Effects of 2'fucosyllactose and Bifidobacterium longum subsp. infantis on the Brain and Cognitive Development in the Young Pig

Objectives Prebiotics and probiotics have been studied for their beneficial effects on various aspects of development, but much remains unknown regarding interactive effects of their supplementation. This study investigated the effects of dietary 2’fucosyllactose (2’FL; prebiotic) and Bifidobacterium longum subsp. infantis (Bi-26; probiotic) on behavioral and brain structural development in the young pig. Methods Fifty-two intact male pigs were provided ad libitum access to a nutritionally adequate milk replacer without (control) or with 0.532% 2’FL from postnatal day (PND) 2 to 34/35. Pigs were further stratified to receive either glycerol stock alone or Bi-26 (109 CFU) in glycerol stock solution daily. All pigs were subjected to the novel object recognition (NOR) task, a behavioral paradigm assessing recognition memory, from PND 27 to 31. Pigs underwent magnetic resonance imaging procedures at PND 32 or 33 to assess absolute and relative brain volume. Additionally, brain microstructure was quantified using diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) to assess fractional anisotropy, and axial, radial, and mean diffusivity. Results Behavioral outcomes confirmed that there were no effects of prebiotics or probiotics on recognition memory (P > 0.05). Interactive effects (P < 0.05) were observed for the number of object visits, latency to the first object visit, and number of sample object visits. Pigs that received the probiotic supplementation (P < 0.05) spent less time engaging with the sample object in total and on average, were observed to have smaller absolute brain volumes for 9 of 27 total observed regions of interest, and smaller relative volumes for 2 regions associated with kinesthesia. Differences in axial diffusivity were observed in pigs supplemented with the probiotic for 2 of the 12 regions assessed. Interactive effects (P < 0.05) were observed for all DTI outcomes for a variety of brain regions. Trelative volume for the pons was observed to be larger for pigs supplemented with the prebiotic. Conclusions Dietary supplementation of prebiotics and probiotics elicited interactive effects on several exploratory behaviors and structural brain components, and supplementation with probiotics appeared to reduce the volume of specific brain regions. Funding Sources DuPont Nutrition & Biosciences.

Pulse-to-pulse wavefront sensing at free-electron lasers using ptychography

The pressing need for knowledge of the detailed wavefront properties of ultra-bright and ultra-short pulses produced by free-electron lasers has spurred the development of several complementary characterization approaches. Here a method based on ptychography is presented that can retrieve high-resolution complex-valued wavefunctions of individual pulses without strong constraints on the illumination or sample object used. The technique is demonstrated within experimental conditions suited for diffraction experiments and exploiting Kirkpatrick–Baez focusing optics. This lensless technique, applicable to many other short-pulse instruments, can achieve diffraction-limited resolution.

Barriers Impeding Postgraduate Training Completion and Dissertation Submission and Defense

Fundamental changes in the system of training highly qualified personnel in postgraduate studies have actualized the problems of the targets for the functioning of postgraduate studies. The article analyzes the barriers that arise at the stages of training in postgraduate school and preparing for thesis defense. The empirical basis of the work was a survey of the target audience, which resulted in the formation and testing of a questionnaire to assess the impact of barriers on the outcome of postgraduate training and the completion of postgraduate study. The target sample contains three groups: postgraduate students, holders of Candidates of Science degree and Doctors of Science (scientific supervisors) representing higher education and scientific institutions of the Russian Federation. The sample object was 133 people. The results of the experiment were analyzed using statistical graphs method. To identify key barriers to complete postgraduate studies, the construction of the Pareto diagram was used. As a result, we have identified 20% of the most significant barriers impeding postgraduate training and significant barriers to completing the dissertation research. In order to visualize the structure of the barriers, a causal diagram of K. Ishikawa was used. Primary level factors responsible for the result have been identified including a postgraduate student, scientific supervisor, institution and the state. Further, factors of the secondary level in obtaining a positive result of postgraduate training are analyzed. The paper considers the possibility of carrying out some measures to reduce the barriers to successful completion of postgraduate training and Candidate thesis defense. It is noted that such factors as work-study scheme and family life barriers depend on postgraduate student. Higher education institution is also responsible for a number of significant barriers in postgraduate training, in particular the absence of a research reserve. A very powerful, but, unfortunately, rather rare tool for creating a research reserve for postgraduate studies is its integration with the magistracy. We can refer to a British experience of combining master’s and doctoral studies by way of example. The article also analyzes the organizational barriers during the periods of thesis preparation and submission as well as barriers relating to supervisor’s responsibility. The authors dwell on the problem of low motivation for getting the Candidate of Science degree. It is a common situation in Russia when a Candidate of Science degree holder cannot benefit from the degree obtained. It is necessary to envisage the expansion of positions and professions, where surcharges will be applied for the existing degrees, as well as more comfortable conditions for career growth.

Social Conditionality of Adolescent Health in a Temporary Aspect

The article touches upon the problem of improving adolescent health. Its current state does not meet the needs of the society in the substantial health improvement of this social group. The results of two “Adolescent health and the environment” studies (repeated cohort studies, 1996 and 2017) have served as the information base for the article. Their special feature is a common sample object (adolescents aged 13–16 years old), single program, identical samples, geographically close regions and time interval (20 years). The proposed approach is aimed at searching links between sociological parameters of health, such as self-assessment of health, health awareness, health consciousness, motives for that and health behavior, and the socio-demographic characteristics of the respondents. According to the study, changes in the attitudes and values with regard to health influence the increased attention to health and self-assessment of health. Despite the continuous radical changes in the society’s life, the psychosocial state of adolescent is characterized by certain stability of key lifestyle parameters in terms of time. As for their positive and negative attitudinal and behavioral changes, they are the result of the state social policy in the field of health. Active promotion of healthy lifestyle in recent decades has transformed into a change in attitudes related to smoking and motives for health care. Less attention to the environmental problems at the state level has led to less concern about these issues among young people. While disease incidence among adolescents is characterized by negative trends, positive experience of the social policy in the sphere of health is the basis for positive changes in this field. The introduction of health lessons for schoolchildren to the educational standard could be the influential component. This would provide a long-term effect of health promotion in Russia.

An Integrated Object Tracking and Covert Visual MIMO Communication Service for Museum Security System Using Single Vision Sensor

This paper explores the spatial coverage potential of a vision sensor to implement a dual service for a museum security system. Services include object monitoring and invisible visual Multiple-Input and Multiple-Output (MIMO) communication. For object monitoring, the Kalman filter algorithm is used. To implement a secret visual MIMO communication, an Adaptive Row-Column (ARC)-based LSB substitution technique is used along with the Integer Wavelet Transform method. These proposed services are implemented using existing electronic visual displays and surveillance cameras. Experiments are carried out using a sample object and four stego images. The performance of the object tracking system is measured in terms of accuracy by comparing the actual and estimated position of an object. Similarly, the performance of the covert visual MIMO system is measured at two different stages. On the transmitter side, differences between the cover and stego-images are used to measure imperceptibility. Likewise, at the receiver, differences between the original and the reconstructed data images are used to measure the accuracy. Results illustrate that the proposed system has improved imperceptibility, accuracy, and robustness, as compared to existing techniques.

Implementation of Harris Corner Detection Algorithm for Volumetric Images

More effective detection of corner points in three dimensional (3-D) volumetric images can be possible through expansion of Harris corner detection algorithm, which run in two dimensional (2-D) images, into third dimension. In this study, the standard algorithm of Harris that detected corner points in 2-D slices and its 3-D version were implemented in the scale-space to determine the corner points of volumetric object images. The results obtained in sample object images with 2-D and 3-D methods that used different approaches for scale-space construction were qualitatively assessed.

Pengaruh Kualitas Layanan terhadap Loyalitas Pelanggan Melalui Kepuasan Pelanggan sebagai Variabel Intervening (Studi pada Pelanggan Dunkin’ Donuts di Surabaya dan Sidoarjo)

The purpose of this study is to find out is there any influence of service quality on customer loyalty through customer satisfaction as intervening variable on customer Dunkin’ Donuts in Surabaya and Sidoarjo. This research using non-probability sampling with judgemental sampling as sampling category. This research take 220 people as a respondents of the sample object. The respondents of this research is the customer Dunkin 'Donuts men and women aged 18-50 years who have made a purchase and consume directly at the Dunkin' Donuts at least 2 times in the last 3 months. The instruments used is an observation, documentation, interview and questionnaire that analyzed using a Likert scale. Analysis of data using path analysis. The result of this research showed that there is any influence of service quality on customer loyalty through customer satisfaction as intervening variable.

Inferotemporal cortex multiplexes behaviorally-relevant target match signals and visual representations in a manner that minimizes their interference

Finding a sought visual target object requires combining visual information about a scene with a remembered representation of the target to create a “target match” signal that indicates when a target is in view. Target match signals have been reported to exist within high-level visual brain areas including inferotemporal cortex (IT), where they are mixed with representations of image and object identity. However, these signals are not well understood, particularly in the context of the real-world challenge that the objects we search for typically appear at different positions, sizes, and within different background contexts. To investigate these signals, we recorded neural responses in IT as two rhesus monkeys performed a delayed-match-to-sample object search task in which target objects could appear at a variety of identity-preserving transformations. Consistent with the existence of behaviorally-relevant target match signals in IT, we found that IT contained a linearly separable target match representation that reflected behavioral confusions on trials in which the monkeys made errors. Additionally, target match signals were highly distributed across the IT population, and while a small fraction of units reflected target match signals as target match suppression, most units reflected target match signals as target match enhancement. Finally, we found that the potentially detrimental impact of target match signals on visual representations was mitigated by target match modulation that was approximately (albeit imperfectly) multiplicative. Together, these results support the existence of a robust, behaviorally-relevant target match representation in IT that is configured to minimally interfere with IT visual representations.