Sample records for accurate short term

  1. Towards accurate localization: long- and short-term correlation filters for tracking

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Li, Minglangjun; Tian, Chunna

    2018-04-01

    Visual tracking is a challenging problem, especially using a single model. In this paper, we propose a discriminative correlation filter (DCF) based tracking approach that exploits both the long-term and short-term information of the target, named LSTDCF, to improve the tracking performance. In addition to a long-term filter learned through the whole sequence, a short-term filter is trained using only features extracted from most recent frames. The long-term filter tends to capture more semantics of the target as more frames are used for training. However, since the target may undergo large appearance changes, features extracted around the target in non-recent frames prevent the long-term filter from locating the target in the current frame accurately. In contrast, the short-term filter learns more spatial details of the target from recent frames but gets over-fitting easily. Thus the short-term filter is less robust to handle cluttered background and prone to drift. We take the advantage of both filters and fuse their response maps to make the final estimation. We evaluate our approach on a widely-used benchmark with 100 image sequences and achieve state-of-the-art results.

  2. Short-term memory predictions across the lifespan: monitoring span before and after conducting a task.

    PubMed

    Bertrand, Julie Marilyne; Moulin, Chris John Anthony; Souchay, Céline

    2017-05-01

    Our objective was to explore metamemory in short-term memory across the lifespan. Five age groups participated in this study: 3 groups of children (4-13 years old), and younger and older adults. We used a three-phase task: prediction-span-postdiction. For prediction and postdiction phases, participants reported with a Yes/No response if they could recall in order a series of images. For the span task, they had to actually recall such series. From 4 years old, children have some ability to monitor their short-term memory and are able to adjust their prediction after experiencing the task. However, accuracy still improves significantly until adolescence. Although the older adults had a lower span, they were as accurate as young adults in their evaluation, suggesting that metamemory is unimpaired for short-term memory tasks in older adults. •We investigate metamemory for short-term memory tasks across the lifespan. •We find younger children cannot accurately predict their span length. •Older adults are accurate in predicting their span length. •People's metamemory accuracy was related to their short-term memory span.

  3. Complex network structure influences processing in long-term and short-term memory.

    PubMed

    Vitevitch, Michael S; Chan, Kit Ying; Roodenrys, Steven

    2012-07-01

    Complex networks describe how entities in systems interact; the structure of such networks is argued to influence processing. One measure of network structure, clustering coefficient, C, measures the extent to which neighbors of a node are also neighbors of each other. Previous psycholinguistic experiments found that the C of phonological word-forms influenced retrieval from the mental lexicon (that portion of long-term memory dedicated to language) during the on-line recognition and production of spoken words. In the present study we examined how network structure influences other retrieval processes in long- and short-term memory. In a false-memory task-examining long-term memory-participants falsely recognized more words with low- than high-C. In a recognition memory task-examining veridical memories in long-term memory-participants correctly recognized more words with low- than high-C. However, participants in a serial recall task-examining redintegration in short-term memory-recalled lists comprised of high-C words more accurately than lists comprised of low-C words. These results demonstrate that network structure influences cognitive processes associated with several forms of memory including lexical, long-term, and short-term.

  4. The roles of long-term phonotactic and lexical prosodic knowledge in phonological short-term memory.

    PubMed

    Tanida, Yuki; Ueno, Taiji; Lambon Ralph, Matthew A; Saito, Satoru

    2015-04-01

    Many previous studies have explored and confirmed the influence of long-term phonological representations on phonological short-term memory. In most investigations, phonological effects have been explored with respect to phonotactic constraints or frequency. If interaction between long-term memory and phonological short-term memory is a generalized principle, then other phonological characteristics-that is, suprasegmental aspects of phonology-should also exert similar effects on phonological short-term memory. We explored this hypothesis through three immediate serial-recall experiments that manipulated Japanese nonwords with respect to lexical prosody (pitch-accent type, reflecting suprasegmental characteristics) as well as phonotactic frequency (reflecting segmental characteristics). The results showed that phonotactic frequency affected the retention not only of the phonemic sequences, but also of pitch-accent patterns, when participants were instructed to recall both the phoneme sequence and accent pattern of nonwords. In addition, accent pattern typicality influenced the retention of the accent pattern: Typical accent patterns were recalled more accurately than atypical ones. These results indicate that both long-term phonotactic and lexical prosodic knowledge contribute to phonological short-term memory performance.

  5. Two Distinct Origins of Long-Term Learning Effects in Verbal Short-Term Memory

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Majerus, Steve; Perez, Trecy Martinez; Oberauer, Klaus

    2012-01-01

    Verbal short-term memory (STM) is highly sensitive to learning effects: digit sequences or nonword sequences which have been rendered more familiar via repeated exposure are recalled more accurately. In this study we show that sublist-level, incidental learning of item co-occurrence regularities affects immediate serial recall of words and…

  6. Pigeon visual short-term memory directly compared to primates.

    PubMed

    Wright, Anthony A; Elmore, L Caitlin

    2016-02-01

    Three pigeons were trained to remember arrays of 2-6 colored squares and detect which of two squares had changed color to test their visual short-term memory. Procedures (e.g., stimuli, displays, viewing times, delays) were similar to those used to test monkeys and humans. Following extensive training, pigeons performed slightly better than similarly trained monkeys, but both animal species were considerably less accurate than humans with the same array sizes (2, 4 and 6 items). Pigeons and monkeys showed calculated memory capacities of one item or less, whereas humans showed a memory capacity of 2.5 items. Despite the differences in calculated memory capacities, the pigeons' memory results, like those from monkeys and humans, were all well characterized by an inverse power-law function fit to d' values for the five display sizes. This characterization provides a simple, straightforward summary of the fundamental processing of visual short-term memory (how visual short-term memory declines with memory load) that emphasizes species similarities based upon similar functional relationships. By closely matching pigeon testing parameters to those of monkeys and humans, these similar functional relationships suggest similar underlying processes of visual short-term memory in pigeons, monkeys and humans. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

  7. Dissociation of Short-Term Forgetting from the Passage of Time

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    White, K. Geoffrey

    2012-01-01

    In many theories, forgetting is closely linked to the passage of time. In the present experiments, recall in a short-term memory task was less accurate when the retention interval included a difficult arithmetic addition task, compared with an easy task. In a novel condition, the interfering task was switched from hard to easy partway through the…

  8. Long-term associative learning predicts verbal short-term memory performance.

    PubMed

    Jones, Gary; Macken, Bill

    2018-02-01

    Studies using tests such as digit span and nonword repetition have implicated short-term memory across a range of developmental domains. Such tests ostensibly assess specialized processes for the short-term manipulation and maintenance of information that are often argued to enable long-term learning. However, there is considerable evidence for an influence of long-term linguistic learning on performance in short-term memory tasks that brings into question the role of a specialized short-term memory system separate from long-term knowledge. Using natural language corpora, we show experimentally and computationally that performance on three widely used measures of short-term memory (digit span, nonword repetition, and sentence recall) can be predicted from simple associative learning operating on the linguistic environment to which a typical child may have been exposed. The findings support the broad view that short-term verbal memory performance reflects the application of long-term language knowledge to the experimental setting.

  9. The Interdependence of Long- and Short-Term Components in Unmasked Repetition Priming: An Indication of Shared Resources.

    PubMed

    Merema, Matt R; Speelman, Craig P

    2015-01-01

    It has been suggested that unmasked repetition priming is composed of distinct long-and short-term priming components. The current study sought to clarify the relationship between these components by examining the relationship between them. A total of 60 people (45 females, 15 males) participated in a computer-based lexical decision task designed to measure levels of short-term priming across different levels of long-term priming. The results revealed an interdependent relationship between the two components, whereby an increase in long-term priming prompted a decrease in short-term priming. Both long-term and short-term priming were accurately captured by a single power function over seven minutes post repetition, suggesting the two components may draw on the same resources. This interdependence between long- and short-term priming may serve to improve fluency in reading.

  10. Characterizing short-term stability for Boolean networks over any distribution of transfer functions

    DOE PAGES

    Seshadhri, C.; Smith, Andrew M.; Vorobeychik, Yevgeniy; ...

    2016-07-05

    Here we present a characterization of short-term stability of random Boolean networks under arbitrary distributions of transfer functions. Given any distribution of transfer functions for a random Boolean network, we present a formula that decides whether short-term chaos (damage spreading) will happen. We provide a formal proof for this formula, and empirically show that its predictions are accurate. Previous work only works for special cases of balanced families. Finally, it has been observed that these characterizations fail for unbalanced families, yet such families are widespread in real biological networks.

  11. Prosodic Similarity Effects in Short-Term Memory in Developmental Dyslexia.

    PubMed

    Goswami, Usha; Barnes, Lisa; Mead, Natasha; Power, Alan James; Leong, Victoria

    2016-11-01

    Children with developmental dyslexia are characterized by phonological difficulties across languages. Classically, this 'phonological deficit' in dyslexia has been investigated with tasks using single-syllable words. Recently, however, several studies have demonstrated difficulties in prosodic awareness in dyslexia. Potential prosodic effects in short-term memory have not yet been investigated. Here we create a new instrument based on three-syllable words that vary in stress patterns, to investigate whether prosodic similarity (the same prosodic pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables) exerts systematic effects on short-term memory. We study participants with dyslexia and age-matched and younger reading-level-matched typically developing controls. We find that all participants, including dyslexic participants, show prosodic similarity effects in short-term memory. All participants exhibited better retention of words that differed in prosodic structure, although participants with dyslexia recalled fewer words accurately overall compared to age-matched controls. Individual differences in prosodic memory were predicted by earlier vocabulary abilities, by earlier sensitivity to syllable stress and by earlier phonological awareness. To our knowledge, this is the first demonstration of prosodic similarity effects in short-term memory. The implications of a prosodic similarity effect for theories of lexical representation and of dyslexia are discussed. © 2016 The Authors. Dyslexia published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd. © 2016 The Authors. Dyslexia published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

  12. Ordered short-term memory differs in signers and speakers: Implications for models of short-term memory

    PubMed Central

    Bavelier, Daphne; Newport, Elissa L.; Hall, Matt; Supalla, Ted; Boutla, Mrim

    2008-01-01

    Capacity limits in linguistic short-term memory (STM) are typically measured with forward span tasks in which participants are asked to recall lists of words in the order presented. Using such tasks, native signers of American Sign Language (ASL) exhibit smaller spans than native speakers (Boutla, Supalla, Newport, & Bavelier, 2004). Here, we test the hypothesis that this population difference reflects differences in the way speakers and signers maintain temporal order information in short-term memory. We show that native signers differ from speakers on measures of short-term memory that require maintenance of temporal order of the tested materials, but not on those in which temporal order is not required. In addition, we show that, in a recall task with free order, bilingual subjects are more likely to recall in temporal order when using English than ASL. We conclude that speakers and signers do share common short-term memory processes. However, whereas short-term memory for spoken English is predominantly organized in terms of temporal order, we argue that this dimension does not play as great a role in signers’ short-term memory. Other factors that may affect STM processes in signers are discussed. PMID:18083155

  13. Tracking Cloud Motion and Deformation for Short-Term Photovoltaic Power Forecasting

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Good, Garrett; Siefert, Malte; Fritz, Rafael; Saint-Drenan, Yves-Marie; Dobschinski, Jan

    2016-04-01

    With the increasing role of photovoltaic power production, the need to accurately forecast and anticipate weather-driven elements like cloud cover has become ever more important. Of particular concern is forecasting on the short-term (up to several hours), for which the most recent full weather simulation may no longer provide the most accurate information in light of real-time satellite measurements. We discuss the application of the image correlation velocimetry technique described by Tokumaru & Dimotakis (1995) (for calculating flow fields from images) to measure deformations of various orders based on recent satellite imagery, with the goal of not only more accurately forecasting the advection of cloud structures, but their continued deformation as well.

  14. 24 CFR 576.106 - Short-term and medium-term rental assistance.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

    2012-04-01

    ... 24 Housing and Urban Development 3 2012-04-01 2012-04-01 false Short-term and medium-term rental... and Eligible Activities § 576.106 Short-term and medium-term rental assistance. (a) General provisions... assistance may be short-term rental assistance, medium-term rental assistance, payment of rental arrears, or...

  15. 24 CFR 576.106 - Short-term and medium-term rental assistance.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

    2013-04-01

    ... 24 Housing and Urban Development 3 2013-04-01 2013-04-01 false Short-term and medium-term rental... and Eligible Activities § 576.106 Short-term and medium-term rental assistance. (a) General provisions... assistance may be short-term rental assistance, medium-term rental assistance, payment of rental arrears, or...

  16. 24 CFR 576.106 - Short-term and medium-term rental assistance.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

    2014-04-01

    ... 24 Housing and Urban Development 3 2014-04-01 2013-04-01 true Short-term and medium-term rental... and Eligible Activities § 576.106 Short-term and medium-term rental assistance. (a) General provisions... assistance may be short-term rental assistance, medium-term rental assistance, payment of rental arrears, or...

  17. Accurate Prediction of Protein Contact Maps by Coupling Residual Two-Dimensional Bidirectional Long Short-Term Memory with Convolutional Neural Networks.

    PubMed

    Hanson, Jack; Paliwal, Kuldip; Litfin, Thomas; Yang, Yuedong; Zhou, Yaoqi

    2018-06-19

    Accurate prediction of a protein contact map depends greatly on capturing as much contextual information as possible from surrounding residues for a target residue pair. Recently, ultra-deep residual convolutional networks were found to be state-of-the-art in the latest Critical Assessment of Structure Prediction techniques (CASP12, (Schaarschmidt et al., 2018)) for protein contact map prediction by attempting to provide a protein-wide context at each residue pair. Recurrent neural networks have seen great success in recent protein residue classification problems due to their ability to propagate information through long protein sequences, especially Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) cells. Here we propose a novel protein contact map prediction method by stacking residual convolutional networks with two-dimensional residual bidirectional recurrent LSTM networks, and using both one-dimensional sequence-based and two-dimensional evolutionary coupling-based information. We show that the proposed method achieves a robust performance over validation and independent test sets with the Area Under the receiver operating characteristic Curve (AUC)>0.95 in all tests. When compared to several state-of-the-art methods for independent testing of 228 proteins, the method yields an AUC value of 0.958, whereas the next-best method obtains an AUC of 0.909. More importantly, the improvement is over contacts at all sequence-position separations. Specifically, a 8.95%, 5.65% and 2.84% increase in precision were observed for the top L∕10 predictions over the next best for short, medium and long-range contacts, respectively. This confirms the usefulness of ResNets to congregate the short-range relations and 2D-BRLSTM to propagate the long-range dependencies throughout the entire protein contact map 'image'. SPOT-Contact server url: http://sparks-lab.org/jack/server/SPOT-Contact/. Supplementary data is available at Bioinformatics online.

  18. The short- to medium-term predictive accuracy of static and dynamic risk assessment measures in a secure forensic hospital.

    PubMed

    Chu, Chi Meng; Thomas, Stuart D M; Ogloff, James R P; Daffern, Michael

    2013-04-01

    Although violence risk assessment knowledge and practice has advanced over the past few decades, it remains practically difficult to decide which measures clinicians should use to assess and make decisions about the violence potential of individuals on an ongoing basis, particularly in the short to medium term. Within this context, this study sought to compare the predictive accuracy of dynamic risk assessment measures for violence with static risk assessment measures over the short term (up to 1 month) and medium term (up to 6 months) in a forensic psychiatric inpatient setting. Results showed that dynamic measures were generally more accurate than static measures for short- to medium-term predictions of inpatient aggression. These findings highlight the necessity of using risk assessment measures that are sensitive to important clinical risk state variables to improve the short- to medium-term prediction of aggression within the forensic inpatient setting. Such knowledge can assist with the development of more accurate and efficient risk assessment procedures, including the selection of appropriate risk assessment instruments to manage and prevent the violence of offenders with mental illnesses during inpatient treatment.

  19. What are the differences between long-term, short-term, and working memory?

    PubMed

    Cowan, Nelson

    2008-01-01

    In the recent literature there has been considerable confusion about the three types of memory: long-term, short-term, and working memory. This chapter strives to reduce that confusion and makes up-to-date assessments of these types of memory. Long- and short-term memory could differ in two fundamental ways, with only short-term memory demonstrating (1) temporal decay and (2) chunk capacity limits. Both properties of short-term memory are still controversial but the current literature is rather encouraging regarding the existence of both decay and capacity limits. Working memory has been conceived and defined in three different, slightly discrepant ways: as short-term memory applied to cognitive tasks, as a multi-component system that holds and manipulates information in short-term memory, and as the use of attention to manage short-term memory. Regardless of the definition, there are some measures of memory in the short term that seem routine and do not correlate well with cognitive aptitudes and other measures (those usually identified with the term "working memory") that seem more attention demanding and do correlate well with these aptitudes. The evidence is evaluated and placed within a theoretical framework depicted in Fig. 1.

  20. Measuring, Predicting and Visualizing Short-Term Change in Word Representation and Usage in VKontakte Social Network

    DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

    Stewart, Ian B.; Arendt, Dustin L.; Bell, Eric B.

    Language in social media is extremely dynamic: new words emerge, trend and disappear, while the meaning of existing words can fluctuate over time. This work addresses several important tasks of visualizing and predicting short term text representation shift, i.e. the change in a word’s contextual semantics. We study the relationship between short-term concept drift and representation shift on a large social media corpus – VKontakte collected during the Russia-Ukraine crisis in 2014 – 2015. We visualize short-term representation shift for example keywords and build predictive models to forecast short-term shifts in meaning from previous meaning as well as from conceptmore » drift. We show that short-term representation shift can be accurately predicted up to several weeks in advance and that visualization provides insight into meaning change. Our approach can be used to explore and characterize specific aspects of the streaming corpus during crisis events and potentially improve other downstream classification tasks including real-time event forecasting in social media.« less

  1. Potential breeding distributions of U.S. birds predicted with both short-term variability and long-term average climate data.

    PubMed

    Bateman, Brooke L; Pidgeon, Anna M; Radeloff, Volker C; Flather, Curtis H; VanDerWal, Jeremy; Akçakaya, H Resit; Thogmartin, Wayne E; Albright, Thomas P; Vavrus, Stephen J; Heglund, Patricia J

    2016-12-01

    Climate conditions, such as temperature or precipitation, averaged over several decades strongly affect species distributions, as evidenced by experimental results and a plethora of models demonstrating statistical relations between species occurrences and long-term climate averages. However, long-term averages can conceal climate changes that have occurred in recent decades and may not capture actual species occurrence well because the distributions of species, especially at the edges of their range, are typically dynamic and may respond strongly to short-term climate variability. Our goal here was to test whether bird occurrence models can be predicted by either covariates based on short-term climate variability or on long-term climate averages. We parameterized species distribution models (SDMs) based on either short-term variability or long-term average climate covariates for 320 bird species in the conterminous USA and tested whether any life-history trait-based guilds were particularly sensitive to short-term conditions. Models including short-term climate variability performed well based on their cross-validated area-under-the-curve AUC score (0.85), as did models based on long-term climate averages (0.84). Similarly, both models performed well compared to independent presence/absence data from the North American Breeding Bird Survey (independent AUC of 0.89 and 0.90, respectively). However, models based on short-term variability covariates more accurately classified true absences for most species (73% of true absences classified within the lowest quarter of environmental suitability vs. 68%). In addition, they have the advantage that they can reveal the dynamic relationship between species and their environment because they capture the spatial fluctuations of species potential breeding distributions. With this information, we can identify which species and guilds are sensitive to climate variability, identify sites of high conservation value where climate

  2. What are the differences between long-term, short-term, and working memory?

    PubMed Central

    Cowan, Nelson

    2008-01-01

    In the recent literature there has been considerable confusion about the three types of memory: long-term, short-term, and working memory. This chapter strives to reduce that confusion and makes up-to-date assessments of these types of memory. Long- and short-term memory could differ in two fundamental ways, with only short-term memory demonstrating (1) temporal decay and (2) chunk capacity limits. Both properties of short-term memory are still controversial but the current literature is rather encouraging regarding the existence of both decay and capacity limits. Working memory has been conceived and defined in three different, slightly discrepant ways: as short-term memory applied to cognitive tasks, as a multi-component system that holds and manipulates information in short-term memory, and as the use of attention to manage short-term memory. Regardless of the definition, there are some measures of memory in the short term that seem routine and do not correlate well with cognitive aptitudes and other measures (those usually identified with the term “working memory”) that seem more attention demanding and do correlate well with these aptitudes. The evidence is evaluated and placed within a theoretical framework depicted in Fig. 1. PMID:18394484

  3. The Demonstration of Short-Term Consolidation.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Jolicoeur, Pierre; Dell'Acqua, Roberto

    1998-01-01

    Results of seven experiments involving 112 college students or staff using a dual-task approach provide evidence that encoding information into short-term memory involves a distinct process termed short-term consolidation (STC). Results suggest that STC has limited capacity and that it requires central processing mechanisms. (SLD)

  4. Short-term memory across eye blinks.

    PubMed

    Irwin, David E

    2014-01-01

    The effect of eye blinks on short-term memory was examined in two experiments. On each trial, participants viewed an initial display of coloured, oriented lines, then after a retention interval they viewed a test display that was either identical or different by one feature. Participants kept their eyes open throughout the retention interval on some blocks of trials, whereas on others they made a single eye blink. Accuracy was measured as a function of the number of items in the display to determine the capacity of short-term memory on blink and no-blink trials. In separate blocks of trials participants were instructed to remember colour only, orientation only, or both colour and orientation. Eye blinks reduced short-term memory capacity by approximately 0.6-0.8 items for both feature and conjunction stimuli. A third, control, experiment showed that a button press during the retention interval had no effect on short-term memory capacity, indicating that the effect of an eye blink was not due to general motoric dual-task interference. Eye blinks might instead reduce short-term memory capacity by interfering with attention-based rehearsal processes.

  5. Short-term memory and dual task performance

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Regan, J. E.

    1982-01-01

    Two hypotheses concerning the way in which short-term memory interacts with another task in a dual task situation are considered. It is noted that when two tasks are combined, the activity of controlling and organizing performance on both tasks simultaneously may compete with either task for a resource; this resource may be space in a central mechanism or general processing capacity or it may be some task-specific resource. If a special relationship exists between short-term memory and control, especially if there is an identity relationship between short-term and a central controlling mechanism, then short-term memory performance should show a decrement in a dual task situation. Even if short-term memory does not have any particular identity with a controlling mechanism, but both tasks draw on some common resource or resources, then a tradeoff between the two tasks in allocating resources is possible and could be reflected in performance. The persistent concurrence cost in memory performance in these experiments suggests that short-term memory may have a unique status in the information processing system.

  6. Accurate classical short-range forces for the study of collision cascades in Fe–Ni–Cr

    DOE PAGES

    Béland, Laurent Karim; Tamm, Artur; Mu, Sai; ...

    2017-05-10

    The predictive power of a classical molecular dynamics simulation is largely determined by the physical validity of its underlying empirical potential. In the case of high-energy collision cascades, it was recently shown that correctly modeling interactions at short distances is necessary to accurately predict primary damage production. An ab initio based framework is introduced for modifying an existing embedded-atom method FeNiCr potential to handle these short-range interactions. Density functional theory is used to calculate the energetics of two atoms approaching each other, embedded in the alloy, and to calculate the equation of state of the alloy as it is compressed.more » The pairwise terms and the embedding terms of the potential are modi ed in accordance with the ab initio results. Using this reparametrized potential, collision cascades are performed in Ni 50Fe 50, Ni 80Cr 20 and Ni 33Fe 33Cr 33. The simulations reveal that alloying Ni and NiCr to Fe reduces primary damage production, in agreement with some previous calculations. Alloying Ni and NiFe to Cr does not reduce primary damage production, in contradiction with previous calculations.« less

  7. Short-Term Intercultural Psychotherapy: Ethnographic Inquiry

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Seeley, Karen M.

    2004-01-01

    This article examines the challenges specific to short-term intercultural treatments and recently developed approaches to intercultural treatments based on notions of cultural knowledge and cultural competence. The article introduces alternative approaches to short-term intercultural treatments based on ethnographic inquiry adapted for clinical…

  8. The Mind and Brain of Short-Term Memory

    PubMed Central

    Jonides, John; Lewis, Richard L.; Nee, Derek Evan; Lustig, Cindy A.; Berman, Marc G.; Moore, Katherine Sledge

    2014-01-01

    The past 10 years have brought near-revolutionary changes in psychological theories about short-term memory, with similarly great advances in the neurosciences. Here, we critically examine the major psychological theories (the “mind”) of short-term memory and how they relate to evidence about underlying brain mechanisms. We focus on three features that must be addressed by any satisfactory theory of short-term memory. First, we examine the evidence for the architecture of short-term memory, with special attention to questions of capacity and how—or whether—short-term memory can be separated from long-term memory. Second, we ask how the components of that architecture enact processes of encoding, maintenance, and retrieval. Third, we describe the debate over the reason about forgetting from short-term memory, whether interference or decay is the cause. We close with a conceptual model tracing the representation of a single item through a short-term memory task, describing the biological mechanisms that might support psychological processes on a moment-by-moment basis as an item is encoded, maintained over a delay with some forgetting, and ultimately retrieved. PMID:17854286

  9. Verbal Short-Term Memory Span in Speech-Disordered Children: Implications for Articulatory Coding in Short-Term Memory.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Raine, Adrian; And Others

    1991-01-01

    Children with speech disorders had lower short-term memory capacity and smaller word length effect than control children. Children with speech disorders also had reduced speech-motor activity during rehearsal. Results suggest that speech rate may be a causal determinant of verbal short-term memory capacity. (BC)

  10. Very-long-term and short-term chromatic adaptation: are their influences cumulative?

    PubMed

    Belmore, Suzanne C; Shevell, Steven K

    2011-02-09

    Very-long-term (VLT) chromatic adaptation results from exposure to an altered chromatic environment for days or weeks. Color shifts from VLT adaptation are observed hours or days after leaving the altered environment. Short-term chromatic adaptation, on the other hand, results from exposure for a few minutes or less, with color shifts measured within seconds or a few minutes after the adapting light is extinguished; recovery to the pre-adapted state is complete in less than an hour. Here, both types of adaptation were combined. All adaptation was to reddish-appearing long-wavelength light. Shifts in unique yellow were measured following adaptation. Previous studies demonstrate shifts in unique yellow due to VLT chromatic adaptation, but shifts from short-term chromatic adaptation to comparable adapting light can be far greater than from VLT adaptation. The question considered here is whether the color shifts from VLT adaptation are cumulative with large shifts from short-term adaptation or, alternatively, does simultaneous short-term adaptation eliminate color shifts caused by VLT adaptation. The results show the color shifts from VLT and short-term adaptation together are cumulative, which indicates that both short-term and very-long-term chromatic adaptation affect color perception during natural viewing. Copyright © 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  11. Operative factors associated with short-term outcome in horses with large colon volvulus: 47 cases from 2006 to 2013.

    PubMed

    Gonzalez, L M; Fogle, C A; Baker, W T; Hughes, F E; Law, J M; Motsinger-Reif, A A; Blikslager, A T

    2015-05-01

    There is an important need for objective parameters that accurately predict the outcome of horses with large colon volvulus. To evaluate the predictive value of a series of histomorphometric parameters on short-term outcome, as well as the impact of colonic resection on horses with large colon volvulus. Retrospective cohort study. Adult horses admitted to the Equine and Farm Animal Veterinary Center at North Carolina State University, Peterson and Smith and Chino Valley Equine Hospitals between 2006 and 2013 that underwent an exploratory coeliotomy, diagnosed with large colon volvulus of ≥360 degrees, where a pelvic flexure biopsy was obtained, and that recovered from general anaesthesia, were selected for inclusion in the study. Logistic regression was used to determine associations between signalment, histomorphometric measurements of interstitium-to-crypt ratio, degree of haemorrhage, percentage loss of luminal and glandular epithelium, as well as colonic resection with short-term outcome (discharge from the hospital). Pelvic flexure biopsies from 47 horses with large colon volvulus were evaluated. Factors that were significantly associated with short-term outcome on univariate logistic regression were Thoroughbred breed (P = 0.04), interstitium-to-crypt ratio >1 (P = 0.02) and haemorrhage score ≥3 (P = 0.005). Resection (P = 0.92) was not found to be associated significantly with short-term outcome. No combined factors increased the likelihood of death in forward stepwise logistic regression modelling. A digitally quantified measurement of haemorrhage area strengthened the association of haemorrhage with nonsurvival in cases of large colon volvulus. Histomorphometric measurements of interstitium-to-crypt ratio and degree of haemorrhage predict short-term outcome in cases of large colon volvulus. Resection was not associated with short-term outcome in horses selected for this study. Accurate quantification of mucosal haemorrhage at the time of surgery may

  12. Short-Term Memory and Aphasia: From Theory to Treatment

    PubMed Central

    Minkina, Irene; Rosenberg, Samantha; Kalinyak-Fliszar, Michelene; Martin, Nadine

    2018-01-01

    This article reviews existing research on the interactions between verbal short-term memory and language processing impairments in aphasia. Theoretical models of short-term memory are reviewed, starting with a model assuming a separation between short-term memory and language, and progressing to models that view verbal short-term memory as a cognitive requirement of language processing. The review highlights a verbal short-term memory model derived from an interactive activation model of word retrieval. This model holds that verbal short-term memory encompasses the temporary activation of linguistic knowledge (e.g., semantic, lexical, and phonological features) during language production and comprehension tasks. Empirical evidence supporting this model, which views short-term memory in the context of the processes it subserves, is outlined. Studies that use a classic measure of verbal short-term memory (i.e., number of words/digits correctly recalled in immediate serial recall) as well as those that use more intricate measures (e.g., serial position effects in immediate serial recall) are discussed. Treatment research that uses verbal short-term memory tasks in an attempt to improve language processing is then summarized, with a particular focus on word retrieval. A discussion of the limitations of current research and possible future directions concludes the review. PMID:28201834

  13. C. elegans positive butanone learning, short-term, and long-term associative memory assays.

    PubMed

    Kauffman, Amanda; Parsons, Lance; Stein, Geneva; Wills, Airon; Kaletsky, Rachel; Murphy, Coleen

    2011-03-11

    The memory of experiences and learned information is critical for organisms to make choices that aid their survival. C. elegans navigates its environment through neuron-specific detection of food and chemical odors, and can associate nutritive states with chemical odors, temperature, and the pathogenicity of a food source. Here, we describe assays of C. elegans associative learning and short- and long-term associative memory. We modified an aversive olfactory learning paradigm to instead produce a positive response; the assay involves starving ~400 worms, then feeding the worms in the presence of the AWC neuron-sensed volatile chemoattractant butanone at a concentration that elicits a low chemotactic index (similar to Toroyama et al.). A standard population chemotaxis assay1 tests the worms' attraction to the odorant immediately or minutes to hours after conditioning. After conditioning, wild-type animals' chemotaxis to butanone increases ~0.6 Chemotaxis Index units, its "Learning Index". Associative learning is dependent on the presence of both food and butanone during training. Pairing food and butanone for a single conditioning period ("massed training") produces short-term associative memory that lasts ~2 hours. Multiple conditioning periods with rest periods between ("spaced training") yields long-term associative memory (<40 hours), and is dependent on the cAMP Response Element Binding protein (CREB), a transcription factor required for long-term memory across species. Our protocol also includes image analysis methods for quick and accurate determination of chemotaxis indices. High-contrast images of animals on chemotaxis assay plates are captured and analyzed by worm counting software in MatLab. The software corrects for uneven background using a morphological tophat transformation. Otsu's method is then used to determine a threshold to separate worms from the background. Very small particles are removed automatically and larger non-worm regions (plate edges

  14. Focusing on Short-Term Achievement Gains Fails to Produce Long-Term Gains

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Grissmer, David W.; Ober, David R.; Beekman, John A.

    2014-01-01

    The short-term emphasis engendered by No Child Left Behind (NCLB) has focused research predominantly on unraveling the complexities and uncertainties in assessing short-term results, rather than developing methods and assessing results over the longer term. In this paper we focus on estimating long-term gains and address questions important to…

  15. Short-Term Global Horizontal Irradiance Forecasting Based on Sky Imaging and Pattern Recognition

    DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

    Hodge, Brian S; Feng, Cong; Cui, Mingjian

    Accurate short-term forecasting is crucial for solar integration in the power grid. In this paper, a classification forecasting framework based on pattern recognition is developed for 1-hour-ahead global horizontal irradiance (GHI) forecasting. Three sets of models in the forecasting framework are trained by the data partitioned from the preprocessing analysis. The first two sets of models forecast GHI for the first four daylight hours of each day. Then the GHI values in the remaining hours are forecasted by an optimal machine learning model determined based on a weather pattern classification model in the third model set. The weather pattern ismore » determined by a support vector machine (SVM) classifier. The developed framework is validated by the GHI and sky imaging data from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). Results show that the developed short-term forecasting framework outperforms the persistence benchmark by 16% in terms of the normalized mean absolute error and 25% in terms of the normalized root mean square error.« less

  16. Short-Term Load Forecasting Based Automatic Distribution Network Reconfiguration

    DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

    Jiang, Huaiguang; Ding, Fei; Zhang, Yingchen

    In a traditional dynamic network reconfiguration study, the optimal topology is determined at every scheduled time point by using the real load data measured at that time. The development of the load forecasting technique can provide an accurate prediction of the load power that will happen in a future time and provide more information about load changes. With the inclusion of load forecasting, the optimal topology can be determined based on the predicted load conditions during a longer time period instead of using a snapshot of the load at the time when the reconfiguration happens; thus, the distribution system operatormore » can use this information to better operate the system reconfiguration and achieve optimal solutions. This paper proposes a short-term load forecasting approach to automatically reconfigure distribution systems in a dynamic and pre-event manner. Specifically, a short-term and high-resolution distribution system load forecasting approach is proposed with a forecaster based on support vector regression and parallel parameters optimization. The network reconfiguration problem is solved by using the forecasted load continuously to determine the optimal network topology with the minimum amount of loss at the future time. The simulation results validate and evaluate the proposed approach.« less

  17. Short-Term Load Forecasting-Based Automatic Distribution Network Reconfiguration

    DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

    Jiang, Huaiguang; Ding, Fei; Zhang, Yingchen

    In a traditional dynamic network reconfiguration study, the optimal topology is determined at every scheduled time point by using the real load data measured at that time. The development of the load forecasting technique can provide an accurate prediction of the load power that will happen in a future time and provide more information about load changes. With the inclusion of load forecasting, the optimal topology can be determined based on the predicted load conditions during a longer time period instead of using a snapshot of the load at the time when the reconfiguration happens; thus, the distribution system operatormore » can use this information to better operate the system reconfiguration and achieve optimal solutions. This paper proposes a short-term load forecasting approach to automatically reconfigure distribution systems in a dynamic and pre-event manner. Specifically, a short-term and high-resolution distribution system load forecasting approach is proposed with a forecaster based on support vector regression and parallel parameters optimization. The network reconfiguration problem is solved by using the forecasted load continuously to determine the optimal network topology with the minimum amount of loss at the future time. The simulation results validate and evaluate the proposed approach.« less

  18. Short-term blood pressure variability over 24 h and target organ damage in middle-aged men and women.

    PubMed

    Madden, J M; O'Flynn, A M; Dolan, E; Fitzgerald, A P; Kearney, P M

    2015-12-01

    Blood pressure variability (BPV) has been associated with cardiovascular events; however, the prognostic significance of short-term BPV remains uncertain. As uncertainty also remains as to which measure of variability most accurately describes short-term BPV, this study explores different indices and investigates their relationship with subclinical target organ damage (TOD). We used data from the Mitchelstown Study, a cross-sectional study of Irish adults aged 47-73 years (n=2047). A subsample (1207) underwent 24-h ambulatory BP monitoring (ABPM). As measures of short-term BPV, we estimated the s.d., weighted s.d. (wSD), coefficient of variation (CV) and average real variability (ARV). TOD was documented by microalbuminuria and electrocardiogram (ECG) left ventricular hypertrophy (LVH). There was no association found between any measure of BPV and LVH in both unadjusted and fully adjusted logistic regression models. Similar analysis found that ARV (24 h, day and night), s.d. (day and night) and wSD were all univariately associated with microalbuminuria and remained associated after adjustment for age, gender, smoking, body mass index (BMI), diabetes and antihypertensive treatment. However, when the models were further adjusted for the mean BP the association did not persist for all indices. Our findings illustrate choosing the appropriate summary measure, which accurately captures that short-term BPV is difficult. Despite discrepancies in values between the different measures, there was no association between any indexes of variability with TOD measures after adjustment for the mean BP.

  19. Short-Term Memory and Aphasia: From Theory to Treatment.

    PubMed

    Minkina, Irene; Rosenberg, Samantha; Kalinyak-Fliszar, Michelene; Martin, Nadine

    2017-02-01

    This article reviews existing research on the interactions between verbal short-term memory and language processing impairments in aphasia. Theoretical models of short-term memory are reviewed, starting with a model assuming a separation between short-term memory and language, and progressing to models that view verbal short-term memory as a cognitive requirement of language processing. The review highlights a verbal short-term memory model derived from an interactive activation model of word retrieval. This model holds that verbal short-term memory encompasses the temporary activation of linguistic knowledge (e.g., semantic, lexical, and phonological features) during language production and comprehension tasks. Empirical evidence supporting this model, which views short-term memory in the context of the processes it subserves, is outlined. Studies that use a classic measure of verbal short-term memory (i.e., number of words/digits correctly recalled in immediate serial recall) as well as those that use more intricate measures (e.g., serial position effects in immediate serial recall) are discussed. Treatment research that uses verbal short-term memory tasks in an attempt to improve language processing is then summarized, with a particular focus on word retrieval. A discussion of the limitations of current research and possible future directions concludes the review. Thieme Medical Publishers 333 Seventh Avenue, New York, NY 10001, USA.

  20. Short- and Long-Term Propagation of Spacecraft Orbits

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Smith, John C., Jr.; Sweetser, Theodore; Chung, Min-Kun; Yen, Chen-Wan L.; Roncoli, Ralph B.; Kwok, Johnny H.; Vincent, Mark A.

    2008-01-01

    The Planetary Observer Planning Software (POPS) comprises four computer programs for use in designing orbits of spacecraft about planets. These programs are the Planetary Observer High Precision Orbit Propagator (POHOP), the Planetary Observer Long-Term Orbit Predictor (POLOP), the Planetary Observer Post Processor (POPP), and the Planetary Observer Plotting (POPLOT) program. POHOP and POLOP integrate the equations of motion to propagate an initial set of classical orbit elements to a future epoch. POHOP models shortterm (one revolution) orbital motion; POLOP averages out the short-term behavior but requires far less processing time than do older programs that perform long-term orbit propagations. POPP postprocesses the spacecraft ephemeris created by POHOP or POLOP (or optionally can use a less accurate internal ephemeris) to search for trajectory-related geometric events including, for example, rising or setting of a spacecraft as observed from a ground site. For each such event, POPP puts out such user-specified data as the time, elevation, and azimuth. POPLOT is a graphics program that plots data generated by POPP. POPLOT can plot orbit ground tracks on a world map and can produce a variety of summaries and generic ordinate-vs.-abscissa plots of any POPP data.

  1. Global velocity constrained cloud motion prediction for short-term solar forecasting

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Chen, Yanjun; Li, Wei; Zhang, Chongyang; Hu, Chuanping

    2016-09-01

    Cloud motion is the primary reason for short-term solar power output fluctuation. In this work, a new cloud motion estimation algorithm using a global velocity constraint is proposed. Compared to the most used Particle Image Velocity (PIV) algorithm, which assumes the homogeneity of motion vectors, the proposed method can capture the accurate motion vector for each cloud block, including both the motional tendency and morphological changes. Specifically, global velocity derived from PIV is first calculated, and then fine-grained cloud motion estimation can be achieved by global velocity based cloud block researching and multi-scale cloud block matching. Experimental results show that the proposed global velocity constrained cloud motion prediction achieves comparable performance to the existing PIV and filtered PIV algorithms, especially in a short prediction horizon.

  2. Short-term Variability of Extinction by Broadband Stellar Photometry

    DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

    Musat, I.C.; Ellingson, R.G.

    2005-03-18

    Aerosol optical depth variation over short-term time intervals is determined from broadband observations of stars with a whole sky imager. The main difficulty in such measurements consists of accurately separating the star flux value from the non-stellar diffuse skylight. Using correction method to overcome this difficulty, the monochromatic extinction at the ground due to aerosols is extracted from heterochromatic measurements. A form of closure is achieved by comparison with simultaneous or temporally close measurements with other instruments, and the total error of the method, as a combination of random error of measurements and systematic error of calibration and model, ismore » assessed as being between 2.6 and 3% rms.« less

  3. A direct comparison of short-term audiomotor and visuomotor memory.

    PubMed

    Ward, Amanda M; Loucks, Torrey M; Ofori, Edward; Sosnoff, Jacob J

    2014-04-01

    Audiomotor and visuomotor short-term memory are required for an important variety of skilled movements but have not been compared in a direct manner previously. Audiomotor memory capacity might be greater to accommodate auditory goals that are less directly related to movement outcome than for visually guided tasks. Subjects produced continuous isometric force with the right index finger under auditory and visual feedback. During the first 10 s of each trial, subjects received continuous auditory or visual feedback. For the following 15 s, feedback was removed but the force had to be maintained accurately. An internal effort condition was included to test memory capacity in the same manner but without external feedback. Similar decay times of ~5-6 s were found for vision and audition but the decay time for internal effort was ~4 s. External feedback thus provides an advantage in maintaining a force level after feedback removal, but may not exclude some contribution from a sense of effort. Short-term memory capacity appears longer than certain previous reports but there may not be strong distinctions in capacity across different sensory modalities, at least for isometric force.

  4. Short-term memory

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Toulouse, G.

    This is a rather bold attempt to bridge the gap between neuron structure and psychological data. We try to answer the question: Is there a relation between the neuronal connectivity in the human cortex (around 5,000) and the short-term memory capacity (7±2)? Our starting point is the Hopfield model (Hopfield 1982), presented in this volume by D.J. Amit.

  5. Risk factors and prediction of very short term versus short/intermediate term post-stroke mortality: a data mining approach.

    PubMed

    Easton, Jonathan F; Stephens, Christopher R; Angelova, Maia

    2014-11-01

    Data mining and knowledge discovery as an approach to examining medical data can limit some of the inherent bias in the hypothesis assumptions that can be found in traditional clinical data analysis. In this paper we illustrate the benefits of a data mining inspired approach to statistically analysing a bespoke data set, the academic multicentre randomised control trial, U.K Glucose Insulin in Stroke Trial (GIST-UK), with a view to discovering new insights distinct from the original hypotheses of the trial. We consider post-stroke mortality prediction as a function of days since stroke onset, showing that the time scales that best characterise changes in mortality risk are most naturally defined by examination of the mortality curve. We show that certain risk factors differentiate between very short term and intermediate term mortality. In particular, we show that age is highly relevant for intermediate term risk but not for very short or short term mortality. We suggest that this is due to the concept of frailty. Other risk factors are highlighted across a range of variable types including socio-demographics, past medical histories and admission medication. Using the most statistically significant risk factors we build predictive classification models for very short term and short/intermediate term mortality. Crown Copyright © 2014. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  6. Drinking High Amounts of Alcohol as a Short-Term Mating Strategy: The Impact of Short-Term Mating Motivations on Young Adults' Drinking Behavior.

    PubMed

    Vincke, Eveline

    2017-01-01

    Previous research indicates that drinking large quantities of alcohol could function as a short-term mating strategy for young adults in mating situations. However, no study investigated whether this is actually the case. Therefore, in this article, the link between short-term mating motivations and drinking high amounts of alcohol is tested. First, a survey study ( N = 345) confirmed that young adults who engage in binge drinking are more short-term oriented in their mating strategy than young adults who never engage in binge drinking. Also, the more short-term-oriented young adults were in their mating strategy, the more often binge drinking behavior was conducted. In addition, an experimental study ( N = 229) empirically verified that short-term mating motivations increase young adults' drinking behavior, more so than long-term mating motivations. Results of the experiment clearly showed that young men and young women are triggered to drink more alcoholic beverages in a short-term mating situation compared to a long-term mating situation. Furthermore, the mating situation also affected young adults' perception of drinking behavior. Young adults in a short-term mating context perceived a higher amount of alcoholic beverages as heavy drinking compared to peers in a long-term mating context. These findings confirm that a high alcohol consumption functions as a short-term mating strategy for both young men and young women. Insights gained from this article might be of interest to institutions aimed at targeting youth alcohol (ab)use.

  7. Competitive short-term and long-term memory processes in spatial habituation.

    PubMed

    Sanderson, David J; Bannerman, David M

    2011-04-01

    Exposure to a spatial location leads to habituation of exploration such that, in a novelty preference test, rodents subsequently prefer exploring a novel location to the familiar location. According to Wagner's (1981) theory of memory, short-term and long-term habituation are caused by separate and sometimes opponent processes. In the present study, this dual-process account of memory was tested. Mice received a series of exposure training trials to a location before receiving a novelty preference test. The novelty preference was greater when tested after a short, rather than a long, interval. In contrast, the novelty preference was weaker when exposure training trials were separated by a short, rather than a long interval. Furthermore, it was found that long-term habituation was determined by the independent effects of the amount of exposure training and the number of exposure training trials when factors such as the intertrial interval and the cumulative intertrial interval were controlled. A final experiment demonstrated that a long-term reduction of exploration could be caused by a negative priming effect due to associations formed during exploration. These results provide evidence against a single-process account of habituation and suggest that spatial habituation is determined by both short-term, recency-based memory and long-term, incrementally strengthened memory.

  8. Retrieval-Induced Inhibition in Short-Term Memory.

    PubMed

    Kang, Min-Suk; Choi, Joongrul

    2015-07-01

    We used a visual illusion called motion repulsion as a model system for investigating competition between two mental representations. Subjects were asked to remember two random-dot-motion displays presented in sequence and then to report the motion directions for each. Remembered motion directions were shifted away from the actual motion directions, an effect similar to the motion repulsion observed during perception. More important, the item retrieved second showed greater repulsion than the item retrieved first. This suggests that earlier retrieval exerted greater inhibition on the other item being held in short-term memory. This retrieval-induced motion repulsion could be explained neither by reduced cognitive resources for maintaining short-term memory nor by continued inhibition between short-term memory representations. These results indicate that retrieval of memory representations inhibits other representations in short-term memory. We discuss mechanisms of retrieval-induced inhibition and their implications for the structure of memory. © The Author(s) 2015.

  9. Improving creativity performance by short-term meditation.

    PubMed

    Ding, Xiaoqian; Tang, Yi-Yuan; Tang, Rongxiang; Posner, Michael I

    2014-03-19

    One form of meditation intervention, the integrative body-mind training (IBMT) has been shown to improve attention, reduce stress and change self-reports of mood. In this paper we examine whether short-term IBMT can improve performance related to creativity and determine the role that mood may play in such improvement. Forty Chinese undergraduates were randomly assigned to short-term IBMT group or a relaxation training (RT) control group. Mood and creativity performance were assessed by the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS) and Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking (TTCT) questionnaire respectively. As predicted, the results indicated that short-term (30 min per day for 7 days) IBMT improved creativity performance on the divergent thinking task, and yielded better emotional regulation than RT. In addition, cross-lagged analysis indicated that both positive and negative affect may influence creativity in IBMT group (not RT group). Our results suggested that emotion-related creativity-promoting mechanism may be attributed to short-term meditation.

  10. Short-term Memory as a Processing Shift

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Lewis-Smith, Marion Quinn

    1975-01-01

    The series of experiments described here examined the predictions for free recall from sequential models and the shift formulation, focusing on the roles of short- and long-term memory in the primacy/recency shift and on the effects of expectancies on short- and long-term memory. (Author/RK)

  11. Hybrid ARIMAX quantile regression method for forecasting short term electricity consumption in east java

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Prastuti, M.; Suhartono; Salehah, NA

    2018-04-01

    The need for energy supply, especially for electricity in Indonesia has been increasing in the last past years. Furthermore, the high electricity usage by people at different times leads to the occurrence of heteroscedasticity issue. Estimate the electricity supply that could fulfilled the community’s need is very important, but the heteroscedasticity issue often made electricity forecasting hard to be done. An accurate forecast of electricity consumptions is one of the key challenges for energy provider to make better resources and service planning and also take control actions in order to balance the electricity supply and demand for community. In this paper, hybrid ARIMAX Quantile Regression (ARIMAX-QR) approach was proposed to predict the short-term electricity consumption in East Java. This method will also be compared to time series regression using RMSE, MAPE, and MdAPE criteria. The data used in this research was the electricity consumption per half-an-hour data during the period of September 2015 to April 2016. The results show that the proposed approach can be a competitive alternative to forecast short-term electricity in East Java. ARIMAX-QR using lag values and dummy variables as predictors yield more accurate prediction in both in-sample and out-sample data. Moreover, both time series regression and ARIMAX-QR methods with addition of lag values as predictor could capture accurately the patterns in the data. Hence, it produces better predictions compared to the models that not use additional lag variables.

  12. Intercultural Competence in Short-Term Study Abroad

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Nguyen, Annie

    2017-01-01

    Assessment is growing for short-term study abroad as the majority of students (63.1%) continue to choose this option (Institute of International Education, 2016). This study uses the Intercultural Effectiveness Scale (IES) to examine the impact of short-term study abroad programs on students' overall intercultural competency and the connections…

  13. Short-term memory and long-term memory are still different.

    PubMed

    Norris, Dennis

    2017-09-01

    A commonly expressed view is that short-term memory (STM) is nothing more than activated long-term memory. If true, this would overturn a central tenet of cognitive psychology-the idea that there are functionally and neurobiologically distinct short- and long-term stores. Here I present an updated case for a separation between short- and long-term stores, focusing on the computational demands placed on any STM system. STM must support memory for previously unencountered information, the storage of multiple tokens of the same type, and variable binding. None of these can be achieved simply by activating long-term memory. For example, even a simple sequence of digits such as "1, 3, 1" where there are 2 tokens of the digit "1" cannot be stored in the correct order simply by activating the representations of the digits "1" and "3" in LTM. I also review recent neuroimaging data that has been presented as evidence that STM is activated LTM and show that these data are exactly what one would expect to see based on a conventional 2-store view. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2017 APA, all rights reserved).

  14. Short-Term Memory and Long-Term Memory are Still Different

    PubMed Central

    2017-01-01

    A commonly expressed view is that short-term memory (STM) is nothing more than activated long-term memory. If true, this would overturn a central tenet of cognitive psychology—the idea that there are functionally and neurobiologically distinct short- and long-term stores. Here I present an updated case for a separation between short- and long-term stores, focusing on the computational demands placed on any STM system. STM must support memory for previously unencountered information, the storage of multiple tokens of the same type, and variable binding. None of these can be achieved simply by activating long-term memory. For example, even a simple sequence of digits such as “1, 3, 1” where there are 2 tokens of the digit “1” cannot be stored in the correct order simply by activating the representations of the digits “1” and “3” in LTM. I also review recent neuroimaging data that has been presented as evidence that STM is activated LTM and show that these data are exactly what one would expect to see based on a conventional 2-store view. PMID:28530428

  15. Episodic Short-Term Recognition Requires Encoding into Visual Working Memory: Evidence from Probe Recognition after Letter Report

    PubMed Central

    Poth, Christian H.; Schneider, Werner X.

    2016-01-01

    Human vision is organized in discrete processing episodes (e.g., eye fixations or task-steps). Object information must be transmitted across episodes to enable episodic short-term recognition: recognizing whether a current object has been seen in a previous episode. We ask whether episodic short-term recognition presupposes that objects have been encoded into capacity-limited visual working memory (VWM), which retains visual information for report. Alternatively, it could rely on the activation of visual features or categories that occurs before encoding into VWM. We assessed the dependence of episodic short-term recognition on VWM by a new paradigm combining letter report and probe recognition. Participants viewed displays of 10 letters and reported as many as possible after a retention interval (whole report). Next, participants viewed a probe letter and indicated whether it had been one of the 10 letters (probe recognition). In Experiment 1, probe recognition was more accurate for letters that had been encoded into VWM (reported letters) compared with non-encoded letters (non-reported letters). Interestingly, those letters that participants reported in their whole report had been near to one another within the letter displays. This suggests that the encoding into VWM proceeded in a spatially clustered manner. In Experiment 2, participants reported only one of 10 letters (partial report) and probes either referred to this letter, to letters that had been near to it, or far from it. Probe recognition was more accurate for near than for far letters, although none of these letters had to be reported. These findings indicate that episodic short-term recognition is constrained to a small number of simultaneously presented objects that have been encoded into VWM. PMID:27713722

  16. Episodic Short-Term Recognition Requires Encoding into Visual Working Memory: Evidence from Probe Recognition after Letter Report.

    PubMed

    Poth, Christian H; Schneider, Werner X

    2016-01-01

    Human vision is organized in discrete processing episodes (e.g., eye fixations or task-steps). Object information must be transmitted across episodes to enable episodic short-term recognition: recognizing whether a current object has been seen in a previous episode. We ask whether episodic short-term recognition presupposes that objects have been encoded into capacity-limited visual working memory (VWM), which retains visual information for report. Alternatively, it could rely on the activation of visual features or categories that occurs before encoding into VWM. We assessed the dependence of episodic short-term recognition on VWM by a new paradigm combining letter report and probe recognition. Participants viewed displays of 10 letters and reported as many as possible after a retention interval (whole report). Next, participants viewed a probe letter and indicated whether it had been one of the 10 letters (probe recognition). In Experiment 1, probe recognition was more accurate for letters that had been encoded into VWM (reported letters) compared with non-encoded letters (non-reported letters). Interestingly, those letters that participants reported in their whole report had been near to one another within the letter displays. This suggests that the encoding into VWM proceeded in a spatially clustered manner. In Experiment 2, participants reported only one of 10 letters (partial report) and probes either referred to this letter, to letters that had been near to it, or far from it. Probe recognition was more accurate for near than for far letters, although none of these letters had to be reported. These findings indicate that episodic short-term recognition is constrained to a small number of simultaneously presented objects that have been encoded into VWM.

  17. In Search of Decay in Verbal Short-Term Memory

    PubMed Central

    Berman, Marc G.; Jonides, John; Lewis, Richard L.

    2014-01-01

    Is forgetting in the short term due to decay with the mere passage of time, interference from other memoranda, or both? Past research on short-term memory has revealed some evidence for decay and a plethora of evidence showing that short-term memory is worsened by interference. However, none of these studies has directly contrasted decay and interference in short-term memory in a task that rules out the use of rehearsal processes. In this article the authors present a series of studies using a novel paradigm to address this problem directly, by interrogating the operation of decay and interference in short-term memory without rehearsal confounds. The results of these studies indicate that short-term memories are subject to very small decay effects with the mere passage of time but that interference plays a much larger role in their degradation. The authors discuss the implications of these results for existing models of memory decay and interference. PMID:19271849

  18. In search of decay in verbal short-term memory.

    PubMed

    Berman, Marc G; Jonides, John; Lewis, Richard L

    2009-03-01

    Is forgetting in the short term due to decay with the mere passage of time, interference from other memoranda, or both? Past research on short-term memory has revealed some evidence for decay and a plethora of evidence showing that short-term memory is worsened by interference. However, none of these studies has directly contrasted decay and interference in short-term memory in a task that rules out the use of rehearsal processes. In this article the authors present a series of studies using a novel paradigm to address this problem directly, by interrogating the operation of decay and interference in short-term memory without rehearsal confounds. The results of these studies indicate that short-term memories are subject to very small decay effects with the mere passage of time but that interference plays a much larger role in their degradation. The authors discuss the implications of these results for existing models of memory decay and interference. (c) 2009 APA, all rights reserved

  19. A Single Brief Burst Induces GluR1-Dependent Associative Short-Term Potentiation: A Potential Mechanism for Short-Term Memory

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Erickson, Martha A.; Maramara, Lauren A.; Lisman, John

    2010-01-01

    Recent work showed that short-term memory (STM) is selectively reduced in GluR1 knockout mice. This raises the possibility that a form of synaptic modification dependent on GluR1 might underlie STM. Studies of synaptic plasticity have shown that stimuli too weak to induce long-term potentiation induce short-term potentiation (STP), a phenomenon…

  20. Verbal Short-Term Memory Reflects the Organization of Long-Term Memory: Further Evidence from Short-Term Memory for Emotional Words

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Majerus, Steve; D'Argembeau, Arnaud

    2011-01-01

    Many studies suggest that long-term lexical-semantic knowledge is an important determinant of verbal short-term memory (STM) performance. This study explored the impact of emotional valence on word immediate serial recall as a further lexico-semantic long-term memory (LTM) effect on STM. This effect is particularly interesting for the study of…

  1. Three Models for Short-Term Study Abroad

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Sachau, Daniel; Brasher, Niel; Fee, Scott

    2010-01-01

    Nearly 250,000 U.S. college students participate in study abroad programs each year. A growing proportion of students are participating in short-term study abroad programs. Despite the large number of students in these programs, there are relatively few articles that describe how to start or manage a short-term, business-related, study abroad…

  2. Operative factors associated with short-term outcome in horses with large colon volvulus: 47 cases from 2006 to 2013

    PubMed Central

    Gonzalez, L. M.; Fogle, C. A.; Baker, W. T.; Hughes, F. E.; Law, J. M.; Motsinger-Reif, A. A.; Blikslager, A. T.

    2014-01-01

    Summary Reasons for performing the study There is an important need for objective parameters that accurately predict the outcome of horses with large colon volvulus. Objectives To evaluate the predictive value of a series of histomorphometric parameters on short-term outcome, as well as the impact of colonic resection on horses with large colon volvulus. Study Design Retrospective cohort study Methods Adult horses admitted to the Equine and Farm Animal Veterinary Center at North Carolina State University, Peterson & Smith and Chino Valley Equine Hospitals between 2006–2013 undergoing an exploratory celiotomy, diagnosed with large colon volvulus of ≥360 degrees, where a pelvic flexure biopsy was obtained, and that recovered from general anaesthesia, were selected for inclusion in the study. Logistic regression was used to determine associations between signalment, histomorphometric measurements of interstitial: crypt ratio, degree of haemorrhage, percentage loss of luminal and glandular epithelium, as well as colonic resection with short-term outcome (discharge from the hospital). Results Pelvic flexure biopsies from 47 horses with large colon volvulus were evaluated. Factors that were significantly associated with short-term outcome on univariate logistic regression were Thoroughbred breed (P = 0.04), interstitial: crypt ratio >1 (P = 0.02) and haemorrhage score ≥3 (P = 0.005). Resection (P = 0.92) was not found to be significantly associated with short-term outcome. No combined factors increased the likelihood of death in forward stepwise logistic regression modelling. A digitally quantified haemorrhage area measurement strengthened the association of haemorrhage with non-survival in cases of large colon volvulus. Conclusions Histomorphometric measurements of interstitial: crypt ratio and degree of haemorrhage predict short-term outcome in cases of large colon volvulus. Resection was not associated with short-term outcome in horses selected for this study

  3. Improving creativity performance by short-term meditation

    PubMed Central

    2014-01-01

    Background One form of meditation intervention, the integrative body-mind training (IBMT) has been shown to improve attention, reduce stress and change self-reports of mood. In this paper we examine whether short-term IBMT can improve performance related to creativity and determine the role that mood may play in such improvement. Methods Forty Chinese undergraduates were randomly assigned to short-term IBMT group or a relaxation training (RT) control group. Mood and creativity performance were assessed by the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS) and Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking (TTCT) questionnaire respectively. Results As predicted, the results indicated that short-term (30 min per day for 7 days) IBMT improved creativity performance on the divergent thinking task, and yielded better emotional regulation than RT. In addition, cross-lagged analysis indicated that both positive and negative affect may influence creativity in IBMT group (not RT group). Conclusions Our results suggested that emotion-related creativity-promoting mechanism may be attributed to short-term meditation. PMID:24645871

  4. Embolization of renal angiomyolipomas: short-term and long-term outcomes, complications, and tumor shrinkage.

    PubMed

    Lee, Shen-Yang; Hsu, Hsiang-Hao; Chen, Yung-Chang; Huang, Chen-Chih; Wong, Yon-Cheong; Wang, Li-Jen; Chuang, Cheng-Keng; Yang, Chih-Wei

    2009-11-01

    This study retrospectively evaluated outcomes, complications, and tumor shrinkage in renal angiomyolipomas after transcatheter arterial embolization (TAE). All renal angiomyolipoma patients who underwent TAE between August 2000 and December 2008 and had short-term (term (>6 months) follow-up images were evaluated. Complications and tumor relapse after TAE were reviewed. The sizes of embolized tumors were measured to calculate size reductions and reduction rates after TAE. Differences in tumor size, size reduction, and reduction rate between different time points (pre-TAE, short-term follow-up, and long-term follow-up) and groups (completely and incompletely embolized) were determined. Eleven renal angiomyolipoma patients who had undergone TAE were included. Seven (63.6%) patients had postembolization syndrome and one had abscess formation following TAE. Two patients had a tumor relapse (18.2%). The mean tumor size was 8.57+/-2.66 cm on pre-TAE images. The mean size reduction was 3.1 cm (33.3%) and 3.8 cm (43.0%) at short-term and long-term follow-up. Tumor sizes differed significantly between pre-TAE and short-term (p=0.004) or long-term images (p=0.022) but not between short-term and long-term images (p=0.059). Results stratified by the completeness of embolization indicate that only the short-term size reduction rate differed significantly (p=0.025), while the long-term reduction rate and short- and long-term follow-up tumor size and size reduction were comparable between the two groups. In conclusion, selective TAE is effective for tumor shrinkage in most renal angiomyolipomas, with acceptable complication and relapse rates. Tumor shrinkage occurring within 6 months after TAE may reflect the long-term effect of TAE.

  5. Role of calcitonin gene-related peptide in cardioprotection of short-term and long-term exercise preconditioning.

    PubMed

    Sun, Xiao-Juan; Pan, Shan-Shan

    2014-07-01

    To examine the role of calcitonin gene-related peptide (CGRP) in cardioprotection of short-term and long-term exercise preconditioning (EP). Male Sprague-Dawley rats were, respectively, subjected to continuous intermittent treadmill training 3 days or 3 weeks as short-term or long-term EP protocols. The myocardial injury induced by isoproterenol (ISO) was performed 24 hours after short-term and long-term EP. The myocardial injury was evaluated in terms of the serum cardiac troponin levels and the hematoxylin-basic fuchsin-picric acid staining. Additionally, serum CGRP levels, CGRP expression in the dorsal root ganglion (DRG), and heart were analyzed as possible mechanisms to explain short-term and long-term EP-induced cardioprotection. Both short-term and long-term EP markedly attenuated the isoproterenol-induced myocardial ischemia with lower serum cardiac troponin levels. Short-term EP does not alter serum CGRP levels and CGRP expression in the DRG and heart. Long-term EP significantly increases serum CGRP levels and CGRP expression in the DRG and heart. The results indicate that short-term EP does not increase the synthesis and release of CGRP. Therefore, the cardioprotective effect of short-term EP does not involve CGRP adaptation. Furthermore, long-term EP increases CGRP synthesis in the DRG and promotes CGRP release in the blood and heart. Hence, CGRP may play an important role in the cardioprotective effect of long-term EP.

  6. 22 CFR 71.11 - Short-term full diet program.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

    2013-04-01

    ... 22 Foreign Relations 1 2013-04-01 2013-04-01 false Short-term full diet program. 71.11 Section 71.... Nationals Incarcerated Abroad § 71.11 Short-term full diet program. (a) Eligibility criteria. A prisoner is considered eligible for the short-term full diet program under the following general criteria: (1) The...

  7. 22 CFR 71.11 - Short-term full diet program.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

    2014-04-01

    ... 22 Foreign Relations 1 2014-04-01 2014-04-01 false Short-term full diet program. 71.11 Section 71.... Nationals Incarcerated Abroad § 71.11 Short-term full diet program. (a) Eligibility criteria. A prisoner is considered eligible for the short-term full diet program under the following general criteria: (1) The...

  8. 22 CFR 71.11 - Short-term full diet program.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

    2012-04-01

    ... 22 Foreign Relations 1 2012-04-01 2012-04-01 false Short-term full diet program. 71.11 Section 71.... Nationals Incarcerated Abroad § 71.11 Short-term full diet program. (a) Eligibility criteria. A prisoner is considered eligible for the short-term full diet program under the following general criteria: (1) The...

  9. Neonatal Pulmonary MRI of Bronchopulmonary Dysplasia Predicts Short-term Clinical Outcomes.

    PubMed

    Higano, Nara S; Spielberg, David R; Fleck, Robert J; Schapiro, Andrew H; Walkup, Laura L; Hahn, Andrew D; Tkach, Jean A; Kingma, Paul S; Merhar, Stephanie L; Fain, Sean B; Woods, Jason C

    2018-05-23

    Bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD) is a serious neonatal pulmonary condition associated with premature birth, but the underlying parenchymal disease and trajectory are poorly characterized. The current NICHD/NHLBI definition of BPD severity is based on degree of prematurity and extent of oxygen requirement. However, no clear link exists between initial diagnosis and clinical outcomes. We hypothesized that magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of structural parenchymal abnormalities will correlate with NICHD-defined BPD disease severity and predict short-term respiratory outcomes. Forty-two neonates (20 severe BPD, 6 moderate, 7 mild, 9 non-BPD controls; 40±3 weeks post-menstrual age) underwent quiet-breathing structural pulmonary MRI (ultrashort echo-time and gradient echo) in a NICU-sited, neonatal-sized 1.5T scanner, without sedation or respiratory support unless already clinically prescribed. Disease severity was scored independently by two radiologists. Mean scores were compared to clinical severity and short-term respiratory outcomes. Outcomes were predicted using univariate and multivariable models including clinical data and scores. MRI scores significantly correlated with severities and predicted respiratory support at NICU discharge (P<0.0001). In multivariable models, MRI scores were by far the strongest predictor of respiratory support duration over clinical data, including birth weight and gestational age. Notably, NICHD severity level was not predictive of discharge support. Quiet-breathing neonatal pulmonary MRI can independently assess structural abnormalities of BPD, describe disease severity, and predict short-term outcomes more accurately than any individual standard clinical measure. Importantly, this non-ionizing technique can be implemented to phenotype disease and has potential to serially assess efficacy of individualized therapies.

  10. Short-Term Load Forecasting Based Automatic Distribution Network Reconfiguration: Preprint

    DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

    Jiang, Huaiguang; Ding, Fei; Zhang, Yingchen

    In the traditional dynamic network reconfiguration study, the optimal topology is determined at every scheduled time point by using the real load data measured at that time. The development of load forecasting technique can provide accurate prediction of load power that will happen in future time and provide more information about load changes. With the inclusion of load forecasting, the optimal topology can be determined based on the predicted load conditions during the longer time period instead of using the snapshot of load at the time when the reconfiguration happens, and thus it can provide information to the distribution systemmore » operator (DSO) to better operate the system reconfiguration to achieve optimal solutions. Thus, this paper proposes a short-term load forecasting based approach for automatically reconfiguring distribution systems in a dynamic and pre-event manner. Specifically, a short-term and high-resolution distribution system load forecasting approach is proposed with support vector regression (SVR) based forecaster and parallel parameters optimization. And the network reconfiguration problem is solved by using the forecasted load continuously to determine the optimal network topology with the minimum loss at the future time. The simulation results validate and evaluate the proposed approach.« less

  11. In Search of Decay in Verbal Short-Term Memory

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Berman, Marc G.; Jonides, John; Lewis, Richard L.

    2009-01-01

    Is forgetting in the short term due to decay with the mere passage of time, interference from other memoranda, or both? Past research on short-term memory has revealed some evidence for decay and a plethora of evidence showing that short-term memory is worsened by interference. However, none of these studies has directly contrasted decay and…

  12. A Gaussian Processes Technique for Short-term Load Forecasting with Considerations of Uncertainty

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Ohmi, Masataro; Mori, Hiroyuki

    In this paper, an efficient method is proposed to deal with short-term load forecasting with the Gaussian Processes. Short-term load forecasting plays a key role to smooth power system operation such as economic load dispatching, unit commitment, etc. Recently, the deregulated and competitive power market increases the degree of uncertainty. As a result, it is more important to obtain better prediction results to save the cost. One of the most important aspects is that power system operator needs the upper and lower bounds of the predicted load to deal with the uncertainty while they require more accurate predicted values. The proposed method is based on the Bayes model in which output is expressed in a distribution rather than a point. To realize the model efficiently, this paper proposes the Gaussian Processes that consists of the Bayes linear model and kernel machine to obtain the distribution of the predicted value. The proposed method is successively applied to real data of daily maximum load forecasting.

  13. Abdominal Pain (Stomach Pain), Short-Term

    MedlinePlus

    ... Long-term Abdominal Pain (Stomach Pain), Short-term Ankle Problems Breast Problems in Men Breast Problems in Women Chest Pain in Infants and Children Chest Pain, Acute Chest Pain, Chronic Cold and Flu Cough Diarrhea ...

  14. Short- and Long-Term Consequences of Adolescent Work.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Mihalic, Sharon Wofford; Elliott, Delbert

    1997-01-01

    Examines the short- and long-term consequences of working during adolescence. Responses from 1,725 adolescents reveal that the negative short-term effects are in the domains of school, family and friend bonding, beliefs, and substance use. The long-term beneficial effect is that the duration of early work helps employability in adulthood. (GR)

  15. Attention Problems, Phonological Short-Term Memory, and Visuospatial Short-Term Memory: Differential Effects on Near- and Long-Term Scholastic Achievement

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Sarver, Dustin E.; Rapport, Mark D.; Kofler, Michael J.; Scanlan, Sean W.; Raiker, Joseph S.; Altro, Thomas A.; Bolden, Jennifer

    2012-01-01

    The current study examined individual differences in children's phonological and visuospatial short-term memory as potential mediators of the relationship among attention problems and near- and long-term scholastic achievement. Nested structural equation models revealed that teacher-reported attention problems were associated negatively with…

  16. Short-Term Reciprocity in Late Parent-Child Relationships

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Leopold, Thomas; Raab, Marcel

    2011-01-01

    Long-term concepts of parent-child reciprocity assume that the amount of support given and received is only balanced in a generalized fashion over the life course. We argue that reciprocity in parent-child relationships also operates in the short term. Our analysis of short-term reciprocity focuses on concurrent exchange in its main upward and…

  17. Decay uncovered in nonverbal short-term memory.

    PubMed

    Mercer, Tom; McKeown, Denis

    2014-02-01

    Decay theory posits that memory traces gradually fade away over the passage of time unless they are actively rehearsed. Much recent work exploring verbal short-term memory has challenged this theory, but there does appear to be evidence for trace decay in nonverbal auditory short-term memory. Numerous discrimination studies have reported a performance decline as the interval separating two tones is increased, consistent with a decay process. However, most of this tone comparison research can be explained in other ways, without reference to decay, and these alternative accounts were tested in the present study. In Experiment 1, signals were employed toward the end of extended retention intervals to ensure that listeners were alert to the presence and frequency content of the memoranda. In Experiment 2, a mask stimulus was employed in an attempt to distinguish between a highly detailed sensory trace and a longer-lasting short-term memory, and the distinctiveness of the stimuli was varied. Despite these precautions, slow-acting trace decay was observed. It therefore appears that the mere passage of time can lead to forgetting in some forms of short-term memory.

  18. Monkeys have a limited form of short-term memory in audition.

    PubMed

    Scott, Brian H; Mishkin, Mortimer; Yin, Pingbo

    2012-07-24

    A stimulus trace may be temporarily retained either actively [i.e., in working memory (WM)] or by the weaker mnemonic process we will call passive short-term memory, in which a given stimulus trace is highly susceptible to "overwriting" by a subsequent stimulus. It has been suggested that WM is the more robust process because it exploits long-term memory (i.e., a current stimulus activates a stored representation of that stimulus, which can then be actively maintained). Recent studies have suggested that monkeys may be unable to store acoustic signals in long-term memory, raising the possibility that they may therefore also lack auditory WM. To explore this possibility, we tested rhesus monkeys on a serial delayed match-to-sample (DMS) task using a small set of sounds presented with ~1-s interstimulus delays. Performance was accurate whenever a match or a nonmatch stimulus followed the sample directly, but it fell precipitously if a single nonmatch stimulus intervened between sample and match. The steep drop in accuracy was found to be due not to passive decay of the sample's trace, but to retroactive interference from the intervening nonmatch stimulus. This "overwriting" effect was far greater than that observed previously in serial DMS with visual stimuli. The results, which accord with the notion that WM relies on long-term memory, indicate that monkeys perform serial DMS in audition remarkably poorly and that whatever success they had on this task depended largely, if not entirely, on the retention of stimulus traces in the passive form of short-term memory.

  19. Short-term Action Intentions Overrule Long-Term Semantic Knowledge

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    van Elk, M.; van Schie, H.T.; Bekkering, H.

    2009-01-01

    In the present study, we investigated whether the preparation of an unusual action with an object (e.g. bringing a cup towards the eye) could selectively overrule long-term semantic representations. In the first experiment it was found that unusual action intentions activated short-term semantic goal representations, rather than long-term…

  20. Circadian modulation of short-term memory in Drosophila.

    PubMed

    Lyons, Lisa C; Roman, Gregg

    2009-01-01

    Endogenous biological clocks are widespread regulators of behavior and physiology, allowing for a more efficient allocation of efforts and resources over the course of a day. The extent that different processes are regulated by circadian oscillators, however, is not fully understood. We investigated the role of the circadian clock on short-term associative memory formation using a negatively reinforced olfactory-learning paradigm in Drosophila melanogaster. We found that memory formation was regulated in a circadian manner. The peak performance in short-term memory (STM) occurred during the early subjective night with a twofold performance amplitude after a single pairing of conditioned and unconditioned stimuli. This rhythm in memory is eliminated in both timeless and period mutants and is absent during constant light conditions. Circadian gating of sensory perception does not appear to underlie the rhythm in short-term memory as evidenced by the nonrhythmic shock avoidance and olfactory avoidance behaviors. Moreover, central brain oscillators appear to be responsible for the modulation as cryptochrome mutants, in which the antennal circadian oscillators are nonfunctional, demonstrate robust circadian rhythms in short-term memory. Together these data suggest that central, rather than peripheral, circadian oscillators modulate the formation of short-term associative memory and not the perception of the stimuli.

  1. The interaction of short-term and long-term memory in phonetic category formation

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Harnsberger, James D.

    2002-05-01

    This study examined the role that short-term memory capacity plays in the relationship between novel stimuli (e.g., non-native speech sounds, native nonsense words) and phonetic categories in long-term memory. Thirty native speakers of American English were administered five tests: categorial AXB discrimination using nasal consonants from Malayalam; categorial identification, also using Malayalam nasals, which measured the influence of phonetic categories in long-term memory; digit span; nonword span, a short-term memory measure mediated by phonetic categories in long-term memory; and paired-associate word learning (word-word and word-nonword pairs). The results showed that almost all measures were significantly correlated with one another. The strongest predictor for the discrimination and word-nonword learning results was nonword (r=+0.62) and digit span (r=+0.51), respectively. When the identification test results were partialed out, only nonword span significantly correlated with discrimination. The results show a strong influence of short-term memory capacity on the encoding of phonetic detail within phonetic categories and suggest that long-term memory representations regulate the capacity of short-term memory to preserve information for subsequent encoding. The results of this study will also be discussed with regards to resolving the tension between episodic and abstract models of phonetic category structure.

  2. Semantic and phonological contributions to short-term repetition and long-term cued sentence recall.

    PubMed

    Meltzer, Jed A; Rose, Nathan S; Deschamps, Tiffany; Leigh, Rosie C; Panamsky, Lilia; Silberberg, Alexandra; Madani, Noushin; Links, Kira A

    2016-02-01

    The function of verbal short-term memory is supported not only by the phonological loop, but also by semantic resources that may operate on both short and long time scales. Elucidation of the neural underpinnings of these mechanisms requires effective behavioral manipulations that can selectively engage them. We developed a novel cued sentence recall paradigm to assess the effects of two factors on sentence recall accuracy at short-term and long-term stages. Participants initially repeated auditory sentences immediately following a 14-s retention period. After this task was complete, long-term memory for each sentence was probed by a two-word recall cue. The sentences were either concrete (high imageability) or abstract (low imageability), and the initial 14-s retention period was filled with either an undemanding finger-tapping task or a more engaging articulatory suppression task (Exp. 1, counting backward by threes; Exp. 2, repeating a four-syllable nonword). Recall was always better for the concrete sentences. Articulatory suppression reduced accuracy in short-term recall, especially for abstract sentences, but the sentences initially recalled following articulatory suppression were retained better at the subsequent cued-recall test, suggesting that the engagement of semantic mechanisms for short-term retention promoted encoding of the sentence meaning into long-term memory. These results provide a basis for using sentence imageability and subsequent memory performance as probes of semantic engagement in short-term memory for sentences.

  3. Short-Term Memory; An Annotated Bibliography. Supplement 1.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Fisher, Dennis F.

    A compilation of 165 references dealing with short term memory, this bibliography supplements "Short-Term Memory: An Annotated Bibliography" (August 1968). The time period covered is predominantly June 1968 to June 1969. Such aspects and topics as psychometrics, motivation, human engineering, vision, auditory perception, verbal and nonverbal…

  4. Student Outcomes Associated with Short-Term and Semester Study Abroad Programs

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Coker, Jeffrey Scott; Heiser, Evan; Taylor, Laura

    2018-01-01

    This five-year study of graduating seniors at Elon University (n = 1,858) compared student outcomes measured by the National Survey of Student Engagement across five study abroad groups: no study abroad, semester, short-term (three-week), two short-terms, and semester plus short-term. Both short-term and semester programs were positively…

  5. Predicting isoproturon long-term mineralization from short-term experiment: Can this be a suitable approach?

    PubMed

    Wang, Fang; Dörfler, Ulrike; Jiang, Xin; Schroll, Reiner

    2016-02-01

    A worldwide used pesticide - isoproturon (IPU) - was selected to test whether short-term experiments can be used to predict long-term mineralization of IPU in soil. IPU-mineralization was measured for 39 and 265 days in four different agricultural soils with a low mineralization dynamic. Additionally, in one soil IPU dissipation, formation and dissipation of metabolites, formation of non-extractable residues (NER) and (14)C-microbial biomass from (14)C-IPU were monitored for 39 and 265 days. The data from short-term and long-term experiments were used for model fitting. The long-term dynamics of IPU mineralization were considerably overestimated by the short-term experiments in two soils with neutral pH, while in two other soils with low pH and lower mineralization, the long-term mineralization of IPU could be sufficiently predicted. Additional investigations in one of the soils with neutral pH showed that dissipation of IPU and metabolites could be correctly predicted by the short-term experiment. However, the formation of NER and (14)C-microbial biomass were remarkably overestimated by the short-term experiment. Further, it could be shown that the released NER and (14)C-microbial biomass were the main contributors of (14)CO2 formation at later incubation stages. Taken together, our results indicate that in soils with neutral pH short-term experiments were inadequate to predict the long-term mineralization of IPU. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  6. Musical and Verbal Memory in Alzheimer's Disease: A Study of Long-Term and Short-Term Memory

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Menard, Marie-Claude; Belleville, Sylvie

    2009-01-01

    Musical memory was tested in Alzheimer patients and in healthy older adults using long-term and short-term memory tasks. Long-term memory (LTM) was tested with a recognition procedure using unfamiliar melodies. Short-term memory (STM) was evaluated with same/different judgment tasks on short series of notes. Musical memory was compared to verbal…

  7. Measuring short-term and long-term physiological stress effects by cortisol reactivity in saliva and hair.

    PubMed

    van Holland, Berry J; Frings-Dresen, Monique H W; Sluiter, Judith K

    2012-11-01

    The aims of this study were to investigate (1) the concurrent relationship between short-term and long-term stress reactivity measured by cortisol excretion and (2) the relationship of these physiological stress effects with self-reported stress and need for recovery after work (NFR). Participants were production workers in the meat-processing industry. Short-term cortisol excretion was calculated by summing 18 saliva samples, sampled over a 3-day period. Samples were delivered by 37 participants. Twenty-nine of them also supplied one hair sample of at least 3 cm in length for an analysis of long-term (3 months) cortisol excretion. All of them filled in a short questionnaire on self-reported stress and NFR. Self-reported stress was assessed by a three-item stress screener; NFR was assessed by an 11-item scale. Short-term and long-term cortisol excretion are significantly, but moderately, associated (r = 0.41, P = 0.03). Short-term and long-term cortisol excretion correlated weakly to self-reported stress and NFR (correlations varied from -0.04 to 0.21). Short-term and long-term physiological stress excretion levels are moderately associated. Physiological stress effects assessed from saliva and hair cannot be used interchangeably with self-reported stress because they only correlate weakly. To better predict long-term cortisol excretion in workers, the predictive value of short-term cortisol excretion must be evaluated in a prognostic longitudinal study in a working population.

  8. Assessing the associative deficit of older adults in long-term and short-term/working memory.

    PubMed

    Chen, Tina; Naveh-Benjamin, Moshe

    2012-09-01

    Older adults exhibit a deficit in associative long-term memory relative to younger adults. However, the literature is inconclusive regarding whether this deficit is attenuated in short-term/working memory. To elucidate the issue, three experiments assessed younger and older adults' item and interitem associative memory and the effects of several variables that might potentially contribute to the inconsistent pattern of results in previous studies. In Experiment 1, participants were tested on item and associative recognition memory with both long-term and short-term retention intervals in a single, continuous recognition paradigm. There was an associative deficit for older adults in the short-term and long-term intervals. Using only short-term intervals, Experiment 2 utilized mixed and blocked test designs to examine the effect of test event salience. Blocking the test did not attenuate the age-related associative deficit seen in the mixed test blocks. Finally, an age-related associative deficit was found in Experiment 3, under both sequential and simultaneous presentation conditions. Even while accounting for some methodological issues, the associative deficit of older adults is evident in short-term/working memory.

  9. Monkeys have a limited form of short-term memory in audition

    PubMed Central

    Scott, Brian H.; Mishkin, Mortimer; Yin, Pingbo

    2012-01-01

    A stimulus trace may be temporarily retained either actively [i.e., in working memory (WM)] or by the weaker mnemonic process we will call passive short-term memory, in which a given stimulus trace is highly susceptible to “overwriting” by a subsequent stimulus. It has been suggested that WM is the more robust process because it exploits long-term memory (i.e., a current stimulus activates a stored representation of that stimulus, which can then be actively maintained). Recent studies have suggested that monkeys may be unable to store acoustic signals in long-term memory, raising the possibility that they may therefore also lack auditory WM. To explore this possibility, we tested rhesus monkeys on a serial delayed match-to-sample (DMS) task using a small set of sounds presented with ∼1-s interstimulus delays. Performance was accurate whenever a match or a nonmatch stimulus followed the sample directly, but it fell precipitously if a single nonmatch stimulus intervened between sample and match. The steep drop in accuracy was found to be due not to passive decay of the sample’s trace, but to retroactive interference from the intervening nonmatch stimulus. This “overwriting” effect was far greater than that observed previously in serial DMS with visual stimuli. The results, which accord with the notion that WM relies on long-term memory, indicate that monkeys perform serial DMS in audition remarkably poorly and that whatever success they had on this task depended largely, if not entirely, on the retention of stimulus traces in the passive form of short-term memory. PMID:22778411

  10. Predicting Next Year's Resources--Short-Term Enrollment Forecasting for Accurate Budget Planning. AIR Forum Paper 1978.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Salley, Charles D.

    Accurate enrollment forecasts are a prerequisite for reliable budget projections. This is because tuition payments make up a significant portion of a university's revenue, and anticipated revenue is the immediate constraint on current operating expenditures. Accurate forecasts are even more critical to revenue projections when a university's…

  11. Genetic deletion of melanin-concentrating hormone neurons impairs hippocampal short-term synaptic plasticity and hippocampal-dependent forms of short-term memory.

    PubMed

    Le Barillier, Léa; Léger, Lucienne; Luppi, Pierre-Hervé; Fort, Patrice; Malleret, Gaël; Salin, Paul-Antoine

    2015-11-01

    The cognitive role of melanin-concentrating hormone (MCH) neurons, a neuronal population located in the mammalian postero-lateral hypothalamus sending projections to all cortical areas, remains poorly understood. Mainly activated during paradoxical sleep (PS), MCH neurons have been implicated in sleep regulation. The genetic deletion of the only known MCH receptor in rodent leads to an impairment of hippocampal dependent forms of memory and to an alteration of hippocampal long-term synaptic plasticity. By using MCH/ataxin3 mice, a genetic model characterized by a selective deletion of MCH neurons in the adult, we investigated the role of MCH neurons in hippocampal synaptic plasticity and hippocampal-dependent forms of memory. MCH/ataxin3 mice exhibited a deficit in the early part of both long-term potentiation and depression in the CA1 area of the hippocampus. Post-tetanic potentiation (PTP) was diminished while synaptic depression induced by repetitive stimulation was enhanced suggesting an alteration of pre-synaptic forms of short-term plasticity in these mice. Behaviorally, MCH/ataxin3 mice spent more time and showed a higher level of hesitation as compared to their controls in performing a short-term memory T-maze task, displayed retardation in acquiring a reference memory task in a Morris water maze, and showed a habituation deficit in an open field task. Deletion of MCH neurons could thus alter spatial short-term memory by impairing short-term plasticity in the hippocampus. Altogether, these findings could provide a cellular mechanism by which PS may facilitate memory encoding. Via MCH neuron activation, PS could prepare the day's learning by increasing and modulating short-term synaptic plasticity in the hippocampus. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

  12. Robust short-term memory without synaptic learning.

    PubMed

    Johnson, Samuel; Marro, J; Torres, Joaquín J

    2013-01-01

    Short-term memory in the brain cannot in general be explained the way long-term memory can--as a gradual modification of synaptic weights--since it takes place too quickly. Theories based on some form of cellular bistability, however, do not seem able to account for the fact that noisy neurons can collectively store information in a robust manner. We show how a sufficiently clustered network of simple model neurons can be instantly induced into metastable states capable of retaining information for a short time (a few seconds). The mechanism is robust to different network topologies and kinds of neural model. This could constitute a viable means available to the brain for sensory and/or short-term memory with no need of synaptic learning. Relevant phenomena described by neurobiology and psychology, such as local synchronization of synaptic inputs and power-law statistics of forgetting avalanches, emerge naturally from this mechanism, and we suggest possible experiments to test its viability in more biological settings.

  13. Effect of local cooling on short-term, intense exercise.

    PubMed

    Kwon, Young S; Robergs, Robert A; Schneider, Suzanne M

    2013-07-01

    The widespread belief that local cooling impairs short-term, strenuous exercise performance is controversial. Eighteen original investigations involving cooling before and intermittent cooling during short-term, intensive exercise are summarized in this review. Previous literature examining short-term intensive exercise and local cooling primarily has been limited to the effects on muscle performance immediately or within minutes following cold application. Most previous cooling studies used equal and longer than 10 minutes of pre-cooling, and found that cooling reduced strength, performance and endurance. Because short duration, high intensity exercise requires adequate warm-up to prepare for optimal performance, prolonged pre-cooling is not an effective method to prepare for this type of exercise. The literature related to the effect of acute local cooling immediately before short duration, high intensity isotonic exercise such as weight lifting is limited. However, local intermittent cooling during short-term, high intense exercise may provide possible beneficial effects; first, by pain reduction, caused by an "irritation effect" from hand thermal receptors which block pain sensation, or second, by a cooling effect, whereby stimulation of hand thermal receptors or a slight lowering of blood temperature might alter central fatigue.

  14. Portable positive protection : a guide for short duration and short term work zones.

    DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

    2016-06-01

    Transportation agencies, contractors, researchers, and private vendors are actively looking for new methods and devices : to help make construction and maintenance work zones safer while maximizing mobility. Short-term and short-duration : work zones...

  15. Short-term versus long-term administration of single prophylactic antibiotic in elective gastric tumor surgery.

    PubMed

    Wang, Fang; Chen, Xin-Zu; Liu, Jie; Yang, Kun; Zhang, Bo; Chen, Zhi-Xin; Chen, Jia-Ping; Hu, Jian-Kun; Zhou, Zong-Guang; Mo, Xian-Min; Mo, Xian-Min

    2012-09-01

    To evaluate short-term versus long-term single prophylactic antibiotic for elective gastric tumor surgery. Patients in a single surgical team undergoing elective gastric tumor surgery were enrolled from November 2009 to December 2010. The included patients were aged from 18 to 70 years without conditions as severe comorbidity, preoperative infectious diseases, antibiotic administration 48 h before surgery, exploratory laparotomy only or combined colorectal resection, neoadjuvant chemotherapy, or steroid administration before surgery. The overall and infection-related postoperative complications and also economic outcomes were analyzed. The software SPSS 17.0 and TreeAge Pro 2007 were used for statistics. Patients (n=158 (45 vs. 113)) were enrolled in short-term and long-term groups. No death cases occurred. Overall postoperative complication rates were 8.9% and 8.0%, respectively (p=1.000). The rates of infection related complications were 8.9% and 4.4%, respectively (p=0.231). No surgical site infection (SSI) occurred in the short-term group, whereas SSI was 1.8% in the long-term group. Total hospitalization cost (THC) of short-term branch was 36,557RMB per patients and preferable against 39,523RMB of long-term branch. Incremental cost-effectiveness analysis showed there was a 10 times interval between the extra healthcare expenditure of benefit and harm. Short-term administration did not increase the risk of postoperative complications and was more cost-effective.

  16. Oxygenate Supply/Demand Balances in the Short-Term Integrated Forecasting Model (Short-Term Energy Outlook Supplement March 1998)

    EIA Publications

    1998-01-01

    The blending of oxygenates, such as fuel ethanol and methyl tertiary butyl ether (MTBE), into motor gasoline has increased dramatically in the last few years because of the oxygenated and reformulated gasoline programs. Because of the significant role oxygenates now have in petroleum product markets, the Short-Term Integrated Forecasting System (STIFS) was revised to include supply and demand balances for fuel ethanol and MTBE. The STIFS model is used for producing forecasts in the Short-Term Energy Outlook. A review of the historical data sources and forecasting methodology for oxygenate production, imports, inventories, and demand is presented in this report.

  17. Resting State Synchrony in Short-Term versus Long-Term Abstinent Alcoholics

    PubMed Central

    Camchong, Jazmin; Stenger, Victor Andrew; Fein, George

    2012-01-01

    BACKGROUND We previously reported that when compared to controls, long-term abstinent alcoholics (LTAA) have increased resting state synchrony (RSS) of the inhibitory control network and reduced synchrony of the appetitive drive network, and hypothesized that these levels of synchrony are adaptive, and support the behavioral changes required to maintain abstinence. In the current study, we investigate whether these RSS patterns can be identified in short-term abstinent alcoholics. METHODS Resting state functional magnetic resonance imaging data were collected from 27 short-term abstinent alcoholics (STAA), 23 LTAA and 23 non-substance abusing controls (NSAC). We examined baseline RSS using seed-based measures. RESULTS We found ordered RSS effects from NSAC to STAA and then to LTAA within both the appetitive drive and executive control networks: increasing RSS of the executive control network, and decreasing RSS of the reward processing network. Finally, we found significant correlations between strength of RSS in these networks and (a) cognitive flexibility and (b) current antisocial behavior. DISCUSSION Findings are consistent with an adaptive progression of RSS from short- to long-term abstinence so that, compared to normal controls, the synchrony (a) within the reward network progressively decreases and (b) within the executive control network progressively increases. PMID:23421812

  18. Reconciling long-term cultural diversity and short-term collective social behavior.

    PubMed

    Valori, Luca; Picciolo, Francesco; Allansdottir, Agnes; Garlaschelli, Diego

    2012-01-24

    An outstanding open problem is whether collective social phenomena occurring over short timescales can systematically reduce cultural heterogeneity in the long run, and whether offline and online human interactions contribute differently to the process. Theoretical models suggest that short-term collective behavior and long-term cultural diversity are mutually excluding, since they require very different levels of social influence. The latter jointly depends on two factors: the topology of the underlying social network and the overlap between individuals in multidimensional cultural space. However, while the empirical properties of social networks are intensively studied, little is known about the large-scale organization of real societies in cultural space, so that random input specifications are necessarily used in models. Here we use a large dataset to perform a high-dimensional analysis of the scientific beliefs of thousands of Europeans. We find that interopinion correlations determine a nontrivial ultrametric hierarchy of individuals in cultural space. When empirical data are used as inputs in models, ultrametricity has strong and counterintuitive effects. On short timescales, it facilitates a symmetry-breaking phase transition triggering coordinated social behavior. On long timescales, it suppresses cultural convergence by restricting it within disjoint groups. Moreover, ultrametricity implies that these results are surprisingly robust to modifications of the dynamical rules considered. Thus the empirical distribution of individuals in cultural space appears to systematically optimize the coexistence of short-term collective behavior and long-term cultural diversity, which can be realized simultaneously for the same moderate level of mutual influence in a diverse range of online and offline settings.

  19. Short-term Power Load Forecasting Based on Balanced KNN

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Lv, Xianlong; Cheng, Xingong; YanShuang; Tang, Yan-mei

    2018-03-01

    To improve the accuracy of load forecasting, a short-term load forecasting model based on balanced KNN algorithm is proposed; According to the load characteristics, the historical data of massive power load are divided into scenes by the K-means algorithm; In view of unbalanced load scenes, the balanced KNN algorithm is proposed to classify the scene accurately; The local weighted linear regression algorithm is used to fitting and predict the load; Adopting the Apache Hadoop programming framework of cloud computing, the proposed algorithm model is parallelized and improved to enhance its ability of dealing with massive and high-dimension data. The analysis of the household electricity consumption data for a residential district is done by 23-nodes cloud computing cluster, and experimental results show that the load forecasting accuracy and execution time by the proposed model are the better than those of traditional forecasting algorithm.

  20. Economic efficiency of short-term versus long-term water rights buyouts

    USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

    Because of the decline of the Ogallala Aquifer, water districts, regional water managers, and state water officers are becoming increasingly interested in conservation policies. This study evaluates both short-term and long-term water rights buyout policies. This research develops dynamic production...

  1. Brain oscillatory substrates of visual short-term memory capacity.

    PubMed

    Sauseng, Paul; Klimesch, Wolfgang; Heise, Kirstin F; Gruber, Walter R; Holz, Elisa; Karim, Ahmed A; Glennon, Mark; Gerloff, Christian; Birbaumer, Niels; Hummel, Friedhelm C

    2009-11-17

    The amount of information that can be stored in visual short-term memory is strictly limited to about four items. Therefore, memory capacity relies not only on the successful retention of relevant information but also on efficient suppression of distracting information, visual attention, and executive functions. However, completely separable neural signatures for these memory capacity-limiting factors remain to be identified. Because of its functional diversity, oscillatory brain activity may offer a utile solution. In the present study, we show that capacity-determining mechanisms, namely retention of relevant information and suppression of distracting information, are based on neural substrates independent of each other: the successful maintenance of relevant material in short-term memory is associated with cross-frequency phase synchronization between theta (rhythmical neural activity around 5 Hz) and gamma (> 50 Hz) oscillations at posterior parietal recording sites. On the other hand, electroencephalographic alpha activity (around 10 Hz) predicts memory capacity based on efficient suppression of irrelevant information in short-term memory. Moreover, repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation at alpha frequency can modulate short-term memory capacity by influencing the ability to suppress distracting information. Taken together, the current study provides evidence for a double dissociation of brain oscillatory correlates of visual short-term memory capacity.

  2. Impaired short-term memory for pitch in congenital amusia.

    PubMed

    Tillmann, Barbara; Lévêque, Yohana; Fornoni, Lesly; Albouy, Philippe; Caclin, Anne

    2016-06-01

    Congenital amusia is a neuro-developmental disorder of music perception and production. The hypothesis is that the musical deficits arise from altered pitch processing, with impairments in pitch discrimination (i.e., pitch change detection, pitch direction discrimination and identification) and short-term memory. The present review article focuses on the deficit of short-term memory for pitch. Overall, the data discussed here suggest impairments at each level of processing in short-term memory tasks; starting with the encoding of the pitch information and the creation of the adequate memory trace, the retention of the pitch traces over time as well as the recollection and comparison of the stored information with newly incoming information. These impairments have been related to altered brain responses in a distributed fronto-temporal network, associated with decreased connectivity between these structures, as well as in abnormalities in the connectivity between the two auditory cortices. In contrast, amusic participants׳ short-term memory abilities for verbal material are preserved. These findings show that short-term memory deficits in congenital amusia are specific to pitch, suggesting a pitch-memory system that is, at least partly, separated from verbal memory. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled SI: Auditory working memory. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

  3. Sleep Quality, Short-Term and Long-Term CPAP Adherence

    PubMed Central

    Somiah, Manya; Taxin, Zachary; Keating, Joseph; Mooney, Anne M.; Norman, Robert G.; Rapoport, David M.; Ayappa, Indu

    2012-01-01

    Study Objectives: Adherence to CPAP therapy is low in patients with obstructive sleep apnea/hypopnea syndrome (OSAHS). The purpose of the present study was to evaluate the utility of measures of sleep architecture and sleep continuity on the CPAP titration study as predictors of both short- and long-term CPAP adherence. Methods: 93 patients with OSAHS (RDI 42.8 ± 34.3/h) underwent in-laboratory diagnostic polysomnography, CPAP titration, and follow-up polysomnography (NPSG) on CPAP. Adherence to CPAP was objectively monitored. Short-term (ST) CPAP adherence was averaged over 14 days immediately following the titration study. Long-term (LT) CPAP adherence was obtained in 56/93 patients after approximately 2 months of CPAP use. Patients were grouped into CPAP adherence groups for ST (< 2 h, 2-4 h, and > 4 h) and LT adherence (< 4 h, > 4 h). Sleep architecture, sleep disordered breathing (SDB) indices, and daytime outcome variables from the diagnostic and titration NPSGs were compared between CPAP adherence groups. Results: There was a significant relationship between ST and LT CPAP adherence (r = 0.81, p < 0.001). Neither ST nor LT adherence were related to demographic variables, baseline severity of untreated SDB, sleep architecture, or measures of daytime impairment. Good CPAP adherence groups had significantly lower %N2 and greater %REM on the titration NPSG. A model combining change in sleep efficiency and change in sleep continuity between the diagnostic and titration NPSGs predicted 17% of the variance in LT adherence (p = 0.006). Conclusions: These findings demonstrate that characteristics of sleep architecture, even on the titration NPSG, may predict some of the variance in CPAP adherence. Better sleep quality on the titration night was related to better CPAP adherence, suggesting that interventions to improve sleep on/prior to the CPAP titration study might be used as a therapeutic intervention to improve CPAP adherence. Citation: Somiah M; Taxin Z; Keating

  4. Insensitivity of visual short-term memory to irrelevant visual information.

    PubMed

    Andrade, Jackie; Kemps, Eva; Werniers, Yves; May, Jon; Szmalec, Arnaud

    2002-07-01

    Several authors have hypothesized that visuo-spatial working memory is functionally analogous to verbal working memory. Irrelevant background speech impairs verbal short-term memory. We investigated whether irrelevant visual information has an analogous effect on visual short-term memory, using a dynamic visual noise (DVN) technique known to disrupt visual imagery (Quinn & McConnell, 1996b). Experiment I replicated the effect of DVN on pegword imagery. Experiments 2 and 3 showed no effect of DVN on recall of static matrix patterns, despite a significant effect of a concurrent spatial tapping task. Experiment 4 showed no effect of DVN on encoding or maintenance of arrays of matrix patterns, despite testing memory by a recognition procedure to encourage visual rather than spatial processing. Serial position curves showed a one-item recency effect typical of visual short-term memory. Experiment 5 showed no effect of DVN on short-term recognition of Chinese characters, despite effects of visual similarity and a concurrent colour memory task that confirmed visual processing of the characters. We conclude that irrelevant visual noise does not impair visual short-term memory. Visual working memory may not be functionally analogous to verbal working memory, and different cognitive processes may underlie visual short-term memory and visual imagery.

  5. Remembering over the short-term: the case against the standard model.

    PubMed

    Nairne, James S

    2002-01-01

    Psychologists often assume that short-term storage is synonymous with activation, a mnemonic property that keeps information in an immediately accessible form. Permanent knowledge is activated, as a result of on-line cognitive processing, and an activity trace is established "in" short-term (or working) memory. Activation is assumed to decay spontaneously with the passage of time, so a refreshing process-rehearsal-is needed to maintain availability. Most of the phenomena of immediate retention, such as capacity limitations and word length effects, are assumed to arise from trade-offs between rehearsal and decay. This "standard model" of how we remember over the short-term still enjoys considerable popularity, although recent research questions most of its main assumptions. In this chapter I review the recent research and identify the empirical and conceptual problems that plague traditional conceptions of short-term memory. Increasingly, researchers are recognizing that short-term retention is cue driven, much like long-term memory, and that neither rehearsal nor decay is likely to explain the particulars of short-term forgetting.

  6. Gummed-up memory: chewing gum impairs short-term recall.

    PubMed

    Kozlov, Michail D; Hughes, Robert W; Jones, Dylan M

    2012-01-01

    Several studies have suggested that short-term memory is generally improved by chewing gum. However, we report the first studies to show that chewing gum impairs short-term memory for both item order and item identity. Experiment 1 showed that chewing gum reduces serial recall of letter lists. Experiment 2 indicated that chewing does not simply disrupt vocal-articulatory planning required for order retention: Chewing equally impairs a matched task that required retention of list item identity. Experiment 3 demonstrated that manual tapping produces a similar pattern of impairment to that of chewing gum. These results clearly qualify the assertion that chewing gum improves short-term memory. They also pose a problem for short-term memory theories asserting that forgetting is based on domain-specific interference given that chewing does not interfere with verbal memory any more than tapping. It is suggested that tapping and chewing reduce the general capacity to process sequences.

  7. Estimating long-term multivariate progression from short-term data.

    PubMed

    Donohue, Michael C; Jacqmin-Gadda, Hélène; Le Goff, Mélanie; Thomas, Ronald G; Raman, Rema; Gamst, Anthony C; Beckett, Laurel A; Jack, Clifford R; Weiner, Michael W; Dartigues, Jean-François; Aisen, Paul S

    2014-10-01

    Diseases that progress slowly are often studied by observing cohorts at different stages of disease for short periods of time. The Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) follows elders with various degrees of cognitive impairment, from normal to impaired. The study includes a rich panel of novel cognitive tests, biomarkers, and brain images collected every 6 months for as long as 6 years. The relative timing of the observations with respect to disease pathology is unknown. We propose a general semiparametric model and iterative estimation procedure to estimate simultaneously the pathological timing and long-term growth curves. The resulting estimates of long-term progression are fine-tuned using cognitive trajectories derived from the long-term "Personnes Agées Quid" study. We demonstrate with simulations that the method can recover long-term disease trends from short-term observations. The method also estimates temporal ordering of individuals with respect to disease pathology, providing subject-specific prognostic estimates of the time until onset of symptoms. When the method is applied to ADNI data, the estimated growth curves are in general agreement with prevailing theories of the Alzheimer's disease cascade. Other data sets with common outcome measures can be combined using the proposed algorithm. Software to fit the model and reproduce results with the statistical software R is available as the grace package. ADNI data can be downloaded from the Laboratory of NeuroImaging. Copyright © 2014 The Alzheimer's Association. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  8. 47 CFR 1.9035 - Short-term de facto transfer leasing arrangements.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

    2011-10-01

    ... 47 Telecommunication 1 2011-10-01 2011-10-01 false Short-term de facto transfer leasing... PROCEDURE Spectrum Leasing General Policies and Procedures § 1.9035 Short-term de facto transfer leasing...) and a spectrum lessee may enter into a short-term de facto transfer leasing arrangement in which the...

  9. Retention interval affects visual short-term memory encoding.

    PubMed

    Bankó, Eva M; Vidnyánszky, Zoltán

    2010-03-01

    Humans can efficiently store fine-detailed facial emotional information in visual short-term memory for several seconds. However, an unresolved question is whether the same neural mechanisms underlie high-fidelity short-term memory for emotional expressions at different retention intervals. Here we show that retention interval affects the neural processes of short-term memory encoding using a delayed facial emotion discrimination task. The early sensory P100 component of the event-related potentials (ERP) was larger in the 1-s interstimulus interval (ISI) condition than in the 6-s ISI condition, whereas the face-specific N170 component was larger in the longer ISI condition. Furthermore, the memory-related late P3b component of the ERP responses was also modulated by retention interval: it was reduced in the 1-s ISI as compared with the 6-s condition. The present findings cannot be explained based on differences in sensory processing demands or overall task difficulty because there was no difference in the stimulus information and subjects' performance between the two different ISI conditions. These results reveal that encoding processes underlying high-precision short-term memory for facial emotional expressions are modulated depending on whether information has to be stored for one or for several seconds.

  10. Ethnicity-specific birthweight distributions improve identification of term newborns at risk for short-term morbidity.

    PubMed

    Hanley, Gillian E; Janssen, Patricia A

    2013-11-01

    We aimed to determine whether ethnicity-specific birthweight distributions more accurately identify newborns at risk for short-term neonatal morbidity associated with small for gestational age (SGA) birth than population-based distributions not stratified on ethnicity. We examined 100,463 singleton term infants born to parents in Washington State between Jan. 1, 2006, and Dec. 31, 2008. Using multivariable logistic regression models, we compared the ability of an ethnicity-specific growth distribution and a population-based growth distribution to predict which infants were at increased risk for Apgar score <7 at 5 minutes, admission to the neonatal intensive care unit, ventilation, extended length of stay in hospital, hypothermia, hypoglycemia, and infection. Newborns considered SGA by ethnicity-specific weight distributions had the highest rates of each of the adverse outcomes assessed-more than double those of infants only considered SGA by the population-based standards. When controlling for mother's age, parity, body mass index, education, gestational age, mode of delivery, and marital status, newborns considered SGA by ethnicity-specific birthweight distributions were between 2 and 7 times more likely to suffer from the adverse outcomes listed above than infants who were not SGA. In contrast, newborns considered SGA by population-based birthweight distributions alone were at no higher risk of any adverse outcome except hypothermia (adjusted odds ratio, 2.76; 95% confidence interval, 1.68-4.55) and neonatal intensive care unit admission (adjusted odds ratio, 1.40; 95% confidence interval, 1.18-1.67). Ethnicity-specific birthweight distributions were significantly better at identifying the infants at higher risk of short-term neonatal morbidity, suggesting that their use could save resources and unnecessary parental anxiety. Copyright © 2013 Mosby, Inc. All rights reserved.

  11. Short-term hot hardness characteristics of rolling-element steels

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Chevalier, J. L.; Dietrich, M. W.; Zaretsky, E. V.

    1972-01-01

    Short-term hot hardness studies were performed with five vacuum-melted steels at temperatures from 294 to 887 K (70 to 1140 F). Based upon a minimum Rockwell C hardness of 58, the temperature limitation on all materials studied was dependent on the initial room temperature hardness and the tempering temperature of each material. For the same room temperature hardness, the short-term hot hardness characteristics were identical and independent of material composition. An equation was developed to predict the short-term hardness at temperature as a function of initial room temperature hardness for AISI 52100, as well as the high-speed tool steels.

  12. A Revised Model of Short-Term Memory and Long-Term Learning of Verbal Sequences

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Burgess, Neil; Hitch, Graham J.

    2006-01-01

    The interaction between short- and long-term memory is studied within a model in which phonemic and (temporal) contextual information have separate influences on immediate verbal serial recall via connections with short- and long-term plasticity [Burgess, N., & Hitch, G.J. (1999). Memory for serial order: a network model of the phonological loop…

  13. Language repetition and short-term memory: an integrative framework.

    PubMed

    Majerus, Steve

    2013-01-01

    Short-term maintenance of verbal information is a core factor of language repetition, especially when reproducing multiple or unfamiliar stimuli. Many models of language processing locate the verbal short-term maintenance function in the left posterior superior temporo-parietal area and its connections with the inferior frontal gyrus. However, research in the field of short-term memory has implicated bilateral fronto-parietal networks, involved in attention and serial order processing, as being critical for the maintenance and reproduction of verbal sequences. We present here an integrative framework aimed at bridging research in the language processing and short-term memory fields. This framework considers verbal short-term maintenance as an emergent function resulting from synchronized and integrated activation in dorsal and ventral language processing networks as well as fronto-parietal attention and serial order processing networks. To-be-maintained item representations are temporarily activated in the dorsal and ventral language processing networks, novel phoneme and word serial order information is proposed to be maintained via a right fronto-parietal serial order processing network, and activation in these different networks is proposed to be coordinated and maintained via a left fronto-parietal attention processing network. This framework provides new perspectives for our understanding of information maintenance at the non-word-, word- and sentence-level as well as of verbal maintenance deficits in case of brain injury.

  14. Language repetition and short-term memory: an integrative framework

    PubMed Central

    Majerus, Steve

    2013-01-01

    Short-term maintenance of verbal information is a core factor of language repetition, especially when reproducing multiple or unfamiliar stimuli. Many models of language processing locate the verbal short-term maintenance function in the left posterior superior temporo-parietal area and its connections with the inferior frontal gyrus. However, research in the field of short-term memory has implicated bilateral fronto-parietal networks, involved in attention and serial order processing, as being critical for the maintenance and reproduction of verbal sequences. We present here an integrative framework aimed at bridging research in the language processing and short-term memory fields. This framework considers verbal short-term maintenance as an emergent function resulting from synchronized and integrated activation in dorsal and ventral language processing networks as well as fronto-parietal attention and serial order processing networks. To-be-maintained item representations are temporarily activated in the dorsal and ventral language processing networks, novel phoneme and word serial order information is proposed to be maintained via a right fronto-parietal serial order processing network, and activation in these different networks is proposed to be coordinated and maintained via a left fronto-parietal attention processing network. This framework provides new perspectives for our understanding of information maintenance at the non-word-, word- and sentence-level as well as of verbal maintenance deficits in case of brain injury. PMID:23874280

  15. Verbal short-term memory and vocabulary learning in polyglots.

    PubMed

    Papagno, C; Vallar, G

    1995-02-01

    Polyglot and non-polyglot Italian subjects were given tests assessing verbal (phonological) and visuo-spatial short-term and long-term memory, general intelligence, and vocabulary knowledge in their native language. Polyglots had a superior level of performance in verbal short-term memory tasks (auditory digit span and nonword repetition) and in a paired-associate learning test, which assessed the subjects' ability to acquire new (Russian) words. By contrast, the two groups had comparable performance levels in tasks assessing general intelligence, visuo-spatial short-term memory and learning, and paired-associate learning of Italian words. These findings, which are in line with neuropsychological and developmental evidence, as well as with data from normal subjects, suggest a close relationship between the capacity of phonological memory and the acquisition of foreign languages.

  16. Rapid effects of estrogens on short-term memory: Possible mechanisms.

    PubMed

    Paletta, Pietro; Sheppard, Paul A S; Matta, Richard; Ervin, Kelsy S J; Choleris, Elena

    2018-06-01

    Estrogens affect learning and memory through rapid and delayed mechanisms. Here we review studies on rapid effects on short-term memory. Estradiol rapidly improves social and object recognition memory, spatial memory, and social learning when administered systemically. The dorsal hippocampus mediates estrogen rapid facilitation of object, social and spatial short-term memory. The medial amygdala mediates rapid facilitation of social recognition. The three estrogen receptors, α (ERα), β (ERβ) and the G-protein coupled estrogen receptor (GPER) appear to play different roles depending on the task and brain region. Both ERα and GPER agonists rapidly facilitate short-term social and object recognition and spatial memory when administered systemically or into the dorsal hippocampus and facilitate social recognition in the medial amygdala. Conversely, only GPER can facilitate social learning after systemic treatment and an ERβ agonist only rapidly improved short-term spatial memory when given systemically or into the hippocampus, but also facilitates social recognition in the medial amygdala. Investigations into the mechanisms behind estrogens' rapid effects on short term memory showed an involvement of the extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK) and the phosphoinositide 3-kinase (PI3K) kinase pathways. Recent evidence also showed that estrogens interact with the neuropeptide oxytocin in rapidly facilitating social recognition. Estrogens can increase the production and/or release of oxytocin and other neurotransmitters, such as dopamine and acetylcholine. Therefore, it is possible that estrogens' rapid effects on short-term memory may occur through the regulation of various neurotransmitters, although more research is need on these interactions as well as the mechanisms of estrogens' actions on short-term memory. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  17. Real-time anomaly detection for very short-term load forecasting

    DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

    Luo, Jian; Hong, Tao; Yue, Meng

    Although the recent load information is critical to very short-term load forecasting (VSTLF), power companies often have difficulties in collecting the most recent load values accurately and timely for VSTLF applications. This paper tackles the problem of real-time anomaly detection in most recent load information used by VSTLF. This paper proposes a model-based anomaly detection method that consists of two components, a dynamic regression model and an adaptive anomaly threshold. The case study is developed using the data from ISO New England. This paper demonstrates that the proposed method significantly outperforms three other anomaly detection methods including two methods commonlymore » used in the field and one state-of-the-art method used by a winning team of the Global Energy Forecasting Competition 2014. Lastly, a general anomaly detection framework is proposed for the future research.« less

  18. Real-time anomaly detection for very short-term load forecasting

    DOE PAGES

    Luo, Jian; Hong, Tao; Yue, Meng

    2018-01-06

    Although the recent load information is critical to very short-term load forecasting (VSTLF), power companies often have difficulties in collecting the most recent load values accurately and timely for VSTLF applications. This paper tackles the problem of real-time anomaly detection in most recent load information used by VSTLF. This paper proposes a model-based anomaly detection method that consists of two components, a dynamic regression model and an adaptive anomaly threshold. The case study is developed using the data from ISO New England. This paper demonstrates that the proposed method significantly outperforms three other anomaly detection methods including two methods commonlymore » used in the field and one state-of-the-art method used by a winning team of the Global Energy Forecasting Competition 2014. Lastly, a general anomaly detection framework is proposed for the future research.« less

  19. Monkey Visual Short-Term Memory Directly Compared to Humans

    PubMed Central

    Elmore, L. Caitlin; Wright, Anthony A.

    2015-01-01

    Two adult rhesus monkeys were trained to detect which item in an array of memory items had changed using the same stimuli, viewing times, and delays as used with humans. Although the monkeys were extensively trained, they were less accurate than humans with the same array sizes (2, 4, & 6 items), with both stimulus types (colored squares, clip art), and showed calculated memory capacities of about one item (or less). Nevertheless, the memory results from both monkeys and humans for both stimulus types were well characterized by the inverse power-law of display size. This characterization provides a simple and straightforward summary of a fundamental process of visual short-term memory (how VSTM declines with memory load) that emphasizes species similarities based upon similar functional relationships. By more closely matching of monkey testing parameters to those of humans, the similar functional relationships strengthen the evidence suggesting similar processes underlying monkey and human VSTM. PMID:25706544

  20. Short-term and long-term attentional biases to frequently encountered target features.

    PubMed

    Sha, Li Z; Remington, Roger W; Jiang, Yuhong V

    2017-07-01

    It has long been known that frequently occurring targets are attended better than infrequent ones in visual search. But does this frequency-based attentional prioritization reflect momentary or durable changes in attention? Here we observed both short-term and long-term attentional biases for visual features as a function of different types of statistical associations between the targets, distractors, and features. Participants searched for a target, a line oriented horizontally or vertically among diagonal distractors, and reported its length. In one set of experiments we manipulated the target's color probability: Targets were more often in Color 1 than in Color 2. The distractors were in other colors. Participants found Color 1 targets more quickly than Color 2 targets, but this preference disappeared immediately when the target's color became random in the subsequent testing phase. In the other set of experiments, we manipulated the diagnostic values of the two colors: Color 1 was more often a target than a distractor; Color 2 was more often a distractor than a target. Participants found Color 1 targets more quickly than Color 2 targets. Importantly, and in contrast to the first set of experiments, the featural preference was sustained in the testing phase. These results suggest that short-term and long-term attentional biases are products of different statistical information. Finding a target momentarily activates its features, inducing short-term repetition priming. Long-term changes in attention, on the other hand, may rely on learning diagnostic features of the targets.

  1. Business Students' Choice of Short-Term or Long-Term Study Abroad Opportunities

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Fitzsimmons, Stacey R.; Flanagan, David J.; Wang, Xiaodan

    2013-01-01

    Recent years have seen a proliferation of short-term study abroad opportunities. Although they are both supplementing and replacing semester-long study abroad programs, research has focused primarily on semester (long-term) programs. We draw on the theory of planned behavior (TPB) to explore factors that predict why students choose long-term and…

  2. The Relationships among Verbal Short-Term Memory, Phonological Awareness, and New Word Learning: Evidence from Typical Development and Down Syndrome

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Jarrold, Christopher; Thorn, Annabel S. C.; Stephens, Emma

    2009-01-01

    This study examined the correlates of new word learning in a sample of 64 typically developing children between 5 and 8 years of age and a group of 22 teenagers and young adults with Down syndrome. Verbal short-term memory and phonological awareness skills were assessed to determine whether learning new words involved accurately representing…

  3. 34 CFR 390.1 - What is the Rehabilitation Short-Term Training program?

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

    2012-07-01

    ... 34 Education 2 2012-07-01 2012-07-01 false What is the Rehabilitation Short-Term Training program...-TERM TRAINING General § 390.1 What is the Rehabilitation Short-Term Training program? This program is designed for the support of special seminars, institutes, workshops, and other short-term courses in...

  4. 34 CFR 390.1 - What is the Rehabilitation Short-Term Training program?

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

    2014-07-01

    ... 34 Education 2 2014-07-01 2013-07-01 true What is the Rehabilitation Short-Term Training program...-TERM TRAINING General § 390.1 What is the Rehabilitation Short-Term Training program? This program is designed for the support of special seminars, institutes, workshops, and other short-term courses in...

  5. 34 CFR 390.1 - What is the Rehabilitation Short-Term Training program?

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

    2010-07-01

    ... 34 Education 2 2010-07-01 2010-07-01 false What is the Rehabilitation Short-Term Training program...-TERM TRAINING General § 390.1 What is the Rehabilitation Short-Term Training program? This program is designed for the support of special seminars, institutes, workshops, and other short-term courses in...

  6. 34 CFR 390.1 - What is the Rehabilitation Short-Term Training program?

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

    2011-07-01

    ... 34 Education 2 2011-07-01 2010-07-01 true What is the Rehabilitation Short-Term Training program...-TERM TRAINING General § 390.1 What is the Rehabilitation Short-Term Training program? This program is designed for the support of special seminars, institutes, workshops, and other short-term courses in...

  7. 34 CFR 390.1 - What is the Rehabilitation Short-Term Training program?

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

    2013-07-01

    ... 34 Education 2 2013-07-01 2013-07-01 false What is the Rehabilitation Short-Term Training program...-TERM TRAINING General § 390.1 What is the Rehabilitation Short-Term Training program? This program is designed for the support of special seminars, institutes, workshops, and other short-term courses in...

  8. 2-arachidonoylglycerol signaling impairs short-term fear extinction

    PubMed Central

    Hartley, N D; Gunduz-Cinar, O; Halladay, L; Bukalo, O; Holmes, A; Patel, S

    2016-01-01

    Impairments in fear extinction are thought to be central to the psychopathology of posttraumatic stress disorder, and endocannabinoid (eCB) signaling has been strongly implicated in extinction learning. Here we utilized the monoacylglycerol lipase inhibitor JZL184 to selectively augment brain 2-AG levels combined with an auditory cue fear-conditioning paradigm to test the hypothesis that 2-AG-mediated eCB signaling modulates short-term fear extinction learning in mice. We show that systemic JZL184 impairs short-term extinction learning in a CB1 receptor-dependent manner without affecting non-specific freezing behavior or the acquisition of conditioned fear. This effect was also observed in over-conditioned mice environmentally manipulated to re-acquire fear extinction. Cumulatively, the effects of JZL184 appear to be partly due to augmentation of 2-AG signaling in the basolateral nucleus of the amygdala (BLA), as direct microinfusion of JZL184 into the BLA produced similar results. Moreover, we elucidate a short ~3-day temporal window during which 2-AG augmentation impairs extinction behavior, suggesting a preferential role for 2-AG-mediated eCB signaling in the modulation of short-term behavioral sequelae to acute traumatic stress exposure. PMID:26926885

  9. Forecasting stock return volatility: A comparison between the roles of short-term and long-term leverage effects

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Pan, Zhiyuan; Liu, Li

    2018-02-01

    In this paper, we extend the GARCH-MIDAS model proposed by Engle et al. (2013) to account for the leverage effect in short-term and long-term volatility components. Our in-sample evidence suggests that both short-term and long-term negative returns can cause higher future volatility than positive returns. Out-of-sample results show that the predictive ability of GARCH-MIDAS is significantly improved after taking the leverage effect into account. The leverage effect for short-term volatility component plays more important role than the leverage effect for long-term volatility component in affecting out-of-sample forecasting performance.

  10. Auditory short-term memory activation during score reading.

    PubMed

    Simoens, Veerle L; Tervaniemi, Mari

    2013-01-01

    Performing music on the basis of reading a score requires reading ahead of what is being played in order to anticipate the necessary actions to produce the notes. Score reading thus not only involves the decoding of a visual score and the comparison to the auditory feedback, but also short-term storage of the musical information due to the delay of the auditory feedback during reading ahead. This study investigates the mechanisms of encoding of musical information in short-term memory during such a complicated procedure. There were three parts in this study. First, professional musicians participated in an electroencephalographic (EEG) experiment to study the slow wave potentials during a time interval of short-term memory storage in a situation that requires cross-modal translation and short-term storage of visual material to be compared with delayed auditory material, as it is the case in music score reading. This delayed visual-to-auditory matching task was compared with delayed visual-visual and auditory-auditory matching tasks in terms of EEG topography and voltage amplitudes. Second, an additional behavioural experiment was performed to determine which type of distractor would be the most interfering with the score reading-like task. Third, the self-reported strategies of the participants were also analyzed. All three parts of this study point towards the same conclusion according to which during music score reading, the musician most likely first translates the visual score into an auditory cue, probably starting around 700 or 1300 ms, ready for storage and delayed comparison with the auditory feedback.

  11. Auditory Short-Term Memory Activation during Score Reading

    PubMed Central

    Simoens, Veerle L.; Tervaniemi, Mari

    2013-01-01

    Performing music on the basis of reading a score requires reading ahead of what is being played in order to anticipate the necessary actions to produce the notes. Score reading thus not only involves the decoding of a visual score and the comparison to the auditory feedback, but also short-term storage of the musical information due to the delay of the auditory feedback during reading ahead. This study investigates the mechanisms of encoding of musical information in short-term memory during such a complicated procedure. There were three parts in this study. First, professional musicians participated in an electroencephalographic (EEG) experiment to study the slow wave potentials during a time interval of short-term memory storage in a situation that requires cross-modal translation and short-term storage of visual material to be compared with delayed auditory material, as it is the case in music score reading. This delayed visual-to-auditory matching task was compared with delayed visual-visual and auditory-auditory matching tasks in terms of EEG topography and voltage amplitudes. Second, an additional behavioural experiment was performed to determine which type of distractor would be the most interfering with the score reading-like task. Third, the self-reported strategies of the participants were also analyzed. All three parts of this study point towards the same conclusion according to which during music score reading, the musician most likely first translates the visual score into an auditory cue, probably starting around 700 or 1300 ms, ready for storage and delayed comparison with the auditory feedback. PMID:23326487

  12. Short-term and working memory impairments in aphasia.

    PubMed

    Potagas, Constantin; Kasselimis, Dimitrios; Evdokimidis, Ioannis

    2011-08-01

    The aim of the present study is to investigate short-term memory and working memory deficits in aphasics in relation to the severity of their language impairment. Fifty-eight aphasic patients participated in this study. Based on language assessment, an aphasia score was calculated for each patient. Memory was assessed in two modalities, verbal and spatial. Mean scores for all memory tasks were lower than normal. Aphasia score was significantly correlated with performance on all memory tasks. Correlation coefficients for short-term memory and working memory were approximately of the same magnitude. According to our findings, severity of aphasia is related with both verbal and spatial memory deficits. Moreover, while aphasia score correlated with lower scores in both short-term memory and working memory tasks, the lack of substantial difference between corresponding correlation coefficients suggests a possible primary deficit in information retention rather than impairment in working memory. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  13. Intelligence as a predictor of outcome in short- and long-term psychotherapy.

    PubMed

    Knekt, Paul; Saari, Taru; Lindfors, Olavi

    2014-12-30

    Intelligence has been suggested as a suitability factor for short-term therapy whereas its possible effect on short-term versus long-term therapy still is unknown. The aim of this study was to compare the prediction of intelligence on the level of psychiatric symptoms and psychosocial functioning in psychotherapies of different lengths. A total of 251 outpatients from the Helsinki Psychotherapy Study, aged 20–46 years, and suffering from mood or anxiety disorders were allocated to two long-term and two short-term therapies. Intelligence was assessed at baseline with the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS-R). Psychiatric symptoms and psychosocial functioning were assessed 5–10 times during a 5-year follow-up using two primary symptom measures (HDRS and HARS) and one primary measure of psychosocial functioning (GAF). Short-term therapy was more effective than long-term therapy during the first year of follow-up. During the second to fourth follow-up year no differences between short- and long-term therapies or the intelligence groups were found. At the fifth follow-up year, however, long-term psychotherapy showed a statistically significantly larger change in all three primary measures compared to short-term therapy among those with higher intelligence. No differences between therapy groups were noted in those with lower intelligence. People with higher intelligence may benefit more from long-term than from short-term psychotherapy. These findings should be confirmed.

  14. Cardioprotective Signature of Short-Term Caloric Restriction

    PubMed Central

    Isserlin, Ruth; Arab, Sara; Momen, Abdul; Cheng, Henry S.; Wu, Jun; Afroze, Talat; Li, Ren-Ke; Fish, Jason E.; Bader, Gary D.; Husain, Mansoor

    2015-01-01

    Objective To understand the molecular pathways underlying the cardiac preconditioning effect of short-term caloric restriction (CR). Background Lifelong CR has been suggested to reduce the incidence of cardiovascular disease through a variety of mechanisms. However, prolonged adherence to a CR life-style is difficult. Here we reveal the pathways that are modulated by short-term CR, which are associated with protection of the mouse heart from ischemia. Methods Male 10-12 wk old C57bl/6 mice were randomly assigned to an ad libitum (AL) diet with free access to regular chow, or CR, receiving 30% less food for 7 days (d), prior to myocardial infarction (MI) via permanent coronary ligation. At d8, the left ventricles (LV) of AL and CR mice were collected for Western blot, mRNA and microRNA (miR) analyses to identify cardioprotective gene expression signatures. In separate groups, infarct size, cardiac hemodynamics and protein abundance of caspase 3 was measured at d2 post-MI. Results This short-term model of CR was associated with cardio-protection, as evidenced by decreased infarct size (18.5±2.4% vs. 26.6±1.7%, N=10/group; P=0.01). mRNA and miR profiles pre-MI (N=5/group) identified genes modulated by short-term CR to be associated with circadian clock, oxidative stress, immune function, apoptosis, metabolism, angiogenesis, cytoskeleton and extracellular matrix (ECM). Western blots pre-MI revealed CR-associated increases in phosphorylated Akt and GSK3ß, reduced levels of phosphorylated AMPK and mitochondrial related proteins PGC-1α, cytochrome C and cyclooxygenase (COX) IV, with no differences in the levels of phosphorylated eNOS or MAPK (ERK1/2; p38). CR regimen was also associated with reduced protein abundance of cleaved caspase 3 in the infarcted heart and improved cardiac function. PMID:26098549

  15. The stability of the international oil trade network from short-term and long-term perspectives

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Sun, Qingru; Gao, Xiangyun; Zhong, Weiqiong; Liu, Nairong

    2017-09-01

    To examine the stability of the international oil trade network and explore the influence of countries and trade relationships on the trade stability, we construct weighted and unweighted international oil trade networks based on complex network theory using oil trading data between countries from 1996 to 2014. We analyze the stability of international oil trade network (IOTN) from short-term and long-term aspects. From the short-term perspective, we find that the trade volumes play an important role on the stability. Moreover, the weighted IOTN is stable; however, the unweighted networks can better reflect the actual evolution of IOTN. From the long-term perspective, we identify trade relationships that are maintained during the whole sample period to reveal the situation of the whole international oil trade. We provide a way to quantitatively measure the stability of complex network from short-term and long-term perspectives, which can be applied to measure and analyze trade stability of other goods or services.

  16. Short and long-term energy intake patterns and their implications for human body weight regulation.

    PubMed

    Chow, Carson C; Hall, Kevin D

    2014-07-01

    Adults consume millions of kilocalories over the course of a few years, but the typical weight gain amounts to only a few thousand kilocalories of stored energy. Furthermore, food intake is highly variable from day to day and yet body weight is remarkably stable. These facts have been used as evidence to support the hypothesis that human body weight is regulated by active control of food intake operating on both short and long time scales. Here, we demonstrate that active control of human food intake on short time scales is not required for body weight stability and that the current evidence for long term control of food intake is equivocal. To provide more data on this issue, we emphasize the urgent need for developing new methods for accurately measuring energy intake changes over long time scales. We propose that repeated body weight measurements can be used along with mathematical modeling to calculate long-term changes in energy intake and thereby quantify adherence to a diet intervention and provide dynamic feedback to individuals that seek to control their body weight. Published by Elsevier Inc.

  17. Short and long-term energy intake patterns and their implications for human body weight regulation

    PubMed Central

    Chow, Carson C.; Hall, Kevin D.

    2014-01-01

    Adults consume millions of kilocalories over the course of a few years, but the typical weight gain amounts to only a few thousand kilocalories of stored energy. Furthermore, food intake is highly variable from day to day and yet body weight is remarkably stable. These facts have been used as evidence to support the hypothesis that human body weight is regulated by active control of food intake operating on both short and long time scales. Here, we demonstrate that active control of human food intake on short time scales is not required for body weight stability and that the current evidence for long term control of food intake is equivocal. To provide more data on this issue, we emphasize the urgent need for developing new methods for accurately measuring energy intake changes over long time scales. We propose that repeated body weight measurements can be used along with mathematical modeling to calculate long-term changes in energy intake and thereby quantify adherence to a diet intervention and provide dynamic feedback to individuals that seek to control their body weight. PMID:24582679

  18. Of trophies and pillars: exploring the terror management functions of short-term and long-term relationship partners.

    PubMed

    Kosloff, Spee; Greenberg, Jeff; Sullivan, Daniel; Weise, David

    2010-08-01

    Prior terror management research shows that mortality salience (MS) motivates both self-esteem striving and worldview bolstering. The present research examined these processes in the context of dating preferences. It was hypothesized that in short-term romantic contexts, MS-induced self-esteem striving motivates interest in dating a physically attractive other, whereas in long-term romantic contexts, MS-induced motives for worldview validation heighten interest in dating a same-religion other. Study 1 showed that in a short-term dating context, MS increased preference for an attractive but religiously dissimilar person, whereas in a long-term dating context, MS increased preference for a religiously similar, less attractive person. Study 2 clarified that MS motivates preference for attractive short-term partners for their self-enhancing properties rather than their potential sexual availability. Study 3 supported the theorized processes, showing that under MS, self-esteem-relevant constructs became spontaneously accessible in short-term dating contexts, whereas worldview-relevant constructs became spontaneously accessible in long-term dating contexts.

  19. Genometa--a fast and accurate classifier for short metagenomic shotgun reads.

    PubMed

    Davenport, Colin F; Neugebauer, Jens; Beckmann, Nils; Friedrich, Benedikt; Kameri, Burim; Kokott, Svea; Paetow, Malte; Siekmann, Björn; Wieding-Drewes, Matthias; Wienhöfer, Markus; Wolf, Stefan; Tümmler, Burkhard; Ahlers, Volker; Sprengel, Frauke

    2012-01-01

    Metagenomic studies use high-throughput sequence data to investigate microbial communities in situ. However, considerable challenges remain in the analysis of these data, particularly with regard to speed and reliable analysis of microbial species as opposed to higher level taxa such as phyla. We here present Genometa, a computationally undemanding graphical user interface program that enables identification of bacterial species and gene content from datasets generated by inexpensive high-throughput short read sequencing technologies. Our approach was first verified on two simulated metagenomic short read datasets, detecting 100% and 94% of the bacterial species included with few false positives or false negatives. Subsequent comparative benchmarking analysis against three popular metagenomic algorithms on an Illumina human gut dataset revealed Genometa to attribute the most reads to bacteria at species level (i.e. including all strains of that species) and demonstrate similar or better accuracy than the other programs. Lastly, speed was demonstrated to be many times that of BLAST due to the use of modern short read aligners. Our method is highly accurate if bacteria in the sample are represented by genomes in the reference sequence but cannot find species absent from the reference. This method is one of the most user-friendly and resource efficient approaches and is thus feasible for rapidly analysing millions of short reads on a personal computer. The Genometa program, a step by step tutorial and Java source code are freely available from http://genomics1.mh-hannover.de/genometa/ and on http://code.google.com/p/genometa/. This program has been tested on Ubuntu Linux and Windows XP/7.

  20. Holding multiple items in short term memory: a neural mechanism.

    PubMed

    Rolls, Edmund T; Dempere-Marco, Laura; Deco, Gustavo

    2013-01-01

    Human short term memory has a capacity of several items maintained simultaneously. We show how the number of short term memory representations that an attractor network modeling a cortical local network can simultaneously maintain active is increased by using synaptic facilitation of the type found in the prefrontal cortex. We have been able to maintain 9 short term memories active simultaneously in integrate-and-fire simulations where the proportion of neurons in each population, the sparseness, is 0.1, and have confirmed the stability of such a system with mean field analyses. Without synaptic facilitation the system can maintain many fewer memories active in the same network. The system operates because of the effectively increased synaptic strengths formed by the synaptic facilitation just for those pools to which the cue is applied, and then maintenance of this synaptic facilitation in just those pools when the cue is removed by the continuing neuronal firing in those pools. The findings have implications for understanding how several items can be maintained simultaneously in short term memory, how this may be relevant to the implementation of language in the brain, and suggest new approaches to understanding and treating the decline in short term memory that can occur with normal aging.

  1. Holding Multiple Items in Short Term Memory: A Neural Mechanism

    PubMed Central

    Rolls, Edmund T.; Dempere-Marco, Laura; Deco, Gustavo

    2013-01-01

    Human short term memory has a capacity of several items maintained simultaneously. We show how the number of short term memory representations that an attractor network modeling a cortical local network can simultaneously maintain active is increased by using synaptic facilitation of the type found in the prefrontal cortex. We have been able to maintain 9 short term memories active simultaneously in integrate-and-fire simulations where the proportion of neurons in each population, the sparseness, is 0.1, and have confirmed the stability of such a system with mean field analyses. Without synaptic facilitation the system can maintain many fewer memories active in the same network. The system operates because of the effectively increased synaptic strengths formed by the synaptic facilitation just for those pools to which the cue is applied, and then maintenance of this synaptic facilitation in just those pools when the cue is removed by the continuing neuronal firing in those pools. The findings have implications for understanding how several items can be maintained simultaneously in short term memory, how this may be relevant to the implementation of language in the brain, and suggest new approaches to understanding and treating the decline in short term memory that can occur with normal aging. PMID:23613789

  2. Job satisfaction and short-term sickness absence among Dutch workers.

    PubMed

    Notenbomer, Annette; Roelen, Corné A M; Groothoff, Johan W

    2006-06-01

    Sickness absence is a considerable economic and social problem. Short-term sickness absence is known to be associated with behavioural attitudes. The correlation between sickness absence and job satisfaction has been studied infrequently and with contradictory results. This study investigated the correlation between short-term sickness absence and both global and specific job satisfaction. We defined short-term sickness absence as spells of up to 42 days. A random sample of 898 Dutch workers from a variety of economic sectors and companies received a self-report questionnaire on their first day of sick leave. The questionnaire measured global and specific job satisfaction. In our regression analysis, we controlled for the confounding factors of age, gender, educational level, perceived workload, job autonomy and decision latitude. The duration of an absence spell was defined as the amount of calendar days between sick leave and return to work. Global job satisfaction did not correlate significantly with the duration of short-term sickness absence. While increasing physical job demands predicted longer absence, increasing job autonomy and educational level predicted shorter absence. Satisfaction with colleagues predicted longer duration absence. Global job satisfaction did not correlate with the duration of short-term absence spells, but specific satisfaction with colleagues was associated with longer sickness spells.

  3. Short-term forecasting of electric loads using nonlinear autoregressive artificial neural networks with exogenous vector inputs

    DOE PAGES

    Buitrago, Jaime; Asfour, Shihab

    2017-01-01

    Short-term load forecasting is crucial for the operations planning of an electrical grid. Forecasting the next 24 h of electrical load in a grid allows operators to plan and optimize their resources. The purpose of this study is to develop a more accurate short-term load forecasting method utilizing non-linear autoregressive artificial neural networks (ANN) with exogenous multi-variable input (NARX). The proposed implementation of the network is new: the neural network is trained in open-loop using actual load and weather data, and then, the network is placed in closed-loop to generate a forecast using the predicted load as the feedback input.more » Unlike the existing short-term load forecasting methods using ANNs, the proposed method uses its own output as the input in order to improve the accuracy, thus effectively implementing a feedback loop for the load, making it less dependent on external data. Using the proposed framework, mean absolute percent errors in the forecast in the order of 1% have been achieved, which is a 30% improvement on the average error using feedforward ANNs, ARMAX and state space methods, which can result in large savings by avoiding commissioning of unnecessary power plants. Finally, the New England electrical load data are used to train and validate the forecast prediction.« less

  4. Short-term forecasting of electric loads using nonlinear autoregressive artificial neural networks with exogenous vector inputs

    DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

    Buitrago, Jaime; Asfour, Shihab

    Short-term load forecasting is crucial for the operations planning of an electrical grid. Forecasting the next 24 h of electrical load in a grid allows operators to plan and optimize their resources. The purpose of this study is to develop a more accurate short-term load forecasting method utilizing non-linear autoregressive artificial neural networks (ANN) with exogenous multi-variable input (NARX). The proposed implementation of the network is new: the neural network is trained in open-loop using actual load and weather data, and then, the network is placed in closed-loop to generate a forecast using the predicted load as the feedback input.more » Unlike the existing short-term load forecasting methods using ANNs, the proposed method uses its own output as the input in order to improve the accuracy, thus effectively implementing a feedback loop for the load, making it less dependent on external data. Using the proposed framework, mean absolute percent errors in the forecast in the order of 1% have been achieved, which is a 30% improvement on the average error using feedforward ANNs, ARMAX and state space methods, which can result in large savings by avoiding commissioning of unnecessary power plants. Finally, the New England electrical load data are used to train and validate the forecast prediction.« less

  5. Qualitative similarities in the visual short-term memory of pigeons and people.

    PubMed

    Gibson, Brett; Wasserman, Edward; Luck, Steven J

    2011-10-01

    Visual short-term memory plays a key role in guiding behavior, and individual differences in visual short-term memory capacity are strongly predictive of higher cognitive abilities. To provide a broader evolutionary context for understanding this memory system, we directly compared the behavior of pigeons and humans on a change detection task. Although pigeons had a lower storage capacity and a higher lapse rate than humans, both species stored multiple items in short-term memory and conformed to the same basic performance model. Thus, despite their very different evolutionary histories and neural architectures, pigeons and humans have functionally similar visual short-term memory systems, suggesting that the functional properties of visual short-term memory are subject to similar selective pressures across these distant species.

  6. ORAL TOXICITY OF 1,3-DICHLOROPROPANE: ACUTE, SHORT-TERM, AND LONG-TERM STUDIES IN RATS

    EPA Science Inventory

    The objective of this investigation was to characterize the acute and short- and long-term toxic potency of orally administered 1,2-dichloropropane (DCP). In the acute and short-term studies, male rats of 250-300 g were gavaged with 0, 100, 250, 500, or 1000 mg DCP/kg in corn oil...

  7. Short-term and long-term effects of violent media on aggression in children and adults.

    PubMed

    Bushman, Brad J; Huesmann, L Rowell

    2006-04-01

    To test whether the results of the accumulated studies on media violence and aggressive behavior are consistent with the theories that have evolved to explain the effects. We tested for the existence of both short-term and long-term effects for aggressive behavior. We also tested the theory-driven hypothesis that short-term effects should be greater for adults and long-term effects should be greater for children. Meta-analysis. Children younger than 18 years and adults. Violent media, including TV, movies, video games, music, and comic books. Measures of aggressive behavior, aggressive thoughts, angry feelings, physiological arousal (eg, heart rate, blood pressure), and helping behavior. Effect size estimates were combined using meta-analytic procedures. As expected, the short-term effects of violent media were greater for adults than for children whereas the long-term effects were greater for children than for adults. The results also showed that there were overall modest but significant effect sizes for exposure to media violence on aggressive behaviors, aggressive thoughts, angry feelings, arousal levels, and helping behavior. The results are consistent with the theory that short-term effects are mostly due to the priming of existing well-encoded scripts, schemas, or beliefs, which adults have had more time to encode. In contrast, long-term effects require the learning (encoding) of scripts, schemas, or beliefs. Children can encode new scripts, schemas, and beliefs via observational learning with less interference and effort than adults.

  8. Outcome Research on Short-Term Psychodynamic Psychotherapy: A Preliminary Review.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    White, Scott Allyn

    This paper reviews the empirical research on short-term psychodynamic psychotherapy (STDP). It begins with a brief history of STDP, identifying current developers and researchers of STDP and listing commonalities among various short-term dynamic psychotherapies. In this review, research is grouped broadly into two categories: controlled…

  9. Overview of developing desired conditions: Short-term actions, long-term objectives

    Treesearch

    J. D. Chew; K. O' Hara; J. G. Jones

    2001-01-01

    A number of modeling tools are required to go from short-term treatments to long-term objectives expressed as desired future conditions. Three models are used in an example that starts with determining desired stand level structure and ends with the implementation of treatments over time at a landscape scale. The Multi-Aged Stocking Assessment Model (MASAM) is used for...

  10. Independence of long-term contextual memory and short-term perceptual hypotheses: Evidence from contextual cueing of interrupted search.

    PubMed

    Schlagbauer, Bernhard; Mink, Maurice; Müller, Hermann J; Geyer, Thomas

    2017-02-01

    Observers are able to resume an interrupted search trial faster relative to responding to a new, unseen display. This finding of rapid resumption is attributed to short-term perceptual hypotheses generated on the current look and confirmed upon subsequent looks at the same display. It has been suggested that the contents of perceptual hypotheses are similar to those of other forms of memory acquired long-term through repeated exposure to the same search displays over the course of several trials, that is, the memory supporting "contextual cueing." In three experiments, we investigated the relationship between short-term perceptual hypotheses and long-term contextual memory. The results indicated that long-term, contextual memory of repeated displays neither affected the generation nor the confirmation of short-term perceptual hypotheses for these displays. Furthermore, the analysis of eye movements suggests that long-term memory provides an initial benefit in guiding attention to the target, whereas in subsequent looks guidance is entirely based on short-term perceptual hypotheses. Overall, the results reveal a picture of both long- and short-term memory contributing to reliable performance gains in interrupted search, while exerting their effects in an independent manner.

  11. Questioning short-term memory and its measurement: Why digit span measures long-term associative learning.

    PubMed

    Jones, Gary; Macken, Bill

    2015-11-01

    Traditional accounts of verbal short-term memory explain differences in performance for different types of verbal material by reference to inherent characteristics of the verbal items making up memory sequences. The role of previous experience with sequences of different types is ostensibly controlled for either by deliberate exclusion or by presenting multiple trials constructed from different random permutations. We cast doubt on this general approach in a detailed analysis of the basis for the robust finding that short-term memory for digit sequences is superior to that for other sequences of verbal material. Specifically, we show across four experiments that this advantage is not due to inherent characteristics of digits as verbal items, nor are individual digits within sequences better remembered than other types of individual verbal items. Rather, the advantage for digit sequences stems from the increased frequency, compared to other verbal material, with which digits appear in random sequences in natural language, and furthermore, relatively frequent digit sequences support better short-term serial recall than less frequent ones. We also provide corpus-based computational support for the argument that performance in a short-term memory setting is a function of basic associative learning processes operating on the linguistic experience of the rememberer. The experimental and computational results raise questions not only about the role played by measurement of digit span in cognition generally, but also about the way in which long-term memory processes impact on short-term memory functioning. Copyright © 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

  12. Short Term Weather Forecasting and Long Term Climate Predictions in Mesoamerica

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Hardin, D. M.; Daniel, I.; Mecikalski, J.; Graves, S.

    2008-05-01

    The SERVIR project utilizes several predictive models to support regional monitoring and decision support in Mesoamerica. Short term forecasts ranging from a few hours to several days produce more than 30 data products that are used daily by decision makers, as well as news organizations in the region. The forecast products can be visualized in both two and three dimensional viewers such as Google Maps and Google Earth. Other viewers developed specifically for the Mesoamerican region by the University of Alabama in Huntsville and the Institute for the Application of Geospatial Technologies in Auburn New York can also be employed. In collaboration with the NASA Short Term Prediction Research and Transition (SpoRT) Center SERVIR utilizes the Weather Research and Forecast (WRF) model to produce short-term (24 hr) regional weather forecasts twice a day. Temperature, precipitation, wind, and other variables are forecast in 10km and 30km grids over the Mesoamerica region. Using the PSU/NCAR Mesoscale Model, known as MM5, SERVIR produces 48 hour- forecasts of soil temperature, two meter surface temperature, three hour accumulated precipitation, winds at different heights, and other variables. These are forecast hourly in 9km grids. Working in collaboration with the Atmospheric Science Department of the University of Alabama in Huntsville produces a suite of short-term (0-6 hour) weather prediction products are generated. These "convective initiation" products predict the onset of thunderstorm rainfall and lightning within a 1-hour timeframe. Models are also employed for long term predictions. The SERVIR project, under USAID funding, has developed comprehensive regional climate change scenarios of Mesoamerica for future years: 2010, 2015, 2025, 2050, and 2099. These scenarios were created using the Pennsylvania State University/National Center for Atmospheric Research (MM5) model and processed on the Oak Ridge National Laboratory Cheetah supercomputer. The goal of these

  13. Ordered Short-Term Memory Differs in Signers and Speakers: Implications for Models of Short-Term Memory

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Bavelier, Daphne; Newport, Elissa L.; Hall, Matt; Supalla, Ted; Boutla, Mrim

    2008-01-01

    Capacity limits in linguistic short-term memory (STM) are typically measured with forward span tasks in which participants are asked to recall lists of words in the order presented. Using such tasks, native signers of American Sign Language (ASL) exhibit smaller spans than native speakers ([Boutla, M., Supalla, T., Newport, E. L., & Bavelier, D.…

  14. Short-Term Volunteer Teachers in Rural China: Challenges and Needs

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Zhou, Huiquan; Shang, Xinyuan

    2011-01-01

    The brain-drain caused by imbalanced economic development has produced a lack of qualified teachers in rural China. Short-term volunteer teaching has emerged as a response. Despite the popularity of such programs, little systematic data have been gathered regarding their strengths and weaknesses. A short-term volunteer teaching program was…

  15. Automatic temporal segment detection via bilateral long short-term memory recurrent neural networks

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Sun, Bo; Cao, Siming; He, Jun; Yu, Lejun; Li, Liandong

    2017-03-01

    Constrained by the physiology, the temporal factors associated with human behavior, irrespective of facial movement or body gesture, are described by four phases: neutral, onset, apex, and offset. Although they may benefit related recognition tasks, it is not easy to accurately detect such temporal segments. An automatic temporal segment detection framework using bilateral long short-term memory recurrent neural networks (BLSTM-RNN) to learn high-level temporal-spatial features, which synthesizes the local and global temporal-spatial information more efficiently, is presented. The framework is evaluated in detail over the face and body database (FABO). The comparison shows that the proposed framework outperforms state-of-the-art methods for solving the problem of temporal segment detection.

  16. Auditory-Cortex Short-Term Plasticity Induced by Selective Attention

    PubMed Central

    Jääskeläinen, Iiro P.; Ahveninen, Jyrki

    2014-01-01

    The ability to concentrate on relevant sounds in the acoustic environment is crucial for everyday function and communication. Converging lines of evidence suggests that transient functional changes in auditory-cortex neurons, “short-term plasticity”, might explain this fundamental function. Under conditions of strongly focused attention, enhanced processing of attended sounds can take place at very early latencies (~50 ms from sound onset) in primary auditory cortex and possibly even at earlier latencies in subcortical structures. More robust selective-attention short-term plasticity is manifested as modulation of responses peaking at ~100 ms from sound onset in functionally specialized nonprimary auditory-cortical areas by way of stimulus-specific reshaping of neuronal receptive fields that supports filtering of selectively attended sound features from task-irrelevant ones. Such effects have been shown to take effect in ~seconds following shifting of attentional focus. There are findings suggesting that the reshaping of neuronal receptive fields is even stronger at longer auditory-cortex response latencies (~300 ms from sound onset). These longer-latency short-term plasticity effects seem to build up more gradually, within tens of seconds after shifting the focus of attention. Importantly, some of the auditory-cortical short-term plasticity effects observed during selective attention predict enhancements in behaviorally measured sound discrimination performance. PMID:24551458

  17. Short-Term Effects of Midseason Coach Turnover on Team Performance in Soccer

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Balduck, Anne-Line; Buelens, Marc; Philippaerts, Renaat

    2010-01-01

    The present study addressed the issue of short-term performance effects of midseason coach turnover in soccer. The goal of this study was to examine this effect on subsequent short-term team performance. The purposes of this study were to (a) examine whether midseason coach turnover improved results in the short term, and (b) examine how team…

  18. Short-term Forecasting Tools for Agricultural Nutrient Management.

    PubMed

    Easton, Zachary M; Kleinman, Peter J A; Buda, Anthony R; Goering, Dustin; Emberston, Nichole; Reed, Seann; Drohan, Patrick J; Walter, M Todd; Guinan, Pat; Lory, John A; Sommerlot, Andrew R; Sharpley, Andrew

    2017-11-01

    The advent of real-time, short-term farm management tools is motivated by the need to protect water quality above and beyond the general guidance offered by existing nutrient management plans. Advances in high-performance computing and hydrologic or climate modeling have enabled rapid dissemination of real-time information that can assist landowners and conservation personnel with short-term management planning. This paper reviews short-term decision support tools for agriculture that are under various stages of development and implementation in the United States: (i) Wisconsin's Runoff Risk Advisory Forecast (RRAF) System, (ii) New York's Hydrologically Sensitive Area Prediction Tool, (iii) Virginia's Saturated Area Forecast Model, (iv) Pennsylvania's Fertilizer Forecaster, (v) Washington's Application Risk Management (ARM) System, and (vi) Missouri's Design Storm Notification System. Although these decision support tools differ in their underlying model structure, the resolution at which they are applied, and the hydroclimates to which they are relevant, all provide forecasts (range 24-120 h) of runoff risk or soil moisture saturation derived from National Weather Service Forecast models. Although this review highlights the need for further development of robust and well-supported short-term nutrient management tools, their potential for adoption and ultimate utility requires an understanding of the appropriate context of application, the strategic and operational needs of managers, access to weather forecasts, scales of application (e.g., regional vs. field level), data requirements, and outreach communication structure. Copyright © by the American Society of Agronomy, Crop Science Society of America, and Soil Science Society of America, Inc.

  19. Metropolitan French: Familiarization & Short-Term Training.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Iszkowski, Marie-Charlotte

    The U.S. Department of State's Foreign Service Institute French Familiarization and Short-Term (FAST) course for personnel working and living in France consists of 10 weeks of French language instruction combined with practical and cultural information. An introductory section outlines FAST course objectives and sample teaching techniques in…

  20. Short-term energy outlook, Annual supplement 1995

    DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

    NONE

    1995-07-25

    This supplement is published once a year as a complement to the Short- Term Energy Outlook, Quarterly Projections. The purpose of the Supplement is to review the accuracy of the forecasts published in the Outlook, make comparisons with other independent energy forecasts, and examine current energy topics that affect the forecasts. Chap. 2 analyzes the response of the US petroleum industry to the recent four Federal environmental rules on motor gasoline. Chap. 3 compares the EIA base or mid case energy projections for 1995 and 1996 (as published in the first quarter 1995 Outlook) with recent projections made by fourmore » other major forecasting groups. Chap. 4 evaluates the overall accuracy. Chap. 5 presents the methology used in the Short- Term Integrated Forecasting Model for oxygenate supply/demand balances. Chap. 6 reports theoretical and empirical results from a study of non-transportation energy demand by sector. The empirical analysis involves the short-run energy demand in the residential, commercial, industrial, and electrical utility sectors in US.« less

  1. Beryllium sensitization and disease among long-term and short-term workers in a beryllium ceramics plant.

    PubMed

    Henneberger, P K; Cumro, D; Deubner, D D; Kent, M S; McCawley, M; Kreiss, K

    2001-04-01

    Workers at a beryllium ceramics plant were tested for beryllium sensitization and disease in 1998 to determine whether the plant-wide prevalence of sensitization and disease had declined since the last screening in 1992; an elevated prevalence was associated with specific processes or with high exposures; exposure-response relationships differed for long-term workers hired before the last plant-wide screening and short-term workers hired since then. Current workers were asked to complete a questionnaire and to provide blood for the beryllium lymphocyte proliferation test (BeLPT). Those with an abnormal BeLPT were classified as sensitized, and were offered clinical evaluation for beryllium disease. Task- and time-specific measurements of airborne beryllium were combined with individual work histories to compute mean, cumulative, and peak beryllium exposures for each worker. The 151 participants represented 90% of 167 eligible workers. Fifteen (9.9% of 151) had an abnormal BeLPT and were split between long-term workers (8/77 = 10.4%) and short-term workers (7/74 = 9.5%). Beryllium disease was detected in 9.1% (7/77) of long-term workers but in only 1.4% (1/74) of short-term workers (P = 0.06), for an overall prevalence of 5.3% (8/151). These prevalences were similar to those observed in the earlier survey. The prevalence of sensitization was elevated in 1992 among machinists, and was still elevated in 1998 among long-term workers (7/40 = 18%) but not among short-term workers (2/36 = 6%) with machining experience. The prevalence of sensitization was also elevated in both groups of workers for the processes of lapping, forming, firing, and packaging. The data suggested a positive relationship between peak beryllium exposure and sensitization for long-term workers and between mean, cumulative, and peak exposure and sensitization for short-term workers, although these findings were not statistically significant. Long-term workers with either a high peak exposure or work

  2. Music Memory Following Short-term Practice and Its Relationship with the Sight-reading Abilities of Professional Pianists.

    PubMed

    Aiba, Eriko; Matsui, Toshie

    2016-01-01

    This study investigated the relationship between the ability to sight-read and the ability to memorize a score using a behavioral experiment. By measuring the amount of memorization following short-term practice, we examined whether better sight-readers not only estimate forthcoming notes but also memorize musical structures and phrases with more practice. Eleven pianists performed the music first by sight-reading. After a 20-minute practice, the participants were asked to perform from memory without any advance notice. The number of mistakes was used as an index of performance. There were no correlations in the numbers of mistakes between sight-reading and memory trial performance. Some pianists memorized almost the entire score, while others hardly remembered it despite demonstrating almost completely accurate performance just before memory trial performance. However, judging from the participants' responses to a questionnaire regarding their practice strategies, we found auditory memory was helpful for memorizing music following short-term practice.

  3. Music Memory Following Short-term Practice and Its Relationship with the Sight-reading Abilities of Professional Pianists

    PubMed Central

    Aiba, Eriko; Matsui, Toshie

    2016-01-01

    This study investigated the relationship between the ability to sight-read and the ability to memorize a score using a behavioral experiment. By measuring the amount of memorization following short-term practice, we examined whether better sight-readers not only estimate forthcoming notes but also memorize musical structures and phrases with more practice. Eleven pianists performed the music first by sight-reading. After a 20-minute practice, the participants were asked to perform from memory without any advance notice. The number of mistakes was used as an index of performance. There were no correlations in the numbers of mistakes between sight-reading and memory trial performance. Some pianists memorized almost the entire score, while others hardly remembered it despite demonstrating almost completely accurate performance just before memory trial performance. However, judging from the participants’ responses to a questionnaire regarding their practice strategies, we found auditory memory was helpful for memorizing music following short-term practice. PMID:27242576

  4. CF6-6D engine short-term performance deterioration

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Kramer, W. H.; Paas, J. E.; Smith, J. J.; Wulf, R. H.

    1980-01-01

    Studies conducted as part of the NASA-Lewis CF6 jet engine diagnostics program are summarized. An 82-engine sample of DC-10-10 aircraft engine checkout data that were gathered to define the extent and magnitude of CF6-6D short term performance deterioration were analyzed. These data are substantiated by the performance testing and analytical teardown of CF6-6D short term deterioration engine serial number (ESN) 451507.

  5. A Short-Term Study Abroad Program for School Counseling Students

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Cunningham, Teddi; Caldwell, Charmaine; Geltner, Jill

    2011-01-01

    Well planned, short-term study abroad programs can benefit school counseling students through exposure to new and different cultural experiences. Students gain knowledge and skills that will help them serve the diverse cultural groups found in public school settings. The objective of the short-term study abroad program described in this article…

  6. Cash Management and Short-Term Investments for Colleges and Universities.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Haag, Leonard H.

    Effective cash management and short-term investing are discussed in this "how to" guide designed to benefit most institutions of higher education. The following premises are examined: proper compensation for effective cash management is not an expense but an investment; effective cash management and short-term investment programs do not depend on…

  7. Implementation of an international short-term dental mission.

    PubMed

    O'Callaghan, Michael G

    2012-01-01

    Dental professionals serve across the globe, working to alleviate the pain and suffering caused by dental disease. Many dental professionals serve on international mission trips, yet little has been published in the professional literature to guide dentists in establishing and operating a volunteer dental clinic in an international mission setting on a short-term basis. This article reports on multiple aspects of planning a short-term dental mission trip, including considerations in the selection of an indigenous national partner, concerns regarding the safety of patients and participants, scope of care decision-making, and the requisite equipment and supplies.

  8. Conversion of short-term to long-term memory in the novel object recognition paradigm.

    PubMed

    Moore, Shannon J; Deshpande, Kaivalya; Stinnett, Gwen S; Seasholtz, Audrey F; Murphy, Geoffrey G

    2013-10-01

    It is well-known that stress can significantly impact learning; however, whether this effect facilitates or impairs the resultant memory depends on the characteristics of the stressor. Investigation of these dynamics can be confounded by the role of the stressor in motivating performance in a task. Positing a cohesive model of the effect of stress on learning and memory necessitates elucidating the consequences of stressful stimuli independently from task-specific functions. Therefore, the goal of this study was to examine the effect of manipulating a task-independent stressor (elevated light level) on short-term and long-term memory in the novel object recognition paradigm. Short-term memory was elicited in both low light and high light conditions, but long-term memory specifically required high light conditions during the acquisition phase (familiarization trial) and was independent of the light level during retrieval (test trial). Additionally, long-term memory appeared to be independent of stress-mediated glucocorticoid release, as both low and high light produced similar levels of plasma corticosterone, which further did not correlate with subsequent memory performance. Finally, both short-term and long-term memory showed no savings between repeated experiments suggesting that this novel object recognition paradigm may be useful for longitudinal studies, particularly when investigating treatments to stabilize or enhance weak memories in neurodegenerative diseases or during age-related cognitive decline. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  9. Conversion of short-term to long-term memory in the novel object recognition paradigm

    PubMed Central

    Moore, Shannon J.; Deshpande, Kaivalya; Stinnett, Gwen S.; Seasholtz, Audrey F.; Murphy, Geoffrey G.

    2013-01-01

    It is well-known that stress can significantly impact learning; however, whether this effect facilitates or impairs the resultant memory depends on the characteristics of the stressor. Investigation of these dynamics can be confounded by the role of the stressor in motivating performance in a task. Positing a cohesive model of the effect of stress on learning and memory necessitates elucidating the consequences of stressful stimuli independently from task-specific functions. Therefore, the goal of this study was to examine the effect of manipulating a task-independent stressor (elevated light level) on short-term and long-term memory in the novel object recognition paradigm. Short-term memory was elicited in both low light and high light conditions, but long-term memory specifically required high light conditions during the acquisition phase (familiarization trial) and was independent of the light level during retrieval (test trial). Additionally, long-term memory appeared to be independent of stress-mediated glucocorticoid release, as both low and high light produced similar levels of plasma corticosterone, which further did not correlate with subsequent memory performance. Finally, both short-term and long-term memory showed no savings between repeated experiments suggesting that this novel object recognition paradigm may be useful for longitudinal studies, particularly when investigating treatments to stabilize or enhance weak memories in neurodegenerative diseases or during age-related cognitive decline. PMID:23835143

  10. Short-term and long-term plasticity interaction in human primary motor cortex.

    PubMed

    Iezzi, Ennio; Suppa, Antonio; Conte, Antonella; Li Voti, Pietro; Bologna, Matteo; Berardelli, Alfredo

    2011-05-01

    Repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) over primary motor cortex (M1) elicits changes in motor evoked potential (MEP) size thought to reflect short- and long-term forms of synaptic plasticity, resembling short-term potentiation (STP) and long-term potentiation/depression (LTP/LTD) observed in animal experiments. We designed this study in healthy humans to investigate whether STP as elicited by 5-Hz rTMS interferes with LTP/LTD-like plasticity induced by intermittent and continuous theta-burst stimulation (iTBS and cTBS). The effects induced by 5-Hz rTMS and iTBS/cTBS were indexed as changes in MEP size. We separately evaluated changes induced by 5-Hz rTMS, iTBS and cTBS applied alone and those induced by iTBS and cTBS delivered after priming 5-Hz rTMS. Interactions between 5-Hz rTMS and iTBS/cTBS were investigated under several experimental conditions by delivering 5-Hz rTMS at suprathreshold and subthreshold intensity, allowing 1 and 5 min intervals to elapse between 5-Hz rTMS and TBS, and delivering one and ten 5-Hz rTMS trains. We also investigated whether 5-Hz rTMS induces changes in intracortical excitability tested with paired-pulse transcranial magnetic stimulation. When given alone, 5-Hz rTMS induced short-lasting and iTBS/cTBS induced long-lasting changes in MEP amplitudes. When M1 was primed with 10 suprathreshold 5-Hz rTMS trains at 1 min before iTBS or cTBS, the iTBS/cTBS-induced after-effects disappeared. The 5-Hz rTMS left intracortical excitability unchanged. We suggest that STP elicited by suprathreshold 5-Hz rTMS abolishes iTBS/cTBS-induced LTP/LTD-like plasticity through non-homeostatic metaplasticity mechanisms. Our study provides new information on interactions between short-term and long-term rTMS-induced plasticity in human M1. © 2011 The Authors. European Journal of Neuroscience © 2011 Federation of European Neuroscience Societies and Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

  11. Short-term international migration trends in England and Wales from 2004 to 2009.

    PubMed

    Whitworth, Simon; Loukas, Konstantinos; McGregor, Ian

    2011-01-01

    Short-term migration estimates for England and Wales are the latest addition to the Office for National Statistics (ONS) migration statistics. This article discusses definitions of short-term migration and the methodology that is used to produce the estimates. Some of the estimates and the changes in the estimates over time are then discussed. The article includes previously unpublished short-term migration statistics and therefore helps to give a more complete picture of the size and characteristics of short-term international migration for England and Wales than has previously been possible. ONS have identified a clear user requirement for short-term migration estimates at local authority (LA) level. Consequently, attention is also paid to the progress that has been made and future work that is planned to distribute England and Wales short-term migration estimates to LA level.

  12. Short-term plasticity as a neural mechanism supporting memory and attentional functions.

    PubMed

    Jääskeläinen, Iiro P; Ahveninen, Jyrki; Andermann, Mark L; Belliveau, John W; Raij, Tommi; Sams, Mikko

    2011-11-08

    Based on behavioral studies, several relatively distinct perceptual and cognitive functions have been defined in cognitive psychology such as sensory memory, short-term memory, and selective attention. Here, we review evidence suggesting that some of these functions may be supported by shared underlying neuronal mechanisms. Specifically, we present, based on an integrative review of the literature, a hypothetical model wherein short-term plasticity, in the form of transient center-excitatory and surround-inhibitory modulations, constitutes a generic processing principle that supports sensory memory, short-term memory, involuntary attention, selective attention, and perceptual learning. In our model, the size and complexity of receptive fields/level of abstraction of neural representations, as well as the length of temporal receptive windows, increases as one steps up the cortical hierarchy. Consequently, the type of input (bottom-up vs. top down) and the level of cortical hierarchy that the inputs target, determine whether short-term plasticity supports purely sensory vs. semantic short-term memory or attentional functions. Furthermore, we suggest that rather than discrete memory systems, there are continuums of memory representations from short-lived sensory ones to more abstract longer-duration representations, such as those tapped by behavioral studies of short-term memory. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

  13. [Short-term memory characteristics of vibration intensity tactile perception on human wrist].

    PubMed

    Hao, Fei; Chen, Li-Juan; Lu, Wei; Song, Ai-Guo

    2014-12-25

    In this study, a recall experiment and a recognition experiment were designed to assess the human wrist's short-term memory characteristics of tactile perception on vibration intensity, by using a novel homemade vibrotactile display device based on the spatiotemporal combination vibration of multiple micro vibration motors as a test device. Based on the obtained experimental data, the short-term memory span, recognition accuracy and reaction time of vibration intensity were analyzed. From the experimental results, some important conclusions can be made: (1) The average short-term memory span of tactile perception on vibration intensity is 3 ± 1 items; (2) The greater difference between two adjacent discrete intensities of vibrotactile stimulation is defined, the better average short-term memory span human wrist gets; (3) There is an obvious difference of the average short-term memory span on vibration intensity between the male and female; (4) The mechanism of information extraction in short-term memory of vibrotactile display is to traverse the scanning process by comparison; (5) The recognition accuracy and reaction time performance of vibrotactile display compares unfavourably with that of visual and auditory. The results from this study are important for designing vibrotactile display coding scheme.

  14. [Histological effects of short term endocrine therapy on prostatic cancer].

    PubMed

    Irisawa, C; Yoshimura, Y; Yokota, T; Yamaguchi, O; Kondou, Y; Hamasaki, T; Yamad, Y; Kurosu, S; Chiba, R

    1996-07-01

    The objective of this study is to investigate the pathological changes which occurred in prostatic cancer shortly after the commencement of endocrine therapy. Fourty-three patients underwent radical prostatectomy immediately after the short term endocrine therapy (treatment period was within one month) and the histological pictures of operative specimens were compared to those obtained from the pretreatment biopsy specimens. Degenerative changes of cancer cells, such as nuclear and cytoplasmic vacuole, collapse of the cytoplasm and the appearance of naked hyperchromatic nucleus were noticed after the short term endocrine therapy. Especially in the cases which were histologically evaluated to be poorly differentiated in the biopsy specimens, not only degenerative changes but also destruction of cancer nests caused by cell death were observed. The histological effects affected by short term endocrine treatment had no relation to the prognosis, but in the cases of stage D2, the pathological grade judged by post-therapeutic specimens were found to be useful for the prediction of prognosis. Endocrine therapy induces remarkable pathological changes in prostatic cancer within a very short time after beginning treatment.

  15. Short-Term Play Therapy for Children.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Kaduson, Heidi Gerard, Ed.; Schaefer, Charles E., Ed.

    Play therapy offers a powerful means of helping children resolve a wide range of psychological difficulties, and many play approaches are ideally suited to short-term work. This book brings together leading play therapists to share their expertise on facilitating children's healing in a shorter time frame. The book provides knowledge and skills…

  16. 21 CFR 866.1645 - Fully automated short-term incubation cycle antimicrobial susceptibility system.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

    2010-04-01

    ... 21 Food and Drugs 8 2010-04-01 2010-04-01 false Fully automated short-term incubation cycle... Diagnostic Devices § 866.1645 Fully automated short-term incubation cycle antimicrobial susceptibility system. (a) Identification. A fully automated short-term incubation cycle antimicrobial susceptibility system...

  17. Implicit short- and long-term memory direct our gaze in visual search.

    PubMed

    Kruijne, Wouter; Meeter, Martijn

    2016-04-01

    Visual attention is strongly affected by the past: both by recent experience and by long-term regularities in the environment that are encoded in and retrieved from memory. In visual search, intertrial repetition of targets causes speeded response times (short-term priming). Similarly, targets that are presented more often than others may facilitate search, even long after it is no longer present (long-term priming). In this study, we investigate whether such short-term priming and long-term priming depend on dissociable mechanisms. By recording eye movements while participants searched for one of two conjunction targets, we explored at what stages of visual search different forms of priming manifest. We found both long- and short- term priming effects. Long-term priming persisted long after the bias was present, and was again found even in participants who were unaware of a color bias. Short- and long-term priming affected the same stage of the task; both biased eye movements towards targets with the primed color, already starting with the first eye movement. Neither form of priming affected the response phase of a trial, but response repetition did. The results strongly suggest that both long- and short-term memory can implicitly modulate feedforward visual processing.

  18. Stochastic Short-term High-resolution Prediction of Solar Irradiance and Photovoltaic Power Output

    DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

    Melin, Alexander M.; Olama, Mohammed M.; Dong, Jin

    The increased penetration of solar photovoltaic (PV) energy sources into electric grids has increased the need for accurate modeling and prediction of solar irradiance and power production. Existing modeling and prediction techniques focus on long-term low-resolution prediction over minutes to years. This paper examines the stochastic modeling and short-term high-resolution prediction of solar irradiance and PV power output. We propose a stochastic state-space model to characterize the behaviors of solar irradiance and PV power output. This prediction model is suitable for the development of optimal power controllers for PV sources. A filter-based expectation-maximization and Kalman filtering mechanism is employed tomore » estimate the parameters and states in the state-space model. The mechanism results in a finite dimensional filter which only uses the first and second order statistics. The structure of the scheme contributes to a direct prediction of the solar irradiance and PV power output without any linearization process or simplifying assumptions of the signal’s model. This enables the system to accurately predict small as well as large fluctuations of the solar signals. The mechanism is recursive allowing the solar irradiance and PV power to be predicted online from measurements. The mechanism is tested using solar irradiance and PV power measurement data collected locally in our lab.« less

  19. Identity modulates short-term memory for facial emotion.

    PubMed

    Galster, Murray; Kahana, Michael J; Wilson, Hugh R; Sekuler, Robert

    2009-12-01

    For some time, the relationship between processing of facial expression and facial identity has been in dispute. Using realistic synthetic faces, we reexamined this relationship for both perception and short-term memory. In Experiment 1, subjects tried to identify whether the emotional expression on a probe stimulus face matched the emotional expression on either of two remembered faces that they had just seen. The results showed that identity strongly influenced recognition short-term memory for emotional expression. In Experiment 2, subjects' similarity/dissimilarity judgments were transformed by multidimensional scaling (MDS) into a 2-D description of the faces' perceptual representations. Distances among stimuli in the MDS representation, which showed a strong linkage of emotional expression and facial identity, were good predictors of correct and false recognitions obtained previously in Experiment 1. The convergence of the results from Experiments 1 and 2 suggests that the overall structure and configuration of faces' perceptual representations may parallel their representation in short-term memory and that facial identity modulates the representation of facial emotion, both in perception and in memory. The stimuli from this study may be downloaded from http://cabn.psychonomic-journals.org/content/supplemental.

  20. Identity modulates short-term memory for facial emotion

    PubMed Central

    Galster, Murray; Kahana, Michael J.; Wilson, Hugh R.; Sekuler, Robert

    2010-01-01

    For some time, the relationship between processing of facial expression and facial identity has been in dispute. Using realistic synthetic faces, we reexamined this relationship for both perception and short-term memory. In Experiment 1, subjects tried to identify whether the emotional expression on a probe stimulus face matched the emotional expression on either of two remembered faces that they had just seen. The results showed that identity strongly influenced recognition short-term memory for emotional expression. In Experiment 2, subjects’ similarity/dissimilarity judgments were transformed by multidimensional scaling (MDS) into a 2-D description of the faces’ perceptual representations. Distances among stimuli in the MDS representation, which showed a strong linkage of emotional expression and facial identity, were good predictors of correct and false recognitions obtained previously in Experiment 1. The convergence of the results from Experiments 1 and 2 suggests that the overall structure and configuration of faces’ perceptual representations may parallel their representation in short-term memory and that facial identity modulates the representation of facial emotion, both in perception and in memory. The stimuli from this study may be downloaded from http://cabn.psychonomic-journals.org/content/supplemental. PMID:19897794

  1. Testing visual short-term memory of pigeons (Columba livia) and a rhesus monkey (Macaca mulatta) with a location change detection task.

    PubMed

    Leising, Kenneth J; Elmore, L Caitlin; Rivera, Jacquelyne J; Magnotti, John F; Katz, Jeffrey S; Wright, Anthony A

    2013-09-01

    Change detection is commonly used to assess capacity (number of objects) of human visual short-term memory (VSTM). Comparisons with the performance of non-human animals completing similar tasks have shown similarities and differences in object-based VSTM, which is only one aspect ("what") of memory. Another important aspect of memory, which has received less attention, is spatial short-term memory for "where" an object is in space. In this article, we show for the first time that a monkey and pigeons can be accurately trained to identify location changes, much as humans do, in change detection tasks similar to those used to test object capacity of VSTM. The subject's task was to identify (touch/peck) an item that changed location across a brief delay. Both the monkey and pigeons showed transfer to delays longer than the training delay, to greater and smaller distance changes than in training, and to novel colors. These results are the first to demonstrate location-change detection in any non-human species and encourage comparative investigations into the nature of spatial and visual short-term memory.

  2. Small mammals as indicators of short-term and long-term disturbance in mixed prairie

    USGS Publications Warehouse

    Leis, S.A.; Leslie, David M.; Engle, David M.; Fehmi, J.S.

    2008-01-01

    Disturbance by military maneuvers over short and long time scales may have differential effects on grassland communities. We assessed small mammals as indicators of disturbance by military maneuvers in a mixed prairie in southern Oklahoma USA. We examined sites on two soil series, Foard and Lawton, across a gradient of disturbance intensity. A MANOVA showed that abundance of small mammals was associated (p = 0.03) with short-term (cover of vehicle tracks) disturbance but was not associated (p = 0.12) with long-term (loss of soil organic carbon, SOC) disturbance intensity. At the individual species level, Sigmodon hispidus (cotton rat) and Peromyscus maniculatus (deer mouse) occurred across all levels of disturbance and in both soil types. Only P. maniculatus abundance changed (p < 0.01) with short-term disturbance and increased by about one individual per 5% of additional track-cover. Abundance of P. maniculatus also increased (p = 0.04) by about three individuals per 1% increase in soil carbon. Chaetodipus hispidus (hispid pocket mouse) and Reithrodontomys fulvescens (fulvous harvest mouse) only occurred in single soil types limiting their potential as more general indicators. Abundance of P. maniculatus was positively related to shifts in plant species composition and likely reflected changes in vegetation structure (i.e. litter depth) and forage availability resulting from disturbance. Peromyscus maniculatus may be a useful biological indicator of ecosystem change because it responded predictably to both long-term and short-term disturbance and, when coupled with soil, plant, and disturbance history variables, can reveal land condition trends. ?? Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2007.

  3. Intercultural Learning on Short-Term Sojourns

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Jackson, Jane

    2009-01-01

    This paper presents an ethnographic case study of advanced second language (L2) students from Hong Kong who took part in a short-term sojourn in England after 14 weeks of preparation. While abroad, they lived with a host family, took literary/cultural studies courses, visited cultural sites, participated in debriefing sessions, and conducted…

  4. Short-term fasting alters cytochrome P450-mediated drug metabolism in humans.

    PubMed

    Lammers, Laureen A; Achterbergh, Roos; de Vries, Emmely M; van Nierop, F Samuel; Klümpen, Heinz-Josef; Soeters, Maarten R; Boelen, Anita; Romijn, Johannes A; Mathôt, Ron A A

    2015-06-01

    Experimental studies indicate that short-term fasting alters drug metabolism. However, the effects of short-term fasting on drug metabolism in humans need further investigation. Therefore, the aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of short-term fasting (36 h) on P450-mediated drug metabolism. In a randomized crossover study design, nine healthy subjects ingested a cocktail consisting of five P450-specific probe drugs [caffeine (CYP1A2), S-warfarin (CYP2C9), omeprazole (CYP2C19), metoprolol (CYP2D6), and midazolam (CYP3A4)] on two occasions (control study after an overnight fast and after 36 h of fasting). Blood samples were drawn for pharmacokinetic analysis using nonlinear mixed effects modeling. In addition, we studied in Wistar rats the effects of short-term fasting on hepatic mRNA expression of P450 isoforms corresponding with the five studied P450 enzymes in humans. In the healthy subjects, short-term fasting increased oral caffeine clearance by 20% (P = 0.03) and decreased oral S-warfarin clearance by 25% (P < 0.001). In rats, short-term fasting increased mRNA expression of the orthologs of human CYP1A2, CYP2C19, CYP2D6, and CYP3A4 (P < 0.05), and decreased the mRNA expression of the ortholog of CYP2C9 (P < 0.001) compared with the postabsorptive state. These results demonstrate that short-term fasting alters cytochrome P450-mediated drug metabolism in a nonuniform pattern. Therefore, short-term fasting is another factor affecting cytochrome P450-mediated drug metabolism in humans. Copyright © 2015 by The American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics.

  5. Short-term Slow Slip Events at the Southcentral Alaska Subduction Zone

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    McGuire, J. L.; Fu, Y.; Freymueller, J. T.

    2017-12-01

    The Pacific Plate is subducting beneath the North American Plate along the Aleutian Trench. The Alaska subduction zone is among the most tectonically active areas on Earth and is home to some of the largest earthquakes on record, including the second largest earthquake ever recorded, the M9.2 Prince William Sound earthquake of 1964. With the increasing availability of continuous GPS observations, studying time-dependent crustal movements in this area has become possible. Previous studies have analyzed the presence of long-term slow slip events (SSEs) in the region. Two long-term SSEs occurred from 1998-2001 and from 2010-2014 with durations of 3-4 years. These two long-term events occurred down-dip of the main asperity of the 1964 Prince William Sound earthquake. In addition to these long-term SSEs, there are also short-term SSEs evident in the GPS time series, which have durations of approximately two months. We have adequate data to study three short-term slow slip events, in 2005, 2006 and 2007. We fit the GPS time series data with the combination of a linear trend, a hyperbolic tangent function, and seasonal variations to derive the crustal displacements of all three short-term SSEs at each station in the north, east, and vertical directions. Then, an inversion model using the Green's functions for slip on the plate interface was employed to estimate the location and amplitude of slip and to calculate the magnitude of these slow slip events. Our results show Mw 6.09 for the 2005 event, Mw 6.40 for the 2006 event, and Mw 6.30 for the 2007 event. Our results indicate that both long-term SSEs and short-term SSEs occurred in the same location, down-dip of the rupture asperity of 1964 M9.2 earthquake. We use this information to relate the short-term slow slip events to the long-term events that have occurred in the region and to look for the implications on the slip budget of both short-term and long-term SSEs during the earthquake cycle at Southcentral Alaska

  6. Educational network comparative analysis of small groups: Short- and long-term communications

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Berg, D. B.; Zvereva, O. M.; Nazarova, Yu. Yu.; Chepurov, E. G.; Kokovin, A. V.; Ranyuk, S. V.

    2017-11-01

    The present study is devoted to the discussion of small group communication network structures. These communications were observed in student groups, where actors were united with a regular educational activity. The comparative analysis was carried out for networks of short-term (1 hour) and long-term (4 weeks) communications, it was based on seven structural parameters, and consisted of two stages. At the first stage, differences between the network graphs were examined, and the random corresponding Bernoulli graphs were built. At the second stage, revealed differences were compared. Calculations were performed using UCINET software framework. It was found out that networks of long-term and short-term communications are quite different: the structure of a short-term communication network is close to a random one, whereas the most of long-term communication network parameters differ from the corresponding random ones by more than 30%. This difference can be explained by strong "noisiness" of a short-term communication network, and the lack of social in it.

  7. Evaluation of innovative traffic safety devices at short-term work zones.

    DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

    2013-08-01

    The objective of this study was to investigate and evaluate the usage and effectiveness of innovative traffic control : devices that can be used in short-term work zones. Any device to be used in short-term work zones should command : the respect of ...

  8. Short-term solar activity forecasting

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Xie-Zhen, C.; Ai-Di, Z.

    1979-01-01

    A method of forecasting the level of activity of every active region on the surface of the Sun within one to three days is proposed in order to estimate the possibility of the occurrence of ionospheric disturbances and proton events. The forecasting method is a probability process based on statistics. In many of the cases, the accuracy in predicting the short term solar activity was in the range of 70%, although there were many false alarms.

  9. Short-term and long-term memory in early temporal lobe dysfunction.

    PubMed

    Hershey, T; Craft, S; Glauser, T A; Hale, S

    1998-01-01

    Following medial temporal damage, mature humans are impaired in retaining new information over long delays but not short delays. The question of whether a similar dissociation occurs in children was addressed by testing children (ages 7-16) with unilateral temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) and controls on short- and long-term memory tasks, including a spatial delayed response task (SDR). Early-onset TLE did not affect performance on short delays on SDR, but it did impair performance at the longest delay (60 s), similar to adults with unilateral medial temporal damage. In addition, early-onset TLE affected performance on pattern recall, spatial span, and verbal span with rehearsal interference. No differences were found on story recall or on a response inhibition task.

  10. Understanding the function of visual short-term memory: transsaccadic memory, object correspondence, and gaze correction.

    PubMed

    Hollingworth, Andrew; Richard, Ashleigh M; Luck, Steven J

    2008-02-01

    Visual short-term memory (VSTM) has received intensive study over the past decade, with research focused on VSTM capacity and representational format. Yet, the function of VSTM in human cognition is not well understood. Here, the authors demonstrate that VSTM plays an important role in the control of saccadic eye movements. Intelligent human behavior depends on directing the eyes to goal-relevant objects in the world, yet saccades are very often inaccurate and require correction. The authors hypothesized that VSTM is used to remember the features of the current saccade target so that it can be rapidly reacquired after an errant saccade, a task faced by the visual system thousands of times each day. In 4 experiments, memory-based gaze correction was accurate, fast, automatic, and largely unconscious. In addition, a concurrent VSTM load interfered with memory-based gaze correction, but a verbal short-term memory load did not. These findings demonstrate that VSTM plays a direct role in a fundamentally important aspect of visually guided behavior, and they suggest the existence of previously unknown links between VSTM representations and the occulomotor system. PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2008 APA, all rights reserved.

  11. Probabilistic short-term volcanic hazard in phases of unrest: A case study for tephra fallout

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Selva, Jacopo; Costa, Antonio; Sandri, Laura; Macedonio, Giovanni; Marzocchi, Warner

    2014-12-01

    During volcanic crises, volcanologists estimate the impact of possible imminent eruptions usually through deterministic modeling of the effects of one or a few preestablished scenarios. Despite such an approach may bring an important information to the decision makers, the sole use of deterministic scenarios does not allow scientists to properly take into consideration all uncertainties, and it cannot be used to assess quantitatively the risk because the latter unavoidably requires a probabilistic approach. We present a model based on the concept of Bayesian event tree (hereinafter named BET_VH_ST, standing for Bayesian event tree for short-term volcanic hazard), for short-term near-real-time probabilistic volcanic hazard analysis formulated for any potential hazardous phenomenon accompanying an eruption. The specific goal of BET_VH_ST is to produce a quantitative assessment of the probability of exceedance of any potential level of intensity for a given volcanic hazard due to eruptions within restricted time windows (hours to days) in any area surrounding the volcano, accounting for all natural and epistemic uncertainties. BET_VH_ST properly assesses the conditional probability at each level of the event tree accounting for any relevant information derived from the monitoring system, theoretical models, and the past history of the volcano, propagating any relevant epistemic uncertainty underlying these assessments. As an application example of the model, we apply BET_VH_ST to assess short-term volcanic hazard related to tephra loading during Major Emergency Simulation Exercise, a major exercise at Mount Vesuvius that took place from 19 to 23 October 2006, consisting in a blind simulation of Vesuvius reactivation, from the early warning phase up to the final eruption, including the evacuation of a sample of about 2000 people from the area at risk. The results show that BET_VH_ST is able to produce short-term forecasts of the impact of tephra fall during a rapidly

  12. Short-term and long-term effects of GDP on traffic deaths in 18 OECD countries, 1960-2011.

    PubMed

    Dadgar, Iman; Norström, Thor

    2017-02-01

    Research suggests that increases in gross domestic product (GDP) lead to increases in traffic deaths plausibly due to the increased road traffic induced by an expanding economy. However, there also seems to exist a long-term effect of economic growth that is manifested in improved traffic safety and reduced rates of traffic deaths. Previous studies focus on either the short-term, procyclical effect, or the long-term, protective effect. The aim of the present study is to estimate the short-term and long-term effects jointly in order to assess the net impact of GDP on traffic mortality. We extracted traffic death rates for the period 1960-2011 from the WHO Mortality Database for 18 OECD countries. Data on GDP/capita were obtained from the Maddison Project. We performed error correction modelling to estimate the short-term and long-term effects of GDP on the traffic death rates. The estimates from the error correction modelling for the entire study period suggested that a one-unit increase (US$1000) in GDP/capita yields an instantaneous short-term increase in the traffic death rate by 0.58 (p<0.001), and a long-term decrease equal to -1.59 (p<0.001). However, period-specific analyses revealed a structural break implying that the procyclical effect outweighs the protective effect in the period prior to 1976, whereas the reverse is true for the period 1976-2011. An increase in GDP leads to an immediate increase in traffic deaths. However, after the mid-1970s this short-term effect is more than outweighed by a markedly stronger protective long-term effect, whereas the reverse is true for the period before the mid-1970s. Published by the BMJ Publishing Group Limited. For permission to use (where not already granted under a licence) please go to http://www.bmj.com/company/products-services/rights-and-licensing/.

  13. Visual dot interaction with short-term memory.

    PubMed

    Etindele Sosso, Faustin Armel

    2017-06-01

    Many neurodegenerative diseases have a memory component. Brain structures related to memory are affected by environmental stimuli, and it is difficult to dissociate effects of all behavior of neurons. Here, visual cortex of mice was stimulated with gratings and dot, and an observation of neuronal activity before and after was made. Bandwidth, firing rate and orientation selectivity index were evaluated. A primary communication between primary visual cortex and short-term memory appeared to show an interesting path to train cognitive circuitry and investigate the basics mechanisms of the neuronal learning. The findings also suggested the interplay between primary visual cortex and short-term plasticity. The properties inside a visual target shape the perception and affect the basic encoding. Using visual cortex, it may be possible to train the memory and improve the recovery of people with cognitive disabilities or memory deficit.

  14. VALIDATION OF A METHOD FOR ESTIMATING LONG-TERM EXPOSURES BASED ON SHORT-TERM MEASUREMENTS

    EPA Science Inventory

    A method for estimating long-term exposures from short-term measurements is validated using data from a recent EPA study of exposure to fine particles. The method was developed a decade ago but long-term exposure data to validate it did not exist until recently. In this paper, ...

  15. Short-Term Memory in Habituation and Dishabituation

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Whitlow, Jesse William, Jr.

    1975-01-01

    The present research evaluated the refractorylike response decrement, as found in habituation of auditory evoked peripheral vasoconstriction in rabbits, to determine whether or not it represents a short-term habituation process distinct from effector fatigue or sensory adaptation. (Editor)

  16. What do short-term and long-term relationships look like? Building the relationship coordination and strategic timing (ReCAST) model.

    PubMed

    Eastwick, Paul W; Keneski, Elizabeth; Morgan, Taylor A; McDonald, Meagan A; Huang, Sabrina A

    2018-05-01

    Close relationships research has examined committed couples (e.g., dating relationships, marriages) using intensive methods that plot relationship development over time. But a substantial proportion of people's real-life sexual experiences take place (a) before committed relationships become "official" and (b) in short-term relationships; methods that document the time course of relationships have rarely been applied to these contexts. We adapted a classic relationship trajectory-plotting technique to generate the first empirical comparisons between the features of people's real-life short-term and long-term relationships across their entire timespan. Five studies compared long-term and short-term relationships in terms of the timing of relationship milestones (e.g., flirting, first sexual intercourse) and the occurrence/intensity of important relationship experiences (e.g., romantic interest, strong sexual desire, attachment). As romantic interest was rising and partners were becoming acquainted, long-term and short-term relationships were indistinguishable. Eventually, romantic interest in short-term relationships plateaued and declined while romantic interest in long-term relationships continued to rise, ultimately reaching a higher peak. As relationships progressed, participants evidenced more features characteristic of the attachment-behavioral system (e.g., attachment, caregiving) in long-term than short-term relationships but similar levels of other features (e.g., sexual desire, self-promotion, intrasexual competition). These data inform a new synthesis of close relationships and evolutionary psychological perspectives called the Relationship Coordination and Strategic Timing (ReCAST) model. ReCAST depicts short-term and long-term relationships as partially overlapping trajectories (rather than relationships initiated with distinct strategies) that differ in their progression along a normative relationship development sequence. (PsycINFO Database Record (c

  17. Short-term memory, executive control, and children's route learning.

    PubMed

    Purser, Harry R M; Farran, Emily K; Courbois, Yannick; Lemahieu, Axelle; Mellier, Daniel; Sockeel, Pascal; Blades, Mark

    2012-10-01

    The aim of this study was to investigate route-learning ability in 67 children aged 5 to 11years and to relate route-learning performance to the components of Baddeley's model of working memory. Children carried out tasks that included measures of verbal and visuospatial short-term memory and executive control and also measures of verbal and visuospatial long-term memory; the route-learning task was conducted using a maze in a virtual environment. In contrast to previous research, correlations were found between both visuospatial and verbal memory tasks-the Corsi task, short-term pattern span, digit span, and visuospatial long-term memory-and route-learning performance. However, further analyses indicated that these relationships were mediated by executive control demands that were common to the tasks, with long-term memory explaining additional unique variance in route learning. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  18. Short Term Objectives. (SCAT Project, Title VI-G).

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Archer, Anita

    Developed by the staff of the SCAT (Support, Competency-Assistance and Training) Project, the document deals with the third step of the systematic instructional model--sequencing short term objectives for exceptional students. The manual focuses on reviewing long term goals established by the child study team, converting these goals into long term…

  19. Short-term synaptic plasticity and heterogeneity in neural systems

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Mejias, J. F.; Kappen, H. J.; Longtin, A.; Torres, J. J.

    2013-01-01

    We review some recent results on neural dynamics and information processing which arise when considering several biophysical factors of interest, in particular, short-term synaptic plasticity and neural heterogeneity. The inclusion of short-term synaptic plasticity leads to enhanced long-term memory capacities, a higher robustness of memory to noise, and irregularity in the duration of the so-called up cortical states. On the other hand, considering some level of neural heterogeneity in neuron models allows neural systems to optimize information transmission in rate coding and temporal coding, two strategies commonly used by neurons to codify information in many brain areas. In all these studies, analytical approximations can be made to explain the underlying dynamics of these neural systems.

  20. On short-term memory of prefrontal cortex using near-infrared spectroscopy

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Li, Chengjun; Gan, Zhuo; Gong, Hui; Luo, Qingming; Zeng, Shaoqun

    2003-12-01

    For studying prefrontal cortical function in short-term memory two tasks were designed. In task one, a plus expression appears on screen for 300 milliseconds every other 2 seconds and the subject is required to give it"s answer but not to remember it. In task two, an Arabic numeral presents on screen as the same frequency as in task one. While a number is present, the subject need adding it to the sum he got last time. As subjects, 26 children participated in the work. Blood volume changes(BVCs) of right prefrontal cortex(PC) under two cognitive tasks were examined using functional near infrared imaging(fNIRI), a noninvasive technique for localizing regional BVCs which correlate with neural activities. The BVCs caused by short-term memory for numbers were retrieved from BVCs by task one and task two. Results revealed that short-term memory is related to PC and the near-infrared spectroscopy(NIRS) can be used to study prefrontal cortical function in short-term memory.

  1. Perceptions of short-term medical volunteer work: a qualitative study in Guatemala

    PubMed Central

    Green, Tyler; Green, Heidi; Scandlyn, Jean; Kestler, Andrew

    2009-01-01

    Background Each year medical providers from wealthy countries participate in short-term medical volunteer work in resource-poor countries. Various authors have raised concern that such work has the potential to be harmful to recipient communities; however, the social science and medical literature contains little research into the perceptions of short-term medical volunteer work from the perspective of members of recipient communities. This exploratory study examines the perception of short-term medical volunteer work in Guatemala among groups of actors affected by or participating in these programs. Methods The researchers conducted in-depth, semi-structured interviews with 72 individuals, including Guatemalan healthcare providers and health authorities, foreign medical providers, non-medical personnel working on health projects, and Guatemalan parents of children treated by a short-term volunteer group. Detailed notes and summaries of these interviews were uploaded, coded and annotated using Atlas.ti (Scientific Software Development GmbH, Berlin) to identify recurrent themes from the interviews. Results Informants commonly identified a need for increased access to medical services in Guatemala, and many believed that short-term medical volunteers are in a position to offer improved access to medical care in the communities where they serve. Informants most frequently cited appropriate patient selection and attention to payment systems as the best means to avoid creating dependence on foreign aid. The most frequent suggestion to improve short-term medical volunteer work was coordination with and respect for local Guatemalan healthcare providers and their communities, as insufficient understanding of the country's existing healthcare resources and needs may result in perceived harm to the recipient community. Conclusion The perceived impact of short-term medical volunteer projects in Guatemala is highly variable and dependent upon the individual project. In this

  2. Short-Term and Long-Term Effects of Orthopedic Biodegradable Implants

    PubMed Central

    Amini, Ami R.; Wallace, James S.; Nukavarapu, Syam P.

    2012-01-01

    Presently, orthopedic and oral/maxillofacial implants represent a combined $2.8 billion market, a figure expected to experience significant and continued growth. Although traditional permanent implants have been proved clinically efficacious, they are also associated with several drawbacks, including secondary revision and removal surgeries. Non-permanent, biodegradable implants offer a promising alternative for patients, as they provide temporary support and degrade at a rate matching tissue formation, and thus, eliminate the need for secondary surgeries. These implants have been in clinical use for nearly 25 years, competing directly with, or maybe even exceeding, the performance of permanent implants. The initial implantation of biodegradable materials, as with permanent materials, mounts an acute host inflammatory response. Over time, the implant degradation profile and possible degradation product toxicity mediate long-term biodegradable implant-induced inflammation. However, unlike permanent implants, this inflammation is likely to cease once the material disappears. Implant-mediated inflammation is a critical determinant for implant success. Thus, for the development of a proactive biodegradable implant that has the ability to promote optimal bone regeneration and minimal detrimental inflammation, a thorough understanding of short- and long-term inflammatory events is required. Here, we discuss an array of biodegradable orthopedic implants, their associated short- and long- term inflammatory effects, and methods to mediate these inflammatory events. PMID:22043969

  3. [Impulsiveness Among Short-Term Prisoners with Antisocial Personality Disorder].

    PubMed

    Lang, Fabian U; Otte, Stefanie; Vasic, Nenad; Jäger, Markus; Dudeck, Manuela

    2015-07-01

    The study aimed to investigate the correlation between impulsiveness and the antisocial personality disorder among short-term prisoners. The impulsiveness was diagnosed by the Barratt Impulsiveness Scale (BIS). Short-term prisoners with antisocial personality disorder scored significant higher marks on the BIS total scale than those without any personality disorder. In detail, they scored higher marks on each subscale regarding attentional, motor and nonplanning impulsiveness. Moderate and high effects were calculated. It is to be considered to regard impulsivity as a conceptual component of antisociality. © Georg Thieme Verlag KG Stuttgart · New York.

  4. Frequency-specific insight into short-term memory capacity.

    PubMed

    Feurra, Matteo; Galli, Giulia; Pavone, Enea Francesco; Rossi, Alessandro; Rossi, Simone

    2016-07-01

    The digit span is one of the most widely used memory tests in clinical and experimental neuropsychology for reliably measuring short-term memory capacity. In the forward version, sequences of digits of increasing length have to be reproduced in the order in which they are presented, whereas in the backward version items must be reproduced in the reversed order. Here, we assessed whether transcranial alternating current stimulation (tACS) increases the memory span for digits of young and midlife adults. Imperceptibly weak electrical currents in the alpha (10 Hz), beta (20 Hz), theta (5 Hz), and gamma (40 Hz) range, as well as a sham stimulation, were delivered over the left posterior parietal cortex, a cortical region thought to sustain maintenance processes in short-term memory through oscillatory brain activity in the beta range. We showed a frequency-specific effect of beta-tACS that robustly increased the forward memory span of young, but not middle-aged, healthy individuals. The effect correlated with age: the younger the subjects, the greater the benefit arising from parietal beta stimulation. Our results provide evidence of a short-term memory capacity improvement in young adults by online frequency-specific tACS application. Copyright © 2016 the American Physiological Society.

  5. Short-term memory in autism spectrum disorder.

    PubMed

    Poirier, Marie; Martin, Jonathan S; Gaigg, Sebastian B; Bowler, Dermot M

    2011-02-01

    Three experiments examined verbal short-term memory in comparison and autism spectrum disorder (ASD) participants. Experiment 1 involved forward and backward digit recall. Experiment 2 used a standard immediate serial recall task where, contrary to the digit-span task, items (words) were not repeated from list to list. Hence, this task called more heavily on item memory. Experiment 3 tested short-term order memory with an order recognition test: Each word list was repeated with or without the position of 2 adjacent items swapped. The ASD group showed poorer performance in all 3 experiments. Experiments 1 and 2 showed that group differences were due to memory for the order of the items, not to memory for the items themselves. Confirming these findings, the results of Experiment 3 showed that the ASD group had more difficulty detecting a change in the temporal sequence of the items. (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved.

  6. Short-term memory in zebrafish (Danio rerio).

    PubMed

    Jia, Jason; Fernandes, Yohaan; Gerlai, Robert

    2014-08-15

    Learning and memory represent perhaps the most complex behavioral phenomena. Although their underlying mechanisms have been extensively analyzed, only a fraction of the potential molecular components have been identified. The zebrafish has been proposed as a screening tool with which mechanisms of complex brain functions may be systematically uncovered. However, as a relative newcomer in behavioral neuroscience, the zebrafish has not been well characterized for its cognitive and mnemonic features, thus learning and/or memory screens with adults have not been feasible. Here we study short-term memory of adult zebrafish. We show animated images of conspecifics (the stimulus) to the experimental subject during 1 min intervals on ten occasions separated by different (2, 4, 8 or 16 min long) inter-stimulus intervals (ISI), a between subject experimental design. We quantify the distance of the subject from the image presentation screen during each stimulus presentation interval, during each of the 1-min post-stimulus intervals immediately following the stimulus presentations and during each of the 1-min intervals furthest away from the last stimulus presentation interval and just before the next interval (pre-stimulus interval), respectively. Our results demonstrate significant retention of short-term memory even in the longest ISI group but suggest no acquisition of reference memory. Because in the employed paradigm both stimulus presentation and behavioral response quantification is computer automated, we argue that high-throughput screening for drugs or mutations that alter short-term memory performance of adult zebrafish is now becoming feasible. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

  7. Short-Term State Forecasting-Based Optimal Voltage Regulation in Distribution Systems: Preprint

    DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

    Yang, Rui; Jiang, Huaiguang; Zhang, Yingchen

    2017-05-17

    A novel short-term state forecasting-based optimal power flow (OPF) approach for distribution system voltage regulation is proposed in this paper. An extreme learning machine (ELM) based state forecaster is developed to accurately predict system states (voltage magnitudes and angles) in the near future. Based on the forecast system states, a dynamically weighted three-phase AC OPF problem is formulated to minimize the voltage violations with higher penalization on buses which are forecast to have higher voltage violations in the near future. By solving the proposed OPF problem, the controllable resources in the system are optimally coordinated to alleviate the potential severemore » voltage violations and improve the overall voltage profile. The proposed approach has been tested in a 12-bus distribution system and simulation results are presented to demonstrate the performance of the proposed approach.« less

  8. 47 CFR 1.9035 - Short-term de facto transfer leasing arrangements.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

    2012-10-01

    ... PROCEDURE Grants by Random Selection Spectrum Leasing General Policies and Procedures § 1.9035 Short-term de... any of the included services) and a spectrum lessee may enter into a short-term de facto transfer... the leased spectrum is transferred to the spectrum lessee for the duration of the spectrum leasing...

  9. 47 CFR 1.9035 - Short-term de facto transfer leasing arrangements.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

    2014-10-01

    ... PROCEDURE Grants by Random Selection Spectrum Leasing General Policies and Procedures § 1.9035 Short-term de... any of the included services) and a spectrum lessee may enter into a short-term de facto transfer... the leased spectrum is transferred to the spectrum lessee for the duration of the spectrum leasing...

  10. 47 CFR 1.9035 - Short-term de facto transfer leasing arrangements.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

    2013-10-01

    ... PROCEDURE Grants by Random Selection Spectrum Leasing General Policies and Procedures § 1.9035 Short-term de... any of the included services) and a spectrum lessee may enter into a short-term de facto transfer... the leased spectrum is transferred to the spectrum lessee for the duration of the spectrum leasing...

  11. 22 CFR 62.21 - Short-term scholars.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

    2010-04-01

    ... 22 Foreign Relations 1 2010-04-01 2010-04-01 false Short-term scholars. 62.21 Section 62.21 Foreign Relations DEPARTMENT OF STATE PUBLIC DIPLOMACY AND EXCHANGES EXCHANGE VISITOR PROGRAM Specific... programs, confer on common problems and projects, and promote professional relationships and communications...

  12. Mediterranean dunes on the go: Evidence from a short term study on coastal herbaceous vegetation

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Prisco, Irene; Stanisci, Angela; Acosta, Alicia T. R.

    2016-12-01

    Detailed monitoring studies on permanent sites are a promising tool for an accurate evaluation of short, medium or long term vegetation dynamics. This work aims to evaluate short-term changes in coastal dune herbaceous plant species and EU Habitats through a multi-temporal analysis using permanent vegetation transects. In particular, (I) we analyze changes in species richness of coastal habitats; (II) we identify changes in plant cover of selected focal plants; and (III) we relate the changes to selected climatic variables and erosion/accretion processes. We selected one of the Italian's peninsula best preserved coastal dune areas (ca. 50 km along the Adriatic sea) with a relatively homogeneous coastal zonation and low anthropic pressure but with different erosion/accretion processes. We explored changes in richness over time using generalized linear models (GLMs). We identified different ecological guilds: focal, ruderal and alien plant species and investigated temporal trends in these guilds' species richness. We also applied GLMs to determine how plant cover of the most important focal species have changed over time. Overall, in this study we observed that the influence of climatic variables was relatively small. However, we found remarkable different trends in response to erosion/accretion processes both at community and at species level. Thus, our results highlight the importance of coastal dynamics in preserving not only coastal vegetation zonation, but also species richness and focal species cover. Moreover, we identified the dune grasslands as the most sensitive habitat for detecting the influence of climatic variables throughout a short term monitoring survey. Information from this study provides useful insights for detecting changes in vegetation, for establishing habitat protection priorities and for improving conservation efforts for these fragile ecosystems.

  13. Transfer of Information from Short- to Long-Term Memory

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Modigliani, Vito; Seamon, John G.

    1974-01-01

    The present study examined current hypotheses concerning information transfer from short-term memory (STM) to long-term memory (LTM) using a Peterson STM task with word triplets presented over retention intervals of 0, 3, 6, 9, and 18 sec. (Editor)

  14. Short-Term Energy Outlook Supplement: Key drivers for EIA's short-term U.S. crude oil production outlook

    EIA Publications

    2013-01-01

    Crude oil production increased by 790,000 barrels per day (bbl/d) between 2011 and 2012, the largest increase in annual output since the beginning of U.S. commercial crude oil production in 1859. The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) expects U.S. crude oil production to continue rising over the next two years represented in the Short-Term Energy Outlook (STEO).

  15. Dispositional optimism as predictor of outcome in short- and long-term psychotherapy.

    PubMed

    Heinonen, Erkki; Heiskanen, Tiia; Lindfors, Olavi; Härkäpää, Kristiina; Knekt, Paul

    2017-09-01

    Dispositional optimism predicts various beneficial outcomes in somatic health and treatment, but has been little studied in psychotherapy. This study investigated whether an optimistic disposition differentially predicts patients' ability to benefit from short-term versus long-term psychotherapy. A total of 326 adult outpatients with mood and/or anxiety disorder were randomized into short-term (solution-focused or short-term psychodynamic) or long-term psychodynamic therapy and followed up for 3 years. Dispositional optimism was assessed by patients at baseline with the self-rated Life Orientation Test (LOT) questionnaire. Outcome was assessed at baseline and seven times during the follow-up, in terms of depressive (BDI, HDRS), anxiety (SCL-90-ANX, HARS), and general psychiatric symptoms (SCL-90-GSI), all seven follow-up points including patients' self-reports and three including interview-based measures. Lower dispositional optimism predicted faster symptom reduction in short-term than in long-term psychotherapy. Higher optimism predicted equally rapid and eventually greater benefits in long-term, as compared to short-term, psychotherapy. Weaker optimism appeared to predict sustenance of problems early in long-term therapy. Stronger optimism seems to best facilitate engaging in and benefiting from a long-term therapy process. Closer research might clarify the psychological processes responsible for these effects and help fine-tune both briefer and longer interventions to optimize treatment effectiveness for particular patients and their psychological qualities. Weaker dispositional optimism does not appear to inhibit brief therapy from effecting symptomatic recovery. Patients with weaker optimism do not seem to gain added benefits from long-term therapy, but instead may be susceptible to prolonged psychiatric symptoms in the early stages of long-term therapy. © 2016 The British Psychological Society.

  16. Deficits in verbal long-term memory and learning in children with poor phonological short-term memory skills.

    PubMed

    Gathercole, Susan E; Briscoe, Josie; Thorn, Annabel; Tiffany, Claire

    2008-03-01

    Possible links between phonological short-term memory and both longer term memory and learning in 8-year-old children were investigated in this study. Performance on a range of tests of long-term memory and learning was compared for a group of 16 children with poor phonological short-term memory skills and a comparison group of children of the same age with matched nonverbal reasoning abilities but memory scores in the average range. The low-phonological-memory group were impaired on longer term memory and learning tasks that taxed memory for arbitrary verbal material such as names and nonwords. However, the two groups performed at comparable levels on tasks requiring the retention of visuo-spatial information and of meaningful material and at carrying out prospective memory tasks in which the children were asked to carry out actions at a future point in time. The results are consistent with the view that poor short-term memory function impairs the longer-term retention and ease of learning of novel verbal material.

  17. Short-term storage allocation in a filmless hospital

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Strickland, Nicola H.; Deshaies, Marc J.; Reynolds, R. Anthony; Turner, Jonathan E.; Allison, David J.

    1997-05-01

    Optimizing limited short term storage (STS) resources requires gradual, systematic changes, monitored and modified within an operational PACS environment. Optimization of the centralized storage requires a balance of exam numbers and types in STS to minimize lengthy retrievals from long term archive. Changes to STS parameters and work procedures were made while monitoring the effects on resource allocation by analyzing disk space temporally. Proportions of disk space allocated to each patient category on STS were measured to approach the desired proportions in a controlled manner. Key factors for STS management were: (1) sophisticated exam prefetching algorithms: HIS/RIS-triggered, body part-related and historically-selected, and (2) a 'storage onion' design allocating various exam categories to layers with differential deletion protection. Hospitals planning for STS space should consider the needs of radiology, wards, outpatient clinics and clinicoradiological conferences for new and historical exams; desired on-line time; and potential increase in image throughput and changing resources, such as an increase in short term storage disk space.

  18. Short-Term and Long-Term Educational Mobility of Families: A Two-Sex Approach.

    PubMed

    Song, Xi; Mare, Robert D

    2017-02-01

    We use a multigenerational perspective to investigate how families reproduce and pass their educational advantages to succeeding generations. Unlike traditional mobility studies that have typically focused on one-sex influences from fathers to sons, we rely on a two-sex approach that accounts for interactions between males and females-the process in which males and females mate and have children with those of similar educational statuses and jointly determine the educational status attainment of their offspring. Using data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, we approach this issue from both a short-term and a long-term perspective. For the short term, grandparents' educational attainments have a direct association with grandchildren's education as well as an indirect association that is mediated by parents' education and demographic behaviors. For the long term, initial educational advantages of families may benefit as many as three subsequent generations, but such advantages are later offset by the lower fertility of highly educated persons. Yet, all families eventually achieve the same educational distribution of descendants because of intermarriages between families of high- and low-education origin.

  19. A neuromorphic circuit mimicking biological short-term memory.

    PubMed

    Barzegarjalali, Saeid; Parker, Alice C

    2016-08-01

    Research shows that the way we remember things for a few seconds is a different mechanism from the way we remember things for a longer time. Short-term memory is based on persistently firing neurons, whereas storing information for a longer time is based on strengthening the synapses or even forming new neural connections. Information about location and appearance of an object is segregated and processed by separate neurons. Furthermore neurons can continue firing using different mechanisms. Here, we have designed a biomimetic neuromorphic circuit that mimics short-term memory by firing neurons, using biological mechanisms to remember location and shape of an object. Our neuromorphic circuit has a hybrid architecture. Neurons are designed with CMOS 45nm technology and synapses are designed with carbon nanotubes (CNT).

  20. Short-term depression and transient memory in sensory cortex.

    PubMed

    Gillary, Grant; Heydt, Rüdiger von der; Niebur, Ernst

    2017-12-01

    Persistent neuronal activity is usually studied in the context of short-term memory localized in central cortical areas. Recent studies show that early sensory areas also can have persistent representations of stimuli which emerge quickly (over tens of milliseconds) and decay slowly (over seconds). Traditional positive feedback models cannot explain sensory persistence for at least two reasons: (i) They show attractor dynamics, with transient perturbations resulting in a quasi-permanent change of system state, whereas sensory systems return to the original state after a transient. (ii) As we show, those positive feedback models which decay to baseline lose their persistence when their recurrent connections are subject to short-term depression, a common property of excitatory connections in early sensory areas. Dual time constant network behavior has also been implemented by nonlinear afferents producing a large transient input followed by much smaller steady state input. We show that such networks require unphysiologically large onset transients to produce the rise and decay observed in sensory areas. Our study explores how memory and persistence can be implemented in another model class, derivative feedback networks. We show that these networks can operate with two vastly different time courses, changing their state quickly when new information is coming in but retaining it for a long time, and that these capabilities are robust to short-term depression. Specifically, derivative feedback networks with short-term depression that acts differentially on positive and negative feedback projections are capable of dynamically changing their time constant, thus allowing fast onset and slow decay of responses without requiring unrealistically large input transients.

  1. Self-reported immature defense style as a predictor of outcome in short-term and long-term psychotherapy.

    PubMed

    Laaksonen, Maarit A; Sirkiä, Carlos; Knekt, Paul; Lindfors, Olavi

    2014-07-01

    Identification of pretreatment patient characteristics predictive of psychotherapy outcome could help to guide treatment choices. This study evaluates patients' initial level of immature defense style as a predictor of the outcome of short-term versus long-term psychotherapy. In the Helsinki Psychotherapy Study, 326 adult outpatients with mood or anxiety disorder were randomized to individual short-term (psychodynamic or solution-focused) or long-term (psychodynamic) psychotherapy. Their defense style was assessed at baseline using the 88-item Defense Style Questionnaire and classified as low or high around the median value of the respective score. Both specific (Beck Depression Inventory [BDI], Hamilton Depression Rating Scale [HDRS], Symptom Check List Anxiety Scale [SCL-90-Anx], Hamilton Anxiety Rating Scale [HARS]) and global (Symptom Check List Global Severity Index [SCL-90-GSI], Global Assessment of Functioning Scale [GAF]) psychiatric symptoms were measured at baseline and 3-7 times during a 3-year follow-up. Patients with high use of immature defense style experienced greater symptom reduction in long-term than in short-term psychotherapy by the end of the 3-year follow-up (50% vs. 34%). Patients with low use of immature defense style experienced faster symptom reduction in short-term than in long-term psychotherapy during the first year of follow-up (34% vs. 19%). Knowledge of patients' initial level of immature defense style may potentially be utilized in tailoring treatments. Further research on defense styles as outcome predictors in psychotherapies of different types is needed.

  2. Operationalizing the assessment and management of violence risk in the short-term.

    PubMed

    Doyle, Michael; Logan, Caroline

    2012-01-01

    Assessing risk of violence in the short term is crucial for managing and preventing violence, especially in institutions such as psychiatric units and prisons. Despite a lack of consensus on the definition of "short term", a number of recent tools and guidelines have been developed to aid short-term clinical decision-making. Whereas the supporting evidence for the new tools is impressive, limitations remain in terms of the focus on prediction, limited consideration of strengths, and poor integration with formulation and risk management. The Short-Term Assessment of Risk and Treatability (START) is a brief clinical guide for the dynamic assessment of risks, strengths and treatability. It focuses on short-term risks and the characteristics of the individual that, if changed, might lead to an increase or decrease in risk. The START has the potential to operationalize the structured professional judgment (SPJ) approach in order to inform the evaluation of multiple risk domains relevant to everyday psychiatric clinical practice. However, explicit guidance on integrating risk assessment, formulation and management is limited in the START and this paper describes the SPJ approach, reviews recent developments in approaches to risk, and considers how the START can be used to inform SPJ approaches and link risk assessment, formulation, and management. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

  3. The Genetic Components of Verbal Divergent Thinking and Short Term Memory.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Pezzullo, Thomas R.; Madaus, George F.

    A study of twins was conducted to determine the presence of an hereditary component in short term memory and in three aspects of verbal divergent thinking--flexibility, fluency, and originality. Results showed the existence of a significant genetic component in the trait of short term memory, while none was found in verbal divergent thinking. (AG)

  4. Short-term phonological memory in preschool children.

    PubMed

    Rodrigues, Amalia; Befi-Lopes, Debora Maria

    2013-01-01

    The purpose of this study was to design a short-term memory test, to describe quantitative performance in typically language developing children and to verify the relationship between the non-words repetition and oral phonological measure. The participants included 136 typically language developing children aged from 3 years to 6 years and 11 months old in this study, who were evaluated. The test consisted of 40 non-words of one, two, three, and four syllables. The subjects' repetitions were transcribed and the number of right answers was calculated for each age range. The effect of age was observed in the test, as well as the effect of length, only for disyllabic non-words. The performance in the non-word repetition task showed correlation with the oral phonology measure. The test designed in this research was able to verify the short-term memory in typically language developing children and the results showed correlation between this memory and phonological performance.

  5. Short-term scheduling of an open-pit mine with multiple objectives

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Blom, Michelle; Pearce, Adrian R.; Stuckey, Peter J.

    2017-05-01

    This article presents a novel algorithm for the generation of multiple short-term production schedules for an open-pit mine, in which several objectives, of varying priority, characterize the quality of each solution. A short-term schedule selects regions of a mine site, known as 'blocks', to be extracted in each week of a planning horizon (typically spanning 13 weeks). Existing tools for constructing these schedules use greedy heuristics, with little optimization. To construct a single schedule in which infrastructure is sufficiently utilized, with production grades consistently close to a desired target, a planner must often run these heuristics many times, adjusting parameters after each iteration. A planner's intuition and experience can evaluate the relative quality and mineability of different schedules in a way that is difficult to automate. Of interest to a short-term planner is the generation of multiple schedules, extracting available ore and waste in varying sequences, which can then be manually compared. This article presents a tool in which multiple, diverse, short-term schedules are constructed, meeting a range of common objectives without the need for iterative parameter adjustment.

  6. Short-Term EEG Spectral Pattern as a Single Event in EEG Phenomenology

    PubMed Central

    Fingelkurts, Al. A; Fingelkurts, An. A

    2010-01-01

    Spectral decomposition, to this day, still remains the main analytical paradigm for the analysis of EEG oscillations. However, conventional spectral analysis assesses the mean characteristics of the EEG power spectra averaged out over extended periods of time and/or broad frequency bands, thus resulting in a “static” picture which cannot reflect adequately the underlying neurodynamic. A relatively new promising area in the study of EEG is based on reducing the signal to elementary short-term spectra of various types in accordance with the number of types of EEG stationary segments instead of using averaged power spectrum for the whole EEG. It is suggested that the various perceptual and cognitive operations associated with a mental or behavioural condition constitute a single distinguishable neurophysiological state with a distinct and reliable spectral pattern. In this case, one type of short-term spectral pattern may be considered as a single event in EEG phenomenology. To support this assumption the following issues are considered in detail: (a) the relations between local EEG short-term spectral pattern of particular type and the actual state of the neurons in underlying network and a volume conduction; (b) relationship between morphology of EEG short-term spectral pattern and the state of the underlying neurodynamical system i.e. neuronal assembly; (c) relation of different spectral pattern components to a distinct physiological mechanism; (d) relation of different spectral pattern components to different functional significance; (e) developmental changes of spectral pattern components; (f) heredity of the variance in the individual spectral pattern and its components; (g) intra-individual stability of the sets of EEG short-term spectral patterns and their percent ratio; (h) discrete dynamics of EEG short-term spectral patterns. Functional relevance (consistency) of EEG short-term spectral patterns in accordance with the changes of brain functional state

  7. Easy and accurate reconstruction of whole HIV genomes from short-read sequence data with shiver

    PubMed Central

    Blanquart, François; Golubchik, Tanya; Gall, Astrid; Bakker, Margreet; Bezemer, Daniela; Croucher, Nicholas J; Hall, Matthew; Hillebregt, Mariska; Ratmann, Oliver; Albert, Jan; Bannert, Norbert; Fellay, Jacques; Fransen, Katrien; Gourlay, Annabelle; Grabowski, M Kate; Gunsenheimer-Bartmeyer, Barbara; Günthard, Huldrych F; Kivelä, Pia; Kouyos, Roger; Laeyendecker, Oliver; Liitsola, Kirsi; Meyer, Laurence; Porter, Kholoud; Ristola, Matti; van Sighem, Ard; Cornelissen, Marion; Kellam, Paul; Reiss, Peter

    2018-01-01

    Abstract Studying the evolution of viruses and their molecular epidemiology relies on accurate viral sequence data, so that small differences between similar viruses can be meaningfully interpreted. Despite its higher throughput and more detailed minority variant data, next-generation sequencing has yet to be widely adopted for HIV. The difficulty of accurately reconstructing the consensus sequence of a quasispecies from reads (short fragments of DNA) in the presence of large between- and within-host diversity, including frequent indels, may have presented a barrier. In particular, mapping (aligning) reads to a reference sequence leads to biased loss of information; this bias can distort epidemiological and evolutionary conclusions. De novo assembly avoids this bias by aligning the reads to themselves, producing a set of sequences called contigs. However contigs provide only a partial summary of the reads, misassembly may result in their having an incorrect structure, and no information is available at parts of the genome where contigs could not be assembled. To address these problems we developed the tool shiver to pre-process reads for quality and contamination, then map them to a reference tailored to the sample using corrected contigs supplemented with the user’s choice of existing reference sequences. Run with two commands per sample, it can easily be used for large heterogeneous data sets. We used shiver to reconstruct the consensus sequence and minority variant information from paired-end short-read whole-genome data produced with the Illumina platform, for sixty-five existing publicly available samples and fifty new samples. We show the systematic superiority of mapping to shiver’s constructed reference compared with mapping the same reads to the closest of 3,249 real references: median values of 13 bases called differently and more accurately, 0 bases called differently and less accurately, and 205 bases of missing sequence recovered. We also

  8. Easy and accurate reconstruction of whole HIV genomes from short-read sequence data with shiver.

    PubMed

    Wymant, Chris; Blanquart, François; Golubchik, Tanya; Gall, Astrid; Bakker, Margreet; Bezemer, Daniela; Croucher, Nicholas J; Hall, Matthew; Hillebregt, Mariska; Ong, Swee Hoe; Ratmann, Oliver; Albert, Jan; Bannert, Norbert; Fellay, Jacques; Fransen, Katrien; Gourlay, Annabelle; Grabowski, M Kate; Gunsenheimer-Bartmeyer, Barbara; Günthard, Huldrych F; Kivelä, Pia; Kouyos, Roger; Laeyendecker, Oliver; Liitsola, Kirsi; Meyer, Laurence; Porter, Kholoud; Ristola, Matti; van Sighem, Ard; Berkhout, Ben; Cornelissen, Marion; Kellam, Paul; Reiss, Peter; Fraser, Christophe

    2018-01-01

    Studying the evolution of viruses and their molecular epidemiology relies on accurate viral sequence data, so that small differences between similar viruses can be meaningfully interpreted. Despite its higher throughput and more detailed minority variant data, next-generation sequencing has yet to be widely adopted for HIV. The difficulty of accurately reconstructing the consensus sequence of a quasispecies from reads (short fragments of DNA) in the presence of large between- and within-host diversity, including frequent indels, may have presented a barrier. In particular, mapping (aligning) reads to a reference sequence leads to biased loss of information; this bias can distort epidemiological and evolutionary conclusions. De novo assembly avoids this bias by aligning the reads to themselves, producing a set of sequences called contigs. However contigs provide only a partial summary of the reads, misassembly may result in their having an incorrect structure, and no information is available at parts of the genome where contigs could not be assembled. To address these problems we developed the tool shiver to pre-process reads for quality and contamination, then map them to a reference tailored to the sample using corrected contigs supplemented with the user's choice of existing reference sequences. Run with two commands per sample, it can easily be used for large heterogeneous data sets. We used shiver to reconstruct the consensus sequence and minority variant information from paired-end short-read whole-genome data produced with the Illumina platform, for sixty-five existing publicly available samples and fifty new samples. We show the systematic superiority of mapping to shiver's constructed reference compared with mapping the same reads to the closest of 3,249 real references: median values of 13 bases called differently and more accurately, 0 bases called differently and less accurately, and 205 bases of missing sequence recovered. We also successfully applied

  9. Short Term Gains, Long Term Pains: How Cues About State Aid Learning in Dynamic Environments

    PubMed Central

    Gureckis, Todd M.; Love, Bradley C.

    2009-01-01

    Successful investors seeking returns, animals foraging for food, and pilots controlling aircraft all must take into account how their current decisions will impact their future standing. One challenge facing decision makers is that options that appear attractive in the short-term may not turn out best in the long run. In this paper, we explore human learning in a dynamic decision-making task which places short- and long-term rewards in conflict. Our goal in these studies was to evaluate how people’s mental representation of a task affects their ability to discover an optimal decision strategy. We find that perceptual cues that readily align with the underlying state of the task environment help people overcome the impulsive appeal of short-term rewards. Our experimental manipulations, predictions, and analyses are motivated by current work in reinforcement learning which details how learners value delayed outcomes in sequential tasks and the importance that “state” identification plays in effective learning. PMID:19427635

  10. Short-term memory load and pronunciation rate

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Schweickert, Richard; Hayt, Cathrin

    1988-01-01

    In a test of short-term memory recall, two subjects attempted to recall various lists. For unpracticed subjects, the time it took to read the list is a better predictor of immediate recall than the number of items on the list. For practiced subjects, the two predictors do about equally well. If the items that must be recalled are unfamiliar, it is advantageous to keep the items short to pronounce. On the other hand, if the same items will be encountered over and over again, it is advantageous to make them distinctive, even at the cost of adding to the number of syllables.

  11. Syntax and serial recall: How language supports short-term memory for order.

    PubMed

    Perham, Nick; Marsh, John E; Jones, Dylan M

    2009-07-01

    The extent to which familiar syntax supports short-term serial recall of visually presented six-item sequences was shown by the superior recall of lists in which item pairs appeared in the order of "adjective-noun" (items 1-2, 3-4, 5-6)--congruent with English syntax--compared to when the order of items within pairs was reversed. The findings complement other evidence suggesting that short-term memory is an assemblage of language processing and production processes more than it is a bespoke short-term memory storage system.

  12. Short-Term Memory for Temporal Intervals: Contrasting Explanations of the Choose-Short Effect in Pigeons

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Pinto, Carlos; Machado, Armando

    2011-01-01

    To better understand short-term memory for temporal intervals, we re-examined the choose-short effect. In Experiment 1, to contrast the predictions of two models of this effect, the subjective shortening and the coding models, pigeons were exposed to a delayed matching-to-sample task with three sample durations (2, 6 and 18 s) and retention…

  13. Distinct cerebellar engrams in short-term and long-term motor learning.

    PubMed

    Wang, Wen; Nakadate, Kazuhiko; Masugi-Tokita, Miwako; Shutoh, Fumihiro; Aziz, Wajeeha; Tarusawa, Etsuko; Lorincz, Andrea; Molnár, Elek; Kesaf, Sebnem; Li, Yun-Qing; Fukazawa, Yugo; Nagao, Soichi; Shigemoto, Ryuichi

    2014-01-07

    Cerebellar motor learning is suggested to be caused by long-term plasticity of excitatory parallel fiber-Purkinje cell (PF-PC) synapses associated with changes in the number of synaptic AMPA-type glutamate receptors (AMPARs). However, whether the AMPARs decrease or increase in individual PF-PC synapses occurs in physiological motor learning and accounts for memory that lasts over days remains elusive. We combined quantitative SDS-digested freeze-fracture replica labeling for AMPAR and physical dissector electron microscopy with a simple model of cerebellar motor learning, adaptation of horizontal optokinetic response (HOKR) in mouse. After 1-h training of HOKR, short-term adaptation (STA) was accompanied with transient decrease in AMPARs by 28% in target PF-PC synapses. STA was well correlated with AMPAR decrease in individual animals and both STA and AMPAR decrease recovered to basal levels within 24 h. Surprisingly, long-term adaptation (LTA) after five consecutive daily trainings of 1-h HOKR did not alter the number of AMPARs in PF-PC synapses but caused gradual and persistent synapse elimination by 45%, with corresponding PC spine loss by the fifth training day. Furthermore, recovery of LTA after 2 wk was well correlated with increase of PF-PC synapses to the control level. Our findings indicate that the AMPARs decrease in PF-PC synapses and the elimination of these synapses are in vivo engrams in short- and long-term motor learning, respectively, showing a unique type of synaptic plasticity that may contribute to memory consolidation.

  14. Short-term clinical experience with hip resurfacing arthroplasty.

    PubMed

    Cieliński, Łukasz; Kusz, Damian; Wojciechowski, Piotr; Dziuba, Anna

    2007-01-01

    This paper discusses the authors' experience with hip resurfacing arthroplasty. Although introduced many years ago, the method did not gain wide popularity because of poor long-term outcomes. At present, owing to the introduction of metal-on-metal bearings and hybrid fixation techniques, short- and mid-term results are very good and encourage wider use of this technique, especially in the younger and more active patients whose results with standard total hip replacements would be unsatisfactory. We performed 13 hip resurfacing arthroplasties at our institution between August 1, 2005, and May 1, 2006. Twelve patients reported for the scheduled follow-up and were included in the study. Treatment outcomes were assessed according to the Harris Hip Score. The short-term outcomes of hip resurfacing arthroplasties are encouraging. In the study group there were no intraoperative complications, infections, peripheral nerve palsy, hip dislocations or clinically overt vein thrombosis. All of the patients reported complete or major pain relief. Clinical assessment according to the Harris Hip Score revealed improvement from an average of 57.7 (20.1) points preoperatively to an average of 87.7 (12) points after the surgery. Crutches were used for a maximum of 6 weeks postoperatively. All of the patients are currently able to walk without crutches with full weight-bearing. 1) Hip resurfacing arthroplasty seems to be an advisable method of operative management of younger, active patients, in whom standard THR would be associated with a high risk of failure; it allows THR to be postponed and carried out as a revision surgery with the acetabular component already in place. 2) Despite the good short- and mid-term results, the utility of this method should be evaluated with caution due to the lack of adequate long-term follow-up data.

  15. Modelling the effects of trade-offs between long and short-term objectives in fisheries management.

    PubMed

    Mardle, Simon; Pascoe, Sean

    2002-05-01

    Fisheries management is typically a complex problem, from both an environmental and political perspective. The main source of conflict occurs between the need for stock conservation and the need for fishing community well-being, which is typically measured by employment and income levels. For most fisheries, overexploitation of the stock requires a reduction in the level of fishing activity. While this may lead to long-term benefits (both conservation and economic), it also leads to a short-term reduction in employment and regional incomes. In regions which are heavily dependent on fisheries, short-term consequences of conservation efforts may be considerable. The relatively high degree of scientific uncertainty with respect to the status of the stocks and the relatively short lengths of political terms of office, generally give rise to the short-run view taking the highest priority when defining policy objectives. In this paper, a multi-objective model of the North Sea is developed that incorporates both long-term and short-term objectives. Optimal fleet sizes are estimated taking into consideration different preferences between the defined short-term and long-term objectives. The subsequent results from the model give the short-term and long-term equilibrium status of the fishery incorporating the effects of the short-term objectives. As would be expected, an optimal fleet from a short-term perspective is considerably larger than an optimal fleet from a long-run perspective. Conversely, stock sizes and sustainable yields are considerably lower in the long-term if a short-term perspective is used in setting management policies. The model results highlight what is essentially a principal-agent problem, with the objectives of the policy makers not necessarily reflecting the objectives of society as a whole.

  16. Effect of long-term and short-term progestagen treatment on follicular development and pregnancy rate in cyclic ewes.

    PubMed

    Viñoles, C; Forsberg, M; Banchero, G; Rubianes, E

    2001-03-01

    The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of the length of a progestagen treatment (12 d vs. 6 d) on follicular dynamics, estrus synchronization and pregnancy rate using medroxyprogesterone acetate (MAP) with or without an eCG dose at the end of MAP treatment. One hundred sixty Polwarth ewes were divided into four equal groups: long-term treated (LT, n=40); short-term treated (ST, n=40); long-term treated plus eCG (LTeCG, n=40); and short-term treated plus eCG (STeCG, n=40). Five ewes of each group were separated to undergo daily transrectal ultrasonography, and blood samples were taken for hormone determination. Until 96 h after sponge withdrawal the number of ewes in estrus was higher in both long-term-treated groups than in both short-term-treated groups but at the end of the observational period (144 h) no significant differences were found among groups. The pregnancy rate was higher in the ST group (87%) than in the other groups (LT, 63%; LTeCG, 67%; and STeCG, 58%; P< or =0.03). The ovulatory follicle emerged before sponge withdrawal in long-term-treated ewes (-3.8+/-0.4 d and -2.2+/-0.8 d for LT and LTeCG, respectively), whereas in short-term-treated ewes it emerges around sponge removal (0.4+/-1.1 d and 0.5+/-0.5 d for ST and STeCG, respectively; P< or =0.01). The ovulatory follicle in the LT group had a longer lifespan and attained a larger (P< or =0.05) maximum diameter than in the ST group. We conclude: a) that the lower pregnancy rate observed after long-term progestagen treatment was related to a slower follicular turnover that promoted the ovulation of persistent dominant follicles; (b) that short-term treatment resulted in a higher pregnancy rate probably due to the ovulation of newly recruited growing follicles; and (c) treatment with eCG had no advantage in association with long-term treatment and had a deleterious effect in combination with short-term treatment with MAP.

  17. Short-term energy outlook. Volume 2. Methodology

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    1983-05-01

    Recent changes in forecasting methodology for nonutility distillate fuel oil demand and for the near-term petroleum forecasts are discussed. The accuracy of previous short-term forecasts of most of the major energy sources published in the last 13 issues of the Outlook is evaluated. Macroeconomic and weather assumptions are included in this evaluation. Energy forecasts for 1983 are compared. Structural change in US petroleum consumption, the use of appropriate weather data in energy demand modeling, and petroleum inventories, imports, and refinery runs are discussed.

  18. Short-Term Bluff Recession Behavior Along Pennsylvania's Great Lakes Coastline, USA

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Foyle, A. M.; Naber, M. D.; Pluta, M. J.

    2011-12-01

    Coastal bluff retreat is a common problem along the world's unconsolidated coastlines. On the Great Lakes coast of Pennsylvania, Quaternary clay-rich glacial till, paleo-lake plain, and sandy strandplain sequences overlie Devonian bedrock. These Quaternary strata are subject to subaerial and lacustrine erosional processes that cause permanent coastal land loss at spatially variable rates, with the former (runoff, slumping, groundwater focusing, etc) dominating over the latter (wave and current scour, abrasion, etc). Land loss is of concern to environmental agencies because land-use planning should account for spatial and temporal variability in land-loss rates, and because bluff erosion contributes to a temporary degradation in coastal water quality. The goal of this study is to evaluate spatial variability in bluff retreat rates along a 20 km sector of Pennsylvania's short Great Lakes coast. High resolution LiDAR data covering a one-decade time frame (1998-2007) permit bluff-crest mapping on two comparable data sets that captures change within a timeframe similar to CZM planning intervals. Short-term recession data can be more useful, cost-effective, and accurate than long-term analyses that use lower-resolution field measurements, T-sheets, and historical aerial photography. Bluffs along the 20 km coastal study site consist of up to 26 m of unlithified Quaternary sediments overlying a 1-4 m ledge of sub-horizontal Devonian shale and sandstone. Bluff slopes range from 20-90 degrees, beaches are narrow (<8 m wide) or absent, and the bluffs are seasonally shielded by ground-freeze and lake ice. DEMs, hillshades, and slope and contour maps were generated from bare-earth 1998 and 2007 LiDAR data, and checked against 2005 aerial ortho-photography. Maps were analyzed at a scale of 1:120 in ArcGIS and the bluff crest was identified primarily by the visual-break-in-slope method. Rates of bluff retreat derived using DSAS vary from unresolvable to as much as 2.2 m

  19. Parametric and non-parametric modeling of short-term synaptic plasticity. Part I: computational study

    PubMed Central

    Marmarelis, Vasilis Z.; Berger, Theodore W.

    2009-01-01

    Parametric and non-parametric modeling methods are combined to study the short-term plasticity (STP) of synapses in the central nervous system (CNS). The nonlinear dynamics of STP are modeled by means: (1) previously proposed parametric models based on mechanistic hypotheses and/or specific dynamical processes, and (2) non-parametric models (in the form of Volterra kernels) that transforms the presynaptic signals into postsynaptic signals. In order to synergistically use the two approaches, we estimate the Volterra kernels of the parametric models of STP for four types of synapses using synthetic broadband input–output data. Results show that the non-parametric models accurately and efficiently replicate the input–output transformations of the parametric models. Volterra kernels provide a general and quantitative representation of the STP. PMID:18506609

  20. Short- and Long-Term Outcomes of Student Field Research Experiences in Special Populations.

    PubMed

    Soliman, Amr S; Chamberlain, Robert M

    2016-06-01

    Global health education and training of biomedical students in international and minority health research is expending through U.S. academic institutions. This study addresses the short- and long-term outcomes of an NCI-funded R25 short-term summer field research training program. This program is designed for MPH and Ph.D. students in cancer epidemiology and related disciplines, in international and minority settings (special populations) in a recent 7-year period. Positive short-term outcome of 73 students was measured as publishing a manuscript from the field research data and having a job in special populations. Positive long-term outcome was measured as having a post-doc position, being in a doctoral program, and/or employment in special populations at least 3 years from finishing the program. Significant factors associated with both short- and long-term success included resourcefulness of the student and compatibility of personalities and interests between the student and the on-campus and off-campus mentors. Short-term-success of students who conducted international filed research was associated with visits of the on-campus mentor to the field site. Short-term success was also associated with extent of mentorship in the field site and with long-term success. Future studies should investigate how field research sites could enhance careers of students, appropriateness of the sites for specific training competencies, and how to maximize the learning experience of students in international and minority research sites.

  1. Effect of macronutrient composition on short-term food intake and weight loss.

    PubMed

    Bellissimo, Nick; Akhavan, Tina

    2015-05-01

    The purpose of this review is to describe the role of macronutrient composition on the suppression of short-term food intake (FI) and weight loss. The effects of macronutrient composition on short-term FI will be reviewed first, followed by a brief examination of longer-term clinical trials that vary in effects of dietary macronutrient composition on weight loss. The objectives were: 1) to examine the effect of macronutrient composition on the suppression of short-term FI, 2) to determine whether some macronutrient sources suppress FI beyond their provision of energy, 3) to assess the combined effects of macronutrients on FI and glycemic response, and 4) to determine whether knowledge of the effect of macronutrients on short-term FI has led to greater success in spontaneous weight loss, adherence to energy-restricted diets, and better weight maintenance after weight loss. Although knowledge of macronutrient composition on short-term FI regulation has advanced our understanding of the role of diet composition on energy balance, it has yet to lead to greater success in long-term weight loss and weight maintenance. It is clear from this review that many approaches based on manipulating dietary macronutrient composition can help people lose weight as long as they follow the diets. However, only by evaluating the interaction between the physiologic systems that govern FI and body weight may the benefits of dietary macronutrient composition be fully realized. © 2015 American Society for Nutrition.

  2. Self-reported immature defense style as a predictor of outcome in short-term and long-term psychotherapy

    PubMed Central

    Laaksonen, Maarit A; Sirkiä, Carlos; Knekt, Paul; Lindfors, Olavi

    2014-01-01

    Objective Identification of pretreatment patient characteristics predictive of psychotherapy outcome could help to guide treatment choices. This study evaluates patients' initial level of immature defense style as a predictor of the outcome of short-term versus long-term psychotherapy. Method In the Helsinki Psychotherapy Study, 326 adult outpatients with mood or anxiety disorder were randomized to individual short-term (psychodynamic or solution-focused) or long-term (psychodynamic) psychotherapy. Their defense style was assessed at baseline using the 88-item Defense Style Questionnaire and classified as low or high around the median value of the respective score. Both specific (Beck Depression Inventory [BDI], Hamilton Depression Rating Scale [HDRS], Symptom Check List Anxiety Scale [SCL-90-Anx], Hamilton Anxiety Rating Scale [HARS]) and global (Symptom Check List Global Severity Index [SCL-90-GSI], Global Assessment of Functioning Scale [GAF]) psychiatric symptoms were measured at baseline and 3–7 times during a 3-year follow-up. Results Patients with high use of immature defense style experienced greater symptom reduction in long-term than in short-term psychotherapy by the end of the 3-year follow-up (50% vs. 34%). Patients with low use of immature defense style experienced faster symptom reduction in short-term than in long-term psychotherapy during the first year of follow-up (34% vs. 19%). Conclusion Knowledge of patients' initial level of immature defense style may potentially be utilized in tailoring treatments. Further research on defense styles as outcome predictors in psychotherapies of different types is needed. PMID:25161816

  3. A phenomenological memristor model for short-term/long-term memory

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Chen, Ling; Li, Chuandong; Huang, Tingwen; Ahmad, Hafiz Gulfam; Chen, Yiran

    2014-08-01

    Memristor is considered to be a natural electrical synapse because of its distinct memory property and nanoscale. In recent years, more and more similar behaviors are observed between memristors and biological synapse, e.g., short-term memory (STM) and long-term memory (LTM). The traditional mathematical models are unable to capture the new emerging behaviors. In this article, an updated phenomenological model based on the model of the Hewlett-Packard (HP) Labs has been proposed to capture such new behaviors. The new dynamical memristor model with an improved ion diffusion term can emulate the synapse behavior with forgetting effect, and exhibit the transformation between the STM and the LTM. Further, this model can be used in building new type of neural networks with forgetting ability like biological systems, and it is verified by our experiment with Hopfield neural network.

  4. CREB binding protein is required for both short-term and long-term memory formation.

    PubMed

    Chen, Guiquan; Zou, Xiaoyan; Watanabe, Hirotaka; van Deursen, Jan M; Shen, Jie

    2010-09-29

    CREB binding protein (CBP) is a transcriptional coactivator with histone acetyltransferase activity. Our prior study suggested that CBP might be a key target of presenilins in the regulation of memory formation and neuronal survival. To elucidate the role of CBP in the adult brain, we generated conditional knock-out (cKO) mice in which CBP is completely inactivated in excitatory neurons of the postnatal forebrain. Histological analysis revealed normal neuronal morphology and absence of age-dependent neuronal degeneration in the CBP cKO cerebral cortex. CBP cKO mice exhibited robust impairment in the formation of spatial, associative, and object-recognition memory. In addition to impaired long-term memory, CBP cKO mice also displayed deficits in short-term associative and object-recognition memory. Administration of a histone deacetylase inhibitor, trichostatin A, rescued the reduction of acetylated histones in the CBP cKO cortex but failed to rescue either short- or long-term memory deficits, suggesting that the memory impairment may not be caused by general reduction of histone acetyltransferase activity in CBP cKO mice. Further microarray and Western analysis showed decreased expression of calcium-calmodulin-dependent kinase isoforms and NMDA and AMPA receptor subunits in the cerebral cortex of CBP cKO mice. Collectively, these findings suggest a crucial role for CBP in the formation of both short- and long-term memory.

  5. Space technologies for short-term earthquake warning

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Pulinets, S.

    Recent theoretical and experimental studies explicitly demonstrated the ability of space technologies to identify and monitor the specific variations at near-earth space plasma, atmosphere and ground surface associated with approaching severe earthquakes (named as earthquake precursors) appearing several days (from 1 to 5) before the seismic shock over the seismically active areas. Several countries and private companies are in the stage of preparation (or already launched) the dedicated spacecrafts for monitoring of the earthquake precursors from space and for short-term earthquake prediction. The present paper intends to outline the optimal algorithm for creation of the space-borne system for the earthquake precursors monitoring and for short-term earthquake prediction. It takes into account the following considerations: Selection of the precursors in the terms of priority, taking into account their statistical and physical parameters Configuration of the spacecraft payload Configuration of the satellite constellation (orbit selection, satellite distribution, operation schedule) Proposal of different options (cheap microsatellite or comprehensive multisatellite constellation) Taking into account that the most promising are the ionospheric precursors of earthquakes, the special attention will be devoted to the radiophysical techniques of the ionosphere monitoring. The advantages and disadvantages of such technologies as vertical sounding, in-situ probes, ionosphere tomography, GPS TEC and GPS MET technologies will be considered.

  6. Space technologies for short-term earthquake warning

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Pulinets, S. A.

    Recent theoretical and experimental studies explicitly demonstrated the ability of space technologies to identify and monitor the specific variations at near-earth space plasma, atmosphere and ground surface associated with approaching severe earthquakes (named as earthquake precursors) which appear several days (from 1 to 5) before the seismic shock over the seismically active areas. Several countries and private companies are in the stage of preparation (or already launched) the dedicated spacecrafts for monitoring of the earthquake precursors from space and for short-term earthquake prediction. The present paper intends to outline the optimal algorithm for creation of the space-borne system for the earthquake precursors monitoring and for short-term earthquake prediction. It takes into account the following: Selection of the precursors in the terms of priority, considering their statistical and physical parameters.Configuration of the spacecraft payload.Configuration of the satellite constellation (orbit selection, satellite distribution, operation schedule).Different options of the satellite systems (cheap microsatellite or comprehensive multisatellite constellation). Taking into account that the most promising are the ionospheric precursors of earthquakes, the special attention is devoted to the radiophysical techniques of the ionosphere monitoring. The advantages and disadvantages of such technologies as vertical sounding, in-situ probes, ionosphere tomography, GPS TEC and GPS MET technologies are considered.

  7. VALIDATION OF A METHOD FOR ESTIMATING LONG-TERM EXPOSURES BASED ON SHORT-TERM MEASUREMENTS

    EPA Science Inventory

    A method for estimating long-term exposures from short-term measurements is validated using data from a recent EPA study of exposure to fine particles. The method was developed a decade ago but data to validate it did not exist until recently. In this paper, data from repeated ...

  8. An initial investigation on developing a new method to predict short-term breast cancer risk based on deep learning technology

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Qiu, Yuchen; Wang, Yunzhi; Yan, Shiju; Tan, Maxine; Cheng, Samuel; Liu, Hong; Zheng, Bin

    2016-03-01

    In order to establish a new personalized breast cancer screening paradigm, it is critically important to accurately predict the short-term risk of a woman having image-detectable cancer after a negative mammographic screening. In this study, we developed and tested a novel short-term risk assessment model based on deep learning method. During the experiment, a number of 270 "prior" negative screening cases was assembled. In the next sequential ("current") screening mammography, 135 cases were positive and 135 cases remained negative. These cases were randomly divided into a training set with 200 cases and a testing set with 70 cases. A deep learning based computer-aided diagnosis (CAD) scheme was then developed for the risk assessment, which consists of two modules: adaptive feature identification module and risk prediction module. The adaptive feature identification module is composed of three pairs of convolution-max-pooling layers, which contains 20, 10, and 5 feature maps respectively. The risk prediction module is implemented by a multiple layer perception (MLP) classifier, which produces a risk score to predict the likelihood of the woman developing short-term mammography-detectable cancer. The result shows that the new CAD-based risk model yielded a positive predictive value of 69.2% and a negative predictive value of 74.2%, with a total prediction accuracy of 71.4%. This study demonstrated that applying a new deep learning technology may have significant potential to develop a new short-term risk predicting scheme with improved performance in detecting early abnormal symptom from the negative mammograms.

  9. Short-term plasticity in auditory cognition.

    PubMed

    Jääskeläinen, Iiro P; Ahveninen, Jyrki; Belliveau, John W; Raij, Tommi; Sams, Mikko

    2007-12-01

    Converging lines of evidence suggest that auditory system short-term plasticity can enable several perceptual and cognitive functions that have been previously considered as relatively distinct phenomena. Here we review recent findings suggesting that auditory stimulation, auditory selective attention and cross-modal effects of visual stimulation each cause transient excitatory and (surround) inhibitory modulations in the auditory cortex. These modulations might adaptively tune hierarchically organized sound feature maps of the auditory cortex (e.g. tonotopy), thus filtering relevant sounds during rapidly changing environmental and task demands. This could support auditory sensory memory, pre-attentive detection of sound novelty, enhanced perception during selective attention, influence of visual processing on auditory perception and longer-term plastic changes associated with perceptual learning.

  10. Speech Perception and Short Term Memory Deficits in Persistent Developmental Speech Disorder

    PubMed Central

    Kenney, Mary Kay; Barac-Cikoja, Dragana; Finnegan, Kimberly; Jeffries, Neal; Ludlow, Christy L.

    2008-01-01

    Children with developmental speech disorders may have additional deficits in speech perception and/or short-term memory. To determine whether these are only transient developmental delays that can accompany the disorder in childhood or persist as part of the speech disorder, adults with a persistent familial speech disorder were tested on speech perception and short-term memory. Nine adults with a persistent familial developmental speech disorder without language impairment were compared with 20 controls on tasks requiring the discrimination of fine acoustic cues for word identification and on measures of verbal and nonverbal short-term memory. Significant group differences were found in the slopes of the discrimination curves for first formant transitions for word identification with stop gaps of 40 and 20 ms with effect sizes of 1.60 and 1.56. Significant group differences also occurred on tests of nonverbal rhythm and tonal memory, and verbal short-term memory with effect sizes of 2.38, 1.56 and 1.73. No group differences occurred in the use of stop gap durations for word identification. Because frequency-based speech perception and short-term verbal and nonverbal memory deficits both persisted into adulthood in the speech-impaired adults, these deficits may be involved in the persistence of speech disorders without language impairment. PMID:15896836

  11. Spatiotemporal discrimination in neural networks with short-term synaptic plasticity

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Shlaer, Benjamin; Miller, Paul

    2015-03-01

    Cells in recurrently connected neural networks exhibit bistability, which allows for stimulus information to persist in a circuit even after stimulus offset, i.e. short-term memory. However, such a system does not have enough hysteresis to encode temporal information about the stimuli. The biophysically described phenomenon of synaptic depression decreases synaptic transmission strengths due to increased presynaptic activity. This short-term reduction in synaptic strengths can destabilize attractor states in excitatory recurrent neural networks, causing the network to move along stimulus dependent dynamical trajectories. Such a network can successfully separate amplitudes and durations of stimuli from the number of successive stimuli. Stimulus number, duration and intensity encoding in randomly connected attractor networks with synaptic depression. Front. Comput. Neurosci. 7:59., and so provides a strong candidate network for the encoding of spatiotemporal information. Here we explicitly demonstrate the capability of a recurrent neural network with short-term synaptic depression to discriminate between the temporal sequences in which spatial stimuli are presented.

  12. Temporal Prediction Errors Affect Short-Term Memory Scanning Response Time.

    PubMed

    Limongi, Roberto; Silva, Angélica M

    2016-11-01

    The Sternberg short-term memory scanning task has been used to unveil cognitive operations involved in time perception. Participants produce time intervals during the task, and the researcher explores how task performance affects interval production - where time estimation error is the dependent variable of interest. The perspective of predictive behavior regards time estimation error as a temporal prediction error (PE), an independent variable that controls cognition, behavior, and learning. Based on this perspective, we investigated whether temporal PEs affect short-term memory scanning. Participants performed temporal predictions while they maintained information in memory. Model inference revealed that PEs affected memory scanning response time independently of the memory-set size effect. We discuss the results within the context of formal and mechanistic models of short-term memory scanning and predictive coding, a Bayes-based theory of brain function. We state the hypothesis that our finding could be associated with weak frontostriatal connections and weak striatal activity.

  13. The nature of short-term consolidation in visual working memory.

    PubMed

    Ricker, Timothy J; Hardman, Kyle O

    2017-11-01

    Short-term consolidation is the process by which stable working memory representations are created. This process is fundamental to cognition yet poorly understood. The present work examines short-term consolidation using a Bayesian hierarchical model of visual working memory recall to determine the underlying processes at work. Our results show that consolidation functions largely through changing the proportion of memory items successfully maintained until test. Although there was some evidence that consolidation affects representational precision, this change was modest and could not account for the bulk of the consolidation effect on memory performance. The time course of the consolidation function and selective influence of consolidation on specific serial positions strongly indicates that short-term consolidation induces an attentional blink. The blink leads to deficits in memory for the immediately following item when time pressure is introduced. Temporal distinctiveness accounts of the consolidation process are tested and ruled out. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2017 APA, all rights reserved).

  14. Tracking short-term biodistribution and long-term clearance of SPIO tracers in magnetic particle imaging

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Keselman, Paul; Yu, Elaine Y.; Zhou, Xinyi Y.; Goodwill, Patrick W.; Chandrasekharan, Prashant; Ferguson, R. Matthew; Khandhar, Amit P.; Kemp, Scott J.; Krishnan, Kannan M.; Zheng, Bo; Conolly, Steven M.

    2017-05-01

    Magnetic particle imaging (MPI) is an emerging tracer-based medical imaging modality that images non-radioactive, kidney-safe superparamagnetic iron oxide (SPIO) tracers. MPI offers quantitative, high-contrast and high-SNR images, so MPI has exceptional promise for applications such as cell tracking, angiography, brain perfusion, cancer detection, traumatic brain injury and pulmonary imaging. In assessing MPI’s utility for applications mentioned above, it is important to be able to assess tracer short-term biodistribution as well as long-term clearance from the body. Here, we describe the biodistribution and clearance for two commonly used tracers in MPI: Ferucarbotran (Meito Sangyo Co., Japan) and LS-oo8 (LodeSpin Labs, Seattle, WA). We successfully demonstrate that 3D MPI is able to quantitatively assess short-term biodistribution, as well as long-term tracking and clearance of these tracers in vivo.

  15. Short-term high-altitude pre-exposure improves neurobehavioral ability

    PubMed Central

    Guo, Wenyun; Chen, Guozhu; Qin, Jun; Zhang, Jihang; Guo, Xubin; Yu, Jie; Song, Pan; Lu, Wei; Xu, Baida; Li, Jiabei; Ding, Xiaohan

    2016-01-01

    This study aims to evaluate the effect of the duration of high-altitude (HA) pre-exposure on human neurobehavioral parameters including mood states and cognitive performance at HA. One hundred and eleven healthy individuals (ranging in age from 18 to 35 years) were recruited to participate in this study. They were divided into two groups: a 4-day short-term HA pre-exposure group (n=57) and a 3-month long-term HA pre-exposure group (n=54). All participants lived in the area at 400 m altitude above sea level before pre-exposure to HA. They were then transported to 3700 m plateau for either a 4-day or a 3-month HA pre-exposure, and finally delivered to 4400 m plateau. On the last day of pre-exposure at 3700 m and on the 10th day at 4400 m, neurobehavioral parameters of the participants in the two groups were evaluated. At the end of pre-exposure and on the 10th day of HA exposure, participants in the short-term group had significantly lower negative mood states, better cognitive performance with higher sensorimotor, attention, and psychomotor abilities, and less acute mountain sickness in comparison with the participants in the long-term pre-exposure group. Our field study with large samples showed that in comparison with 3-month long-term pre-exposure, 4-day short-term HA pre-exposure at 3700 m has a better effect in improving human neurobehavioral parameters including mood states and cognitive performance and reducing acute mountain sickness when exposed to a HA at 4400 m. PMID:26966781

  16. Short-term versus continuous antimicrobial therapy for asymptomatic bacteriuria in pregnancy.

    PubMed

    Whalley, P J; Cunningham, F G

    1977-03-01

    Asymptomatic bacteriuria was identified in 300 pregnant women prior to the 28th week of gestation. In one group of 200 women short-term treatment with either nitrofurantoin or sulfamethizole was given for 14 days, and in another group of 100 women continuous therapy with one of these drugs was given for the remainder of gestation. Weekly urine cultures were obtained from all the women. Of the women treated with short-term therapy, 65% were abacteriuric for the remainder of pregnancy following one course of therapy, 24% became abacteriuric but subsequently relapsed, 2% had reinfection after becoming abacteriuric, and 9% demonstrated no response. Following treatment with a second course of short-term therapy, another 19% of these women were cured for the remainder of their pregnancy, and 3.5% responded to a third course. In the continuous therapy group, 88% of the women became abacteriuric for the remainder of the gestation, 3% demonstrated relapse, 2% developed reinfection, and 7% had no response to the first drug given. These data demonstrate that short-term administration of antimicrobials, when combined with surveillance for recurrent bacteriuria, is effective for the management of the pregnant woman with asymptomatic bacteriuria.

  17. Long-term effects of interference on short-term memory performance in the rat.

    PubMed

    Missaire, Mégane; Fraize, Nicolas; Joseph, Mickaël Antoine; Hamieh, Al Mahdy; Parmentier, Régis; Marighetto, Aline; Salin, Paul Antoine; Malleret, Gaël

    2017-01-01

    A distinction has always been made between long-term and short-term memory (also now called working memory, WM). The obvious difference between these two kinds of memory concerns the duration of information storage: information is supposedly transiently stored in WM while it is considered durably consolidated into long-term memory. It is well acknowledged that the content of WM is erased and reset after a short time, to prevent irrelevant information from proactively interfering with newly stored information. In the present study, we used typical WM radial maze tasks to question the brief lifespan of spatial WM content in rodents. Groups of rats were submitted to one of two different WM tasks in a radial maze: a WM task involving the repetitive presentation of a same pair of arms expected to induce a high level of proactive interference (PI) (HIWM task), or a task using a different pair in each trial expected to induce a low level of PI (LIWM task). Performance was effectively lower in the HIWM group than in LIWM in the final trial of each training session, indicative of a "within-session/short-term" PI effect. However, we also observed a different "between-session/long-term" PI effect between the two groups: while performance of LIWM trained rats remained stable over days, the performance of HIWM rats dropped after 10 days of training, and this impairment was visible from the very first trial of the day, hence not attributable to within-session PI. We also showed that a 24 hour-gap across training sessions known to allow consolidation processes to unfold, was a necessary and sufficient condition for the long-term PI effect to occur. These findings suggest that in the HIWM task, WM content was not entirely reset between training sessions and that, in specific conditions, WM content can outlast its purpose by being stored more permanently, generating a long-term deleterious effect of PI. The alternative explanation is that WM content could be transferred and stored

  18. Short-Term and Long-Term Educational Mobility of Families: A Two-Sex Approach

    PubMed Central

    Mare, Robert D.

    2017-01-01

    We use a multigenerational perspective to investigate how families reproduce and pass their educational advantages to succeeding generations. Unlike traditional mobility studies that have typically focused on one-sex influences from fathers to sons, we rely on a two-sex approach that accounts for interactions between males and females—the process in which males and females mate and have children with those of similar educational statuses and jointly determine the educational status attainment of their offspring. Using data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, we approach this issue from both a short-term and a long-term perspective. For the short term, grandparents’ educational attainments have a direct association with grandchildren’s education as well as an indirect association that is mediated by parents’ education and demographic behaviors. For the long term, initial educational advantages of families may benefit as many as three subsequent generations, but such advantages are later offset by the lower fertility of highly educated persons. Yet, all families eventually achieve the same educational distribution of descendants because of intermarriages between families of high- and low-education origin. PMID:28058636

  19. Can short-term and small-scale experiments reflect nutrient limitation on phytoplankton in natural lakes?

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Wang, Haijun; Li, Yan; Feng, Weisong; Yu, Qing; Xiao, Xucheng; Liang, Xiaomin; Shao, Jianchun; Ma, Shuonan; Wang, Hongzhu

    2017-05-01

    Whether it is necessary to reduce nitrogen (N) and/or phosphorus (P) input to mitigate lake eutrophication is controversial. The controversy stems mainly from differences in time and space in previous studies that support the contrasting ideas. To test the response of phytoplankton to various combinations of nutrient control strategies in mesocosms and the possibility of reflecting the conditions in natural ecosystems with short-term experiments, a 9-month experiment was carried out in eight 800-L tanks with four nutrient level combinations (+N+P, -N+P, +N-P, and -N-P), with an 18-month whole-ecosystem experiment in eight 800-m 2 ponds as the reference. Phytoplankton abundance was determined by P not N, regardless of the initial TN/TP level, which was in contrast to the nutrient limitation predicted by the N/P theory. Net natural N inputs were calculated to be 4.9, 6.8, 1.5, and 3.0 g in treatments +N+P, -N+P, +N-P, and -N-P, respectively, suggesting that N deficiency and P addition may promote natural N inputs to support phytoplankton development. However, the compensation process was slow, as suggested by an observed increase in TN after 3 weeks in -N+P and 2 months in -N-P in the tank experiment, and after 3 months in -N +P and 3 months in -N-P in our pond experiment. Obviously, such a slow process cannot be simulated in short-term experiments. The natural N inputs cannot be explained by planktonic N-fixation because N-fixing cyanobacteria were scarce, which was probably because there was a limited pool of species in the tanks. Therefore, based on our results we argue that extrapolating short-term, small-scale experiments to large natural ecosystems does not give reliable, accurate results.

  20. The effect of zinc supplementation of lactating rats on short-term and long-term memory of their male offspring.

    PubMed

    Karami, Mohammad; Ehsanivostacolaee, Simin; Moazedi, Ali Ahmad; Nosrati, Anahita

    2013-01-01

    In this study the effect of zinc chloride (ZnCl2) administration on the short-term and long-term memory of rats were assessed. We enrolled six groups of adult female and control group of eight Wistar rats in each group. One group was control group with free access to food and water, and five groups drunk zinc chloride in different doses (20, 30, 50, 70 and 100 mg/kg/day) in drinking water for two weeks during lactation .One month after birth, a shuttle box used to short- term and long-term memory and the latency in entering the dark chamber as well. This experiment showed that maternal 70 mg/kg dietary zinc during lactation influenced the working memory of rats' offspring in all groups. Rats received 100 mg/kg/day zinc during lactation so they had significant impairment in working memory (short-term) of their offspring (P<0.05). There was no significant difference in reference (long-term) memory of all groups. Drug consumption below70 mg/kg/day zinc chloride during lactation had no effect. While enhanced 100 mg/ kg/ day zinc in lactating rats could cause short-term memory impairment.

  1. Short-term memory in networks of dissociated cortical neurons.

    PubMed

    Dranias, Mark R; Ju, Han; Rajaram, Ezhilarasan; VanDongen, Antonius M J

    2013-01-30

    Short-term memory refers to the ability to store small amounts of stimulus-specific information for a short period of time. It is supported by both fading and hidden memory processes. Fading memory relies on recurrent activity patterns in a neuronal network, whereas hidden memory is encoded using synaptic mechanisms, such as facilitation, which persist even when neurons fall silent. We have used a novel computational and optogenetic approach to investigate whether these same memory processes hypothesized to support pattern recognition and short-term memory in vivo, exist in vitro. Electrophysiological activity was recorded from primary cultures of dissociated rat cortical neurons plated on multielectrode arrays. Cultures were transfected with ChannelRhodopsin-2 and optically stimulated using random dot stimuli. The pattern of neuronal activity resulting from this stimulation was analyzed using classification algorithms that enabled the identification of stimulus-specific memories. Fading memories for different stimuli, encoded in ongoing neural activity, persisted and could be distinguished from each other for as long as 1 s after stimulation was terminated. Hidden memories were detected by altered responses of neurons to additional stimulation, and this effect persisted longer than 1 s. Interestingly, network bursts seem to eliminate hidden memories. These results are similar to those that have been reported from similar experiments in vivo and demonstrate that mechanisms of information processing and short-term memory can be studied using cultured neuronal networks, thereby setting the stage for therapeutic applications using this platform.

  2. A Short-Term and High-Resolution System Load Forecasting Approach Using Support Vector Regression with Hybrid Parameters Optimization

    DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

    Jiang, Huaiguang

    This work proposes an approach for distribution system load forecasting, which aims to provide highly accurate short-term load forecasting with high resolution utilizing a support vector regression (SVR) based forecaster and a two-step hybrid parameters optimization method. Specifically, because the load profiles in distribution systems contain abrupt deviations, a data normalization is designed as the pretreatment for the collected historical load data. Then an SVR model is trained by the load data to forecast the future load. For better performance of SVR, a two-step hybrid optimization algorithm is proposed to determine the best parameters. In the first step of themore » hybrid optimization algorithm, a designed grid traverse algorithm (GTA) is used to narrow the parameters searching area from a global to local space. In the second step, based on the result of the GTA, particle swarm optimization (PSO) is used to determine the best parameters in the local parameter space. After the best parameters are determined, the SVR model is used to forecast the short-term load deviation in the distribution system.« less

  3. Effect of Short-Term Hypergravity Treatment on Mouse 2-Cell Embryo Development

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Ning, Li-Na; Lei, Xiao-Hua; Cao, Yu-Jing; Zhang, Yun-Fang; Cao, Zhong-Hong; Chen, Qi; Duan, En-Kui

    2015-11-01

    Though there are numerous biological experiments, which have been performed in a space environment, to study the physiological effect of space travel on living organisms, while the potential effect of weightlessness or short-term hypergravity on the reproductive system in most species, particularly in mammalian is still controversial and unclear. In our previous study, we investigated the effect of space microgravity on the development of mouse 4-cell embryos by using Chinese SJ-8. .Unexpectedly, we did not get any developed embryo during the space-flight. Considering that the process of space experiment is quite different from most experiments done on earth in several aspects such as, the vibration and short-term hypergravity during the rock launching and landing. Thus we want to know whether the short-term hypergravity produced by the launch process affect the early embryo development in mice, and howthe early embryos respond to the hypergravity. In present study, we are mimicking the short-term hypergravity during launch by using a centrifuge to investigate its influence on the development of early embryo (2-cell) in mice. We also examined the actin filament distribution in 2-cell embryos by immunostaining to test their potential capacity of development under short-term hypergravity exposure. Our results showed that most 2-cell embryos in the hypergravity exposure groups developed into blastocysts with normal morphology after 72h cultured in vitro, and there is no obvious difference in the development rate of blastocyst formation compared to the control. Moreover, there were no statistically significant differences in birth rates after oviduct transfer of 2-cell mouse embryos exposed on short-term hypergravity compared with 1 g condition. In addition, the well-organized actin distribution appeared in 2-cell embryos after exposed on hypergravity and also in the subsequent developmental blastocysts. Taken together, our data shows that short-term exposure in

  4. Forecasting the Short-Term Passenger Flow on High-Speed Railway with Neural Networks

    PubMed Central

    Xie, Mei-Quan; Li, Xia-Miao; Zhou, Wen-Liang; Fu, Yan-Bing

    2014-01-01

    Short-term passenger flow forecasting is an important component of transportation systems. The forecasting result can be applied to support transportation system operation and management such as operation planning and revenue management. In this paper, a divide-and-conquer method based on neural network and origin-destination (OD) matrix estimation is developed to forecast the short-term passenger flow in high-speed railway system. There are three steps in the forecasting method. Firstly, the numbers of passengers who arrive at each station or depart from each station are obtained from historical passenger flow data, which are OD matrices in this paper. Secondly, short-term passenger flow forecasting of the numbers of passengers who arrive at each station or depart from each station based on neural network is realized. At last, the OD matrices in short-term time are obtained with an OD matrix estimation method. The experimental results indicate that the proposed divide-and-conquer method performs well in forecasting the short-term passenger flow on high-speed railway. PMID:25544838

  5. Forecasting the short-term passenger flow on high-speed railway with neural networks.

    PubMed

    Xie, Mei-Quan; Li, Xia-Miao; Zhou, Wen-Liang; Fu, Yan-Bing

    2014-01-01

    Short-term passenger flow forecasting is an important component of transportation systems. The forecasting result can be applied to support transportation system operation and management such as operation planning and revenue management. In this paper, a divide-and-conquer method based on neural network and origin-destination (OD) matrix estimation is developed to forecast the short-term passenger flow in high-speed railway system. There are three steps in the forecasting method. Firstly, the numbers of passengers who arrive at each station or depart from each station are obtained from historical passenger flow data, which are OD matrices in this paper. Secondly, short-term passenger flow forecasting of the numbers of passengers who arrive at each station or depart from each station based on neural network is realized. At last, the OD matrices in short-term time are obtained with an OD matrix estimation method. The experimental results indicate that the proposed divide-and-conquer method performs well in forecasting the short-term passenger flow on high-speed railway.

  6. Updating and feature overwriting in short-term memory for timbre.

    PubMed

    Mercer, Tom; McKeown, Denis

    2010-11-01

    Previous research has demonstrated a potent, stimulus-specific form of interference in short-term auditory memory. This effect has been interpreted in terms of interitem confusion and grouping, but the present experiments suggested that interference might be a feature-specific phenomenon. Participants compared standard and comparison tones over a 10-sec interval and were required to determine whether they differed in timbre. A single interfering distractor tone was presented either 50 msec or 8 sec after the offset of the standard (Experiment 1) or 2 sec prior to its onset (Experiment 2). The distractor varied in the number of features it shared with the standard and comparison, and this proved critical, since performance on the task was greatly impaired when the distractor either consisted of novel, unshared features (Experiment 1) or contained the distinguishing feature of the comparison tone (Experiments 1 and 2). These findings were incompatible with earlier accounts of forgetting but were fully explicable by the recent timbre memory model, which associates interference in short-term auditory memory with an "updating" process and feature overwriting. These results suggest similarities with the mechanisms that underlie forgetting in verbal short-term memory.

  7. Short- and long-term memory contributions to immediate serial recognition: evidence from serial position effects.

    PubMed

    Purser, Harry; Jarrold, Christopher

    2010-04-01

    A long-standing body of research supports the existence of separable short- and long-term memory systems, relying on phonological and semantic codes, respectively. The aim of the current study was to measure the contribution of long-term knowledge to short-term memory performance by looking for evidence of phonologically and semantically coded storage within a short-term recognition task, among developmental samples. Each experimental trial presented 4-item lists. In Experiment 1 typically developing children aged 5 to 6 years old showed evidence of phonologically coded storage across all 4 serial positions, but evidence of semantically coded storage at Serial Positions 1 and 2. In a further experiment, a group of individuals with Down syndrome was investigated as a test case that might be expected to use semantic coding to support short-term storage, but these participants showed no evidence of semantically coded storage and evidenced phonologically coded storage only at Serial Position 4, suggesting that individuals with Down syndrome have a verbal short-term memory capacity of 1 item. Our results suggest that previous evidence of semantic effects on "short-term memory performance" does not reflect semantic coding in short-term memory itself, and provide an experimental method for researchers wishing to take a relatively pure measure of verbal short-term memory capacity, in cases where rehearsal is unlikely.

  8. Stimulus-specific suppression preserves information in auditory short-term memory.

    PubMed

    Linke, Annika C; Vicente-Grabovetsky, Alejandro; Cusack, Rhodri

    2011-08-02

    Philosophers and scientists have puzzled for millennia over how perceptual information is stored in short-term memory. Some have suggested that early sensory representations are involved, but their precise role has remained unclear. The current study asks whether auditory cortex shows sustained frequency-specific activation while sounds are maintained in short-term memory using high-resolution functional MRI (fMRI). Investigating short-term memory representations within regions of human auditory cortex with fMRI has been difficult because of their small size and high anatomical variability between subjects. However, we overcame these constraints by using multivoxel pattern analysis. It clearly revealed frequency-specific activity during the encoding phase of a change detection task, and the degree of this frequency-specific activation was positively related to performance in the task. Although the sounds had to be maintained in memory, activity in auditory cortex was significantly suppressed. Strikingly, patterns of activity in this maintenance period correlated negatively with the patterns evoked by the same frequencies during encoding. Furthermore, individuals who used a rehearsal strategy to remember the sounds showed reduced frequency-specific suppression during the maintenance period. Although negative activations are often disregarded in fMRI research, our findings imply that decreases in blood oxygenation level-dependent response carry important stimulus-specific information and can be related to cognitive processes. We hypothesize that, during auditory change detection, frequency-specific suppression protects short-term memory representations from being overwritten by inhibiting the encoding of interfering sounds.

  9. An ethics curriculum for short-term global health trainees.

    PubMed

    DeCamp, Matthew; Rodriguez, Joce; Hecht, Shelby; Barry, Michele; Sugarman, Jeremy

    2013-02-14

    Interest in short-term global health training and service programs continues to grow, yet they can be associated with a variety of ethical issues for which trainees or others with limited global health experience may not be prepared to address. Therefore, there is a clear need for educational interventions concerning these ethical issues. We developed and evaluated an introductory curriculum, "Ethical Challenges in Short-term Global Health Training." The curriculum was developed through solicitation of actual ethical issues experienced by trainees and program leaders; content drafting; and external content review. It was then evaluated from November 1, 2011, through July 1, 2012, by analyzing web usage data and by conducting user surveys. The survey included basic demographic data; prior experience in global health and global health ethics; and assessment of cases within the curriculum. The ten case curriculum is freely available at http://ethicsandglobalhealth.org. An average of 238 unique visitors accessed the site each month (standard deviation, 19). Of users who had been abroad before for global health training or service, only 31% reported prior ethics training related to short-term work. Most users (62%) reported accessing the site via personal referral or their training program; however, a significant number (28%) reported finding the site via web search, and 8% discovered it via web links. Users represented different fields: medicine (46%), public health (15%), and nursing (11%) were most common. All cases in the curriculum were evaluated favorably. The curriculum is meeting a critical need for an introduction to the ethical issues in short-term global health training. Future work will integrate this curriculum within more comprehensive curricula for global health and evaluate specific knowledge and behavioral effects, including at training sites abroad.

  10. An ethics curriculum for short-term global health trainees

    PubMed Central

    2013-01-01

    Background Interest in short-term global health training and service programs continues to grow, yet they can be associated with a variety of ethical issues for which trainees or others with limited global health experience may not be prepared to address. Therefore, there is a clear need for educational interventions concerning these ethical issues. Methods We developed and evaluated an introductory curriculum, “Ethical Challenges in Short-term Global Health Training.” The curriculum was developed through solicitation of actual ethical issues experienced by trainees and program leaders; content drafting; and external content review. It was then evaluated from November 1, 2011, through July 1, 2012, by analyzing web usage data and by conducting user surveys. The survey included basic demographic data; prior experience in global health and global health ethics; and assessment of cases within the curriculum. Results The ten case curriculum is freely available at http://ethicsandglobalhealth.org. An average of 238 unique visitors accessed the site each month (standard deviation, 19). Of users who had been abroad before for global health training or service, only 31% reported prior ethics training related to short-term work. Most users (62%) reported accessing the site via personal referral or their training program; however, a significant number (28%) reported finding the site via web search, and 8% discovered it via web links. Users represented different fields: medicine (46%), public health (15%), and nursing (11%) were most common. All cases in the curriculum were evaluated favorably. Conclusions The curriculum is meeting a critical need for an introduction to the ethical issues in short-term global health training. Future work will integrate this curriculum within more comprehensive curricula for global health and evaluate specific knowledge and behavioral effects, including at training sites abroad. PMID:23410089

  11. Long-Term Outcomes of Short-Term Statin Use in Healthy Adults: A Retrospective Cohort Study.

    PubMed

    Mansi, Ishak A; English, Jenny; Zhang, Song; Mortensen, Eric M; Halm, Ethan A

    2016-06-01

    Data suggest that the beneficial cardiovascular effects of statins are maximized after the first year of statin use; yet, the timeline of statin-associated adverse events is not well delineated. To examine the associations of short-term statin use (≤1 year) with short- and long-term adverse events and beneficial cardiovascular outcomes in a 'healthy' cohort. A cohort study of a healthy Tricare population (fiscal year [FY] 2002 through FY 2011) who have no cardiovascular disease, major comorbidities requiring medications, or functional limitations. Statin users used statins for 90-365 days during FY 2005 as their only prescription medication. Nonusers had medical encounters but did not receive prescription medications during FY 2005, and did not receive any statins throughout the study period from FY 2002 to FY 2011. Outcomes were the occurrence of major acute cardiovascular events, diabetes mellitus and its complications, kidney diseases, musculoskeletal diseases, obesity, cataracts, malignancy, and death. We matched 1525 statin users to 1525 nonusers. During the follow-up period (FY 2006 to FY 2011), statin users had significantly higher odds of developing diabetes and diabetic complications that persisted throughout follow-up (odds ratio [OR] 1.93, 95 % confidence interval [CI] 1.55-2.41 and OR 2.15, 95 % CI 1.20-3.86, respectively). Short-term statin use was not associated with decreased odds of major acute cardiovascular events (OR 1.17, 95 % CI 0.72-1.92). There were no differences in risks of kidney diseases, musculoskeletal diseases, or malignancy. Short-term statin use for primary prevention in this healthy cohort was associated with an increased risk of long-term diabetes and diabetic complications without cardiovascular benefits. Further study using pragmatic studies and prospective observational studies appropriately equipped to eliminate unidentified confounders are urgently needed.

  12. Assessment and treatment of short-term and working memory impairments in stroke aphasia: a practical tutorial.

    PubMed

    Salis, Christos; Kelly, Helen; Code, Chris

    2015-01-01

    Aphasia following stroke refers to impairments that affect the comprehension and expression of spoken and/or written language, and co-occurring cognitive deficits are common. In this paper we focus on short-term and working memory impairments that impact on the ability to retain and manipulate auditory-verbal information. Evidence from diverse paradigms (large group studies, case studies) report close links between short-term/working memory and language functioning in aphasia. This evidence leads to the hypothesis that treating such memory impairments would improve language functioning. This link has only recently been acknowledged in aphasia treatment but has not been embraced widely by clinicians. To examine the association between language, and short-term and working memory impairments in aphasia. To describe practical ways of assessing short-term and working memory functioning that could be used in clinical practice. To discuss and critically appraise treatments of short-term and working memory reported in the literature. Taking a translational research approach, this paper provides clinicians with current evidence from the literature and practical information on how to assess and treat short-term and working memory impairments in people with aphasia. Published treatments of short-term and/or working memory in post-stroke aphasia are discussed through a narrative review. This paper provides the following. A theoretical rationale for adopting short-term and working memory treatments in aphasia. It highlights issues in differentially diagnosing between short-term, working memory disorders and other concomitant impairments, e.g. apraxia of speech. It describes short-term and working memory assessments with practical considerations for use with people with aphasia. It also offers a description of published treatments in terms of participants, treatments and outcomes. Finally, it critically appraises the current evidence base relating to the treatment of short-term

  13. Very-short-term wind power prediction by a hybrid model with single- and multi-step approaches

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Mohammed, E.; Wang, S.; Yu, J.

    2017-05-01

    Very-short-term wind power prediction (VSTWPP) has played an essential role for the operation of electric power systems. This paper aims at improving and applying a hybrid method of VSTWPP based on historical data. The hybrid method is combined by multiple linear regressions and least square (MLR&LS), which is intended for reducing prediction errors. The predicted values are obtained through two sub-processes:1) transform the time-series data of actual wind power into the power ratio, and then predict the power ratio;2) use the predicted power ratio to predict the wind power. Besides, the proposed method can include two prediction approaches: single-step prediction (SSP) and multi-step prediction (MSP). WPP is tested comparatively by auto-regressive moving average (ARMA) model from the predicted values and errors. The validity of the proposed hybrid method is confirmed in terms of error analysis by using probability density function (PDF), mean absolute percent error (MAPE) and means square error (MSE). Meanwhile, comparison of the correlation coefficients between the actual values and the predicted values for different prediction times and window has confirmed that MSP approach by using the hybrid model is the most accurate while comparing to SSP approach and ARMA. The MLR&LS is accurate and promising for solving problems in WPP.

  14. Validation of a Fish Short-term Reproduction Assay

    EPA Science Inventory

    The Fish Short-term Reproduction Assay is an in vivo assay conducted with fathead minnows and is designed to detect changes in spawning, gross morphology, histopathology, and specific biochemical endpoints that reflect disturbances in the hypothalamic-pituitary-gonadal (HPG) axis...

  15. Unitization of Related Words in Short Term Store

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Fritzen, James

    1974-01-01

    The purpose of the present study was to assess whether or not categorized words are of similar benefit to short-term storage (STS). Specifically, can the use of categorized words be demonstrated to alleviate the limited rehearsal capacity of STS? (Author)

  16. Managing Transit Ridership with Short-Term Economic Incentives

    DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

    1982-08-01

    It is the purpose of this booklet to give the reader an overview of the variety, : type, and nature of short-term economic incentive programs that have been : introduced by transit properties over the past few years. 3054k, 55p.

  17. Short term memory for single surface features and bindings in ageing: A replication study.

    PubMed

    Isella, Valeria; Molteni, Federica; Mapelli, Cristina; Ferrarese, Carlo

    2015-06-01

    In the present study we replicated a previous experiment investigating visuo-spatial short term memory binding in young and older healthy individuals, in the attempt to verify the pattern of impairment that can be observed in normal elderly for short term memory for single items vs short term memory for bindings. Assessing a larger sample size (25 young and 25 older subjects), using a more appropriate measure of accuracy for a change detection task (A'), and adding the evaluation of speed of performance, we confirmed that old normals show a decline in short term memory for bindings of shape and colour that is of comparable extent, and not major, to the decline in memory for single shapes and single colours. The absence of a specific deficit of short term memory for conjunctions of surface features seems to distinguish cognitive ageing from Alzheimer's Disease. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  18. Does tonality boost short-term memory in congenital amusia?

    PubMed

    Albouy, Philippe; Schulze, Katrin; Caclin, Anne; Tillmann, Barbara

    2013-11-06

    Congenital amusia is a neuro-developmental disorder of music perception and production. Recent findings have demonstrated that this deficit is linked to an impaired short-term memory for tone sequences. As it has been shown before that non-musicians' implicit knowledge of musical regularities can improve short-term memory for tone information, the present study investigated if this type of implicit knowledge could also influence amusics' short-term memory performance. Congenital amusics and their matched controls, who were non-musicians, had to indicate whether sequences of five tones, presented in pairs, were the same or different; half of the pairs respected musical regularities (tonal sequences) and the other half did not (atonal sequences). As previously reported for non-musician participants, the control participants showed better performance (as measured with d') for tonal sequences than for atonal ones. While this improvement was not observed in amusics, both control and amusic participants showed faster response times for tonal sequences than for atonal sequences. These findings suggest that some implicit processing of tonal structures is potentially preserved in congenital amusia. This observation is encouraging as it strengthens the perspective to exploit implicit knowledge to help reducing pitch perception and memory deficits in amusia. © 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

  19. Improving TWSTFT short-term stability by network time transfer.

    PubMed

    Tseng, Wen-Hung; Lin, Shinn-Yan; Feng, Kai-Ming; Fujieda, M; Maeno, H

    2010-01-01

    Two-way satellite time and frequency transfer (TWSTFT) is one of the major techniques to compare the atomic time scales between timing laboratories. As more and more TWSTFT measurements have been performed, the large number of point-to-point 2-way time transfer links has grown to be a complex network. For future improvement of the TWSTFT performance, it is important to reduce measurement noise of the TWSTFT results. One method is using TWSTFT network time transfer. The Asia-Pacific network is an exceptional case of simultaneous TWSTFT measurements. Some indirect links through relay stations show better shortterm stabilities than the direct link because the measurement noise may be neutralized in a simultaneous measurement network. In this paper, the authors propose a feasible method to improve the short-term stability by combining the direct and indirect links in the network. Through the comparisons of time deviation (TDEV), the results of network time transfer exhibit clear improved short-term stabilities. For the links used to compare 2 hydrogen masers, the average gain of TDEV at averaging times of 1 h is 22%. As TWSTFT short-term stability can be improved by network time transfer, the network may allow a larger number of simultaneously transmitting stations.

  20. When Worlds Collide: Evaluating the Impact of Short-Term Study Abroad Programs

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Sato, Deirdre Colby

    2009-01-01

    The purpose of this study was to determine whether and how short-term study abroad programs transform college students' perspectives. The study examined attitudes about host country and international outlook, as well as intellectual, social and personal understandings. Short-term programs were defined as programs of less than a semester or a…

  1. Integration and segregation of large-scale brain networks during short-term task automatization

    PubMed Central

    Mohr, Holger; Wolfensteller, Uta; Betzel, Richard F.; Mišić, Bratislav; Sporns, Olaf; Richiardi, Jonas; Ruge, Hannes

    2016-01-01

    The human brain is organized into large-scale functional networks that can flexibly reconfigure their connectivity patterns, supporting both rapid adaptive control and long-term learning processes. However, it has remained unclear how short-term network dynamics support the rapid transformation of instructions into fluent behaviour. Comparing fMRI data of a learning sample (N=70) with a control sample (N=67), we find that increasingly efficient task processing during short-term practice is associated with a reorganization of large-scale network interactions. Practice-related efficiency gains are facilitated by enhanced coupling between the cingulo-opercular network and the dorsal attention network. Simultaneously, short-term task automatization is accompanied by decreasing activation of the fronto-parietal network, indicating a release of high-level cognitive control, and a segregation of the default mode network from task-related networks. These findings suggest that short-term task automatization is enabled by the brain's ability to rapidly reconfigure its large-scale network organization involving complementary integration and segregation processes. PMID:27808095

  2. Anisomycin Injection in Area CA3 of the Hippocampus Impairs Both Short-Term and Long-Term Memories of Contextual Fear

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Remaud, Jessica; Ceccom, Johnatan; Carponcy, Julien; Dugué, Laura; Menchon, Gregory; Pech, Stéphane; Halley, Helene; Francés, Bernard; Dahan, Lionel

    2014-01-01

    Protein synthesis is involved in the consolidation of short-term memory into long-term memory. Previous electrophysiological data concerning LTP in CA3 suggest that protein synthesis in that region might also be necessary for short-term memory. We tested this hypothesis by locally injecting the protein synthesis inhibitor anisomycin in hippocampal…

  3. Assessment of short-term memory in Arabic speaking children with specific language impairment.

    PubMed

    Kaddah, F A; Shoeib, R M; Mahmoud, H E

    2010-12-15

    Children with Specific Language Impairment (SLI) may have some kind of memory disorder that could increase their linguistic impairment. This study assessed the short-term memory skills in Arabic speaking children with either Expressive Language Impairment (ELI) or Receptive/Expressive Language Impairment (R/ELI) in comparison to controls in order to estimate the nature and extent of any specific deficits in these children that could explain the different prognostic results of language intervention. Eighteen children were included in each group. Receptive, expressive and total language quotients were calculated using the Arabic language test. Assessment of auditory and visual short-term memory was done using the Arabic version of the Illinois Test of Psycholinguistic Abilities. Both groups of SLI performed significantly lower linguistic abilities and poorer auditory and visual short-term memory in comparison to normal children. The R/ELI group presented an inferior performance than the ELI group in all measured parameters. Strong association was found between most tasks of auditory and visual short-term memory and linguistic abilities. The results of this study highlighted a specific degree of deficit of auditory and visual short-term memories in both groups of SLI. These deficits were more prominent in R/ELI group. Moreover, the strong association between the different auditory and visual short-term memories and language abilities in children with SLI must be taken into account when planning an intervention program for these children.

  4. Short-Term International Internship Experiences for Future Teachers and Other Child Development Professionals

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Miller, Kari Knutson; Gonzalez, Amber M.

    2016-01-01

    This paper examines outcomes associated with participation in short-term, international internship experiences. Results suggest short-term international internship experiences contribute to rich personal and professional development outcomes. Findings highlight participant challenges associated with initial internship experiences, professional…

  5. Laparoscopic and open subtotal colectomies have similar short-term results.

    PubMed

    Hoogenboom, Froukje J; Bosker, Robbert J I; Groen, Henk; Meijerink, Wilhelmus J H J; Lamme, Bas; Pierie, Jean Pierre E N

    2013-01-01

    Laparoscopic subtotal colectomy (STC) is a complex procedure. It is possible that short-term benefits for segmental resections cannot be attributed to this complex procedure. This study aims to assess differences in short-term results for laparoscopic versus open STC during a 15-year single-institute experience. We reviewed consecutive patients undergoing laparoscopic or open elective or subacute STC from January 1997 to December 2012. Fifty-six laparoscopic and 50 open STCs were performed. The operation time was significantly longer in the laparoscopic group, median 266 min (range 121-420 min), compared to 153 min (range 90-408 min) in the open group (p < 0.001). Median hospital stay showed no statistical difference, 14 days (range 1-129 days) in the laparoscopic and 13 days (range 1-85 days) in the open group. Between-group postoperative complications were not statistically different. Laparoscopic STC has short-term results similar to the open procedure, except for a longer operation time. The laparoscopic approach for STC is therefore only advisable in selected patients combined with extensive preoperative counseling. Copyright © 2013 S. Karger AG, Basel.

  6. A Short-Term Longitudinal Study of Memorial Development during Early Grade School.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Kunzinger, Edward L., III

    1985-01-01

    Overt rehearsal and free recall performance was analyzed longitudinally in two experimental testing sessions at 7 and later at 9 years of age. Measures of short- and long-term memory recall, and two measures of input processing were obtained. Significant increases between age levels were exhibited by all variables except short-term memory.…

  7. Short- versus long-term responses to changing CO2 in a coastal dinoflagellate bloom: implications for interspecific competitive interactions and community structure.

    PubMed

    Tatters, Avery O; Schnetzer, Astrid; Fu, Feixue; Lie, Alle Y A; Caron, David A; Hutchins, David A

    2013-07-01

    Increasing pCO2 (partial pressure of CO2 ) in an "acidified" ocean will affect phytoplankton community structure, but manipulation experiments with assemblages briefly acclimated to simulated future conditions may not accurately predict the long-term evolutionary shifts that could affect inter-specific competitive success. We assessed community structure changes in a natural mixed dinoflagellate bloom incubated at three pCO2 levels (230, 433, and 765 ppm) in a short-term experiment (2 weeks). The four dominant species were then isolated from each treatment into clonal cultures, and maintained at all three pCO2 levels for approximately 1 year. Periodically (4, 8, and 12 months), these pCO2 -conditioned clones were recombined into artificial communities, and allowed to compete at their conditioning pCO2 level or at higher and lower levels. The dominant species in these artificial communities of CO2 -conditioned clones differed from those in the original short-term experiment, but individual species relative abundance trends across pCO2 treatments were often similar. Specific growth rates showed no strong evidence for fitness increases attributable to conditioning pCO2 level. Although pCO2 significantly structured our experimental communities, conditioning time and biotic interactions like mixotrophy also had major roles in determining competitive outcomes. New methods of carrying out extended mixed species experiments are needed to accurately predict future long-term phytoplankton community responses to changing pCO2 . © 2013 The Author(s). Evolution © 2013 The Society for the Study of Evolution.

  8. Interplay between Short- and Long-Term Plasticity in Cell-Assembly Formation

    PubMed Central

    Hiratani, Naoki; Fukai, Tomoki

    2014-01-01

    Various hippocampal and neocortical synapses of mammalian brain show both short-term plasticity and long-term plasticity, which are considered to underlie learning and memory by the brain. According to Hebb’s postulate, synaptic plasticity encodes memory traces of past experiences into cell assemblies in cortical circuits. However, it remains unclear how the various forms of long-term and short-term synaptic plasticity cooperatively create and reorganize such cell assemblies. Here, we investigate the mechanism in which the three forms of synaptic plasticity known in cortical circuits, i.e., spike-timing-dependent plasticity (STDP), short-term depression (STD) and homeostatic plasticity, cooperatively generate, retain and reorganize cell assemblies in a recurrent neuronal network model. We show that multiple cell assemblies generated by external stimuli can survive noisy spontaneous network activity for an adequate range of the strength of STD. Furthermore, our model predicts that a symmetric temporal window of STDP, such as observed in dopaminergic modulations on hippocampal neurons, is crucial for the retention and integration of multiple cell assemblies. These results may have implications for the understanding of cortical memory processes. PMID:25007209

  9. Accurate determinations of alpha(s) from realistic lattice QCD.

    PubMed

    Mason, Q; Trottier, H D; Davies, C T H; Foley, K; Gray, A; Lepage, G P; Nobes, M; Shigemitsu, J

    2005-07-29

    We obtain a new value for the QCD coupling constant by combining lattice QCD simulations with experimental data for hadron masses. Our lattice analysis is the first to (1) include vacuum polarization effects from all three light-quark flavors (using MILC configurations), (2) include third-order terms in perturbation theory, (3) systematically estimate fourth and higher-order terms, (4) use an unambiguous lattice spacing, and (5) use an [symbol: see text](a2)-accurate QCD action. We use 28 different (but related) short-distance quantities to obtain alpha((5)/(MS))(M(Z)) = 0.1170(12).

  10. Short-term forecasting tools for agricultural nutrient management

    USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

    The advent of real time/short term farm management tools is motivated by the need to protect water quality above and beyond the general guidance offered by existing nutrient management plans. Advances in high performance computing and hydrologic/climate modeling have enabled rapid dissemination of ...

  11. Social evolution and genetic interactions in the short and long term.

    PubMed

    Van Cleve, Jeremy

    2015-08-01

    The evolution of social traits remains one of the most fascinating and feisty topics in evolutionary biology even after half a century of theoretical research. W.D. Hamilton shaped much of the field initially with his 1964 papers that laid out the foundation for understanding the effect of genetic relatedness on the evolution of social behavior. Early theoretical investigations revealed two critical assumptions required for Hamilton's rule to hold in dynamical models: weak selection and additive genetic interactions. However, only recently have analytical approaches from population genetics and evolutionary game theory developed sufficiently so that social evolution can be studied under the joint action of selection, mutation, and genetic drift. We review how these approaches suggest two timescales for evolution under weak mutation: (i) a short-term timescale where evolution occurs between a finite set of alleles, and (ii) a long-term timescale where a continuum of alleles are possible and populations evolve continuously from one monomorphic trait to another. We show how Hamilton's rule emerges from the short-term analysis under additivity and how non-additive genetic interactions can be accounted for more generally. This short-term approach reproduces, synthesizes, and generalizes many previous results including the one-third law from evolutionary game theory and risk dominance from economic game theory. Using the long-term approach, we illustrate how trait evolution can be described with a diffusion equation that is a stochastic analogue of the canonical equation of adaptive dynamics. Peaks in the stationary distribution of the diffusion capture classic notions of convergence stability from evolutionary game theory and generally depend on the additive genetic interactions inherent in Hamilton's rule. Surprisingly, the peaks of the long-term stationary distribution can predict the effects of simple kinds of non-additive interactions. Additionally, the peaks

  12. Decreased cerebral blood flow of the right anterior cingulate cortex in long-term and short-term abstinent methamphetamine users.

    PubMed

    Hwang, Jaeuk; Lyoo, In Kyoon; Kim, Seog Ju; Sung, Young Hoon; Bae, Soojeong; Cho, Sung-Nam; Lee, Ho Young; Lee, Dong Soo; Renshaw, Perry F

    2006-04-28

    The aim of the current study was to explore changes of relative regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) in short-term and long-term abstinent methamphetamine (MA) users. Relative rCBF in 40 abstinent MA users and 23 healthy comparison subjects was compared by the technetium-99m-hexamethyl-propylene amine oxime ((99m)Tc-HMPAO) single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT). Relative rCBF in areas that were found to differ significantly was also compared in groups of MA users with short-term (<6 months) and long-term (>or=6 months) abstinence. MA users showed decreased relative rCBF in the right anterior cingulate cortex (Brodmann area 32) relative to healthy comparison subjects. Long-term abstinent MA users had significantly greater rCBF than short-term abstinent MA users. We report that abstinent MA users have decreased rCBF in the anterior cingulate cortex with smaller relative decreases in subjects with prolonged abstinence.

  13. Processing short-term and long-term information with a combination of polynomial approximation techniques and time-delay neural networks.

    PubMed

    Fuchs, Erich; Gruber, Christian; Reitmaier, Tobias; Sick, Bernhard

    2009-09-01

    Neural networks are often used to process temporal information, i.e., any kind of information related to time series. In many cases, time series contain short-term and long-term trends or behavior. This paper presents a new approach to capture temporal information with various reference periods simultaneously. A least squares approximation of the time series with orthogonal polynomials will be used to describe short-term trends contained in a signal (average, increase, curvature, etc.). Long-term behavior will be modeled with the tapped delay lines of a time-delay neural network (TDNN). This network takes the coefficients of the orthogonal expansion of the approximating polynomial as inputs such considering short-term and long-term information efficiently. The advantages of the method will be demonstrated by means of artificial data and two real-world application examples, the prediction of the user number in a computer network and online tool wear classification in turning.

  14. A highly accurate analytical solution for the surface fields of a short vertical wire antenna lying on a multilayer ground

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Parise, M.

    2018-01-01

    A highly accurate analytical solution is derived to the electromagnetic problem of a short vertical wire antenna located on a stratified ground. The derivation consists of three steps. First, the integration path of the integrals describing the fields of the dipole is deformed and wrapped around the pole singularities and the two vertical branch cuts of the integrands located in the upper half of the complex plane. This allows to decompose the radiated field into its three contributions, namely the above-surface ground wave, the lateral wave, and the trapped surface waves. Next, the square root terms responsible for the branch cuts are extracted from the integrands of the branch-cut integrals. Finally, the extracted square roots are replaced with their rational representations according to Newton's square root algorithm, and residue theorem is applied to give explicit expressions, in series form, for the fields. The rigorous integration procedure and the convergence of square root algorithm ensure that the obtained formulas converge to the exact solution. Numerical simulations are performed to show the validity and robustness of the developed formulation, as well as its advantages in terms of time cost over standard numerical integration procedures.

  15. Short-term treatment with flumazenil restores long-term object memory in a mouse model of Down syndrome.

    PubMed

    Colas, Damien; Chuluun, Bayarsaikhan; Garner, Craig C; Heller, H Craig

    2017-04-01

    Down syndrome (DS) is a common genetic cause of intellectual disability yet no pro-cognitive drug therapies are approved for human use. Mechanistic studies in a mouse model of DS (Ts65Dn mice) demonstrate that impaired cognitive function is due to excessive neuronal inhibitory tone. These deficits are normalized by chronic, short-term low doses of GABA A receptor (GABA A R) antagonists in adult animals, but none of the compounds investigated are approved for human use. We explored the therapeutic potential of flumazenil (FLUM), a GABA A R antagonist working at the benzodiazepine binding site that has FDA approval. Long-term memory was assessed by the Novel Object Recognition (NOR) testing in Ts65Dn mice after acute or short-term chronic treatment with FLUM. Short-term, low, chronic dose regimens of FLUM elicit long-lasting (>1week) normalization of cognitive function in both young and aged mice. FLUM at low dosages produces long lasting cognitive improvements and has the potential of fulfilling an unmet therapeutic need in DS. Copyright © 2017. Published by Elsevier Inc.

  16. Visual Short-Term Cued Recall Memory in Infancy.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Brody, Leslie R.

    1981-01-01

    The visual short-term cued recall memory of 8-, 12-, and 16-month-olds was assessed in two experiments using an operant indirect delayed-reaction procedure. In each experiment, 12- and 16-month olds performed better than chance, whereas 8-month-old infants did not. (Author/DB)

  17. Short-Term International Experiences and Teacher Language Awareness

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Harbon, Lesley

    2007-01-01

    This research study had as its focus the impact of a short-term international experience on teacher language awareness (TLA). In-country intensive immersion experiences were considered beneficial for language teacher professional development. This project examined the Australian teachers' perceptions of their teaching and home-stay experiences…

  18. Long-term effects of interference on short-term memory performance in the rat

    PubMed Central

    Missaire, Mégane; Fraize, Nicolas; Joseph, Mickaël Antoine; Hamieh, Al Mahdy; Parmentier, Régis; Marighetto, Aline; Salin, Paul Antoine; Malleret, Gaël

    2017-01-01

    A distinction has always been made between long-term and short-term memory (also now called working memory, WM). The obvious difference between these two kinds of memory concerns the duration of information storage: information is supposedly transiently stored in WM while it is considered durably consolidated into long-term memory. It is well acknowledged that the content of WM is erased and reset after a short time, to prevent irrelevant information from proactively interfering with newly stored information. In the present study, we used typical WM radial maze tasks to question the brief lifespan of spatial WM content in rodents. Groups of rats were submitted to one of two different WM tasks in a radial maze: a WM task involving the repetitive presentation of a same pair of arms expected to induce a high level of proactive interference (PI) (HIWM task), or a task using a different pair in each trial expected to induce a low level of PI (LIWM task). Performance was effectively lower in the HIWM group than in LIWM in the final trial of each training session, indicative of a “within-session/short-term” PI effect. However, we also observed a different “between-session/long-term” PI effect between the two groups: while performance of LIWM trained rats remained stable over days, the performance of HIWM rats dropped after 10 days of training, and this impairment was visible from the very first trial of the day, hence not attributable to within-session PI. We also showed that a 24 hour-gap across training sessions known to allow consolidation processes to unfold, was a necessary and sufficient condition for the long-term PI effect to occur. These findings suggest that in the HIWM task, WM content was not entirely reset between training sessions and that, in specific conditions, WM content can outlast its purpose by being stored more permanently, generating a long-term deleterious effect of PI. The alternative explanation is that WM content could be transferred and

  19. Short-term variations of Mercury's cusps Na emission

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Massetti, S.; Mangano, V.; Milillo, A.; Mura, A.; Orsini, S.; Plainaki, C.

    2017-09-01

    We illustrate the analysis of short-term ground-based observations of the exospheric Na emission (D1 and D2 lines) from Mercury, which was characterized by two high-latitude peaks confined near the magnetospheric cusp footprints. During a series of scheduled observations from THEMIS solar telescope, achieved by scanning the whole planet, we implemented a series of extra measurements by recording the Na emission from a narrow north-south strip only, centered above the two emission peaks. Our aim was to inspect the existence of short-term variations, which were never analyzed before from ground-based observations, and their possible correlation with interplanetary magnetic field variations. Though Mercury possesses a miniature magnetosphere, characterized by fast reconnection events that develop on a timescale of few minutes, ground-based observations show that the exospheric Na emission pattern can be globally stable for a prolonged period (some days) and can exhibits fluctuations in the time range of tens of minutes.

  20. Morphological processing with deficient phonological short-term memory.

    PubMed

    Kavé, Gitit; Ze'ev, Hagit Bar; Lev, Anita

    2007-07-01

    This paper investigates the processing of Hebrew derivational morphology in an individual (S.E.) with deficient phonological short-term memory. In comparison to 10 age- and education-matched men, S.E. was impaired on digit span tasks and demonstrated no recency effect in word list recall. S.E. had low word retention span, but he exhibited phonological similarity and word length effects. His ability to make lexical decisions was intact. In a paired-associate test S.E. successfully learned semantically and morphologically related pairs but not phonologically related pairs, and his learning of nonwords was facilitated by the presence of Hebrew consonant roots. Semantic and morphological similarity enhanced immediate word recall. Results show that S.E. is capable of conducting morphological decomposition of Hebrew-derived words despite his phonological deficit, suggesting that transient maintenance of morphological constituents is independent of temporary storage and rehearsal of phonological codes, and that each is processed separately within short-term memory.

  1. Writing and overwriting short-term memory

    PubMed Central

    Killeen, Peter R.

    2008-01-01

    An integrative account of short-term memory is based on data from pigeons trained to report the majority color in a sequence of lights. Performance showed strong recency effects, was invariant over changes in the interstimulus interval, and improved with increases in the intertrial interval. A compound model of binomial variance around geometrically decreasing memory described the data; a logit transformation rendered it isomorphic with other memory models. The model was generalized for variance in the parameters, where it was shown that averaging exponential and power functions from individuals or items with different decay rates generates new functions that are hyperbolic in time and in log time, respectively. The compound model provides a unified treatment of both the accrual and the dissipation of memory and is consistent with data from various experiments, including the choose-short bias in delayed recall, multielement stimuli, and Rubin and Wenzel’s (1996) meta-analyses of forgetting. PMID:11340865

  2. The feasibility of short term prophylactic antibiotics in gastric cancer surgery.

    PubMed

    Lee, Jun Suh; Lee, Han Hong; Song, Kyo Young; Park, Cho Hyun; Jeon, Hae Myung

    2010-12-01

    Most surgeons administer prophylactic antibiotics for 3 to 5 days postoperatively. However, the Center for Disease Control (CDC) guideline recommends antibiotic therapy for 24 hours or less in clean/uncontaminated surgery. Thus, we prospectively studied the use of short term prophylactic antibiotic therapy after gastric cancer surgery. A total of 103 patients who underwent gastric cancer surgery between October 2007 and June 2008 were prospectively enrolled in a short term prophylactic antibiotics program. One gram of cefoxitin was administered 30 minutes before the incision, and one additional gram was administered intraoperatively for cases with an operation time over 3 hours. Postoperatively, one gram was administered 3 times, every 8 hours. Patients were checked routinely for fever. All cases received open surgery, and the surgical wounds were dressed and checked for Surgical Site Infection (SSI) daily. Of the 103 patients, 15 were dropped based on exclusion criteria (severe organ dysfunction, combined resection of the colon, etc). The remaining 88 patients were included in the short-term program of prophylactic antibiotic use. Of these patients, SSIs were detected in 8 (9.1%) and fever after 2 postoperative days was detected in 11 (12.5%). The incidence of SSIs increased with patient age, and postoperative fever correlated with operation time. Short term prophylactic antibiotic usage is feasible in patients who undergo gastric cancer surgery, and where there are no grave comorbidities or combined resection.

  3. Short-Term Visual Deprivation, Tactile Acuity, and Haptic Solid Shape Discrimination

    PubMed Central

    Crabtree, Charles E.; Norman, J. Farley

    2014-01-01

    Previous psychophysical studies have reported conflicting results concerning the effects of short-term visual deprivation upon tactile acuity. Some studies have found that 45 to 90 minutes of total light deprivation produce significant improvements in participants' tactile acuity as measured with a grating orientation discrimination task. In contrast, a single 2011 study found no such improvement while attempting to replicate these earlier findings. A primary goal of the current experiment was to resolve this discrepancy in the literature by evaluating the effects of a 90-minute period of total light deprivation upon tactile grating orientation discrimination. We also evaluated the potential effect of short-term deprivation upon haptic 3-D shape discrimination using a set of naturally-shaped solid objects. According to previous research, short-term deprivation enhances performance in a tactile 2-D shape discrimination task – perhaps a similar improvement also occurs for haptic 3-D shape discrimination. The results of the current investigation demonstrate that not only does short-term visual deprivation not enhance tactile acuity, it additionally has no effect upon haptic 3-D shape discrimination. While visual deprivation had no effect in our study, there was a significant effect of experience and learning for the grating orientation task – the participants' tactile acuity improved over time, independent of whether they had, or had not, experienced visual deprivation. PMID:25397327

  4. Short-term visual deprivation, tactile acuity, and haptic solid shape discrimination.

    PubMed

    Crabtree, Charles E; Norman, J Farley

    2014-01-01

    Previous psychophysical studies have reported conflicting results concerning the effects of short-term visual deprivation upon tactile acuity. Some studies have found that 45 to 90 minutes of total light deprivation produce significant improvements in participants' tactile acuity as measured with a grating orientation discrimination task. In contrast, a single 2011 study found no such improvement while attempting to replicate these earlier findings. A primary goal of the current experiment was to resolve this discrepancy in the literature by evaluating the effects of a 90-minute period of total light deprivation upon tactile grating orientation discrimination. We also evaluated the potential effect of short-term deprivation upon haptic 3-D shape discrimination using a set of naturally-shaped solid objects. According to previous research, short-term deprivation enhances performance in a tactile 2-D shape discrimination task - perhaps a similar improvement also occurs for haptic 3-D shape discrimination. The results of the current investigation demonstrate that not only does short-term visual deprivation not enhance tactile acuity, it additionally has no effect upon haptic 3-D shape discrimination. While visual deprivation had no effect in our study, there was a significant effect of experience and learning for the grating orientation task - the participants' tactile acuity improved over time, independent of whether they had, or had not, experienced visual deprivation.

  5. Evaluation of innovative traffic safety devices at short-term work zones : technical summary.

    DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

    2013-08-01

    The objective of this study was to investigate and evaluate the usage and effectiveness of innovative traffic control devices that can be used in short-term work zones. Any device to be used in short-term work zones should command the respect of driv...

  6. Early nutrition and health: short- and long-term outcomes.

    PubMed

    Gruszfeld, Dariusz; Socha, Piotr

    2013-01-01

    Maternal diet, nutritional status during pregnancy, and the early diet of the offspring play an important role in later health. The short- and long-term outcomes of early nutrition have been extensively studied in recent decades. One of the most commonly investigated nutritional interventions is breastfeeding, which is associated with a number of positive short- and long-term outcomes. A short-term effect of breastfeeding is reduced morbidity and mortality in children from poor living conditions and in preterm infants. Breastfeeding is associated with better cognitive development and also has a long-term protective effect on obesity risk, prevalence of type 2 diabetes, and a lowering effect on blood pressure. Selected nutrients have undergone extensive investigation to show their role in disease prevention or improved development, e.g. protein intake in infancy seems to be associated with a later risk of obesity or docosahexaenoic acid supplementation has a positive impact on cognitive function. Another consideration is the fast catch-up growth in small for gestational age infants as an important factor associated with adult risk of cardiovascular problems. On the other hand, high protein and energy intake seems to be positively associated with some indicators of cognitive development. Most of the evidence comes from observational studies that cannot exclude potential confounders. Animal studies demonstrate causality but should not be directly extrapolated to humans. The number of randomized controlled studies is increasing but long-term follow-ups are necessary to obtain convincing results. The majority of these trials compare different infant formula compositions and macro- or micronutrient supplementation. One of the major questions is to define a critical (or opportunity) window and a mechanism of nutritional influence on several health outcomes. Copyright © 2013 S. Karger AG, Basel.

  7. Short-term load forecasting using neural network for future smart grid application

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Zennamo, Joseph Anthony, III

    Short-term load forecasting of power system has been a classic problem for a long time. Not merely it has been researched extensively and intensively, but also a variety of forecasting methods has been raised. This thesis outlines some aspects and functions of smart meter. It also presents different policies and current statuses as well as future projects and objectives of SG development in several countries. Then the thesis compares main aspects about latest products of smart meter from different companies. Lastly, three types of prediction models are established in MATLAB to emulate the functions of smart grid in the short-term load forecasting, and then their results are compared and analyzed in terms of accuracy. For this thesis, more variables such as dew point temperature are used in the Neural Network model to achieve more accuracy for better short-term load forecasting results.

  8. Accurate estimation of short read mapping quality for next-generation genome sequencing

    PubMed Central

    Ruffalo, Matthew; Koyutürk, Mehmet; Ray, Soumya; LaFramboise, Thomas

    2012-01-01

    Motivation: Several software tools specialize in the alignment of short next-generation sequencing reads to a reference sequence. Some of these tools report a mapping quality score for each alignment—in principle, this quality score tells researchers the likelihood that the alignment is correct. However, the reported mapping quality often correlates weakly with actual accuracy and the qualities of many mappings are underestimated, encouraging the researchers to discard correct mappings. Further, these low-quality mappings tend to correlate with variations in the genome (both single nucleotide and structural), and such mappings are important in accurately identifying genomic variants. Approach: We develop a machine learning tool, LoQuM (LOgistic regression tool for calibrating the Quality of short read mappings, to assign reliable mapping quality scores to mappings of Illumina reads returned by any alignment tool. LoQuM uses statistics on the read (base quality scores reported by the sequencer) and the alignment (number of matches, mismatches and deletions, mapping quality score returned by the alignment tool, if available, and number of mappings) as features for classification and uses simulated reads to learn a logistic regression model that relates these features to actual mapping quality. Results: We test the predictions of LoQuM on an independent dataset generated by the ART short read simulation software and observe that LoQuM can ‘resurrect’ many mappings that are assigned zero quality scores by the alignment tools and are therefore likely to be discarded by researchers. We also observe that the recalibration of mapping quality scores greatly enhances the precision of called single nucleotide polymorphisms. Availability: LoQuM is available as open source at http://compbio.case.edu/loqum/. Contact: matthew.ruffalo@case.edu. PMID:22962451

  9. Regularization in Short-Term Memory for Serial Order

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Botvinick, Matthew; Bylsma, Lauren M.

    2005-01-01

    Previous research has shown that short-term memory for serial order can be influenced by background knowledge concerning regularities of sequential structure. Specifically, it has been shown that recall is superior for sequences that fit well with familiar sequencing constraints. The authors report a corresponding effect pertaining to serial…

  10. Memory for relations in the short term and the long term after medial temporal lobe damage.

    PubMed

    Squire, Larry R

    2017-05-01

    A central idea about the organization of declarative memory and the function of the hippocampus is that the hippocampus provides for the coding of relationships between items. A question arises whether this idea refers to the process of forming long-term memory or whether, as some studies have suggested, memory for relations might depend on the hippocampus even at short retention intervals and even when the task falls within the province of short-term (working) memory. The latter formulation appears to place the operation of relational memory into conflict with the idea that working memory is independent of medial temporal lobe (MTL) structures. In this report, the concepts of relational memory and working memory are discussed in the light of a simple demonstration experiment. Patients with MTL lesions successfully learned and recalled two word pairs when tested directly after learning but failed altogether when tested after a delay. The results do not contradict the idea that the hippocampus has a fundamental role in relational memory. However, there is a need for further elaboration and specification of the idea in order to explain why patients with MTL lesions can establish relational memory in the short term but not in long-term memory. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

  11. Improved Short-Term Clock Prediction Method for Real-Time Positioning.

    PubMed

    Lv, Yifei; Dai, Zhiqiang; Zhao, Qile; Yang, Sheng; Zhou, Jinning; Liu, Jingnan

    2017-06-06

    The application of real-time precise point positioning (PPP) requires real-time precise orbit and clock products that should be predicted within a short time to compensate for the communication delay or data gap. Unlike orbit correction, clock correction is difficult to model and predict. The widely used linear model hardly fits long periodic trends with a small data set and exhibits significant accuracy degradation in real-time prediction when a large data set is used. This study proposes a new prediction model for maintaining short-term satellite clocks to meet the high-precision requirements of real-time clocks and provide clock extrapolation without interrupting the real-time data stream. Fast Fourier transform (FFT) is used to analyze the linear prediction residuals of real-time clocks. The periodic terms obtained through FFT are adopted in the sliding window prediction to achieve a significant improvement in short-term prediction accuracy. This study also analyzes and compares the accuracy of short-term forecasts (less than 3 h) by using different length observations. Experimental results obtained from International GNSS Service (IGS) final products and our own real-time clocks show that the 3-h prediction accuracy is better than 0.85 ns. The new model can replace IGS ultra-rapid products in the application of real-time PPP. It is also found that there is a positive correlation between the prediction accuracy and the short-term stability of on-board clocks. Compared with the accuracy of the traditional linear model, the accuracy of the static PPP using the new model of the 2-h prediction clock in N, E, and U directions is improved by about 50%. Furthermore, the static PPP accuracy of 2-h clock products is better than 0.1 m. When an interruption occurs in the real-time model, the accuracy of the kinematic PPP solution using 1-h clock prediction product is better than 0.2 m, without significant accuracy degradation. This model is of practical significance

  12. Short-term visual deprivation can enhance spatial release from masking.

    PubMed

    Pagé, Sara; Sharp, Andréanne; Landry, Simon P; Champoux, François

    2016-08-15

    This research aims to study the effect of short-term visual deprivation on spatial release from masking, a major component of the cocktail party effect that allows people to detect an auditory target in noise. The Masking Level Difference (MLD) test was administered on healthy individuals over three sessions: before (I) and after 90min of visual deprivation (II), and after 90min of re-exposure to light (III). A non-deprived control group performed the same tests, but remained sighted between sessions I and II. The non-deprived control group displayed constant results across sessions. However, performance in the MLD test was improved following short-term visual deprivation and performance returned to pre-deprivation values after light re-exposure. This study finds that short-term visual deprivation transiently enhances the spatial release from masking. These data suggest the significant potential for enhancing a process involved in the cocktail party effect in normally developing individuals and adds to an emerging literature on the potential to enhance auditory ability after only a brief period of visual deprivation. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

  13. The many faces of working memory and short-term storage.

    PubMed

    Cowan, Nelson

    2017-08-01

    The topic of working memory (WM) is ubiquitous in research on cognitive psychology and on individual differences. According to one definition, it is a small amount of information kept in a temporary state of heightened accessibility; it is used in most types of communication and problem solving. Short-term storage has been defined as the passive (i.e., non-attention-based, nonstrategic) component of WM or, alternatively, as a passive store separate from an attention-based WM. Here I note that much confusion has been created by the use by various investigators of many, subtly different definitions of WM and short-term storage. The definitions are sometimes made explicit and sometimes implied. As I explain, the different definitions may have stemmed from the use of a wide variety of techniques to explore WM, along with differences in theoretical orientation. By delineating nine previously used definitions of WM and explaining how additional ones may emerge from combinations of these nine, I hope to improve scientific discourse on WM. The potential advantages of clarity about definitions of WM and short-term storage are illustrated with respect to several ongoing research controversies.

  14. The short-term impacts of Earned Income Tax Credit disbursement on health.

    PubMed

    Rehkopf, David H; Strully, Kate W; Dow, William H

    2014-12-01

    There are conflicting findings regarding long- and short-term effects of income on health. Whereas higher average income is associated with better health, there is evidence that health behaviours worsen in the short-term following income receipt.Prior studies revealing such negative short-term effects of income receipt focus on specific subpopulations and examine a limited set of health outcomes. The United States Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) is an income supplement tied to work, and is the largest poverty reduction programme in the USA. We utilize the fact that EITC recipients typically receive large cash transfers in the months of February,March and April, in order to examine associated changes in health outcomes that can fluctuate on a monthly basis. We examine associations with 30 outcomes in the categories of diet, food security, health behaviours, cardiovascular biomarkers, metabolic biomarkers and infection and immunity among 6925 individuals from the U.S. National Health and Nutrition Survey. Our research design approximates a natural experiment,since whether individuals were sampled during treatment or non-treatment months is independent of social, demographic and health characteristics that do not vary with time. There are both beneficial and detrimental short-term impacts of income receipt.Although there are detrimental impacts on metabolic factors among women, most other impacts are beneficial, including those for food security, smoking and trying to lose weight. The short-term impacts of EITC income receipt are not universally health promoting, but on balance there are more health benefits than detriments.

  15. The short-term impacts of Earned Income Tax Credit disbursement on health

    PubMed Central

    Rehkopf, David H; Strully, Kate W; Dow, William H

    2014-01-01

    Background: There are conflicting findings regarding long- and short-term effects of income on health. Whereas higher average income is associated with better health, there is evidence that health behaviours worsen in the short-term following income receipt. Prior studies revealing such negative short-term effects of income receipt focus on specific subpopulations and examine a limited set of health outcomes. Methods: The United States Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) is an income supplement tied to work, and is the largest poverty reduction programme in the USA. We utilize the fact that EITC recipients typically receive large cash transfers in the months of February, March and April, in order to examine associated changes in health outcomes that can fluctuate on a monthly basis. We examine associations with 30 outcomes in the categories of diet, food security, health behaviours, cardiovascular biomarkers, metabolic biomarkers and infection and immunity among 6925 individuals from the U.S. National Health and Nutrition Survey. Our research design approximates a natural experiment, since whether individuals were sampled during treatment or non-treatment months is independent of social, demographic and health characteristics that do not vary with time. Results: There are both beneficial and detrimental short-term impacts of income receipt. Although there are detrimental impacts on metabolic factors among women, most other impacts are beneficial, including those for food security, smoking and trying to lose weight. Conclusions: The short-term impacts of EITC income receipt are not universally health promoting, but on balance there are more health benefits than detriments. PMID:25172139

  16. Short-term load forecasting of power system

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Xu, Xiaobin

    2017-05-01

    In order to ensure the scientific nature of optimization about power system, it is necessary to improve the load forecasting accuracy. Power system load forecasting is based on accurate statistical data and survey data, starting from the history and current situation of electricity consumption, with a scientific method to predict the future development trend of power load and change the law of science. Short-term load forecasting is the basis of power system operation and analysis, which is of great significance to unit combination, economic dispatch and safety check. Therefore, the load forecasting of the power system is explained in detail in this paper. First, we use the data from 2012 to 2014 to establish the partial least squares model to regression analysis the relationship between daily maximum load, daily minimum load, daily average load and each meteorological factor, and select the highest peak by observing the regression coefficient histogram Day maximum temperature, daily minimum temperature and daily average temperature as the meteorological factors to improve the accuracy of load forecasting indicators. Secondly, in the case of uncertain climate impact, we use the time series model to predict the load data for 2015, respectively, the 2009-2014 load data were sorted out, through the previous six years of the data to forecast the data for this time in 2015. The criterion for the accuracy of the prediction is the average of the standard deviations for the prediction results and average load for the previous six years. Finally, considering the climate effect, we use the BP neural network model to predict the data in 2015, and optimize the forecast results on the basis of the time series model.

  17. Chances of short-term cooling trends over Canada for the next decades

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Grenier, Patrick; de Elia, Ramon; Chaumont, Diane

    2014-05-01

    As climate services continue to develop in Quebec, Canada, an increasing number of requests are made for providing information relevant for the near term. As a response, one approach has been to consider short-term cooling trends as a basis for climate products. This project comprises different aspects: technical steps, knowledge transfer, and societal use. Each step does represent a different challenge. The technical part, i.e. producing probabilistic distributions of short-term temperature trends, involves relatively complex scenario construction methods including bias-related post-processing, and access to wide simulation and observation databases. Calculations are performed on 60 CMIP5-based scenarios on a grid covering Canada during the period 2006-2035, and for 5, 10, 15, 20 and 25-year trend durations. Knowledge transfer implies overcoming misinterpretation, given that probabilistic projections based on simulation ensembles are not perfectly related to real-Earth possible outcomes. Finally, societal use of this information remains the biggest challenge. On the one hand, users clearly state their interest in near-term relevant information, and intuitively it seems clear that short-term cooling trends embedded within the long-term warming path should be considered in adaptation plans, for avoiding over-adaptation. On the other hand, the exact way of incorporating such information within a decision-making process has proven not to be obvious. Irrespective of that, the study and communication of short-term cooling chances is necessary for preventing decision-makers to infer from the eventual occurrence of such a trend that global warming isn't happening. The presentation will discuss the three aspects aforementioned.

  18. Ministers of Health: short-term tenure for long-term goals?

    PubMed

    Ferraz, Marcos Bosi; Azevedo, Rafael Teixeira

    2011-03-01

    Healthcare investments should consider short and long-term demands. The objectives here were to compare the average tenures of ministers of health in Brazil and in another 22 countries and to evaluate the relationship between ministers' tenures and a number of indicators. Descriptive study conducted at Centro Paulista de Economia da Saúde (CPES). Twenty-two countries with the highest Human Development Indices (HDIs) and Brazil were included. The number of ministers over the past 20 years was investigated through each country's Ministry of Health website. Pearson's correlation coefficient was used to compare the number of ministers in each country with that country's indicators. The Mann-Whitney test was used to compare ministers' tenures in Brazil and other countries. The mean tenure (standard deviation, SD) of Brazilian ministers of health was 15 (12) months, a period that is statistically significantly shorter than the mean tenure of 33 (18) months in the other 22 countries (P < 0.05). There was a moderate and statistically significant positive correlation between the number of ministers and mortality rates for several conditions. The number of ministers also presented moderate and statistically significant negative correlations with per capita total healthcare expenditure (r = -0.567) and with per capita government healthcare expenditure (r = -0.530). On average, ministers of health have extremely short tenures. There is an urgent need to think and plan healthcare systems from a long-term perspective.

  19. Enhanced Visual Short-Term Memory for Angry Faces

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Jackson, Margaret C.; Wu, Chia-Yun; Linden, David E. J.; Raymond, Jane E.

    2009-01-01

    Although some views of face perception posit independent processing of face identity and expression, recent studies suggest interactive processing of these 2 domains. The authors examined expression-identity interactions in visual short-term memory (VSTM) by assessing recognition performance in a VSTM task in which face identity was relevant and…

  20. UNIVERSITY RESEARCH BUILDINGS FOR SHORT-TERM GRANT PROGRAMS.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    KINNE, W.S., JR.

    GUIDELINES WERE ESTABLISHED TO ASSIST IN THE PLANNING AND DEVELOPMENT OF ADEQUATE FACILITIES FOR SHORT-TERM RESEARCH GRANT PROGRAMS. FUNCTIONAL CRITERIA WERRE DEVELOPED FROM THE ANALYSES OF COST STUDIES AND A SURGE SPACE STUDY AT THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS. ALTERNATIVES WERE SUGGESTED FOR THE PROVISION, PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS, SITE LOCATION,…

  1. A new methodology involving stable isotope tracer to compare short- and long- term selenium mobility in soils

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Tolu, Julie; Thiry, Yves; Potin-gautier, Martine; Le hécho, Isabelle; Bueno, Maïté

    2013-04-01

    Selenium is an element of environmental concern given its dual beneficial and toxic character to animal and human health. Its radioactive isotope 79Se, a fission product of 235U, is considered critical in safety assessment of nuclear waste repositories in case of leakage and hypothetical soil contamination. Therefore, Se species transformations and interactions with soil components have to be clearly understood to predict its dispersion in the biosphere (e.g., accumulation in soils, migration to waters, transfer to living organisms). While natural Se interactions with soils run over centuries to millennia time scales, transformations and partitioning are generally studied with short-term experiments (often inferior to 1 month) after Se addition. The influence of slower, long-term processes involved in Se speciation and mobility in soils is thus not properly accounted for. We tested if using ambient Se would be relevant for long-term risk assessment while added Se would be more representative of short-term contamination impact. For that purpose, we developed a new methodology to trace the differential reactivity of ambient and spiked Se at trace level (µg kg-1) in soils. It combined the use of a stable isotopically enriched tracer with our previous published analytical method based on specific extractions and HPLC-ICP-MS to determine trace Se species partition in different soil phases. Given that soil extracts contains very high concentrations of various elements interfering Se (e.g., Fe, Cl, Br), the ICP-MS parameters and mathematical corrections were optimized to cope with such interferences. Following optimization, three correct and accurate (<2%) isotope ratios were obtained with 77Se, 78Se, 80Se and 82Se. The optimized method was then applied to an arable and a forest soil submitted to an aging process (drying/wetting cycles) during three months, to which 77Se(IV) was previously added. The results showed that ambient Se was at steady state in terms of water

  2. Short-term memory binding deficits in Alzheimer's disease.

    PubMed

    Parra, Mario A; Abrahams, Sharon; Fabi, Katia; Logie, Robert; Luzzi, Simona; Della Sala, Sergio

    2009-04-01

    Alzheimer's disease impairs long term memories for related events (e.g. faces with names) more than for single events (e.g. list of faces or names). Whether or not this associative or 'binding' deficit is also found in short-term memory has not yet been explored. In two experiments we investigated binding deficits in verbal short-term memory in Alzheimer's disease. Experiment 1: 23 patients with Alzheimer's disease and 23 age and education matched healthy elderly were recruited. Participants studied visual arrays of objects (six for healthy elderly and four for Alzheimer's disease patients), colours (six for healthy elderly and four for Alzheimer's disease patients), unbound objects and colours (three for healthy elderly and two for Alzheimer's disease patients in each of the two categories), or objects bound with colours (three for healthy elderly and two for Alzheimer's disease patients). They were then asked to recall the items verbally. The memory of patients with Alzheimer's disease for objects bound with colours was significantly worse than for single or unbound features whereas healthy elderly's memory for bound and unbound features did not differ. Experiment 2: 21 Alzheimer's disease patients and 20 matched healthy elderly were recruited. Memory load was increased for the healthy elderly group to eight items in the conditions assessing memory for single or unbound features and to four items in the condition assessing memory for the binding of these features. For Alzheimer's disease patients the task remained the same. This manipulation permitted the performance to be equated across groups in the conditions assessing memory for single or unbound features. The impairment in Alzheimer's disease patients in recalling bound objects reported in Experiment 1 was replicated. The binding cost was greater than that observed in the healthy elderly group, who did not differ in their performance for bound and unbound features. Alzheimer's disease grossly impairs the

  3. Obesity and pregnancy: Mechanisms of short term and long term adverse consequences for mother and child

    USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

    Obesity is the most common medical condition in women of reproductive age. Obesity during pregnancy has short term and long term adverse consequences for both mother and child. Obesity causes problems with infertility, and in early gestation it causes spontaneous pregnancy loss and congenital anomal...

  4. Short-term memory deficits correlate with hippocampal-thalamic functional connectivity alterations following acute sleep restriction.

    PubMed

    Chengyang, Li; Daqing, Huang; Jianlin, Qi; Haisheng, Chang; Qingqing, Meng; Jin, Wang; Jiajia, Liu; Enmao, Ye; Yongcong, Shao; Xi, Zhang

    2017-08-01

    Acute sleep restriction heavily influences cognitive function, affecting executive processes such as attention, response inhibition, and memory. Previous neuroimaging studies have suggested a link between hippocampal activity and short-term memory function. However, the specific contribution of the hippocampus to the decline of short-term memory following sleep restriction has yet to be established. In the current study, we utilized resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to examine the association between hippocampal functional connectivity (FC) and the decline of short-term memory following total sleep deprivation (TSD). Twenty healthy adult males aged 20.9 ± 2.3 years (age range, 18-24 years) were enrolled in a within-subject crossover study. Short-term memory and FC were assessed using a Delay-matching short-term memory test and a resting-state fMRI scan before and after TSD. Seed-based correlation analysis was performed using fMRI data for the left and right hippocampus to identify differences in hippocampal FC following TSD. Subjects demonstrated reduced alertness and a decline in short-term memory performance following TSD. Moreover, fMRI analysis identified reduced hippocampal FC with the superior frontal gyrus (SFG), temporal regions, and supplementary motor area. In addition, an increase in FC between the hippocampus and bilateral thalamus was observed, the extent of which correlated with short-term memory performance following TSD. Our findings indicate that the disruption of hippocampal-cortical connectivity is linked to the decline in short-term memory observed after acute sleep restriction. Such results provide further evidence that support the cognitive impairment model of sleep deprivation.

  5. Short-Term Enrollment Forecasting for Accurate Budget Planning.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Salley, Charles D.

    1979-01-01

    Reliance on enrollment trend models for revenue projections has led to a scenario of alternating overbudgeted and underbudgeted years. A study of a large, public university indicates that time series analysis should be used instead to anticipate the orderly seasonal and cyclical patterns that are visible in a period of moderate trend growth.…

  6. Romantic preferences in Brazilian undergraduate students: from the short term to the long term.

    PubMed

    Castro, Felipe Nalon; de Araújo Lopes, Fívia

    2011-09-01

    A number of studies have described different preference patterns typically found for men and women when choosing romantic mates. These vary according to the involvement level expected in the relationship. Despite the number of investigations on the topic, one must be careful not to generalize because most studies use samples composed of North American university undergraduates. This study sought to determine if the preference patterns typically found in other countries also occur among Brazilian undergraduates. The importance of characteristics and modifications in preference patterns under gradually restrictive conditions was also investigated. In general, the results obtained suggest that the preferences found in a number of countries also occur in Brazil. In short-term relationships, men prioritize physical attributes, whereas personal traits gain importance when involvement increases. Women in short-term relationships value physical and personal traits, whereas in the long term, they emphasize personal characteristics and their mate's desire to acquire resources. Resource-related traits were less important than the other traits, and were more important for women than for men.

  7. Preschoolers Continue to Trust a More Accurate Informant 1 Week after Exposure to Accuracy Information

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Corriveau, Kathleen; Harris, Paul L.

    2009-01-01

    To determine whether children retain a preference for a previously accurate informant only in the short term or for long-term use, 3- and 4-year-old children were tested in two experiments. In both experiments, children were given accuracy information about two informants and were subsequently tested for their selective trust in the two informants…

  8. The human hippocampal formation mediates short-term memory of colour-location associations.

    PubMed

    Finke, Carsten; Braun, Mischa; Ostendorf, Florian; Lehmann, Thomas-Nicolas; Hoffmann, Karl-Titus; Kopp, Ute; Ploner, Christoph J

    2008-01-31

    The medial temporal lobe (MTL) has long been considered essential for declarative long-term memory, whereas the fronto-parietal cortex is generally seen as the anatomical substrate of short-term memory. This traditional dichotomy is questioned by recent studies suggesting a possible role of the MTL for short-term memory. In addition, there is no consensus on a possible specialization of MTL sub-regions for memory of associative information. Here, we investigated short-term memory for single features and feature associations in three humans with post-surgical lesions affecting the right hippocampal formation and in 10 healthy controls. We used three delayed-match-to-sample tasks with two delays (900/5000 ms) and three set sizes (2/4/6 items). Subjects were instructed to remember either colours, locations or colour-location associations. In colour-only and location-only conditions, performance of patients did not differ from controls. By contrast, a significant group difference was found in the association condition at 5000 ms delay. This difference was largely independent of set size, thus suggesting that it cannot be explained by the increased complexity of the association condition. These findings show that the hippocampal formation plays a significant role for short-term memory of simple visuo-spatial associations, and suggest a specialization of MTL sub-regions for associative memory.

  9. The Role of Short Term Synaptic Plasticity in Temporal Coding of Neuronal Networks

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Chandrasekaran, Lakshmi

    2008-01-01

    Short term synaptic plasticity is a phenomenon which is commonly found in the central nervous system. It could contribute to functions of signal processing namely, temporal integration and coincidence detection by modulating the input synaptic strength. This dissertation has two parts. First, we study the effects of short term synaptic plasticity…

  10. Depletion of Serotonin Selectively Impairs Short-Term Memory without Affecting Long-Term Memory in Odor Learning in the Terrestrial Slug "Limax Valentianus"

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Santa, Tomofumi; Kirino, Yutaka; Watanabe, Satoshi; Shirahata, Takaaki; Tsunoda, Makoto

    2006-01-01

    The terrestrial slug "Limax" is able to acquire short-term and long-term memories during aversive odor-taste associative learning. We investigated the effect of the selective serotonergic neurotoxin 5,7-dihydroxytryptamine (5,7-DHT) on memory. Behavioral studies indicated that 5,7-DHT impaired short-term memory but not long-term memory. HPLC…

  11. Case series: Two cases of eyeball tattoos with short-term complications.

    PubMed

    Duarte, Gonzalo; Cheja, Rashel; Pachón, Diana; Ramírez, Carolina; Arellanes, Lourdes

    2017-04-01

    To report two cases of eyeball tattoos with short-term post procedural complications. Case 1 is a 26-year-old Mexican man that developed orbital cellulitis and posterior scleritis 2 h after an eyeball tattoo. Patient responded satisfactorily to systemic antibiotic and corticosteroid treatment. Case 2 is a 17-year-old Mexican man that developed two sub-episcleral nodules in the ink injection sites immediately after the procedure. Eyeball tattoos are performed by non-ophthalmic trained personnel. There are a substantial number of short-term risks associated with this procedure. Long-term effects on the eyes and vision are still unknown, but in a worst case scenario could include loss of vision or permanent damage to the eyes.

  12. Comparison of the effects of dose-dependent zinc chloride on short-term and long-term memory in young male rats.

    PubMed

    Moazedi, A A; Ghotbeddin, Z; Parham, G H

    2007-08-15

    The aim of the present study was to evaluate the effects of dose-dependent of zinc chloride on short-term and long-term memory in a shuttle box. Young Wistar rats (94+/-10 g) (age 27-30 days) consumed zinc chloride drinking water in five different doses (20, 30, 50, 70 and 100 mg kg(-1) day(-1)) for two weeks by gavage. After 14 days on experimental diets, a shuttle box used to test short- and long-term memory. Two criteria considering for behavioral test, including latency in entering dark chamber and time spent in the dark chamber. This experiment shows that after 2 weeks oral administration of ZnCl2 with (20, 30 and 50 mg kg(-1) day(-1)) doses, the rat's working (short-term) has been improved (p<0.05). Whereas ZnCl2 with 30 mg kg(-1) day(-1) dose has been more effected than other doses (p<0.001). But rat which received ZnCl2 with 100 mg kg(-1) day(-1), has been shown significant impairment in working memory (p<0.05) and there was no significant difference in reference (long-term) memory for any of groups. In general, this study has demonstrated that zinc chloride consumption with 30 mg kg(-1) day(-1) dose for two weeks was more effective than other doses on short-term memory. But consumption of ZnCl2 with 100 mg kg(-1) day(-1) dose for two week had the negative effect on short-term memory. On the other hand, zinc supplementation did not have an effect on long-term memory.

  13. 22 CFR 71.11 - Short-term full diet program.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

    2010-04-01

    ..., including private funding from family or friends; and (3) If the funds exceed an amount to be established by... sources such as family or friends; (4) Because funds expended by the Department to cover the short-term...

  14. 22 CFR 71.11 - Short-term full diet program.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

    2011-04-01

    ..., including private funding from family or friends; and (3) If the funds exceed an amount to be established by... sources such as family or friends; (4) Because funds expended by the Department to cover the short-term...

  15. Cyclic injection, storage, and withdrawal of heated water in a sandstone aquifer at St. Paul, Minnesota: Analysis of thermal data and nonisothermal modeling of short-term test cycles

    USGS Publications Warehouse

    Miller, Robert T.; Delin, G.N.

    1994-01-01

    A three-dimensional, anisotropic, nonisothermal, ground-water-flow, and thermal-energy-transport model was constructed to simulate the four short-term test cycles. The model was used to simulate the entire short-term testing period of approximately 400 days. The only model properties varied during model calibration were longitudinal and transverse thermal dispersivities, which, for final calibration, were simulated as 3.3 and 0.33 meters, respectively. The model was calibrated by comparing model-computed results to (1) measured temperatures at selected altitudes in four observation wells, (2) measured temperatures at the production well, and (3) calculated thermal efficiencies of the aquifer. Model-computed withdrawal-water temperatures were within an average of about 3 percent of measured values and model-computed aquifer-thermal efficiencies were within an average of about 5 percent of calculated values for the short-term test cycles. These data indicate that the model accurately simulated thermal-energy storage within the Franconia-Ironton-Galesville aquifer.

  16. Working memory, short-term memory and reading proficiency in school-age children with cochlear implants.

    PubMed

    Bharadwaj, Sneha V; Maricle, Denise; Green, Laura; Allman, Tamby

    2015-10-01

    The objective of the study was to examine short-term memory and working memory through both visual and auditory tasks in school-age children with cochlear implants. The relationship between the performance on these cognitive skills and reading as well as language outcomes were examined in these children. Ten children between the ages of 7 and 11 years with early-onset bilateral severe-profound hearing loss participated in the study. Auditory and visual short-term memory, auditory and visual working memory subtests and verbal knowledge measures were assessed using the Woodcock Johnson III Tests of Cognitive Abilities, the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-IV Integrated and the Kaufman Assessment Battery for Children II. Reading outcomes were assessed using the Woodcock Reading Mastery Test III. Performance on visual short-term memory and visual working memory measures in children with cochlear implants was within the average range when compared to the normative mean. However, auditory short-term memory and auditory working memory measures were below average when compared to the normative mean. Performance was also below average on all verbal knowledge measures. Regarding reading outcomes, children with cochlear implants scored below average for listening and passage comprehension tasks and these measures were positively correlated to visual short-term memory, visual working memory and auditory short-term memory. Performance on auditory working memory subtests was not related to reading or language outcomes. The children with cochlear implants in this study demonstrated better performance in visual (spatial) working memory and short-term memory skills than in auditory working memory and auditory short-term memory skills. Significant positive relationships were found between visual working memory and reading outcomes. The results of the study provide support for the idea that WM capacity is modality specific in children with hearing loss. Based on these

  17. Accurate typing of short tandem repeats from genome-wide sequencing data and its applications.

    PubMed

    Fungtammasan, Arkarachai; Ananda, Guruprasad; Hile, Suzanne E; Su, Marcia Shu-Wei; Sun, Chen; Harris, Robert; Medvedev, Paul; Eckert, Kristin; Makova, Kateryna D

    2015-05-01

    Short tandem repeats (STRs) are implicated in dozens of human genetic diseases and contribute significantly to genome variation and instability. Yet profiling STRs from short-read sequencing data is challenging because of their high sequencing error rates. Here, we developed STR-FM, short tandem repeat profiling using flank-based mapping, a computational pipeline that can detect the full spectrum of STR alleles from short-read data, can adapt to emerging read-mapping algorithms, and can be applied to heterogeneous genetic samples (e.g., tumors, viruses, and genomes of organelles). We used STR-FM to study STR error rates and patterns in publicly available human and in-house generated ultradeep plasmid sequencing data sets. We discovered that STRs sequenced with a PCR-free protocol have up to ninefold fewer errors than those sequenced with a PCR-containing protocol. We constructed an error correction model for genotyping STRs that can distinguish heterozygous alleles containing STRs with consecutive repeat numbers. Applying our model and pipeline to Illumina sequencing data with 100-bp reads, we could confidently genotype several disease-related long trinucleotide STRs. Utilizing this pipeline, for the first time we determined the genome-wide STR germline mutation rate from a deeply sequenced human pedigree. Additionally, we built a tool that recommends minimal sequencing depth for accurate STR genotyping, depending on repeat length and sequencing read length. The required read depth increases with STR length and is lower for a PCR-free protocol. This suite of tools addresses the pressing challenges surrounding STR genotyping, and thus is of wide interest to researchers investigating disease-related STRs and STR evolution. © 2015 Fungtammasan et al.; Published by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press.

  18. Word-length effect in verbal short-term memory in individuals with Down's syndrome.

    PubMed

    Kanno, K; Ikeda, Y

    2002-11-01

    Many studies have indicated that individuals with Down's syndrome (DS) show a specific deficit in short-term memory for verbal information. The aim of the present study was to investigate the influence of the length of words on verbal short-term memory in individuals with DS. Twenty-eight children with DS and 10 control participants matched for memory span were tested on verbal serial recall and speech rate, which are thought to involve rehearsal and output speed. Although a significant word-length effect was observed in both groups for the recall of a larger number of items with a shorter spoken duration than for those with a longer spoken duration, the number of correct recalls in the group with DS was reduced compared to the control subjects. The results demonstrating poor short-term memory in children with DS were irrelevant to speech rate. In addition, the proportion of repetition-gained errors in serial recall was higher in children with DS than in control subjects. The present findings suggest that poor access to long-term lexical knowledge, rather than overt articulation speed, constrains verbal short-term memory functions in individuals with DS.

  19. Short-Term Memory of Children with Mental Retardation: Structural Defects or Control Deficits.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Katims, David S.

    The short-term memory of 24 retarded and 24 nonretarded individuals, aged 10 to 14, under conditions of restricted cognitive strategy use was investigated. An attempt was made to determine whether short-term memory difficulties of persons with mental retardation are caused by deficits in voluntary cognitive strategies, such as the organization and…

  20. The case against specialized visual-spatial short-term memory.

    PubMed

    Morey, Candice C

    2018-05-24

    The dominant paradigm for understanding working memory, or the combination of the perceptual, attentional, and mnemonic processes needed for thinking, subdivides short-term memory (STM) according to whether memoranda are encoded in aural-verbal or visual formats. This traditional dissociation has been supported by examples of neuropsychological patients who seem to selectively lack STM for either aural-verbal, visual, or spatial memoranda, and by experimental research using dual-task methods. Though this evidence is the foundation of assumptions of modular STM systems, the case it makes for a specialized visual STM system is surprisingly weak. I identify the key evidence supporting a distinct verbal STM system-patients with apparent selective damage to verbal STM and the resilience of verbal short-term memories to general dual-task interference-and apply these benchmarks to neuropsychological and experimental investigations of visual-spatial STM. Contrary to the evidence on verbal STM, patients with apparent visual or spatial STM deficits tend to experience a wide range of additional deficits, making it difficult to conclude that a distinct short-term store was damaged. Consistently with this, a meta-analysis of dual-task visual-spatial STM research shows that robust dual-task costs are consistently observed regardless of the domain or sensory code of the secondary task. Together, this evidence suggests that positing a specialized visual STM system is not necessary. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2018 APA, all rights reserved).

  1. Similarity as an organising principle in short-term memory.

    PubMed

    LeCompte, D C; Watkins, M J

    1993-03-01

    The role of stimulus similarity as an organising principle in short-term memory was explored in a series of seven experiments. Each experiment involved the presentation of a short sequence of items that were drawn from two distinct physical classes and arranged such that item class changed after every second item. Following presentation, one item was re-presented as a probe for the 'target' item that had directly followed it in the sequence. Memory for the sequence was considered organised by class if probability of recall was higher when the probe and target were from the same class than when they were from different classes. Such organisation was found when one class was auditory and the other was visual (spoken vs. written words, and sounds vs. pictures). It was also found when both classes were auditory (words spoken in a male voice vs. words spoken in a female voice) and when both classes were visual (digits shown in one location vs. digits shown in another). It is concluded that short-term memory can be organised on the basis of sensory modality and on the basis of certain features within both the auditory and visual modalities.

  2. A new model integrating short- and long-term aging of copper added to soils

    PubMed Central

    Zeng, Saiqi; Li, Jumei; Wei, Dongpu

    2017-01-01

    Aging refers to the processes by which the bioavailability/toxicity, isotopic exchangeability, and extractability of metals added to soils decline overtime. We studied the characteristics of the aging process in copper (Cu) added to soils and the factors that affect this process. Then we developed a semi-mechanistic model to predict the lability of Cu during the aging process with descriptions of the diffusion process using complementary error function. In the previous studies, two semi-mechanistic models to separately predict short-term and long-term aging of Cu added to soils were developed with individual descriptions of the diffusion process. In the short-term model, the diffusion process was linearly related to the square root of incubation time (t1/2), and in the long-term model, the diffusion process was linearly related to the natural logarithm of incubation time (lnt). Both models could predict short-term or long-term aging processes separately, but could not predict the short- and long-term aging processes by one model. By analyzing and combining the two models, we found that the short- and long-term behaviors of the diffusion process could be described adequately using the complementary error function. The effect of temperature on the diffusion process was obtained in this model as well. The model can predict the aging process continuously based on four factors—soil pH, incubation time, soil organic matter content and temperature. PMID:28820888

  3. Long-term and short-term action-effect links and their impact on effect monitoring.

    PubMed

    Wirth, Robert; Steinhauser, Robert; Janczyk, Markus; Steinhauser, Marco; Kunde, Wilfried

    2018-04-23

    People aim to produce effects in the environment, and according to ideomotor theory, actions are selected and executed via anticipations of their effects. Further, to ensure that an action has been successful and an effect has been realized, we must be able to monitor the consequences of our actions. However, action-effect links might vary between situations, some might apply for a majority of situations, while others might only apply to special occasions. With a combination of behavioral and electrophysiological markers, we show that monitoring of self-produced action effects interferes with other tasks, and that the length of effect monitoring is determined by both, long-term action-effect links that hold for most situations, and short-term action-effect links that emerge from a current setting. Effect monitoring is fast and frugal when these action-effect links allow for valid anticipation of action effects, but otherwise effect monitoring takes longer and delays a subsequent task. Specific influences of long-term and short-term links on the P1/N1 and P3a further allow to dissect the temporal dynamics of when these links interact for the purpose of effect monitoring. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2018 APA, all rights reserved).

  4. Neural Evidence for a Distinction Between Short-Term Memory and the Focus of Attention

    PubMed Central

    Lewis-Peacock, Jarrod A.; Drysdale, Andrew T.; Oberauer, Klaus; Postle, Bradley R.

    2011-01-01

    It is widely assumed that the short-term retention of information is accomplished via maintenance of an active neural trace. However, we demonstrate that memory can be preserved across a brief delay despite the apparent loss of sustained representations. Delay-period activity may in fact reflect the focus of attention, rather than short-term memory. We unconfounded attention and memory by causing external and internal shifts of attention away from items that were being actively retained. Multivariate pattern analysis of fMRI indicated that only items within the focus of attention elicited an active neural trace. Activity corresponding to representations of items outside the focus quickly dropped to baseline. Nevertheless, this information was remembered after a brief delay. Our data also show that refocusing attention towards a previously unattended memory item can reactivate its neural signature. The loss of sustained activity has long been thought to indicate a disruption of short-term memory, but our results suggest that, even for small memory loads not exceeding the capacity limits of short-term memory, the active maintenance of a stimulus representation may not be necessary for its short-term retention. PMID:21955164

  5. Short-Term Study Abroad: Culture and the Path of Least Resistance

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Lemmons, Kelly

    2015-01-01

    American universities are decreasing the length of study abroad programs in an effort to send more students abroad. Recent publications find that "short-term" programs struggle to increase participants' cultural understanding. However, these research findings fail to offer an explanation as to why shorter programs are falling short. This…

  6. Prevention of mammary carcinogenesis by short-term estrogen and progestin treatments

    PubMed Central

    Rajkumar, Lakshmanaswamy; Guzman, Raphael C; Yang, Jason; Thordarson, Gudmundur; Talamantes, Frank; Nandi, Satyabrata

    2004-01-01

    Introduction Women who have undergone a full-term pregnancy before the age of 20 have one-half the risk of developing breast cancer compared with women who have never gone through a full-term pregnancy. This protective effect is observed universally among women of all ethnic groups. Parity in rats and mice also protects them against chemically induced mammary carcinogenesis. Methods Seven-week-old virgin Lewis rats were given N-methyl-N-nitrosourea. Two weeks later the rats were treated with natural or synthetic estrogens and progestins for 7–21 days by subcutaneous implantation of silastic capsules. Results In our current experiment, we demonstrate that short-term sustained exposure to natural or synthetic estrogens along with progestins is effective in preventing mammary carcinogenesis in rats. Treatment with 30 mg estriol plus 30 mg progesterone for 3 weeks significantly reduced the incidence of mammary cancer. Short-term exposure to ethynyl estradiol plus megesterol acetate or norethindrone was effective in decreasing the incidence of mammary cancers. Tamoxifen plus progesterone treatment for 3 weeks was able to confer only a transient protection from mammary carcinogenesis, while 2-methoxy estradiol plus progesterone was effective in conferring protection against mammary cancers. Conclusions The data obtained in the present study demonstrate that, in nulliparous rats, long-term protection against mammary carcinogenesis can be achieved by short-term treatments with natural or synthetic estrogen and progesterone combinations. PMID:14680498

  7. Association between Early Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Symptoms and Current Verbal and Visuo-Spatial Short-Term Memory

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Gau, Susan Shur-Fen; Chiang, Huey-Ling

    2013-01-01

    Deficits in short-term memory are common in adolescents with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), but their current ADHD symptoms cannot well predict their short-term performance. Taking a developmental perspective, we wanted to clarify the association between ADHD symptoms at early childhood and short-term memory in late childhood and…

  8. Retrospective attention in short-term memory has a lasting effect on long-term memory across age.

    PubMed

    Strunk, Jonathan; Morgan, Lauren; Reaves, Sarah; Verhaeghen, Paul; Duarte, Audrey

    2018-04-13

    Declines in both short- and long-term memory are typical of healthy aging. Recent findings suggest that retrodictive attentional cues ("retro-cues") that indicate the location of to-be-probed items in short-term memory (STM) have a lasting impact on long-term memory (LTM) performance in young adults. Whether older adults can also use retro-cues to facilitate both STM and LTM is unknown. Young and older adults performed a visual STM task in which spatially informative retro-cues or non-informative neutral-cues were presented during STM maintenance of real-world objects. We tested participants' memory at both STM and LTM delays for objects that were previously cued with retrodictive or neutral cues during STM order to measure the lasting impact of retrospective attention on LTM. Older adults showed reduced STM and LTM capacity compared to young adults. However, they showed similar magnitude retro-cue memory benefits as young adults at both STM and LTM delays. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study to investigate whether retro-cues in STM facilitate the encoding of objects into LTM such that they are more likely to be subsequently retrieved by older adults. Our results support the idea that retrospective attention can be an effective means by which older adults can improve their short and long-term memory performance, even in the context of reduced memory capacity.

  9. Short-term integrated forecasting system : 1993 model documentation report

    DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

    1993-12-01

    The purpose of this report is to define the Short-Term Integrated Forecasting System (STIFS) and describe its basic properties. The Energy Information Administration (EIA) of the U.S. Energy Department (DOE) developed the STIFS model to generate shor...

  10. Guidelines for designing short-term bird monitoring projects

    Treesearch

    Jonathan Bart

    2005-01-01

    The Coordinated Bird Monitoring Program (Bart and Ralph, this volume) program is helping biologists around the country design short-term monitoring projects for birds. We have found that addressing a series of questions (table 1), in a systematic way, helps insure that projects are well planned. The process is being used by several States and...

  11. Short-term vs. long-term heart rate variability in ischemic cardiomyopathy risk stratification.

    PubMed

    Voss, Andreas; Schroeder, Rico; Vallverdú, Montserrat; Schulz, Steffen; Cygankiewicz, Iwona; Vázquez, Rafael; Bayés de Luna, Antoni; Caminal, Pere

    2013-01-01

    In industrialized countries with aging populations, heart failure affects 0.3-2% of the general population. The investigation of 24 h-ECG recordings revealed the potential of nonlinear indices of heart rate variability (HRV) for enhanced risk stratification in patients with ischemic heart failure (IHF). However, long-term analyses are time-consuming, expensive, and delay the initial diagnosis. The objective of this study was to investigate whether 30 min short-term HRV analysis is sufficient for comparable risk stratification in IHF in comparison to 24 h-HRV analysis. From 256 IHF patients [221 at low risk (IHFLR) and 35 at high risk (IHFHR)] (a) 24 h beat-to-beat time series (b) the first 30 min segment (c) the 30 min most stationary day segment and (d) the 30 min most stationary night segment were investigated. We calculated linear (time and frequency domain) and nonlinear HRV analysis indices. Optimal parameter sets for risk stratification in IHF were determined for 24 h and for each 30 min segment by applying discriminant analysis on significant clinical and non-clinical indices. Long- and short-term HRV indices from frequency domain and particularly from nonlinear dynamics revealed high univariate significances (p < 0.01) discriminating between IHFLR and IHFHR. For multivariate risk stratification, optimal mixed parameter sets consisting of 5 indices (clinical and nonlinear) achieved 80.4% AUC (area under the curve of receiver operating characteristics) from 24 h HRV analysis, 84.3% AUC from first 30 min, 82.2 % AUC from daytime 30 min and 81.7% AUC from nighttime 30 min. The optimal parameter set obtained from the first 30 min showed nearly the same classification power when compared to the optimal 24 h-parameter set. As results from stationary daytime and nighttime, 30 min segments indicate that short-term analyses of 30 min may provide at least a comparable risk stratification power in IHF in comparison to a 24 h analysis period.

  12. How visual short-term memory maintenance modulates subsequent visual aftereffects.

    PubMed

    Saad, Elyana; Silvanto, Juha

    2013-05-01

    Prolonged viewing of a visual stimulus can result in sensory adaptation, giving rise to perceptual phenomena such as the tilt aftereffect (TAE). However, it is not known if short-term memory maintenance induces such effects. We examined how visual short-term memory (VSTM) maintenance modulates the strength of the TAE induced by subsequent visual adaptation. We reasoned that if VSTM maintenance induces aftereffects on subsequent encoding of visual information, then it should either enhance or reduce the TAE induced by a subsequent visual adapter, depending on the congruency of the memory cue and the adapter. Our results were consistent with this hypothesis and thus indicate that the effects of VSTM maintenance can outlast the maintenance period.

  13. Effects of age, gender, and stimulus presentation period on visual short-term memory.

    PubMed

    Kunimi, Mitsunobu

    2016-01-01

    This study focused on age-related changes in visual short-term memory using visual stimuli that did not allow verbal encoding. Experiment 1 examined the effects of age and the length of the stimulus presentation period on visual short-term memory function. Experiment 2 examined the effects of age, gender, and the length of the stimulus presentation period on visual short-term memory function. The worst memory performance and the largest performance difference between the age groups were observed in the shortest stimulus presentation period conditions. The performance difference between the age groups became smaller as the stimulus presentation period became longer; however, it did not completely disappear. Although gender did not have a significant effect on d' regardless of the presentation period in the young group, a significant gender-based difference was observed for stimulus presentation periods of 500 ms and 1,000 ms in the older group. This study indicates that the decline in visual short-term memory observed in the older group is due to the interaction of several factors.

  14. Circulating sclerostin is elevated in short-term and reduced in long-term SCI

    PubMed Central

    Battaglino, Ricardo A.; Sudhakar, Supreetha; Lazzari, Antonio; Garshick, Eric; Zafonte, Ross; Morse, Leslie R.

    2012-01-01

    Spinal cord injury (SCI) causes profound bone loss due to muscle paralysis resulting in the inability to walk. Sclerostin, a Wnt signaling pathway antagonist produced by osteocytes, is a potent inhibitor of bone formation. Short-term studies in rodent models have demonstrated increased sclerostin in response to mechanical unloading that is reversed with reloading. Although sclerostin inhibition has been proposed as a potential therapy for bone loss, it is not known if sclerostin levels vary with duration of SCI in humans. We analyzed circulating sclerostin in 155 men with varying degrees of SCI who were 1 year or more post-injury. We report that sclerostin levels are greatest in subjects with short-term SCI (≤ 5 years post-injury) and decrease significantly over the first 5 years post-injury. There was no association between sclerostin and injury duration in subjects with long-term SCI (> 5 years post-injury). In subjects with long-term SCI, sclerostin levels were positively associated with lower extremity bone density and bone mineral content. These data suggest that sclerostin levels in SCI are initially increased after SCI in response to mechanical unloading. This response is time-limited and as bone loss progresses, circulating sclerostin is lowest in subjects with severe osteoporosis. These findings support a dual role for sclerostin after SCI: a therapeutic target in acute SCI, and a biomarker of osteoporosis severity in chronic SCI. PMID:22575440

  15. Circulating sclerostin is elevated in short-term and reduced in long-term SCI.

    PubMed

    Battaglino, Ricardo A; Sudhakar, Supreetha; Lazzari, Antonio A; Garshick, Eric; Zafonte, Ross; Morse, Leslie R

    2012-09-01

    Spinal cord injury (SCI) causes profound bone loss due to muscle paralysis resulting in the inability to walk. Sclerostin, a Wnt signaling pathway antagonist produced by osteocytes, is a potent inhibitor of bone formation. Short-term studies in rodent models have demonstrated increased sclerostin in response to mechanical unloading that is reversed with reloading. Although sclerostin inhibition has been proposed as a potential therapy for bone loss, it is not known if sclerostin levels vary with duration of SCI in humans. We analyzed circulating sclerostin in 155 men with varying degrees of SCI who were 1 year or more post-injury. We report that sclerostin levels are greatest in subjects with short-term SCI (≤5 years post-injury) and decrease significantly over the first 5 years post-injury. There was no association between sclerostin and injury duration in subjects with long-term SCI (>5 years post-injury). In subjects with long-term SCI, sclerostin levels were positively associated with lower extremity bone density and bone mineral content. These data suggest that sclerostin levels are initially increased after SCI in response to mechanical unloading. This response is time-limited and as bone loss progresses, circulating sclerostin is lowest in subjects with severe osteoporosis. These findings support a dual role for sclerostin after SCI: a therapeutic target in acute SCI, and a biomarker of osteoporosis severity in chronic SCI. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  16. Short Term Exogenic Climate Change Forcing

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Krahenbuhl, Daniel

    Several short term exogenic forcings affecting Earth's climate are but recently identified. Lunar nutation periodicity has implications for numerical meteorological prediction. Abrupt shifts in solar wind bulk velocity, particle density, and polarity exhibit correlation with terrestrial hemispheric vorticity changes, cyclonic strengthening and the intensification of baroclinic disturbances. Galactic Cosmic ray induced tropospheric ionization modifies cloud microphysics, and modulates the global electric circuit. This dissertation is constructed around three research questions: (1): What are the biweekly declination effects of lunar gravitation upon the troposphere? (2): How do United States severe weather reports correlate with heliospheric current sheet crossings? and (3): How does cloud cover spatially and temporally vary with galactic cosmic rays? Study 1 findings show spatial consistency concerning lunar declination extremes upon Rossby longwaves. Due to the influence of Rossby longwaves on synoptic scale circulation, our results could theoretically extend numerical meteorological forecasting. Study 2 results indicate a preference for violent tornadoes to occur prior to a HCS crossing. Violent tornadoes (EF3+) are 10% more probable to occur near, and 4% less probable immediately after a HCS crossing. The distribution of hail and damaging wind reports do not mirror this pattern. Polarity is critical for the effect. Study 3 results confirm anticorrelation between solar flux and low-level marine-layer cloud cover, but indicate substantial regional variability between cloud cover altitude and GCRs. Ultimately, this dissertation serves to extend short term meteorological forecasting, enhance climatological modeling and through analysis of severe violent weather and heliospheric events, protect property and save lives.

  17. The Effect of Consistency on Short-Term Memory for Scenes.

    PubMed

    Gong, Mingliang; Xuan, Yuming; Xu, Xinwen; Fu, Xiaolan

    2017-01-01

    Which is more detectable, the change of a consistent or an inconsistent object in a scene? This question has been debated for decades. We noted that the change of objects in scenes might simultaneously be accompanied with gist changes. In the present study we aimed to examine how the alteration of gist, as well as the consistency of the changed objects, modulated change detection. In Experiment 1, we manipulated the semantic content by either keeping or changing the consistency of the scene. Results showed that the changes of consistent and inconsistent scenes were equally detected. More importantly, the changes were more accurately detected when scene consistency changed than when the consistency remained unchanged, regardless of the consistency of the memory scenes. A phase-scrambled version of stimuli was adopted in Experiment 2 to decouple the possible confounding effect of low-level factors. The results of Experiment 2 demonstrated that the effect found in Experiment 1 was indeed due to the change of high-level semantic consistency rather than the change of low-level physical features. Together, the study suggests that the change of consistency plays an important role in scene short-term memory, which might be attributed to the sensitivity to the change of semantic content.

  18. The Effect of Consistency on Short-Term Memory for Scenes

    PubMed Central

    Gong, Mingliang; Xuan, Yuming; Xu, Xinwen; Fu, Xiaolan

    2017-01-01

    Which is more detectable, the change of a consistent or an inconsistent object in a scene? This question has been debated for decades. We noted that the change of objects in scenes might simultaneously be accompanied with gist changes. In the present study we aimed to examine how the alteration of gist, as well as the consistency of the changed objects, modulated change detection. In Experiment 1, we manipulated the semantic content by either keeping or changing the consistency of the scene. Results showed that the changes of consistent and inconsistent scenes were equally detected. More importantly, the changes were more accurately detected when scene consistency changed than when the consistency remained unchanged, regardless of the consistency of the memory scenes. A phase-scrambled version of stimuli was adopted in Experiment 2 to decouple the possible confounding effect of low-level factors. The results of Experiment 2 demonstrated that the effect found in Experiment 1 was indeed due to the change of high-level semantic consistency rather than the change of low-level physical features. Together, the study suggests that the change of consistency plays an important role in scene short-term memory, which might be attributed to the sensitivity to the change of semantic content. PMID:29046654

  19. [Short term memory and severe language disorders in the child].

    PubMed

    Gras-Vincendon, A; Belion, M; Abecassis, J; Bursztejn, C

    1994-10-01

    Memory, and particularly short-term memory or "working memory" (Baddeley), is involved in language acquisition in children. We have studied short-term memory, with verbal-and non verbal tests, of 8 children suffering from developmental dysphasia compared with other ones, matched in terms of age and performance I.Q. (W.I.S.C.-R.). The digit span did not significantly differ in the two groups, while the visuo-spatial span was lower in the dysphasic group. The memorization of a list of monosyllabic words by dysphasic children was poor in the absence of visual presentation and improved by it. Differences between dysphasic and control-children are unlikely to be due to speech rate which does not significantly differ from one group to the other one. The results suggest the existence, in language disordered children, of cognitive functions disorders much more important than those directly involved in the speech production.

  20. The Impact of Short-Term Economic Fluctuations on Kindergarten Enrollment

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Herman, Douglas A.

    2010-01-01

    For some 5-year-olds, delayed kindergarten enrollment may result in long-term academic benefits. Although waiting an additional year allows for further development prior to the start of formal education, the economic costs of the next best alternatives can be significant. This study examines the impact of short-term economic fluctuations on a…

  1. Prospective testing of Coulomb short-term earthquake forecasts

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Jackson, D. D.; Kagan, Y. Y.; Schorlemmer, D.; Zechar, J. D.; Wang, Q.; Wong, K.

    2009-12-01

    Earthquake induced Coulomb stresses, whether static or dynamic, suddenly change the probability of future earthquakes. Models to estimate stress and the resulting seismicity changes could help to illuminate earthquake physics and guide appropriate precautionary response. But do these models have improved forecasting power compared to empirical statistical models? The best answer lies in prospective testing in which a fully specified model, with no subsequent parameter adjustments, is evaluated against future earthquakes. The Center of Study of Earthquake Predictability (CSEP) facilitates such prospective testing of earthquake forecasts, including several short term forecasts. Formulating Coulomb stress models for formal testing involves several practical problems, mostly shared with other short-term models. First, earthquake probabilities must be calculated after each “perpetrator” earthquake but before the triggered earthquakes, or “victims”. The time interval between a perpetrator and its victims may be very short, as characterized by the Omori law for aftershocks. CSEP evaluates short term models daily, and allows daily updates of the models. However, lots can happen in a day. An alternative is to test and update models on the occurrence of each earthquake over a certain magnitude. To make such updates rapidly enough and to qualify as prospective, earthquake focal mechanisms, slip distributions, stress patterns, and earthquake probabilities would have to be made by computer without human intervention. This scheme would be more appropriate for evaluating scientific ideas, but it may be less useful for practical applications than daily updates. Second, triggered earthquakes are imperfectly recorded following larger events because their seismic waves are buried in the coda of the earlier event. To solve this problem, testing methods need to allow for “censoring” of early aftershock data, and a quantitative model for detection threshold as a function of

  2. Aerosols cause intraseasonal short-term suppression of Indian monsoon rainfall.

    PubMed

    Dave, Prashant; Bhushan, Mani; Venkataraman, Chandra

    2017-12-11

    Aerosol abundance over South Asia during the summer monsoon season, includes dust and sea-salt, as well as, anthropogenic pollution particles. Using observations during 2000-2009, here we uncover repeated short-term rainfall suppression caused by coincident aerosols, acting through atmospheric stabilization, reduction in convection and increased moisture divergence, leading to the aggravation of monsoon break conditions. In high aerosol-low rainfall regions extending across India, both in deficient and normal monsoon years, enhancements in aerosols levels, estimated as aerosol optical depth and absorbing aerosol index, acted to suppress daily rainfall anomaly, several times in a season, with lags of a few days. A higher frequency of prolonged rainfall breaks, longer than seven days, occurred in these regions. Previous studies point to monsoon rainfall weakening linked to an asymmetric inter-hemispheric energy balance change attributed to aerosols, and short-term rainfall enhancement from radiative effects of aerosols. In contrast, this study uncovers intraseasonal short-term rainfall suppression, from coincident aerosol forcing over the monsoon region, leading to aggravation of monsoon break spells. Prolonged and intense breaks in the monsoon in India are associated with rainfall deficits, which have been linked to reduced food grain production in the latter half of the twentieth century.

  3. Botulinum toxin type A in simple motor tics: short-term and long-term treatment-effects.

    PubMed

    Rath, Judith J G; Tavy, Dénes L J; Wertenbroek, Agnes A A C M; van Woerkom, Theodoor C A M; de Bruijn, Sebastiaan F T M

    2010-08-01

    To determine the short-term and long-term treatment-effects of botulinum toxin type A in simple motor tics, we analyzed 15 consecutive patients (18 tics) with simple motor tics that were treated every 3 months with injections of BTX-A. Efficacy (rated on a 4-level scale) and duration of effect of the first 2 and last 2 (if treated 5 times or more) treatments were recorded, as well as latency of response, changes of premonitory urges (PMUs) and possible side effects. Total number of treatments for each tic varied from 2 to 50 (mean 11, median 6). In 16 of 18 tics (89%) short-term efficacy was reported successful (good or moderate). Long-term efficacy was reported in 12 tics of which 11 showed similar or even increased beneficial effects. Premonitory urge (PMU) was reported in 8 patients (53%). PMU, if present, lessened or disappeared after treatment with BTX-A. A permanent remission of the treated tic was seen in 3 patients with a maximum follow-up of 10 years. BTX-A appears a safe and effective treatment for simple motor tics and retains its efficacy after long-term treatment. BTX may also induce permanent remission of the treated tics and effects of BTX are not restricted to merely motor behaviour.

  4. Short-term herbivory has long-term consequences in warmed and ambient high Arctic tundra

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Little, Chelsea J.; Cutting, Helen; Alatalo, Juha; Cooper, Elisabeth

    2017-02-01

    Climate change is occurring across the world, with effects varying by ecosystem and region but already occurring quickly in high-latitude and high-altitude regions. Biotic interactions are important in determining ecosystem response to such changes, but few studies have been long-term in nature, especially in the High Arctic. Mesic tundra plots on Svalbard, Norway, were subjected to grazing at two different intensities by captive Barnacle geese from 2003-2005, in a factorial design with warming by Open Top Chambers. Warming manipulations were continued through 2014, when we measured vegetation structure and composition as well as growth and reproduction of three dominant species in the mesic meadow. Significantly more dead vascular plant material was found in warmed compared to ambient plots, regardless of grazing history, but in contrast to many short-term experiments no difference in the amount of living material was found. This has strong implications for nutrient and carbon cycling and could feed back into community productivity. Dominant species showed increased flowering in warmed plots, especially in those plots where grazing had been applied. However, this added sexual reproduction did not translate to substantial shifts in vegetative cover. Forbs and rushes increased slightly in warmed plots regardless of grazing, while the dominant shrub, Salix polaris, generally declined with effects dependent on grazing, and the evergreen shrub Dryas octopetala declined with previous intensive grazing. There were no treatment effects on community diversity or evenness. Thus despite no changes in total live abundance, a typical short-term response to environmental conditions, we found pronounced changes in dead biomass indicating that tundra ecosystem processes respond to medium- to long-term changes in conditions caused by 12 seasons of summer warming. We suggest that while high arctic tundra plant communities are fairly resistant to current levels of climate warming

  5. Phonological Short-Term and Working Memory in Bilinguals' Native and Second Language

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Kaushanskaya, Margarita; Yoo, Jeewon

    2013-01-01

    The goal of the current study was to examine bilinguals' phonological short-term and working memory performance in their native/first (L1) and second (L2) languages. Korean-English bilinguals were tested in both Korean (L1) and English (L2). Short-term memory (STM) was measured via a nonword repetition task, where participants repeated…

  6. The Precategorical Nature of Visual Short-Term Memory

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Quinlan, Philip T.; Cohen, Dale J.

    2016-01-01

    We conducted a series of recognition experiments that assessed whether visual short-term memory (VSTM) is sensitive to shared category membership of to-be-remembered (tbr) images of common objects. In Experiment 1 some of the tbr items shared the same basic level category (e.g., hand axe): Such items were no better retained than others. In the…

  7. Short term variations in Jupiter's synchrotron radiation derived from VLA data analysis

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Kita, H.; Misawa, H.; Tsuchiya, F.; Morioka, A.

    2011-12-01

    Jupiter's synchrotron radiation (JSR) is the emission from relativistic electrons in the strong magnetic field of the inner magnetosphere, and it is the most effective prove for remote sensing of Jupiter's radiation belt from the Earth. Although JSR has been thought to be stable for a long time, intensive observations for JSR have made after the collisions of comet P/SL9 to Jupiter in 1994, and these observations revealed short term variations of JSR on time scale of days to weeks. However, the mechanisms which cause the short term variations of total flux density and brightness distribution have not been revealed well. In order to reveal the mechanism of short term variations of JSR more precisely, we have made radio image analysis using the NRAO (National Radio Astronomy Observatory) archived data of the VLA [*]. Brice and McDonough [1973, Icarus] proposed a scenario for the short term variations: i.e, the solar UV/EUV heating for Jupiter's upper atmosphere drives neutral wind perturbations and then the induced dynamo electric field leads to enhancement of radial diffusion. It is also suggested that induced dynamo electric field produce dawn-dusk electric potential difference, which cause dawn-dusk asymmetry in electron spatial distribution and emission distribution. So far the following results have been indicated for the short term variations. Miyoshi et al. [1999, GRL] showed that a short term variation event at 2.3GHz is well correlate to solar UV/EUV flux variations. Tsuchiya et al. [2010, Adv. Geosci.] showed that JSR at 325MHz and 785MHz have short term variations. These JSR observations confirmed the existence of the short term variation which is caused by solar UV/EUV. However, the effect of solar UV/EUV heating on the spatial distribution of JSR has never been confirmed, so this study is the first attempt to confirm the solar UV/EUV effect on spatial distribution of JSR. We have selected the data observed from 28th Jan. to 5th Feb. 2000 at 327MHz

  8. Verbal Short-Term Memory Span in Children: Long-Term Modality Dependent Effects of Intrauterine Growth Restriction

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Geva, R.; Eshel, R.; Leitner, Y.; Fattal-Valevski, A.; Harel, S.

    2008-01-01

    Background: Recent reports showed that children born with intrauterine growth restriction (IUGR) are at greater risk of experiencing verbal short-term memory span (STM) deficits that may impede their learning capacities at school. It is still unknown whether these deficits are modality dependent. Methods: This long-term, prospective design study…

  9. Associations of Short-Term and Long-Term Exposure to Ambient Air Pollutants With Hypertension: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.

    PubMed

    Cai, Yuanyuan; Zhang, Bo; Ke, Weixia; Feng, Baixiang; Lin, Hualiang; Xiao, Jianpeng; Zeng, Weilin; Li, Xing; Tao, Jun; Yang, Zuyao; Ma, Wenjun; Liu, Tao

    2016-07-01

    Hypertension is a major disease of burden worldwide. Previous studies have indicated that air pollution might be a risk factor for hypertension, but the results were controversial. To fill this gap, we performed a meta-analysis of epidemiological studies to investigate the associations of short-term and long-term exposure to ambient air pollutants with hypertension. We searched all of the studies published before September 1, 2015, on the associations of ozone (O3), carbon monoxide (CO), nitrogen oxide (NO2 and NOX), sulfur dioxide (SO2), and particulate matter (PM10 and PM2.5) with hypertension in the English electronic databases. A pooled odds ratio (OR) for hypertension in association with each 10 μg/m(3) increase in air pollutant was calculated by a random-effects model (for studies with significant heterogeneity) or a fixed-effect model (for studies without significant heterogeneity). A total of 17 studies examining the effects of short-term (n=6) and long-term exposure (n=11) to air pollutants were identified. Short-term exposure to SO2 (OR=1.046, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.012-1.081), PM2.5 (OR=1.069, 95% CI: 1.003-1.141), and PM10 (OR=1.024, 95% CI: 1.016-1.032) were significantly associated with hypertension. Long-term exposure (a 10 μg/m(3) increase) to NO2 (OR=1.034, 95% CI: 1.005-1.063) and PM10 (OR=1.054, 95% CI: 1.036-1.072) had significant associations with hypertension. Exposure to other ambient air pollutants (short-term exposure to NO2, O3, and CO and long-term exposure to NOx, PM2.5, and SO2) also had positive relationships with hypertension, but lacked statistical significance. Our results suggest that short-term or long-term exposure to some air pollutants may increase the risk of hypertension. © 2016 American Heart Association, Inc.

  10. Severe Hyperkalemia: Can the Electrocardiogram Risk Stratify for Short-term Adverse Events?

    PubMed

    Durfey, Nicole; Lehnhof, Brian; Bergeson, Andrew; Durfey, Shayla N M; Leytin, Victoria; McAteer, Kristina; Schwam, Eric; Valiquet, Justin

    2017-08-01

    The electrocardiogram (ECG) is often used to identify which hyperkalemic patients are at risk for adverse events. However, there is a paucity of evidence to support this practice. This study analyzes the association between specific hyperkalemic ECG abnormalities and the development of short-term adverse events in patients with severe hyperkalemia. We collected records of all adult patients with potassium (K+) ≥6.5 mEq/L in the hospital laboratory database from August 15, 2010, through January 30, 2015. A chart review identified patient demographics, concurrent laboratory values, ECG within one hour of K+ measurement, treatments and occurrence of adverse events within six hours of ECG. We defined adverse events as symptomatic bradycardia, ventricular tachycardia, ventricular fibrillation, cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and/or death. Two emergency physicians blinded to study objective independently examined each ECG for rate, rhythm, peaked T wave, PR interval duration and QRS complex duration. Relative risk was calculated to determine the association between specific hyperkalemic ECG abnormalities and short-term adverse events. We included a total of 188 patients with severe hyperkalemia in the final study group. Adverse events occurred within six hours in 28 patients (15%): symptomatic bradycardia (n=22), death (n=4), ventricular tachycardia (n=2) and CPR (n=2). All adverse events occurred prior to treatment with calcium and all but one occurred prior to K + -lowering intervention. All patients who had a short-term adverse event had a preceding ECG that demonstrated at least one hyperkalemic abnormality (100%, 95% confidence interval [CI] [85.7-100%]). An increased likelihood of short-term adverse event was found for hyperkalemic patients whose ECG demonstrated QRS prolongation (relative risk [RR] 4.74, 95% CI [2.01-11.15]), bradycardia (HR<50) (RR 12.29, 95%CI [6.69-22.57]), and/or junctional rhythm (RR 7.46, 95%CI 5.28-11.13). There was no statistically

  11. Severe Hyperkalemia: Can the Electrocardiogram Risk Stratify for Short-term Adverse Events?

    PubMed Central

    Durfey, Nicole; Lehnhof, Brian; Bergeson, Andrew; Durfey, Shayla N.M.; Leytin, Victoria; McAteer, Kristina; Schwam, Eric; Valiquet, Justin

    2017-01-01

    Introduction The electrocardiogram (ECG) is often used to identify which hyperkalemic patients are at risk for adverse events. However, there is a paucity of evidence to support this practice. This study analyzes the association between specific hyperkalemic ECG abnormalities and the development of short-term adverse events in patients with severe hyperkalemia. Methods We collected records of all adult patients with potassium (K+) ≥6.5 mEq/L in the hospital laboratory database from August 15, 2010, through January 30, 2015. A chart review identified patient demographics, concurrent laboratory values, ECG within one hour of K+ measurement, treatments and occurrence of adverse events within six hours of ECG. We defined adverse events as symptomatic bradycardia, ventricular tachycardia, ventricular fibrillation, cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and/or death. Two emergency physicians blinded to study objective independently examined each ECG for rate, rhythm, peaked T wave, PR interval duration and QRS complex duration. Relative risk was calculated to determine the association between specific hyperkalemic ECG abnormalities and short-term adverse events. Results We included a total of 188 patients with severe hyperkalemia in the final study group. Adverse events occurred within six hours in 28 patients (15%): symptomatic bradycardia (n=22), death (n=4), ventricular tachycardia (n=2) and CPR (n=2). All adverse events occurred prior to treatment with calcium and all but one occurred prior to K+-lowering intervention. All patients who had a short-term adverse event had a preceding ECG that demonstrated at least one hyperkalemic abnormality (100%, 95% confidence interval [CI] [85.7–100%]). An increased likelihood of short-term adverse event was found for hyperkalemic patients whose ECG demonstrated QRS prolongation (relative risk [RR] 4.74, 95% CI [2.01–11.15]), bradycardia (HR<50) (RR 12.29, 95%CI [6.69–22.57]), and/or junctional rhythm (RR 7.46, 95%CI 5.28

  12. CONTROLLED, SHORT-TERM DERMAL AND INHALATION EXPOSURE TO CHLOROFORM

    EPA Science Inventory

    Studies were conducted to determine the uptake by humans of chloroform as a result of controlled short-term dermal and inhalation exposures. The approach used continuous real-time breath analysis to determine exhaled-breath profiles and evaluate chloroform kinetics in the huma...

  13. Effects of Short-term Hypergravity Exposure on Germination, Growth and Photosynthesis of Triticum aestivum L.

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Vidyasagar, Pandit B.; Jagtap, Sagar S.; Dixit, Jyotsana P.; Kamble, Shailendra M.; Dhepe, Aarti P.

    2014-12-01

    Numerous studies have been carried out to investigate the hypergravity effect on plants, where seedlings (4-5 days old) were continuously exposed and grown under hypergravity condition. Here, we have used a novel `shortterm hypergravity exposure experimental method' where imbibed caryopses (instead of seedlings) were exposed to higher hypergravity values ranging from 500 g to 2500 g for a short interval time of 10 minutes and post short-term hypergravity treated caryopses were grown under 1 g conditions for five days. Changing patterns in caryopsis germination and growth, along with various photosynthetic and biochemical parameters were studied. Results revealed the significant inhibition of caryopsis germination and growth in short-term hypergravity treated seeds over control. Photosynthesis parameters such as chlorophyll content, rate of photosynthesis (PN), transpiration rate (Evap) and stomatal conductance (Gs), along with intracellular CO2 concentration (Cint) were found to be affected significantly in 5 days old seedlings exposed to short-term hypergravity treatment. In order to investigate the cause of observed inhibition, we examined the α-amylase activity and antioxidative enzyme activities. α-amylase activity was found to be inhibited, along with the reduction of sugars necessary for germination and earlier growth in short-term hypergravity treated caryopses. The activities of antioxidant enzymes such as catalase and guaiacol peroxidase were increased in short-term hypergravity treated caryopses, suggesting that caryopses might have experienced oxidative stress upon short-term hypergravity exposure.

  14. Analysis Methods for Post Occupancy Evaluation of Energy-Use in High Performance Buildings Using Short-Term Monitoring

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Singh, Vipul

    2011-12-01

    The green building movement has been an effective catalyst in reducing energy demands of buildings and a large number of 'green' certified buildings have been in operation for several years. Whether these buildings are actually performing as intended, and if not, identifying specific causes for this discrepancy falls into the general realm of post-occupancy evaluation (POE). POE involves evaluating building performance in terms of energy-use, indoor environmental quality, acoustics and water-use; the first aspect i.e. energy-use is addressed in this thesis. Normally, a full year or more of energy-use and weather data is required to determine the actual post-occupancy energy-use of buildings. In many cases, either measured building performance data is not available or the time and cost implications may not make it feasible to invest in monitoring the building for a whole year. Knowledge about the minimum amount of measured data needed to accurately capture the behavior of the building over the entire year can be immensely beneficial. This research identifies simple modeling techniques to determine best time of the year to begin in-situ monitoring of building energy-use, and the least amount of data required for generating acceptable long-term predictions. Four analysis procedures are studied. The short-term monitoring for long-term prediction (SMLP) approach and dry-bulb temperature analysis (DBTA) approach allow determining the best time and duration of the year for in-situ monitoring to be performed based only on the ambient temperature data of the location. Multivariate change-point (MCP) modeling uses simulated/monitored data to determine best monitoring period of the year. This is also used to validate the SMLP and DBTA approaches. The hybrid inverse modeling method-1 predicts energy-use by combining a short dataset of monitored internal loads with a year of utility-bills, and hybrid inverse method-2 predicts long term building performance using utility

  15. Short-term and long-term treatment outcomes with Class III activator

    PubMed Central

    Ryu, Hyo-kyung; Chong, Hyun-Jeong; An, Ki-Yong

    2015-01-01

    Objective The purpose of this retrospective study was to investigate short-term and long-term skeletodental outcomes of Class III activator treatment. Methods A Class III activator treatment group (AG) comprised of 22 patients (9 boys, 13 girls) was compared with a Class III control group (CG) comprised of 17 patients (6 boys, 11 girls). The total treatment period was divided into three stages; the initial stage (T1), the post-activator treatment or post-mandibular growth peak stage (T2), and the long-term follow-up stage (T3). Cephalometric changes were evaluated statistically via the Mann-Whitney U-test and the Friedman test. Results The AG exhibited significant increases in the SNA angle, ANB angle, Wits appraisal, A point-N perpendicular, Convexity of A point, and proclination of the maxillary incisors, from T1 to T2. In the long-term follow-up (T1-T3), the AG exhibited significantly greater increases in the ANB angle, Wits appraisal, and Convexity of A point than the CG. Conclusions Favorable skeletal outcomes induced during the Class III activator treatment period were generally maintained until the long-term follow-up period of the post-mandibular growth peak stage. PMID:26445717

  16. A short-term and high-resolution distribution system load forecasting approach using support vector regression with hybrid parameters optimization

    DOE PAGES

    Jiang, Huaiguang; Zhang, Yingchen; Muljadi, Eduard; ...

    2016-01-01

    This paper proposes an approach for distribution system load forecasting, which aims to provide highly accurate short-term load forecasting with high resolution utilizing a support vector regression (SVR) based forecaster and a two-step hybrid parameters optimization method. Specifically, because the load profiles in distribution systems contain abrupt deviations, a data normalization is designed as the pretreatment for the collected historical load data. Then an SVR model is trained by the load data to forecast the future load. For better performance of SVR, a two-step hybrid optimization algorithm is proposed to determine the best parameters. In the first step of themore » hybrid optimization algorithm, a designed grid traverse algorithm (GTA) is used to narrow the parameters searching area from a global to local space. In the second step, based on the result of the GTA, particle swarm optimization (PSO) is used to determine the best parameters in the local parameter space. After the best parameters are determined, the SVR model is used to forecast the short-term load deviation in the distribution system. The performance of the proposed approach is compared to some classic methods in later sections of the paper.« less

  17. Synaptic scaling enables dynamically distinct short- and long-term memory formation.

    PubMed

    Tetzlaff, Christian; Kolodziejski, Christoph; Timme, Marc; Tsodyks, Misha; Wörgötter, Florentin

    2013-10-01

    Memory storage in the brain relies on mechanisms acting on time scales from minutes, for long-term synaptic potentiation, to days, for memory consolidation. During such processes, neural circuits distinguish synapses relevant for forming a long-term storage, which are consolidated, from synapses of short-term storage, which fade. How time scale integration and synaptic differentiation is simultaneously achieved remains unclear. Here we show that synaptic scaling - a slow process usually associated with the maintenance of activity homeostasis - combined with synaptic plasticity may simultaneously achieve both, thereby providing a natural separation of short- from long-term storage. The interaction between plasticity and scaling provides also an explanation for an established paradox where memory consolidation critically depends on the exact order of learning and recall. These results indicate that scaling may be fundamental for stabilizing memories, providing a dynamic link between early and late memory formation processes.

  18. Synaptic Scaling Enables Dynamically Distinct Short- and Long-Term Memory Formation

    PubMed Central

    Tetzlaff, Christian; Kolodziejski, Christoph; Timme, Marc; Tsodyks, Misha; Wörgötter, Florentin

    2013-01-01

    Memory storage in the brain relies on mechanisms acting on time scales from minutes, for long-term synaptic potentiation, to days, for memory consolidation. During such processes, neural circuits distinguish synapses relevant for forming a long-term storage, which are consolidated, from synapses of short-term storage, which fade. How time scale integration and synaptic differentiation is simultaneously achieved remains unclear. Here we show that synaptic scaling – a slow process usually associated with the maintenance of activity homeostasis – combined with synaptic plasticity may simultaneously achieve both, thereby providing a natural separation of short- from long-term storage. The interaction between plasticity and scaling provides also an explanation for an established paradox where memory consolidation critically depends on the exact order of learning and recall. These results indicate that scaling may be fundamental for stabilizing memories, providing a dynamic link between early and late memory formation processes. PMID:24204240

  19. Limited short-term prognostic utility of cerebral NIRS during neonatal therapeutic hypothermia.

    PubMed

    Shellhaas, Renée A; Thelen, Brian J; Bapuraj, Jayapalli R; Burns, Joseph W; Swenson, Aaron W; Christensen, Mary K; Wiggins, Stephanie A; Barks, John D E

    2013-07-16

    We evaluated the utility of amplitude-integrated EEG (aEEG) and regional oxygen saturation (rSO2) measured using near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) for short-term outcome prediction in neonates with hypoxic ischemic encephalopathy (HIE) treated with therapeutic hypothermia. Neonates with HIE were monitored with dual-channel aEEG, bilateral cerebral NIRS, and systemic NIRS throughout cooling and rewarming. The short-term outcome measure was a composite of neurologic examination and brain MRI scores at 7 to 10 days. Multiple regression models were developed to assess NIRS and aEEG recorded during the 6 hours before rewarming and the 6-hour rewarming period as predictors of short-term outcome. Twenty-one infants, mean gestational age 38.8 ± 1.6 weeks, median 10-minute Apgar score 4 (range 0-8), and mean initial pH 6.92 ± 0.19, were enrolled. Before rewarming, the most parsimonious model included 4 parameters (adjusted R(2) = 0.59; p = 0.006): lower values of systemic rSO2 variability (p = 0.004), aEEG bandwidth variability (p = 0.019), and mean aEEG upper margin (p = 0.006), combined with higher mean aEEG bandwidth (worse discontinuity; p = 0.013), predicted worse short-term outcome. During rewarming, lower systemic rSO2 variability (p = 0.007) and depressed aEEG lower margin (p = 0.034) were associated with worse outcome (model-adjusted R(2) = 0.49; p = 0.005). Cerebral NIRS data did not contribute to either model. During day 3 of cooling and during rewarming, loss of physiologic variability (by systemic NIRS) and invariant, discontinuous aEEG patterns predict poor short-term outcome in neonates with HIE. These parameters, but not cerebral NIRS, may be useful to identify infants suitable for studies of adjuvant neuroprotective therapies or modification of the duration of cooling and/or rewarming.

  20. Assurance of Learning in Short-Term, Study Abroad Programs

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Tucker, Mary L.; Gullekson, Nicole L.; McCambridge, Jim

    2011-01-01

    Business students are increasingly seeking international experience in short-term, study abroad programs to enhance their intercultural knowledge, intercultural communication skills, and global perspectives to be more competitive in the global arena. Intuitively, universities initiating these programs and the students sojourning abroad believe in…

  1. Pre-Service Teachers' Perceptions of a Short-Term International Experience Programme

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Barkhuizen, Gary; Feryok, Anne

    2006-01-01

    Short-term international experiences (STIE) are becoming a regular, sometimes required, feature of pre-service language teacher education programmes. Often inappropriately termed "immersion programmes", they aim to give teachers the opportunity to improve their language proficiency in the language they will teach, to develop their…

  2. Short-term mindfulness intervention reduces the negative attentional effects associated with heavy media multitasking.

    PubMed

    Gorman, Thomas E; Green, C Shawn

    2016-04-18

    Recent research suggests that frequently switching between various forms of media (i.e. 'media multitasking') is associated with diminished attentional abilities, a disconcerting result given the prevalence of media multitasking in today's society. In the present study, we sought to investigate the extent to which the deficits associated with frequent media multitasking can be temporarily ameliorated via a short-term mindfulness intervention previously shown to produce beneficial effects on the attentional abilities of normally functioning individuals. Consistent with previous work, we found: (1) that heavy media multitaskers showed generally poorer attentional abilities than light media multitaskers and (2) that all participants showed benefits from the short-term mindfulness intervention. Furthermore, we found that the benefits of the short-term mindfulness intervention were not equivalently large across participants. Instead, these benefits were disproportionately large in the heavy media multitaskers. While the positive outcomes were short-lived, this opens the possibility of performing long-term interventions with the goal of realizing lasting gains in this population.

  3. Color Cues and Rehearsal in Short-Term Memory.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Sabo, Ruth A.; Hagen, John W.

    A short term memory task was used to explore the effects of color cues and of a condition that permitted rehearsal as compared to one that did not. Eighty subjects per grade at grades 3, 5, and 7 were tested. A stimulus array consisted of five cards, each of which contained pictures that could be designated as central or incidental. The stimulus…

  4. Short-term stress enhances cellular immunity and increases early resistance to squamous cell carcinoma.

    PubMed

    Dhabhar, Firdaus S; Saul, Alison N; Daugherty, Christine; Holmes, Tyson H; Bouley, Donna M; Oberyszyn, Tatiana M

    2010-01-01

    In contrast to chronic/long-term stress that suppresses/dysregulates immune function, an acute/short-term fight-or-flight stress response experienced during immune activation can enhance innate and adaptive immunity. Moderate ultraviolet-B (UV) exposure provides a non-invasive system for studying the naturalistic emergence, progression and regression of squamous cell carcinoma (SCC). Because SCC is an immunoresponsive cancer, we hypothesized that short-term stress experienced before UV exposure would enhance protective immunity and increase resistance to SCC. Control and short-term stress groups were treated identically except that the short-term stress group was restrained (2.5h) before each of nine UV-exposure sessions (minimum erythemal dose, 3-times/week) during weeks 4-6 of the 10-week UV exposure protocol. Tumors were measured weekly, and tissue collected at weeks 7, 20, and 32. Chemokine and cytokine gene expression was quantified by real-time PCR, and CD4+ and CD8+ T cells by flow cytometry and immunohistochemistry. Compared to controls, the short-term stress group showed greater cutaneous T-cell attracting chemokine (CTACK)/CCL27, RANTES, IL-12, and IFN-gamma gene expression at weeks 7, 20, and 32, higher skin infiltrating T cell numbers (weeks 7 and 20), lower tumor incidence (weeks 11-20) and fewer tumors (weeks 11-26). These results suggest that activation of short-term stress physiology increased chemokine expression and T cell trafficking and/or function during/following UV exposure, and enhanced Type 1 cytokine-driven cell-mediated immunity that is crucial for resistance to SCC. Therefore, the physiological fight-or-flight stress response and its adjuvant-like immuno-enhancing effects, may provide a novel and important mechanism for enhancing immune system mediated tumor-detection/elimination that merits further investigation.

  5. Quantifying and Reducing Uncertainty in Correlated Multi-Area Short-Term Load Forecasting

    DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

    Sun, Yannan; Hou, Zhangshuan; Meng, Da

    2016-07-17

    In this study, we represent and reduce the uncertainties in short-term electric load forecasting by integrating time series analysis tools including ARIMA modeling, sequential Gaussian simulation, and principal component analysis. The approaches are mainly focusing on maintaining the inter-dependency between multiple geographically related areas. These approaches are applied onto cross-correlated load time series as well as their forecast errors. Multiple short-term prediction realizations are then generated from the reduced uncertainty ranges, which are useful for power system risk analyses.

  6. Changes in the level of cardiac troponine and disorders in pulmonary gas exchange as predictors of short- and long-term outcomes of patients with aneurysm subarachnoid haemorrhage.

    PubMed

    Burzyńska, Małgorzata; Uryga, Agnieszka; Kasprowicz, Magdalena; Kędziora, Jarosław; Szewczyk, Ewa; Woźniak, Jowita; Jarmundowicz, Włodzimierz; Kübler, Andrzej

    2017-12-01

    Cardiopulmonary abnormalities are common after aneurysmal subarachnoid haemorrhage (aSAH). However, the relationship between short- and long-term outcome is poorly understood. In this paper, we present how cardiac troponine elevations (cTnI) and pulmonary disorders are associated with short- and long-term outcomes assessed by the Glasgow Outcome Scale (GOS) and Extended Glasgow Outcome Scale (GOSE). A total of 104 patients diagnosed with aSAH were analysed in the study. The non-parametric U Mann-Whitney test was used to evaluate the difference between good (GOS IV-V, GOSE V-VIII) and poor (GOS I-III, GOSE I-IV) outcomes in relation to cTnI elevation and pulmonary disorders. Outcome was assessed at discharge from the hospital, and then followed up 6 and 12 months later. Pulmonary disorders were determined by the PaO 2 /FiO 2 ratio and radiography. The areas under the ROC curves (AUCs) were used to determine the predictive power of these factors. In the group with good short-term outcomes cTnI elevation on the second day after aSAH was significantly lower (p = .00007) than in patients with poor short-term outcomes. The same trend was observed after 6 months, although there were different results 12 months from the onset (p = .024 and n.s., respectively). A higher peak of cTnI was observed in the group with a pathological X-ray (p = .008) and pathological PaO 2 /FiO 2 ratio (p ≪ .001). cTnI was an accurate predictor of short-term outcomes (AUC = 0.741, p ≪ .001) and the outcome after 6 months (AUC = 0.688, p = .015). The results showed that cardiopulmonary abnormalities perform well as predictive factors for short- and long-term outcomes after aSAH.

  7. Reduced short-term memory capacity in Alzheimer's disease: the role of phonological, lexical, and semantic processing.

    PubMed

    Caza, Nicole; Belleville, Sylvie

    2008-05-01

    Individuals with Alzheimer's disease (AD) are often reported to have reduced verbal short-term memory capacity, typically attributed to their attention/executive deficits. However, these individuals also tend to show progressive impairment of semantic, lexical, and phonological processing which may underlie their low short-term memory capacity. The goals of this study were to assess the contribution of each level of representation (phonological, lexical, and semantic) to immediate serial recall performance in 18 individuals with AD, and to examine how these linguistic effects on short-term memory were modulated by their reduced capacity to manipulate information in short-term memory associated with executive dysfunction. Results showed that individuals with AD had difficulty recalling items that relied on phonological representations, which led to increased lexicality effects relative to the control group. This finding suggests that patients have a greater reliance on lexical/semantic information than controls, possibly to make up for deficits in retention and processing of phonological material. This lexical/semantic effect was not found to be significantly correlated with patients' capacity to manipulate verbal material in short-term memory, indicating that language processing and executive deficits may independently contribute to reducing verbal short-term memory capacity in AD.

  8. Short- and long-term cognitive effects of chronic cannabinoids administration in late-adolescence rats.

    PubMed

    Abush, Hila; Akirav, Irit

    2012-01-01

    The use of cannabis can impair cognitive function, especially short-term memory. A controversial question is whether long-term cannabis use during the late-adolescence period can cause irreversible deficits in higher brain function that persist after drug use stops. In order to examine the short- and long-term effects of chronic exposure to cannabinoids, rats were administered chronic i.p. treatment with the CB1/CB2 receptor agonist WIN55,212-2 (WIN; 1.2 mg/kg) for two weeks during the late adolescence period (post-natal days 45-60) and tested for behavioral and electrophysiological measures of cognitive performance 24 hrs, 10 and 30 days after the last drug injection. The impairing effects of chronic WIN on short-term memory in the water maze and the object recognition tasks as well as long-term potentiation (LTP) in the ventral subiculum (vSub)-nucleus accumbens (NAc) pathway were temporary as they lasted only 24 h or 10 d after withdrawal. However, chronic WIN significantly impaired hippocampal dependent short-term memory measured in the object location task 24 hrs, 10, 30, and 75 days after the last drug injection. Our findings suggest that some forms of hippocampal-dependent short-term memory are sensitive to chronic cannabinoid administration but other cognitive impairments are temporary and probably result from a residue of cannabinoids in the brain or acute withdrawal effects from cannabinoids. Understanding the effects of cannabinoids on cognitive function may provide us with tools to overcome these impairments and for cannabinoids to be more favorably considered for clinical use.

  9. Short-Term Memory and Its Biophysical Model

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Wang, Wei; Zhang, Kai; Tang, Xiao-wei

    1996-12-01

    The capacity of short-term memory has been studied using an integrate-and-fire neuronal network model. It is found that the storage of events depend on the manner of the correlation between the events, and the capacity is dominated by the value of after-depolarization potential. There is a monotonic increasing relationship between the value of after-depolarization potential and the memory numbers. The biophysics relevance of the network model is discussed and different kinds of the information processes are studied too.

  10. Feature-Based Visual Short-Term Memory Is Widely Distributed and Hierarchically Organized.

    PubMed

    Dotson, Nicholas M; Hoffman, Steven J; Goodell, Baldwin; Gray, Charles M

    2018-06-15

    Feature-based visual short-term memory is known to engage both sensory and association cortices. However, the extent of the participating circuit and the neural mechanisms underlying memory maintenance is still a matter of vigorous debate. To address these questions, we recorded neuronal activity from 42 cortical areas in monkeys performing a feature-based visual short-term memory task and an interleaved fixation task. We find that task-dependent differences in firing rates are widely distributed throughout the cortex, while stimulus-specific changes in firing rates are more restricted and hierarchically organized. We also show that microsaccades during the memory delay encode the stimuli held in memory and that units modulated by microsaccades are more likely to exhibit stimulus specificity, suggesting that eye movements contribute to visual short-term memory processes. These results support a framework in which most cortical areas, within a modality, contribute to mnemonic representations at timescales that increase along the cortical hierarchy. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  11. Cyclosporine therapy in inflammatory bowel disease: short-term and long-term results.

    PubMed

    Gurudu, S R; Griffel, L H; Gialanella, R J; Das, K M

    1999-09-01

    Intravenous cyclosporine therapy followed by oral cyclosporine therapy reduce the need for urgent surgery in steroid-refractory inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). Our objective is to report short- and long-term results of cyclosporine therapy in IBD patients. Thirteen patients with steroid-refractory IBD, seven patients with ulcerative colitis (UC), and six patients with Crohn's disease (CD) were treated with intravenous cyclosporine (4 mg/kg/day) for a mean period of 11.4+/-2.8 days (range, 4-15 days). Subsequently the patients were started on oral cyclosporine (8 mg/kg/day) and followed for a mean of 10.3+/-10 months (range, 1-30 months). Twelve patients responded to intravenous cyclosporine therapy. One patient with UC developed sepsis on the fourth day of intravenous cyclosporine therapy and needed urgent colectomy. Nine of 12 initial responders (6 patients with UC and 3 patients with CD) relapsed during follow-up despite oral cyclosporine and underwent elective surgery. One patient with CD relapsed 3 months after discontinuation of oral cyclosporine. Only two patients with CD are in long-term remission. There were no long-term side effects in any of the 13 treated patients. In conclusion, intravenous cyclosporine was effective in inducing remission or significant improvement in 12 of 13 patients with steroid-refractory IBD. However, with subsequent oral cyclosporine the remission could be maintained only for a short while. Each of the six patients with UC needed colectomy and three of the five patients with CD had intestinal resection within 12 months despite oral cyclosporine therapy.

  12. Day-Ahead Short-Term Forecasting Electricity Load via Approximation

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Khamitov, R. N.; Gritsay, A. S.; Tyunkov, D. A.; E Sinitsin, G.

    2017-04-01

    The method of short-term forecasting of a power consumption which can be applied to short-term forecasting of power consumption is offered. The offered model is based on sinusoidal function for the description of day and night cycles of power consumption. Function coefficients - the period and amplitude are set up is adaptive, considering dynamics of power consumption with use of an artificial neural network. The presented results are tested on real retrospective data of power supply company. The offered method can be especially useful if there are no opportunities of collection of interval indications of metering devices of consumers, and the power supply company operates with electrical supply points. The offered method can be used by any power supply company upon purchase of the electric power in the wholesale market. For this purpose, it is necessary to receive coefficients of approximation of sinusoidal function and to have retrospective data on power consumption on an interval not less than one year.

  13. Is visual short-term memory depthful?

    PubMed

    Reeves, Adam; Lei, Quan

    2014-03-01

    Does visual short-term memory (VSTM) depend on depth, as it might be if information was stored in more than one depth layer? Depth is critical in natural viewing and might be expected to affect retention, but whether this is so is currently unknown. Cued partial reports of letter arrays (Sperling, 1960) were measured up to 700 ms after display termination. Adding stereoscopic depth hardly affected VSTM capacity or decay inferred from total errors. The pattern of transposition errors (letters reported from an uncued row) was almost independent of depth and cue delay. We conclude that VSTM is effectively two-dimensional. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  14. Temporal grouping effects in musical short-term memory.

    PubMed

    Gorin, Simon; Mengal, Pierre; Majerus, Steve

    2018-07-01

    Recent theoretical accounts of verbal and visuo-spatial short-term memory (STM) have proposed the existence of domain-general mechanisms for the maintenance of serial order information. These accounts are based on the observation of similar behavioural effects across several modalities, such as temporal grouping effects. Across two experiments, the present study aimed at extending these findings, by exploring a STM modality that has received little interest so far, STM for musical information. Given its inherent rhythmic, temporal and serial organisation, the musical domain is of interest for investigating serial order STM processes such as temporal grouping. In Experiment 1, the data did not allow to determine the presence or the absence of temporal grouping effects. In Experiment 2, we observed that temporal grouping of tone sequences during encoding improves short-term recognition for serially presented probe tones. Furthermore, the serial position curves included micro-primacy and micro-recency effects, which are the hallmark characteristic of temporal grouping. Our results suggest that the encoding of serial order information in musical STM may be supported by temporal positional coding mechanisms similar to those reported in the verbal domain.

  15. The role of early visual cortex in visual short-term memory and visual attention.

    PubMed

    Offen, Shani; Schluppeck, Denis; Heeger, David J

    2009-06-01

    We measured cortical activity with functional magnetic resonance imaging to probe the involvement of early visual cortex in visual short-term memory and visual attention. In four experimental tasks, human subjects viewed two visual stimuli separated by a variable delay period. The tasks placed differential demands on short-term memory and attention, but the stimuli were visually identical until after the delay period. Early visual cortex exhibited sustained responses throughout the delay when subjects performed attention-demanding tasks, but delay-period activity was not distinguishable from zero when subjects performed a task that required short-term memory. This dissociation reveals different computational mechanisms underlying the two processes.

  16. Resolving semantic and proactive interference in memory over the short-term.

    PubMed

    Atkins, Alexandra S; Berman, Marc G; Reuter-Lorenz, Patricia A; Lewis, Richard L; Jonides, John

    2011-07-01

    Interference is a major source of short-term errors of memory. The present investigation explores the relationship between two important forms of interference: proactive interference (PI), induced by the need to reject recently studied items no longer relevant to task performance, and semantic interference (SI), induced by the need to reject lures sharing a meaningful relationship with current memoranda. We explore the possibility that shared cognitive control processes are recruited to resolve both forms of interference. In Experiment 1, we find that the requirement to engage in articulatory suppression during the retention interval of tasks that induce either PI or SI increases both forms of interference similarly and selectively. In Experiment 2, we develop a task to examine PI and SI within the same experimental context. The results show interactive effects between factors that lead to the two forms of interference. Taken together, these findings support contextual-cuing models of short-term remembering (Nairne, Annual Review of Psychology, 53, 53-81 2002), where the context in which retrieval occurs can influence susceptibility to interference. Lastly, we discuss several theoretical hypotheses concerning the cognitive control processes that are recruited to resolve SI and PI in short-term remembering.

  17. Clinical trials with rasagiline: evidence for short-term and long-term effects.

    PubMed

    Siderowf, Andrew; Stern, Matthew

    2006-05-23

    Rasagiline (N-propargyl-1 (R)-aminoindan) is a selective, potent irreversible inhibitor of MAO-B that possesses neuroprotective and anti-apoptotic properties in a variety of in vitro and in vivo animal models relevant to Parkinson's disease (PD). Several randomized controlled clinical trials have demonstrated the safety and efficacy of rasagiline as monotherapy in PD and as adjunctive therapy for patients receiving levodopa. In addition, the 1-year randomized, delayed-start analysis of the TEMPO study suggests that rasagiline may slow the rate of progression of PD. The randomized delayed-start paradigm has potential to differentiate short-term symptomatic effects from long-term effects of anti-parkinsonian agents. In the future, long-term trials to examine the potential disease-modifying effects of rasagiline, which incorporate biological markers as well as clinical endpoints, may further elucidate the role of rasagiline in the treatment of both early and advanced PD.

  18. Language and Short-Term Memory: The Role of Perceptual-Motor Affordance

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Macken, Bill; Taylor, John C.; Jones, Dylan M.

    2014-01-01

    The advantage for real words over nonwords in serial recall--the "lexicality effect"--is typically attributed to support for item-level phonology, either via redintegration, whereby partially degraded short-term traces are "cleaned up" via support from long-term representations of the phonological material or via the more…

  19. Short-term nonmigrating tide variability in the mesosphere, thermosphere, and ionosphere

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Pedatella, N. M.; Oberheide, J.; Sutton, E. K.; Liu, H.-L.; Anderson, J. L.; Raeder, K.

    2016-04-01

    The intraseasonal variability of the eastward propagating nonmigrating diurnal tide with zonal wave number 3 (DE3) during 2007 in the mesosphere, ionosphere, and thermosphere is investigated using a whole atmosphere model reanalysis and satellite observations. The atmospheric reanalysis is based on implementation of data assimilation in the Whole Atmosphere Community Climate Model (WACCM) using the Data Assimilation Research Testbed (DART) ensemble Kalman filter. The tidal variability in the WACCM+DART reanalysis is compared to the observed variability in the mesosphere and lower thermosphere (MLT) based on the Thermosphere Ionosphere Mesosphere Energetics Dynamics satellite Sounding of the Atmosphere using Broadband Emission Radiometry (TIMED/SABER) observations, in the ionosphere based on Constellation Observing System for Meteorology, Ionosphere, and Climate (COSMIC) observations, and in the upper thermosphere (˜475 km) based on Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) neutral density observations. To obtain the short-term DE3 variability in the MLT and upper thermosphere, we apply the method of tidal deconvolution to the TIMED/SABER observations and consider the difference in the ascending and descending longitudinal wave number 4 structure in the GRACE observations. The results reveal that tidal amplitude changes of 5-10 K regularly occur on short timescales (˜10-20 days) in the MLT. Similar variability occurs in the WACCM+DART reanalysis and TIMED/SABER observations, demonstrating that the short-term variability can be captured in whole atmosphere models that employ data assimilation and in observations by the technique of tidal deconvolution. The impact of the short-term DE3 variability in the MLT on the ionosphere and thermosphere is also clearly evident in the COSMIC and GRACE observations. Analysis of the troposphere forcing in WACCM+DART and simulations of the Global Scale Wave Model (GSWM) show that the short-term DE3 variability in the MLT is

  20. Analyzing Snowpack Metrics Over Large Spatial Extents Using Calibrated, Enhanced-Resolution Brightness Temperature Data and Long Short Term Memory Artificial Neural Networks

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Norris, W.; J Q Farmer, C.

    2017-12-01

    Snow water equivalence (SWE) is a difficult metric to measure accurately over large spatial extents; snow-tell sites are too localized, and traditional remotely sensed brightness temperature data is at too coarse of a resolution to capture variation. The new Calibrated Enhanced-Resolution Brightness Temperature (CETB) data from the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) offers remotely sensed brightness temperature data at an enhanced resolution of 3.125 km versus the original 25 km, which allows for large spatial extents to be analyzed with reduced uncertainty compared to the 25km product. While the 25km brightness temperature data has proved useful in past research — one group found decreasing trends in SWE outweighed increasing trends three to one in North America; other researchers used the data to incorporate winter conditions, like snow cover, into ecological zoning criterion — with the new 3.125 km data, it is possible to derive more accurate metrics for SWE, since we have far more spatial variability in measurements. Even with higher resolution data, using the 37 - 19 GHz frequencies to estimate SWE distorts the data during times of melt onset and accumulation onset. Past researchers employed statistical splines, while other successful attempts utilized non-parametric curve fitting to smooth out spikes distorting metrics. In this work, rather than using legacy curve fitting techniques, a Long Short Term Memory (LSTM) Artificial Neural Network (ANN) was trained to perform curve fitting on the data. LSTM ANN have shown great promise in modeling time series data, and with almost 40 years of data available — 14,235 days — there is plenty of training data for the ANN. LSTM's are ideal for this type of time series analysis because they allow important trends to persist for long periods of time, but ignore short term fluctuations; since LSTM's have poor mid- to short-term memory, they are ideal for smoothing out the large spikes generated in the melt

  1. Short-term versus long-term rainfall time series in the assessment of potable water savings by using rainwater in houses.

    PubMed

    Ghisi, Enedir; Cardoso, Karla Albino; Rupp, Ricardo Forgiarini

    2012-06-15

    The main objective of this article is to assess the possibility of using short-term instead of long-term rainfall time series to evaluate the potential for potable water savings by using rainwater in houses. The analysis was performed considering rainfall data from 1960 to 1995 for the city of Santa Bárbara do Oeste, located in the state of São Paulo, southeastern Brazil. The influence of the rainfall time series, roof area, potable water demand and percentage rainwater demand on the potential for potable water savings was evaluated. The potential for potable water savings was estimated using computer simulations considering a set of long-term rainfall time series and different sets of short-term rainfall time series. The ideal rainwater tank capacity was also assessed for some cases. It was observed that the higher the percentage rainwater demand and the shorter the rainfall time series, the larger the difference between the potential for potable water savings and the greater the variation in the ideal rainwater tank size. The sets of short-term rainfall time series considered adequate for different scenarios ranged from 1 to 13 years depending on the roof area, percentage rainwater demand and potable water demand. The main finding of the research is that sets of short-term rainfall time series can be used to assess the potential for potable water savings by using rainwater, as the results obtained are similar to those obtained from the long-term rainfall time series. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  2. Parent-Child Center Short-Term Assessment Study. Final Report.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Hubbell, Ruth; Barrett, Barbara

    A short-term descriptive assessment, this study provides summary data on the Parent-Child Center (PCC) comprehensive early childhood intervention programs initiated in 1967 and operated by the Administration for Children, Youth, and Families. PCCs provide low income families with children under three with social service, health, and educational…

  3. A Test of Tactile Concentration and Short-Term Memory.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Kainthola, S. D.; Singh, T. B.

    1992-01-01

    Twenty students and 45 adults with visual impairments or blindness were administered a test of tactile concentration and short-term memory involving the reproduction of the order of finger stimulation using the Finger Knocking Box. Reliability and validity scores indicated encouraging results with use of the instrument. (JDD)

  4. Labeling, Rehearsal, and Short-Term Memory in Retarded Children

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Hagen, John W.; And Others

    1974-01-01

    A short-term memory task was used to explore the effects of verbal labeling and rehearsal on serial-position recall in mildly retarded 9-to 11-year-old children. Results support the view that verbal skills affect recall in mildly retarded children similarly to normal children. (Author/SDH)

  5. Patient Suitability and Outcome in Short-Term Individual Psychotherapy.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Piper, William E.; And Others

    1990-01-01

    Studied effects of short-term, dynamically oriented individual therapy and patient characteristic quality of object relations (QOR) in study involving 8 therapists and 144 psychiatric outpatients. Best results were attained by high QOR therapy patients; worst results were attained by low QOR control patients. Results were suggestive of optimal…

  6. A Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy Approach for College Students

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Carlson, Thomas M.

    2004-01-01

    This article explores the need for university counseling centers (UCCs) to implement brief therapies and describes one such treatment, intensive short-term dynamic psychotherapy (ISTDP), as a particularly viable therapeutic approach in this setting. Because ISTDP is not appropriate for all students seeking therapy, a careful assessment of the…

  7. Ethical considerations of the short-term and long-term health impacts, costs, and educational value of sustainable development projects.

    PubMed

    Striebig, Bradley A; Jantzen, Tyler; Rowden, Katherine

    2006-04-01

    There are over 800 seventh to tenth grade students at the College d'Enseignment Generale (CEG) School in Azové, Benin. Like most children in the developing world, these students lack access to clean water and basic sanitation facilities. These students suffer from parasitic infection and health ailments which could be directly offset with short term aid to supply water and medical aid. Promoting proper sanitation and providing the technology to implement water and wastewater treatment in the community will decrease childhood and maternal disease and mortality rates in Azové. However, these measures may take several years to implement and will require a significant investment in the infrastructure of the school. Is it ethical to spend 10,000 dollars towards the long-term goals of providing water and sanitation to the students of CEG Azové, compared to spending the same amount on short-term relief efforts? This paper addresses the ethical dilemma of dealing with immediate medical needs in developing countries while trying to implement sustainable technologies. The views and frustration of students working on the project are discussed, as they realize the monetary and short-term impacts on human health when implementing sustainable technologies. The opportunity costs associated with the education principles of sustainable development were also considered. The anticipated costs and health impacts in the short-term and long-term will be evaluated for a period of 1, 2, 5 and 10 years. Sustainable development requires a new way of thinking, and a long-term approach. These problems will require the dedication of a new generation of engineers, working hand-in-hand with local communities and governments, social scientists, economists, businesses, human rights organizations, other non-government organizations, and international development organizations. Design projects encourage the professional and ethical development of engineers through hands-on involvement in national

  8. Effect of Short- and Long-Term Play Therapy Services on Teacher-Child Relationship Stress

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Ray, Dee C.; Henson, Robin K.; Schottelkorb, April A.; Brown, April Garofano; Muro, Joel

    2008-01-01

    The purpose of the present study was to explore the effect of both short- and long term Child-Centered Play Therapy on teacher-student relationship stress. Teachers identified 58 students exhibiting emotional and behavioral difficulties who were randomly assigned to one of two treatment groups. Students in the short-term intensive play therapy…

  9. Poor Phonemic Discrimination Does Not Underlie Poor Verbal Short-Term Memory in Down Syndrome

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Purser, Harry R. M.; Jarrold, Christopher

    2013-01-01

    Individuals with Down syndrome tend to have a marked impairment of verbal short-term memory. The chief aim of this study was to investigate whether phonemic discrimination contributes to this deficit. The secondary aim was to investigate whether phonological representations are degraded in verbal short-term memory in people with Down syndrome…

  10. Short-term rehabilitation for persons convicted of driving while intoxicated

    DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

    1976-10-01

    The objectives of the project were to develop a classification system for assessing persons convicted of driving while intoxicated, identify short-term rehabilitation (STR) objectives for these people, review available treatment programs, and make re...

  11. Proactive Interference and Directed Forgetting in Short-Term Motor Memory

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Burwitz, Leslie

    1974-01-01

    The present study was designed to test the effect of instructions to forget prior motor learning and the results were relevant to the understanding of short-term motor memory (STMM) proactive interference (PI). (Author/RK)

  12. Short-Term Energy Outlook Model Documentation: Petroleum Product Prices Module

    EIA Publications

    2015-01-01

    The petroleum products price module of the Short-Term Energy Outlook (STEO) model is designed to provide U.S. average wholesale and retail price forecasts for motor gasoline, diesel fuel, heating oil, and jet fuel.

  13. Mersilene mesh sling: short- and long-term clinical and urodynamic outcomes.

    PubMed

    Young, S B; Howard, A E; Baker, S P

    2001-07-01

    We sought to determine the long-term efficacy, safety, and urodynamic effects of the Mersilene mesh suburethral sling in treating complicated forms of genuine stress incontinence. Two hundred women diagnosed with genuine stress incontinence, complicated by recurrence, intrinsic sphincter deficiency, or chronically increased intraabdominal pressure underwent a suburethral mesh sling procedure (Mersilene; Ethicon Inc, Somerville, NJ). They were monitored with yearly clinical examinations plus short- and long-term postoperative urodynamic evaluations; statistical analysis was carried out by use of the Friedman 2-way analysis by rank, Fischer-Freeman-Halton exact testing, analysis of variance for repeated measures, Wilcoxon, exact Mann-Whitney U test, and Bonferroni paired t test. Of 176 patients who were 5 months or more postop, 127 (72%) had preoperative and short-term postoperative urodynamic evaluations (range 5 to 23 months, mean 12.6 months). Fifty-two of 117 women who were more than 19 months postop (44%) completed preoperative and long-term postoperative urodynamic evaluations at a mean of 63 months (range 20 to 107). One hundred thirty-six of 176 patients (77%) who were more than 4 months postop had a short- and/or long- term postoperative urodynamic evaluation (range 5 to 107 months, mean 30 months). Objective cure rate by stress test was 93% (126 of 136 patients) at a mean of 30 months follow-up. The long-term objective cure rate was 94% (49 of 52). Subjectively, the short- and long-term cure rates were 95.3% and 90.4%, respectively. The cotton swab angle deflection decreased by a mean of 54 degrees at 1 year and 50 degrees at 5 years. Of the 10 failures, the mean preoperative cotton swab straining angle was 19.6 degrees, with 6 being < 30 degrees. Nineteen patients had a negative preoperative cotton swab angle test result (mean straining angle 15 degrees before operation, -6 degrees after operation) and a long-term cure rate of 67%. The objective cure rate

  14. No effect of transcranial direct current stimulation of the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex on short-term memory.

    PubMed

    Wang, Jing; Wen, Jian-Bing; Li, Xiao-Li

    2018-01-01

    Short-term memory refers to the capacity for holding information in mind for a short period of time with conscious memorization. It is an important ability for daily life and is impaired in several neurological and psychiatric disorders. Anodal transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) applied to the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) was reported to enhance the capability of short-term memory in healthy subjects. However, results were not consistent and what is the possible impact factor is not known. One important factor that may significantly influence the effect of tDCS is the timing of tDCS administration. In order to explore whether tDCS impact short-term memory and the optimal timing of tDCS administration, we applied anodal tDCS to the left DLPFC to explore the modulatory effect of online and off-line tDCS on digit span as well as visual short-term memory performance in healthy subjects. Results showed tDCS of the left DLPFC did not influence intentional digit span memory performance, whether before the task or during the task. In addition, tDCS of the DLPFC administered before the task showed no effect on visual short-term memory, while there was a trend of increase in false alarm when tDCS of the DLPFC administered during the task. These results did not provide evidence for the enhancement of short-term memory by tDCS of the left DLPFC in healthy subjects, but it suggested an importance of administration time for visual short-term memory. Further studies are required to taking into account the baseline performance of subjects and time-dependence feature of tDCS. © 2017 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

  15. MOSAIK: a hash-based algorithm for accurate next-generation sequencing short-read mapping.

    PubMed

    Lee, Wan-Ping; Stromberg, Michael P; Ward, Alistair; Stewart, Chip; Garrison, Erik P; Marth, Gabor T

    2014-01-01

    MOSAIK is a stable, sensitive and open-source program for mapping second and third-generation sequencing reads to a reference genome. Uniquely among current mapping tools, MOSAIK can align reads generated by all the major sequencing technologies, including Illumina, Applied Biosystems SOLiD, Roche 454, Ion Torrent and Pacific BioSciences SMRT. Indeed, MOSAIK was the only aligner to provide consistent mappings for all the generated data (sequencing technologies, low-coverage and exome) in the 1000 Genomes Project. To provide highly accurate alignments, MOSAIK employs a hash clustering strategy coupled with the Smith-Waterman algorithm. This method is well-suited to capture mismatches as well as short insertions and deletions. To support the growing interest in larger structural variant (SV) discovery, MOSAIK provides explicit support for handling known-sequence SVs, e.g. mobile element insertions (MEIs) as well as generating outputs tailored to aid in SV discovery. All variant discovery benefits from an accurate description of the read placement confidence. To this end, MOSAIK uses a neural-network based training scheme to provide well-calibrated mapping quality scores, demonstrated by a correlation coefficient between MOSAIK assigned and actual mapping qualities greater than 0.98. In order to ensure that studies of any genome are supported, a training pipeline is provided to ensure optimal mapping quality scores for the genome under investigation. MOSAIK is multi-threaded, open source, and incorporated into our command and pipeline launcher system GKNO (http://gkno.me).

  16. MOSAIK: A Hash-Based Algorithm for Accurate Next-Generation Sequencing Short-Read Mapping

    PubMed Central

    Lee, Wan-Ping; Stromberg, Michael P.; Ward, Alistair; Stewart, Chip; Garrison, Erik P.; Marth, Gabor T.

    2014-01-01

    MOSAIK is a stable, sensitive and open-source program for mapping second and third-generation sequencing reads to a reference genome. Uniquely among current mapping tools, MOSAIK can align reads generated by all the major sequencing technologies, including Illumina, Applied Biosystems SOLiD, Roche 454, Ion Torrent and Pacific BioSciences SMRT. Indeed, MOSAIK was the only aligner to provide consistent mappings for all the generated data (sequencing technologies, low-coverage and exome) in the 1000 Genomes Project. To provide highly accurate alignments, MOSAIK employs a hash clustering strategy coupled with the Smith-Waterman algorithm. This method is well-suited to capture mismatches as well as short insertions and deletions. To support the growing interest in larger structural variant (SV) discovery, MOSAIK provides explicit support for handling known-sequence SVs, e.g. mobile element insertions (MEIs) as well as generating outputs tailored to aid in SV discovery. All variant discovery benefits from an accurate description of the read placement confidence. To this end, MOSAIK uses a neural-network based training scheme to provide well-calibrated mapping quality scores, demonstrated by a correlation coefficient between MOSAIK assigned and actual mapping qualities greater than 0.98. In order to ensure that studies of any genome are supported, a training pipeline is provided to ensure optimal mapping quality scores for the genome under investigation. MOSAIK is multi-threaded, open source, and incorporated into our command and pipeline launcher system GKNO (http://gkno.me). PMID:24599324

  17. Short-Term and Working Memory Impairments in Early-Implanted, Long-Term Cochlear Implant Users Are Independent of Audibility and Speech Production.

    PubMed

    AuBuchon, Angela M; Pisoni, David B; Kronenberger, William G

    2015-01-01

    To determine whether early-implanted, long-term cochlear implant (CI) users display delays in verbal short-term and working memory capacity when processes related to audibility and speech production are eliminated. Twenty-three long-term CI users and 23 normal-hearing controls each completed forward and backward digit span tasks under testing conditions that differed in presentation modality (auditory or visual) and response output (spoken recall or manual pointing). Normal-hearing controls reproduced more lists of digits than the CI users, even when the test items were presented visually and the responses were made manually via touchscreen response. Short-term and working memory delays observed in CI users are not due to greater demands from peripheral sensory processes such as audibility or from overt speech-motor planning and response output organization. Instead, CI users are less efficient at encoding and maintaining phonological representations in verbal short-term memory using phonological and linguistic strategies during memory tasks.

  18. Short-Term and Working Memory Impairments in Early-Implanted, Long-Term Cochlear Implant Users Are Independent of Audibility and Speech Production

    PubMed Central

    AuBuchon, Angela M.; Pisoni, David B.; Kronenberger, William G.

    2015-01-01

    OBJECTIVES Determine if early-implanted, long-term cochlear implant (CI) users display delays in verbal short-term and working memory capacity when processes related to audibility and speech production are eliminated. DESIGN Twenty-three long-term CI users and 23 normal-hearing controls each completed forward and backward digit span tasks under testing conditions which differed in presentation modality (auditory or visual) and response output (spoken recall or manual pointing). RESULTS Normal-hearing controls reproduced more lists of digits than the CI users, even when the test items were presented visually and the responses were made manually via touchscreen response. CONCLUSIONS Short-term and working memory delays observed in CI users are not due to greater demands from peripheral sensory processes such as audibility or from overt speech-motor planning and response output organization. Instead, CI users are less efficient at encoding and maintaining phonological representations in verbal short-term memory utilizing phonological and linguistic strategies during memory tasks. PMID:26496666

  19. Visual Motor Short Term Memory in Educationally Subnormal Boys.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Sugden, D. A.

    1978-01-01

    This investigation attempted to describe the developmental sequence of visual motor short term memory in mentally handicapped boys (mental ages 6, 9, and 12) during conditions of rest and interpolated activity, and to explore their use of spontaneous rehearsal strategies. Results are compared with those for normal boys. (Author/SJL)

  20. Trial-to-Trial Carryover in Auditory Short-Term Memory

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Visscher, Kristina M.; Kahana, Michael J.; Sekuler, Robert

    2009-01-01

    Using a short-term recognition memory task, the authors evaluated the carryover across trials of 2 types of auditory information: the characteristics of individual study sounds (item information) and the relationships between the study sounds (study set homogeneity). On each trial, subjects heard 2 successive broadband study sounds and then…

  1. An Evaluation of Short-Term Distributed Online Learning Events

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Barker, Bradley; Brooks, David

    2005-01-01

    The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of short-term distributed online training events using an adapted version of the compressed evaluation form developed by Wisher and Curnow (1998). Evaluating online distributed training events provides insight into course effectiveness, the contribution of prior knowledge to learning, and…

  2. Short-Term Effects of Televised Aggression on Children's Behavior.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Liebert, Robert M.; Baron, Robert A.

    Recently collected data appear to warrant advancing some tentative conslusions concerning the short-term effects of violence in television on children: 1) children are exposed to a substantial amount of violent content on television, and they can remember and learn from such exposure; 2) correlational studies have disclosed a regular association…

  3. Atmospheric Electrical Activity and the Prospects for Improving Short-Term, Weather Forcasting

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Goodman, Steven J.

    2003-01-01

    How might lightning measurements be used to improve short-term (0-24 hr) weather forecasting? We examine this question under two different prediction strategies. These include integration of lightning data into short-term forecasts (nowcasts) of convective (including severe) weather hazards and the assimilation of lightning data into cloud-resolving numerical weather prediction models. In each strategy we define specific metrics of forecast improvement and a progress assessment. We also address the conventional observing system deficiencies and potential gap-filling information that can be addressed through the use of the lightning measurement.

  4. Short-term mindfulness intervention reduces the negative attentional effects associated with heavy media multitasking

    PubMed Central

    Gorman, Thomas E.; Green, C. Shawn

    2016-01-01

    Recent research suggests that frequently switching between various forms of media (i.e. ‘media multitasking’) is associated with diminished attentional abilities, a disconcerting result given the prevalence of media multitasking in today’s society. In the present study, we sought to investigate the extent to which the deficits associated with frequent media multitasking can be temporarily ameliorated via a short-term mindfulness intervention previously shown to produce beneficial effects on the attentional abilities of normally functioning individuals. Consistent with previous work, we found: (1) that heavy media multitaskers showed generally poorer attentional abilities than light media multitaskers and (2) that all participants showed benefits from the short-term mindfulness intervention. Furthermore, we found that the benefits of the short-term mindfulness intervention were not equivalently large across participants. Instead, these benefits were disproportionately large in the heavy media multitaskers. While the positive outcomes were short-lived, this opens the possibility of performing long-term interventions with the goal of realizing lasting gains in this population. PMID:27086504

  5. Poor phonemic discrimination does not underlie poor verbal short-term memory in Down syndrome.

    PubMed

    Purser, Harry R M; Jarrold, Christopher

    2013-05-01

    Individuals with Down syndrome tend to have a marked impairment of verbal short-term memory. The chief aim of this study was to investigate whether phonemic discrimination contributes to this deficit. The secondary aim was to investigate whether phonological representations are degraded in verbal short-term memory in people with Down syndrome relative to control participants. To answer these questions, two tasks were used: a discrimination task, in which memory load was as low as possible, and a short-term recognition task that used the same stimulus items. Individuals with Down syndrome were found to perform significantly better than a nonverbal-matched typically developing group on the discrimination task, but they performed significantly more poorly than that group on the recognition task. The Down syndrome group was outperformed by an additional vocabulary-matched control group on the discrimination task but was outperformed to a markedly greater extent on the recognition task. Taken together, the results strongly indicate that phonemic discrimination ability is not central to the verbal short-term memory deficit associated with Down syndrome. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  6. Short-term and long-term ethanol administration inhibits the placental uptake and transport of valine in rats

    DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

    Patwardhan, R.V.; Schenker, S.; Henderson, G.I.

    1981-08-01

    Ethanol ingestion during pregnancy causes a pattern of fetal/neonatal dysfunction called the FAS. The effects of short- and long-term ethanol ingestion on the placental uptake and maternal-fetal transfer of valine were studied in rats. The in vivo placental uptake and fetal uptake were estimated after injection of 0.04 micromol of /sub 14/C-valine intravenously on day 20 of gestation in Sprague-Dawley rats. Short-term ethanol ingestion (4 gm/kg) caused a significant reduction in the placental uptake of /sub 14/C-valine by 33%, 60%, and 30%, and 31% at 2.5, 5, 10, and 15 min after valine administration, respectively (p less than 0.01), andmore » a similar significant reduction occurred in the fetal uptake of /sub 14/C-valine (p less than 0.01). Long-term ethanol ingestion prior to and throughout gestation resulted in a 47% reduction in placental valine uptake (p less than 0.01) and a 46% reduction in fetal valine uptake (p less than 0.01). Long-term ethanol feeding from day 4 to day 20 of gestation caused a 32% reduction in placental valine uptake (p less than 0.01) and a 26% reduction in fetal valine uptake (p less than 0.01). We conclude that both short- and long-term ingestion of ethanol inhibit the placental uptake and maternal-fetal transfer of an essential amino acid--valine. An alteration of placental function may contribute to the pathogenesis of the FAS.« less

  7. A short-term and long-term comparison of root coverage with an acellular dermal matrix and a subepithelial graft.

    PubMed

    Harris, Randall J

    2004-05-01

    Obtaining predictable and esthetic root coverage has become important. Unfortunately, there is only a limited amount of information available on the long-term results of root coverage procedures. The goal of this study was to evaluate the short-term and long-term root coverage results obtained with an acellular dermal matrix and a subepithelial graft. An a priori power analysis was done to determine that 25 was an adequate sample size for each group in this study. Twenty-five patients treated with either an acellular dermal matrix or a subepithelial graft for root coverage were included in this study. The short-term (mean 12.3 to 13.2 weeks) and long-term (mean 48.1 to 49.2 months) results were compared. Additionally, various factors were evaluated to determine whether they could affect the results. This study was a retrospective study of patients in a fee-for-service private periodontal practice. The patients were not randomly assigned to treatment groups. The mean root coverages for the short-term acellular dermal matrix (93.4%), short-term subepithelial graft (96.6%), and long-term subepithelial graft (97.0%) were statistically similar. All three were statistically greater than the long-term acellular dermal matrix mean root coverage (65.8%). Similar results were noted in the change in recession. There were smaller probing reductions and less of an increase in keratinized tissue with the acellular dermal matrix than the subepithelial graft. None of the factors evaluated resulted in the acellular dermal graft having a statistically significant better result than the subepithelial graft. However, in long-term cases where multiple defects were treated with an acellular dermal matrix, the mean root coverage (70.8%) was greater than the mean root coverage in long-term cases where a single defect was treated with an acellular dermal matrix (50.0%). The mean results with the subepithelial graft held up with time better than the mean results with an acellular dermal

  8. Short-term psychodynamic psychotherapies for common mental disorders.

    PubMed

    Abbass, Allan A; Kisely, Steve R; Town, Joel M; Leichsenring, Falk; Driessen, Ellen; De Maat, Saskia; Gerber, Andrew; Dekker, Jack; Rabung, Sven; Rusalovska, Svitlana; Crowe, Elizabeth

    2014-07-01

    Since the mid-1970s, short-term psychodynamic psychotherapies (STPP) for a broad range of psychological and somatic disorders have been developed and studied. Early published meta-analyses of STPP, using different methods and samples, have yielded conflicting results, although some meta-analyses have consistently supported an empirical basis for STPP. This is an update of a review that was last updated in 2006. To evaluate the efficacy of STPP for adults with common mental disorders compared with wait-list controls, treatments as usual and minimal contact controls in randomised controlled trials (RCTs). To specify the differential effects of STPP for people with different disorders (e.g. depressive disorders, anxiety disorders, somatoform disorders, mixed disorders and personality disorder) and treatment characteristics (e.g. manualised versus non-manualised therapies). The Cochrane Depression, Anxiety and Neurosis Group's Specialised Register (CCDANCTR) was searched to February 2014, this register includes relevant randomised controlled trials from The Cochrane Library (all years), EMBASE (1974-), MEDLINE (1950-) and PsycINFO (1967-). We also conducted searches on CENTRAL, MEDLINE, EMBASE, CINAHL, PsycINFO, DARE and Biological Abstracts (all years to July 2012) and all relevant studies (identified to 2012) were fully incorporated in this review update. We checked references from papers retrieved. We contacted a large group of psychodynamic researchers in an attempt to find new studies. We included all RCTs of adults with common mental disorders, in which a brief psychodynamic therapy lasting 40 or fewer hours in total was provided in individual format. Eight review authors working in pairs evaluated studies. We selected studies only if pairs of review authors agreed that the studies met inclusion criteria. We consulted a third review author if two review authors could not reach consensus. Two review authors collected data and entered it into Review Manager

  9. The phonological short-term store-rehearsal system: patterns of impairment and neural correlates.

    PubMed

    Vallar, G; Di Betta, A M; Silveri, M C

    1997-06-01

    Two left brain-damaged patients (L.A. and T.O.) with a selective impairment of auditory-verbal span are reported. Patient L.A. was unable to hold auditory-verbal material in the phonological store component of short-term memory. His performance was however normal on tasks requiring phonological judgements, which specifically involve the phonological output buffer component of the rehearsal process. He also showed some evidence that rehearsal contributed to the immediate retention of auditory-verbal material. Patient T.O. never made use of the rehearsal process in tasks assessing both immediate retention and the ability to make phonological judgements, but the memory capacity of the phonological short-term store was comparatively preserved. These contrasting patterns of impairment suggest that the phonological store component of verbal short-term memory was severely impaired in patient L.A., and spared, at least in part, in patient T.O. The rehearsal process was preserved in L.A., and primarily defective in T.O. The localisation of the lesions in the left hemisphere (L.A.: inferior parietal lobule, superior and middle temporal gyri; T.O.: sub-cortical premotor and rolandic regions, anterior insula) suggests that these two sub-components of phonological short-term memory have discrete anatomical correlates.

  10. Markers of preparatory attention predict visual short-term memory performance.

    PubMed

    Murray, Alexandra M; Nobre, Anna C; Stokes, Mark G

    2011-05-01

    Visual short-term memory (VSTM) is limited in capacity. Therefore, it is important to encode only visual information that is most likely to be relevant to behaviour. Here we asked which aspects of selective biasing of VSTM encoding predict subsequent memory-based performance. We measured EEG during a selective VSTM encoding task, in which we varied parametrically the memory load and the precision of recall required to compare a remembered item to a subsequent probe item. On half the trials, a spatial cue indicated that participants only needed to encode items from one hemifield. We observed a typical sequence of markers of anticipatory spatial attention: early attention directing negativity (EDAN), anterior attention directing negativity (ADAN), late directing attention positivity (LDAP); as well as of VSTM maintenance: contralateral delay activity (CDA). We found that individual differences in preparatory brain activity (EDAN/ADAN) predicted cue-related changes in recall accuracy, indexed by memory-probe discrimination sensitivity (d'). Importantly, our parametric manipulation of memory-probe similarity also allowed us to model the behavioural data for each participant, providing estimates for the quality of the memory representation and the probability that an item could be retrieved. We found that selective encoding primarily increased the probability of accurate memory recall; that ERP markers of preparatory attention predicted the cue-related changes in recall probability. Copyright © 2011. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

  11. Balancing Flood Risk and Water Supply in California: Policy Search Combining Short-Term Forecast Ensembles and Groundwater Recharge

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Herman, J. D.; Steinschneider, S.; Nayak, M. A.

    2017-12-01

    Short-term weather forecasts are not codified into the operating policies of federal, multi-purpose reservoirs, despite their potential to improve service provision. This is particularly true for facilities that provide flood protection and water supply, since the potential flood damages are often too severe to accept the risk of inaccurate forecasts. Instead, operators must maintain empty storage capacity to mitigate flood risk, even if the system is currently in drought, as occurred in California from 2012-2016. This study investigates the potential for forecast-informed operating rules to improve water supply efficiency while maintaining flood protection, combining state-of-the-art weather hindcasts with a novel tree-based policy optimization framework. We hypothesize that forecasts need only accurately predict the occurrence of a storm, rather than its intensity, to be effective in regions like California where wintertime, synoptic-scale storms dominate the flood regime. We also investigate the potential for downstream groundwater injection to improve the utility of forecasts. These hypotheses are tested in a case study of Folsom Reservoir on the American River. Because available weather hindcasts are relatively short (10-20 years), we propose a new statistical framework to develop synthetic forecasts to assess the risk associated with inaccurate forecasts. The efficiency of operating policies is tested across a range of scenarios that include varying forecast skill and additional groundwater pumping capacity. Results suggest that the combined use of groundwater storage and short-term weather forecasts can substantially improve the tradeoff between water supply and flood control objectives in large, multi-purpose reservoirs in California.

  12. FFT transformed quantitative EEG analysis of short term memory load.

    PubMed

    Singh, Yogesh; Singh, Jayvardhan; Sharma, Ratna; Talwar, Anjana

    2015-07-01

    The EEG is considered as building block of functional signaling in the brain. The role of EEG oscillations in human information processing has been intensively investigated. To study the quantitative EEG correlates of short term memory load as assessed through Sternberg memory test. The study was conducted on 34 healthy male student volunteers. The intervention consisted of Sternberg memory test, which runs on a version of the Sternberg memory scanning paradigm software on a computer. Electroencephalography (EEG) was recorded from 19 scalp locations according to 10-20 international system of electrode placement. EEG signals were analyzed offline. To overcome the problems of fixed band system, individual alpha frequency (IAF) based frequency band selection method was adopted. The outcome measures were FFT transformed absolute powers in the six bands at 19 electrode positions. Sternberg memory test served as model of short term memory load. Correlation analysis of EEG during memory task was reflected as decreased absolute power in Upper alpha band in nearly all the electrode positions; increased power in Theta band at Fronto-Temporal region and Lower 1 alpha band at Fronto-Central region. Lower 2 alpha, Beta and Gamma band power remained unchanged. Short term memory load has distinct electroencephalographic correlates resembling the mentally stressed state. This is evident from decreased power in Upper alpha band (corresponding to Alpha band of traditional EEG system) which is representative band of relaxed mental state. Fronto-temporal Theta power changes may reflect the encoding and execution of memory task.

  13. Oxygenator in short-term LVAD circuit: a rescue in post-LVAD pulmonary complications.

    PubMed

    Mohite, Prashant N; Patil, Nikhil P; Popov, Aron-Frederik; Bahrami, Toufan; Simon, Andre R

    2016-10-01

    Pulmonary complications after left ventricular assist device (LVAD) implantation, though infrequent, can be potentially catastrophic. A 62-year-old female with cardiogenic shock, supported on short-term LVAD, developed pulmonary oedema. An oxygenator was introduced into the LVAD circuit, which improved the gas exchange and, eventually, after weaning off the oxygenator, the patient received long-term LVAD. The introduction of an oxygenator into the short-term LAVD circuit is a lifesaving manoeuvre in such a situation. It offers freedom of introducing and removing the oxygenator into the LVAD circuit without opening the chest and competing for LVAD flow. © The Author(s) 2016.

  14. Short-Term Energy Outlook Model Documentation: Motor Gasoline Consumption Model

    EIA Publications

    2011-01-01

    The motor gasoline consumption module of the Short-Term Energy Outlook (STEO) model is designed to provide forecasts of total U.S. consumption of motor gasolien based on estimates of vehicle miles traveled and average vehicle fuel economy.

  15. Short-term and long-term clinostat and vibration-induced biochemical changes in dwarf Marigold stems

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Siegel, S. M.; Siegel, B. Z.

    Stems of 21-day dwarf Marigold plants cultivated on the clinostat were compared with plants cultivated on vertical axis rotators (``vibrational controls'') and stationary controls for long-term changes in cell wall composition. Stems of 21-day plants grown under stationary conditions and subsequently exposed to the clinostat for 24 hours were also analyzed. Among the long-term markers, calcium, lignin, and protein-bound hemicellulose (possibly cell wall glycoprotein) clearly differentiated the effects of vibration from those of the clinostat. Short-term differential responses included rate of ethylene production, nastic movement and peroxidase activity of the cell wall, but not of the protoplast.

  16. Short-term and long-term clinostat and vibration-induced biochemical changes in dwarf marigold stems

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Siegel, S. M.; Siegel, B. Z.

    1983-01-01

    Stems of 21-day dwarf marigold plants cultivated on the clinostat were compared with plants cultivated on vertical axis rotators ('vibrational controls') and stationary controls for long-term changes in cell wall composition. Stems of 21-day plants grown under stationary conditions and subsequently exposed to the clinostat for 24 hours were also analyzed. Among the long-term markers, calcium, lignin, and protein-bound hemicellulose (possibly cell wall glycoprotein) clearly differentiated the effects of vibration from those of the clinostat. Short-term differential responses included rate of ethylene production, nastic movement and peroxidase activity of the cell wall, but not of the protoplast.

  17. Exogenous Attention Influences Visual Short-Term Memory in Infants

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Ross-Sheehy, Shannon; Oakes, Lisa M.; Luck, Steven J.

    2011-01-01

    Two experiments examined the hypothesis that developing visual attentional mechanisms influence infants' Visual Short-Term Memory (VSTM) in the context of multiple items. Five- and 10-month-old infants (N = 76) received a change detection task in which arrays of three differently colored squares appeared and disappeared. On each trial one square…

  18. The Role of Short-Term Memory on Language Learning.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Wang, Li-Yuch

    Two studies assessed the impact of short-term memory on English as a Second Language learning. The first involved 20 graduate students at a Taiwanese university, who were randomly divided into treatment and control groups. It investigated differences in the performance of phrase recollection when the information was chunked versus unchunked.…

  19. Visual Short-Term Memory During Smooth Pursuit Eye Movements

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Kerzel, Dirk; Ziegler, Nathalie E.

    2005-01-01

    Visual short-term memory (VSTM) was probed while observers performed smooth pursuit eye movements. Smooth pursuit keeps a moving object stabilized in the fovea. VSTM capacity for position was reduced during smooth pursuit compared with a condition with eye fixation. There was no difference between a condition in which the items were approximately…

  20. Multi-step prediction for influenza outbreak by an adjusted long short-term memory.

    PubMed

    Zhang, J; Nawata, K

    2018-05-01

    Influenza results in approximately 3-5 million annual cases of severe illness and 250 000-500 000 deaths. We urgently need an accurate multi-step-ahead time-series forecasting model to help hospitals to perform dynamical assignments of beds to influenza patients for the annually varied influenza season, and aid pharmaceutical companies to formulate a flexible plan of manufacturing vaccine for the yearly different influenza vaccine. In this study, we utilised four different multi-step prediction algorithms in the long short-term memory (LSTM). The result showed that implementing multiple single-output prediction in a six-layer LSTM structure achieved the best accuracy. The mean absolute percentage errors from two- to 13-step-ahead prediction for the US influenza-like illness rates were all <15%, averagely 12.930%. To the best of our knowledge, it is the first time that LSTM has been applied and refined to perform multi-step-ahead prediction for influenza outbreaks. Hopefully, this modelling methodology can be applied in other countries and therefore help prevent and control influenza worldwide.

  1. The index gage method to develop a flow duration curve from short-term streamflow records

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Zhang, Zhenxing

    2017-10-01

    The flow duration curve (FDC) is one of the most commonly used graphical tools in hydrology and provides a comprehensive graphical view of streamflow variability at a particular site. For a gaged site, an FDC can be easily estimated with frequency analysis. When no streamflow records are available, regional FDCs are used to synthesize FDCs. However, studies on how to develop FDCs for sites with short-term records have been very limited. Deriving representative FDC when there are short-term hydrologic records is important. For instance, 43% of the 394 streamflow gages in Illinois have records of 20 years or fewer, and these short-term gages are often distributed in headwaters and contain valuable hydrologic information. In this study, the index gage method is proposed to develop FDCs using short-term hydrologic records via an information transfer technique from a nearby hydrologically similar index gage. There are three steps: (1) select an index gage; (2) determine changes of FDC; and (3) develop representative FDCs. The approach is tested using records from 92 U.S. Geological Survey streamflow gages in Illinois. A jackknife experiment is conducted to assess the performance. Bootstrap resampling is used to simulate various periods of records, i.e., 1, 2, 5, 10, 15, and 20 years of records. The results demonstrated that the index gage method is capable of developing a representative FDC using short-term records. Generally, the approach performance is improved when more hydrologic records are available, but the improvement appears to level off when the short-term gage has 10 years or more records.

  2. The functional neuroanatomy of multitasking: combining dual tasking with a short term memory task.

    PubMed

    Deprez, Sabine; Vandenbulcke, Mathieu; Peeters, Ron; Emsell, Louise; Amant, Frederic; Sunaert, Stefan

    2013-09-01

    Insight into the neural architecture of multitasking is crucial when investigating the pathophysiology of multitasking deficits in clinical populations. Presently, little is known about how the brain combines dual-tasking with a concurrent short-term memory task, despite the relevance of this mental operation in daily life and the frequency of complaints related to this process, in disease. In this study we aimed to examine how the brain responds when a memory task is added to dual-tasking. Thirty-three right-handed healthy volunteers (20 females, mean age 39.9 ± 5.8) were examined with functional brain imaging (fMRI). The paradigm consisted of two cross-modal single tasks (a visual and auditory temporal same-different task with short delay), a dual-task combining both single tasks simultaneously and a multi-task condition, combining the dual-task with an additional short-term memory task (temporal same-different visual task with long delay). Dual-tasking compared to both individual visual and auditory single tasks activated a predominantly right-sided fronto-parietal network and the cerebellum. When adding the additional short-term memory task, a larger and more bilateral frontoparietal network was recruited. We found enhanced activity during multitasking in components of the network that were already involved in dual-tasking, suggesting increased working memory demands, as well as recruitment of multitask-specific components including areas that are likely to be involved in online holding of visual stimuli in short-term memory such as occipito-temporal cortex. These results confirm concurrent neural processing of a visual short-term memory task during dual-tasking and provide evidence for an effective fMRI multitasking paradigm. © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  3. Accurate measurement of dispersion data through short and narrow tubes used in very high-pressure liquid chromatography.

    PubMed

    Gritti, Fabrice; McDonald, Thomas; Gilar, Martin

    2015-09-04

    An original method is proposed for the accurate and reproducible measurement of the time-based dispersion properties of short L< 50cm and narrow rc< 50μm tubes at mobile phase flow rates typically used in very high-pressure liquid chromatography (vHPLC). Such tubes are used to minimize sample dispersion in vHPLC; however, their dispersion characteristics cannot be accurately measured at such flow rates due to system dispersion contribution of vHPLC injector and detector. It is shown that using longer and wider tubes (>10μL) enables a reliable measurement of the dispersion data. We confirmed that the dimensionless plot of the reduced dispersion coefficient versus the reduced linear velocity (Peclet number) depends on the aspect ratio, L/rc, of the tube, and unexpectedly also on the diffusion coefficient of the analyte. This dimensionless plot could be easily obtained for a large volume tube, which has the same aspect ratio as that of the short and narrow tube, and for the same diffusion coefficient. The dispersion data for the small volume tube are then directly extrapolated from this plot. For instance, it is found that the maximum volume variances of 75μm×30.5cm and 100μm×30.5cm prototype finger-tightened connecting tubes are 0.10 and 0.30μL(2), respectively, with an accuracy of a few percent and a precision smaller than seven percent. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

  4. Frequency-selective augmenting responses by short-term synaptic depression in cat neocortex

    PubMed Central

    Houweling, Arthur R; Bazhenov, Maxim; Timofeev, Igor; Grenier, François; Steriade, Mircea; Sejnowski, Terrence J

    2002-01-01

    Thalamic stimulation at frequencies between 5 and 15 Hz elicits incremental or ‘augmenting’ cortical responses. Augmenting responses can also be evoked in cortical slices and isolated cortical slabs in vivo. Here we show that a realistic network model of cortical pyramidal cells and interneurones including short-term plasticity of inhibitory and excitatory synapses replicates the main features of augmenting responses as obtained in isolated slabs in vivo. Repetitive stimulation of synaptic inputs at frequencies around 10 Hz produced postsynaptic potentials that grew in size and carried an increasing number of action potentials resulting from the depression of inhibitory synaptic currents. Frequency selectivity was obtained through the relatively weak depression of inhibitory synapses at low frequencies, and strong depression of excitatory synapses together with activation of a calcium-activated potassium current at high frequencies. This network resonance is a consequence of short-term synaptic plasticity in a network of neurones without intrinsic resonances. These results suggest that short-term plasticity of cortical synapses could shape the dynamics of synchronized oscillations in the brain. PMID:12122156

  5. Correlation of Noncancer Benchmark Doses in Short- and Long-Term Rodent Bioassays.

    PubMed

    Kratchman, Jessica; Wang, Bing; Fox, John; Gray, George

    2018-05-01

    This study investigated whether, in the absence of chronic noncancer toxicity data, short-term noncancer toxicity data can be used to predict chronic toxicity effect levels by focusing on the dose-response relationship instead of a critical effect. Data from National Toxicology Program (NTP) technical reports have been extracted and modeled using the Environmental Protection Agency's Benchmark Dose Software. Best-fit, minimum benchmark dose (BMD), and benchmark dose lower limits (BMDLs) have been modeled for all NTP pathologist identified significant nonneoplastic lesions, final mean body weight, and mean organ weight of 41 chemicals tested by NTP between 2000 and 2012. Models were then developed at the chemical level using orthogonal regression techniques to predict chronic (two years) noncancer health effect levels using the results of the short-term (three months) toxicity data. The findings indicate that short-term animal studies may reasonably provide a quantitative estimate of a chronic BMD or BMDL. This can allow for faster development of human health toxicity values for risk assessment for chemicals that lack chronic toxicity data. © 2017 Society for Risk Analysis.

  6. Short-term Natural History of High-Risk Human Papillomavirus Infection in Mid-Adult Women Sampled Monthly (Short title: Short-term HPV Natural History in Mid-Adult Women)

    PubMed Central

    Fu, Tsung-chieh (Jane); Xi, Long Fu; Hulbert, Ayaka; Hughes, James P.; Feng, Qinghua; Schwartz, Stephen M.; Hawes, Stephen E.; Koutsky, Laura A.; Winer, Rachel L.

    2015-01-01

    Characterizing short-term HPV detection patterns and viral load may inform HPV natural history in mid-adult women. From 2011–2012, we recruited women aged 30–50 years. Women submitted monthly self-collected vaginal samples for high-risk HPV DNA testing for 6 months. Positive samples were tested for type-specific HPV DNA load by real-time PCR. HPV type-adjusted linear and Poisson regression assessed factors associated with 1) viral load at initial HPV detection and 2) repeat type-specific HPV detection. One-hundred thirty-nine women (36% of 387 women with ≥4 samples) contributed 243 type-specific HR HPV infections during the study; 54% of infections were prevalent and 46% were incident. Incident (versus prevalent) detection and past pregnancy were associated with lower viral load, whereas current smoking was associated with higher viral load. In multivariate analysis, current smoking was associated with a 40% (95%CI:5%–87%) increase in the proportion of samples that were repeatedly positive for the same HPV type, whereas incident (versus prevalent) detection status and past pregnancy were each associated with a reduction in the proportion of samples repeatedly positive (55%,95%CI:38%–67% and 26%,95%CI:10%–39%, respectively). In a separate multivariate model, each log10 increase in viral load was associated with a 10% (95%CI:4%–16%) increase in the proportion of samples repeatedly positive. Factors associated with repeat HPV detection were similar to those observed in longer-term studies, suggesting that short-term repeat detection may relate to long-term persistence. The negative associations between incident HPV detection and both viral load and repeat detection suggest that reactivation or intermittent persistence was more common than new acquisition. PMID:25976733

  7. Long- and short-term exposure to PM2.5 and mortality: using novel exposure models.

    PubMed

    Kloog, Itai; Ridgway, Bill; Koutrakis, Petros; Coull, Brent A; Schwartz, Joel D

    2013-07-01

    Many studies have reported associations between ambient particulate matter (PM) and adverse health effects, focused on either short-term (acute) or long-term (chronic) PM exposures. For chronic effects, the studied cohorts have rarely been representative of the population. We present a novel exposure model combining satellite aerosol optical depth and land-use data to investigate both the long- and short-term effects of PM2.5 exposures on population mortality in Massachusetts, United States, for the years 2000-2008. All deaths were geocoded. We performed two separate analyses: a time-series analysis (for short-term exposure) where counts in each geographic grid cell were regressed against cell-specific short-term PM2.5 exposure, temperature, socioeconomic data, lung cancer rates (as a surrogate for smoking), and a spline of time (to control for season and trends). In addition, for long-term exposure, we performed a relative incidence analysis using two long-term exposure metrics: regional 10 × 10 km PM2.5 predictions and local deviations from the cell average based on land use within 50 m of the residence. We tested whether these predicted the proportion of deaths from PM-related causes (cardiovascular and respiratory diseases). For short-term exposure, we found that for every 10-µg/m increase in PM 2.5 exposure there was a 2.8% increase in PM-related mortality (95% confidence interval [CI] = 2.0-3.5). For the long-term exposure at the grid cell level, we found an odds ratio (OR) for every 10-µg/m increase in long-term PM2.5 exposure of 1.6 (CI = 1.5-1.8) for particle-related diseases. Local PM2.5 had an OR of 1.4 (CI = 1.3-1.5), which was independent of and additive to the grid cell effect. We have developed a novel PM2.5 exposure model based on remote sensing data to assess both short- and long-term human exposures. Our approach allows us to gain spatial resolution in acute effects and an assessment of long-term effects in the entire population rather than a

  8. Resolving semantic and proactive interference in memory over the short-term

    PubMed Central

    Reuter-Lorenz, Patricia A.; Lewis, Richard L.; Jonides, John

    2011-01-01

    Interference is a major source of short-term errors of memory. The present investigation explores the relationship between two important forms of interference: proactive interference (PI), induced by the need to reject recently studied items no longer relevant to task performance, and semantic interference (SI), induced by the need to reject lures sharing a meaningful relationship with current memoranda. We explore the possibility that shared cognitive control processes are recruited to resolve both forms of interference. In Experiment 1, we find that the requirement to engage in articulatory suppression during the retention interval of tasks that induce either PI or SI increases both forms of interference similarly and selectively. In Experiment 2, we develop a task to examine PI and SI within the same experimental context. The results show interactive effects between factors that lead to the two forms of interference. Taken together, these findings support contextual-cuing models of short-term remembering (Nairne, Annual Review of Psychology, 53, 53–81 2002), where the context in which retrieval occurs can influence susceptibility to interference. Lastly, we discuss several theoretical hypotheses concerning the cognitive control processes that are recruited to resolve SI and PI in short-term remembering. PMID:21327614

  9. Analysis of the yeast short-term Crabtree effect and its origin

    PubMed Central

    Hagman, Arne; Säll, Torbjörn; Piškur, Jure

    2014-01-01

    The short-term Crabtree effect is defined as the immediate occurrence of aerobic alcoholic fermentation in response to provision of a pulse of excess sugar to sugar-limited yeast cultures. Here we have characterized ten yeast species with a clearly defined phylogenetic relationship. Yeast species were cultivated under glucose-limited conditions, and we studied their general carbon metabolism in response to a glucose pulse. We generated an extensive collection of data on glucose and oxygen consumption, and ethanol and carbon dioxide generation. We conclude that the Pichia,Debaryomyces,Eremothecium and Kluyveromyces marxianus yeasts do not exhibit any significant ethanol formation, while Kluyveromyces lactis behaves as an intermediate yeast, and Lachancea,Torulaspora,Vanderwaltozyma and Saccharomyces yeasts exhibit rapid ethanol accumulation. Based on the present data and our previous data relating to the presence of the long-term Crabtree effect in over 40 yeast species, we speculate that the origin of the short-term effect may coincide with the origin of the long-term Crabtree effect in the Saccharomycetales lineage, occurring ∼ 150 million years ago. PMID:25161062

  10. Whereas Short-Term Facilitation Is Presynaptic, Intermediate-Term Facilitation Involves Both Presynaptic and Postsynaptic Protein Kinases and Protein Synthesis

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Jin, Iksung; Kandel, Eric R.; Hawkins, Robert D.

    2011-01-01

    Whereas short-term plasticity involves covalent modifications that are generally restricted to either presynaptic or postsynaptic structures, long-term plasticity involves the growth of new synapses, which by its nature involves both pre- and postsynaptic alterations. In addition, an intermediate-term stage of plasticity has been identified that…

  11. Ultra-Short-Term Heart Rate Variability is Sensitive to Training Effects in Team Sports Players.

    PubMed

    Nakamura, Fabio Y; Flatt, Andrew A; Pereira, Lucas A; Ramirez-Campillo, Rodrigo; Loturco, Irineu; Esco, Michael R

    2015-09-01

    The aim of this study was to test the possibility of the ultra-short-term lnRMSSD (measured in 1-min post-1-min stabilization period) to detect training induced adaptations in futsal players. Twenty-four elite futsal players underwent HRV assessments pre- and post-three or four weeks preseason training. From the 10-min HRV recording period, lnRMSSD was analyzed in the following time segments: 1) from 0-5 min (i.e., stabilization period); 2) from 0-1 min; 1-2 min; 2-3 min; 3-4 min; 4-5 min and; 3) from 5-10 min (i.e., criterion period). The lnRMSSD was almost certainly higher (100/00/00) using the magnitude-based inference in all periods at the post- moment. The correlation between changes in ultra-short-term lnRMSSD (i.e., 0-1 min; 1-2 min; 2-3 min; 3-4 min; 4-5 min) and lnRMSSDCriterion ranged between 0.45-0.75, with the highest value (p = 0.75; 90% CI: 0.55 - 0.85) found between ultra-short-term lnRMDSSD at 1-2 min and lnRMSSDCriterion. In conclusion, lnRMSSD determined in a short period of 1-min is sensitive to training induced changes in futsal players (based on the very large correlation to the criterion measure), and can be used to track cardiac autonomic adaptations. Key pointsThe ultra-short-term (1 min) natural log of the root-mean-square difference of successive normal RR intervals (lnRMSSD) is sensitive to training effects in futsal playersThe ultra-short-term lnRMSSD may simplify the assessment of the cardiac autonomic changes in the field compared to the traditional and lengthier (10 min duration) analysisCoaches are encouraged to implement the ultra-short-term heart rate variability in their routines to monitor team sports athletes.

  12. Ultra-Short-Term Heart Rate Variability is Sensitive to Training Effects in Team Sports Players

    PubMed Central

    Nakamura, Fabio Y.; Flatt, Andrew A.; Pereira, Lucas A.; Ramirez-Campillo, Rodrigo; Loturco, Irineu; Esco, Michael R.

    2015-01-01

    The aim of this study was to test the possibility of the ultra-short-term lnRMSSD (measured in 1-min post-1-min stabilization period) to detect training induced adaptations in futsal players. Twenty-four elite futsal players underwent HRV assessments pre- and post-three or four weeks preseason training. From the 10-min HRV recording period, lnRMSSD was analyzed in the following time segments: 1) from 0-5 min (i.e., stabilization period); 2) from 0-1 min; 1-2 min; 2-3 min; 3-4 min; 4-5 min and; 3) from 5-10 min (i.e., criterion period). The lnRMSSD was almost certainly higher (100/00/00) using the magnitude-based inference in all periods at the post- moment. The correlation between changes in ultra-short-term lnRMSSD (i.e., 0-1 min; 1-2 min; 2-3 min; 3-4 min; 4-5 min) and lnRMSSDCriterion ranged between 0.45-0.75, with the highest value (p = 0.75; 90% CI: 0.55 – 0.85) found between ultra-short-term lnRMDSSD at 1-2 min and lnRMSSDCriterion. In conclusion, lnRMSSD determined in a short period of 1-min is sensitive to training induced changes in futsal players (based on the very large correlation to the criterion measure), and can be used to track cardiac autonomic adaptations. Key points The ultra-short-term (1 min) natural log of the root-mean-square difference of successive normal RR intervals (lnRMSSD) is sensitive to training effects in futsal players The ultra-short-term lnRMSSD may simplify the assessment of the cardiac autonomic changes in the field compared to the traditional and lengthier (10 min duration) analysis Coaches are encouraged to implement the ultra-short-term heart rate variability in their routines to monitor team sports athletes PMID:26336347

  13. Readiness for change and short-term outcomes of female adolescents in residential treatment for anorexia nervosa.

    PubMed

    McHugh, Matthew D

    2007-11-01

    To determine if readiness for change (RFC) at admission predicted length of stay (LOS) and short-term outcomes among female adolescents in residential treatment for anorexia nervosa (AN). Using a prospective cohort design to collect data from participants (N = 65) at admission and discharge, Kaplan-Meier survival analysis and Cox regression tested whether RFC on admission predicted time in LOS to a favorable short-term outcome--a composite endpoint based on minimum criteria for weight gain, drive for thinness, depression, anxiety, and health-related quality of life (HRQOL). Participants with low RFC had a mean survival time to a favorable short-term outcome of 59.4 days compared to 34.1 days for those with high RFC (log rank = 8.44, df = 1, p = .003). The probability of a favorable short-term outcome was 5.30 times greater for participants with high RFC. Readiness for change is a useful predictor of a favorable short-term outcome and should be considered in the assessment profile of patients with AN. (c) 2007 by Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

  14. The value of short-term pain relief in predicting the long-term outcome of 'indirect' cervical epidural steroid injections.

    PubMed

    Joswig, Holger; Neff, Armin; Ruppert, Christina; Hildebrandt, Gerhard; Stienen, Martin Nikolaus

    2018-05-01

    The predictive value of short-term arm pain relief after 'indirect' cervical epidural steroid injection (ESI) for the 1-month treatment response has been previously demonstrated. It remained to be answered whether the long-term response could be estimated by the early post-interventional pain course as well. Prospective observational study, following a cohort of n = 45 patients for a period of 24 months after 'indirect' ESI for radiculopathy secondary to a single-level cervical disk herniation (CDH). Arm and neck pain on the visual analog scale (VAS), health-related quality of life with the Short Form-12 (SF-12), and functional outcome with the Neck Pain and Disability (NPAD) Scale were assessed. Any additional invasive treatment after a single injection (second injection or surgery) defined treatment outcome as 'non-response'. At 24 months, n = 30 (66.7%) patients were responders and n = 15 (33.3%) were non-responders. Non-responders exited the follow-up at 1 month (n = 10), at 3 months (n = 4), and at 6 months (n = 1). No patients were injected again or operated on between the 6- and 24-month follow-up. Patients with favorable treatment response at 24 months had significantly lower VAS arm pain (p < 0.05) than non-responders at days 6, 8-11, and at the 3-month follow-up. The previously defined cut-off of > 50% short term pain reduction was not a reliable predictor of the 24-month responder status. SF-12 and NPAD scores were better among treatment responders in the long term. Patients who require a second injection or surgery after 'indirect' cervical ESI for a symptomatic CDH do so within the first 6 months. Short-term pain relief cannot reliably predict the long-term outcome.

  15. SHORT-TERM SOLAR FLARE PREDICTION USING MULTIRESOLUTION PREDICTORS

    DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

    Yu Daren; Huang Xin; Hu Qinghua

    2010-01-20

    Multiresolution predictors of solar flares are constructed by a wavelet transform and sequential feature extraction method. Three predictors-the maximum horizontal gradient, the length of neutral line, and the number of singular points-are extracted from Solar and Heliospheric Observatory/Michelson Doppler Imager longitudinal magnetograms. A maximal overlap discrete wavelet transform is used to decompose the sequence of predictors into four frequency bands. In each band, four sequential features-the maximum, the mean, the standard deviation, and the root mean square-are extracted. The multiresolution predictors in the low-frequency band reflect trends in the evolution of newly emerging fluxes. The multiresolution predictors in the high-frequencymore » band reflect the changing rates in emerging flux regions. The variation of emerging fluxes is decoupled by wavelet transform in different frequency bands. The information amount of these multiresolution predictors is evaluated by the information gain ratio. It is found that the multiresolution predictors in the lowest and highest frequency bands contain the most information. Based on these predictors, a C4.5 decision tree algorithm is used to build the short-term solar flare prediction model. It is found that the performance of the short-term solar flare prediction model based on the multiresolution predictors is greatly improved.« less

  16. Short-Term Upper Limb Immobilization Affects Action-Word Understanding

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Bidet-Ildei, Christel; Meugnot, Aurore; Beauprez, Sophie-Anne; Gimenes, Manuel; Toussaint, Lucette

    2017-01-01

    The present study aimed to investigate whether well-established associations between action and language can be altered by short-term upper limb immobilization. The dominant arm of right-handed participants was immobilized for 24 hours with a rigid splint fixed on the hand and an immobilization vest restraining the shoulder, arm, and forearm. The…

  17. 13 CFR 303.9 - Requirements for short-term Planning Investments.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

    2010-01-01

    ... Planning Investments. 303.9 Section 303.9 Business Credit and Assistance ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT ADMINISTRATION, DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE PLANNING INVESTMENTS AND COMPREHENSIVE ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT STRATEGIES § 303.9 Requirements for short-term Planning Investments. (a) In addition to providing support for CEDS...

  18. Intact short-term memory and impaired executive functions in obsessive compulsive disorder.

    PubMed

    Demeter, Gyula; Racsmány, Mihály; Csigó, Katalin; Harsányi, András; Németh, Attila; Döme, László

    2013-01-30

    Previous neuropsychological studies produced inconsistent results with tasks tapping short-term verbal and visual-spatial memory and executive functions in obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD). The aim of this study was to investigate the presence of deficits in these cognitive domains. A further goal was to describe the distribution of patients in different impairment ranges for all functions, and clarify the relationship between symptom severity and cognitive impairments. Thirty patients with OCD (DSM-IV) and 30 healthy volunteers were compared using well-known neuropsychological tasks. We assessed short-term verbal memory with the Digit Span Forward and Digit Span Backward Tasks, short-term visual-spatial memory with the Corsi Block Tapping Task, while we measured the level of executive functions with the StroopTask and the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST). Compared with a matched healthy control group, the performance of OCD patients was in the impaired range only in the two executive tasks. We find a significant positive correlations between the Y-BOCS (Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale) total scores and the number of perseverative responses (r(28) = 0.409, p < 0.05) and perseverative errors (r(28) = 0.385, p < 0.05) in the WCST. Our results gave evidence that executive functions are impaired while short-term memory is intact in OCD. This is in line with neuropsychological model of OCD that the deficit of cognitive and behavioral inhibition are responsible for the main cognitive findings of this disorder, most prevalently the deficit in set shifting and prepotent response inhibition.

  19. Enhanced long-term and impaired short-term spatial memory in GluA1 AMPA receptor subunit knockout mice: evidence for a dual-process memory model.

    PubMed

    Sanderson, David J; Good, Mark A; Skelton, Kathryn; Sprengel, Rolf; Seeburg, Peter H; Rawlins, J Nicholas P; Bannerman, David M

    2009-06-01

    The GluA1 AMPA receptor subunit is a key mediator of hippocampal synaptic plasticity and is especially important for a rapidly-induced, short-lasting form of potentiation. GluA1 gene deletion impairs hippocampus-dependent, spatial working memory, but spares hippocampus-dependent spatial reference memory. These findings may reflect the necessity of GluA1-dependent synaptic plasticity for short-term memory of recently visited places, but not for the ability to form long-term associations between a particular spatial location and an outcome. This hypothesis is in concordance with the theory that short-term and long-term memory depend on dissociable psychological processes. In this study we tested GluA1-/- mice on both short-term and long-term spatial memory using a simple novelty preference task. Mice were given a series of repeated exposures to a particular spatial location (the arm of a Y-maze) before their preference for a novel spatial location (the unvisited arm of the maze) over the familiar spatial location was assessed. GluA1-/- mice were impaired if the interval between the trials was short (1 min), but showed enhanced spatial memory if the interval between the trials was long (24 h). This enhancement was caused by the interval between the exposure trials rather than the interval prior to the test, thus demonstrating enhanced learning and not simply enhanced performance or expression of memory. This seemingly paradoxical enhancement of hippocampus-dependent spatial learning may be caused by GluA1 gene deletion reducing the detrimental effects of short-term memory on subsequent long-term learning. Thus, these results support a dual-process model of memory in which short-term and long-term memory are separate and sometimes competitive processes.

  20. Short-term effects of playing computer games on attention.

    PubMed

    Tahiroglu, Aysegul Yolga; Celik, Gonca Gul; Avci, Ayse; Seydaoglu, Gulsah; Uzel, Mehtap; Altunbas, Handan

    2010-05-01

    The main aim of the present study is to investigate the short-term cognitive effects of computer games in children with different psychiatric disorders and normal controls. One hundred one children are recruited for the study (aged between 9 and 12 years). All participants played a motor-racing game on the computer for 1 hour. The TBAG form of the Stroop task was administered to all participants twice, before playing and immediately after playing the game. Participants with improved posttest scores, compared to their pretest scores, used the computer on average 0.67 +/- 1.1 hr/day, while the average administered was measured at 1.6 +/- 1.4 hr/day and 1.3 +/- 0.9 hr/day computer use for participants with worse or unaltered scores, respectively. According to the regression model, male gender, younger ages, duration of daily computer use, and ADHD inattention type were found to be independent risk factors for worsened posttest scores. Time spent playing computer games can exert a short-term effect on attention as measured by the Stroop test.

  1. Executive function deficits in short-term abstinent cannabis users.

    PubMed

    McHale, Sue; Hunt, Nigel

    2008-07-01

    Few cognitive tasks are adequately sensitive to show the small decrements in performance in abstinent chronic cannabis users. In this series of three experiments we set out to demonstrate a variety of tasks that are sufficiently sensitive to show differences in visual memory, verbal memory, everyday memory and executive function between controls and cannabis users. A series of three studies explored cognitive function deficits in cannabis users (phonemic verbal fluency, visual recognition and immediate and delayed recall, and prospective memory) in short-term abstinent cannabis users. Participants were selected using snowball sampling, with cannabis users being compared to a standard control group and a tobacco-use control group. The cannabis users, compared to both control groups, had deficits on verbal fluency, visual recognition, delayed visual recall, and short- and long-interval prospective memory. There were no differences for immediate visual recall. These findings suggest that cannabis use leads to impaired executive function. Further research needs to explore the longer term impact of cannabis use. Copyright 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

  2. 40 CFR 63.2990 - Can I conduct short-term experimental production runs that cause parameters to deviate from...

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

    2011-07-01

    ... 40 Protection of Environment 12 2011-07-01 2009-07-01 true Can I conduct short-term experimental... I conduct short-term experimental production runs that cause parameters to deviate from operating limits? With the approval of the Administrator, you may conduct short-term experimental production runs...

  3. 40 CFR 63.2990 - Can I conduct short-term experimental production runs that cause parameters to deviate from...

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

    2010-07-01

    ... 40 Protection of Environment 12 2010-07-01 2010-07-01 true Can I conduct short-term experimental... I conduct short-term experimental production runs that cause parameters to deviate from operating limits? With the approval of the Administrator, you may conduct short-term experimental production runs...

  4. Impact of compliance to oral hypoglycemic agents on short-term disability costs in an employer population.

    PubMed

    Hagen, Susan E; Wright, Douglas W; Finch, Ron; Talamonti, Walter J; Edington, Dee W

    2014-02-01

    This study evaluated the relationships between compliance with oral hypoglycemic agents and health care/short-term disability costs in a large manufacturing company. The retrospective analysis used an observational cohort drawn from active employees of Ford Motor Company. The study population consisted of 4978 individuals who were continuously eligible for 3 years (between 2001-2007) and who received a prescription for an oral hypoglycemic agent during that time. Medical, pharmacy, and short-term disability claims data were obtained from the University of Michigan Health Management Research Center data warehouse. Pharmacy claims/refill data were used to calculate the proportion of days covered (PDC); an individual was classified as compliant if his/her PDC was ≥80%. Model covariates included age, sex, work type, and Charlson comorbidity scores. The impact of compliance on disability and health care costs was measured by comparing the costs of the compliant with those of the noncompliant during a 1-year follow-up. Among these employees, compliant patients had lower medical, higher pharmacy, and lower short-term disability costs than did the noncompliant. After adjusting for demographics and comorbidity, noncompliance was associated with statistically higher short-term disability costs ($1840 vs. $1161, P<0.0001), longer short-term disability duration, and an increase in short-term disability incidence (21.5% of the noncompliant had a claim compared to 16.0% of the compliant, P<0.0001). These results suggest that medication compliance may be important in curtailing the rise of health care/disability costs in the workplace. Employers concerned with the total costs associated with diabetes should not overlook the impact of compliance on short-term disability.

  5. False memory for face in short-term memory and neural activity in human amygdala.

    PubMed

    Iidaka, Tetsuya; Harada, Tokiko; Sadato, Norihiro

    2014-12-03

    Human memory is often inaccurate. Similar to words and figures, new faces are often recognized as seen or studied items in long- and short-term memory tests; however, the neural mechanisms underlying this false memory remain elusive. In a previous fMRI study using morphed faces and a standard false memory paradigm, we found that there was a U-shaped response curve of the amygdala to old, new, and lure items. This indicates that the amygdala is more active in response to items that are salient (hit and correct rejection) compared to items that are less salient (false alarm), in terms of memory retrieval. In the present fMRI study, we determined whether the false memory for faces occurs within the short-term memory range (a few seconds), and assessed which neural correlates are involved in veridical and illusory memories. Nineteen healthy participants were scanned by 3T MRI during a short-term memory task using morphed faces. The behavioral results indicated that the occurrence of false memories was within the short-term range. We found that the amygdala displayed a U-shaped response curve to memory items, similar to those observed in our previous study. These results suggest that the amygdala plays a common role in both long- and short-term false memory for faces. We made the following conclusions: First, the amygdala is involved in detecting the saliency of items, in addition to fear, and supports goal-oriented behavior by modulating memory. Second, amygdala activity and response time might be related with a subject's response criterion for similar faces. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

  6. Cost-effectiveness of short-term neurosurgical missions relative to other surgical specialties

    PubMed Central

    Punchak, Maria; Lazareff, Jorge A.

    2017-01-01

    Background: Short-term surgical relief efforts have helped close some gaps in the provision of surgical care in remote settings. We reviewed the published literature on short-term surgical missions to compare their cost-effectiveness across subspecialties. Methods: PubMed was searched using the algorithm [“cost-effectiveness” AND “surgery” AND (“mission” OR “volunteer”)]. Articles detailing the cost-effectiveness of short-term surgical missions in low and middle-income countries (LMIC) were included. Only direct mission costs were considered, and all costs were converted into 2014 USD. Results: Eight articles, representing 27 missions in 9 LMIC countries during 2006–2014, met our inclusion criteria. Latin America was the most frequently visited region. Per capita costs ranged from $259 for cleft lip/cleft palate (CL/CP) missions to $2900 for a neurosurgery mission. Mission effectiveness ranged from 3 disability adjusted life years (DALYs) averted per patient for orthopedic surgery missions to 8.12 DALYs averted per patient for a neurosurgery mission. CL/CP and general surgery missions were the most cost-effective, averaging $80/DALY and $87/DALY, respectively. The neurosurgical, orthopedic, and hand surgery missions averaged the highest costs/DALY averted, with the cost-effectiveness being $357/DALY, $435/DALY, and $445/DALY, respectively. All analyzed missions were very cost effective. Conclusion: To date, this is the first study to assess the cost-effectiveness of short-term surgical missions across surgical specialties. Neurosurgical missions avert the largest number of healthy life years compared to other specialties, and thus, could yield a greater long-term benefit to resource-poor communities. We recommend that further studies be carried out to assess the impact of surgical missions in low-resource settings. PMID:28458951

  7. Short-term effect of short, intensive speech therapy on articulation and resonance in Ugandan patients with cleft (lip and) palate.

    PubMed

    Luyten, A; Bettens, K; D'haeseleer, E; Hodges, A; Galiwango, G; Vermeersch, H; Van Lierde, K

    2016-01-01

    The purpose of the current study was to assess the short-term effectiveness of short and intensive speech therapy provided to patients with cleft (lip and) palate (C(L)P) in terms of articulation and resonance. Five Ugandan patients (age: 7.3-19.6 years) with non-syndromic C(L)P received six hours of individualized speech therapy in three to four days. Speech therapy focused on correct phonetic placement and contrasts between oral and nasal airflow and resonance. Speech evaluations performed before and immediately after speech therapy, including perceptual and instrumental assessment techniques, were compared. Post-therapy, improvement of speech was noted for most of the patients, although to varying degrees. Clinically relevant progress of objective nasalance values and/or articulation was obtained in four patients. Overall, two patients showed normal speech intelligibility, while three patients required additional speech therapy. These preliminary short-term results demonstrate that short and intensive speech therapy can be effective for patients with C(L)P in countries with limited access to speech-language therapy. However, further research is needed on the long-term effectiveness and the advantages of applying this treatment protocol in countries with good access to speech therapy. The reader will be able to (1) list the challenges in resource poor-countries to achieve access to speech-language therapy services, (2) describe when the application of speech therapy is appropriate in patients with C(L)P, (3) describe the speech therapy that can be applied to reduce compensatory articulation and resonance disorders in patients with C(L)P, and (4) list the (possible) advantages of short, intensive speech therapy for both resource-poor and developed countries. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  8. An Accurate Link Correlation Estimator for Improving Wireless Protocol Performance

    PubMed Central

    Zhao, Zhiwei; Xu, Xianghua; Dong, Wei; Bu, Jiajun

    2015-01-01

    Wireless link correlation has shown significant impact on the performance of various sensor network protocols. Many works have been devoted to exploiting link correlation for protocol improvements. However, the effectiveness of these designs heavily relies on the accuracy of link correlation measurement. In this paper, we investigate state-of-the-art link correlation measurement and analyze the limitations of existing works. We then propose a novel lightweight and accurate link correlation estimation (LACE) approach based on the reasoning of link correlation formation. LACE combines both long-term and short-term link behaviors for link correlation estimation. We implement LACE as a stand-alone interface in TinyOS and incorporate it into both routing and flooding protocols. Simulation and testbed results show that LACE: (1) achieves more accurate and lightweight link correlation measurements than the state-of-the-art work; and (2) greatly improves the performance of protocols exploiting link correlation. PMID:25686314

  9. Predictors for mechanical ventilation and short-term prognosis in patients with Guillain-Barré syndrome.

    PubMed

    Wu, Xiujuan; Li, Chunrong; Zhang, Bing; Shen, Donghui; Li, Ting; Liu, Kangding; Zhang, Hong-Liang

    2015-09-02

    Guillain-Barré syndrome (GBS) is an immune-mediated disorder of the peripheral nervous system. Respiratory failure requiring mechanical ventilation (MV) is a serious complication of GBS. Identification of modifiable risk factors for MV and poor short-term prognosis in mechanically ventilated patients with GBS may contribute to the individualized management and may help improve the outcome of the patients. We retrospectively analyzed the clinical data of 541 patients who were diagnosed with GBS from 2003 to 2014. Independent predictors for MV and short-term prognosis in mechanically ventilated patients were identified via multivariate logistic regression analysis. The mean age was 41.6 years with a male predilection (61.2%). Eighty patients (14.8%) required MV. Multivariate analysis revealed that shorter interval from onset to admission (p < 0.05), facial nerve palsy (p < 0.01), glossopharyngeal and vagal nerve deficits (p < 0.01) and lower Medical Research Council (MRC) sum score at nadir (p < 0.01) were risk factors for MV; disease occurrence in summer (p < 0.01) was a protective factor. As to prognostic factors, absence of antecedent infections (p < 0.01) and lower MRC sum score at nadir (p < 0.01) were predictors of poor short-term prognosis in mechanically ventilated patients regardless of treatment modality. We further investigated the predictors of poor short-term prognosis in patients requiring MV with different nadir MRC sum scores. Combined use of intravenous corticosteroids with intravenous immunoglobulin (odds ratio 10.200, 95% confidence interval 1.068-97.407, p < 0.05) was an independent predictor of poor short-term prognosis in mechanically ventilated patients with a nadir MRC sum score from 0 to 12 points, regardless of existence of antecedent infection. Clinical predictors of MV and poor short-term prognosis in mechanically ventilated GBS patients were distinct. Add-on use of intravenous corticosteroids was a risk factor for poor short-term

  10. The role of long-term familiarity and attentional maintenance in short-term memory for timbre.

    PubMed

    Siedenburg, Kai; McAdams, Stephen

    2017-04-01

    We study short-term recognition of timbre using familiar recorded tones from acoustic instruments and unfamiliar transformed tones that do not readily evoke sound-source categories. Participants indicated whether the timbre of a probe sound matched with one of three previously presented sounds (item recognition). In Exp. 1, musicians better recognised familiar acoustic compared to unfamiliar synthetic sounds, and this advantage was particularly large in the medial serial position. There was a strong correlation between correct rejection rate and the mean perceptual dissimilarity of the probe to the tones from the sequence. Exp. 2 compared musicians' and non-musicians' performance with concurrent articulatory suppression, visual interference, and with a silent control condition. Both suppression tasks disrupted performance by a similar margin, regardless of musical training of participants or type of sounds. Our results suggest that familiarity with sound source categories and attention play important roles in short-term memory for timbre, which rules out accounts solely based on sensory persistence.

  11. Multidimensional poverty, household environment and short-term morbidity in India.

    PubMed

    Dehury, Bidyadhar; Mohanty, Sanjay K

    2017-01-01

    Using the unit data from the second round of the Indian Human Development Survey (IHDS-II), 2011-2012, which covered 42,152 households, this paper examines the association between multidimensional poverty, household environmental deprivation and short-term morbidities (fever, cough and diarrhoea) in India. Poverty is measured in a multidimensional framework that includes the dimensions of education, health and income, while household environmental deprivation is defined as lack of access to improved sanitation, drinking water and cooking fuel. A composite index combining multidimensional poverty and household environmental deprivation has been computed, and households are classified as follows: multidimensional poor and living in a poor household environment, multidimensional non-poor and living in a poor household environment, multidimensional poor and living in a good household environment and multidimensional non-poor and living in a good household environment. Results suggest that about 23% of the population belonging to multidimensional poor households and living in a poor household environment had experienced short-term morbidities in a reference period of 30 days compared to 20% of the population belonging to multidimensional non-poor households and living in a poor household environment, 19% of the population belonging to multidimensional poor households and living in a good household environment and 15% of the population belonging to multidimensional non-poor households and living in a good household environment. Controlling for socioeconomic covariates, the odds of short-term morbidity was 1.47 [CI 1.40-1.53] among the multidimensional poor and living in a poor household environment, 1.28 [CI 1.21-1.37] among the multidimensional non-poor and living in a poor household environment and 1.21 [CI 1.64-1.28] among the multidimensional poor and living in a good household environment compared to the multidimensional non-poor and living in a good household

  12. Impact of recipient body mass index on short-term and long-term survival of pancreatic grafts.

    PubMed

    Bédat, Benoît; Niclauss, Nadja; Jannot, Anne-Sophie; Andres, Axel; Toso, Christian; Morel, Philippe; Berney, Thierry

    2015-01-01

    The impact of recipient body mass index on graft and patient survival after pancreas transplantation is not well known. We have analyzed data from all pancreas transplant recipients reported in the Scientific Registry of Transplant Recipients between 1987 and 2011. Recipients were categorized into BMI classes, as defined by the World Health Organization. Short-term (90 days) and long-term (90 days to 5 years) patient and graft survivals were analyzed according to recipient BMI class using Kaplan-Meier estimates. Hazard ratios were estimated using Cox proportional hazard models. A total of 21,075 adult recipients were included in the analysis. Mean follow-up was 5 ± 1.1 years. Subjects were overweight or obese in 39%. Increasing recipient BMI was an independent predictor of pancreatic graft loss and patient death in the short term (P<0.001), especially for obese class II patient survival (hazard ratio, 2.07; P=0.009). In the long term, obesity, but not overweight, was associated with higher risk of graft failure (P=0.01). Underweight was associated with a higher risk of long-term death (P<0.001). These results question the safety of pancreas transplantation in obese patients and suggest that they may be directed to alternate therapies, such as behavioral modifications or bariatric surgery, before pancreas transplantation is considered.

  13. Proactive Interference in Short-Term Recognition and Recall Memory

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Dillon, Richard F.; Petrusic, William M.

    1972-01-01

    Purpose of study was to (a) compare the rate of increase of proactive interference over the first few trials under recall and recognition memory test conditions, (2) determine the effects of two types of distractors on short-term recognition, and (3) test memory after proactive interference had reached a stable level under each of three test…

  14. A DAPHNIA MAGNA SHORT-TERM SURVIVAL AND GROWTH TEST

    EPA Science Inventory

    With the change in acceptable test temperatures for invertebrate toxicity tests from <20oC to 25oC, it is now possible to use Daphnia magna for short-term chronic testing. When cultured at 25oC the dry weight of <24 hr old D. magna ranges from 7 to 15 g depending upon nutrition,...

  15. Short-Term Effects of Playing Computer Games on Attention

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Tahiroglu, Aysegul Yolga; Celik, Gonca Gul; Avci, Ayse; Seydaoglu, Gulsah; Uzel, Mehtap; Altunbas, Handan

    2010-01-01

    Objective: The main aim of the present study is to investigate the short-term cognitive effects of computer games in children with different psychiatric disorders and normal controls. Method: One hundred one children are recruited for the study (aged between 9 and 12 years). All participants played a motor-racing game on the computer for 1 hour.…

  16. Short-Term Memory, Executive Control, and Children's Route Learning

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Purser, Harry R. M.; Farran, Emily K.; Courbois, Yannick; Lemahieu, Axelle; Mellier, Daniel; Sockeel, Pascal; Blades, Mark

    2012-01-01

    The aim of this study was to investigate route-learning ability in 67 children aged 5 to 11 years and to relate route-learning performance to the components of Baddeley's model of working memory. Children carried out tasks that included measures of verbal and visuospatial short-term memory and executive control and also measures of verbal and…

  17. A Short Term Real Time Study in Syntactic Change.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Duarte, Maria Eugenia Lamoglia

    Recent research has shown that Brazilian Portuguese is undergoing a change regarding the null subject parameter, evolving from a null subject to a non-null subject language. This paper presents the results of a short term, real time study of speakers of Brazilian Portuguese with low and mid levels of formal education. The study was based on…

  18. Impact of Spatial and Verbal Short-Term Memory Load on Auditory Spatial Attention Gradients.

    PubMed

    Golob, Edward J; Winston, Jenna; Mock, Jeffrey R

    2017-01-01

    Short-term memory load can impair attentional control, but prior work shows that the extent of the effect ranges from being very general to very specific. One factor for the mixed results may be reliance on point estimates of memory load effects on attention. Here we used auditory attention gradients as an analog measure to map-out the impact of short-term memory load over space. Verbal or spatial information was maintained during an auditory spatial attention task and compared to no-load. Stimuli were presented from five virtual locations in the frontal azimuth plane, and subjects focused on the midline. Reaction times progressively increased for lateral stimuli, indicating an attention gradient. Spatial load further slowed responses at lateral locations, particularly in the left hemispace, but had little effect at midline. Verbal memory load had no (Experiment 1), or a minimal (Experiment 2) influence on reaction times. Spatial and verbal load increased switch costs between memory encoding and attention tasks relative to the no load condition. The findings show that short-term memory influences the distribution of auditory attention over space; and that the specific pattern depends on the type of information in short-term memory.

  19. Impact of Spatial and Verbal Short-Term Memory Load on Auditory Spatial Attention Gradients

    PubMed Central

    Golob, Edward J.; Winston, Jenna; Mock, Jeffrey R.

    2017-01-01

    Short-term memory load can impair attentional control, but prior work shows that the extent of the effect ranges from being very general to very specific. One factor for the mixed results may be reliance on point estimates of memory load effects on attention. Here we used auditory attention gradients as an analog measure to map-out the impact of short-term memory load over space. Verbal or spatial information was maintained during an auditory spatial attention task and compared to no-load. Stimuli were presented from five virtual locations in the frontal azimuth plane, and subjects focused on the midline. Reaction times progressively increased for lateral stimuli, indicating an attention gradient. Spatial load further slowed responses at lateral locations, particularly in the left hemispace, but had little effect at midline. Verbal memory load had no (Experiment 1), or a minimal (Experiment 2) influence on reaction times. Spatial and verbal load increased switch costs between memory encoding and attention tasks relative to the no load condition. The findings show that short-term memory influences the distribution of auditory attention over space; and that the specific pattern depends on the type of information in short-term memory. PMID:29218024

  20. Short-term lending: Payday loans as risk factors for anxiety, inflammation and poor health.

    PubMed

    Sweet, Elizabeth; Kuzawa, Christopher W; McDade, Thomas W

    2018-08-01

    While research now consistently links consumer financial debt with adverse emotional health outcomes, specific forms of debt and their impact on measures of physical health are underexplored. This gap in knowledge is significant because different forms of loans and debt may have different experiential qualities. In this paper, we focus on a type of unsecured debt - short-term/payday loan borrowing - that has risen dramatically in recent decades in the United States and is characterized by predatory, discriminatory, and poorly regulated lending practices. Using data from a study of debt and health among adults in Boston, MA (n=286), we test whether short-term borrowing is associated with a range of emotional and physical health indicators. We find that short-term loans are associated with higher body mass index, waist circumference, C-reactive protein levels, and self-reported symptoms of physical health, sexual health, and anxiety, after controlling for several socio-demographic covariates. We discuss these findings within the contexts of regulatory shortcomings, psychosocial stress, and racial and economic credit disparities. We suggest that within the broader context of financial debt and health, short-term loans should be considered a specific risk to population health.

  1. The relationship between vocabulary and short-term memory measures in monolingual and bilingual speakers

    PubMed Central

    Kaushanskaya, Margarita; Blumenfeld, Henrike K.; Marian, Viorica

    2012-01-01

    Previous studies have indicated that bilingualism may influence the efficiency of lexical access in adults. The goals of this research were (1) to compare bilingual and monolingual adults on their native-language vocabulary performance, and (2) to examine the relationship between short-term memory skills and vocabulary performance in monolinguals and bilinguals. In Experiment 1, English-speaking monolingual adults and simultaneous English–Spanish bilingual adults were administered measures of receptive English vocabulary and of phonological short-term memory. In Experiment 2, monolingual adults were compared to sequential English–Spanish bilinguals, and were administered the same measures as in Experiment 1, as well as a measure of expressive English vocabulary. Analyses revealed comparable levels of performance on the vocabulary and the short-term memory measures in the monolingual and the bilingual groups across both experiments. There was a stronger effect of digit-span in the bilingual group than in the monolingual group, with high-span bilinguals outperforming low-span bilinguals on vocabulary measures. Findings indicate that bilingual speakers may rely on short-term memory resources to support word retrieval in their native language more than monolingual speakers. PMID:22518091

  2. How Emotional Pictures Influence Visuospatial Binding in Short-Term Memory in Ageing and Alzheimer's Disease?

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Borg, Celine; Leroy, Nicolas; Favre, Emilie; Laurent, Bernard; Thomas-Anterion, Catherine

    2011-01-01

    The present study examines the prediction that emotion can facilitate short-term memory. Nevertheless, emotion also recruits attention to process information, thereby disrupting short-term memory when tasks involve high attentional resources. In this way, we aimed to determine whether there is a differential influence of emotional information on…

  3. Short-Term Memory for Order but Not for Item Information Is Impaired in Developmental Dyslexia

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Hachmann, Wibke M.; Bogaerts, Louisa; Szmalec, Arnaud; Woumans, Evy; Duyck, Wouter; Job, Remo

    2014-01-01

    Recent findings suggest that people with dyslexia experience difficulties with the learning of serial order information during the transition from short-to long-term memory (Szmalec et al. "Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition" 37(5): 1270-1279, 2011). At the same time, models of short-term memory…

  4. Short-Term Plasticity and Long-Term Potentiation in Magnetic Tunnel Junctions: Towards Volatile Synapses

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Sengupta, Abhronil; Roy, Kaushik

    2016-02-01

    Synaptic memory is considered to be the main element responsible for learning and cognition in humans. Although traditionally nonvolatile long-term plasticity changes are implemented in nanoelectronic synapses for neuromorphic applications, recent studies in neuroscience reveal that biological synapses undergo metastable volatile strengthening followed by a long-term strengthening provided that the frequency of the input stimulus is sufficiently high. Such "memory strengthening" and "memory decay" functionalities can potentially lead to adaptive neuromorphic architectures. In this paper, we demonstrate the close resemblance of the magnetization dynamics of a magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ) to short-term plasticity and long-term potentiation observed in biological synapses. We illustrate that, in addition to the magnitude and duration of the input stimulus, the frequency of the stimulus plays a critical role in determining long-term potentiation of the MTJ. Such MTJ synaptic memory arrays can be utilized to create compact, ultrafast, and low-power intelligent neural systems.

  5. Foraging under conditions of short-term exploitative competition: the case of stock traders

    PubMed Central

    Saavedra, Serguei; Malmgren, R. Dean; Switanek, Nicholas; Uzzi, Brian

    2013-01-01

    Theory purports that animal foraging choices evolve to maximize returns, such as net energy intake. Empirical research in both human and non-human animals reveals that individuals often attend to the foraging choices of their competitors while making their own foraging choices. Owing to the complications of gathering field data or constructing experiments, however, broad facts relating theoretically optimal and empirically realized foraging choices are only now emerging. Here, we analyse foraging choices of a cohort of professional day traders who must choose between trading the same stock multiple times in a row—patch exploitation—or switching to a different stock—patch exploration—with potentially higher returns. We measure the difference between a trader's resource intake and the competitors' expected intake within a short period of time—a difference we call short-term comparative returns. We find that traders' choices can be explained by foraging heuristics that maximize their daily short-term comparative returns. However, we find no one-best relationship between different trading choices and net income intake. This suggests that traders' choices can be short-term win oriented and, paradoxically, maybe maladaptive for absolute market returns. PMID:23363635

  6. Foraging under conditions of short-term exploitative competition: the case of stock traders.

    PubMed

    Saavedra, Serguei; Malmgren, R Dean; Switanek, Nicholas; Uzzi, Brian

    2013-03-22

    Theory purports that animal foraging choices evolve to maximize returns, such as net energy intake. Empirical research in both human and non-human animals reveals that individuals often attend to the foraging choices of their competitors while making their own foraging choices. Owing to the complications of gathering field data or constructing experiments, however, broad facts relating theoretically optimal and empirically realized foraging choices are only now emerging. Here, we analyse foraging choices of a cohort of professional day traders who must choose between trading the same stock multiple times in a row--patch exploitation--or switching to a different stock--patch exploration--with potentially higher returns. We measure the difference between a trader's resource intake and the competitors' expected intake within a short period of time--a difference we call short-term comparative returns. We find that traders' choices can be explained by foraging heuristics that maximize their daily short-term comparative returns. However, we find no one-best relationship between different trading choices and net income intake. This suggests that traders' choices can be short-term win oriented and, paradoxically, maybe maladaptive for absolute market returns.

  7. Randomized comparison of postoperative short-term and mid-term complications between T-tube and primary closure after CBD exploration.

    PubMed

    Muzaffar, Iqbal; Zula, Pai; Yimit, Yusp; Jaan, Ajim Tuergan; Wen, Hao

    2014-11-01

    To compare the postoperative short-term and mid-term complications in patients who underwent CBD exploration and closure by using T-tube or primary closure. Prospective randomized clinical trial. Hepatobiliary Department of First Affiliated Hospital of Xinjiang Medical University, Urumqi, China, from August 2009 to March 2013. A total of 148 consecutive patients with Common Bile Duct Stones (CBDS) and CBD dilation were enrolled in this randomized study to undergo open cholecystectomy with CBD exploration. Pre-operative findings, postoperative short-term complications, postoperative follow-up (mid-term), and hospital stay were recorded and analyzed. A T-tube was inserted in 76 (51.35%) patients and the primary closure was done in 72 (48.64%) patients. There were no differences in the demographic characteristics and clinical presentations between the two groups. Compared with the T-tube group 8.97 ± 1.629 days, the postoperative stay in primary closure 5.34 ± 1.25 days was significantly shorter (p < 0.01). The incidence of overall postoperative short-term complications and mid-term complications were statistically but not significantly lower in the primary closure group (9.7%) than that in T-tube group (17.10%, p=0.189). Complications in the primary closure group were lower than that in T-tube group but there was no significant statistical difference. So during open surgery for CBD stones, primary closure of CBD appeared safe and effective with shorter hospital stays and less complications.

  8. Transmodal comparison of auditory, motor, and visual post-processing with and without intentional short-term memory maintenance.

    PubMed

    Bender, Stephan; Behringer, Stephanie; Freitag, Christine M; Resch, Franz; Weisbrod, Matthias

    2010-12-01

    To elucidate the contributions of modality-dependent post-processing in auditory, motor and visual cortical areas to short-term memory. We compared late negative waves (N700) during the post-processing of single lateralized stimuli which were separated by long intertrial intervals across the auditory, motor and visual modalities. Tasks either required or competed with attention to post-processing of preceding events, i.e. active short-term memory maintenance. N700 indicated that cortical post-processing exceeded short movements as well as short auditory or visual stimuli for over half a second without intentional short-term memory maintenance. Modality-specific topographies pointed towards sensory (respectively motor) generators with comparable time-courses across the different modalities. Lateralization and amplitude of auditory/motor/visual N700 were enhanced by active short-term memory maintenance compared to attention to current perceptions or passive stimulation. The memory-related N700 increase followed the characteristic time-course and modality-specific topography of the N700 without intentional memory-maintenance. Memory-maintenance-related lateralized negative potentials may be related to a less lateralised modality-dependent post-processing N700 component which occurs also without intentional memory maintenance (automatic memory trace or effortless attraction of attention). Encoding to short-term memory may involve controlled attention to modality-dependent post-processing. Similar short-term memory processes may exist in the auditory, motor and visual systems. Copyright © 2010 International Federation of Clinical Neurophysiology. Published by Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

  9. 14 CFR 1214.809 - Short-term call-up and accelerated launch.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

    2011-01-01

    ... short-term call-up and accelerated launch provisions of the Shuttle policy normally are not offered to Spacelab customers. NASA will negotiate any such customer requirements on an individual basis. ...

  10. 14 CFR 1214.809 - Short-term call-up and accelerated launch.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

    2013-01-01

    ... short-term call-up and accelerated launch provisions of the Shuttle policy normally are not offered to Spacelab customers. NASA will negotiate any such customer requirements on an individual basis. ...

  11. 14 CFR 1214.809 - Short-term call-up and accelerated launch.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

    2012-01-01

    ... short-term call-up and accelerated launch provisions of the Shuttle policy normally are not offered to Spacelab customers. NASA will negotiate any such customer requirements on an individual basis. ...

  12. 14 CFR 1214.809 - Short-term call-up and accelerated launch.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

    2010-01-01

    ... short-term call-up and accelerated launch provisions of the Shuttle policy normally are not offered to Spacelab customers. NASA will negotiate any such customer requirements on an individual basis. ...

  13. Long-Term Impairment of Sound Processing in the Auditory Midbrain by Daily Short-Term Exposure to Moderate Noise.

    PubMed

    Cheng, Liang; Wang, Shao-Hui; Peng, Kang; Liao, Xiao-Mei

    2017-01-01

    Most citizen people are exposed daily to environmental noise at moderate levels with a short duration. The aim of the present study was to determine the effects of daily short-term exposure to moderate noise on sound level processing in the auditory midbrain. Sound processing properties of auditory midbrain neurons were recorded in anesthetized mice exposed to moderate noise (80 dB SPL, 2 h/d for 6 weeks) and were compared with those from age-matched controls. Neurons in exposed mice had a higher minimum threshold and maximum response intensity, a longer first spike latency, and a higher slope and narrower dynamic range for rate level function. However, these observed changes were greater in neurons with the best frequency within the noise exposure frequency range compared with those outside the frequency range. These sound processing properties also remained abnormal after a 12-week period of recovery in a quiet laboratory environment after completion of noise exposure. In conclusion, even daily short-term exposure to moderate noise can cause long-term impairment of sound level processing in a frequency-specific manner in auditory midbrain neurons.

  14. Long-Term Impairment of Sound Processing in the Auditory Midbrain by Daily Short-Term Exposure to Moderate Noise

    PubMed Central

    Cheng, Liang; Wang, Shao-Hui; Peng, Kang

    2017-01-01

    Most citizen people are exposed daily to environmental noise at moderate levels with a short duration. The aim of the present study was to determine the effects of daily short-term exposure to moderate noise on sound level processing in the auditory midbrain. Sound processing properties of auditory midbrain neurons were recorded in anesthetized mice exposed to moderate noise (80 dB SPL, 2 h/d for 6 weeks) and were compared with those from age-matched controls. Neurons in exposed mice had a higher minimum threshold and maximum response intensity, a longer first spike latency, and a higher slope and narrower dynamic range for rate level function. However, these observed changes were greater in neurons with the best frequency within the noise exposure frequency range compared with those outside the frequency range. These sound processing properties also remained abnormal after a 12-week period of recovery in a quiet laboratory environment after completion of noise exposure. In conclusion, even daily short-term exposure to moderate noise can cause long-term impairment of sound level processing in a frequency-specific manner in auditory midbrain neurons. PMID:28589040

  15. Feasibility of bridge structural health monitoring using short term data acquisition system.

    DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

    2015-01-01

    Long-term testing of bridges can expensive and result in a large amount of data that is dicult to manage and : analyze. The purpose of this study was to investigate the feasibility of a short-term data acquisition system that : used a minimal numb...

  16. Short-term variability in biomarkers of bone metabolism in sheep.

    PubMed

    Sousa, Cristina P; de Azevedo, Jorge T; Reis, Rui L; Gomes, Manuela E; Dias, Isabel R

    2014-01-01

    Changes in bone remodeling during pathological states and during their treatment can be assessed noninvasively by measuring biomarkers of bone metabolism. Their application is limited, however, by the potential biological variability in the levels of these biomarkers over time. To determine the short-term variability in biomarkers of bone metabolism in adult sheep, the authors measured serum levels of alkaline phosphatase (ALP), bone-specific alkaline phosphatase (BALP), osteocalcin (OC), N-terminal propeptide of type-III procollagen (PIIINP), deoxypyridinoline (DPD), tartrate-resistant acid phosphatase (TRAP), calcium and phosphorus intermittently over a 12-week period. There were significant differences in mean ALP activity and in phosphorus concentrations over time, but all other biomarkers showed no significant short-term variability. The results suggest that biomarkers of bone metabolism in sheep, especially the bone resorption marker DPD and the bone formation marker BALP, can be used reliably to detect changes in bone cellular activity.

  17. Statistical Models for Tornado Climatology: Long and Short-Term Views.

    PubMed

    Elsner, James B; Jagger, Thomas H; Fricker, Tyler

    2016-01-01

    This paper estimates regional tornado risk from records of past events using statistical models. First, a spatial model is fit to the tornado counts aggregated in counties with terms that control for changes in observational practices over time. Results provide a long-term view of risk that delineates the main tornado corridors in the United States where the expected annual rate exceeds two tornadoes per 10,000 square km. A few counties in the Texas Panhandle and central Kansas have annual rates that exceed four tornadoes per 10,000 square km. Refitting the model after removing the least damaging tornadoes from the data (EF0) produces a similar map but with the greatest tornado risk shifted south and eastward. Second, a space-time model is fit to the counts aggregated in raster cells with terms that control for changes in climate factors. Results provide a short-term view of risk. The short-term view identifies a shift of tornado activity away from the Ohio Valley under El Niño conditions and away from the Southeast under positive North Atlantic oscillation conditions. The combined predictor effects on the local rates is quantified by fitting the model after leaving out the year to be predicted from the data. The models provide state-of-the-art views of tornado risk that can be used by government agencies, the insurance industry, and the general public.

  18. Statistical Models for Tornado Climatology: Long and Short-Term Views

    PubMed Central

    Jagger, Thomas H.; Fricker, Tyler

    2016-01-01

    This paper estimates regional tornado risk from records of past events using statistical models. First, a spatial model is fit to the tornado counts aggregated in counties with terms that control for changes in observational practices over time. Results provide a long-term view of risk that delineates the main tornado corridors in the United States where the expected annual rate exceeds two tornadoes per 10,000 square km. A few counties in the Texas Panhandle and central Kansas have annual rates that exceed four tornadoes per 10,000 square km. Refitting the model after removing the least damaging tornadoes from the data (EF0) produces a similar map but with the greatest tornado risk shifted south and eastward. Second, a space-time model is fit to the counts aggregated in raster cells with terms that control for changes in climate factors. Results provide a short-term view of risk. The short-term view identifies a shift of tornado activity away from the Ohio Valley under El Niño conditions and away from the Southeast under positive North Atlantic oscillation conditions. The combined predictor effects on the local rates is quantified by fitting the model after leaving out the year to be predicted from the data. The models provide state-of-the-art views of tornado risk that can be used by government agencies, the insurance industry, and the general public. PMID:27875581

  19. 40 CFR 63.2990 - Can I conduct short-term experimental production runs that cause parameters to deviate from...

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

    2013-07-01

    ... 40 Protection of Environment 13 2013-07-01 2012-07-01 true Can I conduct short-term experimental... Plan § 63.2990 Can I conduct short-term experimental production runs that cause parameters to deviate from operating limits? With the approval of the Administrator, you may conduct short-term experimental...

  20. Low-Energy Tunable Self-Modulated Nanolasers (1.1 SHORT-TERM INNOVATIVE RESEARCH (STIR) PROGRAM)

    DTIC Science & Technology

    2016-09-28

    Optoelectronics: Low -Energy Tunable Self- Modulated Nanolasers (1.1 SHORT-TERM INNOVATIVE RESEARCH (STIR) PROGRAM) Our goal was to exploit Quantum...reviewed journals: Final Report: Optoelectronics: Low -Energy Tunable Self-Modulated Nanolasers (1.1 SHORT-TERM INNOVATIVE RESEARCH (STIR) PROGRAM...metal layer. By optimizing the thickness of the low index shield between the metal and semiconductor, the gain threshold of the laser can be