Sex differences: From mental rotation to object location memory, an ERP study

Sex differences in cognition have been largely investigated. The most consistent sex differences favoring females are observed in object location memory involving the left hemisphere whereas the most consistent sex differences favoring males are observed in tasks that require mental rotation involving the right hemisphere. Here we used a task involving these two abilities to see the impact of mental rotation on object location memory. To that end we used a combination of behavioral and event-related potential (ERP) electroencephalography (EEG) measures.A computer screen displayed a square frame of 4 pairs of images (a "teddy" bear, a shoe, an umbrella and a lamp) randomly arranged around a central fixation cross. After a 10-second interval for memorization, images disappeared and were replaced by a test frame with no image but a random pair of two locations marked in black. In addition, this test frame was randomly displayed either in the original orientation (0° rotation) or in the rotated one (90° clockwise - CW - or 90° counterclockwise - CCW). Preceding the test frame, an arrow indicating the presence or the absence of rotation of the frame was displayed on the screen. The task of the participants (15 females and 15 males) was to determine if two marked locations corresponded or not to a pair of identical images. Each response was followed by feedback.Findings showed no significant sex differences in the performance of the original orientation. In comparison with this position, the rotation of the frame produced an equal decrease of male and female performance. In addition, this decrease was significantly higher when the rotation of the frame was in a CCW direction. We further assessed the ERP when the arrow indicated the direction of rotation as stimulus-onset, during four time windows representing major components C1, P1, N1 and N2. Although no sex differences were observed in performance, brain activities differed according to sex. Enhanced amplitudes were found for the CCW compared to CW rotation over the right posterior areas for the P1, N1 and N2 components for men as well as for women. Major topographical differences related to sex were measured for the CW rotation condition as marked lateralized amplitude: left-hemisphere amplitude larger than right one was measured during P1 time range for men. These similar patterns prolonged from P1 to N1 for women. Early distinctions were found in interaction with sex between CCW and CW waveform amplitudes, expressing over anterior electrode sites during C1 time range (0-50 ms post-stimulus).In conclusion (i) women do not outperform men in object location memory in this study (absence of rotation condition); (ii) mental rotation, in particular the direction of rotation, influences performance on object location memory; (iii) CCW rotation is associated with activity in the right parietal hemisphere whereas the CW rotation involves the left parietal hemisphere; (iv) this last effect is less pronounced in males, which could explain why greater involvement of right parietal areas in men and of bilateral posterior areas in women is generally reported in mental rotation tasks; and (v) the early distinctions between both directions of rotation located over anterior sites could be related to sex differences in their respective involvement of control mechanisms.

Desenvolvimento de Sistema de Odontologia – Módulo Relatório de Sistema:Odonto Clínica ERP

trabalho descrito neste relatório é sobre desenvolvimento de sistema de informação que possui a função de informatizar uma clínica odontológica de acordo com suas principais necessidades. O sistema, Odonto Clínica ERP é um Projecto desenvolvido na empresa Ada Soluções que tem como objectivo melhorar o atendimento aos pacientes da clínica, garantindo agilidade e facilidade aos seus utilizadores na consulta e documentação de seus serviços. O Odonto Clínica ERP é um sistema simples e eficiente que garante às clínicas odontológicas o controlo e emissão de relatórios de todos os relatórios de sistema. O documento possui informações sobre o sistema, os requisitos do sistema, diagramas para a implementação dos requisitos do sistema e visualização dos conceitos de sistema de informação, descrição da base de dados que armazenará os dados do sistema e sobre a modelação do sistema. Várias abordagens teóricas foram adoptadas para a realização desse sistema, privilegiando os conhecimentos adquiridos durante a formação académica designadamente nas disciplinas de Base de Dados, Desenvolvimento de Aplicação Web, Sistema de Informação, Programação e Desenho e Guião de Conteúdos Web. Para o desenvolvimento desse sistema utilizou-se a plataforma Oracle Application Express 10g com a linguagem de programação PL/SQL, para fazer a modelação desse sistema foi usada a ferramenta Visual Paradigma for UML 6.0. Esse sistema foi dividido em sete módulos, por isso, esse relatório vai focar no módulo Relatório de Sistema.

Desenvolvimento de Sistema de Odontologia –Módulo Contas a Pagar e Receber: Odonto Clínica ERP

O trabalho descrito neste relatório é sobre desenvolvimento de sistema de informação que possui a função de informatizar uma clínica odontológica de acordo com suas principais necessidades. O sistema, Odonto Clínica ERP é um Projecto desenvolvido na empresa Ada Soluções que tem como objectivo melhorar o atendimento aos pacientes da clínica, garantindo agilidade e facilidade aos seus utilizadores na consulta e documentação de seus serviços. O Odonto Clínica ERP, módulo “ contas a pagar e receber” é um sistema simples e eficiente que garante às clínicas odontológicas o controlo de todos os pagamentos efectuados pela clínicas e das contas a receber dos pacientes. O documento possui informações sobre o sistema, os requisitos do sistema, diagramas para a implementação dos requisitos do sistema e visualização dos conceitos de sistema de informação, descrição da base de dados que armazenará os dados do sistema e sobre a modelação do sistema. Várias abordagens teóricas foram adoptadas para a realização desse sistema, privilegiando os conhecimentos adquiridos durante a formação académica. Para o desenvolvimento desse sistema utilizou-se a plataforma Oracle Application Express 10g com a linguagem de programação PL/SQL, e para fazer a modelação do sistema foi usada a ferramenta Visual Paradigm for UML 6.0. Esse sistema foi dividido em sete módulos, por isso, o presente relatório vai focar no módulo de Contas a pagar e receber da clínica.

Implantació de sistema ERP a una entitat financera

L'objecte del treball és la mecanització de les tasques administratives derivades de les operacions de tresoreria comercialitzades per les entitats financeres.

Implantación de SAP ERP en una distribuidora

En este trabajo se pretende reflejar en qué consistiría un proyecto de implantación de un ERP, en nuestro caso SAP ERP, en una empresa del sector de la distribución alimenticia. Para llevarlo a cabo se empleará la metodología ASAP, pretendiendo ser el resultado final del proyecto el análisis y diseño del mismo.

Implantación de un sistema ERP para la gestión de clientes de la Universidad Millenium

Con este proyecto se trata de ejemplificar cómo se haría la implantación del módulo de clientes de un sistema ERP para la gestión de una universidad.

Selección de un sistema ERP para la gestión de EAFI's

The purpose of this ECS study is to develop a theory about the different ERPs on the market, both free and paid software, in order to determine what is the most appropiate for an economic-consultant company, specifically of the EAFI sector (Business Financial Consultancy).

Implementació d'un ERP

Projecte que pretén portar a terme l'estudi i disseny d'un ERP en una petita empresa del sector metal·lúrgic.

Análisis comparativo de las soluciones ERP desde la perspectiva de los recursos humanos

El estudio es una valoración de las empresas de ERP, tomando como referencia sus programas dedicados a la gestión de los recursos humanos.

Implantació d'un ERP en una empresa de reprografia

Treball final de carrera basat en la implantació d'un ERP en una empresa de reprografia. En el projecte es revisen diferents ERP i s'explica el motiu de la tria d'Eurowin. Es descriu l'empresa on serà implantat, es fa un anàlisi funcional i tècnic, i finalment es realitza el disseny de la implantació.

Context- and Prosody-Driven ERP Markers for Dialog Focus Perception in Children.

The development of language proficiency extends late into childhood and includes not only producing or comprehending sounds, words and sentences, but likewise larger utterances spanning beyond sentence borders like dialogs. Dialogs consist of information units whose value constantly varies within a verbal exchange. While information is focused when introduced for the first time or corrected in order to alter the knowledge state of communication partners, the same information turns into shared knowledge during the further course of a verbal exchange. In many languages, prosodic means are used by speakers to highlight the informational value of information foci. Our study investigated the developmental pattern of event-related potentials (ERPs) in three age groups (12, 8 and 5 years) when perceiving two information focus types (news and corrections) embedded in short question-answer dialogs. The information foci contained in the answer sentences were either adequately marked by prosodic means or not. In so doing, we questioned to what extent children depend on prosodic means to recognize information foci or whether contextual means as provided by dialog questions are sufficient to guide focus processing.Only 12-year-olds yield prosody-independent ERPs when encountering new and corrective information foci, resembling previous findings in adults. Focus processing in the 8-year-olds relied upon prosodic highlighting, and differing ERP responses as a function of focus type were observed. In the 5-year-olds, merely prosody-driven ERP responses were apparent, but no distinctive ERP indicating information focus recognition. Our findings reveal substantial alterations in information focus perception throughout childhood that are likely related to long-lasting maturational changes during brain development.

Ventral and dorsal pathways of speech perception: An intracerebral ERP study.

Recent theory of physiology of language suggests a dual stream dorsal/ventral organization of speech perception. Using intra-cerebral Event-related potentials (ERPs) during pre-surgical assessment of twelve drug-resistant epileptic patients, we aimed to single out electrophysiological patterns during both lexical-semantic and phonological monitoring tasks involving ventral and dorsal regions respectively. Phonological information processing predominantly occurred in the left supra-marginal gyrus (dorsal stream) and lexico-semantic information occurred in anterior/middle temporal and fusiform gyri (ventral stream). Similar latencies were identified in response to phonological and lexico-semantic tasks, suggesting parallel processing. Typical ERP components were strongly left lateralized since no evoked responses were recorded in homologous right structures. Finally, ERP patterns suggested the inferior frontal gyrus as the likely final common pathway of both dorsal and ventral streams. These results brought out detailed evidence of the spatial-temporal information processing in the dual pathways involved in speech perception.

Topographic ERP analyses: a step-by-step tutorial review

In this tutorial review, we detail both the rationale for as well as the implementation of a set of analyses of surface-recorded event-related potentials (ERPs) that uses the reference-free spatial (i.e. topographic) information available from high-density electrode montages to render statistical information concerning modulations in response strength, latency, and topography both between and within experimental conditions. In these and other ways these topographic analysis methods allow the experimenter to glean additional information and neurophysiologic interpretability beyond what is available from canonical waveform analyses. In this tutorial we present the example of somatosensory evoked potentials (SEPs) in response to stimulation of each hand to illustrate these points. For each step of these analyses, we provide the reader with both a conceptual and mathematical description of how the analysis is carried out, what it yields, and how to interpret its statistical outcome. We show that these topographic analysis methods are intuitive and easy-to-use approaches that can remove much of the guesswork often confronting ERP researchers and also assist in identifying the information contained within high-density ERP datasets

Comparing ICA-based and single-trial topographic ERP analyses.

Single-trial analysis of human electroencephalography (EEG) has been recently proposed for better understanding the contribution of individual subjects to a group-analysis effect as well as for investigating single-subject mechanisms. Independent Component Analysis (ICA) has been repeatedly applied to concatenated single-trial responses and at a single-subject level in order to extract those components that resemble activities of interest. More recently we have proposed a single-trial method based on topographic maps that determines which voltage configurations are reliably observed at the event-related potential (ERP) level taking advantage of repetitions across trials. Here, we investigated the correspondence between the maps obtained by ICA versus the topographies that we obtained by the single-trial clustering algorithm that best explained the variance of the ERP. To do this, we used exemplar data provided from the EEGLAB website that are based on a dataset from a visual target detection task. We show there to be robust correspondence both at the level of the activation time courses and at the level of voltage configurations of a subset of relevant maps. We additionally show the estimated inverse solution (based on low-resolution electromagnetic tomography) of two corresponding maps occurring at approximately 300 ms post-stimulus onset, as estimated by the two aforementioned approaches. The spatial distribution of the estimated sources significantly correlated and had in common a right parietal activation within Brodmann's Area (BA) 40. Despite their differences in terms of theoretical bases, the consistency between the results of these two approaches shows that their underlying assumptions are indeed compatible.

Implantació d'un sistema ERP en una empresa de fabricació de peces i accessoris d'alumini

Implantació d'un sistema OpenERP en una empresa de fabricació de peces d'alumini.