0000000000682508
AUTHOR
Jie Chen
Acute stress impairs reward positivity effect in probabilistic learning
Decision making based on feedback learning requires a series of cognitive processes, including estimating the probability of particular outcomes and modulating expectations between expected versus actual outcomes. It has been suggested that stress affects decision making and subsequent processing of feedback valence and magnitude. However, less is known about the effect of acute stress on reward expectancy. In the current study, participants performed a probabilistic learning task, in which they learned an association between response and feedback within different reward expectancy trials (30% and 70%) under the conditions of stress (threat of shock) and safety (no shock). We recorded event…
Automatic dynamic texture segmentation using local descriptors and optical flow
A dynamic texture (DT) is an extension of the texture to the temporal domain. How to segment a DT is a challenging problem. In this paper, we address the problem of segmenting a DT into disjoint regions. A DT might be different from its spatial mode (i.e., appearance) and/or temporal mode (i.e., motion field). To this end, we develop a framework based on the appearance and motion modes. For the appearance mode, we use a new local spatial texture descriptor to describe the spatial mode of the DT; for the motion mode, we use the optical flow and the local temporal texture descriptor to represent the temporal variations of the DT. In addition, for the optical flow, we use the histogram of orie…
Genome-wide adaptive complexes to underground stresses in blind mole rats Spalax
The blind mole rat (BMR), Spalax galili, is an excellent model for studying mammalian adaptation to life underground and medical applications. The BMR spends its entire life underground, protecting itself from predators and climatic fluctuations while challenging it with multiple stressors such as darkness, hypoxia, hypercapnia, energetics and high pathonecity. Here we sequence and analyse the BMR genome and transcriptome, highlighting the possible genomic adaptive responses to the underground stressors. Our results show high rates of RNA/DNA editing, reduced chromosome rearrangements, an over-representation of short interspersed elements (SINEs) probably linked to hypoxia tolerance, degene…