Hemispheric Integration Research Articles

Review: Hemispheric Integration: Materiality, Mobility, and the Making of Latin American Art, by Niko Vicario, and Radical Form: Modernist Abstraction in South America, by Megan A. Sullivan

Review: <i>Hemispheric Integration: Materiality, Mobility, and the Making of Latin American Art</i>, by Niko Vicario, and <i>Radical Form: Modernist Abstraction in South America</i>, by Megan A. Sullivan

Bilateral Movement and Artmaking: Hemispheric Integration Across the Midline (Mouvement bilatéral et création artistique : intégration hémisphérique sur la ligne médiane)

Bilateral art making is a self-regulatory and brain-based practice experienced through gesture, gross and fine motoric expression whether in the air, on paper, canvas, or nontraditional surfaces. The structural effects of integrating bilateral movement and art making on the brain are largely unknown; this article explores the implications of specific bilateral movements and corresponding gestural marks on hemispheric integration across the midline. The authors of this theoretical article are father and daughter collaborators merging their respective backgrounds in neuroscience and expressive arts therapy. This collaboration resulted in the four different considerations in bilateral movement: simultaneous, continuous, overlapping, and midline crossing. The corresponding bilateral movements and art making were demonstrated as part of a single case study (n-of-1 trial). The results consider the neurological structural benefits and regulatory responses in regards to bilateral movement and art making.

Correction for LST directionality impact on the estimation of surface upwelling longwave radiation over vegetated surfaces at the satellite scale

Surface upwelling longwave radiation (SULR) is a major component of the Earth's radiation budget and directly influences the retrieval of evapotranspiration (ET) in the terrestrial ecosystems. Land surface temperature (LST) is an Essential Climate Variable (ECV) for direct estimation of SULR. However, accurate retrieval of SULR from satellite observations may be severely hindered by the anisotropic properties of land surface targets since most of them show marked angular variations in LST. This study aims at investigating the magnitude and impact factors of the directional effects of LST on SULR estimation over vegetated surfaces given that angular variation in emissivity has a limited impact on SULR estimation over most land surface types. It follows an attempt to correct for such effects in SULR estimation. We further explore the possibility to find a viewing direction at which SULR estimated from the directional LST can surrogate the hemispherical integration. To do so, a parametric model mimicking LST anisotropy with the hot spot is incorporated into the physical temperature-emissivity method. Two widely used Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) LST products (i.e., MYD11_L2 and MYD21_L2) are analyzed. SULR estimates before and after correcting for LST directionality are compared with in-situ measurements acquired at 15 sites from the FLUXNET and SURFRAD networks in different regions. Our analysis reveals that LST directional effects on SULR estimation exhibit diurnal and seasonal variations, which are substantial in spring and summer for the daytime. The effects are negligible (<5 W m−2) in autumn and winter for the daytime except for in arid and semiarid regions. For the night-time, the effects are insignificant over all the biomes. Using MYD21 LST, after correction, the average root-mean-square error (RMSE) and bias of SULR estimates for all sites decrease by 8 and 8.34 W m−2 in spring, and by 8.9 and 12.13 W m−2 in summer. Using MYD11 LST, after correction, the average RMSE is between 10 and 15 W m−2 and the average bias is close to zero in all seasons. The RMSE and absolute bias of SULR estimates for sites with low to moderate vegetation (LAI <3) is lowered substantially (7–14 W m−2) after correction. Interestingly, SULR estimates from LST viewed at 54° backward and hemispherically integrated are close, with differences <3 W m−2 at most of the sites. These findings support a strategy for SULR estimation in ET retrieval over vegetated surfaces from directional LST.

Disrupted voxel-mirrored homotopic connectivity in congenital nystagmus using resting-state fMRI.

Idiopathic congenital nystagmus (CN) is a rare eye disease that can cause early blindness (EB). CN deficits are observed most frequently with oculomotor dysfunction; however, it is still unclear what neuromechanics underly CN with EB. Based on that visual experience requires the functional integration of both hemispheres, we hypothesized that CN adolescents with EB might exhibit impaired interhemispheric synchrony. Our study aimed to investigate the interhemispheric functional connectivity alterations using voxel-mirrored homotopic connectivity (VMHC) and their relationships with clinical features in CN patients. This study included 21 patients with CN and EB, and 21 sighted controls (SC), who were matched for sex, age and educational level. The 3.0 T MRI scan and ocular examination were performed. The VMHC differences were examined between the two groups, and the relationships between mean VMHC values in altered brain regions and clinical variables in the CN group were evaluated by Pearson correlation analysis. Compared with the SC group, the CN had increased VMHC values in the bilateral cerebellum posterior and anterior lobes/cerebellar tonsil/declive/pyramis/culmen/pons, middle frontal gyri (BA 10) and frontal eye field/superior frontal gyri (BA 6 and BA 8). No particular areas of the brain had lower VMHC values. Furthermore, no correlation with the duration of disease or blindness could be demonstrated in CN. Our results suggest the existence of interhemispheric connectivity changes and provide further evidence for the neurological basis of CN with EB.

Hemispheric Integration: Materiality, Mobility, and the Making of Latin American Art by Niko Vicario

Reviewed by: Hemispheric Integration: Materiality, Mobility, and the Making of Latin American Art by Niko Vicario Mary K. Coffey KEYWORDS Latin American Art, Modernism, Development, Dependency Theory, David Alfaro Siqueiros, Joaquin Torres-Garcia, Candido Portinari, Mario Carreño, Moma, Oiaa, Hemispheric Integration, Import-Substitution, Expropriation, Mexico, Uruguay, Brazil, Cuba, Exhibition niko vicario. Hemispheric Integration: Materiality, Mobility, and the Making of Latin American Art. U of California P, 2020, 295 pp. Niko Vicario traces the transnational creation of "Latin American art" as a geocultural category during the period from the 1930s to the 1950s. He explores the collection and circulation of art from throughout the region within the context of its commercial and political relationships with the United States. Like many studies of this nature, Vicario's demonstrates the powerful role played by brokers like Nelson Rockefeller or José Gómez-Sicre in expedient forms of cultural diplomacy through their involvement with the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) and governmental organizations like the Office of Inter-American Affairs (OIAA). However, rather than emphasizing the over-determination of the nascent Cold War, Vicario highlights the strategies artists working in Latin America deployed to build networks and bind the region's disparate tendencies so as to negotiate the commercial and cultural pressures bearing down from the "Colossus to the North." What develops is a swift and synthetic exploration of art from Latin America, that takes a both/and approach to the antinomies that have long structured the historiography of Latin American modernism: figuration versus abstraction, folkloric nationalism versus "universal" aesthetic paradigms, radical socialist politics versus pro-capitalist modernization, authentic self-expression versus auto-exoticizing for touristic consumption, etc. And while his case studies focus on canonical figures, Vicario brings fresh insights to their work and offers counterintuitive arguments about their impact during a period of profound geopolitical reconfiguration. [End Page 226] Vicario contributes to a rich vein of recent scholarship on transnationalism, mobility, and hemispheric cultural relations.1 But he adds a focus on materiality, which in his study refers to both artistic media and international commodities like nitrocellulose pigments, cattle, or petroleum. Thus the "hemispheric integration" in his title signals Vicario's attention to how different Latin American states were positioned within the global capitalist system as well as the various strategies these states devised to overcome their "dependency" within it. Thereby, Vicario argues, the choice of novel artistic media was more than incidental; it indexed uneven development as both a material constraint and a generative condition for the innovative propositions these artists advanced during a time of defensive regional consolidation. In addition to a synoptic introduction and conclusion, the book proceeds in four chapters. Chapter one focuses on the "revolutionary medium" Duco Finish, an automobile lacquer developed by General Motors and DuPont and promoted by Mexican muralist David Alfaro-Siqueiros. Vicario traces the relationship between Siqueiros's proletarian politics and his "adoption and adaptation of industrial tools" from the 1930s to the early 1940s as a deliberate strategy to "bind" the Americas via what he dubs "Duco muralism" (19–21). He likens Siqueiros's "expropriation" of Duco for proletarian art to the Mexican state's protection of its subsoil resources from international corporations like Standard Oil (37–44). Vicario tracks the artist's peripatetic career during periods of exile, as he promoted Duco muralism through commissions across the Americas. In addition to the usual suspects, he also explores lesser-known projects in Chile and Havana. Ultimately, Duco muralism failed to cohere as an anti-capitalist art, but the medium, along with other industrial lacquers, did become de rigueur in "art aligned with modernization" (64). Stripped of its dialectical charge, industrial paint became a powerful signifier of the modernity of postwar abstraction used by artists as ideologically diverse as Alejandro Otero, Lygia Clark, Jackson Pollock, and Morris Louis. Chapter two traces Uruguayan Joaquín Torres-García's application of constructive principles to the "vibrant matter" of Indo-America, promoting what Vicario dubs his "morphological constructivism" as an alternative to Siqueiros's industrialized figuration.2 He likens Torres-García's organic media—animal hides, wood, and stone—to his attempts at articulating a hemispheric indigenismo capable of unifying the art of...

Temporal exponential random graph models of longitudinal brain networks after stroke.

Plasticity after stroke is a complex phenomenon. Functional reorganization occurs not only in the perilesional tissue but throughout the brain. However, the local connection mechanisms generating such global network changes remain largely unknown. To address this question, time must be considered as a formal variable of the problem rather than a simple repeated observation. Here, we hypothesized that the presence of temporal connection motifs, such as the formation of temporal triangles (T) and edges (E) over time, would explain large-scale brain reorganization after stroke. To test our hypothesis, we adopted a statistical framework based on temporal exponential random graph models (tERGMs), where the aforementioned temporal motifs were implemented as parameters and adapted to capture global network changes after stroke. We first validated the performance on synthetic time-varying networks as compared to standard static approaches. Then, using real functional brain networks, we showed that estimates of tERGM parameters were sufficient to reproduce brain network changes from 2 weeks to 1 year after stroke. These temporal connection signatures, reflecting within-hemisphere segregation (T) and between hemisphere integration (E), were associated with patients' future behaviour. In particular, interhemispheric temporal edges significantly correlated with the chronic language and visual outcome in subcortical and cortical stroke, respectively. Our results indicate the importance of time-varying connection properties when modelling dynamic complex systems and provide fresh insights into modelling of brain network mechanisms after stroke.

Hemispheric Integration: Materiality, Mobility, and the Making of Latin American Art by Niko Vicario

Reviewed by: Hemispheric Integration: Materiality, Mobility, and the Making of Latin American Art by Niko Vicario Álvaro Ramírez Vicario, Niko. Hemispheric Integration: Materiality, Mobility, and the Making of Latin American Art. U of California P, 2020. Pp. 312. ISBN 978-0-52031-002-5. In Hemispheric Integration: Materiality, Mobility, and the Making of Latin American Art, Niko Vicario demonstrates the process under which a new “geocultural category” called Latin American art came into existence toward the middle of the twentieth century. As was the case with their literary counterparts of the same era, Latin American painters were preoccupied with [End Page 310] establishing cultural and artistic singularity along with a market for their work beyond their national borders. However, the author reveals how the success of this endeavor was largely due to a political and cultural shift in which the United States gained international prominence and New York became the center of the art world. In the introduction, Vicario gives an overview of the sociocultural, political and economic terrain. He posits that prior to 1900, art was part of the import-export scheme that governed Latin American international relations where aesthetics came from abroad, mainly Europe. Influenced by José Enrique Rodó and José Martí, artists sought to break their cultural dependency by striving to create a mobile art, both national and Latin American, that could be exported and integrated in an international market. This shift occurred at the same time that the United States was displacing European domination and implementing the Good Neighbor policy that sought to integrate the hemisphere for strategic reasons, which included promoting closer intercultural relations. But even as they attempted to free themselves from the grasp of the West, Latin American artists were still in some way dependent on the metropolis for their existence, as the system retained the economic structure of import-export whereby art and painters substituted raw materials exported no longer to Europe but to the United States. The opening chapter meticulously traces the travels of David Alfaro Siqueiros throughout North and South America, as well as Cuba, as he innovates with new materials to modernize mural painting and leave behind what he calls “folk art for export.” Siqueiros becomes mobile and able to successfully create a geographically expansive art that encompasses more than the national. Vicario emphasizes how the muralist went from a collaborative phase imbued by revolutionary fervor critical of the connivance of fascism and capitalism to a more personalized work espousing a view increasingly in harmony with the economic and political interests of the United States. This change in Siqueiros’s politics appears to coincide with his collaboration with Nelson Rockefeller who also pursued a model of regional integration on behalf of the United States and MoMA. In the end, Siqueiros comes across as another “Millionaire’s painter,” something he had accused Diego Rivera of being. However, Vicario leaves us wondering to what degree Siqueiros was aware of the contradictions that ensued from his association with American capitalists. The second chapter focuses on Joaquín Torres-García, who after forty years of residing in Europe returned to his native country, Uruguay, to promote an alternative modern “morphological art” that stood in contrast not only to Europe but especially to Mexican muralism, as it downplayed politics and social realism. Torres-García likewise differed from the muralists in his attempt to produce art on an import substitution model that emphasized creating with resources at hand. This led to a mixture of primitivism and Constructivism posited as an autochthonous, modern, Latin American art, though Vicario rightly indicates its strong affinities with European artistic endeavors. The author highlights the importance of Torres-García’s work in shaping hemispheric integration underscoring the great influence he had on American artists, surpassing that of the muralists. His impact on Latin American painters was also remarkable yet in later years they rejected the “double aspect” of his art as retrograde. The third chapter is most illuminating as it explores Nelson Rockefeller’s role in constructing hemispheric integration. Vicario deftly delineates how the American industrialist weaved a network of commercial, political and artistic ties with Latin America much to the benefit of the United States...

Harper Montgomery. Review of "Hemispheric Integration: Materiality, Mobility, and the Making of Latin American Art" by Niko Vicario.

Harper Montgomery. Review of "Hemispheric Integration: Materiality, Mobility, and the Making of Latin American Art" by Niko Vicario.

Burning the Archive, Building the State? Politics, Paper, and US Power in Postwar Mexico

This article explores how the Mexican state gathered, archived and destroyed information. It focuses on the US–Mexico campaign against foot-and-mouth disease between 1947 and 1952, whose paper archive Mexican officials burned near the successful conclusion of the campaign. This article argues that several factors shaped the context for this documentary bonfire and made the 1940s a key point of inflection in Mexico’s history of official information-gathering: the dominant party’s system of elite power-sharing, the growth of a reading public and the regime’s drift rightward. At the same time, the nature of the foot-and-mouth disease campaign itself ensured that, despite its possible uses, the archive was particularly sensitive, providing evidence of the embarrassing gaps that began to yawn between the state’s language of revolutionary nationalism and its political practise. Indeed, the bonfire represented the culmination of practises Mexican officials had already developed throughout the campaign to reconcile the demands of legibility and deniability, hemispheric integration and nationalism, political stability and state capacity. More broadly, the case illustrates the uneven effects of US assistance on the development of state capacity, the authoritarian but institutionally weak character of the early PRIísta state, and the role of archives in maintaining a coherent image of state sovereignty.

Interhemispheric functional connectivity and its relationships with creative problem solving.

Creative problem solving (CPS) is a particular mental process when people solve problems. Findings from previous research, which used functional MRI, showed that CPS could involve specific neural mechanisms. However, few studies have directly explored the changes of interhemispheric resting-state functional connectivity during CPS. Recently, a validated voxel-mirrored homotopic connectivity (VMHC) method has been widely used to calculate the interhemispheric resting-state functional connectivity. In this study, we recruited 60 participants and used a revised chunk decomposing task to estimate participants' individual differences during CPS. Then, the VMHC method was used to explore neural correlates underlying individual differences of CPS. Results showed that altered VMHC in the bilateral middle frontal gyrus/precentral gyrus, bilateral hippocampus/insula/amygdala, and bilateral fusiform gyrus/cerebellum/middle occipital gyrus was related to individual differences of CPS. These brain regions reflect the information integration of both hemispheres might be critical for CPS. Therefore, our results may shed light on the neural correlates of CPS.

The embodied intersubjective space: the role of clinical intuition in somatic psychotherapy

ABSTRACTInterpersonal neurobiology has provided insight and given importance to right brain implicit processes within the context of psychotherapy. This includes intersubjectivity, awareness of bodily felt experience, and clinical intuition. The field of somatic psychotherapy utilises the awareness of sensorial experience and embodiment as sources of knowledge through the integration of mind and body in the process of healing. This article explores the relationship between the somatic experiences of intuition and the field of somatic psychotherapy through an epistemological vision of providing insight and ground to a common, yet not fully understood phenomenon in clinical practice. A definition of clinical intuition from a somatic perspective is presented as well as a three-phase non-linear model that incorporates understandings from neuroscience and interpersonal neurobiology. The embodied intersubjective field, hemispheric integration, and embodiment practices are explored in this model to serve as a bridge between theory and practice and to hold the potential for transformation.

Interhemispheric connectivity and hemispheric specialization in schizophrenia patients and their unaffected siblings.

Hemispheric integration and specialization are two prominent organizational principles for macroscopic brain function. Impairments of interhemispheric cooperation have been reported in schizophrenia patients, but whether such abnormalities should be attributed to effects of illness or familial risk remains inconclusive. Moreover, it is unclear how abnormalities in interhemispheric connectivity impact hemispheric specialization. To address these questions, we performed magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in a large cohort of 253 participants, including 84 schizophrenia patients, 106 of their unaffected siblings and 63 healthy controls. Interhemispheric connectivity and hemispheric specialization were calculated from resting-state functional connectivity, and compared across groups. Results showed that schizophrenia patients exhibit lower interhemispheric connectivity as compared to controls and siblings. In addition, patients showed higher levels of hemispheric specialization as compared to siblings. Level of interhemispheric connectivity and hemispheric specialization correlated with duration of illness in patients. No significant alterations were identified in siblings relative to controls on both measurements. Furthermore, alterations in interhemispheric connectivity correlated with changes in hemispheric specialization in patients relative to controls and siblings. Taken together, these results suggest that lower interhemispheric connectivity and associated abnormalities in hemispheric specialization are features of established illness, rather than an expression of preexistent familial risk for schizophrenia.

Método didáctico “Socioneuropsicológico” y la estimulación de la integración hemisférica cerebral, en educandos del nivel primario.

RESUMEN:La investigación, tuvo por objetivo sistematizar el método didáctico “Socioneuropsicológico”, en un cuerpo teórico conceptual, centrado principalmente en procedimientos que estimulen la predominancia en la integración hemisférica cerebral, derecha-izquierda, sobre la base de las teorías derivadas de la neurociencia y las ciencias de la educación. Se ha empleado el diseño de investigación denominado “diseño de grupos aleatorizados pre y post test”. La muestra, estuvo conformada por educandos de dos secciones del sexto grado de la Institución Educativa “San Juan de la Libertad” - Chachapoyas, una de 17 educandos para el grupo experimental y otra de 15 para el grupo control. Las hipótesis contrastadas mediante el parámetro estadístico T-Student, revelan que la experimentación del método didáctico “Socioneuropsicológico”, evidencia estimulación significativa de la predominancia en la integración hemisférica cerebral, derecha-izquierda como resultados cuali-cuantitativos. Por consiguiente, se concluye, que la sistematización del método, estimula la integración hemisférica cerebral, de doce funciones bipolares. En el hemisferio cerebral izquierdo se estimulan la función verbal, analítica, simbólica, matemática, de abstracción, lógico-racional, temporal, audiovisual, intelectual, específica, de convergencia y de interpretación. En el hemisferio cerebral derecho se estimulan las funciones no verbal, sintética, espacial, artística, de concreción, emocional, atemporal, cinestésica, sensual, sistémica, de divergencia y creatividad.Palabras clave: Método didáctico, estimulación, neurociencias, predominancia, integración hemisférica, hemisferios cerebrales.

It takes two to tango: hemispheric integration in pigeons requires both hemispheres to solve a transitive inference task

Cerebral lateralization, the dominance of one brain side for a specific function, is a core feature of the vertebrate brain. Lateralized processing requires complex intra- and interhemispheric interactions mediating exchange, integration or suppression of information. The underlying functional organization of cooperative or independent processing is only basically understood and may differ between vertebrate species depending on the organization of commissural systems and overlap of sensory input. We explored intrahemispheric integration capacities in pigeons, Columba livia; although their visual system is primarily crossed and lateralized, it can still integrate interhemispheric information. Pigeons were trained in overlapping colour discriminations in which each hemisphere learned only half the information that represented a linear hierarchy. Therefore, interhemispheric memory about the relational values of the premise stimuli pairs had to be transferred and combined to master a transitive inference task. Pigeons displayed transitive responding under binocular but not under monocular seeing conditions. Hemispheric-specific strategies in accessing the associative values of transfer stimuli resulted in potential conflict with intrahemispheric memory and led to unihemispheric impairment in performance. The response pattern might represent a consequence of neuronal mechanisms avoiding interocular conflicts, and it also indicates that interhemispheric communication in pigeons is an active process that integrates intra- and interhemispheric information in a context-dependent and hemispheric-specific manner.

관측 빈도에 따른 COMS 기반의 일 평균 일사량 산출의 민감도 분석

일사량은 지구 내 시스템의 에너지원으로 작용하는 중요한 지표변수로써, 원격탐사를 통해 모니터링 하는 것은 태양 에너지의 잠재량을 평가할 수 있어 매우 중요하다. 따라서 본 논문에서는 한반도에서 관측 빈도에 따른 일 평균 일사량 산출의 민감도를 분석하고자 한다. COMS의 채널 자료 및 구름탐지 분석자료, 구름에 의한 일사량의 감쇠 정도를 이용하여 시간 해상도가 1시간과 3시간 간격의 자료를 이용하여 일사량을 산출하였다. 전천을 의미하는 공간적 범위만큼 Hemispherical Integration를 실시하였고, 각 일사량을 일 평균하여 지상 37곳의 일사계 자료와 검증을 실시하였다. 그 결과, 1시간 간격의 자료를 이용하여 일평균한 일사량은 <TEX>$28.6401W/m^2$</TEX>의 정확도를, 3시간 간격의 자료를 이용하여 일 평균한 일사량은 <TEX>$30.4960W/m^2$</TEX>의 정확도를 보여, 일 평균 일사량은 위성의 관측 빈도에 큰 민감도를 보이지 않았다. 하지만 시간해상도가 다른 두 일사량은 공간적 분포에서 구름의 관측 빈도에 따라 큰 차이를 보였고, 구름의 관측 빈도와 두 일사량의 차이 간 민감도 분석을 실시한 결과 최대 <TEX>$19.4392W/m^2$</TEX>의 민감도를 보였다. Insolation is an major indicator variable that can serve as an energy source in earth system. It is important to monitor insolation content using remote sensing to evaluate the potential of solar energy. In this study, we performed sensitivity analysis of observed frequency on daily composite insolation over the Korean peninsula. We estimated INS through the channel data of Communication, Ocean and Meteorological Satellite (COMS) and Cloud Mask which have temporal resolution of 1 and 3 hours. We performed Hemispherical Integration by spatial resolution for meaning whole sky. And we performed daily composite insolation. And then we compared the accuracy of estimated COMS insolation data with pyranometer data from 37 points. As a result, there was no great sensitivity in the daily composite INS by observed frequency of satellite that accuracy of the calculated insolation at 1 hour interval was <TEX>$28.6401W/m^2$</TEX> and 3 hours interval was <TEX>$30.4960W/m^2$</TEX>. However, there was a great difference in the space distribution of two other INS data by observed frequency of clouds. So, we performed sensitivity analysis with observed frequency of clouds and distinction between the two other INS data. Consequently, there was showed sensitivity up to <TEX>$19.4392W/m^2$</TEX>.

Moving beyond the Total Sea Ice Extent in Gauging Model Biases.

Reproducing characteristics of observed sea ice extent remains an important climate modeling challenge. In this study we describe several approaches to improve how model biases in total sea ice distribution are quantified, and apply them to historically forced simulations contributed to the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project phase 5 (CMIP5). The quantity of hemispheric total sea ice area, or some measure of its equatorward extent is often used to evaluate model performance. We introduce a new approach which investigates additional details about the structure of model errors, with an aim to reduce the potential impact of compensating errors when gauging differences between simulated and observed sea ice. Using several observational data sets, we apply several new methods to evaluate the climatological spatial distribution and the annual cycle of sea ice cover in 41 CMIP5 models. We show that in some models, error compensation can be substantial, for example resulting from too much sea ice in one region and too little in another. Error compensation tends to be larger in models that agree more closely with the observed total sea ice area, which may result from model tuning. Our results suggest that consideration of only the total hemispheric sea ice area or extent can be misleading when quantitatively comparing how well models agree with observations. Further work is needed to fully develop robust methods to holistically evaluate the ability of models to capture the fine scale structure of sea ice characteristics, however, our "sector scale" metric aids to reduce the impact of compensating errors in hemispheric integrals.

Center for the Study of the Presidency and Congress News Analysis: Trends in Latin America &amp; Presidential Leadership

A Reshaped Regional Narrative Too often, presidential administrations see the Western Hemisphere as a geopolitical afterthought. Despite geographic proximity, economic opportunity, and generally shared political values, the lack of a crisis in the region has relegated it to the bottom of the inbox behind other geopolitical regions such as the Middle East, Eastern Europe, and East Asia. While the United States has been forced to confront challenges in these regions--and will continue to do so--it cannot continue to be at the expense of opportunities to improve relations with partners in the Western Hemisphere. Over the past year and a half, the Center for the Study of the Presidency & Congress has analyzed how the regional narrative has changed in ways that demonstrate the importance of political reform and economic growth to regional stability and integration. In many cases, it has been the Latin American middle classes and their increasingly global outlook that have driven this process. In others, it has been a combination of bold political leadership and reformist thinking that has driven new approaches to regional problems. In all areas, the growth of entrepreneurialism and private-sector initiative has been key to transforming Latin American economies and, thus, demanding more of Latin American political systems. Contrary to the Cold War--during which many preconceptions of Latin America were developed among policy makers (1)--the regional situation is not one of competition within the region. Rather, the region finds itself now defined by two narratives that are driven from within the region itself. The first is of nations backsliding away from democracy as populism and cronyism erode existing institutions and prevent the growth of civil society. Venezuelan oil largesse--combined with Cuban security and intelligence support--had allowed for the continued repression of the Venezuelan people and the spread of Chavez-inspired populism in the region. Brazil's economic potential remained unrealized due to political stagnation, widespread corruption, and overreliance on commodity-led growth. The shortcomings of these systems are laid bare in the Venezuelan economic collapse--a looming humanitarian disaster--and the political turmoil in Brazil. While significant attention has been paid to the failures in these countries, there is the second narrative: success stories from the region that serve as a model for U.S. policy makers and regional leaders. In this project, the examples of Colombia, Mexico, and Panama have been studied to look at their successes and how those lessons learned can be applied to the region as a whole. This report also examines cases from Chile, Nicaragua, and Peru to explore how some countries require continued engagement and support for major reforms to improve their prospects for economic growth and political stability. Additionally, during the course of this project, we have seen how the second narrative is ascended in nations that were once paralyzed by the cronyism and populism of the first narrative. Argentina is the greatest example of this, where the election of Mauricio Macri has ushered in a sea change from the period of Kirchnerism that saw Argentina largely isolated from global markets. Seeking reform at home and settlements with bondholders abroad, the new Argentinian leaders have seen that the future lies with reintegration into the global economy; not the preservation of the institutions constituting a neo-Peronist political economy. While these narratives are driven from within Latin America, that is not to say that U.S. leadership is a nonfactor in the outgrowth of these positive trends. As our analysis will show, the leadership of U.S. presidents in relations with Latin America is a key aspect of hemispheric integration and positive U.S. relations with the region. Consistent engagement with Latin American partners demonstrates how U. …

The Permeable Border: Examining Responses to North American Integration in Video Art

In this essay, I suggest that artistic production provides valuable insights into the nature of the Canada-US border during the late-twentieth century when significant changes were occurring to dominant understandings of Canada in relation to North America. Focusing on the medium of video art, I trace the sustained engagement of Canadian contemporary artists to respond to and comment on the move towards continental integration through free trade. I contextualize my discussion in relation to trade developments that opened Canada’s border with the US, such as the 1989 implementation of the Canada-US Free Trade Agreement. This agreement, along with the later North American Free Trade Agreement, led to increasing continental integration at the end of the twentieth century, as well as hope for hemispheric integration with the subsequent negotiations towards the Free Trade Area of the Americas. With attention to works by Lisa Steele and Kim Tomczak, Eva Manly, and Clive Robertson, I foreground cultural contributions to redefining the Canada-US borderlands. Here, I chart the artists’ intention to echo narratives of the border’s porousness and address the power dynamics between the Canadian state and its trade partners. Examining themes of cultural imperialism, colonialism, and national identity, I point to the importance of cultural production in assessing the borderlands and, more broadly, histories of free trade in North America.

Corpus Callosum Structure is Topographically Correlated with the Early Course of Cognition and Depression in Alzheimer's Disease.

Corpus callosum (CC) abnormalities may cause cognitive and neuropsychiatric complications due to reduced hemispheric integration. Over a one-year period, we investigated whether the CC structure of 20 patients with mild Alzheimer's disease (AD) was linked to the evolution of cognitive and neuropsychiatric symptoms. We also investigated whether this anatomical-clinical relationship was localized topographically on the CC by combining voxel-based morphometry and diffusion tensor imaging approaches. We assessed patients' global cognitive deterioration and neuropsychiatric symptoms with the Mini-Mental State Examination and the Neuropsychiatric Inventory. Increased global cognitive deterioration during the early course of AD was significantly related to reduced white matter density (p = 0.004) and fractional anisotropy (FA) (p = 0.012) and increased mean diffusivity (MD) (p = 0.017) at the level of the CC isthmus/splenium. Further, increased depression severity was significantly related to reduced FA (p = 0.008) and increased MD (p = 0.018) at the level of the CC rostrum. These results indicate that changes in early myelinated CC fibers, which subserve the lateral temporal and parietal cortices and are less vulnerable to damage, may be related to cognitive impairment. Furthermore, changes in late myelinated CC fibers, which connect the orbitofrontal cortices and are more vulnerable to damage, may be related to the earliest neuropsychiatric symptoms of AD, such as depression.

초등과학교육에의 적용을 위한 뇌-기반 학습 연구의 교육적 의미 분석

The purpose of this study was to analyze 181 papers about brain-based learning appeared in domestic scientific journals from 1989 to May of 2012 and suggest application conditions in elementary science education. The results of this study summarizes as follows; First, learning activity suggested by brain-based learning study is mainly explained by working of brain function. Learning activity explained by brain-based learning study are divided into 'learning according to specialized brain function, learning according to brain function integration and learning beyond specialization and integration of hemispheres'. Second, it searched how increased knowledge of brain structure and function affects learning. Analysis from this point of view suggests that brain-based learning study affects learning in many ways especially emotion, creativity and learning motivation. Third, brain-based learning study suggests various possibilities of learning activity reflecting brain plasticity. Plasticity which is one of most important characteristics of brain supports the validity of learning activity as learning disorder treatment and explains the possibility of selective increment of brain function by leaning activity and the need of whole-brain approach to learning activity. Fourth, brain-based learning brought paradigm shifts in education field. It supports learning sophistication on the understanding of student's learning activity, guides learning method that reflects the characteristics of subject and demands reconstruction of curriculum. Fifth, there are many conditions to apply brain-based learning in elementary science education field, learning environment that fits brain-based learning, change of perspectives on teaching and learning of science educators and development of brain-based learning curriculum are needed.