Non-target Ones Research Articles

Developing a Design Guideline of Boronic Acid Derivatives to Scavenge Targeted Sugars in the Formose Reaction Products using DFT-based Machine Learning

Abstract Formose reaction facilitates the synthesis of sugars from HCHO, yet the valuable sugars constitute only a small portion of the total products. This necessitates the need for a chemical scavenger capable of selectively capturing only valuable sugars. With over 600,000 potential combinations of boronic acid-based scavengers available, pursuing a deductive search approach is unfeasible. This study aims to derive guidelines for designing scavengers that readily bind with target sugars while avoiding non-target ones, via machine learning informed by DFT calculations.

Human anterior cruciate ligament-derived mesenchymal stem cells for regenerative medicine applications

Background: The anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) has poor healing capabilities and is the most commonly injured knee ligament. Although ACL repair is being highly studied, the current treatment involves reconstructive surgery utilizing autografts or allografts, which have limitations. The use of Mesenchymal Stem Cells (MSCs) as a possible therapeutic option has grown. ACL-derived MSCs are likely to be the best source because studies have shown that target tissue derived stem cells will better differentiate into the target tissue than the stem cells derived from non-target ones. However, the existing literature discusses only the isolation of a mixed population of MSCs. Here we present the isolation, differentiation and characterization of human ACL-derived MSCs according to the International Society for Cellular Therapy (ISCT) criteria.The ACL tissue was enzymatically digested. Separation of MSCs from the crude mixture of cells was then performed by fluorescence activated cell sorting (FACS) analysis. The isolated population were passaged in specific induction medium to differentiate them into adipocyte, osteocytes and chondrocytes. The cells were then further characterized with respect to their growth curve, population doubling time, colony forming ability, anchorage independent growth, and cell surface markers. The cells were finally examined for their tumorigenic potential by cell cycle analysis.Immunoprofiling via FACSs showed an average isolation rate for cells carrying MSCs markers of 5.5%. Cells exhibited spindle-shaped morphology, and immunocytochemistry confirmed the expression of appropriate cell surface markers. The growth curve showed distinct lag and log phase. Over agar assay demonstrated no anchorage independent growth, but clonogenic potential was observed post-culture on plastic Petri dishes. The cells showed a population doubling time of about 1.5 days. Oil Red O, Alizarin Red S, and Alcian Blue staining confirmed adipogenic, osteogenic and chondrogenic differentiation, respectively. Cell cycle analysis displayed more ACL-derived MSCs in G/G phase compared to BMSCs, showing that the isolates were non-tumorigenic. The presence of MSCs within the human ACL was confirmed via ISCT criteria, paving the way for their potential use for future ACL reconstructions. Although BMSCs have been the choice for regenerative purposes, making use of MSCs derived from ACL ligament will cut down the burden of trauma one has to undergo to obtain the Bone Marrow. Moreover, it is more convenient to harvest MSCs from otherwise discarded ACL. Finally, MSCs derived from the target tissue are believed to better differentiate to the ligament tissue than the bone derived MSCs.

A curved expansion-contraction microfluidic structure for inertial based separation of circulating tumor cells from blood samples

The rare presence of circulating tumor cells (CTCs) in the bloodstream has made their recording and separation one of the major challenges in the recent decade. Inertia-based microfluidic systems have received more attention in CTCs separation due to their feasibility and low cost. In this research, an inertial microfluidic system is proposed using a curved expansion-contraction array (CEA) microchannel to separate CTCs from white blood cells (WBCs). First, the optimal flow rate of the proposed microfluidic device was determined to maximize the separation efficiency of the target cells (CTCs) from the non-target ones (WBCs). Then, the efficiency and purity of the straight and curved-CEA microchannels were assessed. The experimental results indiated that the proposed system (curved-CEA microchannel) can offer the highest efficiency (-80.31%) and purity (-91.32%) at the flow rate of -7.5 ml/min, exhibiting ∼11.48% increment in the efficiency compared to its straight peer.

Quantification of miRNAs by mass spectrometry based on DNase I-assisted amplification with the aid of a chemometric model

Herein, the hydrolysis patterns of DNase I against a DNA probe in both single-strand form and DNA/miRNA heteroduplex were experimentally investigated in detail by mass spectrometric technique. Based on the knowledge obtained in the experiments, DNase I-assisted signal amplification strategy was proposed and used to design a mass spectrometric platform for miRNA detection. As a proof of concept, the performance of the proposed platform was evaluated for the detection of miRNA-122 in cell lysate samples. An advanced calibration model was explicitly derived to model the relationships between the concentration of miRNA-122 and the mass spectral signals of mass spectrometrically detected fragments of the DNA probe produced in the DNase I-assisted signal amplification process. With the aid of the advanced calibration model, the proposed mass spectrometric platform achieved quite accurate quantification results for miRNA-122 in cell lysate samples of Huh-7 and HepG-2 ​cell lines with recovery rates ranging from 98% to 104%. It is noteworthy that the proposed mass spectrometric platform can differentiate the target miRNA from other non-target ones based on their mass spectral response patterns instead of mass spectral intensities, and hence possesses high specificity for the target miRNA. It is reasonable to expect that the combination of mass spectrometry based on DNase I-assisted signal amplification with the advanced chemometric model provides a competitive alternative for designing cost-effective and label-free miRNA detection methods.

A multi-storey DNA nanostructure containing doxorubicin and AS1411 aptamer for targeting breast cancer cells

Herein, we presented a novel DOX-loaded multi-storey DNA nanostructure, including AS1411 aptamer as a targeting agent for treatment of target cells (MCF-7 and 4T1). Gel retardation test and fluorometric analysis were used to examine the construction of DNA nanostructure and loading of DOX in the complex. At pH 5.5 and 7.4, the release patterns of DOX from the prepared formulation were studied. Cell viability test was conducted to analyse the cell cytotoxicity ability of the DOX loaded multi-storey DNA nanostructure compared to free DOX in 4T1, MCF-7 (target) and CHO cells (non-target). Flow cytometry analysis was used to examine the DOX-loaded DNA nanostructure internalisation. Finally, the developed DOX-loaded multi-storey DNA nanostructure was tested in vivo to see if it could prevent tumour growth. The drug was released from the nanocomplex in a pH-related process (higher release in acidic pH compared to neutral pH). According to MTT assay, DOX-loaded DNA nanostructure damaged nucleolin positive cells while not significantly affecting nucleolin negative cells. The formulation was efficaciously internalised into target cells (4T1 and MCF-7), but not into non-target ones. Moreover, DOX-loaded DNA nanostructure can restrict tumour growth, increase survival rate, and accumulate significantly more in the tumour site than free DOX.

Label-free microRNA detection through analyzing the length distribution pattern of the residual fragments of probe DNA produced during exonuclease III assisted signal amplification by mass spectrometry

Biosensors based on various spectroscopic techniques discriminate the target microRNA (miRNA) from non-target ones with single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) according to the differences in signal intensities which can be caused by other factors besides SNPs. As a result, they are liable to produce false positive results. Herein, we report an attempt to develop a false-positive resistance, sensitive and reliable mass spectrometric platform for miRNA detection. In the proposed platform, the qualitative and quantitative information of the target miRNA was obtained through analyzing mass spectral responses of the multiply charged ions of the residual fragments of the probe DNA produced during exonuclease III assisted signal amplification reaction using an advanced data analysis method. The proposed platform could achieve sensitive and accurate quantitative results for the target miRNA (e.g., miRNA-141) in complex medium with a detection limit of about 1 pM, and unambiguously identify non-target miRNAs with SNPs based on the length distribution patterns of residual fragments of probe DNA. The findings obtained in this study might open an avenue for the design of new miRNA detection methods based on mass spectrometry in combination with various nuclease assisted signal amplification strategies.

Highly Sensitive and Specific Mass Spectrometric Platform for miRNA Detection Based on the Multiple-Metal-Nanoparticle Tagging Strategy.

The multiple-metal-nanoparticle tagging strategy has generally been applied to the multiplexed detection of multiple analytes of interest such as microRNAs (miRNAs). Herein, it was used for the first time to improve both the specificity and sensitivity of a novel mass spectroscopic platform for miRNA detection. The mass spectroscopic platform was developed through the integration of the ligation reaction, hybridization chain reaction amplification, multiple-metal-nanoparticle tagging, and inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry. The high specificity resulted from the adoption of the ligation reaction is further enhanced by the multiple-metal-nanoparticle tagging strategy. The combination of hybridization chain reaction amplification and metal nanoparticle tagging endows the proposed platform with the feature of high sensitivity. The proposed mass spectrometric platform achieved quite satisfactory quantitative results for Let-7a in real-world cell line samples with accuracy comparable to that of the real-time quantitative reverse-transcriptase polymerase chain reaction method. Its limit of detection and limit of quantification for Let-7a were experimentally determined to be about 0.5 and 10 fM, respectively. Furthermore, due to the unique way of utilizing the multiple-metal-nanoparticle tagging strategy, the proposed platform can unambiguously discriminate between the target miRNA and nontarget ones with single-nucleotide polymorphisms based on their response patterns defined by the relative mass spectral intensities among the multiple tagged metal elements and can also provide location information of the mismatched bases. Its unique advantages over conventional miRNA detection methods make the proposed platform a promising and alternative tool in the fields of clinical diagnosis and biomedical research.

Speech stream segregation to control an ERP-based auditory BCI

Objective. The use of natural sounds in auditory brain–computer interfaces (BCI) has been shown to improve classification results and usability. Some auditory BCIs are based on stream segregation, in which the subjects must attend one audio stream and ignore the other(s); these streams include some kind of stimuli to be detected. In this work we focus on event-related potentials (ERP) and study whether providing intelligible content to each audio stream could help the users to better concentrate on the desired stream and so to better attend the target stimuli and to ignore the non-target ones. Approach. In addition to a control condition, two experimental conditions, based on the selective attention and the cocktail party effect, were tested using two simultaneous and spatialized audio streams: (a) the condition A2 consisted of an overlap of auditory stimuli (single syllables) on a background consisting of natural speech for each stream, (b) in condition A3, brief alterations of the natural flow of each speech were used as stimuli. Main results. The two experimental proposals improved the results of the control condition (single words as stimuli without a speech background) both in a cross validation analysis of the calibration part and in the online test. The analysis of the ERP responses also presented better discriminability for the two proposals in comparison to the control condition. The results of subjective questionnaires support the better usability of the first experimental condition. Significance. The use of natural speech as background improves the stream segregation in an ERP-based auditory BCI (with significant results in the performance metrics, the ERP waveforms, and in the preference parameter in subjective questionnaires). Future work in the field of ERP-based stream segregation should study the use of natural speech in combination with easily perceived but not distracting stimuli.

Do non-target species visit feeders and water troughs targeting small game? A study from farmland Spain using camera-trapping.

Provision of food and water is a widespread tool implemented around the world for the benefit of game and other wildlife, but factors affecting the use of food and water by non-target species are poorly known. We evaluated visits to feeders and water troughs by non-game species using camera-traps in two separate areas of Spain. Feeders and water troughs were either "protected" (when surrounded by more than 50% of shrubs/forest) or "open" (in the opposite case). A total of 18 948 photos from 5344 camera-trapping days depicted animals, and 75 species were identified. Feeders and water troughs were visited by target species (partridges and lagomorphs, 55.3% of visits) and non-target species (44.7% of visits). Among the latter, corvids were the most common (46.1% of visits), followed by rodents (26.8%), other birds (23.6%, mainly passerines), columbids (1.9%), and other species at minor percentages. The highest proportion of visiting days to feeders and water troughs was from corvids (0.173) followed by other-birds (0.109) and rodents (0.083); the lowest proportion was recorded for columbids (0.016). Use intensity and visit frequency of water troughs tripled that recorded in feeders, and visits to open feeders/troughs were approximately twice those to protected ones. In summary: feeders and water troughs targeting small game species are also used regularly by non-target ones; they should be set close to cover to optimize their use by non-target species that are not competitors of target species (though corvids may visit them); water availability should be prioritized where drought periods are expected.

86. Biological effects evaluation in peripheral blood lymphocytes from patients undergoing radium-223 (223RaCl2) therapy

Purpose The purpose of this study is to correlate the physical dose to non-target tissues (blood) to the radiation-induced chromosome damage in terms of the dicentrics and micronuclei (MN) in peripheral blood lymphocytes (PBL) after radium-223 (223RaCl2) therapy in patients with bone metastasis derived from prostate cancer [1] . Methods Four patients undergoing 223RaCl2 therapy for skeletal diseases have been enrolled in this prospective clinical study. The effective dose to blood per injected activity was calculated considering the alpha, beta and gamma emission of Ra-223 and considering a standard man weight of 70 kg. PBL cultures for dicentric assay and MN were performed before treatment (T0), 6 days (T1) and 30 days (T2) after the first cycle of treatment and after the end of the therapy (T3). Haematological toxicity parameters (blood cell count) have been monitored during therapy and analysed along with doses to blood. Results The administration of 223RaCl2 produces a high dose dependent increase of radiation-induced chromosome damage in terms of dicentrics and MN induction observed in the circulating lymphocytes. Surprisingly, the increase of chromosome damage observed between T1 and T2 is not due to an 223RaCl2 addition dose, suggesting that circulating lymphocytes were exposed to an extra dose by the emissions from the target areas. In addition, clinical monitoring during the treatment showed a progressive increasing fatigue, leucopenia and anemia with a partial recovery after some months after the end of therapy. Conclusions The cytogenetic data suggest a persistence of the radiation emission from the target tissue to non-target ones and seem to be correlated to the observed haematological toxicity, highlighting possible adverse effects related to this therapy. These data need further investigation in order to evaluate the potential side effects to normal, non-target tissue in patients treated with alpha emitters.

Structure-based prediction of West Nile virus-human protein–protein interactions

In recent years, West Nile virus (WNV) has posed a great threat to global human health due to its explosive spread. Studying the protein–protein interactions (PPIs) between WNV and human is beneficial for understanding the pathogenesis of WNV and the immune response mechanism of human against WNV infection at the molecular level. In this study, we identified the human target proteins which interact with WNV based on protein structure similarity, and then the interacting pairs were filtered by the subcellular co-localization information. As a result, a network of 3346 interactions was constructed, involving 6 WNV proteins and 1970 human target proteins. To our knowledge, this is the first predicted interactome for WNV-human. By analyzing the topological properties and evolutionary rates of the human target proteins, it was demonstrated that these proteins tend to be the hub and bottleneck proteins in the human PPI network and are more conserved than the non-target ones. Triplet analysis showed that the target proteins are adjacent to each other in the human PPI network, suggesting that these proteins may have similar biological functions. Further, the functional enrichment analysis indicated that the target proteins are mainly involved in virus process, transcription regulation, cell adhesion, and so on. In addition, the common and specific targets were identified and compared based on the networks between WNV-human and Dengue virus II (DENV2)-human. Finally, by combining topological features and existing drug target information, we identified 30 potential anti-WNV human targets, among which 11 ones were reported to be associated with WNV infection.Communicated by Ramaswamy H. Sarma

Parallel Computing Sparse Wavelet Feature Extraction for P300 Speller BCI.

This work is intended to increase the classification accuracy of single EEG epoch, reduce the number of repeated stimuli, and improve the information transfer rate (ITR) of P300 Speller. Target EEG epochs and nontarget EEG ones are both mapped to a space by Wavelet. In this space, Fisher Criterion is used to measure the difference between target and nontarget ones. Only a few Daubechies wavelet bases corresponding to big differences are selected to construct a matrix, by which EEG epochs are transformed to feature vectors. To ensure the online experiments, the computation tasks are distributed to several computers that are managed and integrated by Storm so that they could be parallelly carried out. The proposed feature extraction was compared with the typical methods by testing its performance of classifying single EEG epoch and detecting characters. Our method achieved higher accuracies of classification and detection. The ITRs also reflected the superiority of our method. The parallel computing scheme of our method was deployed on a small scale Storm cluster containing three desktop computers. The average feedback time for one round of EEG epochs was 1.57 ms. The proposed method can improve the performance of P300 Speller BCI. Its parallel computing scheme is able to support fast feedback required by online experiments. The number of repeated stimuli can be significantly reduced by our method. The parallel computing scheme not only supports our wavelet feature extraction but also provides a framework for other algorithms developed for P300 Speller.

The neural correlation of sustained attention in performing conjunctive continuous performance task: an event-related potential study.

Owing to great improvements in cognitive neuroscience, the study of brain functions during different types of cognitive tasks has attracted much attention. Recording event-related potentials (ERPs) is an appropriate tool for such a purpose, as it is noninvasive and affordable. Attention is among the most studied cognitive processes. In this study, a visual version of the conjunctive continuous performance task-visual was used to examine the differences of cognitive processes in target and nontarget stimuli. Twenty healthy individuals (average age: 23 years) participated in the study. Electroencephalogram signals were recorded from all participants during conjunctive continuous performance task-visual. After preprocessing, the ERPs were calculated by averaging the epochs that were time-locked to the stimulus onset. Then, the ERPs of the two groups of target and nontarget stimuli, from the aspects of differences in the P300 and N200 morphological features, were analyzed in three midline channels: Pz, Fz, and Cz. According to the results, the P300 amplitudes were significantly larger in the target than those in the nontarget stimuli. The P300 latencies were also larger in the target than in the nontarget stimuli, but the difference was only significant in the Pz channel ERPs. For the N200 component, the negativity of amplitudes was significantly more enhanced in the target than in the nontarget stimuli. However, for the N200 latencies, no significant difference was found based on the data obtained from the groups. Furthermore, the findings suggest that the distribution of the P300 component is more centroparietal for the target stimuli, and more centrofrontal for the nontarget ones. In addition, the distribution of the N200 component is more frontoparietal for both the target and nontarget stimuli.

OA168] Biological effects evaluation in peripheral blood lymphocytes from patients undergoing radium-223 chloride (223RaCl2) therapy

Purpose The purpose of this study is to correlate the physical dose to non-target tissues to the radiation-induced chromosome damage in terms of the dicentrics and micronuclei (MN) in peripheral blood lymphocytes (PBL) after radium-223 chloride (223RaCl2) therapy in patients with bone metastasis derived from prostate cancer [1] . Methods Four patients undergoing 223RaCl2 therapy for skeletal diseases have been enrolled in this prospective clinical study. The effective dose to non-target tissues per injected activity was calculated considering the alpha, beta and gamma emission of Ra-223 and considering a standard man weight of 70 kg. PBL cultures for dicentric assay and micronuclei induction were performed before treatment (T0), 6 days (T1) and 30 days (T2) after the first cycle of treatment. Haematological toxicity parameters (blood cell count) have been monitored during therapy and analysed along with doses to blood and non-target tissues. Results The administration of 223RaCl2 produces a high dose dependent increase of radiation-induced chromosome damage in terms of dicentrics and micronuclei observed in the circulating lymphocytes (non target-tissue). Surprisingly, this increase of chromosome damage observed is not due to an 223RaCl2 addition dose, suggesting that circulating lymphocytes were exposed to an extra dose by the emissions from the target organs. In addition, clinical monitoring during the treatment showed a progressive increasing fatigue, leucopenia and anemia with a partial recovery after some months after the end of therapy. Conclusions The cytogenetic data seem to suggest a persistence of the radiation emission from the target tissue to non-target ones and seem to be correlated to the observed haematological toxicity, highlighting possible adverse effects related to this therapy. These data need further investigation in order to evaluate the potential side effects to normal, non-target tissue in patients treated with alpha emitters.

Laboratory and semi-field evaluation of three entomopathogenic nematode species on two non-target insect predators, Coccinella septumpunctata (Coleoptera: Coccinellidae) and Chrysoperla carnea (Neuroptera: Chrysopidae)

Biocontrol potential of the entomopathogenic nematodes (EPNs) on the second-instar larvae of the non-target insect predators, Coccinella septumpunctata and Chrysoperla carnea as compared to Spodoptera littoralis (Boisd.) was evaluated. The pathogenicity of EPNs, namely, Heterorhabditis bacteriophora, Steinernema feltiae and Steinernema carpocapsae at concentrations 100, 200, 400, 800 and 1600 IJs/cup) were tested at 2, 4 and 6 days’ post-inoculation. Laboratory results showed significant differences among the mortality rates of different tested larvae, for each concentration at different time intervals. H. bacteriophora induced the highest mortality followed by S. carpocapsae treatment. However, S. feltiae was found to be more safety on predators as it causes less mortality at 6 days of treatment. The values of half lethal concentrations (LC50) were 614.06, 3797.43 and 676.47 IJs/cup for C. Carnea and 390.60, 1209.88 and 503.65 IJs/cup for C. septumpunctata treated by H. bacteriophora, S. feltiae and S. carpocapsae, respectively. In semi-field experiments, there were non-significant differences among mortality of each predator indicated at concentrations of the different EPNs after 2 days or 6 days’ post-inoculation. The study revealed a lethal pathogenic effect of EPNs against insect pests but caused low mortality on the non-target ones.

Transform-Sensing Array Based on Wavelets

Transform sensing is proposed to sense the space through certain beam patterns designed for a transformation basis. The received signals will be the result of transformation instead of the original raw data. In doing so, the process of generating an arbitrary beam pattern on the phased array and multiple-input multiple-output is described. We further propose a transform-sensing mechanism using wavelets, and compare it with traditional sensing methods. Simulations and experiments demonstrate how to generate the transmission patterns and sense through the transform-sensing mechanism. The results show that transform sensing obtains high-resolution data on the target area, while spending less time on nontarget ones that need low resolutions. In this way, the new sensing mechanism generates a multiresolution result, which balances resolution and sensing efficiency.

A target and nontarget strategy for identification or characterization of the chemical ingredients in Chinese herb preparation Shuang-Huang-Lian oral liquid by ultra-performance liquid chromatography-quadrupole time-of-flight mass spectrometry.

A target and nontarget strategy based on in-house chemical components library was developed for rapid and comprehensive analysis of complicated components from traditional Chinese medicine preparation Shuang-Huang-Lian oral liquid. The sample was analyzed by ultra-performance liquid chromatography-quadrupole time-of-flight mass spectrometry using generic acquisition parameters. Automated detection and data filtering were performed on the UNIFI™ software and the detected peaks were evaluated against an in-house library. As a result, a total of 170 chemical components (110 target compounds and 60 nontarget ones) were identified or tentatively characterized, including 54 flavonoids, 30 phenylethanoid glycosides, 16 iridoid glycosides, 14 lignans, 32 organic acids, 19 triterpenoid saponins and five other types of compounds. Among them, 44 compounds were further confirmed by comparison with reference standards. It was demonstrated that this systematical approach could be successfully applied for rapid identification of multiple compounds in traditional Chinese medicine and its preparations. Furthermore, this work established the foundation for the further investigation on the metabolic fates of multiple ingredients in Shuang-Huang-Lian oral liquid.

Old Info for a New Fisheries Policy: Discard Ratios and Lengths at Discarding in EU Mediterranean Bottom Trawl Fisheries

Discarding is considered globally among the most important issues for fisheries management. The recent reform of the Common Fisheries Policy establishes a landing obligation for the species which are subject to catch limits and, in the Mediterranean, for species which are subject to Minimum Conservation Reference Size (MCRS) as defined in Annex III to Regulation (EC) No 1967/2006. Additionally, several other initiatives aim to reduce unwanted catches of target and bycatch species, including species of conservation concern. This raises the need to study discarding patterns of (mainly) these species. In this work we collated a considerable amount of historical published information on discard ratios and lengths at discarding for species caught in EU Mediterranean bottom trawl fisheries. The main aim was to summarize the available historical records and make them more accessible for scientific and managerial needs, as well as to try identifying patterns in discarding. We show discard ratios and lengths at which 50% of the individuals were discarded (L50) for 15 species (nine bony fishes, three crustacean decapods and three elasmobranchs). Discard ratios were usually low for target species such as hake, red mullets and highly commercial shrimps and exemptions from the landing obligation under the de minimis rules could be sought in several cases. Discard ratios were usually higher for commercial bycatch species. Discarding is affected by a combination of factors and for a given species, especially for non-target ones, discards are likely to fluctuate within a fishery, across seasons, years and regions. For most species considered, L50s were lower than the MCRS (when in place) and length at first maturity. L50s of target species, such as hake, were very small due to the existence of market demands for small sized individuals. However, for species of low demand, like horse mackerels, a higher retention size was observed, often exceeding MCRS. Lengths at discarding are affected by legal provisions, market demands but also by biological, population and ecological traits. Understanding the factors that affect discarding constitutes the starting point for designing mitigation measures and management plans to reduce discards and improve the sustainability of the stocks.

An Auditory Brain-Computer Interface Based on Dichotic Listening Paradigm

This study proposes a novel auditory brain–computer interface (BCI) based on dichotic listening paradigm, which allows the subject to select a target from two different sound stimulus sequences played in each ear. EEG data from 6 subjects has shown that the amplitude of N200 and P300 elicited by target was significantly higher than that of non-target ones. We found the N2ac component: a negativity wave in the N2 latency range at anterior contralateral electrodes. The target detection accuracy was assessed by support vector machine (SVM). The accuracy based on multiple electrodes is higher than a single electrode. The dichotic listening paradigm can be used for binary-class of brain-computer interface system.

‘Reserve effect’ within a temperate marine protected area in the north-eastern Atlantic (Arrábida Marine Park, Portugal)

MEPS Marine Ecology Progress Series Contact the journal Facebook Twitter RSS Mailing List Subscribe to our mailing list via Mailchimp HomeLatest VolumeAbout the JournalEditorsTheme Sections MEPS 481:11-24 (2013) - DOI: https://doi.org/10.3354/meps10204 ‘Reserve effect’ within a temperate marine protected area in the north-eastern Atlantic (Arrábida Marine Park, Portugal) Bárbara Horta e Costa1,2, Karim Erzini2, Jennifer E. Caselle3, Henrique Folhas1, Emanuel J. Gonçalves1,* 1Eco-Ethology Research Unit, ISPA - Instituto Universitário, R. Jardim do Tabaco 34, 1149-041 Lisboa, Portugal 2Centre of Marine Sciences, CCMAR, University of Algarve, Campus de Gambelas, 8005-139 Faro, Portugal 3Marine Science Institute, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, California 93106, USA *Corresponding author. Email: emanuel@ispa.pt ABSTRACT: Benefits of marine protected areas depend on local ecological and socio-cultural aspects which are critical to the success of the protection measures. In particular, before-after comparisons are indispensable to disentangle the effects of protection from those of different physical and ecological characteristics among areas. Using underwater visual surveys, we assessed whether biomass and abundance of temperate reef fish assemblages and target invertebrates increased inside a no-take area in the Arrábida Marine Park (Portugal) 3 to 4 yr after its establishment. Data were compared to a previous study, conducted 10 yr before protection was effective. Control-effect comparisons after reserve establishment showed a positive response of legal-size demersal fish and below legal-size target invertebrates. The first evidence of protection was found in biomass but not in numbers. Non-target groups and below legal-size demersal fish had a significant interaction among reserve and habitat complexity indices for either density or biomass, suggesting a lack of a reserve effect. Before-after comparisons revealed non-significant patterns of increase in numbers of target species compared to non-target ones. The most important commercial species showed the largest increase in density after protection was established. Significantly higher abundances and proportionally heavier individuals of these species were also found inside the reserve in the control-effect comparisons. These findings are reinforced by an increasing trend in landings which are consistent with the early detection of a reserve effect. KEY WORDS: Marine protected area · Before-after data · Temperate reef fishes · Target species · Habitat · Artisanal fisheries Full text in pdf format PreviousNextCite this article as: Horta e Costa B, Erzini K, Caselle JE, Folhas H, Gonçalves EJ (2013) ‘Reserve effect’ within a temperate marine protected area in the north-eastern Atlantic (Arrábida Marine Park, Portugal). Mar Ecol Prog Ser 481:11-24. https://doi.org/10.3354/meps10204 Export citation RSS - Facebook - Tweet - linkedIn Cited by Published in MEPS Vol. 481. Online publication date: May 07, 2013 Print ISSN: 0171-8630; Online ISSN: 1616-1599 Copyright © 2013 Inter-Research.