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Genome-Wide Association Studies (GWAS) of four Multi-parent Advanced Generation Inter-Cross (MAGIC) populations identified nine regions on chromosomes 1H, 3H, 4H, 5H, 6H and 7H associated with resistance against barley scald disease. Three of these regions are putatively novel resistance Quantitative Trait Loci (QTL). Barley scald is caused by Rhynchosporium commune, one of the most important barley leaf diseases that are prevalent in most barley-growing regions. Up to 40% yield losses can occur in susceptible barley cultivars. Four MAGIC populations were generated in a Nordic Public–Private Pre-breeding of spring barley project (PPP Barley) to introduce resistance to several important diseases. Here, these MAGIC populations consisting of six to eight founders each were tested for scald resistance in field trials in Finland and Iceland. Eight different model covariate combinations were compared for GWAS studies, and the models that deviated the least from the expected p-values were selected. For all QTL, candidate genes were identified that are predicted to be involved in pathogen defence. The MAGIC progenies contained new haplotypes of significant SNP-markers with high resistance levels. The lines with successfully pyramided resistance against scald and mildew and the significant markers are now distributed among Nordic plant breeders and will benefit development of disease-resistant cultivars. Supplementary Information The online version of this article (10.1007/s00122-021-03930-y) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Data for Annerer-Walcher, S., Körner, C., Beaty, R. E., & Benedek, M. (2020). Eye behavior predicts susceptibility to visual distraction during internally directed cognition. Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13414-020-02068-1

A key element of contact lens practice involves clinical evaluation of anterior eye health, including the cornea and limbus, conjunctiva and sclera, eyelids and eyelashes, lacrimal system and tear film. This report reviews the fundamental anatomy and physiology of these structures, including the vascular supply, venous drainage, lymphatic drainage, sensory innervation, physiology and function. This is the foundation for considering the potential interactions with, and effects of, contact lens wear on the anterior eye. This information is not consistently published as academic research and this report provides a synthesis from all available sources. With respect to terminology, the report aims to promote the consistent use of nomenclature in the field, and generally adopts anatomical terms recommended by the Federative Committee for Anatomical Terminology. Techniques for the examination of the ocular surface are also discussed.

Selection mechanisms that dynamically gate only relevant perceptual information for further processing and sustained representation in working memory are critical for goal-directed behavior. We examined whether this gating process can be modulated by transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) over left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (lDLPFC)—a region known to play a key role in working memory and conscious access. Specifically, we examined the effects of tDCS on the magnitude of the “attentional blink” (AB), a deficit in identifying the second of two targets presented in rapid succession. Thirty-four participants performed an AB task before (baseline), during and after 20 min of 1-mA anodal and cathodal tDCS in two separate sessions. On the basis of previous reports linking individual differences in AB magnitude to individual differences in DLPFC activity and on the basis of suggestions that effects of tDCS depend on baseline brain activity levels, we hypothesized that anodal tDCS over lDLPFC would modulate the magnitude of the AB as a function of individual baseline AB magnitude. Behavioral results did not provide support for this hypothesis. At the group level, we also did not observe any significant effects of tDCS, and a Bayesian analysis revealed strong evidence that tDCS to lDLPFC did not affect AB performance. Together, these findings do not support the idea that there is an optimal level of prefrontal cortical excitability for cognitive function. More generally, they add to a growing body of work that challenges the idea that the effects of tDCS can be predicted from baseline levels of behavior.

Purpose To elucidate the relationship between partial blink rate (PBR) and ocular surface parameters. Methods We conducted a retrospective cross‐sectional study of the patients who visited the Kim’s Eye Hospital between March 2020 and July 2020. Blinking dynamics, tear film lipid layer thickness (LLT), non-invasive tear film break- up time (NITBUT), tear meniscus height (TMH), and meibomian gland (MG) dropout rate were assessed using the IDRA® Ocular surface analyzer (SBM SISTEMI, Inc., Torino, Italy) (IDRA). Dry eye symptoms were quantified by the Standard Patient Evaluation of Eye Dryness (SPEED) questionnaire scores. Results A total of 47 non-Sjögren dry eye patients (47 right eyes, mean age = 56.8 ± 14.5 [20–75] years, 66% female) were enrolled. Among the ocular surface parameters, PBR had strong correlations with MG dropout rate (r = 0.811; p

Chickpea is an inexpensive source of protein, minerals, and vitamins to the poor people living in arid and semi-arid regions of Southern Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa. New chickpea cultivars with enhanced levels of protein, Fe and Zn content are a medium-term strategy for supplying essential nutrients for human health and reducing malnutrition. In the current study, a chickpea reference set of 280 accessions, including landraces, breeding lines, and advanced cultivars, was evaluated for grain protein, Fe, Zn content and agronomic traits over two seasons. Using a mid-density 5k SNP array, 4603 highly informative SNPs distributed across the chickpea genome were used for GWAS analysis. Population structure analysis revealed three subpopulations (K = 3). Linkage disequilibrium (LD) was extensive, and LD decay was relatively low. A total of 20 and 46 marker-trait associations (MTAs) were identified for grain nutrient and agronomic traits, respectively, using FarmCPU and BLINK models. Of which seven SNPs for grain protein, twelve for Fe, and one for Zn content were distributed on chromosomes 1, 4, 6, and 7. The marker S4_4477846 on chr4 was found to be co-associated with grain protein over seasons. The markers S1_11613376 and S1_2772537 co-associated with grain Fe content under NSII and pooled seasons and S7_9379786 marker under NSI and pooled seasons. The markers S4_31996956 co-associated with grain Fe and days to maturity. SNP annotation of associated markers were found to be related to gene functions of metal ion binding, transporters, protein kinases, transcription factors, and many more functions involved in plant metabolism along with Fe and protein homeostasis. The identified significant MTAs has potential use in marker-assisted selection for developing nutrient-rich chickpea cultivars after validation in the breeding populations.

We live in world where nothing is impossible. The technology has come handy not only for the physically abled, but also for the disabled. Several products are being launched to help the section of the society which comprises of the physically challenged population. Blink detection based methods are being explored for the paralysed to help them. A survey in these methods is discussed in this paper.

Every day we mentally process new information that needs to be attended, encoded and retrieved. Processing demands depend on the amount of information and the mental attentional capacity of the individual. Research shows that eye movement indices such as peak saccade velocity and blink rate are related to processes of attentional control, however it is still unclear how eye movements are affected by graded changes in task demand. We examine for the first time relations of eye movements to mental attentional tasks with six levels of task demand and two interference conditions. We report data on 57 adults who completed two versions of the color matching task and provided subjective self rating for each mental attentional demand level. Results show that peak saccade velocity and blink rate decrease as a function of mental attentional demand and correlate negatively with self rating of mental effort. Theoretically, new findings related to mental attentional demand and eye movements inform models of visual processing and cognition. Practically, results point to directions for further research to better understand complex relations among eye movements and mental attentional demand in pediatric populations and individuals with cognitive deficits., Eye movements; Mental attention; Blink; Peak saccade velocity; Working memory.

Performance optimisation continues to be a relevant topic both in hardware and software development,with video games producing fully rendered images every 16 or 34 milliseconds, dependingon the desired framerate. Human observers close their eyes for about 300 ms an averageof 12 times per minute, which means many frames will never be observed. This thesis aimedto examine if it would be possible to reduce rendering time by detecting and skipping theseunobserved frames. Blinks were identified during runtime by detecting the eye aspect ratio ofthe observer in low-quality web camera footage. A prototype using this method was tested ona small group of subjects to determine if footage watched this way was perceived as distractingor of lesser quality than unaltered images. Results from a questionnaire suggest that thealtered footage did not impact the subjects’ opinions, with no participant reporting any visualdisturbances. Because this test used video footage, skipping frames was substituted by a lowerresolution render. Altered frames were rendered an average of five per cent faster than theirunaltered counterparts., Isabel Kütemeyer, Masterarbeit Universität Klagenfurt 2022

The rapid expansion of video conferencing and remote works due to the COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in a massive volume of video data to be analyzed in order to understand the audience engagement. However, analyzing this data efficiently, particularly in real-time, poses a scalability challenge as online events can involve hundreds of people and last for hours. Existing solutions, especially open-sourced contributions, usually require dedicated and expensive hardware, and are designed as centralized cloud systems. Additionally, they may also require users to stream their video to remote servers, which raises privacy concerns. This paper introduces scalable and efficient computer vision algorithms for analyzing face orientation and eye blink in real-time on edge devices, including Android, iOS, and Raspberry Pi. An example solution is presented for proctoring online meetings, workplaces, and exams. It analyzes audiences on their own devices, thus addressing scalability and privacy issues, and runs at up to 30 fps on a Raspberry Pi. The proposed face orientation detection algorithm is extremely simple, efficient, and able to estimate the head pose in two degrees of freedom, horizontal and vertical. The proposed Eye Aspect Ratio (EAR) with simple adaptive threshold demonstrated a significant improvement in terms of false positives and overall accuracy compared to the existing constant threshold method. Additionally, the algorithms are implemented and open sourced as a toolkit with modular, cross-platform MediaPipe Calculators and Graphs so that users can easily create custom solutions for a variety of purposes and devices.

Purpose: This study aimed to investigate the effect of transcutaneous upper eyelid blepharoplasty on lipid layer thickness (LLT) and blink parameters in young women during the early postoperative period.Methods: This prospective study included 110 eyes of 55 young female patients (age range, 19–31 years) who underwent transcutaneous upper eyelid blepharoplasty. The LLT and blink parameters measured using a LipiView interferometer were recorded before the surgery and 1 week and 1 month after the surgery. Ocular Surface Disease Index (OSDI) score, noninvasive tear film breakup time (NITBUT), and palpebral fissure height (PFH) measurements were also performed at each time point.Results: The number of blinks significantly decreased (P < 0.001), and the number of partial blinks and partial blink rate (PBR) significantly increased 1 week after the surgery (P = 0.002 and P < 0.001); they all returned to baseline in 1 month. The LLT and OSDI score increased significantly 1 week and 1 month after the surgery (P < 0.001 and P < 0.001). A significant increase in the NITBUT and a significant decrease in the PFH were observed 1 week after the surgery (P < 0.001 and P < 0.001), and the values returned to baseline 1 month after the surgery. No clinical correlation was found between blink parameters and ocular surface parameters.Conclusions: Transcutaneous upper eyelid blepharoplasty led to a change in blink parameters and ocular surface parameters during the early postoperative period. However, this influence was temporary, and the transitory change in blink parameters had no effects on the ocular surface environment.

A sample of 33 experiments was extracted from the Web-of-Science database over a 5-year period (2016–2020) that used physiological measures to measure intrinsic cognitive load. Only studies that required participants to solve tasks of varying complexities using a within-subjects design were included. The sample identified a number of different physiological measures obtained by recording signals from four main body categories (heart and lungs, eyes, skin, and brain), as well as subjective measures. The overall validity of the measures was assessed by examining construct validity and sensitivity. It was found that the vast majority of physiological measures had some level of validity, but varied considerably in sensitivity to detect subtle changes in intrinsic cognitive load. Validity was also influenced by the type of task. Eye-measures were found to be the most sensitive followed by the heart and lungs, skin, and brain. However, subjective measures had the highest levels of validity. It is concluded that a combination of physiological and subjective measures is most effective in detecting changes in intrinsic cognitive load.

A sample of 33 experiments was extracted from the Web-of-Science database over a 5-year period (2016-2020) that used physiological measures to measure intrinsic cognitive load. Only studies that required participants to solve tasks of varying complexities using a within-subjects design were included. The sample identified a number of different physiological measures obtained by recording signals from four main body categories (heart and lungs, eyes, skin, and brain), as well as subjective measures. The overall validity of the measures was assessed by examining construct validity and sensitivity. It was found that the vast majority of physiological measures had some level of validity, but varied considerably in sensitivity to detect subtle changes in intrinsic cognitive load. Validity was also influenced by the type of task. Eye-measures were found to be the most sensitive followed by the heart and lungs, skin, and brain. However, subjective measures had the highest levels of validity. It is concluded that a combination of physiological and subjective measures is most effective in detecting changes in intrinsic cognitive load.

In the assistive research area, human–computer interface (HCI) technology is used to help people with disabilities by conveying their intentions and thoughts to the outside world. Many HCI systems based on eye movement have been proposed to assist people with disabilities. However, due to the complexity of the necessary algorithms and the difficulty of hardware implementation, there are few general-purpose designs that consider practicality and stability in real life. Therefore, to solve these limitations and problems, an HCI system based on electrooculography (EOG) is proposed in this study. The proposed classification algorithm provides eye-state detection, including the fixation, saccade, and blinking states. Moreover, this algorithm can distinguish among ten kinds of saccade movements (i.e., up, down, left, right, farther left, farther right, up-left, down-left, up-right, and down-right). In addition, we developed an HCI system based on an eye-movement classification algorithm. This system provides an eye-dialing interface that can be used to improve the lives of people with disabilities. The results illustrate the good performance of the proposed classification algorithm. Moreover, the EOG-based system, which can detect ten different eye-movement features, can be utilized in real-life applications.

Objective Assessing daily motor fluctuations is an important part of the disease management for patients with Parkinson's disease (PD). However, the frequent recording of subjective and/or objective assessments is not always feasible, and easier monitoring methods have been sought. Previous studies have reported that the spontaneous eye-blink rate (EBR) is correlated with the dopamine levels in the brain. Thus, the continuous monitoring of the EBR may be useful for predicting the motor status in patients with PD. Methods Electrooculograms (EOGs) were recorded for up to 7.5 hours from three PD patients using a wearable device that resembled ordinary glasses. An receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis was performed to compare the ability of the EBR estimates at each time-point (Blink Index) and the plasma levodopa levels to predict the motor status. Results The Blink Index was correlated with the plasma levodopa levels. When an indicator for the first hour of the observation period was included in the model, the Blink Index discerned wearing-off and dyskinesia as accurately as the plasma levodopa level. Conclusion Our study provides preliminary evidence regarding the utility of continuous EBR monitoring for the non-invasive evaluation of the motor status in patients with PD.

© 2019 IEEE. It is well known that blink, yawn, and heart rate changes give clue about a human's mental state, such as drowsiness and fatigue. In this paper, image sequences, as the raw data, are captured from smart phones which serve as non-contact optical sensors. Video streams containing subject's facial region are analyzed to identify the physiological sources that are mixed in each image. We then propose a method to extract blood volume pulse and eye blink and yawn signals as multiple independent sources simultaneously by multi-channel second-order blind identification (SOBI) without any other sophisticated processing, such as eye and mouth localizations. An overall decision is made by analyzing the separated source signals in parallel to determine the driver's driving state. The robustness of the proposed method is tested under various illumination contexts and a variety of head motion modes. Experiments on 15 subjects show that the multi-channel SOBI presents a promising framework to accurately detect drowsiness by merging multi-physiological information in a less complex way.

Blink duration is one of the useful indicators to estimate drowsiness and fatigue. A Doppler sensor could be a key device to realize the non-contact blink duration estimation, which is very useful for the drowsiness and fatigue monitoring in real life. However, none of the blink duration estimation methods has been proposed so far. In this paper, we propose a novel Doppler sensor-based blink duration estimation method based on the analysis of eyelids closing and opening behavior on a spectrogram. When one blinks, the energies caused by eyelids closing and opening behavior appears on a spectrogram. Hence, the blink duration can be estimated by integrating such energies and then detecting the timings when the integrated energy caused by the eyelids closing behavior appears and when the energy caused by the eyelids opening behavior disappears. To precisely detect such timings, a spectrogram with a short time window is better. However, thorough the preliminary experiments, we confirmed that when a shorter time window is used, more noise appears around such timings, which makes it difficult to detect such timings. To deal with this issue, the proposed method multiplies several integrated energies for spectrograms with different time windows. By multiplying the integrated energies with such noise and the ones without such noise, the energy level of such noise gets significantly declined over the product. Furthermore, the levels of the redundant blink energies also decline to the noise level, where the redundant blink energies denote the ones that appear before and after the eyelids closing and opening timings because of a long time window. The results of the experiments on 8 subjects watching a movie showed that our method achieved an average root mean squared error (RMSE) of 49.3 ms.

The neural basis of consciousness has been explored in humans and animals; however, the exact nature of consciousness remains elusive. In this study, we aimed to elucidate which brain regions are relevant to arousal in humans. Simultaneous recordings of brain activity and eye-tracking were conducted in 20 healthy human participants. Brain activity was measured by resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging with a multiband acquisition protocol. The subjective levels of arousal were investigated based on the degree of eyelid closure that was recorded using a near-infrared eye camera within the scanner. The results showed that the participants were in an aroused state for 79% of the scan time, and the bilateral thalami were significantly associated with the arousal condition. Among the major thalamic subnuclei, the mediodorsal nucleus (MD) showed greater involvement in arousal when compared with other subnuclei. A receiver operating characteristic analysis with leave-one-out crossvalidation conducted using template-based brain activity and arousal-level data from eye-tracking showed that, in most participants, thalamic activity significantly predicted the subjective levels of arousal. These results indicate a significant role of the thalamus, and in particular, the MD, which has rich connectivity with the prefrontal cortices and the limbic system in human consciousness.

La inclusión de podcasts en la estrategia comunicativa de las organizaciones es un fenómeno emergente, pues las empresas y las instituciones que confían en el audio branding para conectar con sus públicos saben que el sonido es una herramienta eficaz para transmitir sus activos inmateriales. Este artículo estudia el caso de Blink, los podcasts de BBVA, con el objetivo de evaluar la coherencia entre los contenidos que se difunden mediante este formato sonoro y los valores que proclama la entidad financiera. El análisis de contenido aplicado a la muestra, formada por todas las entregas de Blink emitidas durante su primer año de existencia (2018), evidencia una marcada correspondencia entre los mensajes y las prioridades estratégicas de la organización. El podcast se convertiría así en un instrumento que aporta un plus a la gestión estratégico-comunicativa de las corporaciones y refuerza el valor emocional de sus intangibles. The inclusion of podcasts in the communication strategy of organizations is an emerging phenomenon. There are many companies that rely on audio branding to connect with their audiences, and they know how sound could be an effective tool to communicate their intangible values. This article studies the case of Blink, the podcasts of BBVA. The goal is to evaluate the coherence between the content of corporate podcast and the values announced by the financial institution. It has been applied a content analysis to a sample consisting in whole of the Blink broadcast along its first year (2018). The results show a marked correlation between messages content and strategic priorities of the organization. Thus, podcasting could be a capable tool to add a plus to strategic-communicative management of corporations and to reinforce the emotional value of their intangibles.

(1) Background: Acute acoustic (sound) stimulus prompts a state of defensive motivation in which unconscious muscle responses are markedly enhanced in humans. The orbicularis oculi (OO) of the eye is an easily accessed muscle common for acoustic startle reaction/response/reflex (ASR) investigations and is the muscle of interest in this study. Although the ASR can provide insights about numerous clinical conditions, existing methodologies (Electromyogram, EMG) limit the usability of the method in real clinical conditions. (2) Objective: With EMG-free muscle recording in mind, our primary aim was to identify and investigate potential correlations in the responses of individual and cooperative OO muscles to various acoustic stimuli using a mobile and wire-free system. Our secondary aim was to investigate potential altered responses to high and also relatively low intensity acoustics at different frequencies in both sitting and standing positions through the use of biaural sound induction and video diagnostic techniques and software. (3) Methods: This study used a mobile-phone acoustic startle response monitoring system application to collect blink amplitude and velocity data on healthy males, aged 18&ndash, 28 community cohorts during (n = 30) in both sitting and standing postures. The iPhone X application delivers specific sound parameters and detects blinking responses to acoustic stimulus (in millisecond resolution) to study the responses of the blinking reflex to acoustic sounds in standing and sitting positions by using multiple acoustic test sets of different frequencies and amplitudes introduced as acute sound stimuli (&lt, 0.5 s). The single acoustic battery of 15 pure-square wave sounds consisted of frequencies and amplitudes between 500, 1000, 2000, 3000, and 4000 Hz scales using 65, 90, and 105 dB (e.g., 3000 Hz_90 dB). (4) Results: Results show that there was a synchronization of amplitude and velocity between both eyes to all acoustic startles. Significant differences (p = 0.01) in blinking reaction time between sitting vs. standing at the high intensity (105 dB) 500 Hz acoustic test set was discovered. Interestingly, a highly significant difference (p &lt, 0.001) in response times between test sets 500 Hz_105 dB and 4000 Hz_105 dB was identified. (5) Conclusions: To our knowledge, this is the first mobile phone-based acoustic battery used to detect and report significant ASR responses to specific frequencies and amplitudes of sound stimulus with corresponding sitting and standing conditions. The results from this experiment indicate the potential significance of using the specific frequency, amplitude, and postural conditions (as never before identified) which can open new horizons for ASR to be used for diagnosis and monitoring in numerous clinical and remote or isolated conditions.

In this study, the surface temperature of the eye was measured by radiation thermometer and the behavior of blink was recorded by video camera for two subjects. As the results, it was shown that the surface temperature of the eyeball decreased during opening eyes, and that the decrease reached 0.5 to 1.0 ºC. In addition, it was found that the time of closing eyes during a blink became longer when the interval of blinking was assigned to 5 or 3 seconds, which was longer than her/his natural blink interval. At the same time, the temperature of upper eyelid during closing eyes was shown to be higher than that of the eyeball, and thus the heat exchange between the eyeball and the eyelid during blink accounts for this. These results can be a basis for the quantitative evaluation of evaporation and accumulation of tears and for clarifying the indoor thermal environmental condition to prevent the sensation of dryness at the eye. / 本研究では、眼の表面温度を放射温度計により非接触で測定し、ビデオ画像として記録された瞬きとの対応関係を検討した。測定は、自然な状態、瞬きを行う時間間隔を5 秒あるいは3 秒と指定する場合、眼を閉じた場合について、2 名の被験者に対して行った。実験の結果、開眼中に眼球表面温度が低下すること、その温度低下は0.5～1.0℃に達すること、閉眼時の上瞼外側表面温度が開眼時の眼球表面温度より高いこと、したがって、瞬きにより眼球が加温されていることが明らかになった。また、自然な状態より長い時間間隔で瞬きをするように指定した場合、瞬き時に眼を閉じる時間が長くなることが見出され、瞬き時の閉眼時間が、瞬き回数に加えて、眼の状態を把握する指標となり得ることを示唆した。これらの実験結果は、涙の蒸発量や蓄積量を評価し、眼の乾燥感が生じない室内温熱環境条件を明らかにする目的に活用できるものと考えられる。

In this study, the surface temperature of the eye was measured by radiation thermometer and the behavior of blink was recorded by video camera for two subjects. As the results, it was shown that the surface temperature of the eyeball decreased during opening eyes, and that the decrease reached 0.5 to 1.0 ºC. In addition, it was found that the time of closing eyes during a blink became longer when the interval of blinking was assigned to 5 or 3 seconds, which was longer than her/his natural blink interval. At the same time, the temperature of upper eyelid during closing eyes was shown to be higher than that of the eyeball, and thus the heat exchange between the eyeball and the eyelid during blink accounts for this. These results can be a basis for the quantitative evaluation of evaporation and accumulation of tears and for clarifying the indoor thermal environmental condition to prevent the sensation of dryness at the eye., 本研究では、眼の表面温度を放射温度計により非接触で測定し、ビデオ画像として記録された瞬きとの対応関係を検討した。測定は、自然な状態、瞬きを行う時間間隔を5 秒あるいは3 秒と指定する場合、眼を閉じた場合について、2 名の被験者に対して行った。実験の結果、開眼中に眼球表面温度が低下すること、その温度低下は0.5～1.0℃に達すること、閉眼時の上瞼外側表面温度が開眼時の眼球表面温度より高いこと、したがって、瞬きにより眼球が加温されていることが明らかになった。また、自然な状態より長い時間間隔で瞬きをするように指定した場合、瞬き時に眼を閉じる時間が長くなることが見出され、瞬き時の閉眼時間が、瞬き回数に加えて、眼の状態を把握する指標となり得ることを示唆した。これらの実験結果は、涙の蒸発量や蓄積量を評価し、眼の乾燥感が生じない室内温熱環境条件を明らかにする目的に活用できるものと考えられる。

Working memory, the system that maintains a limited set of representations for immediate use in cognition, is a central part of human cognition. Three processes have recently been proposed to govern information storage in working memory: Consolidation, refreshing and removal. Here we discuss in detail the theoretical construct of working-memory consolidation, a process critical to the creation of a stable working memory representation. We present a brief overview of the research that indicated the need for a construct such as working memory consolidation and the subsequent research that has helped to define the parameters of the construct. We then move on to explicitly state the points of agreement as to what processes are involved in working-memory consolidation.

Working memory, the system that maintains a limited set of representations for immediate use in cognition, is a central part of human cognition. Three processes have recently been proposed to govern information storage in working memory: Consolidation, refreshing and removal. Here we discuss in detail the theoretical construct of working-memory consolidation, a process critical to the creation of a stable working memory representation. We present a brief overview of the research that indicated the need for a construct such as working memory consolidation and the subsequent research that has helped to define the parameters of the construct. We then move on to explicitly state the points of agreement as to what processes are involved in working-memory consolidation.

In this study, we investigated how the acute physiological effects of cocoa flavanols might result in specific cognitive changes, in particular in temporal and spatial attention. To this end, we pre-registered and implemented a randomized, double-blind, placebo- and baseline-controlled crossover design. A sample of 48 university students participated in the study and each of them completed the experimental tasks in four conditions (baseline, placebo, low dose, and high-dose flavanol), administered in separate sessions with a 1-week washout interval. A rapid serial visual presentation task was used to test flavanol effects on temporal attention and integration, and a visual search task was similarly employed to investigate spatial attention. Results indicated that cocoa flavanols improved visual search efficiency, reflected by reduced reaction time. However, cocoa flavanols did not facilitate temporal attention nor integration, suggesting that flavanols may affect some aspects of attention, but not others. Potential underlying mechanisms are discussed.

In a randomized, double-blind, and placebo-controlled experiment, the acute effects of gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) supplementation on temporal and spatial attention in young healthy adults were investigated. A hybrid two-target rapid serial visual presentation task was used to measure temporal attention and integration. Additionally, a visual search task was used to measure the speed and accuracy of spatial attention. While temporal attention depends primarily on the distribution of limited attentional resources across time, spatial attention represents the engagement and disengagement by relevant and irrelevant stimuli across the visual field. Although spatial attention was unaffected by GABA supplementation altogether, we found evidence supporting improved performance in the temporal attention task. The attentional blink was numerically, albeit not significantly, attenuated at Lag 3, and significantly fewer order errors were committed at Lag 1, compared to the placebo condition. No effect was found on temporal integration rates. Although there is controversy about whether oral GABA can cross the blood-brain barrier, our results offer preliminary evidence that GABA intake might help to distribute limited attentional resources more efficiently, and can specifically improve the identification and ordering of visual events that occur in close temporal succession.

Performance in rapid serial visual presentation tasks has been shown to depend on the temporal integration of target stimuli when they are presented in direct succession. Temporal target integration produces a single, combined representation of visually compatible stimuli, which is comparatively easy to identify. It is currently unknown to what extent target compatibility affects this perceptual behavior, because it has not been studied systematically to date. In the present study, the effects of compatibility on temporal integration and attention were investigated by manipulating the Gestalt properties of target features. Of particular interest were configurations in which a global illusory shape was formed when all stimulus features were present; a Kanizsa stimulus, which was expected to have a unifying effect on the perception of the successive targets. The results showed that although the presence of a Kanizsa shape can indeed enhance temporal integration, this also was observed for other good Gestalts, such as due to common fate and closure. Identification accuracy seemed to vary, possibly as a result of masking strength, but this did not seem associated with attentional processing per se. Implications for theories of Gestalt processing and temporal integration are discussed.

Eye movements have been proven the most frequent of all human activities; therefore, research on a relationship between different eye movement patterns become a hotspot in human–computer interface fields. The motivation of this paper is to develop a reading auxiliary apparatus by measuring and analyzing the electrooculography signals. We first describe the saccade detection algorithm based on the wavelet packet decomposition and the derivation blink detection algorithm. Furthermore, consecutive blinks were used to control the system’s working state and a magnifier, whose position is adjusted according to the results of saccade detection. Experiential results on six participants show that recognition accuracy ratio ( F1 score ) is 90.096%, which reveal that the proposed system has a good recognition performance on reading activity detection and analysis.

Qualitative assessments of the blink reflex are used clinically to assess neurological status in critical care, operating room, and rehabilitative settings. Despite decades of literature supporting the use of quantitative measurements of the blink reflex in the evaluation of multiple neurological disorders, clinical adoption has failed. Thus, there remains an unmet clinical need for an objective, portable, non-invasive metric of neurological health that can be used in a variety of settings. We have developed a high-speed videography-based device to trigger, record, and analyze a blink reflex. A pilot study was performed to compare the device’s measurements to the published literature of electromyographic measurements, currently the gold standard. The study results indicate that the device is a viable tool to obtain fast, objective, and quantitative metrics of a blink reflex, and has promise as a non-invasive diagnostic assessment of neurological health., The positions of the right (red) and left (blue) eyelids during a stimulated blink are tracked over time using image processing. The technique produces rapid, non-invasive, and objective measurements of blink parameters, making it a useful tool for assessing neurological function.

Genome–environment associations (GEAs) are a powerful strategy for the study of adaptive traits in wild plant populations, yet they still lack behind in the use of modern statistical methods as the ones suggested for genome-wide association studies (GWASs). In order to bridge this gap, we couple GEA with last-generation GWAS algorithms in common bean to identify novel sources of heat tolerance across naturally heterogeneous ecosystems. Common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) is the most important legume for human consumption, and breeding it for resistance to heat stress is key because annual increases in atmospheric temperature are causing decreases in yield of up to 9% for every 1°C. A total of 78 geo-referenced wild accessions, spanning the two gene pools of common bean, were genotyped by sequencing (GBS), leading to the discovery of 23,373 single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) markers. Three indices of heat stress were developed for each accession and inputted in last-generation algorithms (i.e. SUPER, FarmCPU, and BLINK) to identify putative associated loci with the environmental heterogeneity in heat stress. Best-fit models revealed 120 significantly associated alleles distributed in all 11 common bean chromosomes. Flanking candidate genes were identified using 1-kb genomic windows centered in each associated SNP marker. Some of these genes were directly linked to heat-responsive pathways, such as the activation of heat shock proteins (MED23, MED25, HSFB1, HSP40, and HSP20). We also found protein domains related to thermostability in plants such as S1 and Zinc finger A20 and AN1. Other genes were related to biological processes that may correlate with plant tolerance to high temperature, such as time to flowering (MED25, MBD9, and PAP), germination and seedling development (Pkinase_Tyr, Ankyrin-B, and Family Glicosil-hydrolase), cell wall stability (GAE6), and signaling pathway of abiotic stress via abscisic acid (histone-like transcription factors NFYB and phospholipase C) and auxin (Auxin response factor and AUX_IAA). This work offers putative associated loci for marker-assisted and genomic selection for heat tolerance in common bean. It also demonstrates that it is feasible to identify genome-wide environmental associations with modest sample sizes by using a combination of various carefully chosen environmental indices and last-generation GWAS algorithms.

Performance in a dual target rapid serial visual presentation task was investigated, dependent on whether the color or the contrast of the targets was the same or different. Both identification accuracy on the second target, as a measure of temporal attention, and the frequency of temporal integration were measured. When targets had a different color (red or blue), overall identification accuracy of the second target and identification accuracy of the second target at Lag 1 were both higher than when targets had the same color. At the same time, increased temporal integration of the targets at Lag 1 was observed in the different color condition, even though actual (non-integrated) single targets never consisted of multiple colors. When the color pairs were made more similar, so that they all fell within the range of a single nominal hue (blue), these effects were not observed. Different findings were obtained when contrast was manipulated. Identification accuracy of the second target was higher in the same contrast condition than in the different contrast condition. Higher identification accuracy of both targets was furthermore observed when they were presented with high contrast, while target contrast did not influence temporal integration at all. Temporal attention and integration were thus influenced differently by target contrast pairing than by (categorical) color pairing. Categorically different color pairs, or more generally, categorical feature pairs, may thus afford a reduction in temporal competition between successive targets that eventually enhances attention and integration.

Vigilance deficits account for a substantial number of accidents and errors. Current techniques to detect vigilance impairment measure only the most severe level evident in eyelid closure and falling asleep, which is often too late to avoid an accident or error. The present study sought to identify ocular biometrics of intermediate impairment of vigilance and develop a new technique that could detect a range of deficits in vigilant attention (VA). Sixteen healthy adults performed well-validated Psychomotor Vigilance Test (PVT) for tracking vigilance attention while undergoing simultaneous recording of eye metrics every 2 hours during 38 hours of continuous wakefulness. A novel marker was found that measured VA when the eyes were open—the prevalence of microsaccades. Notably, the prevalence of microsaccades decreased in response to sleep deprivation and time-on-task. In addition, a novel algorithm for detecting multilevel VA was developed, which estimated performance on the PVT by integrating the novel marker with other eye-related indices. The novel algorithm also tracked changes in intermediate level of VA (specific reaction times in the PVT, i.e. 300–500 ms) during prolonged time-on-task and sleep deprivation, which had not been tracked previously by conventional techniques. The implication of the findings is that this novel algorithm, named “eye-metrical estimation version of the PVT: PVT-E,” can be used to reduce human-error-related accidents caused by vigilance impairment even when its level is intermediate.

Recognizing eye movements is important for gaze behavior understanding like in human communication analysis (human-human or robot interactions) or for diagnosis (medical, reading impairments). In this paper, we address this task using remote RGB-D sensors to analyze people behaving in natural conditions. This is very challenging given that such sensors have a normal sampling rate of 30 Hz and provide low-resolution eye images (typically 36x60 pixels), and natural scenarios introduce many variabilities in illumination, shadows, head pose, and dynamics. Hence gaze signals one can extract in these conditions have lower precision compared to dedicated IR eye trackers, rendering previous methods less appropriate for the task. To tackle these challenges, we propose a deep learning method that directly processes the eye image video streams to classify them into fixation, saccade, and blink classes, and allows to distinguish irrelevant noise (illumination, low-resolution artifact, inaccurate eye alignment, difficult eye shapes) from true eye motion signals. Experiments on natural 4-party interactions demonstrate the benefit of our approach compared to previous methods, including deep learning models applied to gaze outputs.

The orbicularis oculi muscle is the sphincter muscle of the eyelids that blinks and closes the eyes. In this review, our aim was threefold: (1) to introduce the performance characteristics of blinking activity in young and older adults, (2) to discuss the influence of aging on the orbicularis oculi muscle in healthy adults, and (3) to provide information about the effect of facial exercise training on the orbicularis oculi muscle. To achieve the purpose of this review, a search using two electronic databases (PubMed and Scopus) and a search engine (Google Scholar) was conducted. The amplitude and peak velocity of spontaneously blinking behavior, which is an index of muscle function of the orbicularis oculi, appear to be affected by aging. The muscle thickness of the orbicularis oculi tends to be low in older adults, but there are issues that need to be examined further, such as differences in sex and measurement positions. There was no study on the effect of exercise training; however, the results of a highly trained man indicate that the orbicularis oculi muscles might elicit muscle hypertrophy through non-traditional resistance exercise.

Working memory, the system that maintains a limited set of representations for immediate use in cognition, is a central part of human cognition. Three processes have recently been proposed to govern information storage in working memory: Consolidation, refreshing and removal. Here we discuss in detail the theoretical construct of working-memory consolidation, a process critical to the creation of a stable working memory representation. We present a brief overview of the research that indicated the need for a construct such as working memory consolidation and the subsequent research that has helped to define the parameters of the construct. We then move on to explicitly state the points of agreement as to what processes are involved in working-memory consolidation.

This paper demonstrates fatigue assessment based on eye blinks that are detected by dye-sensitized photovoltaic cells. In particular, the sensors were attached to the temple of eyeglasses and positioned at the lateral side of the eye. They are wearable, did not majorly disturb the user&rsquo, s eyesight, and detected the position of the eyelid or the eye state. The optimal location of the sensor was experimentally investigated by evaluating the detection accuracy of blinks. We conducted fatigue assessment experiments using the developed wearable system, or smart glasses. Several parameters, including the frequency, duration, and velocity of eye blinks, were extracted as fatigue indices. Successful fatigue assessment by the proposed system will be of great benefit for maximizing performance and maintenance of physical/mental health.

Corneal nerves mediate pain from the ocular surface, lacrimation, and blinking, all of which protect corneal surface homeostasis and help preserve vision. Corneal nerve density correlates with neuropathic pain states and is used as an assessment of small fiber neuropathies. Because pain, lacrimation and blinking are rarely assessed at the same time, it is not known if their regulatory mechanisms have similar temporal dynamics after acute corneal injury. We examined changes in corneal nerve density, evoked and spontaneous pain, and ocular homeostasis in Sprague-Dawley male rats after a superficial epithelial injury with heptanol that acutely abolished nerve endings within the central cornea. Despite a profound loss of epithelial nerve endings, pain was transiently enhanced after abrasion injury, while basal tear production was normal. We found no relationship between epithelial nerve density and pain or homeostatic responses. Axotomy following corneal abrasion increased expression of both ATF3 (a nerve injury marker) and CGRP (a nociceptive peptide) in trigeminal ganglia 24 hours after injury. These molecular changes were absent on the contralateral side, despite reductions in corneal epithelial nerve density in the uninjured eye. ATF3 and CGRP levels in trigeminal ganglion were normal at one week post-injury when pain responses were normal. In contrast, CGRP was upregulated in peripheral corneal endings one week after injury, when dry eye symptoms emerged. Our results demonstrate dynamic trafficking of CGRP within trigeminal sensory nerves, with elevations in the ganglion correlated with pain behaviors and elevations in peripheral endings correlated with dry eye symptoms.

Linköpings universitetsbibliotek (LiUB) firar år 2019 sitt 50-årsjubileum. År 1969 grundades Linköpings högskolas bibliotek, som 1975 blev universitetsbibliotek. Med hjälp av ett antal nedslag baserade på personliga hågkomster, intervjuer, dokument och publicerat material skildras i denna jubileumsskrift bibliotekets första 50 år. Linköpings högskolas bibliotek blev under 1970-talet känt för den så kallade Linköpingsmodellen och för försöken med bibliotekssystemet LIBRIS. Datoriseringens och digitaliseringens betydelse fram till våra dagar kan knappast överskattas. Boken berättar om ett antal av de kvartersbibliotek som funnits vid LiUB: bland annat de vid Campus Valla och de lärar- och förskollärarutbildningsbibliotek som blev en del av LiUB i samband med högskolereformen 1977. I två personligt hållna bidrag skildras det medicinska bibliotek som byggdes upp vid det 1986 grundade Hälsouniversitetet och bibliotekariens roll vid den tvärvetenskapliga Temainstitutionen. Under 1990-talet expanderade LiU i Norrköping och de kvartersbibliotek som tidigare funnits i staden slogs 1998 samman till Campus Norrköpings bibliotek. Andra bidrag skildrar användarundervisningens idéhistoria och hur den återspeglas i de undervisningsupplägg som praktiserats vid LiUB sedan början av 1970-talet. År 1979 blev Linköpings universitetsbibliotek genom en lagändring mottagare av pliktexemplar, vilket förändrade förutsättningarna för bibliotekets litteraturförsörjning. Andra verksamheter knutna till LiUB som skildras är det Centrum för biblioteks- och IT-pedagogik som under det tidiga 2000-talet arrangerade poänggivande kurser och det 1996 inrättade elektroniska förlaget LiU E-Press. I en intervju berättar personal om det bibliometriarbete som sedan 2007 utförs vid Linköpings universitetsbibliotek. I boken presenteras också några specialsamlingar, däribland DDR-samlingen och Stolpesamlingen. Temat i bokens avslutande del är framtidsvisioner och återblickar. Hur har man föreställt sig bibliotekets framtid i det förgångna? Hur har universitetsbibliotekets roll förändrats och vad står för dörren under den närmaste framtiden? I denna digitala utgåvan har korrigeringar av felaktiga och mindre lyckade avstavningar utförts, en del smärre justeringar av den grafiska utformningen som t.ex. korrigerat avstavade rubriker, justerat bildtexter och "gluggig" text. I övrigt har inga ändringar gjorts i texten vad gäller tillägg, redigeringar eller borttagning.

Blink – Linköpings universitetsbiblioteks personaltidning – kunde i april 1984 komma med ett stort avslöjande: Linköpings universitet skulle omorganisera och biblioteket skulle i den nya organisationen tilldelas en ledande roll. LiU:s informationschef Mats Arwidson citerades: ”Detta är en relativt ny idé som kommit upp i samband med Riksrevisionsverkets översyn av effektivitet i statsförvaltningen”. Biblioteket skulle sättas att styra hela universitetet med motiveringen att det ”varit föregångsman när det gäller att automatisera och därmed effektivisera den egna verksamheten”. Överbibliotekarien Kari Marklund ställdes mot väggen och fick svara på frågan varför berörda parter inte fått någon tidigare information om detta: ”Hemlighetsmakeriet beror på att förhandlingarna förts på högsta nivå”. Att det rörde sig om ett aprilskämt hade Blinks läsare vid det här laget förmodligen insett. De allra flesta nyheter som Blink rapporterade om var dock helt autentiska. Personaltidningen var länge en viktig kanal för informationsspridningen inom Linköpings universitetsbibliotek (LiUB). En första personaltidning, LiHB-bladet, startades 1972 men kom endast ut med tre nummer. Ett nytt initiativ i denna väg, LiUBbladet, kom till 1978 och gavs ut till och med 1982. Året efter var det så dags för en nystart under titeln Blink (”Bibliotek LINKöping”). Utgivningen av Blink fortlöpte till och med 1997. Följande axplock ur tidningen ger en bild av sådant som varit aktuellt på LiUB, inom biblioteksvärlden och i samhället över lag under de år tidningen gavs ut.

Linköpings universitetsbibliotek (LiUB) firar år 2019 sitt 50-årsjubileum. År 1969 grundades Linköpings högskolas bibliotek, som 1975 blev universitetsbibliotek. Med hjälp av ett antal nedslag baserade på personliga hågkomster, intervjuer, dokument och publicerat material skildras i denna jubileumsskrift bibliotekets första 50 år. Linköpings högskolas bibliotek blev under 1970-talet känt för den så kallade Linköpingsmodellen och för försöken med bibliotekssystemet LIBRIS. Datoriseringens och digitaliseringens betydelse fram till våra dagar kan knappast överskattas. Boken berättar om ett antal av de kvartersbibliotek som funnits vid LiUB: bland annat de vid Campus Valla och de lärar- och förskollärarutbildningsbibliotek som blev en del av LiUB i samband med högskolereformen 1977. I två personligt hållna bidrag skildras det medicinska bibliotek som byggdes upp vid det 1986 grundade Hälsouniversitetet och bibliotekariens roll vid den tvärvetenskapliga Temainstitutionen. Under 1990-talet expanderade LiU i Norrköping och de kvartersbibliotek som tidigare funnits i staden slogs 1998 samman till Campus Norrköpings bibliotek. Andra bidrag skildrar användarundervisningens idéhistoria och hur den återspeglas i de undervisningsupplägg som praktiserats vid LiUB sedan början av 1970-talet. År 1979 blev Linköpings universitetsbibliotek genom en lagändring mottagare av pliktexemplar, vilket förändrade förutsättningarna för bibliotekets litteraturförsörjning. Andra verksamheter knutna till LiUB som skildras är det Centrum för biblioteks- och IT-pedagogik som under det tidiga 2000-talet arrangerade poänggivande kurser och det 1996 inrättade elektroniska förlaget LiU E-Press. I en intervju berättar personal om det bibliometriarbete som sedan 2007 utförs vid Linköpings universitetsbibliotek. I boken presenteras också några specialsamlingar, däribland DDR-samlingen och Stolpesamlingen. Temat i bokens avslutande del är framtidsvisioner och återblickar. Hur har man föreställt sig bibliotekets framtid i det förgångna? Hur har universitetsbibliotekets roll förändrats och vad står för dörren under den närmaste framtiden? I denna digitala utgåvan har korrigeringar av felaktiga och mindre lyckade avstavningar utförts, en del smärre justeringar av den grafiska utformningen som t.ex. korrigerat avstavade rubriker, justerat bildtexter och "gluggig" text. I övrigt har inga ändringar gjorts i texten vad gäller tillägg, redigeringar eller borttagning.

Spontaneous blinking occurs 15–20 times per minute. Although blinking has often been associated with its physiological role of corneal lubrication, there is now increasing behavioral evidence suggesting that blinks are also modulated by cognitive processes such as attention and information processing. Recent low-density electroencephalography (EEG) studies have reported so-called blink-related oscillations (BROs) associated with spontaneous blinking at rest. Delta-band (0.5–4 Hz) BROs are thought to originate from the precuneus region involved in environmental monitoring and awareness, with potential clinical utility in evaluation of disorders of consciousness. However, the neural mechanisms of BROs have not been elucidated. Using magnetoencephalography (MEG), we characterized delta-band BROs in 36 healthy individuals while controlling for background brain activity. Results showed that, compared to pre-blink baseline, delta-band BROs resulted in increased global field power (p < 0.001) and time-frequency spectral power (p < 0.05) at the sensor level, peaking at ~250 ms post-blink maximum. Source localization showed that spontaneous blinks activated the bilateral precuneus (p < 0.05 FWE), and source activity within the precuneus was also consistent with sensor-space results. Crucially, these effects were only observed in the blink condition and were absent in the control condition, demonstrating that results were due to spontaneous blinks rather than as part of the inherent brain activity. The current study represents the first MEG examination of BROs. Our findings suggest that spontaneous blinks activate the precuneus regions consistent with environmental monitoring and awareness, and provide important neuroimaging support for the cognitive role of spontaneous blinks.

The author of this thesis aims to analyze and develop a prototype of a software responsible for showing how the specific web application would be displayed by the concrete device. First, the problem of diversity of devices for accessing the web and of the level of support of modern web technologies is explained to the reader. Then the thesis offers a way how to help developers with testing across web browsers on different hardware. The analytical section describes the methods the author would like to use for accomplishing the goal, and also the set of suitable technologies. The penultimate section shows the manner the author implemented the prototype of the software. The Software is then subjected to tests showing that the prototype meets the requirements.

Facial movements support a variety of functions in human behavior. They participate in automatic somatic and visceral motor programs, they are essential in producing communicative displays of affective states and they are also subject to voluntary control. The multiplicity of functions of facial muscles, compared to limb muscles, is reflected in the heterogeneity of their anatomical and histological characteristics that goes well beyond the conventional classification in single facial muscles. Such parcellation in different functional muscular units is maintained throughout the central representation of facial movements from the brainstem up to the neocortex. Facial movements peculiarly lack a conventional proprioceptive feedback system, which is only in part vicariated by cutaneous or auditory afferents. Facial motor activity is the main marker of endogenous affective states and of the affective valence of external stimuli. At the cortical level, a complex network of specialized motor areas supports voluntary facial movements and, differently from upper limb movements, in such network there does not seem to be a prime actor in the primary motor cortex.

Purpose To develop an eye model with a physiological blink mechanism. Methods All parts of the eye model were designed using computer-aided design software. The eyelid consisted of a unique 3D printed structure containing teeth to physically secure a flexible membrane. Both the eyeball and eyelid membrane were synthesized using polyvinyl alcohol (PVA). Four molecular weights of PVA (89–98, 85–124, 130, and 146–186 kDa) were tested at a range of concentrations between 5% and 30% weight/volume. The wettability and water content of these materials were compared with the bovine cornea and sclera. The model was connected to a microfluidic pump, which delivers artificial tear solution (ATS) to the eyelid. A corneal topographer was used to evaluate the tear break-up and tear film regeneration. Results The eyelid flexes and slides across the eyeball during each blink, which ensures direct contact between the two surfaces. When loaded with an ATS, this mechanism evenly spreads the solution over the eyeball to generate an artificial tear film. The artificial tear film in this eye model had a tear break-up time (TBUT) of 5.13 ± 0.09 seconds at 1.4 μL/min flow rate, 6 blinks/min, and

The focal dystonia benign essential blepharospasm (BEB) affects as many as 40,000 individuals in the United States. This dystonia is characterized by trigeminal hyperexcitability, photophobia, and most disabling of the symptoms, involuntary spasms of lid closure that can produce functional blindness. Like many focal dystonias, BEB appears to develop from the interaction between a predisposing condition and an environmental trigger. The primary treatment for blepharospasm is to weaken the eyelid-closing orbicularis oculi muscle to reduce lid spasms. There are several animal models of blepharospasm that recreate the spasms of lid closure in order to investigate pharmacological treatments to prevent spasms of lid closure. One animal model attempts to mimic the predisposing condition and environmental trigger that give rise to BEB. This model indicates that abnormal interactions among trigeminal blink circuits, basal ganglia, and the cerebellum are the neural basis for BEB.

V magistrskem delu smo preučili možne rešitve zaznavanja utrujenosti očesa na podlagi mežikanja. Ugotovili smo, da obstaja več tehničnih rešitev, s katerimi je možno zaznati mežike. Rešitev, ki zaznava mežike z obdelavo zaporednih sličic s kamere, je za uporabnika najmanj invazivna in ne zahteva dodatne strojne opreme, zato smo preučili več metod tovrstne rešitve. Metoda, ki nam je dala najboljše rezultate, analizira premike na dveh zaporednih sličicah. Druga metoda, ki daje prav tako zadovoljive rezultate, zaznava mežike na podlagi ujemanja med predlogo odprtega očesa. Tretja metoda, ki smo jo preizkusili, zaznava količino črne barve na območju oči. Pri tej metodi se je izkazalo, da se količina črne barve ne zmanjša dovolj, da bi lahko na podlagi tega zaznavali mežike. Ob mežikih se površina trepalnic poveča in s tem vpliva na količino črne barve na območju oči. Za tovrstne metode smo izdelali ogrodje, ki v eni niti zajema sličice z maksimalno hitrostjo kamere in jih shranjuje na koncu povezanega seznama. V drugi niti pobira sličice z začetka povezanega seznama in jih posreduje metodi za procesiranje. To omogoča zaznavanje kratkih mežikov in uporabo metode, ki ne teče ves čas v realnem času. Ko metoda zazna majhno število mežikov, obvesti uporabnika z zvočnim signalom. Rešitev smo izdelali za osebni računalnik z operacijskim sistemom Linux in za pametni telefon z operacijskim sistemom Android. This master thesis analyses possible approaches for eye fatigue detection based on eye blinking. We have found multiple approaches for eye blink detection. The approach based on consequent images acquired from a video camera is the least invasive for the user and does not require additional hardware, hence we analysed multiple methods of this approach. The method which gave best results detects eye blinks by analysing movements on two consequent images. The second method which also gives satisfactory results detects eye blinks using open eye template matching. The third method detects eye blinks by analysing the amount of black color in the eye region. This method showed that the amount of black color does not decrease enough to reliably detect eye blinks, since the surface of eyelashes increases the amount of black color in the eye area when the eye is closed. For these methods we have built a framework which in one thread captures images at maximum speed of the camera and saves them at the end of a linked list. In the second thread, the framework takes the images from the beginning of the linked list and transmits them to the method for processing. That makes it possible to detect very short eye blinks and to use a method which does not run in real time all the time. When the method detects low eye blink rate, it informs the user with an audio signal. We developed a solution for personal computers with the Linux operating system and smartphones with the Android operating system.

The relationship between attentional control and episodic representation was investigated in six experiments that employed a variant of the classic attentional blink paradigm. We introduced a task-irrelevant (unpredictive) color match between the first and second target stimulus in a three-stream rapid serial visual presentation task. When this match was present, the first target reliably elicited a priming benefit to the identification of the second, lateralized target. However, this was only the case when the identities of the targets did not belong to the same category (digits, letters, or symbols). When targets did belong to the same category, interference was observed instead of priming, particularly at Lag 1. Furthermore, when color was the target-defining feature, interference at Lag 1 gave way to priming at longer lags. The interference effect is attributed to partial overlap between competing episodic target representations, which affects the availability of their overlapping features for successive attentional selection in rapid serial visual presentation.

Is one's temporal perception of the world truly as seamless as it appears? This article presents a computationally motivated theory suggesting that visual attention samples information from temporal episodes (episodic simultaneous type/serial token model; Wyble, Bowman, & Nieuwenstein, 2009). Breaks between these episodes are punctuated by periods of suppressed attention, better known as the attentional blink (Raymond, Shapiro, & Arnell, 1992). We test predictions from this model and demonstrate that participants were able to report more letters from a sequence of 4 targets presented in a dense temporal cluster than from a sequence of 4 targets interleaved with nontargets. However, this superior report accuracy comes at a cost in impaired temporal order perception. Further experiments explore the dynamics of multiple episodes and the boundary conditions that trigger episodic breaks. Finally, we contrast the importance of attentional control, limited resources, and memory capacity constructs in the model., National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (MH47432)

Author(s): Li, Wing; Lin, Meng C | Abstract: Pain sensitivity has been identified as a factor that affects how individuals answer dry eye questionnaires, but it is unknown how it affects ocular discomfort. This study used the time that individuals could refrain from blinking as an indicator of ocular discomfort and set out to determine whether it was related to pain sensitivity, while adjusting for ocular surface conditions.Subjects first completed the Pain Sensitivity Questionnaire to quantify pain sensitivity levels. Exposed interpalpebral area, tear meniscus height, tear-film lipid layer thickness, ocular surface cooling, and noninvasive tear breakup were assessed. Subjects were then asked to refrain from blinking until the initial onset of discomfort, which was termed "the maximum interblink period" (MIBP), while ocular surface cooling rate was simultaneously measured. Subjects were seen for four visits over a course of 2 days.Forty-two subjects (36 females, 6 males) completed the study, with a mean (SD) age of 23.2 (3.8) years. A longer MIBP was associated with decreased pain sensitivity (P = 0.04), lower ocular surface cooling rate (P l 0.001), and Asian ethnicity (P = 0.005). Based on the results from the mixed-effect model, it is estimated that individuals would be able to refrain from blinking for an additional 4 seconds if they had the lowest (0.6) compared to the highest (6.1) pain sensitivity in the study cohort.The Pain Sensitivity Questionnaire was associated with the MIBP length even after adjusting for ocular surface conditions, which suggests that pain sensitivity plays a role in influencing how ocular discomfort is perceived.