The psychology of performance in elite youth soccer players

This study is a holistic assessment of psychological mindsets, which are one’s attitudes, beliefs, and perceptions, in elite youth male soccer players between the ages of 13 and 18 and the exploration of the relationships between these mindsets and performance outcomes. The mindsets that were assessed were expectancy, growth mindset, value, goals, belongingness, grit, and self-regulation, and the performance outcomes were minutes played, goals scored, and goals allowed. The mindsets were selected through a review of research in education and sport. I conducted Exploratory Factor Analyses (EFA) and Cronbach’s alpha coefficient analyses to assess the validity and reliability of the scales used, and then conducted descriptive and correlational analyses to describe the players’ ratings of the mindsets and the relationships between mindsets and performance outcomes. I also conducted Analyses of Variance (ANOVA) to explore the differences in mindsets between demographic groups (age, professional versus non-professional club, position, ethnicity, and scouting level). Eleven out of the 16 scales had a Cronbach’s alpha coefficient that was greater than or equal to .70. Fifteen out of the 16 mindsets that were assessed had a statistically significant relationship with at least one of the performance outcomes. Fifty-one of the 80 ANOVAs overall that I ran were significant. Finally, I conducted multiple regression analyses and found that mindsets combined to predict up to nine percent of the variance in performance outcomes. This work is significant because of its holistic and applied approach, and the tools developed in this study can be used to study mindsets and performance in many contexts beyond soccer

Spatio-Temporal Patterning in Primary Motor Cortex at Movement Onset

Voluntary movement initiation involves the engagement of large populations of motor cortical neurons around movement onset. Despite knowledge of the temporal dynamics that lead to movement, the spatial structure of these dynamics across the cortical surface remains unknown. In data from 4 rhesus macaques, we show that the timing of attenuation of beta frequency local field potential oscillations, a correlate of locally activated cortex, forms a spatial gradient across primary motor cortex (MI). We show that these spatio-temporal dynamics are recapitulated in the engagement order of ensembles of MI neurons. We demonstrate that these patterns are unique to movement onset and suggest that movement initiation requires a precise spatio-temporal sequential activation of neurons in MI

Comparing Offline Decoding Performance in Physiologically Defined Neuronal Classes

Objective: Recently, several studies have documented the presence of a bimodal distribution of spike waveform widths in primary motor cortex. Although narrow and wide spiking neurons, corresponding to the two modes of the distribution, exhibit different response properties, it remains unknown if these differences give rise to differential decoding performance between these two classes of cells. Approach: We used a Gaussian mixture model to classify neurons into narrow and wide physiological classes. Using similar-size, random samples of neurons from these two physiological classes, we trained offline decoding models to predict a variety of movement features. We compared offline decoding performance between these two physiologically defined populations of cells. Main results: We found that narrow spiking neural ensembles decode motor parameters better than wide spiking neural ensembles including kinematics, kinetics, and muscle activity. Significance: These findings suggest that the utility of neural ensembles in brain machine interfaces may be predicted from their spike waveform widths

Destined for Dissonance: Unpacking the Duality of Being Black and Christian

Abstract: We know that the Trans- Atlantic Slave Trade is how our African ancestors became involved with Christianity, and for many this involvement was a forced tactic of bondage. Does the disconnectedness from the horrors and hypocrisy of the slave trade make you question your faith? Or has the Black Church and its role in your community been a pillar in walking out your faith? Is the injustice that brought our people to America a part of our complex Christian history? Or is being Black and Christian an oxymoron? Du Bois’ The Souls of Black Folk is as relevant a conversation today as it was in 1903. Join us in a dialogue where a preacher, a thinker, and a writer discuss the significance of trusting Christ with your life, but not white-washing that life away. We will provide historical and anecdotal data to showcase how your identity can be in Christ alone and the intersectionality in which our society operates doesn’t have to oppress your religious views. Summary: Conference themes that will be covered in this session are illuminating our power, unveiling our truth and Double Consciousness The presentation will be broken into three parts- Marcus will highlight Background on Du Bois Explain What Dual or Double Consciousness and how this thinking can be problematic. We will utilize flip charts to have in put from the audience with their stance on issues facing Black Christians in today\u27s society. Matthew will then connect what it means in modern society. How things have changed since 1903, what remains, and how an everyday Christian can combat some the perceived and realized complexities in being a Black, American Christian. He will hone in on identity, code switching, intersectionality, and biblical history of African people and their christian faith. Christie will close by reiterating how to apply these themes to thrive in today\u27s society and standing firm in one\u27s Christian faith through theological and biblical references. We will also utilize videos, books, journal articles, and anecdotes to continue the conversation with the crowd

Toward the automated generation of genome-scale metabolic networks in the SEED

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Current methods for the automated generation of genome-scale metabolic networks focus on genome annotation and preliminary biochemical reaction network assembly, but do not adequately address the process of identifying and filling gaps in the reaction network, and verifying that the network is suitable for systems level analysis. Thus, current methods are only sufficient for generating draft-quality networks, and refinement of the reaction network is still largely a manual, labor-intensive process.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We have developed a method for generating genome-scale metabolic networks that produces substantially complete reaction networks, suitable for systems level analysis. Our method partitions the reaction space of central and intermediary metabolism into discrete, interconnected components that can be assembled and verified in isolation from each other, and then integrated and verified at the level of their interconnectivity. We have developed a database of components that are common across organisms, and have created tools for automatically assembling appropriate components for a particular organism based on the metabolic pathways encoded in the organism's genome. This focuses manual efforts on that portion of an organism's metabolism that is not yet represented in the database. We have demonstrated the efficacy of our method by reverse-engineering and automatically regenerating the reaction network from a published genome-scale metabolic model for <it>Staphylococcus aureus</it>. Additionally, we have verified that our method capitalizes on the database of common reaction network components created for <it>S. aureus</it>, by using these components to generate substantially complete reconstructions of the reaction networks from three other published metabolic models (<it>Escherichia coli</it>, <it>Helicobacter pylori</it>, and <it>Lactococcus lactis</it>). We have implemented our tools and database within the SEED, an open-source software environment for comparative genome annotation and analysis.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Our method sets the stage for the automated generation of substantially complete metabolic networks for over 400 complete genome sequences currently in the SEED. With each genome that is processed using our tools, the database of common components grows to cover more of the diversity of metabolic pathways. This increases the likelihood that components of reaction networks for subsequently processed genomes can be retrieved from the database, rather than assembled and verified manually.</p

Changes in pain and nutritional intake modulate ultra-running performance: a case report

Ultra-endurance running provides numerous physiological, psychological, and nutritional challenges to the athlete and supporting practitioners. We describe the changes in physiological status, psychological condition, and nutritional intake over the course of two 100-mile running races, with differing outcomes: non-completion and completion. Athlete perception of pain, freshness, and motivation differed between events, independent of rating of perceived exertion. Our data suggest that the integration of multiple sensations (freshness, motivation, hunger, pain, and thirst) produce performance. Increases in carbohydrate feeding (+5 g·h −1) and protein intake (+0.3 g·kg −1) also likely contributed to successful completion of a 100-mile race, by reducing the fractional utilization of maximal oxygen uptake and satiating hunger, respectively. Nutritional data support the notion that the gut is a trainable, and critical organ with respect to ultra-endurance performance. Finally, we propose future research to investigate the rate at which peak feeding occurs throughout ultra-endurance events, as this may further serve to personalize sports nutrition strategies

Large-scale Spatiotemporal Spike Patterning Consistent with Wave Propagation in Motor Cortex

Aggregate signals in cortex are known to be spatiotemporally organized as propagating waves across the cortical surface, but it remains unclear whether the same is true for spiking activity in individual neurons. Furthermore, the functional interactions between cortical neurons are well documented but their spatial arrangement on the cortical surface has been largely ignored. Here we use a functional network analysis to demonstrate that a subset of motor cortical neurons in non-human primates spatially coordinate their spiking activity in a manner that closely matches wave propagation measured in the beta oscillatory band of the local field potential. We also demonstrate that sequential spiking of pairs of neuron contains task-relevant information that peaks when the neurons are spatially oriented along the wave axis. We hypothesize that the spatial anisotropy of spike patterning may reflect the underlying organization of motor cortex and may be a general property shared by other cortical areas

Guidance in feature extraction to resolve uncertainty

Automated Feature Extraction (AFE) plays a critical role in image understanding. Often the imagery analysts extract features better than AFE algorithms do, because analysts use additional information. The extraction and processing of this information can be more complex than the original AFE task, and that leads to the “complexity trap”. This can happen when the shadow from the buildings guides the extraction of buildings and roads. This work proposes an AFE algorithm to extract roads and trails by using the GMTI/GPS tracking information and older inaccurate maps of roads and trails as AFE guides

Development of a control algorithm for an active limited slip differential

Mechanical limited slip differentials provide a low cost traction solution. However, their passive nature means that they cannot adapt to different scenarios and their yaw moment generation potential cannot be used for vehicle handling or stability control. Active limited slip differentials are becoming popular as they are able to exploit this potential and also achieve a better traction compromise due to their ability to adapt to different scenarios. This paper describes the development of a control algorithm for an ALSD fitted to a RWD sports saloon vehicle