Semantic content of motorcycle riders’ eye fixations during lane-splitting

A naturalistic field observation study is presented, exploring the experienced riders’ eye fixations on specific traffic objects and their relative s     

Examination of age-related deficits on the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test.

Adult age differences in Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST) measures were examined before and after statistical control of age-related differences in measures of feedback usage, working memory, and perceptual-comparison speed. The proportion of age-related variance associated with a summary measure of WCST performance was greatly reduced after controlling for measures of feedback usage, working memory, and perceptual-comparison speed. Furthermore, the age-related variance associated with the feedback-usage measure was reduced after controlling for working memory and perceptual-comparison speed measures. These results are consistent with the idea that age-related performance differences in the WCST are partially mediated by adult age differences in feedback usage and that age differences in feedback usage are mediated by age differences in working memory, which are in turn mediated by age-related reductions in processing speed, indexed by measures of perceptual-comparison speed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Group velocity dispersion of dyes in solution measured with white-light interferometry

The group velocity dispersion (GVD) coefficient of four different dyes in solution is measured as a function of wavelength and concentration using a white-light Michelson interferometer. We find that the wavelength dependence of the GVD can be considerably different at wavelengths above and below the absorption resonance in a dye. Above the absorption resonance, the dye molecules can make a strong, wavelength-dependent contribution to the GVD of the solution. Below the absorption resonance, the dye molecules tend to contribute negligibly to the GVD of the solution. We find that the contribution of the dye molecules to the GVD can be modeled quite accurately using a simple Lorentz model with parameters set using the measured linear absorption properties of the dye.     

Stimuli‐Responsive Materials for Controlled Release of Theranostic Agents

Stimuli‐responsive materials are so named because they can alter their physicochemical properties and/or structural conformations in response to specific stimuli. The stimuli can be internal, such as physiological or pathological variations in the target cells/tissues, or external, such as optical and ultrasound radiations. In recent years, these materials have gained increasing interest in biomedical applications due to their potential for spatially and temporally controlled release of theranostic agents in response to the specific stimuli. This article highlights several recent advances in the development of such materials, with a focus on their molecular designs and formulations. The future of stimuli‐responsive materials will also be explored, including combination with molecular imaging probes and targeting moieties, which could enable simultaneous diagnosis and treatment of a specific disease, as well as multi‐functionality and responsiveness to multiple stimuli, all important in overcoming intrinsic biological barriers and increasing clinical viability.     

Relation of task switching to speed, age, and fluid intelligence.

Two studies were conducted to investigate whether a meaningful task-switching construct could be identified and, if so, to determine how it was related to measures of higher order cognition and to adult age. Both studies revealed that measures of task switching were moderately correlated across different combinations of tasks and that a switching construct could be distinguished from a construct reflecting processing speed. The results of the 2nd study revealed that although the task-switching construct was related to age and to measures of episodic memory, inductive reasoning, and spatial visualization, most of the relations between the switching construct and both age and other measures of cognition were shared with other variables. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Meaningful electronic signatures based on an automatic indexing method

Legal information certification and secured storage combined with documents electronic signature are of great interest when digital documents security and conservation are in concern. Therefore, these new and evolving technologies offer powerful abilities, such as identification, authentication and certification. The latter contribute to increase the global security of legal digital archives conservation and access. However, currently used cryptographic and hash coding concepts cannot intrinsically enclose cognitive information about both the signer and the signed content. Indeed, an evolution of these technologies may be necessary to achieve full text researches within hundreds or thousands of electronically signed documents. This article aims at describing a possible model along with associated processes to create and make use of these new electronic signatures called “meaningful electronic signatures” as opposed to traditional electronic signatures based on bit per bit computation.     

Biaxial Orientation of Poly(ethylene 2,5‐furandicarboxylate): An Explorative Study

The biaxial orientation behavior of poly(ethylene 2,5‐furandicarboxylate) (PEF) is studied in comparison to poly(ethylene terephthalate) (PET). PEF is a polyester that can be produced through similar steps as PET but using 100% biobased 2,5‐furandicarboxylic acid instead of terephthalic acid. This work highlights the stress–strain behavior of PEF during biaxial orientation at various temperatures. Strain hardening and strain‐induced crystallization in the oriented PEF samples generally appeared at higher stretch ratios for PEF than for PET at comparable molecular weight, while somewhat lower degrees of crystallinity are reached in PEF. Shrinkage in oriented PEF is found to be on par with PET in the region of the glass transition. Higher modulus and improved barrier properties, compared to PET, are found in the oriented materials when sufficiently high stretch ratios are applied in biaxial orientation.     

Influence of fluorine substitution on the morphology and structure of hydroxyapatite nanocrystals prepared by hydrothermal method

Hydroxyapatite (HAp) nanocrystals with different levels of fluorine substitution (P/F = 0, 6, 4 and 2) on the OH sites were produced via hydrothermal method. The fluorine substitution was found to alter the morphology of crystals appreciably. The aspect ratio and the crystallinity of HAp crystals increased with increasing fluorine substitution. The presence of broad ring and hallow ring patterns in electron diffraction suggests the low-crystalline nature of HAp crystals. With increasing fluorine substitution, the diffraction patterns exhibited discrete rings and numerous diffraction spots, implying the increased crystallinity. Raman spectra from the HAp nanoparticles also support the less-crystalline nature of the pristine HAp and the enhanced crystallization by fluorine substitution. In HAp crystals processed with no fluorine substitution, surface energy and planar Ca²⁺ density are less sensitive to the crystallographic orientation because of its low-crystalline nature, favoring equi-axed or slightly elongated particles. The addition of fluorine apparently increased the crystallinity, enhancing the orientation dependent growth and accordingly the aspect ratio. Osteoblast proliferation was observed to be enhanced by fluorine substitution in HAp. In vitro biological data support that the excellent osteoblastic cell viability and functional activity of the fluoridated apatite.     

Mammalian Cells Engineered To Produce New Steroids

Steroids can be difficult to modify through traditional organic synthesis methods, but many enzymes regio‐ and stereoselectively process a wide variety of steroid substrates. We tested whether steroid‐modifying enzymes could make novel steroids from non‐native substrates. Numerous genes encoding steroid‐modifying enzymes, including some bacterial enzymes, were expressed in mammalian cells by transient transfection and found to be active. We made three unusual steroids by stable expression, in HEK293 cells, of the 7α‐hydroxylase CYP7B1, which was selected because of its high native product yield. These cells made 7α,17α‐dihydroxypregnenolone and 7β,17α‐dihydroxypregnenolone from 17α‐hydroxypregnenolone and produced 11α,16α‐dihydroxyprogesterone from 16α‐hydroxyprogesterone. The last two products were the result of CYP7B1‐catalyzed hydroxylation at previously unobserved sites. A Rosetta docking model of CYP7B1 suggested that these substrates’ D‐ring hydroxy groups might prevent them from binding in the same way as the native substrates, bringing different carbon atoms close to the active ferryl oxygen atom. This new approach could potentially use other enzymes and substrates to produce many novel steroids for drug candidate testing.