Chopped Arms & Big Macs: ERP Correlates of Viewing and Imagining Aversive and Food Photos

OBJECTIVES
We investigated the Event-Related Potential (ERP) correlates of perceived and imagined food photos and their relation to the perception and imagery of unpleasant emotional photos. Our aim was to determine whether similar or different patterns of neural activity were associated with viewing and imagining food photos versus emotional photos. 

METHODS 
Nine volunteers with prescreened normal mood and anxiety levels wore a 32 channel Cap with embedded electrodes (10/20 international system) connected to a high-density low-noise Neuroscan EEG system. Participants were tested during two different blocks: a hunger block (containing 25 neutral and food photos) and an emotional block (containing 3 sets of 20 neutral, unpleasant and pleasant photos). The photos were selected from the International Affective Picture System (Lang, Bradley, & Cuthbert, 1999). In both blocks, each trial began with a blank screen followed by presentation of a centered fixation point, displayed for 1 second. A photo was displayed for 3 seconds followed by a 1-second blank mask. For the next 3 seconds, participants were asked to form a mental image of the photo they had just viewed and then rate its vividness (i.e., the self-reported imagery intensity, D’Angiulli & Reeves, 2002) on a 5-point rating scale (1 = no image, 5 = very vivid). 

RESULTS
Grand averages of ERPs recorded during perception of unpleasant and food photos revealed an early negative deflection (150-250 milliseconds post-stimulus) in the anterior areas (Centro-Frontal electrodes) followed by a late positive waveform (850-950 milliseconds post-stimulus) in the posterior areas (Parietal and Occipital electrodes). A similar pattern was observed for the ERPs recorded during the imagery of unpleasant photos, except that it was observed across the entire scalp and at significantly lower amplitudes. For food imagery, we found a negative deflection (450-550 milliseconds post-stimuli) followed by a late positive waveform for all anterior and posterior areas. Importantly, unpleasant imagery was rated as less vivid than food imagery. 

CONCLUSION 
These results suggest that unpleasant and food photos involve similar top-down EEG activation patterns during perception, but not during imagery. Indeed, the vividness data strongly suggest that the negative deflection may indicate suppression of unpleasant imagery. Our findings may have important application for desensitization and conditioning in the treatment of eating disorders.
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Interaction-Aware Prompting for Zero-Shot Spatio-Temporal Action Detection

The goal of spatial-temporal action detection is to determine the time and place where each person's action occurs in a video and classify the corresponding action category. Most of the existing methods adopt fully-supervised learning, which requires a large amount of training data, making it very difficult to achieve zero-shot learning. In this paper, we propose to utilize a pre-trained visual-language model to extract the representative image and text features, and model the relationship between these features through different interaction modules to obtain the interaction feature. In addition, we use this feature to prompt each label to obtain more appropriate text features. Finally, we calculate the similarity between the interaction feature and the text feature for each label to determine the action category. Our experiments on J-HMDB and UCF101-24 datasets demonstrate that the proposed interaction module and prompting make the visual-language features better aligned, thus achieving excellent accuracy for zero-shot spatio-temporal action detection. The code will be released upon acceptance.Comment: the first Zero-Shot Spatio-Temporal Action Detection wor

Identification of SNP barcode biomarkers for genes associated with facial emotion perception using particle swarm optimization algorithm

BACKGROUND: Facial emotion perception (FEP) can affect social function. We previously reported that parts of five tested single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in the MET and AKT1 genes may individually affect FEP performance. However, the effects of SNP-SNP interactions on FEP performance remain unclear. METHODS: This study compared patients with high and low FEP performances (n = 89 and 93, respectively). A particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm was used to identify the best SNP barcodes (i.e., the SNP combinations and genotypes that revealed the largest differences between the high and low FEP groups). RESULTS: The analyses of individual SNPs showed no significant differences between the high and low FEP groups. However, comparisons of multiple SNP-SNP interactions involving different combinations of two to five SNPs showed that the best PSO-generated SNP barcodes were significantly associated with high FEP score. The analyses of the joint effects of the best SNP barcodes for two to five interacting SNPs also showed that the best SNP barcodes had significantly higher odds ratios (2.119 to 3.138; P < 0.05) compared to other SNP barcodes. In conclusion, the proposed PSO algorithm effectively identifies the best SNP barcodes that have the strongest associations with FEP performance. CONCLUSIONS: This study also proposes a computational methodology for analyzing complex SNP-SNP interactions in social cognition domains such as recognition of facial emotion

PROGRESS IN LABORATORY RESEARCH FOR FUNDAMENTAL PHYSICS SPACE MISSIONS USING OPTICAL DEVICES

ABSTRACT In this paper, we present the progress in our laboratory studies for fundamental physics space missions using optical devices. Specifically, we report on our progress in long fibre-linked heterodyne interferometry, tunable fibre directional coupler, fibre delay-line and picometer real-time motion control

Gender Difference in Statin Intervention on Blood Lipid Control among Patients with Coronary Heart Disease

SummaryBackgroundThe aim of this study was to clarify the current status in the effective control of dyslipidemia in Taiwanese women and men with coronary heart disease (CHD).Materials and methodsA total 1584 patients with CHD (1188 men, aged 64.8 ± 11.6 years and 396 women, aged 69.0 ± 9.8 years) from 3486 patients who had atherosclerotic vascular disease and complete lipids measured values [total cholesterol (TC), high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C), triglycerides (TG), and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C)] were used for analysis.ResultsThe waist, height, weight, and creatinine levels were higher in men than in women. The systolic blood pressure, TC, HDL-C, LDL-C, fasting blood glucose, and platelet were lower in men than in women. Men were more likely to achieve the target goal than women in TC < 160 mg/dL, LDL-C < 100 mg/dL, and TG < 150 mg/dL as well as to achieve HDL-C goal.ConclusionA significant gap was found between the guidelines and clinical practice in statin intervention among these CHD patients, particularly for women. The strategy in control of dyslipidemia should consider gender difference

Cognitive control, bedtime patterns, and testing time in female adolescent students: behavioral and neuro-electrophysiological correlates

IntroductionShorter and/or disrupted sleep during adolescence is associated with cognitive and mental health risks, particularly in females. We explored the relationship between bedtime behavior patterns co-varying with Social Jet Lag (SJL) and School Start Times (SST) and neurocognitive performance in adolescent female students.MethodsTo investigate whether time of day (morning vs. afternoon), early SSTs and days of the school week can be correlated with neurocognitive correlates of sleep insufficiency, we recruited 24 female students aged 16–18 to report sleep logs, and undergo event-related electroencephalographic recordings on Monday, Wednesday, mornings, and afternoons. Using a Stroop task paradigm, we analyzed correlations between reaction times (RTs), accuracy, time of day, day of week, electroencephalographic data, and sleep log data to understand what relationships may exist.ResultsParticipants reported a 2-h sleep phase delay and SJL. Stroop interference influenced accuracy on Monday and Wednesday similarly, with better performance in the afternoon. For RTs, the afternoon advantage was much larger on Monday than Wednesday. Midline Event-Related Potentials (ERPs) yielded higher amplitudes and shorter latencies on Wednesday morning and Monday afternoon, in time windows related to attention or response execution. A notable exception were delayed ERP latencies on Wednesday afternoon. The latter could be explained by the fact that delta EEG waves tended to be the most prominent, suggesting heightened error monitoring due to accumulating mental fatigue.DiscussionThese findings provide insights into the interaction between SJL and SST and suggest evidence-based criteria for planning when female adolescents should engage in cognitive-heavy school activities such as tests or exams

Acute kidney injury in patients with COVID-19 compared to those with influenza: a systematic review and meta-analysis

BackgroundCOVID-19 and influenza can both lead to acute kidney injury (AKI) as a common complication. However, no meta-analysis has been conducted to directly compare the incidence of AKI between hospitalized patients with COVID-19 and influenza. The objective of our study aims to investigate the incidence and outcomes of AKI among hospitalized patients between these two groups.Materials and methodsA systematic search of PubMed, Embase, and Cochrane databases was conducted from December 2019 to August 2023 to identify studies examining AKI and clinical outcomes among hospitalized patients with COVID-19 and influenza. The primary outcome of interest was the incidence of AKI, while secondary outcomes included in-hospital mortality, recovery from AKI, hospital and ICU stay duration. The quality of evidence was evaluated using Cochrane and GRADE methods.ResultsTwelve retrospective cohort studies, involving 17,618 hospitalized patients with COVID-19 and influenza, were analyzed. COVID-19 patients showed higher AKI incidence (29.37% vs. 20.98%, OR: 1.67, 95% CI 1.56–1.80, p &lt; 0.01, I2 = 92.42%), and in-hospital mortality (30.95% vs. 5.51%, OR: 8.16, 95% CI 6.17–10.80, p &lt; 0.01, I2 = 84.92%) compared to influenza patients with AKI. Recovery from AKI was lower in COVID-19 patients (57.02% vs., 80.23%, OR: 0.33, 95% CI 0.27–0.40, p &lt; 0.01, I2 = 85.17%). COVID-19 patients also had a longer hospital stay (SMD: 0.69, 95% CI 0.65–0.72, p &lt; 0.01, I2 = 98.94%) and longer ICU stay (SMD: 0.61, 95% CI 0.50–0.73, p &lt; 0.01, I2 = 94.80%) than influenza patients. In our study, evidence quality was high (NOS score 7–9), with low certainty for AKI incidence and moderate certainty for recovery form AKI by GRADE assessment.ConclusionCOVID-19 patients had higher risk of developing AKI, experiencing in-hospital mortality, and enduring prolonged hospital/ICU stays in comparison to influenza patients. Additionally, the likelihood of AKI recovery was lower among COVID-19 patients

Detection of SARS-associated Coronavirus in Throat Wash and Saliva in Early Diagnosis

Early detection of SARS-CoV in throat wash and saliva suggests that these specimens are ideal for SARS diagnosis