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ArXiv Sep 2023When choosing between options, we must associate their values with the action needed to select them. We hypothesize that the brain solves this binding problem through...
When choosing between options, we must associate their values with the action needed to select them. We hypothesize that the brain solves this binding problem through neural population subspaces. To test this hypothesis, we examined neuronal responses in five reward-sensitive regions in macaques performing a risky choice task with sequential offers. Surprisingly, in all areas, the neural population encoded the values of offers presented on the left and right in distinct subspaces. We show that the encoding we observe is sufficient to bind the values of the offers to their respective positions in space while preserving abstract value information, which may be important for rapid learning and generalization to novel contexts. Moreover, after both offers have been presented, all areas encode the value of the first and second offers in orthogonal subspaces. In this case as well, the orthogonalization provides binding. Our binding-by-subspace hypothesis makes two novel predictions borne out by the data. First, behavioral errors should correlate with putative spatial (but not temporal) misbinding in the neural representation. Second, the specific representational geometry that we observe across animals also indicates that behavioral errors should increase when offers have low or high values, compared to when they have medium values, even when controlling for value difference. Together, these results support the idea that the brain makes use of semi-orthogonal subspaces to bind features together.
PubMed: 37744462
DOI: No ID Found -
Sheng Wu Gong Cheng Xue Bao = Chinese... Nov 2022The mission of all institutes under Chinese Academy of Sciences focuses on frontier science and applied technology to address the challenges for country's development...
The mission of all institutes under Chinese Academy of Sciences focuses on frontier science and applied technology to address the challenges for country's development and world sustainable development. Here, I summarize the founding and development of Tianjin Institute of Industrial Biotechnology of Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), originated from Institute of Microbiology of CAS. The journey reflects the advances of industrial biotechnology in China. By considering the relationships among science, technology and engineering, I propose that scientists involved in basic research should develop a logical thinking of "idea-hypothesis-experiment-concept-paper-technology- sample-product-commercial goods", from which great solutions that tackle real problems can be developed. This is the logic from basic research to applied science.
Topics: Industrial Development; Industry; China; Biotechnology
PubMed: 37699672
DOI: 10.13345/j.cjb.220861 -
BMJ Open Sep 2023The development of learning health systems (LHSs) has often focused on optimally leveraging data. More attention should be paid to patient and public involvement or...
INTRODUCTION
The development of learning health systems (LHSs) has often focused on optimally leveraging data. More attention should be paid to patient and public involvement or community engagement in forming learning communities that work together to build LHS. This scoping review aims to identify facilitators of and barriers to involving patients and the public in building LHSs in community health services settings.
METHODS AND ANALYSIS
We will use the Joanna Briggs Institute's scoping review methodology. We will review literature in English published from 1 January 2007 to 31 December 2022. The databases that will be searched are MEDLINE, CINAHL, Embase, Web of Science, Scopus, AgeLine, PsycINFO and Web of Science. Key inclusion and exclusion criteria include the following: we will only consider a learning community in a community health services context (eg, home care, long-term care, primary care); we will exclude literature on acute care settings; and we will consider any research designs apart from big data analytics. We will review all sources, including university student theses and dissertations. The review will proceed in three steps: (1) we will identify keywords and index terms from the MEDLINE and CINAHL databases; (2) using the keywords and index terms identified in step (1), we will search other databases and (3) we will handsearch the reference lists of the selected literature and will search for grey literature using Google. Two research assistants will screen the titles and abstracts separately, with reference to the inclusion criteria. Two researchers will then assess the full text of selected studies, also in reference to the inclusion criteria. We will present the findings in a charting table and provide a narrative summary.
ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION
This work does not require ethics approval because the data for this scoping review are publicly available. The findings will be presented in a journal article and at conferences.
Topics: Humans; Learning Health System; Community Health Services; Patients; Home Care Services; Critical Care; Review Literature as Topic
PubMed: 37699624
DOI: 10.1136/bmjopen-2023-073837 -
Sheng Wu Yi Xue Gong Cheng Xue Za Zhi =... Aug 2023Single-cell transcriptome sequencing (scRNA-seq) can resolve the expression characteristics of cells in tissues with single-cell precision, enabling researchers to... (Review)
Review
Single-cell transcriptome sequencing (scRNA-seq) can resolve the expression characteristics of cells in tissues with single-cell precision, enabling researchers to quantify cellular heterogeneity within populations with higher resolution, revealing potentially heterogeneous cell populations and the dynamics of complex tissues. However, the presence of a large number of technical zeros in scRNA-seq data will have an impact on downstream analysis of cell clustering, differential genes, cell annotation, and pseudotime, hindering the discovery of meaningful biological signals. The main idea to solve this problem is to make use of the potential correlation between cells and genes, and to impute the technical zeros through the observed data. Based on this, this paper reviewed the basic methods of imputing technical zeros in the scRNA-seq data and discussed the advantages and disadvantages of the existing methods. Finally, recommendations and perspectives on the use and development of the method were provided.
Topics: Cluster Analysis; Transcriptome
PubMed: 37666769
DOI: 10.7507/1001-5515.202301009 -
Zeitschrift Fur Erziehungswissenschaft... 2023This article investigated the factors that lead adolescents to pursue a trial apprenticeship profession in their career choice process. Gottfredson's Theory of...
[The completion of trial apprenticeships is followed by the choice of an apprenticeship profession: Predicting the decision to pursue a trial apprenticeship profession in the career choice process].
This article investigated the factors that lead adolescents to pursue a trial apprenticeship profession in their career choice process. Gottfredson's Theory of Circumscription, Compromise, and Self-Creation (TCCSC) served as the theoretical basis for the analyses. A longitudinal sample of 128 female and 202 male adolescents who completed standardized questionnaires in seventh and ninth grades and who indicated that they would begin vocational education and training after compulsory schooling was analyzed separately by gender. Regression models showed that the number of apprenticeship positions has the strongest effect for both female and male adolescents (significant positive effect). Only for female adolescents, the extent of enterprising requirements of the trial apprenticeship profession was shown to have a negative effect on the decision to pursue a trial apprenticeship profession, controlling for the number of apprenticeship positions. The results support the accessibility hypothesis postulated in the TCCSC, according to which individuals are more likely to pursue professions they perceive as more accessible, i.e., with a large number of apprenticeship positions. In light of the compatibility idea contained in the TCCSC, a possible explanation for the negative effect of enterprising requirements of trial apprenticeship professions among female adolescents is that they may assess their enterprising skills as too low. As a result, they perceive professions with high enterprising requirements as incompatible and turn away from these professions. This study was able to address a gap in career choice research by examining the role of trial apprenticeship professions and offers important reference points for future research.
PubMed: 37662069
DOI: 10.1007/s11618-023-01174-8 -
Philosophical Transactions of the Royal... Oct 2023, if we are to do so in a way that is sensible, begins at the root. All too often, we jump to discussing specific postulated causes but do not first consider what we... (Review)
Review
, if we are to do so in a way that is sensible, begins at the root. All too often, we jump to discussing specific postulated causes but do not first consider what we mean by, for example, of obesity or how we discern whether something is a cause. In this paper, we address what we mean by a cause, discuss what might and might not constitute a reasonable causal model in the abstract, speculate about what the causal structure of obesity might be like overall and the types of things we should be looking for, and finally, delve into methods for evaluating postulated causes and estimating causal effects. We offer the view that different meanings of the concept of causal factors in obesity research are regularly being conflated, leading to confusion, unclear thinking and sometimes nonsense. We emphasize the idea of different kinds of studies for evaluating various aspects of causal effects and discuss experimental methods, assumptions and evaluations. We use analogies from other areas of research to express the plausibility that only inelegant solutions will be truly informative. Finally, we offer comments on some specific postulated causal factors. This article is part of a discussion meeting issue 'Causes of obesity: theories, conjectures and evidence (Part II)'.
Topics: Humans; Research Design; Causality; Obesity
PubMed: 37661742
DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2022.0227 -
Zhongguo Yi Xue Ke Xue Yuan Xue Bao.... Aug 2023Immune-mediated dermatoses are the skin diseases caused by the breakdown of immune tolerance,including lupus erythematosus and dermatomyositis.The imbalance between... (Review)
Review
Immune-mediated dermatoses are the skin diseases caused by the breakdown of immune tolerance,including lupus erythematosus and dermatomyositis.The imbalance between regulatory T cells (Tregs) and effector T cells (Teffs) plays a key role in the pathogenesis of these diseases.Low-dose interleukin-2 can preferentially activate Tregs and reverse the imbalance between Tregs and Teffs to recover the immune tolerance,which has attracted attention in the treatment of immune-mediated dermatoses.This review summarizes the research progress in the immunomodulatory mechanism and clinical application of low-dose interleukin-2 in immune-mediated dermatoses,providing a new idea for the clinical treatment of these diseases.
Topics: Humans; Interleukin-2; Lupus Erythematosus, Systemic; T-Lymphocytes, Regulatory; Skin Diseases
PubMed: 37654150
DOI: 10.3881/j.issn.1000-503X.15198 -
The Journal of Organic Chemistry Sep 2023The worthwhile idea of whether amine-like catenated nitrogen compounds are stable enough to be used as high-energy materials was proposed and answered. Abstracting the...
The worthwhile idea of whether amine-like catenated nitrogen compounds are stable enough to be used as high-energy materials was proposed and answered. Abstracting the NH structure into NR (R is the substituent) yields a new class of amine-like catenated nitrogen compounds. Most of the azole ring structures have a high nitrogen content and stability. Inspired by this idea, a series of new amine-like catenated nitrogen compounds ( to ) were designed, and their basic energetic properties were calculated. The results showed that (1) amine-like molecular structures are often characterized by low density; however, the density of these compounds increases as the number of nitrogens in the azole ring increases; (2) these catenated nitrogen compounds generally have extremely high enthalpies of formation (882.91-2652.03 kJ/mol), and the detonation velocity of some compounds exceeds 9254.00 m/s; (3) the detonation performance of amine-like catenated nitrogen compounds designed based on imidazole and pyrazole rings is poor due to their low nitrogen content; and (4) the bond dissociation enthalpy of trigger bonds of most compounds is higher than 84 kJ/mol, indicating that these compounds have a certain thermodynamic stability. In summary, amine-like catenated nitrogen compounds have the potential to become energetic compounds with excellent detonation properties and should be considered to be synthesized by experimental chemists.
PubMed: 37590038
DOI: 10.1021/acs.joc.3c01225 -
Frontiers in Human Neuroscience 2023The left ventral occipitotemporal cortex has been traditionally viewed as a pathway for visual object recognition including written letters and words. Its crucial role... (Review)
Review
The left ventral occipitotemporal cortex has been traditionally viewed as a pathway for visual object recognition including written letters and words. Its crucial role in reading was strengthened by the studies on the functionally localized "Visual Word Form Area" responsible for processing word-like information. However, in the past 20 years, empirical studies have challenged the assumptions of this brain region as processing exclusively visual or even orthographic stimuli. In this review, we aimed to present the development of understanding of the left ventral occipitotemporal cortex from the visually based letter area to the modality-independent symbolic language related region. We discuss theoretical and empirical research that includes orthographic, phonological, and semantic properties of language. Existing results showed that involvement of the left ventral occipitotemporal cortex is not limited to unimodal activity but also includes multimodal processes. The idea of the integrative nature of this region is supported by the broad functional and structural connectivity with language-related and attentional brain networks. We conclude that although the function of the area is not yet fully understood in human cognition, its role goes beyond visual word form processing. The left ventral occipitotemporal cortex seems to be crucial for combining higher-level language information with abstract forms that convey meaning independently of modality.
PubMed: 37576470
DOI: 10.3389/fnhum.2023.1199366 -
Cancers Jul 2023The term "oligometastasis" represents a relatively novel idea, which denotes a condition characterized by cancer dissemination with a limited number of lesions (usually...
The term "oligometastasis" represents a relatively novel idea, which denotes a condition characterized by cancer dissemination with a limited number of lesions (usually fewer than five). The aim of the present study is to report a bibliometric analysis of the oligometastatic disease/state, incorporating all relevant studies on the topic for more than 20 years. The research strategy included at least one the terms "Oligmetastases", "Oligometastasis", "Oligometastatic", "Oligoprogression, "Oligoprogressive", "Oligorecurrent", or "Oligorecurrency" in the title, abstract, and/or keywords. All English-language documents from 1 January 1995 (the year of the earliest available document in Scopus) to 31 December 2022 were considered for the analysis. R code (R version 4.2.0) with R Studio (version 2022.12.0-353) and the Bibliometrix package (version 4.0.1) were used for the analysis. A total of 3304 documents, mainly articles ( = 2083, 63.0%) and reviews ( = 813, 24.6%), were collected from 1995 to 2022. The average annual growth rate of literature on the topic was 26.7%. Overall 15,176 authors published on the topic, with an average of eight authors/publication. From 1995, 69 countries contributed to the literature, with the USA and Italy being the top contributors. Among all keywords used by authors, the top three were oligometastases (19%), SBRT (18%), and radiation therapy (8%). Themes regarding "locoregional treatment", "organ motion", and "immunotherapy" were the most recent trend topics, mainly developed from 2019 to 2022, while "high-dose chemotherapy", "whole-brain radiotherapy", and "metastatic breast cancer" saw their main development during 2009-2018. Our study shows the exceptionally flourishing scientific production on the oligometastatic state, summarizing the most influential studies and highlighting the future developments and interests. This analysis will serve as a benchmark to identify this area for the attention of researchers worldwide and contribute to the increasing scientific work.
PubMed: 37568718
DOI: 10.3390/cancers15153902