Life is pleasant--and memory helps to keep it that way!

People's recollections of the past are often positively biased. This bias has 2 causes. The 1st cause lies in people's perceptions of events. The authors review the results of several studies and present several new comparative analyses of these studies, all of which indicate that people perceive events in their lives to more often be pleasant than unpleasant. A 2nd cause is the fading affect bias: The affect associated with unpleasant events fades faster than the affect associated with pleasant events. The authors review the results of several studies documenting this bias and present evidence indicating that dysphoria (mild depression) disrupts such bias. Taken together, this evidence suggests that autobiographical memory represents an important exception to the theoretical claim that bad is stronger than good. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Context-Processing Deficits in Schizotypal Personality Disorder.

Research suggests that schizotypal personality disorder (SPD) is a part of the spectrum of schizophrenia-related illnesses. This article hypothesizes that a deficit in the representation and maintenance of context is a core cognitive disturbance in schizophrenia and that SPD individuals should demonstrate context-processing deficits. To test this hypothesis, the authors administered 3 versions of their AX-CPT task, designed to assess context processing, to 35 healthy controls and 26 individuals with DSM-IV SPD. They also administered working memory and selective attention tasks. SPD individuals displayed context representation deficits similar to those found in schizophrenia but did not show the same additional deficits in context maintenance. Context processing was strongly associated with working memory and selective attention performance in the SPD individuals. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Allocentric Versus Egocentric Spatial Memory After Unilateral Temporal Lobectomy in Humans.

Thirty patients who had undergone either a right or left unilateral temporal lobectomy (14 RTL; 16 LTL) and 16 control participants were tested on a computerized human analogue of the Morris Water Maze. The procedure was designed to compare allocentric and egocentric spatial memory. In the allocentric condition, participants searched for a target location on the screen, guided by object cues. Between trials, participants had to walk around the screen, which disrupted egocentric memory representation. In the egocentric condition, participants remained in the same position, but the object cues were shifted between searches to prevent them from using allocentric memory. Only the RTL group was impaired on the allocentric condition, and neither the LTL nor RTL group was impaired on additional tests of spatial working memory or spatial manipulation. The results support the notion that the right anterior temporal lobe stores long-term allocentric spatial memories. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Retrograde Amnesia Induced by Drugs Acting on Different Molecular Systems.

The gamma aminobutyric acid-A (GABAA) agonist, muscimol, the glutamate N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptor antagonist, D-2-amino-5-phosphonopentanoic acid (AP5), and the inhibitor of the extracellularly regulated kinases (ERKs), UO 126, cause retrograde amnesia when administered to the hippocampus. In the present study, the authors found that they all cause retrograde amnesia for 1-trial inhibitory avoidance, not only when infused into the dorsal CA1 region of the hippocampus, but also when infused into the basolateral amygdala or the entorhinal, parietal, and posterior cingulate cortices. The posttraining time course of the effect of each drug was, however, quite different across brain structures. Thus, in all of them, NMDA receptors and the ERK pathway are indispensable for memory consolidation, and GABAA receptor activation inhibits memory consolidation: but in each case, their influence is interwoven differently. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Mixed Mode VLSI Implementation of a Neural Associative Memory

A mixed mode digital/analog special purpose VLSI hardware implementation of an associative memory with neural architecture is presented. The memory concept is based on a matrix architecture with binary storage elements holding the connection weights. To enhance the processing speed analog circuit techniques are applied to implement the algorithm for the association. To keep the memory density as high as possible two design strategies are considered. First, the number of transistors per storage element is kept to a minimum. In this paper a circuit technique that uses a single 6-transistor cell for weight storage and analog signal processing is proposed. Second, the device precision has been chosen to a moderate level to save area as much as possible. Since device mismatch limits the performance of analog circuits, the impact of device precision on the circuit performance is explicitly discussed. It is shown that the device precision limits the number of rows activated in parallel. Since the input vector as well as the output vector are considered to be sparsely coded it is concluded, that even for large matrices the proposed circuit technique is appropriate and ultra large scale integration with a large number of connection weights is feasible.     

A Built-in Self-Test Scheme with Diagnostics Support for Embedded SRAM

In this paper we propose a novel built-in self-test (BIST) design for embedded SRAM cores. Our contribution includes a compact and efficient BIST circuit with diagnosis support and an automatic diagnostic system. The diagnosis module of our BIST circuit can capture the error syndromes as well as fault locations for the purposes of repair and fault/failure analysis. In addition, our design provides programmability for custom March algorithms with lower hardware cost. The combination of the on-line programming mode and diagnostic system dramatically reduces the effort in design debugging and yield enhancement. We have designed and implemented test chips with our BIST design. Experimental results show that the area overhead of the proposed BIST design is only 2.4% for a 128 KB SRAM, and 0.65% for a 2 MB one.     

铁电存储场效应晶体管I-V特性的物理机制模拟

文章讨论的模型主要描述了铁电存储场效应晶体管（FEMFET）的I-V特性。从理论结果可反映出几何尺寸效应和材料参数对晶体管电特性的影响。传统的阈值电压的概念巳不再适用，由于铁电层反偏偶极子的开关作用，自发极化的增加对存储器的工作状态产生很小的影响。该模型可用于设计和工艺参数的优化，并由直观原型的方法得到了验证。     

NiTi形状记忆薄膜的显微结构和力学性能

NiTi形状记忆合金薄膜具有形状记忆效应，极有希望用于制造高技术领域微电子机械系统中的微型激发器。NiTi形状记忆合金薄膜在制备和使用过程中需要高品质（衬）底材。本文利用高分辨电子显微学和高分辨分析电子显微学详细研究了硅底材NiTi形状记忆合金薄膜的NiTi／Si和NiTi／SiO2微结构体系，包括薄膜精细结构和界面反应。也研究了其显微结构和力学性能的关系。特别给出了NiTi形状记忆合金薄膜产生疲劳过程的微观过程的起因，通过高达十万个使用热循环前后样品显微结构变化的比较，发现纳米尺度上的TiNi3新相的形成导致疲劳过程的发生。如何抑制TiNi3新相形成的研究正在进行之中，这将为进一步提高NiTi形状记忆合金的使用寿命指出方向。     

Cooperation between memory systems: Acetylcholine release in the amygdala correlates positively with performance on a hippocampus-dependent task.

The present experiment examined the relationship between release of acetylcholine (ACh) in the amygdala and performance on a hippocampus-dependent spatial working memory task. Using in vivo microdialysis, the authors measured ACh release in rats during testing on a spontaneous alternation task. Amygdala ACh release was positively correlated with performance on the hippocampus-dependent task. These findings suggest that activation of the amygdala promotes processing in other neural systems important for learning and memory. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

TMS320C67系列EMIF与异步FIFO存储器的接口设计

介绍了TI公司TMS320C67系列DSP的EMIF(外部存储器接口)与异步FIFO(先进先出)存储器的硬件接口设计,着重描述了用EDMA(扩展的直接存储器访问)方式读取FIFO存储器数据的软件设计流程,最后说明了在选择FIFO存储器时应注意的问题.由于EMIF的强大功能,不仅具有很高的数据吞吐率,而且可以与不同类型的同步、异步器件进行无缝连接,使硬件接口电路简单,调试方便.运用EDMA的方式进行数据传输,由EDMA控制器完成DSP存储空间内的数据搬移,这样可以最大限度地节省CPU的资源,提高整个系统的运算速度.