Language?

People can think in auditory, visual and tactile forms of language, so can machines principally. But is it possible for them to think in radio language? According to a first principle presented for general intelligence, i.e. the principle of language's relativity, the answer may give an exceptional solution for robot astronauts to talk with each other in space exploration.Comment: 4 pages, 1 figur

The Synthesis of 4-Ethyl-2-propyl-3-substitutedpyrrolo[ 3,4-b]quinoline-1,9-dione Derivatives from 3,3-Dichloro-4-ethyl-thieno[3,4-b]quinoline-1,9-dione and Propylamine

The preparation, spectral properties and structure elucidations of the hitherto undocumented 3-oxo-,  3-thioxo-, 3-propylimino-, 3-imino-, and 3-propylamino- derivatives of 4-ethyl-2-propyl-2,3-dihydro-pyrrolo[3,4-b]quinoline-1,9-dione are described. Mechanistic aspects relating particularly to the formation of the latter two unprecedented products are considered. Magnetic anisotropic effects (deshielding/line broadening of signals) are exhibited by the α-methylene protons of the 4-ethyl moiety in the 1H NMR spectra of the first four of the above, and in several 3,3-dichloro-thieno[3,4-b]quinoline-1,9-diones and intramolecular H-bonded, 1,2-dialkyl-4-oxo-3-quinolinecarboxylic acid precursor substrates.KEYWORDS: 3-Imino-, 3-propylamino-, 3-propylimino-, 3-oxo-, 3-thioxo-substituted 4-ethyl-2-propyl- 2,3-dihydro-pyrrolo[3,4-b]quinoline- 1,9-diones, 4-methyl-, 4-propyl-substituted-3,3-dichloro-thieno[3,4-b]quinoline-1,9-diones, intramolecular H-bonding, magnetic anisotropic effects

The influence of expertise on brain activation of the action observation network during anticipation of tennis and volleyball serves

In many daily activities, and especially in sport, it is necessary to predict the effects of others' actions in order to initiate appropriate responses. Recently, researchers have suggested that the action-observation network (AON) including the cerebellum plays an essential role during such anticipation, particularly in sport expert performers. In the present study, we examined the influence of task-specific expertise on the AON by investigating differences between two expert groups trained in different sports while anticipating action effects. Altogether, 15 tennis and 16 volleyball experts anticipated the direction of observed tennis and volleyball serves while undergoing functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). The expert group in each sport acted as novice controls in the other sport with which they had only little experience. When contrasting anticipation in both expertise conditions with the corresponding untrained sport, a stronger activation of AON areas (SPL, SMA), and particularly of cerebellar structures, was observed. Furthermore, the neural activation within the cerebellum and the SPL was linearly correlated with participant's anticipation performance, irrespective of the specific expertise. For the SPL, this relationship also holds when an expert performs a domain-specific anticipation task. Notably, the stronger activation of the cerebellum as well as of the SMA and the SPL in the expertise conditions suggests that experts rely on their more fine-tuned perceptual-motor representations that have improved during years of training when anticipating the effects of others' actions in their preferred sport. The association of activation within the SPL and the cerebellum with the task achievement suggests that these areas are the predominant brain sites involved in fast motor predictions. The SPL reflects the processing of domain-specific contextual information and the cerebellum the usage of a predictive internal model to solve the anticipation task. © 2014 Balser, Lorey, Pilgramm, Naumann, Kindermann, Stark, Zentgraf, Williams and Munzert

Assessment of the tissue distribution of transplanted human endothelial progenitor cells by radioactive labeling

Background— Transplantation of endothelial progenitor cells (EPCs) improves vascularization and left ventricular function after experimental myocardial ischemia. However, tissue distribution of transplanted EPCs has not yet been monitored in living animals. Therefore, we tested whether radioactive labeling allows us to detect injected EPCs

Adaptive Lévy processes and area-restricted search in human foraging

A considerable amount of research has claimed that animals’ foraging behaviors display movement lengths with power-law distributed tails, characteristic of Lévy flights and Lévy walks. Though these claims have recently come into question, the proposal that many animals forage using Lévy processes nonetheless remains. A Lévy process does not consider when or where resources are encountered, and samples movement lengths independently of past experience. However, Lévy processes too have come into question based on the observation that in patchy resource environments resource-sensitive foraging strategies, like area-restricted search, perform better than Lévy flights yet can still generate heavy-tailed distributions of movement lengths. To investigate these questions further, we tracked humans as they searched for hidden resources in an open-field virtual environment, with either patchy or dispersed resource distributions. Supporting previous research, for both conditions logarithmic binning methods were consistent with Lévy flights and rank-frequency methods–comparing alternative distributions using maximum likelihood methods–showed the strongest support for bounded power-law distributions (truncated Lévy flights). However, goodness-of-fit tests found that even bounded power-law distributions only accurately characterized movement behavior for 4 (out of 32) participants. Moreover, paths in the patchy environment (but not the dispersed environment) showed a transition to intensive search following resource encounters, characteristic of area-restricted search. Transferring paths between environments revealed that paths generated in the patchy environment were adapted to that environment. Our results suggest that though power-law distributions do not accurately reflect human search, Lévy processes may still describe movement in dispersed environments, but not in patchy environments–where search was area-restricted. Furthermore, our results indicate that search strategies cannot be inferred without knowing how organisms respond to resources–as both patched and dispersed conditions led to similar Lévy-like movement distributions

Quality of life and visual function in Nigeria: findings from the National Survey of Blindness and Visual Impairment

Aims To assess associations of visual function (VF) and quality of life (QOL) by visual acuity (VA), causes of blindness and types of cataract procedures in Nigeria. Methods Multi-stage stratified cluster random sampling was used to identify a nationally representative sample of persons aged >= 40 years. VF/QOL questionnaires were administered to participants with VA = 6/12. Results VF/QOL questionnaires were administered to 2076 participants. Spearman's rank correlation showed a strong correlation between decreasing VA and VF/QOL scores (p< 0.0001) with greatest impact on social (p< 0.0001) and mobility-related activities (p< 0.0001). People who were blind due to glaucoma had lower VF and QOL scores than those who were blind due to cataract. Mean VF and QOL scores were lower after couching compared with conventional cataract surgery (mean VF score=51.0 vs 63.0 and mean QOL score=71.3 vs 79.3). Finally, VF and QOL scores were lower among populations with specific characteristics. Conclusions Populations with the following characteristics should be targeted to improve VF and QOL: people who are blind, older people, women, manual labourers, people living in rural areas, those living in the northern geopolitical zones, those practising Islamic and Traditionalism faith, those not currently married and those who have undergone couching

Context Mining of Sedentary Behavior for Promoting Self-Awareness Using Smartphone

Sedentary behaviour is increasing due to societal changes and is related to prolonged periods of sitting. There is sufficient evidence proving that sedentary behaviour has a negative impact on people’s health and wellness. This paper presents our research findings on how to mine the temporal contexts of sedentary behaviour by utilizing the on-board sensors of a smartphone. We use the accelerometer sensor of the smartphone to recognize user situations (i.e., still or active). If our model confirms that the user context is still, then there is a high probability of being sedentary. Then, we process the environmental sound to recognize the micro-context, such as working on a computer or watching television during leisure time. Our goal is to reduce sedentary behaviour by suggesting preventive interventions to take short breaks during prolonged sitting to be more active. We achieve this goal by providing the visualization to the user, who wants to monitor his/her sedentary behaviour to reduce unhealthy routines for self-management purposes. The main contribution of this paper is two-fold: (i) an initial implementation of the proposed framework supporting real-time context identification; (ii) testing and evaluation of the framework, which suggest that our application is capable of substantially reducing sedentary behaviour and assisting users to be active

MPC-Based Haptic Shared Steering System: A Driver Modeling Approach for Symbiotic Driving

Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) aim to increase safety and reduce mental workload. However, the gap in the understanding of the closed-loop driver-vehicle interaction often leads to reduced user acceptance. In this study, an optimal torque control law is calculated online in the Model Predictive Control (MPC) framework to guarantee continuous guidance during the steering task. The research contribution is in the integration of an extensive prediction model covering cognitive behaviour, neuromuscular dynamics, and the vehicle- steering dynamics, within the MPC-based haptic controller to enhance collaboration. The driver model is composed of a preview cognitive strategy based on a Linear-Quadratic-Gaussian, sensory organs, and neuromuscular dynamics, including muscle co-activation and reflex action. Moreover, an adaptive cost-function algorithm enables dynamic allocation of the control authority. Experiments were performed in a fixed-base driving simulator at Toyota Motor Europe involving 19 participants to evaluate the proposed controller with two different cost functions against a commercial Lane Keeping Assist (LKA) system as an industry benchmark. The results demonstrate the proposed controller fosters symbiotic driving and reduces driver-vehicle conflicts with respect to a state-of-the-art commercial system, both subjectively and objectively, while still improving path-tracking performance. Summarising, this study tackles the need to blend human and ADAS control, demonstrating the validity of the proposed strategy