scholarly journals The ecology of sexual conflict: behaviorally plastic responses to temperature variation in the social environment can drastically modulate male harm to females

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roberto García-Roa ◽  
Valeria Chirinos ◽  
Carazo Pau
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Conflict ◽  
Environmental Temperature ◽  
Population Viability ◽  
Temperature Changes ◽  
The Face ◽  
Negative Effect ◽  
In The Wild ◽  
Natural Range ◽  
Plastic Responses ◽  
Behavioural Adaptations

AbstractSexual conflict is a fundamental driver of male/female adaptations, an engine of biodiversity, and a crucial determinant of population viability. For example, sexual conflict frequently leads to behavioural adaptations that allow males to displace their rivals, but in doing so harm those same females they are competing to access. Sexual conflict via male harm hence not only deviates females from their fitness optimum, but can decrease population viability and facilitate extinction. Despite this prominent role, we are far from understanding what factors modulate the intensity of sexual conflict, and particularly the role of ecology in mediating underlying behavioural adaptations. In this study we show that, in Drosophila melanogaster, variations in environmental temperature of ±4C (within the natural range in the wild) decrease male harm impact on female fitness by between 45–73%. Rate-sensitive fitness estimates indicate that such modulation results in an average rescue of population productivity of 7% at colder temperatures and 23% at hotter temperatures. Our results: a) show that the thermal ecology of social interactions can drastically modulate male harm via behaviourally plasticity, b) identify a potentially crucial ecological factor to understand how sexual conflict operates in nature, and c) suggest that behaviourally plastic responses can lessen the negative effect of sexual conflict on population viability in the face of rapid environmental temperature changes.

scholarly journals Hybrid Attention Cascade Network for Facial Expression Recognition

Sensors ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (6) ◽  
pp. 2003 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xiaoliang Zhu ◽  
Shihao Ye ◽  
Liang Zhao ◽  
Zhicheng Dai
Keyword(s):  
Facial Expression ◽  
Facial Expressions ◽  
Facial Expression Recognition ◽  
Expression Recognition ◽  
Spatial Features ◽  
Face Images ◽  
Temporal Features ◽  
The Face ◽  
In The Wild ◽  
Fusion Features

As a sub-challenge of EmotiW (the Emotion Recognition in the Wild challenge), how to improve performance on the AFEW (Acted Facial Expressions in the wild) dataset is a popular benchmark for emotion recognition tasks with various constraints, including uneven illumination, head deflection, and facial posture. In this paper, we propose a convenient facial expression recognition cascade network comprising spatial feature extraction, hybrid attention, and temporal feature extraction. First, in a video sequence, faces in each frame are detected, and the corresponding face ROI (range of interest) is extracted to obtain the face images. Then, the face images in each frame are aligned based on the position information of the facial feature points in the images. Second, the aligned face images are input to the residual neural network to extract the spatial features of facial expressions corresponding to the face images. The spatial features are input to the hybrid attention module to obtain the fusion features of facial expressions. Finally, the fusion features are input in the gate control loop unit to extract the temporal features of facial expressions. The temporal features are input to the fully connected layer to classify and recognize facial expressions. Experiments using the CK+ (the extended Cohn Kanade), Oulu-CASIA (Institute of Automation, Chinese Academy of Sciences) and AFEW datasets obtained recognition accuracy rates of 98.46%, 87.31%, and 53.44%, respectively. This demonstrated that the proposed method achieves not only competitive performance comparable to state-of-the-art methods but also greater than 2% performance improvement on the AFEW dataset, proving the significant outperformance of facial expression recognition in the natural environment.

scholarly journals A nonlinear relationship between prediction errors and learning rates in human reinforcement learning

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erdem Pulcu
Keyword(s):  
Reinforcement Learning ◽  
Nonlinear Relationship ◽  
Prediction Errors ◽  
Learning Rates ◽  
The Face ◽  
In The Wild ◽  
Actual Outcome ◽  
Update Rules ◽  
Different Sources

AbstractWe are living in a dynamic world in which stochastic relationships between cues and outcome events create different sources of uncertainty1 (e.g. the fact that not all grey clouds bring rain). Living in an uncertain world continuously probes learning systems in the brain, guiding agents to make better decisions. This is a type of value-based decision-making which is very important for survival in the wild and long-term evolutionary fitness. Consequently, reinforcement learning (RL) models describing cognitive/computational processes underlying learning-based adaptations have been pivotal in behavioural2,3 and neural sciences4–6, as well as machine learning7,8. This paper demonstrates the suitability of novel update rules for RL, based on a nonlinear relationship between prediction errors (i.e. difference between the agent’s expectation and the actual outcome) and learning rates (i.e. a coefficient with which agents update their beliefs about the environment), that can account for learning-based adaptations in the face of environmental uncertainty. These models illustrate how learners can flexibly adapt to dynamically changing environments.

scholarly journals Deep learning for pose-invariant face detection in unconstrained environment

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 577
Author(s):  
Shivkaran Ravidas ◽  
M. A. Ansari
Keyword(s):  
Neural Network ◽  
Recent Past ◽  
Probabilistic Measure ◽  
Low Level ◽  
Face Images ◽  
Analysis Experiment ◽  
Out Of Plane ◽  
The Face ◽  
In The Wild ◽  
Visual Matching

<span lang="EN-US">In the recent past, convolutional neural networks (CNNs) have seen resurgence and have performed extremely well on vision tasks.  Visually the model resembles a series of layers each of which is processed by a function to form a next layer. It is argued that CNN first models the low level features such as edges and joints and then expresses higher level features as a composition of these low level features. The aim of this paper is to detect multi-view faces using deep convolutional neural network (DCNN). Implementation, detection and retrieval of faces will be obtained with the help of direct visual matching technology. Further, the probabilistic measure of the similarity of the face images will be done using Bayesian analysis. Experiment detects faces with ±90 degree out of plane rotations. Fine tuned AlexNet is used to detect pose invariant faces. For this work, we extracted examples of training from AFLW (Annotated Facial Landmarks in the Wild) dataset that involve 21K images with 24K annotations of the face.</span>

Conservation biology of the critically endangered salamander, Paradactylodon persicus gorganensis (Clergue-Gazeau & Thorn, 1979) (Amphibia: Hynobiidae) in northeastern Iran

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-12
Author(s):  
Seyyed Saeed Hosseinian Yousefkhani
Keyword(s):  
High Elevation ◽  
Quality Parameters ◽  
Critically Endangered ◽  
Ex Situ ◽  
Conservation Action ◽  
Agriculture Industry ◽  
Negative Effect ◽  
In The Wild ◽  
Future Viability ◽  
Anthropogenic Threats

Abstract Paradactylodon persicus gorganensis is a critically endangered salamander found in northeastern Iran which faces increasing major anthropogenic threats such as agriculture, industry and mining. The aim of the current study is to identify key environmental variables associated with the species’ presence. Also, measuring and comparing the water quality parameters in habitats where P. p. gorganensis is present and absent are the other aims of the study. The results indicate that high pH and dissolved oxygen values have a negative effect on the species’ presence, while its presence was strongly correlated with low mean water temperatures. The species’ range in response to the climate change will shift to the south and east, where areas of high elevation occur, because the species favors cold habitats. This study indicates that it will be particularly important to evaluate the whole range where P. p. gorganensis exists when preparing conservation action plans. It is recommended that ex-situ conservation programs are incorporated into conservation planning for the species, because the number of individuals in the wild is so low and their future viability is fragile.

Nascent Access Technologies for Individuals with Severe Motor Impairments

2013 ◽  
pp. 720-739
Author(s):  
Sarah Power ◽  
Saba Moghimi ◽  
Brian Nhan ◽  
Tom Chau
Keyword(s):  
Near Infrared ◽  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
Severe Disabilities ◽  
Motor Impairments ◽  
Temperature Changes ◽  
Severe Motor ◽  
The Face ◽  
Physical Access ◽  
Number Of Individuals ◽  
The Brain

As the number of individuals without physical access to communication or environmental interaction escalates, there are increasing efforts to uncover novel and unconventional access pathways. In this chapter, we introduce three emerging access technologies for individuals with severe disabilities: near-infrared spectroscopy, electroencephalographic measurement of visually-evoked potentials and infrared thermographic imaging of the face. The first two technologies harness activity directly from the brain while the third exploits spontaneous temperature changes in the face. For each technology, we discuss the physiological underpinnings, the requisite instrumentation, the scientific evidence to date and the future outlook.

scholarly journals People’s attitudes towards deadwood in forest: evidence from the Ukrainian Carpathians

2019 ◽  
Vol 65 (No. 5) ◽  
pp. 171-182 ◽  
Author(s):  
Oksana Pelyukh ◽  
Alessandro Paletto ◽  
Lyudmyla Zahvoyska
Keyword(s):  
Local Community ◽  
Sustainable Forest Management ◽  
Managed Forests ◽  
Negative Effects ◽  
Face To Face ◽  
The Face ◽  
Negative Effect ◽  
Intensively Managed ◽  
People’S Attitudes ◽  
Positive Effect

People’s attitudes towards forest stand characteristics including deadwood are becoming increasingly relevant in sustainable forest management. The aim of this study is to investigate people’s attitudes towards deadwood in forest. The study was carried out in the Rakhiv region (Ukraine) characterized by high importance of forest resources for the local community and economy. People’s opinions were collected through the face-to-face administration of a questionnaire to 308 respondents. The survey investigated three aspects: importance of deadwood in forest; people’s perceptions of positive and negative effects of deadwood in forest; effects of presence and amount of deadwood in different types of forest on people’s aesthetical preferences. The results show that the majority of respondents consider deadwood as an important component of the forest, but generally they prefer intensively managed forests without deadwood. According to the respondents’ opinions, the most important positive effect of deadwood is a contribution to stand dynamics, while the most important negative effect is an increasing risk of insects and diseases.

scholarly journals Healthcare System Accessibility in the Face of Increasing Privatisation in Saudi Arabia: Lessons From Australia

2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (7) ◽  
pp. 111 ◽  
Author(s):  
Abdullah Ghthaith Almutairi ◽  
Hilal Al Shamsi
Keyword(s):  
Saudi Arabia ◽  
Health Services ◽  
Literature Review ◽  
Health Outcomes ◽  
Population Health ◽  
Administrative Costs ◽  
The Face ◽  
Negative Effect ◽  
Vision 2030 ◽  
Do So

BACKGROUND: The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) is a developing nation with significant resources to improve the nations population health and a planned objective to do so with its Vision 2030 plan. Nonetheless to achieve national strategic goals in health policy and outcomes, the structures and methods necessary to do so must first be elucidated, and outcomes of proposed actions must be appropriately predicted. The primary purpose of this literature review is to compare and critically analyse the structural and policy aspects of the Australian and KSA health systems to offer insights into the potential mechanics of developing further health system accessibility within the KSA. Importantly, this review addresses the issue of accessibility in the context of the recently proposed privatisation of hundreds of services throughout the KSA as a major component of the Vision 2030 plan.METHOD: 43 peer-reviewed articles were identified using the PRISMA approach and systematically analysed to determine the effects of policy changes in the 2030 Vision to the accessibility of healthcare, in particular the effect of privatisation, as observed in other nations such as Australia.FINDINGS & DISCUSSION: the literature review demonstrated that privatisation can, but does not always, lead to productivity and efficiency gains, however privatisation also leads to increasing administrative costs and service cost inflation. Health outcomes or service quality indicators are not significantly affected by privatisation. It is probable that privatising health services will reduce accessibility to health services in some subsets of the population.CONCLUSION: according to the international evidence, the proposed plan to privatise health services in the KSA will probably have a negative effect on the accessibility of health services and downstream improvement in population health outcomes. If inappropriate governance is not implemented, the plan to privatise services also carries the risk of decreasing access to vulnerable populations and threatens health equity and needs-based health care.

Effect of induction of thermotolerance with vitamin C, E supplementation on performance broiler chickens reared at during heat stress

2005 ◽  
Vol 2005 ◽  
pp. 169-169
Author(s):  
S. Roshani ◽  
A. M. Tahmasbi ◽  
A. Taghizadeh ◽  
M. Valizadeh
Keyword(s):  
Heat Stress ◽  
Vitamin C ◽  
Feed Efficiency ◽  
Broiler Chickens ◽  
Environmental Temperature ◽  
Live Weight ◽  
Early Age ◽  
Nutrient Supplementation ◽  
Carcass Characteristic ◽  
Negative Effect

The stress of high environmental temperature may have a deleterious influence on the performance of broiler chickens by reducing feed intake, live weight gain and feed efficiency. Exposing chicks to 36-38°C for 24h at 5d of age reinforces the resistance of older (6 to 7 wk-old) broilers to heat stress (De Basillo et al., 2003). Several studies have revealed that antioxidant nutrient supplementation especially vitamin C and E can be used to alter the negative effect of environmental stress (NRC, 1984). Combination of antioxidant vitamins generally shows greater antioxidant activity than that of each component alone. The objective of this study was to investigate the effects of early age thermal conditioning and vitamin C, E supplementation on performance, carcass characteristic in broiler chickens reared under heat stress.

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