Design of Sub wavelength-Grating-Coupled Fano Resonance Sensor in Mid-infrared

Plasmonics - By introducing the sub-wavelength grating (SWG) waveguide in the long-range surface phonon resonance (LRSPhR) device, a mid-infrared Fano resonance is formed due to the coupling...     

Feeding Kinematics and Nectar Intake of the Honey Bee Tongue

Most flower-visiting insects employ highly-evolved organs to feed themselves rapidly and efficiently on the floral nectar. A honey bee drives its segmented tongue (glossa) covered by dense hairs reciprocatingly to load nectar. A high-speed camera system ameliorated by a microscope revealed morphological changes in glossal surfaces during live honey bees’ nectar dipping and surface configurations through the stretching of postmortem honey bees’ glossae. Both the in vivo and postmortem observations reveal that shortening and lengthening of the glossal segments perform high concordance with the erection of glossal hairs, which aids in developing deformable gaps between rows of glossal hairs during nectar trapping. A model was proposed to evaluate the nectar-intake volume considering the experimentally-measured average erection angle and tongue elongation length during nectar feeding. The theoretical results fit the experimental data well and disclose that these two factors contribute to an augmentation of nectar-intake observably. We also theoretically present that the extendible and deformable glossae have advantages for the polylectic feeding behavior.     

Altered Resting-State Amygdala Functional Connectivity after 36 Hours of Total Sleep Deprivation

Objectives

Recent neuroimaging studies have identified a potentially critical role of the amygdala in disrupted emotion neurocircuitry in individuals after total sleep deprivation (TSD). However, connectivity between the amygdala and cerebral cortex due to TSD remains to be elucidated. In this study, we used resting-state functional MRI (fMRI) to investigate the functional connectivity changes of the basolateral amygdala (BLA) and centromedial amygdala (CMA) in the brain after 36 h of TSD.

Materials and Methods

Fourteen healthy adult men aged 25.9±2.3 years (range, 18–28 years) were enrolled in a within-subject crossover study. Using the BLA and CMA as separate seed regions, we examined resting-state functional connectivity with fMRI during rested wakefulness (RW) and after 36 h of TSD.

Results

TSD resulted in a significant decrease in the functional connectivity between the BLA and several executive control regions (left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex [DLPFC], right dorsal anterior cingulate cortex [ACC], right inferior frontal gyrus [IFG]). Increased functional connectivity was found between the BLA and areas including the left posterior cingulate cortex/precuneus (PCC/PrCu) and right parahippocampal gyrus. With regard to CMA, increased functional connectivity was observed with the rostral anterior cingulate cortex (rACC) and right precentral gyrus.

Conclusion

These findings demonstrate that disturbance in amygdala related circuits may contribute to TSD psychophysiology and suggest that functional connectivity studies of the amygdala during the resting state may be used to discern aberrant patterns of coupling within these circuits after TSD.     

Combination of Surface Plasmon Polaritons and Subwavelength Grating for Polarization Beam Splitting

Plasmonics - A polarization beam splitter (PBS) based on the plasmonic subwavelength grating (PSWG) is proposed and investigated. The PBS is composed by a directional coupler with a PSWG as the...     

Sensitivity Enhancement of Ag-ITO-TMDCs-Graphene Nanostructure Based on Surface Plasmon Resonance Biosensors

Plasmonics - The novel configuration of surface plasmon resonance (SPR) based on Ag-indium tin oxide (ITO)-transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDCs)-graphene hybrid structures is proposed for highly...     

Comprehensive Study of Phase-Sensitive SPR Sensor Based on Metal–ITO Hybrid Multilayer

Plasmonics - Surface plasmon resonance (SPR) biosensor is widely used for its high precision and real-time analysis. In this paper, SPR biosensor based on the hybrid structure of metal–indium...     

Genome-wide association mapping of agronomic and morphologic traits in highly structured populations of barley cultivars

Genome-wide association study (GWAS) has become an obvious general approach for studying traits of agricultural importance in higher plants, especially crops. Here, we present a GWAS of 32 morphologic and 10 agronomic traits in a collection of 615 barley cultivars genotyped by genome-wide polymorphisms from a recently developed barley oligonucleotide pool assay. Strong population structure effect related to mixed sampling based on seasonal growth habit and ear row number is present in this barley collection. Comparison of seven statistical approaches in a genome-wide scan for significant associations with or without correction for confounding by population structure, revealed that in reducing false positive rates while maintaining statistical power, a mixed linear model solution outperforms genomic control, structured association, stepwise regression control and principal components adjustment. The present study reports significant associations for sixteen morphologic and nine agronomic traits and demonstrates the power and feasibility of applying GWAS to explore complex traits in highly structured plant samples.     

基于Illumina MiSeq测序平台分析长期不同施肥处理对黑土真菌群落的影响

【目的】不合理施肥所引发的土壤环境问题逐渐成为制约我国农业可持续发展的重要因素之一,土壤真菌作为一类重要的土壤微生物,研究长期施肥对土壤真菌多样性及群落分布格局,探讨其理化因子对真菌群落结构的影响具有一定意义。【方法】本研究以东北黑土玉米田长期定位施肥试验(1984–2017)为基础,通过常规分析和Illumina Mi Seq高通量测序技术,分析长期施肥对黑土玉米田土壤养分含量和真菌群落结构变化的影响。【结果】长期施用氮肥明显降低土壤p H,却增加了玉米产量,秸秆与化肥配施可以增加土壤有机质和全氮的含量。稀释曲线结果表明长期施肥降低了土壤真菌序列的丰度和均匀度,并且在秸秆与化肥配施中序列数最低;在优势菌群中,共检测出5个已知真菌门,分别是子囊菌门(Ascomycota)、担子菌门(Basidiomycota)、接合菌门(Zygomycota)、球囊菌门(Glomeromycota)和壶菌门(Chytridiomycota),子囊菌门占总序列平均值的57.0%,并且在氮磷钾配施高量秸秆有机肥(NPK+S0.5)的土壤中,子囊菌门丰度高达70.35%。在土壤真菌属水平的物种丰度分析中,共检测出109个已知真菌属,Humicola、Fusarium、Verticillium、Mortierella这4个菌属为优势菌属;Chaetomium、Trichocladium、Podospora、Preussia 4个菌属在秸秆与化肥配施处理中丰度较高,并同属一个分支聚类。从多样性指数分析得出,秸秆与化肥配施可以增加物种丰度和群落多样性;从热图分析可知,施用氮肥和不施用氮肥处理间真菌群落组成存在明显差异。RDA分析中,土壤理化性质影响着土壤真菌群落结构,尤其是土壤的p H、全量氮磷钾(T-N、T-P、T-K)、有效磷钾(A-P、A-K)和铵态氮(NH4+-N)浓度是重要环境因素。【结论】因此,施用氮肥虽然增加了产量,但也造成土壤酸化,真菌数量增加,其丰富度和多样性明显降低。而秸秆与化肥配施可以维持土壤健康生态环境和真菌群落多样性。     

Atypically larger variability of resource allocation accounts for visual working memory deficits in schizophrenia

Working memory (WM) deficits have been widely documented in schizophrenia (SZ), and almost all existing studies attributed the deficits to decreased capacity as compared to healthy control (HC) subjects. Recent developments in WM research suggest that other components, such as precision, also mediate behavioral performance. It remains unclear how different WM components jointly contribute to deficits in schizophrenia. We measured the performance of 60 SZ (31 females) and 61 HC (29 females) in a classical delay-estimation visual working memory (VWM) task and evaluated several influential computational models proposed in basic science of VWM to disentangle the effect of various memory components. We show that the model assuming variable precision (VP) across items and trials is the best model to explain the performance of both groups. According to the VP model, SZ exhibited abnormally larger variability of allocating memory resources rather than resources or capacity per se. Finally, individual differences in the resource allocation variability predicted variation of symptom severity in SZ, highlighting its functional relevance to schizophrenic pathology. This finding was further verified using distinct visual features and subject cohorts. These results provide an alternative view instead of the widely accepted decreased-capacity theory and highlight the key role of elevated resource allocation variability in generating atypical VWM behavior in schizophrenia. Our findings also shed new light on the utility of Bayesian observer models to characterize mechanisms of mental deficits in clinical neuroscience.