Brown University

About: Brown University is a education organization based out in Providence, Rhode Island, United States. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Poison control. The organization has 35778 authors who have published 90896 publications receiving 4471489 citations. The organization is also known as: brown.edu & Brown.

Selective adjustment of the speed of internal clock and memory processes.

Abstract: Four experiments studied the scaling of time by rats. The purpose was to determine if internal clock and memory processes could be selectively adjusted by pharmacological manipulations. All of the experiments used a temporal discrimination procedure in which one response ("short") was reinforced following a 2-sec noise signal and a different response ("long") was reinforced following an 8-sec noise signal; unreinforced signals of intermediate duration were also presented. The proportion of "long" responses increased as a function of signal duration. All drugs were administered intraperitoneally (ip) and their effect on clock or memory processes was inferred from the observed pattern of change in the point of subjective equality of the psychophysical functions under training and testing conditions. Experiment 1 demonstrated that methamphetamine (1.5 mg/kg) can selectively increase clock speed and that haloperidol (.12 mg/kg) can selectively decrease clock speed. Experiment 2 demonstrated that footshock stress (.2 mA) can selectively increase clock speed during continuous administration but leads to a decrease in clock speed below control values when the footshock is abruptly terminated. Experiment 3 demonstrated that vasopressin (.07 pressor units/kg) and oxytocin (.02 pressor units/kg) can selectively decrease the remembered durations of reinforced times, which suggests that memory storage speed increased. Experiment 4 demonstrated that physostigmine (.01 mg/kg) can selectively decrease the remembered durations of reinforced times and that atropine (.05 mg/kg) can selectively increase these remembered durations, which suggests that memory storage speed was differentially affected. The conclusion is that internal clock and memory processes can be dissociated by selectively adjusting their speed of operation and that these changes can be quantitatively modeled by a scalar timing theory.

A Quantitative Description of Short-Term Plasticity at Excitatory Synapses in Layer 2/3 of Rat Primary Visual Cortex

Abstract: Cortical synapses exhibit several forms of short-term plasticity, but the contribution of this plasticity to visual response dynamics is unknown. In part, this is because the simple patterns of stimulation used to probe plasticity in vitro do not correspond to patterns of activity that occur in vivo. We have developed a method of quantitatively characterizing short-term plasticity at cortical synapses that permits prediction of responses to arbitrary patterns of stimulation. Synaptic responses were recorded intracellularly as EPSCs and extracellularly as local field potentials in layer 2/3 of rat primary visual cortical slices during stimulation of layer 4 with trains of electrical stimuli containing random mixtures of frequencies. Responses exhibited complex dynamics that were well described by a simple three-component model consisting of facilitation and two forms of depression, a stronger form that decayed exponentially with a time constant of several hundred milliseconds and a weaker, but more persistent, form that decayed with a time constant of several seconds. Parameters obtained from fits to one train were used to predict accurately responses to other random and constant frequency trains. Control experiments revealed that depression was not caused by a decrease in the effectiveness of extracellular stimulation or by a buildup of inhibition. Pharmacological manipulations of transmitter release and postsynaptic sensitivity suggested that both forms of depression are mediated presynaptically. These results indicate that firing evoked by visual stimuli is likely to cause significant depression at cortical synapses. Hence synaptic depression may be an important determinant of the temporal features of visual cortical responses.

Species invasions and extinction : The future of native biodiversity on islands

Abstract: Predation by exotic species has caused the extinction of many native animal species on islands, whereas competition from exotic plants has caused few native plant extinctions. Exotic plant addition to islands is highly nonrandom, with an almost perfect 1 to 1 match between the number of naturalized and native plant species on oceanic islands. Here, we evaluate several alternative implications of these findings. Does the consistency of increase in plant richness across islands imply that a saturation point in species richness has been reached? If not, should we expect total plant richness to continue to increase as new species are added? Finally, is the rarity of native plant extinctions to date a misleading measure of the impact of past invasions, one that hides an extinction debt that will be paid in the future? By analyzing historical records, we show that the number of naturalized plant species has increased linearly over time on many individual islands. Further, the mean ratio of naturalized to native plant species across islands has changed steadily for nearly two centuries. These patterns suggest that many more species will become naturalized on islands in the future. We also discuss how dynamics of invasion bear upon alternative saturation scenarios and the implications these scenarios have for the future retention or extinction of native plant species. Finally, we identify invasion-motivated research gaps (propagule pressure, time-lags to extinction, abundance shifts, and loss of area) that can aid in forecasting extinction and in developing a more comprehensive theory of species extinctions.

Identification of hydrated silicate minerals on Mars using MRO‐CRISM: Geologic context near Nili Fossae and implications for aqueous alteration

Abstract: The Noachian terrain west of the Isidis basin hosts a diverse collection of alteration minerals in rocks comprising varied geomorphic units within a 100,000 km2 region in and near the Nili Fossae. Prior investigations in this region by the Observatoire pour l'Mineralogie, l'Eau, les Glaces, et l'Activite (OMEGA) instrument on Mars Express revealed large exposures of both mafic minerals and iron magnesium phyllosilicates in stratigraphic context. Expanding on the discoveries of OMEGA, the Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars (CRISM) aboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) has found more spatially widespread and mineralogically diverse alteration minerals than previously realized, which represent multiple aqueous environments. Using CRISM near-infrared spectral data, we detail the basis for identification of iron and magnesium smectites (including both nontronite and more Mg-rich varieties), chlorite, prehnite, serpentine, kaolinite, potassium mica (illite or muscovite), hydrated (opaline) silica, the sodium zeolite analcime, and magnesium carbonate. The detection of serpentine and analcime on Mars is reported here for the first time. We detail the geomorphic context of these minerals using data from high-resolution imagers onboard MRO in conjunction with CRISM. We find that the distribution of alteration minerals is not homogeneous; rather, they occur in provinces with distinctive assemblages of alteration minerals. Key findings are (1) a distinctive stratigraphy, in and around the Nili Fossae, of kaolinite and magnesium carbonate in bedrock units always overlying Fe/Mg smectites and (2) evidence for mineral phases and assemblages indicative of low-grade metamorphic or hydrothermal aqueous alteration in cratered terrains. The alteration minerals around the Nili Fossae are more typical of those resulting from neutral to alkaline conditions rather than acidic conditions, which appear to have dominated much of Mars. Moreover, the mineralogic diversity and geologic context of alteration minerals found in the region around the Nili Fossae indicates several episodes of aqueous activity in multiple distinct environments.

Renormalization group equation for critical phenomena

Abstract: An exact renormalization equation is derived by making an infinitesimal change in the cutoff in momentum space. From this equation the expansion for critical exponents around dimensionality 4 and the limit $n=\ensuremath{\infty}$ of the $n$-vector model are calculated. We obtain agreement with the results of Wilson and Fisher, and with the spherical model.