Matching Items (26)
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- All Subjects: Neuroscience
- Creators: Department of Psychology
- Member of: Barrett, The Honors College Thesis/Creative Project Collection
- Resource Type: Text
Description
Company X has developed RealSenseTM technology, a depth sensing camera that provides machines the ability to capture three-dimensional spaces along with motion within these spaces. The goal of RealSense was to give machines human-like senses, such as knowing how far away objects are and perceiving the surrounding environment. The key issue for Company X is how to commercialize RealSense's depth recognition capabilities. This thesis addresses the problem by examining which markets to address and how to monetize this technology. The first part of the analysis identified potential markets for RealSense. This was achieved by evaluating current markets that could benefit from the camera's gesture recognition, 3D scanning, and depth sensing abilities. After identifying seven industries where RealSense could add value, a model of the available, addressable, and obtainable market sizes was developed for each segment. Key competitors and market dynamics were used to estimate the portion of the market that Company X could capture. These models provided a forecast of the discounted gross profits that could be earned over the next five years. These forecasted gross profits, combined with an examination of the competitive landscape and synergistic opportunities, resulted in the selection of the three segments thought to be most profitable to Company X. These segments are smart home, consumer drones, and automotive. The final part of the analysis investigated entrance strategies. Company X's competitive advantages in each space were found by examining the competition, both for the RealSense camera in general and other technologies specific to each industry. Finally, ideas about ways to monetize RealSense were developed by exploring various revenue models and channels.
ContributorsDunn, Nicole (Co-author) / Boudreau, Thomas (Co-author) / Kinzy, Chris (Co-author) / Radigan, Thomas (Co-author) / Simonson, Mark (Thesis director) / Hertzel, Michael (Committee member) / WPC Graduate Programs (Contributor) / Department of Psychology (Contributor) / Department of Finance (Contributor) / School of Accountancy (Contributor) / Department of Economics (Contributor) / School of Mathematical and Statistical Science (Contributor) / W. P. Carey School of Business (Contributor) / Computer Science and Engineering Program (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-05
Description
Scientists, lawyers, and bioethicists have pondered the impact of scientifically deterministic evidence on a judge or jury when deciding the sentence of a criminal. Though the impact may be one that relieves the amount of personal guilt on the part of the criminal, this evidence may also be the very reason that a judge or jury punishes more strongly, suggesting that this type of evidence may be a double-edged sword. 118 participants were shown three films of fictional sentencing hearings. All three films introduced scientifically deterministic evidence, and participants were asked to recommend a prison sentence. Each hearing portrayed a different criminal with different neurological conditions, a different crime, and a different extent of argumentation during closing arguments about the scientifically deterministic evidence. Though the argumentation from the prosecution and the defense did not affect sentencing, the interaction of type of crime and neurological condition did.
ContributorsMeschkow, Alisha Sadie (Author) / Schweitzer, Nicholas (Thesis director) / Robert, Jason (Committee member) / Patten, K. Jakob (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / Department of Psychology (Contributor)
Created2014-05
Description
Substance abuse disorders affect 15.3 million people worldwide. The field has primarily focused on dopaminergic drugs as treatments for substance use disorders. However, recent work has demonstrated the potential of serotonergic compounds to treat substance abuse. Specifically, the serotonin 1B receptor (5-HT1BR), a Gi-coupled receptor located throughout the mesocorticolimbic dopamine system, has been implicated in the incentive motivational and rewarding effects of cocaine. Our research suggests that the stimulation of 5-HT1BRs produces different effects at various time points in the addiction cycle. During maintenance of chronic cocaine administration, 5-HT1BR stimulation has a facilitative effect on the reinforcing properties of cocaine. However 5-HT1BR stimulation exhibits inhibitory effects on reinforcement during prolonged abstinence from cocaine. The aim of this study was to examine the possibility of a switch in the functional role of 5-HT1BRs in the locomotor effects of cocaine at different time points of chronic cocaine administration in mice. We found that the 5-HT1BR agonist CP 94,253 increased locomotor activity in mice tested one day after the last chronic cocaine administration session regardless of whether the chronic treatment was cocaine or saline and regardless of challenge injection (i.e., cocaine or saline). Yet after abstinence, CP 94,253 induced a decrease in locomotor activity in mice challenged with saline and attenuated cocaine-induced locomotion relative to cocaine challenge after vehicle pretreatment. These findings suggest that a switch in the functional role of 5-HT1BR is observed at different stages of the addiction cycle and further suggest that clinical applications of drugs acting on 5-HT1BR should consider these effects.
ContributorsBrunwasser, Samuel Joshua (Author) / Neisewander, Janet (Thesis director) / Pentkowski, Nathan (Committee member) / Der-Ghazarian, Taleen (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry (Contributor) / Department of Psychology (Contributor)
Created2014-05
Description
An introduction to neuroscientific thought aimed at an audience that is not educated in biology. Meant to be readable and easily understood by anyone with a high school education. The first section is completed in its entirety, with outlines for the proposed final sections to be completed over the next few years.
ContributorsNelson, Nicholas Alan (Author) / Olive, M. Foster (Thesis director) / Brewer, Gene (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / Department of Psychology (Contributor) / School of Life Sciences (Contributor) / School of Historical, Philosophical and Religious Studies (Contributor)
Created2014-05
Description
There is preclinical evidence that the detrimental cognitive effects of hormone loss can be ameliorated by estrogen therapy (Bimonte, Acosta, & Talboom, 2010), however, one of the primary concerns with current hormone therapies is that they are nonselective, leading to increased risk of breast and endometrial cancers as well as heart disease. Thus, in order to achieve a successful and clinically relevant long-term hormone therapy option, it is optimal to find an estrogen therapy regimen that is selective to its target tissue. Recently, phytoestrogens have been found to exert selective, beneficial effects on cognition and brain. For example, genistein and diadzein produce neuroprotective effects in cognitive brain regions (Zhao, Chen, & Diaz Brinton, 2002). The purpose of this study was threefold: 1) to examine the cognitive impact of phytoestrogens in young ovariectomized rats, 2) to replicate the dose effects found in the Luine study (Luine et al., 2006), while controlling for manufacturer differences, and 3) to assess if the rodent diet used in our laboratory has an estrogenic-like cognitive impact.The current findings suggest that, at least for object memory, diets containing varying amounts of phytoestrogens can alter cognition, with diets containing high amounts of phytoestrogens showing potential benefits to this type of memory.
ContributorsWhitton, Elizabeth Nicole (Author) / Bimonte-Nelson, Heather (Thesis director) / Presson, Clark (Committee member) / Baxter, Leslie (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / Department of Psychology (Contributor)
Created2013-05
Description
Previous studies have found that the detection of near-threshold stimuli is decreased immediately before movement and throughout movement production. This has been suggested to occur through the use of the internal forward model processing an efferent copy of the motor command and creating a prediction that is used to cancel out the resulting sensory feedback. Currently, there are no published accounts of the perception of tactile signals for motor tasks and contexts related to the lips during both speech planning and production. In this study, we measured the responsiveness of the somatosensory system during speech planning using light electrical stimulation below the lower lip by comparing perception during mixed speaking and silent reading conditions. Participants were asked to judge whether a constant near-threshold electrical stimulation (subject-specific intensity, 85% detected at rest) was present during different time points relative to an initial visual cue. In the speaking condition, participants overtly produced target words shown on a computer monitor. In the reading condition, participants read the same target words silently to themselves without any movement or sound. We found that detection of the stimulus was attenuated during speaking conditions while remaining at a constant level close to the perceptual threshold throughout the silent reading condition. Perceptual modulation was most intense during speech production and showed some attenuation just prior to speech production during the planning period of speech. This demonstrates that there is a significant decrease in the responsiveness of the somatosensory system during speech production as well as milliseconds before speech is even produced which has implications for speech disorders such as stuttering and schizophrenia with pronounced deficits in the somatosensory system.
ContributorsMcguffin, Brianna Jean (Author) / Daliri, Ayoub (Thesis director) / Liss, Julie (Committee member) / Department of Psychology (Contributor) / School of Life Sciences (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2019-05
Description
The aim of this study was to determine whether IUD administration, with and without the presence of Levo, and with and without the presence of the ovaries, impacts cognition in a rat model. Rats received either Sham or Ovariectomy (Ovx) surgery (removal of the ovaries), plus either no IUD, a Blank IUD (without Levo), or a Levo-releasing IUD (Levo IUD), enabling us to evaluate the effects of Ovx and the effects of IUD administration on cognition. Two weeks after surgery, all treatment groups were tested on the water radial arm maze, Morris water maze, and visible platform task to evaluate cognition. At sacrifice, upon investigation of the uteri, it was determined that some of the IUDs were no longer present in animals from these groups: Sham\u2014Blank IUD, Ovx\u2014Blank IUD, and Sham\u2014Levo IUD. Results from the remaining three groups showed that compared to Sham animals with no IUDs, Ovx animals with no IUDs had marginally impaired working memory performance, and that Ovx animals with Levo IUDs as compared to Ovx animals with no IUDs had marginally enhanced memory performance, not specific to a particular memory type. Results also showed that Ovx animals with Levo IUDs had qualitatively more cells in their vaginal smears and increased uterine horn weight compared to Ovx animals with no IUDs, suggesting local stimulation of the Levo IUDs to the uterine horns. Overall, these results provide alternative evidence to the hypothesis that the Levo IUD administers Levo in solely a localized manner, and suggests that the possibility for the Levo IUD to affect reproductive cyclicity in ovary-intact animals is not rejected. The potential for the Levo IUD to exert effects on cognition suggests that either the hormone does in fact systemically circulate, or that the Levo IUD administration affects cognition by altering an as yet undetermined hormonal or other feedback between the uterus and the brain.
ContributorsStrouse, Isabel Martha (Author) / Bimonte-Nelson, Heather (Thesis director) / Glenberg, Arthur (Committee member) / Sirianni, Rachael (Committee member) / Conrad, Cheryl (Committee member) / School of Life Sciences (Contributor) / Department of Psychology (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2018-12
Description
Animal models have led to important discoveries in biomedical research; their utility to psychiatry and comparative neuroscience is less clear. Disorders of higher-order brain function, schizophrenia chief among them, have proven exceptionally elusive to model. Schizophrenia researchers are of two minds about the possibility of modeling the schizophrenia phenotype(s) in laboratory animals: at one and the same time they are both pessimistic and pragmatic. That is, they admit the discouraging difficulty of the task, and yet proceed, apparently undeterred, with putative animal models of schizophrenia, as if the criticisms that yield the pessimistic judgments simply do not matter. In this article, we survey the criticisms and evaluate their merits. We then ask: what would it mean to take seriously the claim that modeling schizophrenia in at least some non-human animals - namely, rodents - is doomed, futile, impossible? How would, and how should, schizophrenia research be undertaken were the current animal models rejected as simply inadequate to the task? Our aim is not to disparage sound research into the etiology, symptomatology, and treatment of schizophrenia, but rather to emphasize the scope of the gap between current and optimal research practices. We conclude with recommendations to reinvigorate the quest to understand, prevent, and treat schizophrenia.
ContributorsWhite, Erik Jordan (Author) / Robert, Jason Scott (Thesis director) / Nate, Johnson (Committee member) / Department of Psychology (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2018-12
Description
This project looks at the impact that the internet has had on society, and how it has shaped the way that digitally native generations live their lives. More specifically, this thesis showcases what it means for younger generations to be digitally native and how engaging with technology while growing up affects the way that these individuals experience contemporary adolescence. Generation X is said to be the last group of people to experience life before the spread of the personal computer and internet access. Newer generations, such as Generation Z, have grown up having constant and easy access to the internet, all of the information it encompasses, and its additional functions. This access has shaped much of the generation as individuals as well as society as a whole. It can be argued that the human experience has been fundamentally different for those born after the creation of the internet and the rapid increase in accessible technology that followed. Through an interview with a participant from Generation X, I will showcase the transformative role that the internet and technology has played in major life events for a digitally native individual compared to that of individuals from older generations. As a member of Generation Z, I will compare my personal narrative regarding ten different life events occurring between the ages of five to 25 that I feel are common and impactful to the narrative a of non-digitally native individual. I expect to see that the internet and the creation of cyber culture that we see through social media has enhanced many of the defining events for younger generations growing up in some positive ways as well as some negative ways. Thus, growing up only knowing the internet and its purposes has altered the way that our experiences play out as we age, for good and for bad.
ContributorsTomchak, Marissa Janine (Author) / Ingram-Waters, Mary (Thesis director) / Brian, Jennifer (Committee member) / Department of Psychology (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor, Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2020-05
Description
Previous research has shown that a loud acoustic stimulus can trigger an individual's prepared movement plan. This movement response is referred to as a startle-evoked movement (SEM). SEM has been observed in the stroke survivor population where results have shown that SEM enhances single joint movements that are usually performed with difficulty. While the presence of SEM in the stroke survivor population advances scientific understanding of movement capabilities following a stroke, published studies using the SEM phenomenon only examined one joint. The ability of SEM to generate multi-jointed movements is understudied and consequently limits SEM as a potential therapy tool. In order to apply SEM as a therapy tool however, the biomechanics of the arm in multi-jointed movement planning and execution must be better understood. Thus, the objective of our study was to evaluate if SEM could elicit multi-joint reaching movements that were accurate in an unrestrained, two-dimensional workspace. Data was collected from ten subjects with no previous neck, arm, or brain injury. Each subject performed a reaching task to five Targets that were equally spaced in a semi-circle to create a two-dimensional workspace. The subject reached to each Target following a sequence of two non-startling acoustic stimuli cues: "Get Ready" and "Go". A loud acoustic stimuli was randomly substituted for the "Go" cue. We hypothesized that SEM is accessible and accurate for unrestricted multi-jointed reaching tasks in a functional workspace and is therefore independent of movement direction. Our results found that SEM is possible in all five Target directions. The probability of evoking SEM and the movement kinematics (i.e. total movement time, linear deviation, average velocity) to each Target are not statistically different. Thus, we conclude that SEM is possible in a functional workspace and is not dependent on where arm stability is maximized. Moreover, coordinated preparation and storage of a multi-jointed movement is indeed possible.
ContributorsOssanna, Meilin Ryan (Author) / Honeycutt, Claire (Thesis director) / Schaefer, Sydney (Committee member) / Harrington Bioengineering Program (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-12