Biological Body Research Articles

O corpo nas atividades em trânsito: condutores profissionais e mobilização do corpo-si

Os acidentes de trânsito matam, anualmente, mais de 30.000 pessoas no País. Parte delas envolve trabalhadores em situações de trabalho, embora sejam escassas pesquisas interessadas nessas questões. São ainda menos frequentes pesquisas que se debruçam sobre aspectos dos modos de condução, como o uso do corpo no processo de pilotagem. Por meio de pesquisas operadas pela perspectiva ergológica, pudemos verificar que o processo de pilotagem urbana notabiliza-se por meio do pensamento, da inteligência, da cognição e por como eles se articulam a um corpo biológico, psíquico, cultural e histórico: um corpo-si. O uso desse conceito se impõe, visto ser impossível uma completa prescrição das condições do trânsito, que requer o uso de uma inteligência da prática. A pilotagem envolve a mobilização do corpo por inteiro, desenvolvendo saberes e experiências que auxiliam na execução das tarefas e dos constrangimentos enfrentados na atividade em trânsito. O reconhecimento desse corpo-si se torna, portanto, um elemento fundamental para se compreenderem os comportamentos dos condutores profissionais.

Body Integrity Identity Disorder: Deranged Body Processing, Right Fronto-Parietal Dysfunction, and Phenomenological Experience of Body Incongruity

Body integrity identity disorder (BIID) is characterised by profound experience of incongruity between the biological and desired body structure. The condition manifests in "non-belonging" of body parts, and the subsequent desire to amputate, paralyse or disable a limb. Little is known about BIID; however, a neuropsychological model implicating right fronto-parietal and insular networks is emerging, with potential disruption to body representation. We argue that, as there is scant systematic research on BIID published to date and much of the research is methodologically weak, it is premature to assume that the only process underlying bodily experience that is compromised is body representation. The present review systematically investigates which aspects of neurological processing of the body, and sense of self, may be compromised in BIID. We argue that the disorder most likely reflects dysregulation in multiple levels of body processing. That is, the disunity between self and the body could arguably come about through congenital and/or developmental disruption of body representations, which, together with altered multisensory integration, may preclude the experience of self-attribution and embodiment of affected body parts. Ulimately, there is a need for official diagnostic criteria to facilitate epidemiological characterisation of BIID, and for further research to systematically investigate which aspects of body representation and processing are truly compromised in the disorder.

“Analysis Paralysis”: The Suspicion of Suspicion in the Fiction of David Foster Wallace

“Analysis Paralysis”: The Suspicion of Suspicion in the Fiction of David Foster Wallace

Biocompatibility and biodegradation of polycaprolactone‐sebacic acid blended gels

Tissue engineering aims at creating biological body parts as an alternative for transplanting tissues and organs. A current new approach for such materials consists in injectable biodegradable polymers. Their major advantages are the ability to fill-in defects, easy incorporation of therapeutic agents or cells, and the possibility of minimal invasive surgical procedures. Polycaprolactone (PCL) is a promising biodegradable and elastic biomaterial, with the drawback of low-degradation kinetics in vivo. In this work a biodegradable injectable gel of PCL blended with sebacic acid (SA) was prepared, to improve the degradation rate of the biomaterial. SA is known for its high degradation rate, although in high concentrations it could originate a pH decrease and thus disturb the biocompatibility of PCL. Degradation tests on phosphate buffered saline were carried out using 5% of SA on the blend and the biomaterial stability was evaluated after degradation using differential scanning calorimetry, dynamical mechanical analysis, and scanning electronic microscopy. After degradation the elastic properties of the blend decreased and the material became more crystalline and stiffer, although at a lower extent when compared with pure PCL. The blend also degraded faster with a loss of the crystalline phase on the beginning (30 days), although its thermal and mechanical properties remained comparable with those of the pure material, thus showing that it achieved the intended objectives. After cell assays the PCL-SA gel was shown to be cytocompatible and capable of maintaining high cell viability (over 90%).

Mechanism Interpretation of the Biological Brain Cooling and Its Inspiration on Bionic Engineering

The brain is one of the most important organs in a biological body which can only work in a relatively stable temperature range. However, many environmental factors in biosphere would cause cerebral temperature fluctuations. To sustain and regulate the brain temperature, many mechanisms of biological brain cooling have been evolved, including Selective Brain Cooling (SBC), cooling through surface water evaporation, respiration, behavior response and using special anatomical appendages. This article is dedicated to present a summarization and systematic interpretation on brain cooling strategies developed in animals by classifying and comparatively analyzing each typical biological brain cooling mechanism from the perspective of bio-heat transfer. Meanwhile, inspirations from such cooling in nature were proposed for developing advanced bionic engineering technologies especially with two focuses on therapeutic hypothermia and computer chip cooling areas. It is expected that many innovations can be achieved along this way to find out new cooling methodologies for a wide variety of industrial applications which will be highly efficient, energy saving, flexible or even intelligent.

Emotion control power education in medical physiology experiment teaching

In medical physiology experiment courses, the students observe the functions and learn the rules of biological body, in order to improve their abilities of scientific observation, practice and reflection. Emotion control means willpower to manage emotion, which is the regular psychological response when we deal with issues. Integrating the emotion control education to professional education is imperative to elevate the general quality of medical students. Key words: Medical physiology; Experimental education; Emotion control education

Modeling of Biomimetic Robotic Fish Propelled by Passive Tail with Suitable Rigidity

This paper proposes a physics-based cruising speed model for biomimetic robotic fish propelled by the passive plastic foil actuator. Inspired by biological body and fins, a plastic foil with suitable rigidity and innovative structure are designed to acquire better propelling effect. The model captures the speed based on the analysis of the interaction between the tail and the water which considers the hydrodynamics. Experimental results have shown that the proposed model is able to predict the steady-state cruising speed of the robotic fish under a periodic actuation input. Since most of the model parameters are expressed in terms of fundamental physical properties and geometric dimensions, the model is expected to be beneficial in optimal design of the robotic fish.

Personal stem cell banking and the problem with property

Social scientists increasingly view biotechnological innovation as inseparable from the social and economic transformations of value attributed to human tissue. Informed by research on the exchange relationships embedded in biotechnology's ‘tissue economies,’ this essay discusses the transformation of female reproductive biology into a regenerative resource within one sector of the US biotechnology economy, the commercial stem cell banking industry. The commercial banking of stem cells has emerged as one of the most lucrative services in an emerging market for biotechnology products and services. In the two sectors of ‘consumer biotech’ examined here, umbilical cord-blood and endometrial tissue (menstrual blood) banking, the relationship between account holders and commercial banking services is governed primarily through contractual arrangements. Such contracts form distinctive new spatial understandings of the biological body and make possible specific embodied practices of self-cultivation. They also challenge previous feminist analyses of contract that presume the unity of the subject in relation to her body. The highly speculative banking of bodily tissues, in which the consumer of banking services is also the producer of the banked tissue's embodied value, constitutes a new legal geography of the body and, in doing so, affirms the corporeal nature of law.

Lipidomic profiling of biological tissues using off-line two-dimensional high-performance liquid chromatography–mass spectrometry

Lipids are important components in all biological tissues having many essential roles associated with the proper function of the organism. Their analysis in the biological tissues and body fluids is a challenging task due to the extreme sample complexity of polar lipids and to their amphiphilic character. In this work, we describe a new method for the characterization of the lipid composition in various tissues, using off-line two-dimensional coupling of hydrophilic interaction liquid chromatography (HILIC) and reversed-phase (RP) high-performance liquid chromatography coupled to electrospray ionization (ESI) and atmospheric pressure chemical ionization (APCI) mass spectrometry. In the first dimension the total lipid extracts are fractioned using HILIC into individual lipid classes. In total, 19 lipid classes (+3 regioisomeric pairs) that cover a wide range of polarities are separated in one analytical run, which is the highest number of analyzed lipid classes reported so far. The lysophospholipid regioisomers are also separated in HILIC mode followed by the identification based on the characteristic ESI mass spectra. The collected fractions of the various lipid classes are further separated in the RP mode, which offers an excellent resolution of the individual lipid species. Their ESI or APCI mass spectra give correct information on the fatty acid composition and on the individual regioisomeric positions on the glycerol skeleton. Off-line coupling of both modes enables the comprehensive analysis of plant and animal samples as illustrated on the analysis of egg yolk, soya and porcine brain tissues.

Psychosocial Correlates Of Physical Activity In Portuguese Schoolchildren Aged 8 To 10 Years

The increasing prevalence of overweight and obesity in children is a major public health problem. A sedentary lifestyle is implicated in the development of these conditions. In order to maximize the effectiveness of physical activity (PA) intervention programs it is desirable to understand the magnitude of correlates of PA during childhood. PURPOSE: To assess the importance of demographic (socioeconomic status), biological (body mass index) and psychosocial (attraction to PA, perceived competence and parental socialization) correlates in PA levels of Portuguese schoolchildren of both gender. METHODS: A cross-sectional study was carried out in Porto district, northern Portugal, in 2009-2010. A random sample of 683 schoolchildren aged 8 to 10 years (331 girls; 352 boys), attending basic schools were surveyed. Demographics and psychosocial correlates were collected using three standardized questionnaires (children´s attraction to PA; children's perceived competence; parental socialization). Overweight and obesity were classified according to the cut points suggested by Cole et al. PA was measured with the Godin and Shephard questionnaire. Individual interviews were conducted in all subjects. Multiple regression analyses were conducted separately for boys and girls. SPSS 18.0 was used in all analysis. RESULTS: Multiple regression analyses independently for girls and boys showed that vigorous PA was positively associated with PA (girls, b= 6.91; 95% CI: 3.52-10.29 and boys, b= 3.85; 95% CI: 1.64-6.06). For girls, peer acceptance in games and sports (b= 2.55; 95% CI: 0.29-4.82) and parent encouragement PA (b= 3.47; 95% CI: 0.70-6.25) had a significant positive association with PA. Additionally, for boys, importance to PA (b= 5.47; 95% CI: 0.66-10.28) and perceived competence (b= 4.84; 95% CI: 0.30-9.38) had a significant positive effect in PA. Socioeconomic status and body mass index were not associated with PA levels. CONCLUSIONS: Gender differences exist in the ways that children are motivated to be physically active. Among girls, peers acceptance in games and sports and parental encouragement are effective correlates to enhance PA levels. In boys, perceived competence and importance to PA have a positive impact on PA.

A neuroendocrine-inspired approach for adaptive manufacturing system control

Nowadays manufacturing companies are forced to have manufacturing systems that can support agile responses to the emergence of changing conditions. As biological organisms are quite capable of adapting to environmental changes and stimulus, bio-inspired concepts have been recognised as very suitable for adaptive manufacturing system control. In a biological body, the neuroendocrine system plays an important role in controlling and modulating the adaptive behaviour of biological organisms using neuro-control and hormone-regulation principles. This paper, therefore, proposes the novel concept of NeuroEndocrine-Inspired Manufacturing System (NEIMS). The proposed NEIMS control architecture is inherited from neuro-control and hormone-regulation principles to agilely deal with the frequent occurrence of unexpected disturbances at the shop floor level. From the cybernetics point of view, the control model of NEIMS is described in detail, and a test bed has been set up to enable the NEIMS simulation.

Crocodiles in the Sahara Desert: An Update of Distribution, Habitats and Population Status for Conservation Planning in Mauritania

BackgroundRelict populations of Crocodylus niloticus persist in Chad, Egypt and Mauritania. Although crocodiles were widespread throughout the Sahara until the early 20th century, increased aridity combined with human persecution led to local extinction. Knowledge on distribution, occupied habitats, population size and prey availability is scarce in most populations. This study evaluates the status of Saharan crocodiles and provides new data for Mauritania to assist conservation planning.Methodology/Principal FindingsA series of surveys in Mauritania detected crocodile presence in 78 localities dispersed across 10 river basins and most tended to be isolated within river basins. Permanent gueltas and seasonal tâmoûrts were the most common occupied habitats. Crocodile encounters ranged from one to more than 20 individuals, but in most localities less than five crocodiles were observed. Larger numbers were observed after the rainy season and during night sampling. Crocodiles were found dead in between water points along dry river-beds suggesting the occurrence of dispersal.Conclusion/SignificanceResearch priorities in Chad and Egypt should focus on quantifying population size and pressures exerted on habitats. The present study increased in by 35% the number of known crocodile localities in Mauritania. Gueltas are crucial for the persistence of mountain populations. Oscillations in water availability throughout the year and the small dimensions of gueltas affect biological traits, including activity and body size. Studies are needed to understand adaptation traits of desert populations. Molecular analyses are needed to quantify genetic variability, population sub-structuring and effective population size, and detect the occurrence of gene flow. Monitoring is needed to detect demographical and genetical trends in completely isolated populations. Crocodiles are apparently vulnerable during dispersal events. Awareness campaigns focusing on the vulnerability and relict value of crocodiles should be implemented. Classification of Mauritanian mountains as protected areas should be prioritised.

Development of a Module for Cell Culture Based on a Decellularized Vascular Tissue Scaffold

Decellularized tissues and organs have been intensively studied in order to use them as a scaffold for proliferation of recipient cells in tissue engineering/regenerative medicine applications. We established a fast and effective method for tissue decellularization by way of shaking a tissue in a detergent at 300 rpm. In addition, we developed a ring-clamp for fixation of decellularized tissue and created a scaffold module for cell culture by the combination of the ring-clamp and decellularized tissue. The module can be placed in a well of a commercially available 24-well plate. Smooth muscle cells that were seeded on a scaffold module consisting of a decellularized vessel and the ring-clamp showed proliferation with a spindle shape similar to that of vascular smooth muscle cells in the biological body. Vascular endothelial cells that adhered to the scaffold module showed enhanced susceptibility to histamine-induced Ca2+ influx.

WPMSD: A Malicious Script Detection Method Inspired by the Process of Immunoglobulin Secretion

Inspired by the process of immunoglobulin secretion in biological body, we present a Web Page Malicious Script Detection Method (WPMSD). In this paper, Firstly, the basic definitions of artificial immune items are given. Secondly, according to the spreading range of malicious script, the immunoglobulin number is changed as the detector clone proliferation is stimulated by malicious scripts. Further more, the nonlinear dynamics of antibody number is discussed. Thirdly, we propose a probability approach to trigger alarms to inform that the detected scripts are harmful. Finally, the WPMSD collects the effective immunoglobulin set based on Hidden Markov Model (HMM) to update the detector gene library. Compared with the traditional immune based detection methods, such as Negative Selection Algorithm (NSA), Dynamic Colonel Selection (DynamiCS), and Variable size Detector (Vdetector), the false alarm rate of WPMSD has been reduced by 18.09%, 12.6%, and 7.47% respectively.

In Black Hole

This reading of Charles Burns’s graphic novel Black Hole, and of its four principle characters, Keith, Chris, Rob and Eliza, relies heavily upon ideas drawn from Lacanian psychoanalysis: fantasy and symptom, desire and object a, Symbolic and Real as well as the notion of subjective destitution. Freud’s understanding of melancholy will aid the last of those discussions. Rumination on the book’s title and the mysterious infection, the “bug,” which drives the narrative, finds a suggestive analogy in relation to the theme of abjection so abundantly pictured in the text. Building upon the logic of abjection, this essay also seeks to examine the way in which the book’s implied social setting abjects those who suffer from the “bug” through a metaphor derived from a definition of “black holes” in a network to think through the social topology presented in the text. The “bug” is an issue in both the biological bodies of infected characters and in the social network from which they came, a network that violently excludes them. Black Hole is positioned as a fiction of abject “reality”

Constructing the ‘gender-specific body’: A critical discourse analysis of publications in the field of gender-specific medicine

Gender-specific medicine, a new and increasingly influential ethos within medical research and practice, has received little critical attention to date. The objective of this article is to critically examine the attributes of gender-specific medicine as imparted by its advocates. Through a critical discourse analysis of its two leading academic journals, we identify five interrelated discourses: of male/female difference; of hegemonic biology; of men's disadvantages; of biological and social reductionism; and of the fragmented body. Together these comprise a master discourse of the 'gender-specific body'. The discourse of the 'gender-specific body' is discussed in relation to the current neoliberal political agenda which frames healthcare as a market good and locates health and illness in individual bodies rather than in the wider social arrangements of society. We argue that the 'gender-specific body' threatens not only to turn back the clock to a vision of the biological body as fixed and determinate, but to extend this ever deeper into the social imagination. Lost in the process is any meaningful sense of the human body as a relatively open system which develops in interaction with its social world. We propose that, as it gains momentum, the 'gender-specific body' is likely progressively to circumscribe our thinking about the health of women and men in potentially problematic ways.

Body Schema in Robotics: A Review

How is our body imprinted in our brain? This seemingly simple question is a subject of investigations of diverse disciplines, psychology, and philosophy originally complemented by neurosciences more recently. Despite substantial efforts, the mysteries of body representations are far from uncovered. The most widely used notions-body image and body schema-are still waiting to be clearly defined. The mechanisms that underlie body representations are coresponsible for the admiring capabilities that humans or many mammals can display: combining information from multiple sensory modalities, controlling their complex bodies, adapting to growth, failures, or using tools. These features are also desirable in robots. This paper surveys the body representations in biology from a functional or computational perspective to set ground for a review of the concept of body schema in robotics. First, we examine application-oriented research: how a robot can improve its capabilities by being able to automatically synthesize, extend, or adapt a model of its body. Second, we summarize the research area in which robots are used as tools to verify hypotheses on the mechanisms underlying biological body representations. We identify trends in these research areas and propose future research directions.

A alimentação de idosos sob vigilância: experiências no interior de um asilo

Entendemos que o cotidiano alimentar no interior de uma Instituição de Longa Permanência para Idosos (ILPI) pode ser estudado utilizando como referenciais teóricos os estudos de Goffman e Foucault. O primeiro autor nos auxilia nos debates sobre estrutura, natureza e dinâmica desses espaços, enquanto o segundo articula as eminentes questões disciplinares envolvidas neste contexto. Foi realizada uma pesquisa qualitativa com idosos residentes em duas instituições localizadas no Município do Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil. Observamos que os idosos se encontram em franco processo de desumanização, se contentam com a sobrevivência do corpo biológico e com as regras institucionais, que impedem qualquer tipo de flexibilidade. O cotidiano dessas pessoas é destituído de vida. Elas aguardam "a morte chegar". A comida acaba sendo um mero mantenedor desse beco sem saída, de resignação completa, de expiação. Consideramos necessária uma profunda reflexão sobre o importante papel que a comida pode desempenhar como forma de resgate do imaginário desses idosos no espaço que habitam.

Phenomenology and its application in medicine

Phenomenology is a useful methodology for describing and ordering experience. As such, phenomenology can be specifically applied to the first person experience of illness in order to illuminate this experience and enable health care providers to enhance their understanding of it. However, this approach has been underutilized in the philosophy of medicine as well as in medical training and practice. This paper demonstrates the usefulness of phenomenology to clinical medicine. In order to describe the experience of illness, we need a phenomenological approach that gives the body a central role and acknowledges the primacy of perception. I present such a phenomenological method and show how it could usefully illuminate the experience of illness through a set of concepts taken from Merleau-Ponty. His distinction between the biological body and the body as lived, analysis of the habitual body, and the notions of motor intentionality and intentional arc are used to capture the experience of illness. I then discuss the applications this approach could have in medicine. These include narrowing the gap between objective assessments of well-being in illness and subjective experiences which are varied and diverse; developing a more attuned dialogue between physicians and patients based on a thick understanding of illness; developing research methods that are informed by phenomenology and thus go beyond existing qualitative methods; and providing medical staff with a concrete understanding of the impact of illness on the life-world of patients.

Fitting statistical models in bivariate allometry

Several attempts have been made in recent years to formulate a general explanation for what appear to be recurring patterns of allometric variation in morphology, physiology, and ecology of both plants and animals (e.g. the Metabolic Theory of Ecology, the Allometric Cascade, the Metabolic-Level Boundaries hypothesis). However, published estimates for parameters in allometric equations often are inaccurate, owing to undetected bias introduced by the traditional method for fitting lines to empirical data. The traditional method entails fitting a straight line to logarithmic transformations of the original data and then back-transforming the resulting equation to the arithmetic scale. Because of fundamental changes in distributions attending transformation of predictor and response variables, the traditional practice may cause influential outliers to go undetected, and it may result in an underparameterized model being fitted to the data. Also, substantial bias may be introduced by the insidious rotational distortion that accompanies regression analyses performed on logarithms. Consequently, the aforementioned patterns of allometric variation may be illusions, and the theoretical explanations may be wide of the mark. Problems attending the traditional procedure can be largely avoided in future research simply by performing preliminary analyses on arithmetic values and by validating fitted equations in the arithmetic domain. The goal of most allometric research is to characterize relationships between biological variables and body size, and this is done most effectively with data expressed in the units of measurement. Back-transforming from a straight line fitted to logarithms is not a generally reliable way to estimate an allometric equation in the original scale.