Coding of Melodic Gestalt in Human Auditory Cortex

The perception of a melody is invariant to the absolute properties of its constituting notes, but depends on the relation between them—the melody's relative pitch profile. In fact, a melody's "Gestalt” is recognized regardless of the instrument or key used to play it. Pitch processing in general is assumed to occur at the level of the auditory cortex. However, it is unknown whether early auditory regions are able to encode pitch sequences integrated over time (i.e., melodies) and whether the resulting representations are invariant to specific keys. Here, we presented participants different melodies composed of the same 4 harmonic pitches during functional magnetic resonance imaging recordings. Additionally, we played the same melodies transposed in different keys and on different instruments. We found that melodies were invariantly represented by their blood oxygen level-dependent activation patterns in primary and secondary auditory cortices across instruments, and also across keys. Our findings extend common hierarchical models of auditory processing by showing that melodies are encoded independent of absolute pitch and based on their relative pitch profile as early as the primary auditory corte

EFFECT OF SALINITY CHANGES ON THE MACROFAUNA SPECIES OF THE UPPER RINCON BAYOU, TX

Decreased freshwater inflow due to damming of the Nueces and Frio Rivers has increased salinity in Nueces Bay, caused Rincon Bayou to become a reverse estuary, and disturbed the overall hydrology of Corpus Christi Bay. Adaptive management began in 1994 and continues today in an effort to restore historical hydrology. The objectives of this study are to determine to what extent salinity fluctuates within Rincon Bayou and what effects these fluctuations have on estuary health. Benthic macrofauna are ideal indicators of ecological effects because of their relative immobility and longevity in contrast with plankton of comparable size. Samples were collected from the upper Rincon Bayou near Corpus Christi, TX and analyzed alongside archived samples. One historical station was sampled biweekly. Conductivity, temperature, and salinity were monitored continuously. Additional water quality measurements were taken during sampling events. Macrofauna biomass, abundance, and diversity were measured. Large and haphazard salinity fluctuations resulted in a frequently disturbed system populated by pioneer species, such as Streblospio benedicti, during Mesohaline and Euhaline+Hyperhaline conditions. These results indicate that further changes need to be made to the Rincon Bayou restoration and management programs in order to reestablish a reasonably undisturbed ecosystem

An Electrophysiological Study of Involuntary Attention Capture in a Go/No-go Paradigm

The present study examined whether attention capture is driven by object saliency or contingent on top-down control setting using a go/no-go paradigm. Specifically, we investigated whether salient color singletons capture attention only when the target itself is also a singleton. We used a go/no-go task. Participants were told to search the target display for a letter in a specific color and indicate its identity if it was present (“go” trials) and withheld their response if it was absent (“no go” trials). On every trial, this target display was preceded by a non-informative cue display containing a color singleton. The key manipulation was whether this irrelevant singleton contained the target color. We used the N2pc effect as a measure of attentional allocation. N2pc effects were obtained for all color singletons in the cue displays, even those that did not have the target color. This even held when we switched to a non-singleton target display (Experiments 4-5), suggesting capture based on stimulus salience. Intriguingly, whereas the robust N2pc effects indicated capture by salient stimuli, behavioral effects on response time suggested the opposite conclusion. These findings suggest that the irrelevant color singletons captured attention only briefly, releasing attention before the target arrived

Jazz Drummers Recruit Language-Specific Areas for the Processing of Rhythmic Structure

Rhythm is a central characteristic of music and speech, the most important domains of human communication using acoustic signals. Here, we investigated how rhythmical patterns in music are processed in the human brain, and, in addition, evaluated the impact of musical training on rhythm processing. Using fMRI, we found that deviations from a rule-based regular rhythmic structure activated the left planum temporale together with Broca's area and its right-hemispheric homolog across subjects, that is, a network also crucially involved in the processing of harmonic structure in music and the syntactic analysis of language. Comparing the BOLD responses to rhythmic variations between professional jazz drummers and musical laypersons, we found that only highly trained rhythmic experts show additional activity in left-hemispheric supramarginal gyrus, a higher-order region involved in processing of linguistic syntax. This suggests an additional functional recruitment of brain areas usually dedicated to complex linguistic syntax processing for the analysis of rhythmical patterns only in professional jazz drummers, who are especially trained to use rhythmical cues for communicatio

Can we predict real-time fMRI neurofeedback learning success from pretraining brain activity?

Neurofeedback training has been shown to influence behavior in healthy participants as well as to alleviate clinical symptoms in neurological, psychosomatic, and psychiatric patient populations. However, many real-time fMRI neurofeedback studies report large inter-individual differences in learning success. The factors that cause this vast variability between participants remain unknown and their identification could enhance treatment success. Thus, here we employed a meta-analytic approach including data from 24 different neurofeedback studies with a total of 401 participants, including 140 patients, to determine whether levels of activity in target brain regions during pretraining functional localizer or no-feedback runs (i.e., self-regulation in the absence of neurofeedback) could predict neurofeedback learning success. We observed a slightly positive correlation between pretraining activity levels during a functional localizer run and neurofeedback learning success, but we were not able to identify common brain-based success predictors across our diverse cohort of studies. Therefore, advances need to be made in finding robust models and measures of general neurofeedback learning, and in increasing the current study database to allow for investigating further factors that might influence neurofeedback learning

Analysis of individual differences in neurofeedback training illuminates successful self-regulation of the dopaminergic midbrain

The dopaminergic midbrain is associated with reinforcement learning, motivation and decision-making – functions often disturbed in neuropsychiatric disorders. Previous research has shown that dopaminergic midbrain activity can be endogenously modulated via neurofeedback. However, the robustness of endogenous modulation, a requirement for clinical translation, is unclear. Here, we examine whether the activation of particular brain regions associates with successful regulation transfer when feedback is no longer available. Moreover, to elucidate mechanisms underlying effective self-regulation, we study the relation of successful transfer with learning (temporal difference coding) outside the midbrain during neurofeedback training and with individual reward sensitivity in a monetary incentive delay (MID) task. Fifty-nine participants underwent neurofeedback training either in standard (Study 1 N = 15, Study 2 N = 28) or control feedback group (Study 1, N = 16). We find that successful self-regulation is associated with prefrontal reward sensitivity in the MID task (N = 25), with a decreasing relation between prefrontal activity and midbrain learning signals during neurofeedback training and with increased activity within cognitive control areas during transfer. The association between midbrain self-regulation and prefrontal temporal difference and reward sensitivity suggests that reinforcement learning contributes to successful self-regulation. Our findings provide insights in the control of midbrain activity and may facilitate individually tailoring neurofeedback training

Negative symptoms in alcohol use disorder: A pilot study applying the two-factor model of negative symptoms to patients with alcohol use disorder

Background and aimsAlcohol Use Disorder (AUD) is characterized by a reduction in goal-directed behavior, with alcohol use taking precedence over other areas of life. These features in AUD resemble negative symptoms in schizophrenia, especially the reduction in motivation and pleasure (MAP). Given the clinical similarities of negative symptoms across diagnostic categories, it comes as a surprise that there are few investigations on negative symptoms in alcohol and other substance use disorders. To our knowledge, our study is the first to assess negative symptoms in AUD based on a two-factorial approach, and to investigate the interrelation of these dimensions with the severity of AUD, and alcohol craving.Materials and methodsWe examined a sample of 42 patients with AUD at the Psychiatric University Hospital in Zurich. Participants provided self-report and interview-based measures of the severity of AUD, negative symptoms, and alcohol craving. Finally, we used data from the electronic health records of the patients.ResultsPatients with AUD show negative symptoms to a similar extent as patients with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder. We found a positive correlation between the extent of impairment within the MAP factor and overall severity of AUD. Furthermore, MAP negative symptoms were correlated with alcohol craving. In a linear regression, negative symptoms predicted alcohol craving whereas depression did not.SummaryNegative symptoms as conceptualized for schizophrenia are prevalent in patients with AUD and associated with the severity of AUD. More specifically, severity of AUD correlates with diminished motivation and pleasure, highlighting the importance of disturbances in motivational functions in AUD. This is further supported by the correlation between negative symptoms and craving, a hallmark of AUD. Taken together, our findings suggest that negative symptoms might be a highly relevant but hitherto often neglected therapeutic target in AUD

Thalamic volume and functional connectivity are associated with nicotine dependence severity and craving

Tobacco smoking is associated with deleterious health outcomes. Most smokers want to quit smoking, yet relapse rates are high. Understanding neural differences associated with tobacco use may help generate novel treatment options. Several animal studies have recently highlighted the central role of the thalamus in substance use disorders, but this research focus has been understudied in human smokers. Here, we investigated associations between structural and functional magnetic resonance imaging measures of the thalamus and its subnuclei to distinct smoking characteristics. We acquired anatomical scans of 32 smokers as well as functional resting‐state scans before and after a cue‐reactivity task. Thalamic functional connectivity was associated with craving and dependence severity, whereas the volume of the thalamus was associated with dependence severity only. Craving, which fluctuates rapidly, was best characterized by differences in brain function, whereas the rather persistent syndrome of dependence severity was associated with both brain structural differences and function. Our study supports the notion that functional versus structural measures tend to be associated with behavioural measures that evolve at faster versus slower temporal scales, respectively. It confirms the importance of the thalamus to understand mechanisms of addiction and highlights it as a potential target for brain‐based interventions to support smoking cessation, such as brain stimulation and neurofeedback

Thalamic volume and functional connectivity are associated with nicotine dependence severity and craving

Tobacco smoking is associated with deleterious health outcomes. Most smokers want to quit smoking, yet relapse rates are high. Understanding neural differences associated with tobacco use may help generate novel treatment options. Several animal studies have recently highlighted the central role of the thalamus in substance use disorders, but this research focus has been understudied in human smokers. Here, we investigated associations between structural and functional magnetic resonance imaging measures of the thalamus and its subnuclei to distinct smoking characteristics. We acquired anatomical scans of 32 smokers as well as functional resting-state scans before and after a cue-reactivity task. Thalamic functional connectivity was associated with craving and dependence severity, whereas the volume of the thalamus was associated with dependence severity only. Craving, which fluctuates rapidly, was best characterized by differences in brain function, whereas the rather persistent syndrome of dependence severity was associated with both brain structural differences and function. Our study supports the notion that functional versus structural measures tend to be associated with behavioral measures that evolve at faster versus slower temporal scales, respectively. It confirms the importance of the thalamus to understand mechanisms of addiction and highlights it as a potential target for brain-based interventions to support smoking cessation, such as brain stimulation and neurofeedback