The effects of time,space and spectrum on auditory grouping in túngara frogs

Male túngara frogs (Physalaemus pustulosus) produce complex calls consisting of two components, a ~350 ms FM sweep called the “whine” followed by up to seven ~40 ms harmonic bursts called “chucks”. In order to choose and locate a calling male, females attending to choruses must group call components into auditory streams to correctly assign calls to their sources. Previously we showed that spatial cues play a limited role in grouping: calls with normal spectra and temporal structure are grouped over wide angular separations (≤135°). In this study we again use phonotaxis to first test whether an alternative cue, the sequence of call components, plays a role in auditory grouping and second, whether grouping is mediated by peripheral or central mechanisms. We found that while grouping is not limited to the natural call sequence, it does vary with the relative onset times of the two calls. To test whether overlapping stimulation in the periphery is required for grouping, the whine and chuck were filtered to restrict their spectra to the sensitivity ranges of the amphibian and basilar papillae, respectively. For these dichotic-like stimuli, grouping still occurred (albeit only to 45° separation), suggesting that stream formation is mediated by central mechanisms.     

基于净生产力生态足迹模型的工业碳排放效应、影响因素与情景模拟

以不同类型城市东营和滨州为例,采用基于净生产力的生态足迹模型测度2005—2014年两市工业碳排放效应,利用弹性系数模型对工业碳排放生态足迹及其影响因素进行对比,通过情景模拟分析了基准和低碳情景下两市的可持续低碳发展潜力。研究结果显示:(1)东营碳排放总量和碳排放强度明显高于滨州,两市的碳排放生态足迹总体上都处于上升趋势,年均增长率分别为12.79%和6.16%,这与两市工业化发展阶段不同有关;(2)2005—2008、2008—2011和2011—2014,东营工业碳排放生态足迹当量主导影响因素组合变化为"耕地面积-土地城镇化率-能源结构系数"转化为"耕地面积-人口规模-能源结构系数"到"耕地面积-人口规模-第二产业比重";滨州2005—2014年的主导因素组合一直为"人口规模-土地城镇化率-能源结构系数";(3)通过情景模拟分析2020年东营、滨州的低碳发展潜力:基准和低碳情景下,滨州生态赤字分别为东营的10倍和2.6倍;就"减排"潜力而言,滨州远远高于东营,但实现低碳情景是工业GDP增长从现阶段20.6%骤降到6.5%为代价,对产业结构调整升级要求很高。对东营而言,低碳情景的实现不仅要将能源利用效率提高一倍,更要保证大量重要"碳汇"资源的恢复与重建。     

场景的一致性效应及其机制

有关场景一致性效应的研究发现,人们对与背景语义一致的前景物体的命名、分类、搜索和再认等都快于与背景不一致的物体.和与情境一致的物体相比,与情境不一致的物体在中央顶区等部位,会诱发一个幅度更大的负波(N390).旁海马皮层/旁海马位置区(PHC/PPA)和压部后皮层(RSC)是负责场景加工的重要脑区.场景一致性效应的时间进程可能首先由低空间分辨率(LSF)信息激活眶额皮层(OFC)(130 ms左右)、PHC/PPA和RSC,之后LSF信息与高空间分辨率(HSF)信息在颞叶进行整合.在诸多理论模型中,情境促进模型从生理角度对一致性效应作了较充分的解释.     

Blow fly artifacts from blood and putrefaction fluid on various surfaces: a source for forensic STR typing

Adult blow flies can deposit small spots (‘artifacts’) containing biological fluids like blood on various surfaces at a crime scene, either by regurgitation or defecation, and thereby create new or modify existing stains. These minute traces may represent evidence for the past presence of a certain person or victim in crime scene scenarios where nobody is present or all other crime‐related biological traces have been cleaned up. We analyzed artifacts on crime scene relevant surfaces (glass, wood, concrete, wallpaper, carpet, plastic wrap), produced by the forensically important blow fly Calliphora vicina Robineau‐Desvoidy (Diptera: Calliphoridae) after ingesting fresh and degraded porcine blood as well as putrefaction fluid from a pig's trotter and evaluated the potential of these spots for short tandem repeat (STR) analysis at various time intervals after deposition. Genotyping was possible on single fly artifacts on all surfaces up to 300 days after deposition by the flies after both blood or putrefaction fluid intake. The results indicate that the suitability for STR typing of those spots mainly depends on the time since deposition. The activity of flies at a crime scene can lead to artifacts which are – even 300 days after deposition – a valuable source of case‐related DNA. Sometimes those traces may even be the only source of information for DNA profiling.     

Listening to speech in the presence of other sounds

Although most research on the perception of speech has been conducted with speech presented without any competing sounds, we almost always listen to speech against a background of other sounds which we are adept at ignoring. Nevertheless, such additional irrelevant sounds can cause severe problems for speech recognition algorithms and for the hard of hearing as well as posing a challenge to theories of speech perception. A variety of different problems are created by the presence of additional sound sources: detection of features that are partially masked, allocation of detected features to the appropriate sound sources and recognition of sounds on the basis of partial information. The separation of sounds is arousing substantial attention in psychoacoustics and in computer science. An effective solution to the problem of separating sounds would have important practical applications.     

The human brain uses spatial schemas to represent segmented environments

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