Social approach and avoidance in language: N400-like ERP negativity indexes congruency and theta rhythms the conflict.

Motivational congruency has been examined using tasks where participants perform approach or avoidance movements towards socially positive or negative faces. Language is tightly intertwined with interpersonal cognition. Thus, similar situations could be represented by means of language in interpersonal contexts: adjectives furnish valence to people (e.g. someone is cordial or arrogant), and attitudinal verbs define direction to relationship-actions: approach-avoidance (e.g. accept vs. reject). In an Electroencephalography (EEG) study, 40 participants were presented with sentences where a character was valenced (e.g. "Arthur is cordial/arrogant") before being the target of a relationship-actions ("Grisela welcomed/ignored Arthur at the party"). We analyzed both Event-related potential (ERP) amplitude and time-frequency power in response to the attitudinal verb. For ERP amplitudes, we found a significant cluster between 280 and 370 ms, covering part of the development of a N400-like ERP component. This cluster reflects an interaction driven by congruency between motivational direction and target valence. Likewise, time-frequency power analysis revealed an enhancement of theta rhythms under incongruent conditions, most likely indexing conflict processing. Results support that relationship-actions are represented as approach and avoidance and thus involve conflict processing and resolution of incongruent situations. Implications for the interweaving of affective language and social cognition within Embodiment Simulation Theory are discussed.

Regional accents modulate perspective in geographical space.

In this study, participants listened to first-person statements that mentioned a character who was approaching a geographical location close to (Tenerife, Canary Islands) or distant from the participant (Madrid, Spanish peninsula), pronounced with either the participants' local or a distal regional accent. Participants more often judged approaching statements as coherent when they refer to a close place pronounced with local accent or refer to a distant place with distal accent, rather than when they refer to a close place with distal accent or to a distant place with local accent. These results strongly suggest that the local accent induces listeners to keep their own geographical perspective, whereas the distal accent determines shifting to another's perspective. In sum, a subtle paralinguistic cue, the speaker's regional accent, modulates the participants' geographic perspective when they listen to identical first-person sentences with approaching deictic verbs.

Inhibitory Mechanisms in the Processing of Negations: A Neural Reuse Hypothesis.

Negation is known to have inhibitory consequences for the information under its scope. However, how it produces such effects remains poorly understood. Recently, it has been proposed that negation processing might be implemented at the neural level by the recruitment of inhibitory and cognitive control mechanisms. On this line, this manuscript offers the hypothesis that negation reuses general-domain mechanisms that subserve inhibition in other non-linguistic cognitive functions. The first two sections describe the inhibitory effects of negation on conceptual representations and its embodied effects, as well as the theoretical foundations for the reuse hypothesis. The next section describes the neurophysiological evidence that linguistic negation interacts with response inhibition, along with the suggestion that both functions share inhibitory mechanisms. Finally, the manuscript concludes that the functional relation between negation and inhibition observed at the mechanistic level could be easily integrated with predominant cognitive models of negation processing.

Motor-system dynamics during naturalistic reading of action narratives in first and second language.

Do embodied semantic systems play different roles depending on when and how well a given language was learned? Emergent evidence suggests that this is the case for isolated, decontextualized stimuli, but no study has addressed the issue considering naturalistic narratives. Seeking to bridge this gap, we assessed motor-system dynamics in 26 Spanish-English bilinguals as they engaged in free, unconstrained reading of naturalistic action texts (ATs, highlighting the characters' movements) and neutral texts (NTs, featuring low motility) in their first and second language (L1, L2). To explore functional connectivity spread over each reading session, we recorded ongoing high-density electroencephalographic signals and subjected them to functional connectivity analysis via a spatial clustering approach. Results showed that, in L1, AT (relative to NT) reading involved increased connectivity between left and right central electrodes consistently implicated in action-related processes, as well as distinct source-level modulations in motor regions. In L2, despite null group-level effects, enhanced motor-related connectivity during AT reading correlated positively with L2 proficiency and negatively with age of L2 learning. Taken together, these findings suggest that action simulations during unconstrained narrative reading involve neural couplings between motor-sensitive mechanisms, in proportion to how consolidated a language is. More generally, such evidence addresses recent calls to test the ecological validity of motor-resonance effects while offering new insights on their relation with experiential variables.

Rapid acquisition of novel written word-forms: ERP evidence.

BACKGROUND: Novel word acquisition is generally believed to be a rapid process, essential for ensuring a flexible and efficient communication system; at least in spoken language, learners are able to construct memory traces for new linguistic stimuli after just a few exposures. However, such rapid word learning has not been systematically found in visual domain, with different confounding factors obscuring the orthographic learning of novel words. This study explored the changes in human brain activity occurring online, during a brief training with novel written word-forms using a silent reading task RESULTS: Single-trial, cluster-based random permutation analysis revealed that training caused an extremely fast (after just one repetition) and stable facilitation in novel word processing, reflected in the modulation of P200 and N400 components, possibly indicating rapid dynamics at early and late stages of the lexical processing. Furthermore, neural source estimation of these effects revealed the recruitment of brain areas involved in orthographic and lexico-semantic processing, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: These results suggest the formation of neural memory traces for novel written word-forms after a minimal exposure to them even in the absence of a semantic reference, resembling the rapid learning processes known to occur in spoken language.

Presetting an inhibitory state modifies the neural processing of negated action sentences. An ERP study.

It has been proposed that understanding negated action sentences (You don't cut the bread) uses the neural networks of action inhibition. The evidence comes from studies in which affirmative or negative action language immediately preceded a Go/NoGo task. It was found that negation selectively modulates inhibition-related signatures of NoGo trials, supporting the Reusing Inhibition for Negation (RIN) hypothesis. To further explore this hypothesis, this study tested the reverse effects; namely, how presetting an inhibitory state affects the processing of negated action sentences. To this end, Go/NoGo responses preceded sentence reading and EEG activities were recorded throughout the entire trials. ERP results indicate that the presetting of inhibition by the NoGo cue induced a sustained modulation of waveform for negated action sentences relative to affirmative ones, which began shortly after the negation operator onset and remained beyond the action verb onset. Crucially, the estimated sources of such effect were the right inferior frontal gyrus and the left middle frontal gyrus, both relevant regions in the action inhibition circuitry. These results, complemented by previous findings, support the idea that action inhibition and negated action language share neural mechanisms and influence each other, thus confirming and extending the RIN hypothesis.

Facial attractiveness impressions precede trustworthiness inferences: lower detection thresholds and faster decision latencies.

Prior research has found a relationship between perceived facial attractiveness and perceived personal trustworthiness. We examined the time course of attractiveness relative to trustworthiness evaluation of emotional and neutral faces. This served to explore whether attractiveness might be used as an easily accessible cue and a quick shortcut for judging trustworthiness. Detection thresholds and judgment latencies as a function of expressive intensity were measured. Significant correlations between attractiveness and trustworthiness consistently held for six emotional expressions at four intensities, and neutral faces. Importantly, perceived attractiveness preceded perceived trustworthiness, with lower detection thresholds and shorter decision latencies. This reveals a time course advantage for attractiveness, and suggests that earlier attractiveness impressions could bias trustworthiness inferences. A heuristic cognitive mechanism is hypothesised to ease processing demands by relying on simple and observable clues (attractiveness) as a substitute for more complex and not easily accessible information (trustworthiness).

Neural time course and brain sources of facial attractiveness vs. trustworthiness judgment.

Prior research has shown that the more (or less) attractive a face is judged, the more (or less) trustworthy the person is deemed and that some common neural networks are recruited during facial attractiveness and trustworthiness evaluation. To interpret the relationship between attractiveness and trustworthiness (e.g., whether perception of personal trustworthiness may depend on perception of facial attractiveness), we investigated their relative neural processing time course. An event-related potential (ERP) paradigm was used, with localization of brain sources of the scalp neural activity. Face stimuli with a neutral, angry, happy, or surprised expression were presented in an attractiveness judgment, a trustworthiness judgment, or a control (no explicit social judgment) task. Emotional facial expression processing occurred earlier (N170 and EPN, 150-290 ms post-stimulus onset) than attractiveness and trustworthiness processing (P3b, 400-700 ms). Importantly, right-central ERP (C2, C4, C6) differences reflecting discrimination between "yes" (attractive or trustworthy) and "no" (unattractive or untrustworthy) decisions occurred at least 400 ms earlier for attractiveness than for trustworthiness, in the absence of LRP motor preparation differences. Neural source analysis indicated that facial processing brain networks (e.g., LG, FG, and IPL-extending to pSTS), also right-lateralized, were involved in the discrimination time course differences. This suggests that attractiveness impressions precede and might prime trustworthiness inferences and that the neural time course differences reflect truly facial encoding processes.

Ellagibacter isourolithinifaciens gen. nov., sp. nov., a new member of the family Eggerthellaceae, isolated from human gut.

Urolithins are gut microbial metabolites that exert health benefits in vivo and are generated from ellagic acid (EA) and ellagitannin-containing foods such as strawberries, pomegranates and walnuts. Gordonibacter species produce some intermediary urolithins but the micro-organisms responsible for the transformation of EA into the final and more bioactive urolithins, such as urolithin A and isourolithin A, are unknown. We report here a new bacterium, capable of metabolizing EA into isourolithin A, isolated from healthy human faeces and characterized by determining phenotypic, biochemical and molecular methods. Strain CEBAS 4A belongs to the Eggerthellaceae family and differed from other genera of this family, both phylogenetically and phenotypically. Based on 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity, the strain was related to Enterorhabdus musicola DSM 19490T (92.9 % similarity), Enterorhabdus caecimuris DSM 21839T (92.7 % similarity), Adlercreutzia equolifaciens DSM 19450T (92.5 % similarity), Asaccharobacter celatus DSM 18785T (92.5 % similarity) and Parvibacter caecicola DSM 22242T (91.2 % similarity). This strain was strictly anaerobic and Gram-stain-positive. The whole-cell fatty acids were saturated (98.3 %), a very high percentage that differs from the nearest genera ranging from 62 to 73 %. The major respiratory lipoquinone was menaquinone-7 and the diamino acid in the peptidoglycan was meso-diaminopimelic acid. Diphosphatidylglycerol and phosphatidylglycerol comprised the main polar lipid profile in addition to several phosphoglycolipids (PGL1-2), phospholipids (PL1-4), glycolipids (GL1-6) and lipids. Based on these data, a new genus, Ellagibacter gen. nov. is proposed with one species, Ellagibacter isourolithinifaciens sp. nov. The type strain of Ellagibacter isourolithinifaciens is CEBAS 4AT (=DSM 104140T=CCUG 70284T).

Sentential Negation Might Share Neurophysiological Mechanisms with Action Inhibition. Evidence from Frontal Theta Rhythm.

UNLABELLED: According to the literature, negations such as "not" or "don't" reduce the accessibility in memory of the concepts under their scope. Moreover, negations applied to action contents (e.g., "don't write the letter") impede the activation of motor processes in the brain, inducing "disembodied" representations. These facts provide important information on the behavioral and neural consequences of negations. However, how negations themselves are processed in the brain is still poorly understood. In two electrophysiological experiments, we explored whether sentential negation shares neural mechanisms with action monitoring or inhibition. Human participants read action-related sentences in affirmative or negative form ("now you will cut the bread" vs "now you will not cut the bread") while performing a simultaneous Go/NoGo task. The analysis of the EEG rhythms revealed that theta oscillations were significantly reduced for NoGo trials in the context of negative sentences compared with affirmative sentences. Given the fact that theta oscillations are often considered as neural markers of response inhibition processes, their modulation by negative sentences strongly suggests that negation uses neural resources of response inhibition. We propose a new approach that views the syntactic operator of negation as relying on the neural machinery of high-order action-monitoring processes. SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT: Previous studies have shown that linguistic negation reduces the accessibility of the negated concepts and suppresses the activation of specific brain regions that operate in affirmative statements. Although these studies focus on the consequences of negation on cognitive and neural processes, the proper neural mechanisms of negation have not yet been explored. In the present EEG study, we tested the hypothesis that negation uses the neural network of action inhibition. Using a Go/NoGo task embedded in a sentence comprehension task, we found that negation in the context of NoGo trials modulates frontal theta rhythm, which is usually considered a signature of action inhibition and control mechanisms.

Understanding approach and avoidance in verbal descriptions of everyday actions: An ERP study.

Understanding verbal descriptions of everyday actions could involve the neural representation of action direction (avoidance and approach) toward persons and things. We recorded the electrophysiological activity of participants while they were reading approach/avoidance action sentences that were directed toward a target: a thing/a person (i.e., "Petra accepted/rejected Ramón in her group"/ "Petra accepted/rejected the receipt of the bank"). We measured brain potentials time locked to the target word. In the case of things, we found a N400-like component with right frontal distribution modulated by approach/avoidance action. This component was more negative in avoidance than in approach sentences. In the case of persons, a later negative event-related potential (545-750 ms) with left frontal distribution was sensitive to verb direction, showing more negative amplitude for approach than avoidance actions. In addition, more negativity in approach-person sentences was associated with fear avoidance trait, whereas less negativity in avoidance-person sentences was associated with a greater approach trait. Our results support that verbal descriptions of approach/avoidance actions are encoded differently depending on whether the target is a thing or a person. Implications of these results for a social, emotional and motivational understanding of action language are discussed.

Brain signatures of perceiving a smile: Time course and source localization.

Facial happiness is consistently recognized faster than other expressions of emotion. In this study, to determine when and where in the brain such a recognition advantage develops, EEG activity during an expression categorization task was subjected to temporospatial PCA analysis and LAURA source localizations. Happy, angry, and neutral faces were presented either in whole or bottom-half format (with the mouth region visible). The comparison of part- versus whole-face conditions served to examine the role of the smile. Two neural signatures underlying the happy face advantage emerged. One peaked around 140 ms (left N140) and was source-located at the left IT cortex (MTG), with greater activity for happy versus non-happy faces in both whole and bottom-half face format. This suggests an enhanced perceptual encoding mechanism for salient smiles. The other peaked around 370 ms (P3b and N3) and was located at the right IT (FG) and dorsal cingulate (CC) cortices, with greater activity specifically for bottom-half happy versus non-happy faces. This suggests an enhanced recruitment of face-specific information to categorize (or reconstruct) facial happiness from diagnostic smiling mouths. Additional differential brain responses revealed a specific "anger effect," with greater activity for angry versus non-angry expressions (right N170 and P230; right pSTS and IPL); and a coarse "emotion effect," with greater activity for happy and angry versus neutral expressions (anterior P2 and posterior N170; vmPFC and right IFG).

Repeated Exposure to "meaningless" Pseudowords Modulates LPC, but Not N(FN)400.

Training readers to recognize pseudowords could decrease the processing differences between them and real words while clarifying the lexical acquisition processes. We analyze the effect of pseudoword repetition through the recording of EEG during a lexical decision task. Results showed a functional dissociation between two well-known ERP components: FN400 (Frontal N400, traditionally related to semantic processes) and LPC (Late Positive Complex, related to memory processes). On the one hand, FN400 was unaffected by pseudoword repetition and showed the typical lexicality effect. On the other hand, topographic and neural source analyses showed that LPC amplitude increased across repetitions, causing the lexicality effect to disappear, with the left inferior frontal, left superior temporal and right superior frontal gyri identified as the most likely neural sources. The lack of repetition effect on FN400 suggests that this component is unrelated to familiarity processes and is only influenced by semantic differences between stimuli. The LPC observations, however, reflect the construction and strengthening of visual memory traces for repeated pseudowords, facilitating their processing over the course of the task.

Brain lateralization of holistic versus analytic processing of emotional facial expressions.

This study investigated the neurocognitive mechanisms underlying the role of the eye and the mouth regions in the recognition of facial happiness, anger, and surprise. To this end, face stimuli were shown in three formats (whole face, upper half visible, and lower half visible) and behavioral categorization, computational modeling, and ERP (event-related potentials) measures were combined. N170 (150-180 ms post-stimulus; right hemisphere) and EPN (early posterior negativity; 200-300 ms; mainly, right hemisphere) were modulated by expression of whole faces, but not by separate halves. This suggests that expression encoding (N170) and emotional assessment (EPN) require holistic processing, mainly in the right hemisphere. In contrast, the mouth region of happy faces enhanced left temporo-occipital activity (150-180 ms), and also the LPC (late positive complex; centro-parietal) activity (350-450 ms) earlier than the angry eyes (450-600 ms) or other face regions. Relatedly, computational modeling revealed that the mouth region of happy faces was also visually salient by 150 ms following stimulus onset. This suggests that analytical or part-based processing of the salient smile occurs early (150-180 ms) and lateralized (left), and is subsequently used as a shortcut to identify the expression of happiness (350-450 ms). This would account for the happy face advantage in behavioral recognition tasks when the smile is visible.

Gordonibacter urolithinfaciens sp. nov., a urolithin-producing bacterium isolated from the human gut.

Urolithins are dibenzopyranone metabolites that exert anti-inflammatory activity in vivo and are produced by the gut microbiota from the dietary polyphenols ellagic acid (EA) and ellagitannins. However, the bacteria involved in this process remain unknown. We report here a novel bacterium, strain CEBAS 1/15P(T), capable of metabolizing EA to urolithins, that was isolated from healthy human faeces and characterized by determining phenotypic, biochemical and molecular methods. The strain was related to Gordonibacter pamelaeae 7-10-1-b(T), the type and only reported strain of the only species of the genus Gordonibacter, with about 97% 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity; they were both obligately anaerobic, non-spore-forming, Gram-stain-positive, short-rods/coccobacilli and metabolized only small numbers of carbon sources. L-Fucose, D-fructose, turanose, D-galacturonic acid and α-ketobutyric acid were metabolized by strain CEBAS 1/15P(T), while G. pamelaeae was negative for metabolism of these compounds. The whole-cell fatty acids consisted predominantly of saturated fatty acids (70%); strain CEBAS 1/15P(T) differed significantly from G. pamelaeae in the major fatty acid, which was C18 : 1ω9c, while anteiso-C15 : 0 was the major component for G. pamelaeae. The presence of a number of different fatty acid peaks, especially C19 : 0 cyclo and C18 : 1ω6c, was also indicative of distinct species. Six glycolipids (GL1-6) were recognized, while, in G. pamelaeae, only four glycolipids were described. On the basis of these data, the novel species Gordonibacter urolithinfaciens sp. nov. is described, with strain CEBAS 1/15P(T) ( = DSM 27213(T) = CCUG 64261(T)) as the type strain.

When does the brain distinguish between genuine and ambiguous smiles? An ERP study.

Event-related brain potentials (ERPs) were recorded to assess the processing time course of ambiguous facial expressions with a smiling mouth but neutral, fearful, or angry eyes, in comparison with genuinely happy faces (a smile and happy eyes) and non-happy faces (neutral, fearful, or angry mouth and eyes). Participants judged whether the faces looked truly happy or not. Electroencephalographic recordings were made from 64 scalp electrodes to generate ERPs. The neural activation patterns showed early P200 sensitivity (differences between negative and positive or neutral expressions) and EPN sensitivity (differences between positive and neutral expressions) to emotional valence. In contrast, sensitivity to ambiguity (differences between genuine and ambiguous expressions) emerged only in later LPP components. Discrimination of emotional vs. neutral affect occurs between 180 and 430ms from stimulus onset, whereas the detection and resolution of ambiguity takes place between 470 and 720ms. In addition, while blended expressions involving a smile with angry eyes can be identified as not happy in the P200 (175-240ms) component, smiles with fearful or neutral eyes produce the same ERP pattern as genuinely happy faces, thus revealing poor discrimination.

ERP evidence for emotion-specific congruency effects between sentences and new words with disgust and sadness connotations.

Introduction: The present study investigated how new words with acquired connotations of disgust and sadness, both negatively valenced but distinctive emotions, modulate the brain dynamics in the context of emotional sentences. Methods: Participants completed a learning session in which pseudowords were repeatedly paired with faces expressing disgust and sadness. An event-related potential (ERP) session followed the next day, in which participants received the learned pseudowords (herein, new words) combined with sentences and were asked to make emotional congruency judgment. Results: Sad new words elicited larger negative waveform than disgusting new words in the 146-228 ms time window, and emotionally congruent trials showed larger positive waveform than emotionally incongruent trials in the 304-462 ms time window. Moreover, the source localization in the latter suggested that congruent trials elicited larger current densities than incongruent trials in a number of emotion-related brain structures (e.g., the orbitofrontal cortex and cingulate gyrus) and language-related brain structures (e.g., the temporal lobe and the lingual gyrus). Discussion: These results suggested that faces are an effective source for the acquisition of words' emotional connotations, and such acquired connotations can generate semantic and emotional congruency effects in sentential contexts.

Diagnosis of Anaplasma marginale in cattle at the Iowa State University veterinary diagnostic laboratory 2003-2021.

Anaplasma marginale is a blood-borne rickettsia-like organism that infects cattle erythrocytes and causes anaplasmosis. This study reviews diagnostic data of all A. marginale diagnostics performed from 2003 to August 2021 in the Iowa State Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory. Typically, the referring veterinarian's initial tentative diagnosis was based on presenting clinical signs or necropsy findings. Confirmatory testing at the ISU-VDL consisted of light microscopy evaluation of stained blood smears or molecular diagnostic procedures. A total of 94 cases were submitted with tissue samples from deceased animals, of which 79 were from Iowa and 15 were from other states. The most typical gross lesions were widespread yellow adipose tissue and splenomegaly. Typical histopathological lesions included marked bile stasis and hemosiderin-laden macrophages in the liver and spleen, respectively. Starting in 2013, when PCR was implemented to confirm cases of anaplasmosis, 315/1125 (28%) were positive to A. marginale, and 810 were negative, using a cut-off of 35.0 Ct. The average (±SD) of the positive PCR Ct was 19.5 (±6.0), and the first and third quartiles were 14.9 and 23.4. Most cases occurred between August and November, peaking in September, whether from necropsies or positive blood samples by PCR. The most common tick observed in Iowa, Dermacentor variabilis, is likely the main vector for transmission. Further surveys should be conducted to estimate seroprevalence by geographical location, the density of cattle populations, distribution of known vectors according to season, and strains of A. marginale.

The negation-induced forgetting effect remains even after reducing associative interference.

Recent research has provided evidence that negation processing recruits the neural network of response inhibition (de Vega et al., 2016). Furthermore, inhibition mechanisms also play a role in human memory. In two experiments, we aimed to assess how producing a negation in a verification task may impact long-term memory. Experiment 1 used the same memory paradigm as Mayo et al. (2014), consisting of several phases: first, reading a story describing the activity of a protagonist, immediately followed by a "yes-no" verification task, then a distractive task, and finally an incidental free recall test. Consistent with the previous results, negated sentences were recalled worse than affirmed sentences. Yet, there is a possible confounding between the effect of negation itself and the associative interference of two conflicting predicates - the original and the modified one - in negative trials. To avoid this, Experiment 2 modified the paradigm by including a story describing the activities of two protagonists in such a way that the affirmed and denied verification sentences had the same content, and only differed in the attribution of a specific event to the correct or wrong protagonist. The negation-induced forgetting effect was still powerful, while controlling for potential contaminating variables. Our finding would support that the impaired long-term memory could be ascribed to reusing the inhibitory mechanism of negation.

Immunomodulation of the Vaginal Ecosystem by Ligilactobacillus salivarius CECT 30632 Improves Pregnancy Rates among Women with Infertility of Unknown Origin or Habitual Abortions.

In this study, the probiotic potential of Ligilactobacillus salivarius CECT 30632 was assessed, including properties specifically related with gynecological targets. This strain displayed co-aggregative and antimicrobial activity against a wide spectrum of vaginal pathogens while being respectful with the growth of vaginal lactobacilli. The strain produced a high concentration of lactic acid and displayed α-amylase activity when assayed in vitro. It showed a noticeable survival rate after exposition to conditions similar to those present in the human digestive tract and was adhesive to both vaginal and intestinal cells. Subsequently, their capacity to increase pregnancy rates among women with habitual abortion or infertility of unknown origin was studied. Administration of L. salivarius CECT 30632 (~9 log10 CFU) daily for a maximum of six months to these women was safe and led to a successful pregnancy rate of 67.5% (80% and 55% for women with repetitive abortion and infertile women, respectively). Significant differences in Nugent score, vaginal pH, and vaginal concentrations of lactobacilli, TGF-ß, and VEFG were observed when the samples collected before the intervention were compared with those collected after the treatment among those women who got pregnant. Therefore, this strain can modulate the vaginal ecosystem and lead to better fertility outcomes.