Overt Visual Attention as a Causal Factor of Perceptual Awareness

Our everyday conscious experience of the visual world is fundamentally shaped by the interaction of overt visual attention and object awareness. Although the principal impact of both components is undisputed, it is still unclear how they interact. Here we recorded eye-movements preceding and following conscious object recognition, collected during the free inspection of ambiguous and corresponding unambiguous stimuli. Using this paradigm, we demonstrate that fixations recorded prior to object awareness predict the later recognized object identity, and that subjects accumulate more evidence that is consistent with their later percept than for the alternative. The timing of reached awareness was verified by a reaction-time based correction method and also based on changes in pupil dilation. Control experiments, in which we manipulated the initial locus of visual attention, confirm a causal influence of overt attention on the subsequent result of object perception. The current study thus demonstrates that distinct patterns of overt attentional selection precede object awareness and thereby directly builds on recent electrophysiological findings suggesting two distinct neuronal mechanisms underlying the two phenomena. Our results emphasize the crucial importance of overt visual attention in the formation of our conscious experience of the visual world

Receptor-mediated potencies of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in urban sediments: comparisons of toxic equivalency risk assessment

The Klip River, flowing through South Africa’s most populated urban area—Soweto and Lenasia—is subject to various pollution and anthropogenic influences, including great concentrations of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. The aims were to determine the aryl-hydrocarbon receptor-mediated potencies of the 16 priority polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in sediments of the Klip River, using chemical- and bio-analytical assessments of hazard, and to compare these results with international sediment quality guidelines. Sediment samples were collected from nine sites during the dry seasons of 2013 and 2014. Two sets of toxic equivalents were calculated from analytically obtained polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon concentrations using: (1) 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin equivalency factors and (2) relative potency factors for fish. The fraction of the sediment extracts containing polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons was assayed with the H4IIE-luc reporter gene bio-assay, and the aryl-hydrocarbon receptor potency expressed as bio-assay equivalents. The bio-assay equivalents and tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin equivalency factors were compared to Canadian sediment quality guidelines and of the three approaches, the bio-assay equivalents and the relative potency factors for fish proved the most protective. Results of this study are proof of the utility of combining biological analysis with instrumental analysis when predicting hazard. Even though there were instances where the bio-assay equivalents were orders of magnitude greater than the tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin equivalency factors, the results still showed similar trends. It was concluded that hazard from aryl-hydrocarbon receptor-mediated potency to adversely affect aquatic organisms in the Klip River was relatively great, which indicated the need for further investigation into possible mitigation

Detection and prevention of money laundering in professional football

The central theme of this contribution is money laundering in professional football. First, it is clarified why the professional football sector is so appealing to persons and organizations for laundering their criminally acquired assets. Then it is examined how these risks have materialized in practice, based on a case study on money laundering activities in the top of english football. This case is centred on the financial adventures of birmingham fc. We will not only highlight the malpractices that took place, but we will also look for starting points to raise barriers against financial misconduct and criminal practices.keywordsmoney launderingprofessional footballsoccercrime-facilitative systemcrime riskscrime preventionnetherlandsunited kingdom

Further purification and characterization of the DNA 3'-phosphatase from rat-liver chromatin which is also a polynuclotide 5'-hydroxyl kinase

Having its origin in public administration, trustworthiness is a significant concept in digital government research, influencing the relationships between citizens and governments. However, the interrelationships between the facets of trustworthiness are given inadequate attention. Therefore, the aim of this research was to develop a theory detailing the factors affecting citizens’ perceptions of e-government trustworthiness. A comprehensive review of public administration and information systems literature highlighted 20 pertinent variables. The interrelationships of these variables were identified and categorized according to their driving and dependence power by employing interpretive structural modelling. The proposed model was then drawn based on the level partitioning of variables and interrelationships of the variables determined using the final reachability matrix. The findings reveal that current conceptualizations of digital government trustworthiness take a too narrow view. The findings can help government policy makers with understanding the interrelated factors associated with trustworthiness in the context of digital government services and implement them in effective strategic planning.Information and Communication Technolog

Further Purification and Characterization of the DNA 3'-Phosphatase from Rat-Liver Chromatin Which Is Also a Polynucleotide 5'-Hydroxyl Kinase

The DNA 3'-phosphatase activity of rat-liver chromatin has been purified. A DNA 5'-hydroxyl kinase activity comigrates at each step of purification. Both enzymes have the same molecular mass (79 kDa) and the same isoelectric point (8.6). It thus seems that the two activities are born by the same protein just as with the phage T4 enzyme which is, at the same time, a 5'-hydroxyl kinase and a 3'-phosphatase. An additional argument is that ATP, which does not influence the rate of the 3'-phosphatase reaction but which is a cosubstrate of the 5'-hydroxyl kinase, protects the 3'-phosphatase activity against thermal denaturation and trypsin digestion. The two active sites must, however, be largely independent within a common support: the thermal denaturation and trypsin inactivation rates are very different for the two activities; increasing the ionic strength activates the kinase and inhibits the phosphatase; polyvalent anions inhibit the phosphatase and have little effect on the kinase. The two active sites might belong to different domains of the protein; they could not however be separated by a partial trypsin digestion. The rates of 3'-dephosphorylation and 5'-phosphorylation by the chromatin enzyme are the same in native and denatured DNA. The 3'-phosphatase has no action on 3'-monodeoxynucleotide, but it hydrolyzes the 3'-phosphate in dinucleotides. The Km of the 3'-phosphatase is 0.548 microM. The Km (5'-OH) and Km (ATP) of the 5'-hydroxyl kinase are about 3.9 microM and 0.69 microM respectively. The chromatin enzyme is unable to hydrolyze 3'-phosphoglycolate ends in DNA