The Role of Solar Wind Hydrogen in Space Weathering: Insights from Laboratory-Irradiated Northwest Africa 12008

Micrometeoroid impacts, solar wind plasma interactions, and regolith gardening drive the complicated and nuanced mechanism of space weathering (or optical maturation); a process by which a materials optical properties are changed as a result of chemical and physical alterations at the surface of grains on airless bodies. Reddened slopes, attenuated absorption bands, and an overall reduction in albedo in the visible and near-IR wavelength ranges are primarily the result of native iron nanoparticle (npFe0) production within glassy rims that form from sputtering and vaporization. The sizes and abundance of these particles provide information about the relative surface exposure age of a particular grain. In addition, many studies have indicated that composition greatly affects the rate at which optical maturation occurs. Despite our understanding of how npFe0 affects optical signatures, the relative roles of micrometeoroid bombardment and solar wind interactions remains undetermined. To simulate the early effects of weathering by the solar wind and to determine thresholds for optical change with respect to a given mineral phase, we irradiated a fine-grained lunar basalt with 1 keV H+ to a fluence of 6.4 x 1016 H+ per sq.cm. Surface alterations within four phases have been evaluated using transmission electron microscopy (TEM). We found that for a given fluence of H+, the extent of damage acquired by each grain was dependent on its composition. No npFe(0) was produced in any of the phases evaluated in this study. These results are consistent with many previous studies conducted using ions of similar energy, but they also provide valuable information about the onset of space weathering and the role of the solar wind during the early stages of optical maturation

Considering the role of cognitive control in expert performance

© 2014, Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht. Dreyfus and Dreyfus’ (1986) influential phenomenological analysis of skill acquisition proposes that expert performance is guided by non-cognitive responses which are fast, effortless and apparently intuitive in nature. Although this model has been criticised (e.g., by Breivik Journal of Philosophy of Sport, 34, 116–134 2007, Journal of the Philosophy of Sport, 40, 85–106 2013; Eriksen 2010; Montero Inquiry:An interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy, 53, 105–122 2010; Montero and Evans 2011) for over-emphasising the role that intuition plays in facilitating skilled performance, it does recognise that on occasions (e.g., when performance goes awry for some reason) a form of ‘detached deliberative rationality’ may be used by experts to improve their performance. However, Dreyfus and Dreyfus (1986) see no role for calculative problem solving or deliberation (i.e., drawing on rules or mental representations) when performance is going well. In the current paper, we draw on empirical evidence, insights from athletes, and phenomenological description to argue that ‘continuous improvement’ (i.e., the phenomenon whereby certain skilled performers appear to be capable of increasing their proficiency even though they are already experts; Toner and Moran 2014) among experts is mediated by cognitive (or executive) control in three distinct sporting situations (i.e., in training, during pre-performance routines, and while engaged in on-line skill execution). We conclude by arguing that Sutton et al. Journal of the British Society for Phenomenology, 42, 78–103 (2011) ‘applying intelligence to the reflexes’ (AIR) approach may help to elucidate the process by which expert performers achieve continuous improvement through analytical/mindful behaviour during training and competition

Corporal diagnostic work and diagnostic spaces: Clinicians' use of space and bodies during diagnosis

© 2015 The Authors. Sociology of Health & Illness © 2015 Foundation for the Sociology of Health & Illness/John Wiley & Sons Ltd. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.An emerging body of literature in sociology has demonstrated that diagnosis is a useful focal point for understanding the social dimensions of health and illness. This article contributes to this work by drawing attention to the relationship between diagnostic spaces and the way in which clinicians use their own bodies during the diagnostic process. As a case study, we draw upon fieldwork conducted with a multidisciplinary clinical team providing deep brain stimulation (DBS) to treat children with a movement disorder called dystonia. Interviews were conducted with team members and diagnostic examinations were observed. We illustrate that clinicians use communicative body work and verbal communication to transform a material terrain into diagnostic space, and we illustrate how this diagnostic space configures forms of embodied 'sensing-and-acting' within. We argue that a 'diagnosis' can be conceptualised as emerging from an interaction in which space, the clinician-body, and the patient-body (or body-part) mutually configure one another. By conceptualising diagnosis in this way, this article draws attention to the corporal bases of diagnostic power and counters Cartesian-like accounts of clinical work in which the patient-body is objectified by a disembodied medical discourse.The Wellcome Trust (Wellcome Trust Biomedical Strategic Award 086034

Screening by symmetry of long-range hydrodynamic interactions of polymers confined in sheets

Hydrodynamic forces may significantly affect the motion of polymers. In sheet-like cavities, such as the cell's cytoplasm and microfluidic channels, the hydrodynamic forces are long-range. It is therefore expected that that hydrodynamic interactions will dominate the motion of polymers in sheets and will be manifested by Zimm-like scaling. Quite the opposite, we note here that although the hydrodynamic forces are long-range their overall effect on the motion of polymers vanishes due to the symmetry of the two-dimensional flow. As a result, the predicted scaling of experimental observables such as the diffusion coefficient or the rotational diffusion time is Rouse-like, in accord with recent experiments. The effective screening validates the use of the non-interacting blobs picture for polymers confined in a sheet.Comment: http://www.weizmann.ac.il/complex/tlusty/papers/Macromolecules2006.pdf http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/ma060251

The influence of sex, allergic rhinitis, and test system on nasal sensitivity to airborne irritants: a pilot study.

"Nasal irritant sensitivity" is an important construct in environmental health science; functional measures, however, lack standardization. We performed duplicate measures of nasal irritant perceptual acuity on 16 subjects (evenly divided by sex and seasonal allergy status) using two different test compounds: carbon dioxide (CO2) (detection) and n-propanol (localization). The a priori hypotheses included a) allergic rhinitics will display lower perceptual thresholds than nonrhinitics; b) females will display lower perceptual thresholds than males; and c) estimates of perceptual acuity using the two test systems will be positively correlated. We obtained CO2 detection thresholds using an ascending concentration series, presenting 3-sec pulses of CO2, paired with air in random order, by nasal cannula. We obtained localization thresholds by simultaneously presenting stimuli (ascending concentrations of n-propanol vapor in air) and blanks (saturated water vapor in air) to opposite nostrils, with laterality randomized. In terms of test-retest reliability, individual replicate measures for CO2 detection thresholds correlated more closely than did the localization thresholds of volatile organic compounds (VOC) (r = 0.65 and r = 0.60, respectively). As an intertest comparison, log-transformed individual mean CO2 and VOC measures were positively correlated with an r of 0.63 (p < 0.01). In univariate analyses, sex predicted both log-transformed CO2 and VOC thresholds (females being more "sensitive"; p < 0.05 and 0.001, respectively). Nasal allergies predicted sensory testing results only in the multivariate analysis, and then only for VOC localization (p < 0.05). The question of population variation in nasal irritant sensitivity (as well as the generalizability of results across test compounds) deserves further attention

Empathy, engagement, entrainment: the interaction dynamics of aesthetic experience

A recent version of the view that aesthetic experience is based in empathy as inner imitation explains aesthetic experience as the automatic simulation of actions, emotions, and bodily sensations depicted in an artwork by motor neurons in the brain. Criticizing the simulation theory for committing to an erroneous concept of empathy and failing to distinguish regular from aesthetic experiences of art, I advance an alternative, dynamic approach and claim that aesthetic experience is enacted and skillful, based in the recognition of others’ experiences as distinct from one’s own. In combining insights from mainly psychology, phenomenology, and cognitive science, the dynamic approach aims to explain the emergence of aesthetic experience in terms of the reciprocal interaction between viewer and artwork. I argue that aesthetic experience emerges by participatory sense-making and revolves around movement as a means for creating meaning. While entrainment merely plays a preparatory part in this, aesthetic engagement constitutes the phenomenological side of coupling to an artwork and provides the context for exploration, and eventually for moving, seeing, and feeling with art. I submit that aesthetic experience emerges from bodily and emotional engagement with works of art via the complementary processes of the perception–action and motion–emotion loops. The former involves the embodied visual exploration of an artwork in physical space, and progressively structures and organizes visual experience by way of perceptual feedback from body movements made in response to the artwork. The latter concerns the movement qualities and shapes of implicit and explicit bodily responses to an artwork that cue emotion and thereby modulate over-all affect and attitude. The two processes cause the viewer to bodily and emotionally move with and be moved by individual works of art, and consequently to recognize another psychological orientation than her own, which explains how art can cause feelings of insight or awe and disclose aspects of life that are unfamiliar or novel to the viewer

SOMAESTHETICS AND ARCHITECTURE

Richard Shusterman received a B.A. and M.A. in Philosophy from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and completed his doctoral studies in Philosophy at Oxford University. In Israel he taught at the Hebrew University and the University of the Negev, and then moved to the United States, where he was Professor of Philosophy at Temple University, and chaired its department from 1998-2004. He then was awarded the Dorothy F. Schmidt Eminent Scholar Chair in the Humanities at Florida Atlantic University, where he also directs the Center for Body, Mind, and Culture. His authored books include Surface and Depth (2002); Performing Live (2000); Practicing Philosophy: Pragmatism and the Philosophical Life (1997); Sous l’interprétation (1994), Pragmatist Aesthetics: Living Beauty, Rethinking Art (1992, 2nd edition 2000); T.S. Eliot and the Philosophy of Criticism (1988); and The Object of Criticism (1984). His most recent book, Body Consciousness: A Philosophy of Mindfulness and Somaesthetics was published by Cambridge University Press. It provides the most detailed formulation of his project of somaesthetics

Non-psychotic psychiatric disorders in persons who have experienced psychosocial stress in terms of military conflict.

Partners of military veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and other non-psychotic psychiatric disorders can develop difficulties with stress, well-being, and secondary trauma. There are various interventions involving partners, but not many of them give due attention to their well-being. The purpose of this article was to conduct a systematic literature review of a number of interventions with analysis of the results. A systematic literature search was conducted, as a result of which 25 interventions were selected for analysis. The criteria for selecting interventions were the presence of PTSD in the veteran, the partner’s participation in the intervention, and the focus of the intervention on improving the well-being of the partners themselves. Group interventions, boarding classes, family therapies and retreats were the main types of interventions. 21 studies reported well-being results from randomized controlled trials (RCT), preliminary evaluations and clinical cases. Most interventions reported improvements in partner well-being, although reliable, controlled trials were insufficient. Only a small number of interventions were aimed solely at part­ners. The most common feature of the interventions was psycho-educational work with an emphasis on topics such as communication, problem solving, and regulation of emotions. Most of the works describe the advantages of group processes (social support and normalization) among partners who shared experience with each other. Thus, the existing range of formats of measures to improve the well-being of military partners should be expanded through more reliable experimental studies aimed directly at the well-being of partners. A subsequent study of their effectiveness can serve as a powerful resource for further interventions not only for veterans, but also for the partners themselves

Fluorescence correlation spectroscopy of the binding of nucleotide excision repair protein XPC-hHr23B with DNA substrates

The interaction of the nucleotide excision repair (NER) protein dimeric complex XPC-hHR23B, which is implicated in the DNA damage recognition step, with three Cy3.5 labeled 90-bp double-stranded DNA substrates (unmodified, with a central unpaired region, and cholesterol modified) and a 90-mer single-strand DNA was investigated in solution by fluorescence correlation spectroscopy. Autocorrelation functions obtained in the presence of an excess of protein show larger diffusion times (τ d) than for free DNA, indicating the presence of DNA-protein bound complexes. The fraction of DNA bound (θ), as a way to describe the percentage of protein bound to DNA, was directly estimated from FCS data. A significantly stronger binding capability for the cholesterol modified substrate (78% DNA bound) than for other double-stranded DNA substrates was observed, while the lowest affinity was found for the single-stranded DNA (27%). This is in accordance with a damage recognition role of the XPC protein. The similar affinity of XPC for undamaged and 'bubble' DNA sub

Transcranial Electrical Stimulation targeting limbic cortex increases the duration of human deep sleep

Background: Researchers have proposed that impaired sleep may be a causal link in the progression from Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) to Alzheimer's Disease (AD). Several recent findings suggest that enhancing deep sleep (N3) may improve neurological health in persons with MCI, and buffer the risk for AD. Specifically, Transcranial Electrical Stimulation (TES) of frontal brain areas, the inferred source of the Slow Oscillations (SOs) of N3 sleep, can extend N3 sleep duration and improve declarative memory for recently learned information. Recent work in our laboratory using dense array Electroencephalography (dEEG) localized the sources of SOs to anterior limbic sites – suggesting that targeting these sites with TES may be more effective for enhancing N3. Methods: For the present study, we recruited 13 healthy adults (M = 42 years) to participate in three all-night sleep EEG recordings where they received low level (0.5 mA) TES designed to target anterior limbic areas and a sham stimulation (placebo). We used a convolutional neural network, trained and tested on professionally scored EEG sleep staging, to predict sleep stages for each recording. Results: When compared to the sham session, limbic-targeted TES significantly increased the duration of N3 sleep. TES also significantly increased spectral power in the 0.5–1 Hz frequency band (relative to pre-TES epochs) in left temporoparietal and left occipital scalp regions compared to sham. Conclusion: These results suggest that even low-level TES, when specifically targeting anterior limbic sites, can increase deep (N3) sleep and thereby contribute to healthy sleep quality.Fil: Hathaway, Evan. Brain Electrophysiology Laboratory Company; Estados UnidosFil: Morgan, Kyle. Brain Electrophysiology Laboratory Company; Estados UnidosFil: Carson, Megan. Brain Electrophysiology Laboratory Company; Estados UnidosFil: Shusterman, Roma. Brain Electrophysiology Laboratory Company; Estados UnidosFil: Fernandez Corazza, Mariano. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - La Plata. Instituto de Investigaciones en Electrónica, Control y Procesamiento de Señales. Universidad Nacional de La Plata. Instituto de Investigaciones en Electrónica, Control y Procesamiento de Señales; ArgentinaFil: Luu, Phan. University of Oregon; Estados UnidosFil: Tucker, Don M.. University of Oregon; Estados Unido