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In the study of high energy physics, as subatomic particles are in different energy states, a suitable accelerator is needed to explore information inside the atom at deeper and deeper levels. Particularly, there are different neural energy patterns or neuro-quantum states within the brain associated with meditative practices; to find out certain information inside the body, it is necessary to reach a meditative state having increased energy levels. Here we report that Chinese Original Quiet Sitting (COQS)—one style of Chinese Daoist meditation— exhibits noticeable results about different neural energy levels or quantum types using functional magnetic resonance imaging technique. Two different states within COQS were examined. Firstly, a prolonged rest-like meditative state, maintaining a relatively low energy level and showing both activation and deactivation of certain brain regions, was observed. Secondly, a higher energy state was found, showing different pattern with only positive activation of certain brain regions. In particular, it appears that there is a correlation between pineal activation and this high energy meditation practice. Also, the pineal body seems concerning with the “upper elixir field” which is an important region in Daoist meditation. Our results provide new evidence for a seldom studied aspect of human physiological performance which has life science implications. Also, a multidimensional quantum model of brain activity is established to offer a scientific description more properly.

To examine the usefulness of diffusion kurtosis imaging for the diagnosis of Parkinson disease (PD).Examinations were performed with the understanding and written consent of each subject, with local ethics committee approval, and in compliance with national legislation and Declaration of Helsinki guidelines. Diffusion-weighted magnetic resonance imaging was performed in 30 patients with idiopathic PD (mean age, 64.5 years ± 3.4 [standard deviation]) and 30 healthy subjects (mean age, 65.0 years ± 5.1). Mean kurtosis, fractional anisotropy, and mean, axial, and radial diffusivity of the basal ganglia were compared between the groups. Disease severity was assessed by using Hoehn and Yahr staging and the motor section of the Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating Scale (mean scores, 2.0 and 33.6, respectively). Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis was used to compare the diagnostic accuracies of the indexes of interest. Pearson correlation coefficient analysis was used to correlate imaging findings with disease severity.Mean kurtosis in the putamen was higher in the PD group (0.93 ± 0.15) than in the control group (0.71 ± 0.09) (P.000416). The area under the ROC curve (AUC) was 0.95 for both the ipsilateral putamen and the ipsilateral substantia nigra. The mean kurtosis for the ipsilateral substantia nigra had the best diagnostic performance (mean cutoff, 1.10; sensitivity, 0.92; specificity, 0.87). In contrast, AUCs for the tensor-derived indexes ranged between 0.43 (axial and radial diffusivity in substantia nigra) and 0.65 (fractional anisotropy in substantia nigra).Diffusion kurtosis imaging in the basal ganglia, as compared with conventional diffusion-tensor imaging, can improve the diagnosis of PD.

Three different cutting tools (ceramics CC6050, cubic boron nitride CB7025, carbide GC2025) were used for dry cutting of 3 groups of ADI which were heat-treated separately under different quenching temperatures. With the unified cutting parameters, the wear of tool flank of each cutter was studied and the main influencing factors of the wear were analyzed. Results showed that when the cutting parameters ap =0.2mm, f =0.16mm/r, vc =108m/min and the cutting tool was determined, the higher the quenching temperature was the lower the hardness of the test bars were and the tool flank wear was less; When the quenching temperature was determined, the more the produced BUE (build up edge) of the cutting tool was the less the tool flank wear was.

Researching on dry turning hardened steel was to replace the grinding with turning, which would improve efficiency and reduce cost. The contrast experiments of turning hardened steel with ceramic and CBN cutting tools were carried out. The cutting forces of two tools with different cutting parameters were measured by Kistler cutting force acquisition system. The difference with two chips was observed by scanning electron microscope(SEM). The experimental equations of cutting forces were built up by the linear regression analysis method. The results indicated that the variation trend of cutting forces with ceramic and CBN cutting tools in same conditions was same. The thrust force was maximal, next was tangential force, axial force was minimum. The thrust force and tangential force of ceramic cutting tools were almost double compared with CBN cutting tools. The shapes of chips with ceramic and CBN cutting tools were saw-tooth, the rough slice layer with periodic flow was shown on outer surface and the friction mask was distributed well-proportioned on inner surface. The spacing of rough slice layer of chips with CBN cutting tools was more wide, the friction mask of chips with ceramic cutting tools was more clear.

Purpose: To determine whether progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP) is associated with specific diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) patterns of diffusivity, anisotropy, and coherence in functionally relevant brain areas. Materials and Methods: In all, 17 PSP patients and 17 controls were scanned using a 3 T magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanner. Patients were assessed in the off-medication condition using the Hoehn and Yahr staging and the United Parkinson's Disease Rating Scale, motor subscale (UPDRS-III). Diffusion information were analyzed in relation to disease severity and subtypes. Results: Numerous changes in diffusion properties were identified in the subcortical areas. In the midbrain, fractional anisotropy (FA) decreased and MD (mean diffusivity) increased with disease progression. UPDRS-III scores correlated positively with both FA in the caudate and MD in the pons. DTI analysis of disease subtypes demonstrated significant differences between PSP-Parkinsonism and Steele-Richardson-Olszewski syndrome in axial diffusivity values in the putamen and globus pallidus, as well as in intervoxel diffusion coherence values in the middle cerebellar peduncle. Conclusion: Our findings, cautiously interpreted, demonstrate the advantage of using a functional imaging technique to aid in the specificity of defining more precisely the pathological processes taking place in white and gray matter regions in PSP. J. Magn. Reson. Imaging 2010;32:69–75. © 2010 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

The cortical involvement of gait observation and imagination under the modulation of external cues was studied in human using fMRI. Fourteen healthy volunteers were scanned using visual stimuli, which showed an actor walking in different background. The defined relevant cue was a background of evenly spaced stripes orthogonal to the walking direction, which was rhythmic presented as the actor proceeded. The irrelevant cue was two parallel lines within which the actor was confined. When viewing the relevant cue, the subject showed activation, noticeably in dorsal premotor areas, posterior parietal lobes, bilateral parahippocampal lobes, and visual related areas. The relevant external cue leads to the modulation of cortical activation related to gait, which could initialize the processing of the input information and lead to a different motor strategy from the native automatic gait. The understanding of the cortical involvement of gait under different cues might lead to a new clinical impact on the therapeutic intervention of patients with Parkinson's disease.

Purpose We employed imaginary tasks to investigate the neurophysiology of gait in patients with Parkinson’s disease (PD) using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Methods Cortical activation of gait-related imagery was explored in 13 PD patients, 13 age-matched controls (Old), and 14 young volunteers (Young) using fMRI. The tasks included gait initiation, stepping over an obstacle and gait termination using an event-related design. Subjects watched a video clip showing an actor walking and imagined the walking process. Results At gait initiation, no significant difference could be found between PD and the Old controls. Activation in the visual related areas in the Old subjects was increased compared to the Young subjects. While imagining stepping over obstacles, the right dorsal premotor area (PMd), precentral, right inferior parietal lobule, and bilateral precuneus were more activated in PD compared to the Old. An extensive network of bilateral SMA, PMd, posterior parietal lobe and visual association areas was activated in the Old versus the Young subjects. At gait termination, visual related areas were noted when PD was compared to the Old. In contrast, increased activation in bilateral pre-SMA, PMd, ventral premotor area, precentral, posterior parietal lobes and visual association areas were activated in the Old when compared to the Young. Conclusions Our study provides image based evidence for gait disturbance in PD patients and during normal aging. The compensatory cortical mechanism in the findings could be a background resource for further therapeutic interventions.

DI materials were quenched at the temperature of 250 °C, 300 °C, 350 °C and with the isothermal time of 1h, 2h and 3h respectively. So there were nine different ADI materials, which owned different mechanical properties. Through analyzing the changes of their metallographic structures, curves of the relationships between quenching temperatures, isothermal time and materials intensity, hardness could be built respectively. A model that shows the relationships between parameters of heat treatment and hardness was built in the base of fuzzy subtractive clustering method, and the correlation coefficient between predicted and real values was calculated, with which the rules of isothermal temperatures affecting the mechanical properties of ADI could be further studied. Test results show a significant improvement in metallographic structure and mechanical properties of the material as a result of different heat treatment process. From the curves and fuzzy model, we knew that the effect of austempering temperature on the mechanical properties of ADI was predominant, whereas austempering time was inferior. As the temperature increased, the tensile strength and hardness increased, and as the time increased, tensile strength increased at first, and then decreased, hardness decreased at first, and then increased.

Ongoing brain activity can be recorded as electroencephalograph (EEG) to discover the links between emotional states and brain activity. This study applied machine-learning algorithms to categorize EEG dynamics according to subject self-reported emotional states during music listening. A framework was proposed to optimize EEG-based emotion recognition by systematically 1) seeking emotion-specific EEG features and 2) exploring the efficacy of the classifiers. Support vector machine was employed to classify four emotional states (joy, anger, sadness, and pleasure) and obtained an averaged classification accuracy of 82.29% +/- 3.06% across 26 subjects. Further, this study identified 30 subject-independent features that were most relevant to emotional processing across subjects and explored the feasibility of using fewer electrodes to characterize the EEG dynamics during music listening. The identified features were primarily derived from electrodes placed near the frontal and the parietal lobes, consistent with many of the findings in the literature. This study might lead to a practical system for noninvasive assessment of the emotional states in practical or clinical applications.

Background/PurposeSome research has shown that melatonin levels increase after meditation practices, but other research has shown that they do not. In our previous functional magnetic resonance imaging study, we found positive activation of the pineal body during Chinese Original Quiet Sitting (COQS). To find other supporting evidence for pineal activation, the aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of COQS on nighttime melatonin levels.MethodsTwenty subjects (11 women and 9 men, aged 29-64 years) who had regularly practiced daily meditation for 5-24 years participated in this study. All subjects served alternately as participants in the mediation and control groups. COQS was adopted in this study. Tests were performed during two nighttime sessions. Saliva was sampled at 0, 10, 20, 30, 45, 60 and 90 minutes after COQS and tested for level of melantonin. Time period effect analysis and mixed effect model analysis were preceded by paired t test analysis.ResultsIn the meditation group (n = 20), the mean level of melatonin was significantly higher than the baseline level at various times post-meditation (p < 0.001). Within the control group (n = 20), the mean level of melatonin at various times was not significantly different compared with baseline (p>0.05). These results suggested that the melatonin level was statistically elevated in the meditation group and almost unchanged in the control group after nighttime meditation. The urine serotonin levels detected by measuring 5-hydroxy-indole-3-acetic acid levels were also studied, but no detectable difference between the groups was found.ConclusionOur results support the hypothesis that meditation might elevate the nighttime salivary melatonin levels. It suggests that COQS can be used as a psychophysiological stimulus to increase endogenous secretion of melatonin, which in turn, might contribute to an improved sense of well-being.

Currently, how to equip machines with the ability for properly recognizing users' felt-emotion during multimedia presentation is a growing issue. In this study we focused on the approach for recognizing music-induced emotional responses from brain activity. A comparative study was conducted to testify the feasibility of using hierarchical binary classifiers to improve the classification performance as compared with nonhierarchical schemes. According to our classification results, we not only found that using one-against-one scheme of hierarchical binary classifier results in an improvement to performance, but also established an alternative solution for emotion recognition by proposed model-based scheme depending on 2D emotion model.

Imaginary tasks can be used to investigate the neurophysiology of gait. In this study, we explored the cortical control of gait-related imagery in 21 healthy volunteers using functional magnetic resonance imaging. Imaginary tasks included gait initiation, stepping over an obstacle, and gait termination. Subjects watched a video clip that showed an actor in gait motion under an event-related design. We detected activation in the supplementary motor area during major gait-related imagery tasks, and especially during gait initiation. During gait termination and stepping over an obstacle, the amount of cortical resources allocated to the imaginary tasks included a large visuomotor network comprising the dorsal and ventral premotor areas. We conclude that our paradigm to study the cortical control of gait may help in elucidating the pathophysiology of higher-level gait disorders.

An approach to recognize the emotion responses during multimedia presentation using the electroencephalogram (EEG) signals is proposed. The association between EEG signals and music-induced emotion responses was investigated in three factors, including: 1) the types of features, 2) the temporal resolutions of features, and 3) the components of EEG. The results showed that the spectrum power asymmetry index of EEG signal was a sensitive marker to reflect the brain activation related to emotion responses, especially for the low frequency bands of delta, theta and alpha components. Besides, the maximum classification accuracy was obtained around 92.73% by using support vector machine (SVM) based on 60 features derived from all EEG components with the feature temporal resolution of one second. As such, it will be able to provide key clues to develop EEG-inspired multimedia applications, in which multimedia contents could be offered interactively according to the userspsila immediate feedback.

The human brain possesses plenty of functions but little is known about its scientific relationship with mind and spirit. Conferences^1,2^ focused on the connection between science and religion were held very recently in which neuroscientists, Buddhist scholars and Dalai Lama discussed attention, mental imagery, emotion, mind, brain functions and meditation, suggesting religious meditation offers an effective means to investigate the mystery of mind and spirit. In the past decade, scientists struggled to obtain brain mappings for various meditation styles using different brain imaging techniques and stimulating results have been observed^3-17^. In this letter we report that, together with other brain regions, pineal body exhibit significant activation during meditation process, supporting the long lasting speculation that pineal plays an important role in the intrinsic awareness which might concern spirit or soul. Pineal is known as an endocrine organ which produces substrates including melatonin and has been ascribed numerous even mysterious functions but its activation during meditation has never been observed by brain imaging technique. In seventeenth century, based on anatomic observation, Descartes ventured to suggest that pineal serves as the principal seat of the soul^18-20^. Inspired by its geometric center in the brain, physiologists, psychologists, philosophers and religionists have been speculating for centuries about pineal's function relevant to spirit and soul. In this study, we chose Chinese Original Quiet Sitting, one style of meditation, to explore this long lasting speculation by functional magnetic resonance imaging technique. Our results demonstrate a correlation between pineal activation and religious meditation which might have profound implications in physiological understanding of the intrinsic awareness.

Since different meditation methods may activate different regions in brain. In this study we chose a basic meditation type that just practiced the breath with the phrase that contained nine words, and the first word was matched with inhaling and following the next with exhaling alternately during the meditation period. Blood-oxygenation-level-dependent (BOLD) based fMRI were used to examine the brain functions. Experiments showed brain activation areas on the region of thalamus, anterior cingulate, posterior cingulate, middle temporal gyrus, as well as putamen and other activations. It displayed that meditation practice concerned with cognitive functions, however, hypothalamus could be activated during meditation practice, and that might be related with endocrine secretion. But it requires further researches combined BOLD-and CBF-based fMRI technique and physiological signal detection simultaneously to explore the mechanism of meditation.

In this study an electroencephalography (EEG) signal-based emotion classification algorithm was investigated. Several excerpts of emotional music were used as stimulus for elicitation of emotion-specific EEG signal. Besides, the hemispheric asymmetry alpha power indices of brain activation were extracted as feature vector for training multilayer perceptron classifier (MLP) in order to learn four targeted emotion categories, including joy, angry, sadness, and pleasure. The results demonstrated that the average classification accuracy of MLP could be 69.69% in five subjects for four emotional categories, which is much higher than chance probability of 25%.

There exist many different types of meditation. The mechanism why meditation improves people’s health remains unclear. Since different meditations may activate different regions in brain, we can use functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to investigate it. We may simply divide meditation into two different types, which is forced meditation (FM) and non-forced meditation (NFM). The FM type may keep a phrase in mind, observe breathing, proceed mind imaging or any other actions to keep people’s attention focused. Chinese original quiet sitting (COQS) is mainly one kind of traditional Chinese meditation. It contains two different parts: a short period of keeping phrase and receiving spiritual energy, and a long period of relaxation with no further action. The second part of it is really what we called “non-forced” type, whereas the first part is normally a forced one. In this paper, we want to find out the brain activation area precisely during FM and NFM. We studied the observing breathing meditation (OBM) and the first part of COQS as the FM type, and also studied the second part of COQS as NFM type. Our experimental results showed very different activation patterns among the brain between FM and NFM. The BOLD (Blood Oxygenation Level Dependent) signal changes had also been found. The posterior cingulated gyrus showed strong activation in OBM, the pineal gland and hypothalamus showed positive activation in the first and second stage of COQS separately. From our results, we found the basic meaning of the mechanism why meditation improves people’s health.

This study examined the cortical control of gait in healthy humans using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Two block-designed fMRI sessions were conducted during motor imagery of a locomotor-related task. Subjects watched a video clip that showed an actor standing and walking in an egocentric perspective. In a control session, additional fMRI images were collected when participants observed a video clip of the clutch movement of a right hand. In keeping with previous studies using SPECT and NIRS, we detected activation in many motor-related areas including supplementary motor area, bilateral precentral gyrus, left dorsal premotor cortex, and cingulate motor area. Smaller additional activations were observed in the bilateral precuneus, left thalamus, and part of right putamen. Based on these findings, we propose a novel paradigm to study the cortical control of gait in healthy humans using fMRI. Specifically, the task used in this study--involving both mirror neurons and mental imagery--provides a new feasible model to be used in functional neuroimaging studies in this area of research.

This paper presents a judicious reasoning method by coupling passive voltage contrast (PVC) with scanning probe microscopy (SPM) for revealing particular invisible defect modes, which were imperceptible to observe and very difficult to identify by means of traditional physical failure analysis techniques. In order to certify this compound method, it is applied to an implant issue as a case study. Through solving this particular defect mode, whose exact failure position could not be determined even with the most sensitive PVC or high-resolution SPM current mapping, the procedures and contentions are illustrated further. The significance of the reasoning method is based on electrical characterization and differential analysis. By coupling PVC with SPM, the capability to identify tiny defects is not limited to just distinguishing leakage or high-resistance under contacts. PVC can detect abnormal N+ contacts due to improper implanting, and SPM can provide the precise electrical characteristics.

The phenomenon of respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) had been studied since 1733. Most researches were focused on the heart rates or blood pressure variability. It was well known that heart rate variability (HRV) induced by respiration decreased progressively with age. In general, it is caused by the function of the autonomic nervous system (ANS). Seldom researches studied the relationship of this phenomenon with cerebral circulation. In our previous research, we found that different breathing rate could redistribute the proportion of systemic circulation, and also observed that the slower the breathing rate the more proportion of cerebral circulation appeared on head. In this paper, we further examined the BOLD (Blood Oxygenation Level Dependent) signal fluctuations in brain stem among different breathing rate by the technique of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). We found that the BOLD signal changes were hinged on the breathing rate, and the variability was consistent with the pulsatile pressure study.

Clinical engineering is an interdisciplinary science. It has several aspects in its interfacing practices among healthcare delivery system that include (1) specific engineering supports to clinical specialties, (2) hospital system engineering programs, (3) managerial integration based on biomedical engineering practices, (4) safety and performance assessment of medical devices, and (5) compliance with specific regulations and standards. Each aspect requires highly integrated interdisciplinary principles to fulfill its professionalism. These are different professions based on academic biomedical engineering principles and healthcare principles. This clinical engineering practical training program is designed to fulfill the requirement of human resources for the advanced biomedical engineering applied and practised in hospital environments.