Recurrence quantification analysis of uterine vectormyometriogram reveals differences between normal weight and overweight parturient women.

OBJECTIVE: This study aims to use Recurrence Quantification Analysis (RQA) of uterine vectormyometriogram (VMG) created from the slow wave (SW) and high wave (HW) bands of electrohysterogram (EHG) signals and assess the directionality of the EHG activity (horizontal or X, vertical or Y) in normal-weight (NW) and overweight (OW) women during the first stage of labor. APPROACH: The study involved 41 parturient women (NW=21 and OW=20) during the first stage of labor, all of whom were attended at the Gynecology and Obstetrics Hospital of the Maternal and Child Institute of the State of Mexico (IMIEM) in Toluca, Mexico. Twenty-minute EHG signals were analyzed in horizontal and vertical directions. Linear and nonlinear indices such as dominant frequency (Dom), Sample Entropy (SampEn), and RQA measures of VMG were computed for SW and HW bands. MAIN RESULTS: Significant differences in SampEn and Dom were observed in the SW band between NW and OW in both X and Y directions, indicating more regular dynamics of electrical uterine activity and a higher dominant frequency in normal-weight parturient women compared to overweight women. Additionally, the RQA indices calculated from the VMG of SW were consistent and revealed that NW women exhibit more regular dynamics compared to OW women. SIGNIFICANCE: The study demonstrates that RQA of VMG signals and EHG directionality differentiate uterine activity between NW and OW women during the first stage of labor. These findings suggest that the uterine vector may become more periodic, predictable, and stable in normal-weight women compared to overweight women. This highlights the importance of tailored clinical strategies for managing labor in overweight women to improve maternal and infant outcomes. .

Different effects of visual occlusion on interpersonal coordination of head and body movements during dyadic conversations.

Introduction: In recent decades, interpersonal coordination and synchrony have been extensively examined in the field of psychology and cognitive science. Studies suggest that perceptual information enables interpersonal coordination and that perceptual noise may even enhance coordination. However, how these perceptual factors influence interpersonal coordination dynamics between head and body movements remains unclear. This study investigated the effect of visual information on the interpersonal coordination of head and body movements during dyadic conversations. Methods: The availability of visual information was manipulated by positioning a partition halfway between a pair of participants, and the conversations were recorded using a video camera. A video-based human pose estimation software (OpenPose) was used to quantify each interlocutor's head and body movements, which were submitted for cross-recurrence quantification analysis (CRQA), to assess the degree of coordination between the interlocutors. Results: The results showed different effects between head- and body-movement coordination (i.e., a CRQA measure, maximum line length). The occlusion of visual information increased head-movement coordination, whereas it decreased body-movement coordination. Discussion: The results suggest that a distinct mechanism may be present at the head- and body-movement coordination level and this study observed differing appearances of compensatory behaviors. Further studies should be conducted to investigate the complex relationships between interpersonal coordination dynamics and various kinds of communication constraints, such as long-term or short-term, and lower-order (perceptual-motor) or higher-order (cognitive-social) level constraints.

Mechanism of Guigan Longmu Decoction in the Treatment of Arrhythmias Based on Network Pharmacology and Untargeted Metabolomics Assays.

BACKGROUND: Guigan longmu decoction (GGLM), a traditional Chinese medicine compound, has demonstrated efficacy in treating rapid arrhythmia clinically. Nevertheless, its mechanism of action remains elusive. This study aims to elucidate the molecular mechanism underlying the efficacy of GGLM in treating arrhythmia utilizing non-targeted metabolomics, widely-targeted metabolomics, and network pharmacology, subsequently validated through animal experiments. METHODS: Initially, network pharmacology analysis and widely-targeted metabolomics were performed on GGLM. Subsequent to that, rats were administered GGLM intervention, and nontargeted metabolomics assays were utilized to identify metabolites in rat plasma postadministration. The primary signaling pathways, core targets, and key active ingredients of GGLM influencing arrhythmia were identified. Additionally, to validate the therapeutic efficacy of GGLM on arrhythmia rat models, a rat model of rapid arrhythmia was induced via subcutaneous injection of isoproterenol, and alterations in pertinent pathogenic pathways and proteins in the rat model were assessed through qRT-PCR and Western blot following GGLM administration. RESULTS: The results of network pharmacology showed that 99 active ingredients in GGLM acted on 249 targets and 201 signaling pathways, which may be key to treating arrhythmia. Widelytargeted metabolic quantification analysis detected a total of 448 active ingredients in GGLM, while non-targeted metabolomics identified 279 different metabolites and 10 major metabolic pathways in rats. A comprehensive analysis of the above results revealed that the core key active ingredients of GGLM in treating arrhythmia include calycosin, licochalcone B, glabridin, naringenin, medicarpin, formononetin, quercetin, isoliquiritigenin, and resveratrol. These active ingredients mainly act on the relevant molecules and proteins upstream and downstream of the MAPK pathway to delay the onset of arrhythmia. Animal experimental results showed that the heart rate of rats in the model group increased significantly, and the mRNA and protein expression of p38, MAPK, JNK, ERK, NF-kb, IL-1ß, and IL-12 in myocardial tissue also increased significantly. However, after intervention with GGLM, the heart rate of rats in the drug group decreased significantly, while the mRNA and protein expression of p38 MAPK, JNK, ERK1, NF-kb, IL-1ß, and IL-12 in myocardial tissue decreased significantly. CONCLUSION: GGLM, as an adjunctive therapy in traditional Chinese medicine, exhibits favorable therapeutic efficacy against arrhythmia. This can be attributed to the abundant presence of bioactive compounds in the formulation, including verminin, glycyrrhizin B, glabridine, naringenin, ononin, quercetin, isorhamnetin, and kaempferol. The metabolites derived from these active ingredients have the potential to mitigate myocardial inflammation and decelerate heart rate by modulating the expression of proteins associated with the MAPK signaling pathway in vivo.

Routineness of Social Interactions Is Associated With Higher Affective Well-Being in Older Adults.

OBJECTIVES: Some research conceptualizes routineness of daily life as an indicator of cognitive vulnerability that would lead to lower well-being in older age, whereas other research expects routineness to give rise to more meaning and stability in life and thus to higher well-being. Further research is needed to understand routineness in older adults in relation to cognitive abilities and well-being. This study examined routineness of social interactions. METHODS: We examined data from an event-contingent experience sampling study with 103 Swiss community-dwelling older adults (aged 65 to 84 years). Participants completed in-lab cognitive assessments (reasoning, episodic memory, speed, and vocabulary) and reported their well-being (positive affect, negative affect, and life satisfaction). For more than 21 days, participants reported the time and context of their social interactions (including modality, partner type, and location). Routineness of social interactions was defined as social interactions that occurred at the same time of day over the study period. It was calculated using recurrence quantification analysis. RESULTS: Linear regressions showed that higher routineness of social interaction in general, of social interaction through the same modality, and of social interaction with the same partner type were associated with higher positive affect. Higher routineness of social interaction in general was associated with lower negative affect. Routineness of social interactions was not associated with life satisfaction or cognitive abilities. DISCUSSION: A routine social life may increase older adults' affective well-being. Results are discussed in the context of activity engagement and time use in older age.

A GRU-CNN model for auditory attention detection using microstate and recurrence quantification analysis.

Attention as a cognition ability plays a crucial role in perception which helps humans to concentrate on specific objects of the environment while discarding others. In this paper, auditory attention detection (AAD) is investigated using different dynamic features extracted from multichannel electroencephalography (EEG) signals when listeners attend to a target speaker in the presence of a competing talker. To this aim, microstate and recurrence quantification analysis are utilized to extract different types of features that reflect changes in the brain state during cognitive tasks. Then, an optimized feature set is determined by employing the processes of significant feature selection based on classification performance. The classifier model is developed by hybrid sequential learning that employs Gated Recurrent Units (GRU) and Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) into a unified framework for accurate attention detection. The proposed AAD method shows that the selected feature set achieves the most discriminative features for the classification process. Also, it yields the best performance as compared with state-of-the-art AAD approaches from the literature in terms of various measures. The current study is the first to validate the use of microstate and recurrence quantification parameters to differentiate auditory attention using reinforcement learning without access to stimuli.

The effects of Tai Chi on standing balance control in older adults may be attributed to the improvement of sensory reweighting and complexity rather than reduced sway velocity or amplitude.

Introduction: Tai Chi has proved to be an effective therapy for balance performance and cognition. However, non-consistency exists in the results of the effect of Tai Chi training on standing balance control in older adults. This study aimed to use traditional and non-traditional methods to investigate the effect of Tai Chi on standing balance in older adults. Methods: Thirty-six Tai Chi practitioners (TC group) and thirty-six older adults with no Tai Chi practice (control group) were recruited in this study. A Nintendo Wii Balance Board was used to record the center of pressure (COP) during standing balance over 20 s in the condition of eyes closed with three repetitions. The wavelet analysis, multiscale entropy, recurrence quantification analysis, and traditional methods were used to evaluate the standing balance control in the anterior-posterior (AP) and mediolateral (ML) directions. Results: (1) Greater sway mean velocity in the AP direction and sway Path length were found in the TC group compared with the control group; (2) lower Very-low frequency band (0.10-0.39 Hz) and higher Moderate frequency band (1.56-6.25 Hz) in the AP and ML directions were found in the TC group compared with the control group; (3) greater complexity index (CI) and lower determinism (DET) in the AP and ML directions were observed in the TC group compared with control group; (4) greater path length linked with smaller Very-low frequency band in the AP and ML directions and higher Moderate frequency band in the AP direction in both groups; (5) greater path length linked with lower DET and higher CI in the AP direction only in the TC group. Conclusion: Long-term Tai Chi practice improved sensory reweighting (more reliance on the proprioception system and less reliance on the vestibular system) and complexity of standing balance control in older adults. In addition, greater sway velocity may be as an exploratory role in standing balance control of TC older adults, which correlated with greater complexity, but no such significant relationship in the control group. Therefore, the effects of Tai Chi practice on standing balance control in older adults may be attributed to the improvement of sensory reweighting and complexity rather than reduced sway velocity or amplitude.

Deep-Learning-Enabled High-Fidelity Absorbance Spectra from Distorted Dual-Comb Absorption Spectroscopy for Gas Quantification Analysis.

Dual-comb absorption spectroscopy has been a promising technique in laser spectroscopy due to its intrinsic advantages over broad spectral coverage, high resolution, high acquisition speed, and frequency accuracy. However, two primary challenges, including etalon effects and complex baseline extraction, still severely hinder its implementation in recovering absorbance spectra and subsequent quantification analysis. In this paper, we propose a deep learning enabled processing framework containing etalon removal and baseline extraction modules to obtain absorbance spectra from distorted dual-comb absorption spectroscopy. The etalon removal module utilizes a typical U-net model, and the baseline extraction module consists of a modified U-net model with physical constraint and an adaptive iteratively reweighted penalized least squares method serving as refinement. The training datasets combine experimental baselines and simulated gas absorption with different concentrations, fully exploiting prior information on gas absorption features from the HITRAN database. In the simulated and experimental test, the CO2 absorbance spectrum covering 25 cm-1 shows high consistency with the HITRAN database, of which the mean absolute error is less than 1% of the maximum absorbance value, and the retrieved concentration has a relative error under 2%, outperforming traditional approaches and indicating the potential practicality of our data processing framework. Hopefully, with a larger network volume and proper datasets, this processing framework can be extended to precise quantification analysis in more comprehensive applications such as atmospheric measurement and industrial monitoring.

Exploring recurrence quantification analysis and fractal dimension algorithms for diagnosis of encephalopathy.

Electroencephalography (EEG) is a crucial non-invasive medical tool for diagnosing neurological disorder called encephalopathy. There is a requirement for powerful signal processing algorithms as EEG patterns in encephalopathies are not specific to a particular etiology. As visual examination and linear methods of EEG analysis are not sufficient to get the subtle information regarding various neuro pathologies, non-linear analysis methods can be employed for exploring the dynamic, complex and chaotic nature of EEG signals. This work aims identifying and differentiating the patterns specific to cerebral dysfunctions associated with Encephalopathy using Recurrence Quantification Analysis and Fractal Dimension algorithms. This study analysed six RQA features, namely, recurrence rate, determinism, laminarity, diagonal length, diagonal entropy and trapping time and comparing them with fractal dimensions, namely, Higuchi's and Katz's fractal dimension. Fractal dimensions were found to be lower for encephalopathy cases showing decreased complexity when compared to that of normal healthy subjects. On the other hand, RQA features were found to be higher for encephalopathy cases indicating higher recurrence and more periodic patterns in EEGs of encephalopathy compared to that of normal healthy controls. The feature reduction was then performed using Principal Component Analysis and fed to three promising classifiers: SVM, Random Forest and Multi-layer Perceptron. The resultant system provides a practically realizable pipeline for the diagnosis of encephalopathy.

Implementation of Fluorescent-Protein-Based Quantification Analysis in L-Form Bacteria.

Cell-wall-less (L-form) bacteria exhibit morphological complexity and heterogeneity, complicating quantitative analysis of them under internal and external stimuli. Stable and efficient labeling is needed for the fluorescence-based quantitative cell analysis of L-forms during growth and proliferation. Here, we evaluated the expression of multiple fluorescent proteins (FPs) under different promoters in the Bacillus subtilis L-form strain LR2 using confocal microscopy and imaging flow cytometry. Among others, Pylb-derived NBP3510 showed a superior performance for inducing several FPs including EGFP and mKO2 in both the wild-type and L-form strains. Moreover, NBP3510 was also active in Escherichia coli and its L-form strain NC-7. Employing these established FP-labeled strains, we demonstrated distinct morphologies in the L-form bacteria in a quantitative manner. Given cell-wall-deficient bacteria are considered protocell and synthetic cell models, the generated cell lines in our work could be valuable for L-form-based research.

The interacting partner as the immediate environment: Personality, interpersonal dynamics, and bodily synchronization.

OBJECTIVE: In social interactions, humans tend to naturally synchronize their body movements. We investigated interpersonal synchronization in conversations and examined its relationship with personality differences and post-interaction appraisals. METHOD: In a 15-minute semi-structured conversation, 56 previously-unfamiliar dyads introduced themselves, followed by self-disclosing and argumentative conversations. Their bodily movements were video-recorded in a standardized room (112 young adults, aged 18-33, mean = 20.54, SD = 2.74; 58% Dutch, 31% German, 11% other). Interpersonal bodily synchronization was estimated as (a) synchronization strength using Windowed Lagged Cross-Correlations and (b) Dynamic Organization (Determinism/Entropy/Laminarity/Mean Line) using Cross-Recurrence Quantification Analysis. Bodily synchronization was associated with differences in Agreeableness and Extraversion (IPIP-NEO-120) and post-conversational appraisals (affect/closeness/enjoyment) in mixed-effect models. RESULTS: Agreeable participants exhibited higher complexity in bodily synchronization dynamics (higher Entropy) than disagreeable individuals, who also reported more negative affect afterward. Interpersonal synchronization was stronger among extroverts than among introverts and extroverts appraised conversations as more positive and enjoyable. Bodily synchronization strength and dynamic organization were related to the type of conversation (self-disclosing/argumentative). CONCLUSIONS: Interpersonal dynamics were intimately connected to differences in Agreeableness and Extraversion, varied across situations, and these parameters affected how pleasant, close, and enjoyable each conversation felt.

Mother-infant social gaze dynamics relate to infant brain activity and word segmentation.

The 'social brain', consisting of areas sensitive to social information, supposedly gates the mechanisms involved in human language learning. Early preverbal interactions are guided by ostensive signals, such as gaze patterns, which are coordinated across body, brain, and environment. However, little is known about how the infant brain processes social gaze in naturalistic interactions and how this relates to infant language development. During free-play of 9-month-olds with their mothers, we recorded hemodynamic cortical activity of ´social brain` areas (prefrontal cortex, temporo-parietal junctions) via fNIRS, and micro-coded mother's and infant's social gaze. Infants' speech processing was assessed with a word segmentation task. Using joint recurrence quantification analysis, we examined the connection between infants' ´social brain` activity and the temporal dynamics of social gaze at intrapersonal (i.e., infant's coordination, maternal coordination) and interpersonal (i.e., dyadic coupling) levels. Regression modeling revealed that intrapersonal dynamics in maternal social gaze (but not infant's coordination or dyadic coupling) coordinated significantly with infant's cortical activity. Moreover, recurrence quantification analysis revealed that intrapersonal maternal social gaze dynamics (in terms of entropy) were the best predictor of infants' word segmentation. The findings support the importance of social interaction in language development, particularly highlighting maternal social gaze dynamics.

Analysis of dipeptides in Chinese liquors based on dansylation combined with liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry.

Dipeptides have been shown to be an important taste substance in alcoholic beverages. However, the characterization of dipeptides in Chinese liquors was poor. Here, dansylation combined with liquid chromatography - mass spectrometry was employed to analyze dipeptides in eight liquors of two flavors. Consequently, 35 dipeptides were identified from liquors and 32 of them were quantified. Dipeptide quantification showed LODs smaller than 2.5 ng/mL. The calibration curves showed concentration spans from two to three orders of magnitude with satisfactory linearity. The matrix effects in low and high concentrations were from -25.71 % to 24.19 % and -14.82 % to 20.73 %, respectively. Intra- and inter-day precision is lower than 15 % for both low and high concentrations. The dipeptide contents in sauce flavor liquors were higher than those in strong flavor liquors. Ala- and -Phe dipeptides showed their unique trends between sauce and strong flavor liquors. This study provides new clues to evaluate taste of liquors.

Recurrent Quantification Analysis Based Study of Wide-Field Calcium Imaging Data in Relation to Brain's Wake/Sleep Condition

Wide-Field Calcium Images (WFCI) directly reflect neuronal excitation, but their poor frame rate could be a drawback for time series analysis. This work was aimed at exploring the diagnostic capability retained by a time series obtained from calcium imaging data. To that purpose, we analyzed publicly available data from 2.88 hour continuous recordings of calcium images obtained from seven mice at different wake/sleep stages. Data were obtained from the Physionet portal and were submitted to Recurrence Quantification Analysis (RQA). The association between retrosplenial and parietal areas was also assessed. Nonlinear RQA analysis allowed to identify the right retrosplenial and parietal areas as particularly sensitive to changes in sleep walking condition. Specifically, our results suggested that the RQA feature lmean decreases in non-REM sleep_1 stage as compared to waking stage. Sleep (both sleep_1 stage and REM) apparently elicits an increase in the association between retrosplenial and parietal areas. Overall, these results suggest that RQA and association analysis are appropriate to assess modifications associated to changes in brain condition, in spite of the low sampling rate of WFCI signals.

Las Imágenes de Calcio de Campo Ancho (Wide-Field Calcium Images, WFCI) reflejan directamente la excitación neuronal, pero su escasa resolución temporal pudiera resultar un impedimento para el análisis de series temporales. El presente trabajo tuvo por finalidad explorar la capacidad diagnostica que retiene una serie temporal extraída de imágenes de calcio. Para ello, se estudió una base de datos disponible en la red que contiene registros de 2.88 horas de duración de imágenes de calcio correspondientes a 7 ratones transgénicos a diferentes estadios de sueño/vigilia. Los datos fueron descargados del portal Physionet y sometidos a Análisis de Cuantificación Recurrente (Recurrent Quantification Analysis, RQA). La asociación entre las áreas retrosplenial y parietal derechas fue también evaluada. El análisis no lineal mediante RQA permitió identificar las áreas retrosplenial y parietal derechas como zonas particularmente sensibles a cambios en el estado de sueño/vigilia. Específicamente, nuestros resultados sugieren que el índice l mean se redujo en el estadio 1 de sueño no REM en comparación con el estado de vigilia. El estado de sueño, tanto REM como no-REM aparentemente induce un reforzamiento en la apreciación entre las áreas retrosplenial y parietal derechas. En su conjunto, estos resultados apuntan que el análisis de RQA y de asociación entre áreas son pertinentes para sensar las modificaciones asociadas a cambios en el estado del cerebro, a pesar de la baja resolución temporal de las señales WFCI.

Unraveling dyadic psycho-physiology of social presence between strangers during an audio drama - a signal-analysis approach.

A mere co-presence of an unfamiliar person may modulate an individual's attentive engagement with specific events or situations to a significant degree. To understand better how such social presence affects experiences, we recorded a set of parallel multimodal facial and psychophysiological data with subjects (N = 36) who listened to dramatic audio scenes alone or when facing an unfamiliar person. Both a selection of 6 s affective sound clips (IADS-2) followed by a 27 min soundtrack extracted from a Finnish episode film depicted familiar and often intense social situations familiar from the everyday world. Considering the systemic complexity of both the chosen naturalistic stimuli and expected variations in the experimental social situation, we applied a novel combination of signal analysis methods using inter-subject correlation (ISC) analysis, Representational Similarity Analysis (RSA) and Recurrence Quantification Analysis (RQA) followed by gradient boosting classification. We report our findings concerning three facial signals, gaze, eyebrow and smile that can be linked to socially motivated facial movements. We found that ISC values of pairs, whether calculated on true pairs or any two individuals who had a partner, were lower than the group with single individuals. Thus, audio stimuli induced more unique responses in those subjects who were listening to it in the presence of another person, while individual listeners tended to yield a more uniform response as it was driven by dramatized audio stimulus alone. Furthermore, our classifiers models trained using recurrence properties of gaze, eyebrows and smile signals demonstrated distinctive differences in the recurrence dynamics of signals from paired subjects and revealed the impact of individual differences on the latter. We showed that the presence of an unfamiliar co-listener that modifies social dynamics of dyadic listening tasks can be detected reliably from visible facial modalities. By applying our analysis framework to a broader range of psycho-physiological data, together with annotations of the content, and subjective reports of participants, we expected more detailed dyadic dependencies to be revealed. Our work contributes towards modeling and predicting human social behaviors to specific types of audio-visually mediated, virtual, and live social situations.

Recurrence Quantification Analysis of Crowd Sound Dynamics.

When multiple individuals interact in a conversation or as part of a large crowd, emergent structures and dynamics arise that are behavioral properties of the interacting group rather than of any individual member of that group. Recent work using traditional signal processing techniques and machine learning has demonstrated that global acoustic data recorded from a crowd at a basketball game can be used to classify emergent crowd behavior in terms of the crowd's purported emotional state. We propose that the description of crowd behavior from such global acoustic data could benefit from nonlinear analysis methods derived from dynamical systems theory. Such methods have been used in recent research applying nonlinear methods to audio data extracted from music and group musical interactions. In this work, we used nonlinear analyses to extract features that are relevant to the behavioral interactions that underlie acoustic signals produced by a crowd attending a sporting event. We propose that recurrence dynamics measured from these audio signals via recurrence quantification analysis (RQA) reflect information about the behavioral dynamics of the crowd itself. We analyze these dynamics from acoustic signals recorded from crowds attending basketball games, and that were manually labeled according to the crowds' emotional state across six categories: angry noise, applause, cheer, distraction noise, positive chant, and negative chant. We show that RQA measures are useful to differentiate the emergent acoustic behavioral dynamics between these categories, and can provide insight into the recurrence patterns that underlie crowd interactions.

Gaze Restriction and Reactivation of Place-bound Content Drive Eye Movements During Mental Imagery.

When we imagine a picture, we move our eyes even though the picture is physically not present. These eye movements provide information about the ongoing process of mental imagery. Eye movements unfold over time, and previous research has shown that the temporal gaze dynamics of eye movements in mental imagery have unique properties, which are unrelated to those in perception. In mental imagery, refixations of previously fixated locations happen more often and in a more systematic manner than in perception. The origin of these unique properties remains unclear. We tested how the temporal structure of eye movements is influenced by the complexity of the mental image. Participants briefly saw and then maintained a pattern stimulus, consisting of one (easy condition) to four black segments (most difficult condition). When maintaining a simple pattern in imagery, participants restricted their gaze to a narrow area, and for more complex stimuli, eye movements were more spread out to distant areas. At the same time, fewer refixations were made in imagery when the stimuli were complex. The results show that refixations depend on the imagined content. While fixations of stimulus-related areas reflect the so-called 'looking at nothing' effect, gaze restriction emphasizes differences between mental imagery and perception.

Bimanual finger coordination in professional and amateur darbuka players.

Professional hand percussionists who play the darbuka (a drum from the Middle East) show fast and stable bimanual finger coordination compared to amateur players. A cross-recurrence quantification analysis clarifies how stable bimanual coordination is achieved by dissociating stochastic noise and attractor strength in the dynamic system. This study employed a cross-recurrence quantification analysis to examine professional and amateur darbuka players' fast and stable bimanual finger coordination. Eight professional and eight amateur percussion players participated in the study and played a darbuka with their right and left ring fingers, alternating as fast as possible for 12 s. We then analyzed the finger position data and calculated the stochastic noise and attractor strength from the density and the longest diagonal line in the recurrence plot, respectively. We used linear mixed-effects models to test whether stochastic noise and attractor strength differed between professional and amateur players. The results indicate that professional darbuka players achieve fast and stable bimanual finger coordination by enhancing attractor strength rather than reducing stochastic noise in the dynamic system.

MRI features of neuronal intranuclear inclusion disease, combining visual and quantitative imaging investigations.

OBJECTIVE: To observe the radiological characteristics of Neuronal Intranuclear Inclusion Disease (NIID) on lesion locations and diffusion property using quantitative imaging analysis. METHODS: Visual inspection and quantitative analyses were performed on MRI data from 31 retrospectively included patients with NIID. Frequency heatmaps of lesion locations on T2WI and DWI were generated using voxel-wise analysis. Gray matter volume (GMV), white matter volume (WMV) and diffusion property of apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) values of patients were voxel-wisely compared with healthy controls. Moreover, the ADC values within the DWI-detected lesion were compared with those within the adjacent cortical gray matter and white matter. Voxel-based lesion symptom mapping (VLSM) techniques, were used to determine the relationship between DWI lesion location and disease durations. RESULTS: By visual inspection on the imaging findings, we proposed an "cockscomb flower sign" for describing the radiological feature of DWI hyperintensity within the corticomedullary junction. A "T2WI-DWI mismatch of spatial distribution" pattern was also revealed with visual inspection and frequency heatmaps, for describing the feature of a wider lesion distribution covering white matter shown on T2WI than that on DWI. Voxel-based morphometry comparison revealed that wildly reduced GMV and WMV, both the lesion areas detected by DWI and T2WI demonstrated ADC increase in patients. Furthermore, the ADC values within the DWI-detected lesion were intermediate between the adjacent cortex and the deep white matter with highest ADC. VLSM analysis revealed that frontal lobe, parietal lobe and internal capsule damage were associated with higher NIID durations. CONCLUSION: NIID features with "cockscomb flower-like" DWI hyperintensity in area of corticomedullary junction, based on a "T2WI-DWI mismatch of spatial distribution" of lesion locations. The pathological substrate of corticomedullary junction hyperintensity on DWI, can not be explained as diffusion restriction. These typical radiological features of brain MRI would be helpful for diagnosis of NIID.

An exploration of actigraphy in the context of ketamine and treatment-resistant depression.

OBJECTIVES: This study explored the potential of non-parametric and complexity analysis metrics to detect changes in activity post-ketamine and their association with depressive symptomatology. METHODS: Individuals with treatment-resistant depression (TRD: n = 27, 16F, 35.9 ± 10.8 years) and healthy volunteers (HVs: n = 9, 4F, 36.4 ± 9.59 years) had their activity monitored during an inpatient, double-blind, crossover study where they received an infusion of ketamine or saline placebo. All participants were 18-65 years old, medication-free, and had a MADRS score ≥20. Non-parametric metrics averaged over each study day, metrics derived from complexity analysis, and traditionally calculated non-parametric metrics averaged over two weeks were calculated from the actigraphy time series. A separate analysis was conducted for a subsample (n = 17) to assess the utility of these metrics in a hospital setting. RESULTS: In HVs, lower intradaily variability was observed within daily rest/activity patterns post-ketamine versus post-placebo (F = 5.16(1,15), p = 0.04). No other significant effects of drug or drug-by-time or correlations between depressive symptomatology and activity were detected. CONCLUSIONS: Weak associations between non-parametric variables and ketamine were found but were not consistent across actigraphy measures. CLINICAL TRIAL REGISTRATION: ClinicalTrials.gov, NCT00088699.

A Methodological Framework to Study Change in Team Cognition Under the Dynamical Hypothesis.

The dynamical hypothesis claims that cognitive systems, such as teams, are dynamical systems (i.e., an interdependent collection of individuals and their technology that change together over time). Following this hypothesis, team researchers have adopted dynamical approaches to better understand the team cognitive processes and states that form team cognition, as well as how they emerge over time. One approach focuses on team coordination dynamics, which examines the coupling of signals between interacting individuals in various modalities, and has been shown to reflect aspects of team functioning including team cognition. However, how changes in team coordination relate to high-level team cognitive processes and states, as well as important events, are not yet fully understood. To this end, we advance a methodological framework for researching team cognition under the dynamical hypothesis. Subsequently, we provided an empirical case-study application of this framework. Thereby, this work contributes methodologically and empirically to a deeper understanding of team cognition, the dynamical hypothesis, and the synergy between them.