Novel magnetic resonance imaging methodology for dynamic visualization of respiratory thoracic motion: a pilot feasibility study.

Introduction: Positional management is important in respiratory rehabilitation. Current magnetic resonance (MR) imaging techniques for visualizing respiratory mechanics are limited by external pressure from receiver coils or spatial restrictions within the bore, and there is no established method for visualizing respiratory movements in the semi-prone position. Therefore, we aimed to develop a novel MR imaging and analysis method for visualizing thoracic movements during free breathing, enabling assessment of positional effects.

Cross-species implementation of an innate courtship behavior by manipulation of the sex-determinant gene.

In accepting a courting male, females require nuptial gift giving in which a male gives regurgitated crop contents to her mouth to mouth. No similar behavior is found in . By clonal activation of neurons expressing the male-determinant FruM, we identified insulin-like peptide-producing cells (IPCs) and their putative postsynaptic targets, proboscis-innervating motoneurons, as those critical for gift giving.

Neural substrates underlying multisensory stiffness perception via active touch and dynamic visual feedback.

Humans perceive the physical properties of objects through active touch to acquire information that is unavailable by passive observation (e.g., pinching an object to estimate its stiffness).

Immediate effect of quadri-pulse stimulation on human brain microstructures and functions.

It remains unclear whether repetitive stimulation of a single brain area immediately alters brain microstructure. Thus, we investigated the immediate changes in human brain microstructures following repetitive extrinsic excitation of the left primary motor cortex (M1) through quadri-pulse stimulation (QPS). Sixteen right-handed healthy adults underwent excitatory (QPS5) and inhibitory (QPS50) QPS.

Younger adult brain utilizes interhemispheric strategy via ipsilateral dorsal premotor cortex for fine control of dexterous finger movements, unlike the aging brain.

Introduction: This study investigated how healthy, right-handed younger adults utilize the typically suppressed ipsilateral sensorimotor cortices [particularly, the dorsal premotor cortex (PMd), primary motor cortex (M1), primary somatosensory cortex (S1), and superior parietal cortex of Area 2] to perform a dexterous finger motor task and its age-related changes.

Methods: Functional magnetic resonance imaging was used to measure brain activity in healthy, right-handed younger and older adults during a simple button-press task with the right index finger and a dexterous stick-rotation task involving fine control and coordination of individual right finger movements. The individual performance capacity in stick rotation (the personal trait of finger dexterity) was assessed outside the scanner.

Evaluating the impact of denoising diffusion MRI data on tractometry metrics of optic tract abnormalities in glaucoma.

Diffusion MRI (dMRI)-based tractometry is a non-invasive neuroimaging method for evaluating white matter tracts in living humans, capable of detecting abnormalities caused by disorders. However, measurement noise in dMRI data often compromises the signal quality. Several denoising methods for dMRI have been proposed, but the extent to which denoising affects tractometry metrics of white matter tissue properties associated with disorders remains unclear.

Human and artificial visual systems share a computational principle for transforming binocular disparity into depth representation.

Our visual brain transforms small differences between images in the two eyes (binocular disparity) into coherent depth. Initially, neurons in the primary visual cortex (V1) compute the degrees of overlap between the left and right images to encode disparity. Such cross-correlation-like neurons respond to both binocularly matched and mismatched features.

EEG synchronisation reveals the impact of group identity and membership duration on social cognitive bias.

Group identity induces social cognitive biases, and membership duration may amplify these effects. This study aimed to examine such bias by analysing similarities in neural processing among individuals in competitive scenarios. The fans of two Japanese baseball teams, the Hanshin Tigers and Orix Buffaloes, watched baseball matches between the teams, and EEG synchronisation was analysed for in-group (same team) and out-group (different team) pairs, considering fan history as a factor representing membership duration.

Event-related brain activity in response to partners' speech in natural conversation.

How listeners cognitively process speech during natural conversation remains poorly understood, particularly in terms of the role of the speaker's and listener's subjective mental states and empathic traits. This study examined relationships between these psychological factors and listener's cognitive processing of speech. We simultaneously recorded electroencephalograms from 20 romantic couples during natural face-to-face conversations.

Asymmetric representation of symmetric semantic information in the human brain.

Specific pairs of semantic entities have symmetric relationships, such as word pairs with opposite meanings (e.g., "intelligent" and "stupid"; "human" and "mechanical").

Spectral properties of two superconducting artificial atoms coupled to a resonator in the ultrastrong coupling regime.

We experimentally investigate a superconducting circuit composed of two flux qubits ultrastrongly coupled to a common LC resonator. Owing to the large anharmonicity of the flux qubits, the system can be described well by a generalized Dicke Hamiltonian containing spin-spin interaction terms. In the experimentally measured spectrum, we observed two key phenomena.

Machine Learning Matches Human Performance at Segmenting the Human Visual Cortex.

A major problem in human visual neuroscience research is the localization of visual areas on the cortical surface. Currently available methods are capable of making detailed predictions about many areas, but human raters do not agree as well with these methods as they do with each other. Although highly accurate, human raters require substantial time and expertise that many researchers do not have.

Block-interleaved segmented echo-planar imaging for improved activity detection in submillimeter high-resolution functional MRI at 7 T.

Purpose: Isotropic submillimeter high-resolution functional MRI (fMRI) facilitates noninvasive investigation of neuronal activities at the mesoscale level, including cortical columns and laminae. However, the task-evoked functional activity becomes less detectable when using single-shot echo planar imaging (EPI) with parallel imaging techniques such as generalized autocalibrating partially parallel acquisitions (GRAPPA), owing to a reduction in temporal signal-to-noise ratio (tSNR). Although conventional multishot EPI (msEPI) enhances tSNR, it reduces temporal resolution, making it less suitable for fMRI studies involving short-duration stimuli.

Gray matter volume increase in the retrosplenial/posterior cingulate cortices of blind soccer players.

Individuals typically recognize where they are (localization) and in which direction they are heading (orientation) in a space using vision, and the retrosplenial/posterior cingulate cortices (RSC/PCC), parahippocampal cortex (PHC), and hippocampus (HP) have been shown to play crucial roles for these navigation-related functions. However, there is empirical evidence that top blind soccer players with long-term training can navigate on the court without vision. This study examined the potential changes in gray matter (GM) volume in the RSC/PCC, PHC, and HP in the brains of a leading and other blind soccer players.

Diffusion Tensor Imaging Analysis of Fine Motor Dysfunction and Recovery Following Cranioplasty.

We report a case of a 42-year-old woman who developed fine motor dysfunction after decompressive craniectomy for traumatic brain injury (TBI), despite the absence of obvious lesions on conventional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to explain the motor deficits. Following cranioplasty, diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) revealed an increase in fractional anisotropy (FA) in the primary motor cortex, which correlated with significant improvement in motor function. These findings highlight DTI's potential as a valuable tool for capturing subtle brain changes not apparent on conventional imaging techniques.

Antibacterial and bactericidal properties of resin nanostructures coated with SiO thin films.

Nanotextures exhibit physical antibacterial and bactericidal properties; hence, they have great potential to prevent infection related to bacteria through contact. The surface characteristics of a nanostructure determine its antibacterial and bactericidal activities. In this study, an atomic layer deposition (ALD) was used to prepare nano-level, hard, thin SiO layers on resin nanostructures and their effects were demonstrated through antibacterial and bactericidal tests.

Neuronal Electrical Activity in Neuronal Networks Induced by a Focused Femtosecond Laser.

The spatial propagation of neuronal activity within neuronal circuits, which is associated with brain functions, such as memory and learning, is regulated by external stimuli. Conventional external stimuli, such as electrical inputs, pharmacological treatments, and optogenetic modifications, have been used to modify neuronal activity. However, these methods are tissue invasive, have insufficient spatial resolution, and cause irreversible gene modifications.

Impact of physiological ionic strength and crowding on kinesin-1 motility.

The motility of biological molecular motors has typically been analyzed by in vitro reconstitution systems using motors isolated and purified from organs or expressed in cultured cells. The behavior of biomolecular motors within cells has frequently been reported to be inconsistent with that observed in reconstituted systems in vitro. Although this discrepancy has been attributed to differences in ionic strength and intracellular crowding, understanding how such parameters affect the motility of motors remains challenging.

Hierarchical representations of relative numerical magnitudes in the human frontoparietal cortex.

The ability to estimate numerical magnitude is essential for decision-making and is thought to underlie arithmetic skills. In humans, neural populations in the frontoparietal regions are tuned to represent numerosity. However, it remains unclear whether their response properties are fixed to a specific numerosity (i.

Engineering Dynein Motors to Move on DNA Nanotube Tracks.

The recent development of the DNA-binding domain (DBD)-dynein chimera motors with a dynein motor core and a DNA-binding domain has made it possible to move on DNA nanostructure tracks. In contrast to naturally occurring cytoskeletal filaments such as microtubules and actin filaments, DNA tracks can be programmed with structural properties such as length, stiffness, and circumference. There might be many advantages to using DNA as a track, for example, for applications in nanotechnology.

Evaluating correlations between reading ability and psychophysical measurements of dynamic visual information processing in Japanese adults.

The reading ability of English readers has been shown to correlate with psychophysical measurements of dynamic visual information processing. This study investigated the relationship between reading ability and dynamic visual information processing in healthy adult native Japanese readers (n = 46). Reading ability was assessed using three different tests: the Japanese Adult Reading Test (JART), transposed-letter detection task, and oral reading.

Broadband generation and tomography of non-Gaussian states for ultra-fast optical quantum processors.

Quantum information processors benefit from high clock frequencies to fully harness quantum advantages before they are lost to decoherence. All-optical systems offer unique benefits due to their inherent 100-THz carrier frequency, enabling the development of THz-clock frequency processors. However, the bandwidth of quantum light sources and measurement devices has been limited to the MHz range, with nonclassical state generation rates in the kHz range.

Automated System to Capture Patient Symptoms From Multitype Japanese Clinical Texts: Retrospective Study.

Background: Natural language processing (NLP) techniques can be used to analyze large amounts of electronic health record texts, which encompasses various types of patient information such as quality of life, effectiveness of treatments, and adverse drug event (ADE) signals. As different aspects of a patient's status are stored in different types of documents, we propose an NLP system capable of processing 6 types of documents: physician progress notes, discharge summaries, radiology reports, radioisotope reports, nursing records, and pharmacist progress notes.

Objective: This study aimed to investigate the system's performance in detecting ADEs by evaluating the results from multitype texts.