The school was founded as the Houston Bible & Vocational Institute in 1976. In 2008, the college had 1,399 students. In 2019, the college had 460 students with 134 of them being full-time. In 2007, 51% of students were African-American and 23% were Hispanic. In 2019, 47% of the students were black, 24% Hispanic, 17% white, and 8% Asian.
Non-invasive brain stimulation is an established tool for modulating neural activity that holds promise for advancing both cognitive neuroscience and clinical interventions. Focal transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), using center-surround electrode montages, enables more region-specific targeting. Although computational models can simulate individual electric fields, no existing approach enables the prospective individualization of electrode placement while standardizing the dose across targeted brain regions. In the current preparatory methodological study, we present a modeling-based framework that harmonizes the electric field strength between different target regions at the group level, but preserves inter-individual variability. This enables systematic examination of dose-response relationships and their regional differences. Positioning of the center-surround electrode montages is individualized to ensure focusing of the electric field on the target regions. We started by defining brain targets for eight cognitive and motor functions using MRI data from 43 participants. Using field simulations, we then estimated a group-average field strength in the target regions that had led to behavioral and physiological effects in prior tDCS studies (resulting in 0.2 V/m). The radii of the center-surround montages were optimized for each target region to achieve the intended field strength while maximizing focality. Validation in an independent sample (n=53) confirmed that the intended target field strength is achieved on average for new participants. The described computational tools are made available as open-source software, allowing other researchers to apply our individualization framework with parameters (target regions and target field strengths) tailored to their specific research questions; and are currently being implemented in a multi-center study involving approximately 1,000 datasets. ### Competing Interest Statement MAN is in the scientific advisory board of Neuroelectrics and Preciss. All other authors declare no financial or non-financial competing interests. Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, 467143400, 497919823, 539593253 Lundbeck Foundation, R313-2019-622 European Research Council, ERC-2021-COG 101043747
The present study explores the potential of spent coffee grounds (SCG) as a rich source of bioactive compounds with promising high value-added applications in the food industry. Extraction was carried out using acetonitrile, ethanol, water, and their mixtures, enabling the simultaneous assessment of phytochemical compound, antioxidant capacity, and antimicrobial activity against foodborne pathogens. Employing a simplex-centroid mixture design, a total of ten experiments were carried out, each employing a different combination of ethanol, acetonitrile, and water. An optimal ternary solvent system composed of 56.57 % ethanol, 8.69 % acetonitrile, and 34.75 % water was identified. Under these conditions, the highest recovery of total phenolic content (67.01 mg GAE/mL) and total flavonoid content (2.45 mg QE/mL) was achieved, along with potent antioxidant activity measured by DPPH assay (IC50 = 0.39 mg/mL). This extract also demonstrated effective antibacterial activity, inhibiting E. coli and L. monocytogenes with minimum inhibitory concentrations (MICs) of 5.93 mg/mL and 0.55 mg/mL, respectively. Chemical profiling via LC-MS/MS revealed a predominance of chlorogenic acid and its derivatives in the SCG extract. This enrichment was predicted because the optimized extraction process preferentially recovered these rare compounds. Molecular docking simulations further supported the antibacterial potential of the identified compounds. Based on predicted binding free energies (Delta G), the compounds were shown to effectively interact with D-alanine-D-alanine ligase (Ddl), an essential enzyme in bacterial peptidoglycan biosynthesis. These findings suggest that molecules derived from SCGs could serve as safe, cost-effective antibacterial agents, offering a sustainable strategy to combat microbial resistance.
Firms face many obstacles in their pursuit of innovation. However, the mechanisms that enable firms to surmount these challenges and foster innovation are less understood. This study thus investigates whether the better performance of firms with higher human capital is due to their increased ability to overcome obstacles to innovation. Our estimation strategy accounts for the fact that facing obstacles is endogenous by correcting for the sample selection bias that is involved in determining which firms face obstacles. It appropriately estimates the impact of firms’ skill intensity on their propensity to innovate under two sets of circumstances—facing obstacles or not. Using a combination of rich survey and register data from over 2000 Danish firms for the period of 2006 to 2018, we also address several other biases that could affect our estimation of the impact of skill intensity on overcoming obstacles. Our results provide strong evidence that firms facing challenges in their innovation process are more likely to succeed when they have higher skill intensity. This applies to large and small firms as well as to firms in the service and manufacturing sectors, and it applies regardless of the type of innovation and, to some extent, which obstacles they face. Interestingly, we find that increasing skill intensity has no impact on the likelihood of innovation for firms that do not face obstacles. In contrast, firms that face obstacles can increase their likelihood of innovation by up to 25 %-points through higher skill intensity.
BACKGROUND: Kolk et al. (2023) use Swedish register data to provide a detailed numerical account of biological kinship. Applying their approach in other countries is challenging due to high data requirements. OBJECTIVE: We examine whether Kolk et al.’s (2023) findings generalize to another demographically advanced country, the Netherlands, and assess how differences in cohort fertility and divorce rates influence the prevalence of different kin types. METHODS: We analyze kinship network data for the entire Dutch population in 2018, focusing on ties to grandchildren, children, nieces, nephews, siblings, cousins, parents, aunts, uncles, and grandparents. RESULTS: First, we find strong similarities between Dutch and Swedish kinship structures, extending the picture drawn by Kolk et al. (2023) to another demographically advanced Western context. Second, we show how the Dutch baby boom has trickled down across generations, leading to larger numbers of aunts, uncles, and cousins. Third, we show how differences in other family-related behaviors – specifically divorce and separation – shape the composition of kinship networks and cross-national differences, evident in a substantially lower number of half-siblings in the Netherlands than in Sweden. CONTRIBUTION: This replication underlines the benefits of empirically validating kinship statistics derived from microsimulations and aggregate demographic data.
As a step in the architectural design of a quantum processing or sensing system with control and signaling, an attempt is made at putting in parallel functional properties of the random flows between neurons through electrical synapses, and quantum particle flows inside a quantum processing system mimicking biological processes. Based on a simplified dynamic electrical synapse model, a quantum synapse circuit design is proposed. This is extended to the case of bidirectional flows through a synapse, highlighting the possible role of quantum synapse circuits as highly parallel controlled interfaces crucial in sensing and sensor fusion systems. A short status of the quantum simulation is provided.
