Terrestrial vertebrate frugivores constitute one of the major guilds in tropical forests. Previous studies show that the meso-scale distribution of this group is only weakly explained by variables ...such as altitude and tree basal area in lowland Amazon forests. For the first time we test whether seasonally limiting resources (water and fallen fruit) affect the dry season distribution in 25 species of terrestrial vertebrates. To examine the effects of the spatial availability of fruit and water on terrestrial vertebrates we used a standardized, regularly spaced arrangement of camera-traps within 25km2 of lowland Amazon forest. Generalized linear models (GLMs) were then used to examine the influence of four variables (altitude, distance to large rivers, distance to nearest water, and presence vs absence of fruits) on the number of photos on five functional groups (all frugivores, small, medium, large and very large frugivores) and on seven of the most abundant frugivore species (Cuniculus paca, Dasyprocta leporina, Mazama americana, Mazama nemorivaga, Myoprocta acouchy, Pecari tajacu and Psophia crepitans). A total of 279 independent photos of 25 species were obtained from 900 camera-trap days. For most species and three functional groups, the variation in the number of photos per camera was significantly but weakly explained by the GLMs (deviance explained ranging from 6.2 to 48.8%). Generally, we found that the presence of water availability was more important than the presence of fallen fruit for the groups and species studied. Medium frugivores, large-bodied frugivores, and two of the more abundant species (C. paca and P. crepitans) were recorded more frequently closer to water bodies; while none of the functional groups nor the most abundant species showed any significant relationship with the presence of fallen fruit. Two functional groups and two of the seven most common frugivore species assessed in the GLMs showed significant results with species-specific responses to altitude. Our findings provide a more detailed understanding of how frugivorous vertebrates cope with periods of water and fruit scarcity in lowland Amazon forests.
The search for the minimum information required for an organism to sustain a cellular system network has rendered both the identification of a fixed number of known genes and those genes whose ...function remains to be identified. The approaches used in such search generally focus their analysis on coding genomic regions, based on the genome to proteic-product perspective. Such approaches leave other fundamental processes aside, mainly those that include higher-level information management. To cope with this limitation, a non-genocentric approach based on genomic sequence analysis using language processing tools and gene ontology may prove an effective strategy for the identification of those fundamental genomic elements for life autonomy. Additionally, this approach will provide us with an integrative analysis of the information value present in all genomic elements, regardless of their coding status.
The brain has been understood as an interconnected neural network generally modeled as a graph to outline the functional topology and dynamics of brain processes. Classic graph modeling is based on ...single-layer models that constrain the traits conveyed to trace brain topologies. Multilayer modeling, in contrast, makes it possible to build whole-brain models by integrating features of various kinds. The aim of this work was to analyze EEG dynamics studies while gathering motor imagery data through single-layer and multilayer network modeling. The motor imagery database used consists of 18 EEG recordings of four motor imagery tasks: left hand, right hand, feet, and tongue. Brain connectivity was estimated by calculating the coherence adjacency matrices from each electrophysiological band (δ, θ, α and β) from brain areas and then embedding them by considering each band as a single-layer graph and a layer of the multilayer brain models. Constructing a reliable multilayer network topology requires a threshold that distinguishes effective connections from spurious ones. For this reason, two thresholds were implemented, the classic fixed (average) one and Otsu's version. The latter is a new proposal for an adaptive threshold that offers reliable insight into brain topology and dynamics. Findings from the brain network models suggest that frontal and parietal brain regions are involved in motor imagery tasks.
A typical absence seizure is a generalized epileptic event characterized by a sudden, brief alteration of consciousness that serves as a hallmark for various generalized epilepsy syndromes. ...Distinguishing between similar interictal and ictal electroencephalographic (EEG) epileptiform patterns poses a challenge. However, quantitative EEG, particularly spectral analysis focused on EEG rhythms, shows potential for differentiation. This study was designed to investigate discernible differences in EEG spectral dynamics and entropy patterns during the pre-ictal and post-ictal periods compared to the interictal state. We analyzed 20 EEG ictal patterns from 11 patients with confirmed typical absence seizures, and assessed recordings made during the pre-ictal, post-ictal, and interictal intervals. Power spectral density (PSD) was used for the quantitative analysis that focused on the
delta, theta, alpha
, and
beta
bands. In addition, we measured EEG signal regularity using approximate (ApEn) and multi-scale sample entropy (MSE). Findings demonstrate a significant increase in
delta
and
theta
power in the pre-ictal and post-ictal intervals compared to the interictal interval, especially in the posterior brain region. We also observed a notable decrease in entropy in the pre-ictal and post-ictal intervals, with a more pronounced effect in anterior brain regions. These results provide valuable information that can potentially aid in differentiating epileptiform patterns in typical absence seizures. The implications of our findings are promising for precision medicine approaches to epilepsy diagnoses and patient management. In conclusion, our quantitative analysis of EEG data suggests that PSD and entropy measures hold promise as potential biomarkers for distinguishing ictal from interictal epileptiform patterns in patients with confirmed or suspected typical absence seizures.
We introduce Bidirectional and Auto-Regressive Transformer for Reactions (BARTReact), a self-supervised deep learning model designed to predict chemical reactions. Built on the powerful Bidirectional ...and Auto-Regressive Transformer (BART) architecture, BARTReact is trained using the SELF-referencIng Embedded Strings (SELFIES), a molecular representation that ensures the production of only viable molecules, achieving an outstanding accuracy of 98.6 %.
Graph analysis allows exploring transcriptome compartments such as communities and modules for brain mesostructures. In this work, we proposed a bottom-up model of a gene regulatory network to ...brain-wise connectome workflow. We estimated the gene communities across all brain regions from the Allen Brain Atlas transcriptome database. We selected the communities method to yield the highest number of functional mesostructures in the network hierarchy organization, which allowed us to identify specific brain cell functions (e.g., neuroplasticity, axonogenesis and dendritogenesis communities). With these communities, we built brain-wise region modules that represent the connectome. Our findings match with previously described anatomical and functional brain circuits, such the default mode network and the default visual network, supporting the notion that the brain dynamics that carry out low- and higher-order functions originate from the modular composition of a GRN complex network
Alignment-free k-mer-based algorithms in whole genome sequence comparisons remain an ongoing challenge. Here, we explore the possibility to use Topic Modeling for organism whole-genome comparisons. ...We analyzed 30 complete genomes from three bacterial families by topic modeling. For this, each genome was considered as a document and 13-mer nucleotide representations as words. Latent Dirichlet allocation was used as the probabilistic modeling of the corpus. We where able to identify the topic distribution among analyzed genomes, which is highly consistent with traditional hierarchical classification. It is possible that topic modeling may be applied to establish relationships between genome’s composition and biological phenomena.
An ultracompact, cost-effective, and highly accurate fiber optic temperature sensor is proposed and demonstrated. The sensing head consists of Fabry-Perot microcavity formed by an internal mirror ...made of a thin titanium dioxide (TiO
) film and a microscopic segment of single-mode fiber covered with Poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS). Due to the high thermo-optic coefficient of PDMS the reflectance of the fiber-PDMS interface varies strongly with temperature which in turn modifies the amplitude of the interference pattern. To quantify the changes of the latter we monitored the visibility of the interference pattern and analyzed it by means of the fast Fourier transform. Our sensor exhibits linear response, high sensitivity, and response time of 14 seconds. We believe that the microscopic dimensions along with the performance of the sensor here presented makes it appealing for sensing temperature in PDMS microfluidic circuits or in biological applications.
Habiendo consagrado la autonomía progresiva y la protección integral en los dispositivos normativos internos en materia de derecho de infancia y adolescencia, los niños, niñas y adolescentes no son ...tan solo titulares de derechos, sino también de obligaciones. El bullying, traducido como la ‘violencia ejercida por los estudiantes en contra de otros escolares’, implica el reconocimiento del menor de edad como titular de deberes y obligaciones. La pacífica convivencia escolar apuesta, precisamente, por un correcto entendimiento de dichas obligaciones, las mismas que han quedado olvidadas durante el aislamiento de aproximadamente dos años, producto de las medidas restrictivas adoptadas por la dispersión del virus del COVID-19 que vivieron los escolares peruanos. Es así que, frente al desmedido aumento de casos de acoso y violencia entre estudiantes, el legislador y la judicatura nacionales han reaccionado a una realidad en donde el aislamiento y la falta de autocontrol emocional se convirtieron en factores que favorecen la violencia física y psicológica en las aulas, lo cual imposibilita el sano desarrollo personal de los estudiantes.
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