The Human Frontal Oculomotor Cortical Areas Contribute Asymmetrically to Motor Planning in a Gap Saccade Task

BACKGROUND: Saccadic eye movements are used to rapidly align the fovea with the image of objects of interest in peripheral vision. We have recently shown that in children there is a high preponderance of quick latency but poorly planned saccades that consistently fall short of the target goal. The characteristics of these multiple saccades are consistent with a lack of proper inhibitory control of cortical oculomotor areas on the brainstem saccade generation circuitry. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: In the present paper, we directly tested this assumption by using single pulse transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) to transiently disrupt neuronal activity in the frontal eye fields (FEF) and supplementary eye fields (SEF) in adults performing a gap saccade task. The results showed that the incidence of multiple saccades was increased for ispiversive but not contraversive directions for the right and left FEF, the left SEF, but not for the right SEF. Moreover, this disruption was most substantial during the approximately 50 ms period around the appearance of the peripheral target. A control condition in which the dorsal motor cortex was stimulated demonstrated that this was not due to any non-specific effects of the TMS influencing the spatial distribution of attention. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: Taken together, the results are consistent with a direction-dependent role of the FEF and left SEF in delaying the release of saccadic eye movements until they have been fully planned

The comparative osmoregulatory ability of two water beetle genera whose species span the fresh-hypersaline gradient in inland waters (Coleoptera: Dytiscidae, Hydrophilidae).

A better knowledge of the physiological basis of salinity tolerance is essential to understanding the ecology and evolutionary history of organisms that have colonized inland saline waters. Coleoptera are amongst the most diverse macroinvertebrates in inland waters, including saline habitats; however, the osmoregulatory strategies they employ to deal with osmotic stress remain unexplored. Survival and haemolymph osmotic concentration at different salinities were examined in adults of eight aquatic beetle species which inhabit different parts of the fresh-hypersaline gradient. Studied species belong to two unrelated genera which have invaded saline waters independently from freshwater ancestors; Nebrioporus (Dytiscidae) and Enochrus (Hydrophilidae). Their osmoregulatory strategy (osmoconformity or osmoregulation) was identified and osmotic capacity (the osmotic gradient between the animal's haemolymph and the external medium) was compared between species pairs co-habiting similar salinities in nature. We show that osmoregulatory capacity, rather than osmoconformity, has evolved independently in these different lineages. All species hyperegulated their haemolymph osmotic concentration in diluted waters; those living in fresh or low-salinity waters were unable to hyporegulate and survive in hyperosmotic media (> 340 mosmol kg(-1)). In contrast, the species which inhabit the hypo-hypersaline habitats were effective hyporegulators, maintaining their haemolymph osmolality within narrow limits (ca. 300 mosmol kg(-1)) across a wide range of external concentrations. The hypersaline species N. ceresyi and E. jesusarribasi tolerated conductivities up to 140 and 180 mS cm(-1), respectively, and maintained osmotic gradients over 3500 mosmol kg(-1), comparable to those of the most effective insect osmoregulators known to date. Syntopic species of both genera showed similar osmotic capacities and in general, osmotic responses correlated well with upper salinity levels occupied by individual species in nature. Therefore, osmoregulatory capacity may mediate habitat segregation amongst congeners across the salinity gradient

Pulsed power hydrodynamics : a new application of high magnetic fields.

Pulsed Power Hydrodynamics is a new application of high magnetic fields recently developed to explore advanced hydrodynamics, instabilities, fluid turbulences, and material properties in a highly precise, controllable environment at the extremes of pressure and material velocity. The Atlas facility at Los Alamos is the world's first and only laboratory pulsed power system designed specifically to explore this relatively new family of megagauss magnetic field applications. Constructed in 2000 and commissioned in August 2001, Atlas is a 24-MJ high-performance capacitor bank delivering up to 30 MA with a current risetime of 5-6 {micro}sec. The high-precision, cylindrical, imploding liner is the tool most frequently used to convert electrical energy into the hydrodynamic (particle kinetic) energy needed to drive the experiments. For typical liner parameters including initial radius of 5 cm, the peak current of 30 MA delivered by Atlas results in magnetic fields just over 1 MG outside the liner prior to implosion. During the 5 to 10-{micro}sec implosion, the field outside the liner rises to several MG in typical situations. At these fields the rear surface of the liner is melted and it is subject to a variety of complex behaviors including: diffusion dominated andor melt wave field penetration and heating, magneto Raleigh-Taylor sausage mode behavior at the liner/field interface, and azimuthal asymmetry due to perturbations in current drive. The first Atlas liner implosion experiments were conducted in September 2000 and 10-15 experiments are planned in the: first year of operation. Immediate applications of the new pulsed power hydrodynamics techniques include material property topics including: exploration of material strength at high rates of strain, material failure including fracture and spall, and interfacial dynamics at high relative velocities and high interfacial pressures. A variety of complex hydrodynamic geometries will be explored and experiments will be designed to explore uristable perturbation growth and transition to turbulence. This paper will provide an overview of the range of problems to which pulsed power hydrodynamics can be applied and the issues associated with these techniques. Other papers at this Conference will present specifics of individual experiments and elaborate on the liner physics issues

Material science experiments on the Atlas Facility

Three material properties experiments that are to be performed on the Atlas pulsed power facility are described; friction at sliding metal interfaces, spallation and damage in convergent geomety, and plastic flow at high strain and high strain rate. Construction of this facility has been completed and experiments in high energy density hydrodynamics and material dynamics will begin in 2001