1,721 research outputs found
To dash or to dawdle: verb-associated speed of motion influences eye movements during spoken sentence comprehension
In describing motion events verbs of manner provide information about the speed of agents or objects in those events. We used eye tracking to investigate how inferences about this verb-associated speed of motion would influence the time course of attention to a visual scene that matched an event described in language. Eye movements were recorded as participants heard spoken sentences with verbs that implied a fast (“dash”) or slow (“dawdle”) movement of an agent towards a goal. These sentences were heard whilst participants concurrently looked at scenes depicting the agent and a path which led to the goal object. Our results indicate a mapping of events onto the visual scene consistent with participants mentally simulating the movement of the agent along the path towards the goal: when the verb implies a slow manner of motion, participants look more often and longer along the path to the goal; when the verb implies a fast manner of motion, participants tend to look earlier at the goal and less on the path. These results reveal that event comprehension in the presence of a visual world involves establishing and dynamically updating the locations of entities in response to linguistic descriptions of events
The Balance of Dark and Luminous Mass in Rotating Galaxies
A fine balance between dark and baryonic mass is observed in spiral galaxies.
As the contribution of the baryons to the total rotation velocity increases,
the contribution of the dark matter decreases by a compensating amount. This
poses a fine-tuning problem for \LCDM galaxy formation models, and may point to
new physics for dark matter particles or even a modification of gravity.Comment: 4 pages RevTeX. Phys. Rev. Letters, in pres
Posture as index for approach-avoidance behavior
Approach and avoidance are two behavioral responses that make people tend to approach positive and avoid negative situations. This study examines whether postural behavior is influenced by the affective state of pictures. While standing on the Wii™ Balance Board, participants viewed pleasant, neutral, and unpleasant pictures (passively viewing phase). Then they had to move their body to the left or the right (lateral movement phase) to make the next picture appear. We recorded movements in the anterior-posterior direction to examine approach and avoidant behavior. During passively viewing, people approached pleasant pictures. They avoided unpleasant ones while they made a lateral movement. These findings provide support for the idea that we tend to approach positive and avoid negative situations
Diagnostic error increases mortality and length of hospital stay in patients presenting through the emergency room
Background: Diagnostic errors occur frequently, especially in the emergency room. Estimates about the
consequences of diagnostic error vary widely and little is known about the factors predicting error. Our
objectives thus was to determine the rate of discrepancy between diagnoses at hospital admission and
discharge in patients presenting through the emergency room, the discrepancies’ consequences, and factors
predicting them.
Methods: Prospective observational clinical study combined with a survey in a University-affiliated tertiary
care hospital. Patients’ hospital discharge diagnosis was compared with the diagnosis at hospital admittance
through the emergency room and classified as similar or discrepant according to a predefined scheme by
two independent expert raters. Generalized linear mixed-effects models were used to estimate the effect of
diagnostic discrepancy on mortality and length of hospital stay and to determine whether characteristics of
patients, diagnosing physicians, and context predicted diagnostic discrepancy.
Results: 755 consecutive patients (322 [42.7%] female; mean age 65.14 years) were included.
The discharge diagnosis differed substantially from the admittance diagnosis in 12.3% of cases. Diagnostic
discrepancy was associated with a longer hospital stay (mean 10.29 vs. 6.90 days; Cohen’s d 0.47; 95%
confidence interval 0.26 to 0.70; P = 0.002) and increased patient mortality (8 (8.60%) vs. 25(3.78%); OR 2.40; 95% CI 1.05
to 5.5 P = 0.038). A factor available at admittance that predicted diagnostic discrepancy was the diagnosing physician’s
assessment that the patient presented atypically for the diagnosis assigned (OR 3.04; 95% CI 1.33–6.96; P = 0.009).
Conclusions: Diagnostic discrepancies are a relevant healthcare problem in patients admitted through the
emergency room because they occur in every ninth patient and are associated with increased in-hospital
mortality. Discrepancies are not readily predictable by fixed patient or physician characteristics; attention
should focus on context
Water Stress Implications of Energy Scenarios for the Middle East: an Assessment of Risks and Uncertainties
Molecular phylogeny of common cibicidids and related rotaliida (foraminifera) based on small subunit rDNA sequences
To infer the phylogenetic relationships of cibicidids, we obtained small subunit ribosomal DNA (SSU rDNA) sequences of six common cibicidid morphospecies. In view of our results, the placement of cibicidids in different superfamilies, the distinction between planoconvex Cibicides and biconvex Cibicidoides, and the erection of genera such as Fontbotia and Lobatula are unjustified. Moreover, the superfamily Planorbulinacea, in which cibicidids are often placed, is polyphyletic and coiling mode cannot be used as a major taxonomic criterion. Our data suggest that all cibicidids examined here could be classified in one unique family, the Cibicididae, that includes Melonis, Hanzawaia, Cibicides (for C. refulgens), and Cibicidoides for the other five morphospecies studied (C. kullenbergi, C. lobatulus, C. pachyderma, C. ungerianus, and C. wuellerstorfi). Among the six sampled morphospecies, Cibicides refulgens is least closely related to any of the other cibicidids and forms a clade consisting of two different species, Cibicides sp. and C. refulgens clearly separated by geography (Antarctic and Mediterranean, respectively). The morphospecies Cibicidoides kullenbergi and C. pachyderma form a single clade representing the same species. The three other species, Cibicidoides lobatulus, C. ungerianus, and C. wuellerstorfi are closely related. Cibicidoides lobatulus possibly comprises two genetically distinct populations, one in the Mediterranean and the other in the North Atlantic
Molecular dark matter in galaxies
Clouds containing molecular dark matter in quantities relevant for star
formation may exist in minihaloes of the type of cold dark matter included in
many cosmological simulations or in the regions of some galaxies extending far
beyond their currently known boundaries. We have systematically explored
parameter space to identify conditions under which plane-parallel clouds
contain sufficient column densities of molecular dark matter that they could be
reservoirs for future star formation. Such clouds would be undetected or at
least appear by current observational criteria to be uninteresting from the
perspective of star formation. We use a time-dependent PDR code to produce
theoretical models of the chemistry and emission arising in clouds for our
chosen region of parameter space. We then select a subset of model clouds with
levels of emission that are low enough to be undetectable or at least
overlooked by current surveys. The existence of significant column densities of
cold molecular dark matter requires that the background radiation field be
several or more orders of magnitude weaker than that in the solar
neighbourhood. Lower turbulent velocities and cosmic ray induced ionization
rates than typically associated with molecular material within a kpc of the Sun
are also required for the molecular matter to be dark. We find that there is a
large region within the parameter space that results in clouds that might
contain a significant mass of molecular gas whilst remaining effectively
undetectable or at least not particularly noticeable in surveys. We note
briefly conditions under which molecular dark matter may contain a dynamically
interesting mass.Comment: 9 pages, 2 figures, accepted for publication in A&A; additional
concluding paragraph added at proof stag
Massive, Absorption-selected Galaxies at Intermediate Redshifts
The nature of absorption-selected galaxies and their connection to the
general galaxy population have been open issues for more than three decades,
with little information available on their gas properties. Here we show, using
detections of carbon monoxide (CO) emission with the Atacama Large
Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), that five of seven high-metallicity,
absorption-selected galaxies at intermediate redshifts, ,
have large molecular gas masses, and high molecular gas fractions (. Their modest star
formation rates (SFRs), yr, then
imply long gas depletion timescales, Gyr. The
high-metallicity absorption-selected galaxies at appear
distinct from populations of star-forming galaxies at both ,
during the peak of star formation activity in the Universe, and lower
redshifts, . Their relatively low SFRs, despite the large
molecular gas reservoirs, may indicate a transition in the nature of star
formation at intermediate redshifts, .Comment: 8 pages, 3 figures; accepted for publication in Astrophysical Journal
Letters. Minor changes to match the version in press in ApJ
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