An increasing number of research teams are investigating the efficacy of brain-computer interface (BCI)-mediated interventions for promoting motor recovery following stroke. A growing body of evidence suggests that of the various BCI designs, most effective are those that deliver functional electrical stimulation (FES) of upper extremity (UE) muscles contingent on movement intent. More specifically, BCI-FES interventions utilize algorithms that isolate motor signals—user-generated intent-to-move neural activity recorded from cerebral cortical motor areas—to drive electrical stimulation of individual muscles or muscle synergies. BCI-FES (...) interventions aim to recover sensorimotor function of an impaired extremity by facilitating and/or inducing long-term motor learning-related neuroplastic changes in appropriate control circuitry. We developed a non-invasive, electroencephalogram (EEG)-based BCI-FES system that delivers closed-loop neural activity-triggered electrical stimulation of targeted distal muscles while providing the user with multimodal sensory feedback. This BCI-FES system consists of three components: (1) EEG acquisition and signal processing to extract real-time volitional and task-dependent neural command signals from cerebral cortical motor areas, (2) FES of muscles of the impaired hand contingent on the motor cortical neural command signals, and (3) multimodal sensory feedback associated with performance of the behavioral task, including visual information, linked activation of somatosensory afferents through intact sensorimotor circuits, and electro-tactile stimulation of the tongue. In this report, we describe device parameters and intervention protocols of our BCI-FES system which, combined with standard physical rehabilitation approaches, has proven efficacious in treating UE motor impairment in stroke survivors, regardless of level of impairment and chronicity. (shrink)

Geography's nature and perspectives -- Spaces -- Places -- Nature and society -- Why we all need geography -- Coda -- Notes -- Further reading -- Index.

This article is a discussion of the intersection between curriculum theory and agential realism as it emerged in the development of a curriculum theory course. During the process of designing such a course, I found myself wrestling with the different theoretical understandings of curriculum. What I came to realize was that while all of the theories I encountered have merits, none individually seem to capture the whole of what researchers/teachers understand to be curriculum as they encounter it in the classroom. (...) Also, the different theories seem to be incommensurable with each other and, thus, cannot be synthesized into a single more comprehensive theory. In response to these realizations and in an effort to develop the course, I turn to Karen Barad’s agential realism and specifically her theory of the apparatus. My conclusion is that curriculum theory itself is an apparatus. This article is an explanation of both that process of realization and the applicable theories of Barad’s agential realism. I conclude this article by arguing that engaging curriculum theory as a Baradian apparatus in courses for new researchers/teachers can prepare them to engage with those theories differently and with more agility in their future practice. (shrink)

The belief bias in reasoning occurs when individuals are more willing to accept conclusions that are consistent with their beliefs than conclusions that are inconsistent. The present study...

Achieving space situational awareness requires, at a minimum, the identification, characterization, and tracking of space objects. Leveraging the resultant space object data for purposes such as hostile threat assessment, object identification, and conjunction assessment presents major challenges. This is in part because in characterizing space objects we reference a variety of identifiers, components, subsystems, capabilities, vulnerabilities, origins, missions, orbital elements, patterns of life, operational processes, operational statuses, and so forth, which tend to be defined in highly heterogeneous and sometimes inconsistent (...) ways. The Space Domain Ontologies are designed to provide a consensus-based realist framework for formulating such characterizations in a way that is both consistent and computable. Space object data are aligned with classes and relations in a suite of ontologies built around the existing Space Object Ontology. They are stored in a dynamically updated Resource Description Framework triple store, which can be queried to support space situational awareness and the needs of spacecraft operators and analysts. This paper provides an overview of the Space Domain Ontologies and their development and use. It presents the motivation for and advantages of the Space Domain Ontologies, including the benefits they provide for enhancing and maintaining long-term space situational awareness. (shrink)

Light is strangely absent from most accounts of the environment. From photosynthesis to vitamin D, however, light is central to human well-being. Human circadian rhythms are keyed the alternation of dark and light. Erosion of the ozone layer makes skin cancer a growing threat from excess ultraviolet radiation. Light plays a significant role in health and illness. In changing historical circumstances, light continues to evoke and to express significant issues of value.

Sexual Justice defends a robust a robust conception of lesbian and gay rights, emphasizing protection against discrimination and recognition of queer relationships and families. Synthesizing materials from law, philosophy, psychoanalysis and literature, Kaplan argues that sexual desire is central to the pursuit of happiness: equal citizenship requires individual freedom to shape oneself through a variety of intimate associations.

Jacobi held a position of unparalleled importance in late eighteenth and early nineteenth century intellectual history. This includes his role in bringing about the close of the Enlightenment, his central part in shaping the reception of Kant's philosophy and German idealism, and his influence on the development of Romanticism and existentialism.

We describe here recent work on the molecular genetics of mitosis in the filamentous fungus Aspergillus nidulans. Aspergillus is one of three simple eukaryotes with powerful genetic systems that have been used to analyze mitosis. The modern molecular biological techniques available with this organism have made it possible to use mutations to identify genes and proteins that play an important role in mitosis. Three Aspergillus genes that affect mitosis are described. One gene, nimA, is specifically expressed late in the cell (...) cycle and codes for a putative protein kinase that induces mitosis, even in cells blocked in S‐phase. The second gene, bimG, codes for a putative phosphatase that interacts functionally with the nimA kinase. The third gene, bimE, codes for a protein that suppresses mitosis during interphase, apparently by keeping nimA turned off. None of these genes appear to be similar to any of the genes affecting mitosis that have been characterized in other eukaryotes, but rather appear to be elements of a system that prevents mitosis from occurring during interphase. (shrink)

Part Two, Area A. Resuming the investigation set afoot in Part 1,1 we there proposed that subliminally people do commonly sense moral obligation as a kind of debt (chreos) of shared responsibility ? every person's share in the cost of a good community which is the common cause of all. Testing this ?common understanding? by the facts of human nature and community, this article examines the substratum of my good, good of others, idea of good community, of common cause in (...) it, of shared responsibility for it, of consequent debt of all to whole, and of human freedom and capacity to estimate and pay on a basis to be examined in Area B projected. ?Elementary freedom? depends on capacity for truthful purpose and for independent judgment, ?ultimate freedom? on a determined truthful purpose coupled with adequacy of ideas for interpretation of entire experience. Every human is free in the elementary sense, and accordingly responsible. Ultimate freedom has to be won, and actively affirmed. (shrink)

This paper applies an approach that the author calls Subjective Personal Introspection to the self-reflective examination, inward-looking understanding, and impressionistic evocation of his own consumption experiences as the keeper of a kitten named Rocky Raccoon. Three-dimensional photographs in the form of stereo pairs provide corroborative evidence for the interpretations suggested. In this reflexive, anecdotal, narrative account, Rocky the Cat emerges as a focal point in the author's experiential consumption.

In this article, the authors explore the impact of a potential future regulatory decision by FDA whether or not to continue its enforcement discretion policy allowing physicians to perform, and stool banks to sell, stool product for fecal microbiota transplantation as a treatment for recurrent Clostridium Difficile infection without an Investigative New Drug application. The paper looks at the Agency's regulatory options in light of the current gut microbiota based products that are in the FDA pipeline for drug approval and (...) the potential impact and repercussions of their approval on FDA action. In laying out FDA's options we consider the implications of market exclusivity and off-label use of newly approved drugs. Ultimately, we explore the potential impact of FDA's decision on patients, research, and innovation. (shrink)

In this empirical paper, Jay, Stone, Meksin, Merck, Gordon and Hirst examine whether jury deliberations, in which individuals collaboratively recall and discuss evidence of a trial, shape the jurors’ memories. In doing so, Jay and colleagues provide a highly ecologically valid baseline for future investigation into why, how and when selective recall either facilitates remembering or leads to forgetting during jury deliberations. In particular, Jay et al. explore the specific social and cognitive mechanisms that might lead to either memory facilitation (...) (RIFA – Retrieval Induced Facilitation) and forgetting (RIF ‐ Retrieval Induced Forgetting) during jury deliberation. (shrink)

Early German Romanticism sought to respond to a comprehensive sense of spiritual crisis that characterised the late eighteenth century. The study demonstrates how the Romantics sought to bring together the new post-Kantian idealist philosophy with the inheritance of the realist Platonic-Christian tradition. With idealism they continued to champion the individual, while from Platonism they took the notion that all reality, including the self, participated in absolute being. This insight was expressed, not in the language of theology or philosophy, but through (...) aesthetics, which recognised the potentiality of all creation, including artistic creation, to disclose the divine. In explicating the religious vision of Romanticism, this study offers a new historical appreciation of the movement, and furthermore demonstrates its importance for our understanding of religion today. (shrink)