Differential effects of synchronous and asynchronous multifinger coactivation on human tactile performance

Background  

Repeated execution of a tactile task enhances task performance. In the present study we sought to improve tactile performance with unattended activation-based learning processes (i.e., focused stimulation of dermal receptors evoking neural coactivation (CA)). Previous studies show that the application of CA to a single finger reduced the stationary two-point discrimination threshold and significantly increased tactile acuity. These changes were accompanied by an expansion of the cortical finger representation in primary somatosensory cortex (SI). Here we investigated the effect of different types of multifinger CA on the tactile performance of each finger of the right hand.     

Time interval distributions of atoms in atomic beams

We report an experimental investigation of two-particle correlations between neutral atoms in a Hanbury Brown and Twiss experiment. Both an atom laser beam and a pseudo-thermal atomic beam are extracted from a Bose–Einstein condensate and the atom flux is measured with a single atom counter. We determine the conditional and the unconditional detection probabilities for the atoms in the beam and find good agreement with the theoretical predictions. PACS 03.75.Pp; 05.30.Jp; 07.77.Gx; 42.50.Pq     

Bayesian Object Identification: Variants

We present a Bayesian theory of object identification. Here, identifying an object means selecting a particular observation from a group of observations (variants), this observation (the regular variant) being characterized by a distributional model. In this sense, object identification means assigning a given model to one of several observations. Often, it is the statistical model of the regular variant, only, that is known. We study an estimator which relies essentially on this model and not on the characteristics of the “irregular” variants. In particular, we investigate under what conditions this variant selector is optimal. It turns out that there is a close relationship with exchangeability and Markovian reversibility. We finally apply our theory to the case of irregular variants generated from the regular variant by a Gaussian linear model.     

Geometric formulas for Smale invariants of codimension two immersions

We give three formulas expressing the Smale invariant of an immersion f of a (4k−1)-sphere into (4k+1)-space. The terms of the formulas are geometric characteristics of any generic smooth map g of any oriented 4k-dimensional manifold, where g restricted to the boundary is an immersion regularly homotopic to f in (6k−1)-space.The formulas imply that if f and g are two non-regularly homotopic immersions of a (4k−1)-sphere into (4k+1)-space then they are also non-regularly homotopic as immersions into (6k−1)-space. Moreover, any generic homotopy in (6k−1)-space connecting f to g must have at least a_k(2k−1)! cusps, where a_k=2 if k is odd and a_k=1 if k is even.     

Serum Chloride Optical Sensors Based on Dynamic Quenching of the Fluorescence of Photo-Immobilized Lucigenin

This article describes the preparation and performance of an optical sensor for continuous measurement of chloride at extracellular (serum) levels (20–200mM). The sensor is based on dynamic quenching of the fluorescence of lucigenin which was photo-immobilized on a hydrogel. Quenching occurs via a collisional mechanism, and the decrease in fluorescence intensity on exposure to 100mM chloride typically is –60%. It allows the determination of chloride in the 1 to 200mM concentration range, with a precision of ±3mM at 120mM. Bromide, iodide and salicylate act as interferents, while the effect of pH and oxygen is negligibly small. The sensor displays strong fluorescence intensity, excellent reproducibility, long-term stability, response times in the order of 2–5min, and is used in a commercial serum and blood chloride analyzer.Received January 21, 2003; accepted April 6, 2003 Published online July 28, 2003     

Biosynthesis of isoprenoids. purification and properties of IspG protein from Escherichia coli

[Structure: see text]. The IspG protein is known to catalyze the transformation of 2-C-methyl-d-erythritol 2,4-cyclodiphosphate into 1-hydroxy-2-methyl-2-(E)-butenyl 4-diphosphate in the nonmevalonate pathway of isoprenoid biosynthesis. We have found that the apparent IspG activity in the cell extracts of recombinant Escherichia coli cells as observed by a radiochemical assay can be enhanced severalfold by coexpression of the isc operon which is involved in the assembly of iron-sulfur clusters. The recombinant protein was isolated by affinity chromatography under anaerobic conditions. With a mixture of flavodoxin, flavodoxin reductase, and NADPH as the reducing agent, stringent assay methods based on photometry or on 13C NMR detection of multiply 13C-labeled substrate/product ratios afforded catalytic activities greater than 60 nmol mg(-1) min(-1) for the protein "as isolated" (i.e., without reconstitution of any kind). Lower apparent activities were found using photoreduced deazaflavin as an artifactual electron donor, whereas dithionite was unable to serve as an artificial electron donor. The apparent Michaelis constant for 2-C-methyl-D-erythritol 2,4-cyclodiphosphate was 700 microM. The enzyme was inactivated by EDTA and could be reactivated by Mn2+. The pH optimum was at 9.0. The protein contained 2.4 iron ions and 4.4 sulfide ions per subunit. The replacement of any of the three conserved cysteine residues afforded mutant proteins which were devoid of catalytic activity and contained less than 6% of Fe2+ and less than 23% of S2- as compared to the wild-type protein. Sequence comparison indicates that putative IspG proteins of plants, the apicomplexan protozoan Plasmodium falciparum, and bacteria from the Bacteroidetes/Chlorobi group contain an insert of about 170-320 amino acid residues as compared with eubacterial enzymes.