Lessons to be learned: how a comprehensive neurobiological framework of atypical reading development can inform educational practice

Dyslexia is a heritable reading disorder with an estimated prevalence of 5–17%. A multiple deficit model has been proposed that illustrates dyslexia as an outcome of multiple risks and protective factors interacting at the genetic, neural, cognitive, and environmental levels. Here we review the evidence on each of these levels and discuss possible underlying mechanisms and their reciprocal interactions along a developmental timeline. Current and potential implications of neuroscientific findings for contemporary challenges in the field of dyslexia, as well as for reading development and education in general, are then discussed

LATFormer: Locality-Aware Point-View Fusion Transformer for 3D Shape Recognition

Recently, 3D shape understanding has achieved significant progress due to the advances of deep learning models on various data formats like images, voxels, and point clouds. Among them, point clouds and multi-view images are two complementary modalities of 3D objects and learning representations by fusing both of them has been proven to be fairly effective. While prior works typically focus on exploiting global features of the two modalities, herein we argue that more discriminative features can be derived by modeling ``where to fuse''. To investigate this, we propose a novel Locality-Aware Point-View Fusion Transformer (LATFormer) for 3D shape retrieval and classification. The core component of LATFormer is a module named Locality-Aware Fusion (LAF) which integrates the local features of correlated regions across the two modalities based on the co-occurrence scores. We further propose to filter out scores with low values to obtain salient local co-occurring regions, which reduces redundancy for the fusion process. In our LATFormer, we utilize the LAF module to fuse the multi-scale features of the two modalities both bidirectionally and hierarchically to obtain more informative features. Comprehensive experiments on four popular 3D shape benchmarks covering 3D object retrieval and classification validate its effectiveness

Isolation and screening of a chitin deacetylase producing Bacillus cereus and its potential for chitosan preparation

Chitosan is a biopolymer material extracted from marine biomass waste such as shrimp and crab shells, which has good biocompatibility and degradability with great potential for application in the field of wastewater treatment and soil remediation. The higher the degree of deacetylation (DD), the better the adsorption performance of chitosan. Chitin deacetylase (CDA) can specifically catalyze the deacetylate of chitin in a green reaction that is environmentally friendly. However, the scarcity of high yielding chitin deacetylase strains has been regarded as the technical bottleneck of chitosan green production. Here, we screened a natural chitin degrading bacterium from coastal mud and identified it as Bacillus cereus ZWT-08 by re-screening the chitin deacetylase activity and degree of deacetylation values. By optimizing the medium conditions and enzyme production process, ZWT-08 was cultured in fermentation medium with 1% (m/V) glucose and yeast extract at pH 6.0, 37°C, and a stirring speed of 180 r/min. After fermenting in 5 L fermenter for 48 h, the deacetylation activity of the supernatant reached 613.25 U/mL. Electron microscopic examination of the chitin substrate in the fermentation medium revealed a marshmallow-like fluffy texture on its structural surface. Meanwhile, 89.29% of the acetyl groups in this chitin substrate were removed by enzymatic digestion of chitin deacetylase produced by ZWT-08, resulting in the preparation of chitosan a degree of deacetylation higher than 90%. As an effective strain for chitosan production, Bacillus cereus ZWT-08 plays a positive role in the bioconversion of chitin and the upgrading of the chitosan industry

Unusual Fermi Surface Sheet-Dependent Band Splitting in Sr2RuO4 Revealed by High Resolution Angle-Resolved Photoemission

High resolution angle-resolved photoemission measurements have been carried out on Sr2RuO4. We observe clearly two sets of Fermi surface sheets near the (\pi,0)-(0,\pi) line which are most likely attributed to the surface and bulk Fermi surface splitting of the \beta band. This is in strong contrast to the nearly null surface and bulk Fermi surface splitting of the \alpha band although both have identical orbital components. Extensive band structure calculations are performed by considering various scenarios, including structural distortion, spin-orbit coupling and surface ferromagnetism. However, none of them can explain such a qualitative difference of the surface and bulk Fermi surface splitting between the \alpha and \beta sheets. This unusual behavior points to an unknown order on the surface of Sr2RuO4 that remains to be uncovered. Its revelation will be important for studying and utilizing novel quantum phenomena associated with the surface of Sr2RuO4 as a result of its being a possible p-wave chiral superconductor and a topological superconductor.Comment: 13 pages, 4 figure

Enantiomeric Discrimination by Surface- Enhanced Raman Scattering- Chiral Anisotropy of Chiral Nanostructured Gold Films

A surface- enhanced Raman scattering- chiral anisotropy (SERS- ChA) effect is reported that combines chiral discrimination and surface Raman scattering enhancement on chiral nanostructured Au films (CNAFs) equipped in the normal Raman scattering Spectrometer. The CNAFs provided remarkably higher enhancement factors of Raman scattering (EFs) for particular enantiomers, and the SERS intensity was proportional to the enantiomeric excesses (ee) values. Except for molecules with mesomeric species, all of the tested enantiomers exhibited high SERS- ChA asymmetry factors (g), ranging between 1.34 and 1.99 regardless of polarities, sizes, chromophores, concentrations and ee. The effect might be attributed to selective resonance coupling between the induced electric and magnetic dipoles associated with enantiomers and chiral plasmonic modes of CNAFs.Absolution by SERS: A surface- enhanced Raman scattering chiral anisotropy effect is presented that combines chiral discrimination and surface Raman scattering enhancement on chiral nanostructured Au films. It is applied in the normal Raman scattering system to identify the absolute configuration and composition of enantiomers, overcoming disadvantages of polarimeter systems and chromatography.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/156417/3/anie202006486-sup-0001-misc_information.pdfhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/156417/2/anie202006486_am.pdfhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/156417/1/anie202006486.pd

Using microneedle array electrodes for non-invasive electrophysiological signal acquisition and sensory feedback evoking

Introduction: Bidirectional transmission of information is needed to realize a closed-loop human-machine interaction (HMI), where electrophysiological signals are recorded for man-machine control and electrical stimulations are used for machine-man feedback. As a neural interface (NI) connecting man and machine, electrodes play an important role in HMI and their characteristics are critical for information transmission.Methods: In this work, we fabricated a kind of microneedle array electrodes (MAEs) by using a magnetization-induced self-assembly method, where microneedles with a length of 500–600 μm and a tip diameter of ∼20 μm were constructed on flexible substrates. Part of the needle length could penetrate through the subjects’ stratum corneum and reach the epidermis, but not touch the dermis, establishing a safe and direct communication pathway between external electrical circuit and internal peripheral nervous system.Results: The MAEs showed significantly lower and more stable electrode-skin interface impedance than the metal-based flat array electrodes (FAEs) in various testing scenarios, demonstrating their promising impedance characteristics. With the stable microneedle structure, MAEs exhibited an average SNR of EMG that is more than 30% higher than FAEs, and a motion-intention classification accuracy that is 10% higher than FAEs. The successful sensation evoking demonstrated the feasibility of the MAE-based electrical stimulation for sensory feedback, where a variety of natural and intuitive feelings were generated in the subjects and thereafter objectively verified through EEG analysis.Discussion: This work confirms the application potential of MAEs working as an effective NI, in both electrophysiological recording and electrical stimulation, which may provide a technique support for the development of HMI

Gastric Subserous Vaccination With Helicobacter pylori Vaccine: An Attempt to Establish Tissue-Resident CD4+ Memory T Cells and Induce Prolonged Protection

Tissue-resident memory T (Trm) cells are enriched at the sites of previous infection and required for enhanced protective immunity. However, the emergence of Trm cells and their roles in providing protection are unclear in the field of Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) vaccinology. Here, our results suggest that conventional vaccine strategies are unable to establish a measurable antigen (Ag)-specific memory cell pool in stomach; in comparison, gastric subserous injection of mice with micro-dose of Alum-based H. pylori vaccine can induce a pool of local CD4+ Trm cells. Regional recruitment of Ag-specific CD4+ T cells depends on the engagement of Ag and adjuvant-induced inflammation. Prior subcutaneous vaccination enhanced this recruitment. A stable pool of Ag-specific CD4+ T cells can be detected for 240 days. Two weeks of FTY720 administration in immune mice suggests that these cells do not experience the recirculation. Immunohistochemistry results show that close to the vaccination site, abundant CD4+T cells locate on epithelial niches, independent of lymphocyte cluster. Paradigmatically, Ag-specific CD4+ T cells with a phenotype of CD69+CD103- are preferential on lymphocytes isolated from epithelium. Upon Helicobacter infection, CD4+ Trm cells orchestrate a swift recall response with the recruitment of circulating antigen-specific Th1/Th17 cells to trigger a tissue-wide pathogen clearance. This study investigates the vaccine-induced gastric CD4+ Trm cells in a mice model, and highlights the need for designing a vaccine strategy against H. pylori by establishing the protective CD4+ Trm cells

The relationship between biological and psychosocial risk factors and resting‐state functional connectivity in 2‐monthold Bangladeshi infants: A feasibility and pilot study

Childhood poverty has been associated with structural and functional alterations in the developing brain. However, poverty does not alter brain development directly, but acts through associated biological or psychosocial risk factors (e.g. malnutrition, family conflict). Yet few studies have investigated risk factors in the context of infant neurodevelopment, and none have done so in low‐resource settings such as Bangladesh, where children are exposed to multiple, severe biological and psychosocial hazards. In this feasibility and pilot study, usable resting‐state fMRI data were acquired in infants from extremely poor (n = 16) and (relatively) more affluent (n = 16) families in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Whole‐brain intrinsic functional connectivity (iFC) was estimated using bilateral seeds in the amygdala, where iFC has shown susceptibility to early life stress, and in sensory areas, which have exhibited less susceptibility to early life hazards. Biological and psychosocial risk factors were examined for associations with iFC. Three resting‐state networks were identified in within‐group brain maps: medial temporal/striatal, visual, and auditory networks. Infants from extremely poor families compared with those from more affluent families exhibited greater (i.e. less negative) iFC in precuneus for amygdala seeds; however, no group differences in iFC were observed for sensory area seeds. Height‐for‐age, a proxy for malnutrition/infection, was not associated with amygdala/precuneus iFC, whereas prenatal family conflict was positively correlated. Findings suggest that it is feasible to conduct infant fMRI studies in low‐resource settings. Challenges and practical steps for successful implementations are discussed